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The “Signs” Does Bring People Into the Truth

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Sep 16, 1915

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 92, No. 46.

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The “Signs” Does Bring People Into the Truth

By E. M. GRAHAM

“A BROTHER who was selling ‘Great Controversy’ stopped at my place last spring. As we are in poor circumstances, we did not feel that we could buy the book, but he ordered the Signs of the Times for us. Now, he did just what was necessary to put us on the way of truth. We found in the columns of the Signs that the seventh day is the only day sanctified and blessed and commanded to be kept.”
“A brother writes that one family to whom he has been sending the Signs has begun to keep the Sabbath. This is one of three missionary subscriptions he has been sending, and he feels much encouraged.”
“Last fall, at the close of a tent effort, I solicited subscriptions, and in a very short time took seventeen six months’ subscriptions at Holyoke, Colo., and have had the pleasure of hearing that some of the readers are now living the truth.”
“At the Weston (Oregon) camp meeting recently held, a minister arose in one of the meetings, and said that he had been called over to the coast to a small place to baptize some people, and when he got there he found that an old lady had been using five copies of the Signs and had won five souls to the truth. Then she kept on working with her Signs, and now she has five more ready.”
If every Seventh-day Adventist had used two Signs a week in missionary work, I wonder how many more souls might have been saved. The experiences given are only a very few of those that might be related. The Lord very evidently does use the Signs to bring people to a knowledge of the truth, but his power to do this depends upon the co-operation of his people in circulating the paper. He does his part, but he needs people to be laborers together with him to do the part he has given into the hands of human beings.
At the end of September many subscriptions for the Signs weekly will expire, so now is the time to renew them. Have your papers brought souls to the truth? Then I am sure you will want to continue your work to get other souls. Have you heard of no definite results from your past six months’ work with the Signs? Then I am sure you will want to go on for another six months and try again for definite results. The message is, “Hasten, hasten, hasten. Press the battle to the gates.” Therefore every effort that has been begun should be pressed forward until the work is done.
Not only should subscriptions be renewed, but thousands of new subscriptions should go in. Only a very few of the members in the North American Division are using this paper in soul-winning efforts. At the end of June, 1915, we had 75,436 church members, and they were taking 20,000 weekly Signs. As a number of people take several copies, it is evident that considerably less than one fourth of our members are laborers together with God in the circulation of this paper. Are there not many others who have not realized that their backwardness in distributing this paper is hampering the Lord in his efforts to reach souls, who will now send in their subscriptions for this soul-winning agency? It is a great privilege to labor with God for souls, and soon it will be too late to share in this blessed work.
E. M. GRAHAM.