SINCE the close of school I have been out in the bush doing village work, and am off again tomorrow evening for a week in the Lusakas district, to look at two sites Brother Anderson found.
WORKERS AND BELIEVERS CONNECTED WITH THE TENT EFFORT AT NAGOYA, JAPAN
There is a fine chance in that district to open up work. The natives are anxious for a school, and the government is willing to sell us a piece of land. The natives of this district seem to be brighter than many of the other tribes in this part of the country. We had some of these Batama boys in our school last year.
A few weeks ago, when I was working among the Machikilombwe people, I was impressed with the wonderful change that the grace of God makes in the lives of these people. One of our brightest boys was home in his village for a little vacation. I found him at Maninga, and he went with me to hold services in the many native villages along the river about two miles from his kraal. I held a service in his kraal, but his father and mother were not there. We found them later in a small village where a number of people were having an orgy of beer drinking.
The father was nearly naked, his coarse black hair hung in strings, and his principal comfort was his long-stemmed pipe. The mother wore her letchwe skin, and was decorated about the same as all native women. I could not help thinking of the question the people asked concerning Christ, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” How, I asked myself, could this boy, who is a Christian worker and as bright and intelligent a boy as I have seen since I have been in Africa, come out of such a home and such a village, and from among such people? Surely the gospel has power to change the heart and life when we allow it to have its free course in us.
The work is progressing here, and we hope that soon we can push out still farther with the light of truth. Brother Wilson is going up with me, and will bring down some of these Batama boys for the next school year.
All the white workers are well at present, and we have much to be thankful for. The war seems to go on, and some of the natives and some of the white men have left the district to engage in it; but so far we can go about unmolested, proclaiming the truths for this time. The truth is so simple that the dullest native can understand it if he wills to do so.
