A Plan to Double the Number of Our Workers in Mission Fields
By A. G. DANIELLS
DURING the past winter all the union conferences in the United States have adopted a series of resolutions outlining a well-defined plan for greatly increasing our contributions to foreign missions. These resolutions were printed in full in last week’s REVIEW. The two main resolutions of the series are these:— 1. That we undertake to raise for foreign mission work an amount equal to ten cents a week per capita for our church-membership. 2. That we urge each conference in this union to make a most earnest effort to secure the payment of a full tithe in every church. If these two reasonable resolutions are carried into effect by all our churches in the United States, there will be a great increase in our gifts and appropriations to missions. It may be well to state the exact sources from which we receive our funds for the support and enlargement of our work in mission fields. They are as follows: The regular tithe from union conferences; the Christmas, midsummer, and personal offerings; the portion of the Sabbath-school contributions passed on by each school; and the surplus tithes appropriated by union and local conferences. It is now proposed that an effort be made to raise in contributions for missions a sum in each conference equal to ten cents a week for each church-member. And it is agreed that the Christmas, midsummer, and Sabbath-school offerings sent in by each church shall be applied on the amount to be thus raised. That means that if the Christmas, midsummer, and Sabbath-school contributions devoted to missions, in a church of twenty members, all amount to fifty-two dollars for the year, the members of that church will have only fifty-two dollars more to raise by personal gifts to make a sum equal to ten cents a week for each member. Now, brethren and sisters, let me ask if you think this is an unreasonable undertaking? Do you think it is possible and reasonable for our people in the United States to give a sum equal to ten cents a week, or five dollars and twenty cents a year for each member, to proclaim the third angel’s message to all the world in this generation? If we can not do this, how are we going to finish our work in our day? The conference officers, ministers, and delegates who attended all our union conferences during the past winter believe that this amount can and should be raised. They believed, too, that our people generally would believe it and gladly do it. And believing this they pledged to undertake the task of raising in each conference for missions a sum equal to7ten cents a week for each church-member. We now have about seventy thousand members. Ten cents a week for each member will mean seven thousand dollars every week. That will be just a thousand dollars a day, and the splendid total of three hundred sixty-five thousand dollars for the year. That will more than double our present contributions to missions, and that means that we shall more than double our forces in mission fields. How this announcement will cheer the hearts of our missionaries! They are few and hard pressed in the great lands to which we have sent them. They are all overworked in their efforts to help and save the teeming millions around them. Their ranks must be strengthened. It is time to bring on the reserves, for we are surely approaching the final struggle. Brethren and sisters, more must be done to hasten this work. We know of no more practical and effective way than to increase our gifts that we may enlarge our operations. True, we must pray and rely upon the operations of the Holy Spirit. This we must surely do, but with our prayers and our reliance on divine power we must give of our means. This is our Lord’s appointed way. We feel sure that our people everywhere will welcome this plan for increasing our gifts to missions. We believe they will be glad to count it their own plan. How I wish that each church could study, discuss, and adopt these resolutions as the conferences have during the past winter. It would surely do every member good, and it would create a new burden for our missionary enterprises. This must be one of our campaigns until this plan is materialized. Each conference is to appoint some one to give this work special attention. These persons are to write articles, give addresses, and correspond with the churches in behalf of this movement. Then, too, each church is to appoint some one of its members to distribute and collect the missionary envelopes, and do everything reasonable and necessary to help the church raise an amount equal to ten cents a week for all its members. No better use can be made of money in this world than devoting it to soul-saving work. We earnestly appeal to our church officers to take hold of this effort with all their hearts. Remember that the one thing that stands between us to-day and the end of the world is the finishing of the work. God has given us this work to do in this generation. This campaign for funds is to hasten the finishing of this work and so hasten the coming of the day of God.