Teaching Missions by William Ambrose Spicer

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D.C. · Jun 2, 1904

Teaching Missions

By William Ambrose Spicer

I AM sure there can not be a station on our missionary map in which the workers do not gather added courage from the knowledge that there is a growing army of teachers in the homelands who are teaching the missionary idea.

It is not alone that our missionaries look to the training-schools to send recruits into the fields. It is well understood that wherever a church-school is gathering the children into the fold, there is bound to be also a center of glowing interest in missions. It means a study of the fields day by day, and of the work to be done in them. That is sure to mean prayer for missions, and an earnest zeal among the children, which must stimulate the practical missionary interest in any church.

We have good reason to remember the teacher as in the very front rank of the missionary forces. And it is indeed a privilege that the teacher has. Most of us can only talk missions as we pass along. The teacher can teach missions. It is a grand subject, and the school program touches it at every turn. Our one aim in all study is to learn how best to help on this message until the cry rings out in every land, and the work is done.

With our work spreading out at many points in every continent, the whole world has a very special and personal interest for us to-day. The study of geography is to us a study of our own mission fields, the world that God loves, and that we, too, must learn verily to love. Few of us can have passed our school days without bearing away a memory of geography as one of the most interesting studies. I could never forget how real and tangible a place every corner of this earth became to some of us as children in the geography classes taught by Sister E. H. Morton. We studied a real and living world. Our missionary extension of late years has made the study a more fascinating one than ever it could have been years ago. Now it is all a study of peoples for whom our missionaries are actually working, and for whom we, too, may carry a very practical and helpful burden. How can a geography class help loving the world to-day? Nothing would seem more natural now, after some specially practical study of a field, than to close the geography recitation for the day with prayer for that country just studied and our workers' work in it.

As a missionary map for the class room, I like best of all the regular school maps. The map houses bring out cheap and good maps with the latest markings and colorings. Even the large missionary maps do not indicate national and political divisions and other details which are needed to show the world as it really is. A good map is a picture of the world that God loves, and that we must work for and pray for. By watching the reports in the papers, any teacher can readily keep in touch with the current progress in the fields.

As soon as the mission department can get to it, we shall have a pamphlet for our teachers, giving in brief outline a sketch of our missionary work abroad, the date of opening stations, the places entered, the workers engaged, etc. Such an outline requires bringing down to date now and then; but we know our teachers need at least a summary of our mission story to the present time, and the General Conference office means to arrange such a help.

A series of mission hand-books has just been issued that will surely be a boon to any teacher desiring to study the great mission fields. These hand-books tell the stirring story of the pioneer work, and sketch the general progress of the various societies since. They give information as to the physical geography of the countries, and the languages, customs, and religions of the peoples. The price is but nominal for works so complete. Here is a list of some of these books:—

“Africa Waiting;” the Problem of Africa’s Evangelization, 148 pages, 35 cents.

“Protestant Missions in South America,” 280 pages, 35 cents.

“Dawn on the Hills of T’ang;” or Missions in China, 181 pages, 35 cents.

“Japan and Its Regeneration,” 137 pages, 35 cents.

“The Cross in the Land of the Trident” (India), 108 pages, 25 cents.

“Modern Apostles in Missionary Byways”—lives of pioneer missionaries, 108 pages, 25 cents.

These are issued by the Student Volunteer Movement, 3 West Twenty-ninth St., New York. They give no discounts, as the price is put low in order to encourage teachers and leaders of mission bands to use the books. With such helps, and with the reports from our own missionaries appearing in our papers, the teacher may make the study of the great mission fields a joy and a delight indeed. And our workers on the frontier lines will be encouraged to press deeper and ever deeper into the regions still beyond, knowing that there is a growing army of believers, old and young, at home, studying the fields and their needs, ready to send re-enforcements, and to back up advance moves with means and intelligent prayer for missions. W. A. Spicer.