This Lutheran apostle to North Carolina saw twenty congregations established on the "most distant border of the civilized world" during the American Revolution and Independence (1773-1794). He was baptized on the day of his birth, July 12, 1739, by the Catholic Church in Munster, Westphalia; was converted to the Lutheran faith from the Franciscan Order; was instructed in Lutheran theology at the University of Göttingen, and chosen by the Consistory of Hanover to answer the call from North Carolina. He supported the Patriots; though tortured by the Tories, stayed in North Carolina to proclaim the Word of God. He saw many members of St. John's Lutheran Church in Cabarrus County serve in the American Army. After Independence, he enlisted help from the Helmstedt Missionary Society for the North Carolina Mission; lived to see five other Lutheran clergymen labor in the Piedmont; sponsored a school for every congregation; was appointed a trustee in 1785 by the General Assembly of North Carolina to establish an academy in Salisbury. With Christlike fortitude he showed the pioneers how to live and how to die.