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Calcutta, India

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Sep 8, 1910

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 87, No. 36.

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Calcutta, India

By L. G. MOOKERJEE

L. G. MOOKERJEE
IT is almost two years since we left the United States. During that time we have seen marked evidences of the Lord's soon coming. In February, 1909, I took charge of the Bengali work in Calcutta, where they had been having one meeting on Sabbath on my father's veranda. Immediately we organized a Sabbath-school, and began holding an evening service, and soon had a prayer-meeting started. Within six months we had two baptisms.
In our Sabbath-school we began taking donations, and from February 6 to the end of the year the donations amounted to about nineteen dollars. We thank the Lord that every cent of this went to missions and not for the expenses of our church or school. The first of May we began taking collections at the evening service, and this amounted at the end of the year to thirty-five rupees, besides fifteen rupees given to help a leper brother in east Bengal while he was building his thatched house.
Our tithe last year amounted to 595 rupees. This year we are averaging about sixty rupees a month, so that the tithe pays our three workers. When we started our work in February, 1909, we had not a single worker. Now we have three earnest workers who can give to any one a reason for their hope. They can explain the prophecies of Daniel and the Revelation, and are well informed on all doctrinal points of the message.
At present eight persons desire baptism, but we are waiting until they shall be fully established. Several others are interested, and our cottage meetings are well attended. I am using the stereopticon to good advantage.
The question of support is a great obstacle in the way of many who would otherwise accept the truth. Some simple-hearted Christians intend to take their stand soon, but how will they live? In America a man who accepts the truth may become a canvasser, an evangelist, a teacher, a tent helper, a clerk in an office, a nurse, a doctor, or a Bible worker. But our people here have no way to support themselves and keep the Sabbath. They can not support themselves by selling our half-cent paper, for they can not sell more than twelve copies a day in a city like Calcutta, where such literature has been freely scattered.
We need a medical worker for our Bengali people in Calcutta, and a zenana Bible worker. There are many calls to which I can not respond where a ladyworker could go. This is the time when the cities should be warned. Already the gates are closing against us. O, where are the reapers?