He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1807, studied theology with Justus Henry Christian Helmuth, John Frederick Schmidt,[2] and his father, and was ordained by the Pennsylvania Ministerium in 1812, though he had received his license to preach in 1808.
[1] In 1808 he became pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran congregation at Frederick, Maryland, where he remained for the rest of his life.
A ministerial challenge in his times was the development of English-language worship as an alternative to the hitherto exclusive use of the German language.
Besides a large number of doctrinal and other articles in the Lutheran Intelligencer, he published various addresses and sermons.
Illness and the death of his wife were difficulties of his later years, as was the Maryland Synod, which sanctioned him for intemperance.