Among the Sioux: A Story of the Twin Cities and the Two DakotasCreswell, R. J. (Robert J.)
History
Among the Sioux: A Story of the Twin Cities and the Two Dakotas
Creswell, R. J. (Robert J.)
Dakota Indians -- Missions; Missionaries -- Great Plains -- Biography
"I was many days travel away in the wilderness. My child was very sick.
I felt much troubled. A man of God came to my tent. I remember all he
said. He told me not to be troubled, but to trust in God, and all would
be well. He prayed; he asked God to strengthen the child so I could
bring him home. God heard him. My child lived to get home. Once my
heart would have been very sad, and I would have done something very
wicked. I look forward and trust Jesus."
This is how Rev. Artemas Ehnamane spent his vacations, hunting for wild
souls instead of wild deer.
He was a scriptural, personal and powerful preacher.
Faith in a risen Saviour, was the keynote of his ministry. As he said:
"Who of all the Saviours of the Indian people has risen from the dead?
Not one." "Our fathers told us many things and gave us many customs,
but they were not true." "I grew up believing in what my father taught
me, but when I knew of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, I believed in Him
and put aside all my ways." It was to him in truth, the coming out of
darkness into light. "Sins are like wolves," he said. "They abound in
the darkness and destroy men. When we enter the way, Jesus watches over
us. Be awake and follow Him. All over the world men are beginning to
follow Christ. The day is here." "Repent, believe, obey."
He loved to sing:
"Saved, by grace, alone;
That is all my plea;
Jesus died for all mankind;
Jesus died for me."
The twenty grand-children of the old Sioux--all of school age--are
diligently prosecuting their studies in order to be prepared to meet
the changed conditions which civilization has made possible for the
Indians. One of his grand-sons is a physician now, in a fair practice
among his own people.
This man President Lincoln wisely pardoned, knowing full well what a
great influence for good such a man could wield over his turbulent
people. And the President was not disappointed. One of his sons has
been a missionary among the Swift Bear tribe at the Rose Bud Agency for
twenty years; another son has been a missionary at Standing Rock, on
the Grand River, and is now pastor of an Indian congregation on Basile
Creek, Nebraska, and is also an important leader of his tribe. The Rev.
Francis Frazier, one of his sons, was installed September 10, 1902, as
his father's successor in the pastorate of Pilgrim church at Santee.
His married daughter is also very earnest in the woman's work in the
church. Seventy-seven years of age at his death, Rev. Artemas Ehnamane
had filled to overflowing with good deeds to offset the first half,
when he fought against the encroachments of the whites and the advance
of civilization with as much zeal as later he evinced in his religious
and beneficent life. Abraham Lincoln pardoned Ehnamane and the old
warrior never forgot it. But it was another pardon he prized more
highly than that. It was this pardon he preached and died believing.
VI
TWO FAMOUS MISSIONS.
_Lake Harriet and Prairieville_
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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