Newspaper Publicity Growing by W. L. Burgan

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Oct 14, 1915

Newspaper Publicity Growing

By W. L. Burgan

ENCOURAGING letters are still being received from both ministers and lay members who are continuing to cooperate in the rapidly growing campaign of giving the message through the newspapers. Workers in various large cities are securing excellent space for their reports, and those in smaller places are also doing well.

Now that the camp meeting season is over for this year, it can be stated that this has been an excellent season so far as newspaper publicity is concerned. Our local conference presidents showed their appreciation of this feature of the movement by appointing certain workers to look after the reporting, with the result that the newspapers gladly published the contributions, the truth was heralded far and wide, and many were attracted to the evening meetings not only from the cities where the camp was held, but also from the surrounding country. Our local conference officials were pleased over the liberality of the editors, and also over the way in which the truth was given publicity. Souls surely will be saved in the kingdom who were attracted to the truth through newspaper reports during the past summer.

One of our brethren, eighty-two years old, who has been unable to walk even with crutches for the past three years, has been making good use of the newspapers in his locality for the spread of the message. Recently he wrote an article about a column and a half in length, on the Sabbath question, in answer to an article he read in the same paper by one who would make void the law of God. Our brother, helpless as he is, did good missionary work by having his article circulated in more than nine thousand copies of the paper in which it appeared. There are, no doubt, others who could take advantage of numerous opportunities to present phases of the message through newspaper work, which certainly is a very important line of missionary endeavor.

One of the workers in Wisconsin has been meeting with success in his newspaper efforts, and has the following encouraging words to say: “With the two daily papers we are reaching hundreds of homes. I am doing my own reporting, giving my sermons to the editor before I preach them. One comes out in the morning, and the other in the afternoon.” This brother says he will continue to use the newspapers in the proclamation of the message even more than he has done in the past.

One of our brethren in Minnesota tells of the success he and another worker have had in getting articles published in connection with their tent effort, as follows: “Although our efforts have been confined to a weekly paper,—there being no dailies here,—we see good results. Each week we have written up extracts of our sermons, and every article has appeared in full each week. Our attendance has been from three hundred to six hundred all summer, and thus far thirty-three have been baptized. We believe that the publication of our sermons has done much toward drawing the crowd to the tent.”

What has been accomplished through the tent season can also be done in the fall and winter, when the meetings are held in the churches and halls. Thousands of persons who have read the explanations of the prophecies, especially concerning the drying up of the Turkish Empire, are watching the developments of the war in the Near East, principally for the fulfillment of these prophecies. There never was a greater opportunity for our workers to continue to herald the message through the newspapers than now. As the situation in Turkey becomes more ominous, our preachers should continue to give the papers reports, and thus keep these questions before the minds of the readers. The editors will gladly publish our views, especially as they see the prophecies fulfilling before their very eyes. This is the golden opportunity to give the message through the secular press.

W. L. BURGAN.