Lake Union Conference Items
By J. B. Blosser
THE present year bids fair to be one of the most encouraging for the canvassing work that this field has experienced for many years. Our force during January and February was double the usual number, and many of those who worked had better success than they had before the holidays. Thus far the attendance at institutes has doubled previous years; East Michigan led out with eight, Indiana about the same. In Ohio the interest from last year has spread, and about forty attended their institute. Wisconsin has bestirred itself as never before, and held a six weeks’ canvassers’ school with an attendance of over twenty, and an institute of two weeks with some additional ones, besides several Scandinavians who have been in training by Elder Christian at Milwaukee. I have just closed a very profitable institute in the North Michigan Conference, where twelve promising young people were prepared to engage in the work. I am now on my way to West Michigan, where we expect to hold an institute in connection with Cedar Lake Academy, and I am informed that a number will enter the work. A plan has been arranged by which young people can readily earn a year’s scholarship in Emmanuel Missionary College by selling one hundred and fifty dollars’ worth of subscription books, turning the whole amount into the tract society, which will arrange with the college for the scholarship. All the conferences in the Emmanuel Missionary College district have adopted this plan, with the possible exception of Indiana; also some of the academies have similar arrangements. This plan has met a hearty response, and I hear of a goodly number who are entering into it heartily. We feel sure that this will give these young people an experience that will be a blessing to them, and will bring into our schools a spirit that will inspire others to enter this work. It is a noticeable fact that this work will always revive and succeed in any field where it is taken hold of by faith and conducted according to methods that have proved a success elsewhere. It has been arranged by the union conference to hold a bookmen’s convention just prior to the union conference meeting in May. We expect that all our conference presidents, missionary secretaries, field secretaries, and others will be in attendance, and contribute to make the meeting a help in establishing and maintaining right methods in this work. This union should be a great recruiting ground for all parts of the world, and it will be if the work is taken hold of as it should be. The material is here; it only needs development.
J. B. BLOSSER.