PLAYING AT MISSIONS

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Aug 19, 1880

"PLAYING AT MISSIONS."

SAID Dr. Duff: "We are playing at missions." It is not altogether strange that this strong, almost bitter utterance should have been forced from this great-hearted, eager, self-forgetful servant of God, as he looked on the one hand at the people of God in Christian lands, and on the other hand at the condition of the heathen world. "Playing at missions." There are probably ten millions of people in Christendom, each one of whom has professedly devoted himself to the service of Christ Jesus; each one of whom has said, "I no longer live unto myself; I no longer live, but it is Christ that liveth in me; I am not my own; I am bought with a price;" each one of whom has pledged himself to obey the last command of the Lord, "Go, teach all nations." And yet what do we see? In our own land, certainly in our own denomination throughout this land, but a fraction of the 23,000 churches do ought for the cause at missions; and, in the fraction that do anything, it is all done by but a fraction of the church. It would be safe to say that to withdraw from the Missionary Union the contributions of fifty churches and of a hundred contributors, would be to cripple it fatally.

We profess to have consecrated our all to Christ and his cause. And yet, as we look over a Christian congregation, how often do we see a single Christian lady wearing diamonds that would support a school, a missionary, for a year? How many a professed Christian is spending more on one of his horses than he gives to spread the gospel over all lands? How many a Christian is spending in what is sheer luxury and ostentation an amount that would confer countless blessings on the heathen world? Surely we are "playing at missions."

The women of Carthage were not playing at warfare, when they cut off their hair to make bow-strings for the defenders of the city. The people of Holland were not playing, when they broke down the dykes and let in the sea over the fields and orchards that they might drown out the Spaniards. The German women were not playing at patriotism, when they gave their gold ornaments to the government for the expenses of the war against Napoleon, and wore, instead, ornaments of iron. The Moravian missionary was not playing at missions, when he consented to be sold as a slave that he might be admitted to the West Indies, and might preach to the negroes. But we, are we not playing?

And when we look at the work to be done, the hundreds of millions to be enlightened, and at the scale of our preparations, we are compelled to realize bitterly that we are "playing at missions." Is it not time that we ceased playing, and began to be in earnest?—National Baptist.