Hawaiian Islands by Mabel Marvin Mc Keague

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jun 24, 1915

Hawaiian Islands

By Mabel Marvin Mc Keague

MABEL MARVIN MC KEAGUE

I HAVE read in the columns of the REVIEW of missionary launches and boats of various descriptions, of ox teams and burros, but I have failed to see an account of a missionary motorcycle. So I will tell you something of the work which ours helps us to accomplish.

In Honolulu the motorcycle did good duty in carrying the message from place to place, for more than a year; and in coming to Hawaii, the largest island of the group, where the population is scattered over a large area of cane field and forest, we found it even more necessary. When we arrived, last September, we found families out in the Olaa district ready for Bible readings, and had to plan how we could best meet these scattered appointments and also carry on our city work. A short railroad runs from Hilo to some of these plantations, but we find it very impracticable for our use, as it runs but one train a day, and the rates are high. So every Sunday (unless it should be raining fourteen inches in so many hours, as it is doing while I write) my husband goes to the country, and with the aid of the motorcycle three or four readings can be held, from nine to sixteen miles out, in one day.

Yesterday I made the trip with him, which I do whenever it is possible. We load ourselves with books and papers, and perhaps some food or clothing for the poor families which we visit. A few miles from town the road takes us through a beautiful tropical forest, and then out into the wide expanse of sugar-cane fields.

Our first stop is at a humble home in Keaau, where we are sure of a hearty welcome. Mrs. Henry and six children have been studying the truth for several months, and are keeping the Sabbath. While Mr. Henry finds it a greater struggle to surrender all, still he is convinced, and eager to study with us. While my husband holds a Bible reading with the parents and neighbors whom they call in, I teach the children and their little friends many new songs, verses, and the doctrinal truths in a simple way. Every head is bowed, eyes are closed, hands folded, and it is perfectly quiet while we pray, and all join in the Lord’s Prayer. They can repeat the ten commandments, the quarter’s memory verses, and several songs very readily, and drink in the truth, as well as the older ones.

But the best part of it is that this is a family of real missionaries. The children gather in a half dozen of their little playmates for their Sabbath school, which is conducted by their mother each week. Mrs. Henry keeps our good papers in circulation all the time, and many are becoming interested. She talks the message to her neighbors, and quite recently when her brother tried to convince her of the truth of Mormonism, she “reasoned with him from the Scriptures” all night. One other encouraging feature is that she calls all the family together for morning and evening worship. She has the new “Bible Readings” and the Signs, and is letting her light shine.

And how, you ask, did you gain an entrance into this home? Martin and Nicholas Nielsen, who for years have been the only representatives of this message on this island, live in that district, and walk for many miles selling literature in the languages of the plantation laborers, as well as selling English reading matter. One day they sold a Signs to the Keaau storekeeper, and as he did not care for it he gave it to Mrs.

Henry. The seed fell on good ground, and she has accepted the light for which she had been searching.

Four miles farther up this volcano road we enter the home of one of our Norwegian sisters, who recently married a Hawaiian. Their house is a poor one, and their food is very simple. She readily responded to encouragement, and now she and her husband are keeping the Sabbath. Some of the neighbors come in to the studies, and we are trying to lift them from the life they now lead to walk in the light of the third angel’s message.

Sixteen miles farther on we are sure of a hearty welcome in the neat little home of an aged couple from the New England States, who became interested through reading the literature which their daughter-in-law, Mrs. Henry, lent them. They also call in their friends, and we expect the station agent and the postmistress of that town to become regular readers with us.

We have just begun Bible readings with the school-teachers. Judging from the flowers, bananas, and good wishes which we carry home with us, we consider the day well spent; and although the road is often rough, and we get caught in the rain, and are lame for several days, it pays, and the Lord has blessed and protected us.

More calls are coming in, but other days are filled with our city work. There are Bible readings to give, prayer meeting and Sabbath meetings, the jail meeting, treatments, and from one hundred and seventy-five to two hundred papers to sell each month. There are only six members in our Hilo Sabbath school, but our donations for the quarter ending March 27 were $22.90, and the tithe for the same period was $70. A church collection is also taken. We have just organized four home departments, with a membership of twelve.

Our treatment room has never failed to keep up with its running expenses and the buying of new supplies, and for several months we have been able to turn a surplus into the mission treasury. Every patient receives and reads our truth-filled literature. We believe the treatment room is a mighty factor in carrying the message for these last days.

With the literature that our members here mail and sell, together with the work already mentioned, we feel sure the Lord will prepare a people from this island to meet him in his soon-coming kingdom. How we wish we had literature for the Hawaiians, for we do see gratifying results in proclaiming the truth to them in their own language. We believe that a large company would be obeying God’s commandments where now there are so few, had our missionaries studied the language and worked for the native as well as for the white man in these islands. May the Lord give us strength to warn those who remain.

Pray for the workers on this island and for more laborers to carry the message here.

Hilo. Hawaii.