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It is extremely hard to arrive at definite figures on the number of members forming the parish during the earliest years. The oldest report discovered in all the Sterling and Whiteside County histories, old Sterling newspapers and early publications of The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod we have consulted is found in the "History of Whiteside County, Illinois, Bent. Wilson, Edition 1875," which offers the following report: "This church forms the German branch of the Lutheran Church in Sterling, and was organized in 1874 (?) with only six members. The roll has been steadily increasing until it now reaches over forty. Services are held every Sabbath at the Bethlehem Lutheran Church. Rev. F. Lusskey has charge of the church in connection with one at Round Grove." Since both the date of organization, as reported here, and the spelling of the Pastor's name are in error, we cannot be too sure of the figures used here either. But this is obviously a reference to our church. When this was brought to the founding Pastor's attention he commented: "This history is probably referring to the first services I held in Sterling. The 'six members' probably means the six main persons there." The first official Synodical report available merely indicates that Pastor Lussky had "two churches, 71 communicants." The Sterling-Hopkins statistics remain combined through 1882. If we count the different persons who were guests at the Lord's Supper in Sterling, we arrive at a communicant membership of 45 in 1875. By the same method we discover that the membership remained below 55 for the first eight years. But even this method of calculating the communicant membership isn't too reliable because so many communed locally a time or two, and then moved on to other parts of the middle west. The first official report for this congregation only was offered in 1883. At that time the communicant membership stood at 37. It is also evident that the founding fathers of this Parish did not esteem the Holy Communion as they should have. No doubt this may be explained by the fact that carelessness about communion attendance was characteristic of the Lutheran church in Germany at that time and most of the members, as Pastor Lussky put it, "had not been in America very long." Only one member went to the Lord's Supper every time it was celebrated from 1876 through 1881 and that was Seb. Ockenfels. Pastor Lussky remembered him too, for he wrote in 1940: "I can recall confirming a Mr. Ockenfels, a German Catholic, in our church." This man may well have been the first adult confirmand. |
