Your ShelfYour Projects

Home Missionary Department

5%

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Aug 24, 1916

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 93, No. 42.

Read the full edition

Home Missionary Department

By A. T. Robinson

D. M. GRAHAM — General Secretary
F. W. PAAP — N. Am. Div. Secretary

To Every Man His Work

“To every man his work,” was the parting commission of Christ to his followers to whom he spoke, and through them to his followers in all the days then to come. This divine commission is explained through the Spirit of prophecy to mean, “not work in his fields of corn and wheat, but earnest, persevering work for the salvation of souls.”—“Testimonies for the Church,” Vol. V, p. 381.
The call of the hour is for an entirely new movement on the part of this people. The Seventh-day Adventist Church today stands on the very threshold of “a great reformatory movement among God’s people.” This new movement “among God’s people,” with its blessed experiences and results, is thus presented in a graphic word-picture:—
“In visions of the night, representations passed before me of a great reformatory movement among God’s people. Many were praising God. The sick were healed, and other miracles were wrought. A spirit of intercession was seen, even as was manifested before the great day of Pentecost. Hundreds and thousands were seen visiting families, and opening before them the Word of God. Hearts were convicted by the power of the Holy Spirit, and a spirit of genuine conversion was manifest. On every side doors were thrown open to the proclamation of the truth. The world seemed to be lightened with the heavenly influence. Great blessings were received by the true and humble people of God. I heard voices of thanksgiving and praise, and there seemed to be a reformation such as we witnessed in 1844.”—Id., Vol. IX, p. 126.
Every one who has a genuine faith in this movement as the fulfilment of the description presented in Rev. 14:6-16, believes in his heart that in the nine volumes of the “Testimonies for the Church,” the Lord has given instruction, reproof, and warning for the special benefit of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. I have recently gone through the entire set, selecting pointed statements showing that this movement will never, can never, “be finished until the men and women comprising our church membership rally to the work, and unite their efforts with those of ministers and church officers.”
I have prepared a special study on home missionary work, in the form of questions, with direct and pointed answers from the Bible and the Testimonies. This study has been given in some of our churches in Colorado, and has been witnessed to by the presence and power of the Holy Spirit in a marked manner. We have seen a response on the part of hundreds of our people, in a renewed consecration to do definite personal work for the salvation of souls. There is not space in this department of the REVIEW to give even an outline of this study, but I should like to give a few of the statements that have deeply impressed many hearts as they have been read.
“The church of Christ on earth was organized for missionary purposes, and the Lord desires to see the entire church devising ways and means whereby high and low, rich and poor, may hear the message of truth.”—Id., Vol. VI, p. 29.
“Satan is now seeking to hold God’s people in a state of inactivity, to keep them from acting their part in spreading the truth, that they may at last be weighed in the balance and found wanting.”—Id., Vol. I, p. 260.
“We are not doing a twentieth part of what we might do if we were awake.”—Id., Vol. III, p. 407.
“As a people we are almost paralyzed. We are not doing one twentieth part of the good we might, because selfishness prevails to a large extent among us.”—Id., Vol. IV, p. 426.
“I was shown that the blood of souls will be on the garments of very many who now feel at ease and irresponsible for souls that are perishing around them for want of light and knowledge.”—Id., p. 392.
“Had the believers in the truth purified their minds by obeying it, . . . where one soul has been saved there might have been twenty.”—Id., p. 68.
“When God’s people are truly converted, when they realize the obligation resting on them to labor for those within their reach, when they leave no means untried to rescue sinners from the power of the enemy, the reproach will be removed from our churches.”—Id., Vol. VII, p. 11.
“It becomes the people of God to humble their hearts before him, and in the deepest humiliation to pray the Lord to pardon our apathy and selfish indulgence, and to blot out the shameful record of duties neglected and privileges unimproved.”—Id., Vol. III, p. 408.
“The work which the church has failed to do in a time of peace and prosperity, she will have to do in a terrible crisis, under most discouraging, forbidding circumstances. The warnings that worldly conformity has silenced or withheld, must be given under the fiercest opposition from enemies of the faith.”—Id., Vol. V, p. 463.
It is as plain and clear as noonday that this work is never to be finished without a great revival of missionary activity on the part of the individual members of the churches. The one thing lacking to bring this about is strong, consecrated, courageous leadership. May our great invisible Leader raise up men whose souls are on fire, to lead forward this great army of willing soldiers (Ps. 110: 3, R. V.) in a new forward movement that shall end in the long-talked-of and soon-to-be-realized finishing of the third angel’s message. A. T. ROBINSON.