Success Story

The biggest Easter turnout of any U.S. Protestant parish flocked more than 7,000 strong to eight Easter services at the North Austin Lutheran Church on Chicago's West Side.

Better than words the attendance told a success story as suggestive as any in this generation's church history: the success story of a mission chapel that grew almost overnight to be the largest Lutheran church in the country; the success story of an ex-Ford-salesman whom everyone came to like and admire as truly a "man of God."

There were four other churches within two miles when Frederick William Otterbein went to North Austin as a seminary student to round up a congregation for the $13,000 bungalow chapel the synod had built on the outskirts. That was in 1920, and in September he had rounded up 51 members. Today the church has 5,577 on its rolls, the free-will offerings have passed $68,000 a year, mission contributions for 1941 will run close to $25,000, the plant is worth $300,000, the debt has been cut to $30,000, and every Sunday three services are needed to get the congregation into the big brick and stone church built in 1925. There is no such thing as a membership committee, but every year 300 to 600 new members are received.

Pastor Otterbein credits this success largely to making the church "a place of worship, not a club with religion for an excuse." More than 72% of the congregation use the Lutherans' often-neglected Family Altar Service in their homes every day. The same personal and spiritual touch is preserved in the services in church, where the sermon is always a message from the Bible, never a topical discussion.

Perhaps more important to the success of the church is the good-neighbor policy Dr. Otterbein has fostered from the beginning. As neat brick bungalows mushroomed up in North Austin, he and his flock kept up steady personal evangelism on their own blocks. Their slogan was, "When you see a moving van, spend a nickel," referring to their pastor's request that any member who saw a moving van in his neighborhood call Dr. Otterbein so that he could go right over.

Dr. Otterbein believes a church should make its good-neighbor policy practical as well as friendly, so all through Depression his parish took care of every member family which would otherwise have had to go on relief. To prevent embarrassment, he was go-between for gifts from the better-off members, distributed them where needed, established a successful employment agency on the side.

Like the National Christian Mission (TIME, April 14), Dr. Otterbein went after the unchurched. He got them by-1) tireless pastoral work, 2) worship, not revivals, 3) never pressing membership on any of the thousands he invited to attend a service. Says ex-Salesman Otterbein: "When a man is ready to join the church, he will make the move himself. Sure you can push a man into joining, but when you do, that is the last time you will see him." His congregation, which includes 19 nationalities, also has a high percentage of onetime lapsed members of other denominations, including 400 ex-Catholics.

When Dr. Otterbein and his congregation of 51 drew up their plans for organization, they agreed that the church would be run entirely on the basis of a free-will offering. No sales, bazaars, tickets for entertainments, would be sold. The parish has adhered to this rule 100% ever since. They do occasionally have church suppers for "fellowship," but there is no price of admission.

Dr. Otterbein never says "I" in telling of his work. He always says "we." Through the years he has made his members feel that the church is theirs and it is up to them to make sure their neighbors are welcome. "We simply started them thinking," he says. "They did the rest." That he has lost none of this power to get his friends to bring their friends he proved again at Tucson last fall when the local pastor doubted whether anyone would come to a Thanksgiving service. Dr. Otterbein telephoned a few key people, and the church was filled to overflowing.

One member of North Austin Lutheran Church who could not attend the Easter services was Pastor Otterbein himself. He had a stroke in February 1940, is still unable to resume his work. His one object in life is to return, and doctors say some day he can. Only parish activity they now allow him is two pastoral visits a week. A sick man, he makes these to the sick because he can share their suffering. But though he has not conducted a service there for over a year, North Austin Lutheran's attendance has continued to grow under a succession of supply preachers and the Rev. William Carl Satre's acting pastorate since November. And from his comfortable brick bungalow Pastor Otterbein can look across to the church, watch the crowds which line up for half a block waiting to get into the services, and realize he built not just a personal following but a church.

Perhaps he also knows that in a city where revivalism signally failed this winter his work is cited more and more frequently to show how a local church can meet the challenge of "reaching the unreached" and making a religion a living thing throughout its community.

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