Seventh-day Adventists and Medical Education by Newton Evans, M. D.; Percy T. Magan, M. D.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Aug 31, 1916

Seventh-day Adventists and Medical Education

By Newton Evans, M. D.; Percy T. Magan, M. D.

SCATTERED throughout the writings of the Spirit of prophecy are a number of statements to the effect that medical missionaries will fill a large and important place in the closing work of mercy which God is carrying on in the earth. The idea is there set forth that this class of laborers will be permitted to carry on their work long after all others have been compelled to cease their efforts.

The colossal upheaval of the human race which at the present time is convulsing the world, is the greatest “pentecost of calamity” which has been visited upon the earth since the days when God destroyed the inhabitants of the world by the flood. There is a welter of war which verily is bleeding Europe white. On the battle fields, men by the hundreds of thousands suffer indescribable tortures. In the homes which they have left, there is sorrow so great that it cannot be pictured, want so terrible that it cannot be portrayed, and in many places, famine so awful that it makes the heart shudder to think of it.

Such conditions will continue with but little respite till the Son of man comes again in the clouds of heaven. Viewed from one angle of vision, it would seem that, in a certain sense, these judgments are God’s mighty call to his people to prepare men and women whose especial work will be to minister to the suffering and to heal the sick. Because of its woes, the world will permit laborers skilled in this line to follow their vocations even if their religious views are not in harmony with those of the majority of mankind.

Seventh-day Adventists have built up a more thorough and complete educational system than any other religious denomination on earth. Provision has been made for training the children and youth in our own church institutions, from their earliest school years until they complete the college courses; and the judgment alone will reveal the number of young men and women who have been saved to the kingdom of God by these instrumentalities. Few indeed are the Adventist youth in worldly colleges and seminaries.

Turning now to the training of laborers in medical missionary lines: For a long time the idea seems to have prevailed that such work would have to be done in institutions conducted by those not of our faith. Only in recent years has an attempt been made to conduct a Seventh-day Adventist medical college. The pathway of this institution has been beset with difficulties and discouragements. The educating of physicians is very complex, exceedingly costly, and is regulated by civil law to a greater degree than any other branch of learning. Only the faith which the Seventh-day Adventist people have in the Word of God and in the Spirit of prophecy could ever have led them to undertake such an enterprise. An unflinching faith that God is calling for medical evangelists and physicians, and calling upon us to train them in our own school, alone will enable this institution to fill the place which God designs it should in the world.

The instruction which has been sent upon this matter is clear and plain, and the following words illustrate well the goal to be aimed at:—

“As pointed out about the time this school was founded, we must provide that which is essential to qualify our youth who desire to be physicians, so that they may intelligently fit themselves to stand the examinations required to prove their efficiency as physicians. They should be taught to treat understandingly the cases of those who are diseased, so that the door will be closed for any sensible physician to imagine that we are not giving in our school the instruction necessary for properly qualifying young men and women to do the work of a physician. Continually the students who are graduated are to advance in knowledge, for practice makes perfect.”

“The medical school at Loma Linda is to be of the highest order, because those who are in that school have the privilege of maintaining a living connection with the wisest of all physicians, from whom there is communicated knowledge of a superior order. And for the special preparation of those of our youth who have clear convictions of their duty to obtain a medical education that will enable them to pass the examinations required by law, of all who practice as regularly qualified physicians, we are to supply whatever may be required, so that these youth need not be compelled to go to medical schools conducted by men not of our faith. Thus we shall close a door that the enemy would be pleased to have left open; and our young men and women, whose spiritual interests the Lord desires us to safeguard, will not feel compelled to connect with unbelievers in order to obtain thorough training along medical lines.”—“Counsels to Teachers,” pp. 480, 481.

To those who are acquainted with the pitfalls and temptations which beset the Seventh-day Adventist youth in worldly medical colleges, this quotation will appeal with much force. In the first place, the Adventist student in attendance upon a worldly medical college is at once brought face to face with the question of Sabbath classes. Nearly all, if not all, the medical colleges of the land conduct class work and clinics on Saturday. In order to secure his grades, the student must be present at eighty per cent of all lectures and laboratory periods. In many instances, if he is not present on Saturdays, this is impossible.

Because of this many of our youth have compromised with worldly custom and broken the fourth commandment. They quiet their conscience by telling themselves that they will return to their allegiance to God when they shall have finished their course. But the seed has been sown, the twig has been bent, and the tree of their life is thereafter marked by a carelessness, if not by an utter disregard, of the claims of God’s sacred law. Many times students will manage to get along with this matter during the first two years of their course, and then will be confronted with the alternative of breaking the Sabbath or leaving school. Can Seventh-day Adventists be clear before God and permit their sons and daughters to be put into the position where they are led into such almost overmastering temptation?

Because of this state of affairs, many of our youth who started out with the intention of fitting themselves for the service of God, have not only abandoned this idea, but have given up their faith. Out of seventeen Seventh-day Adventist medical students who were classmates in the same school, only three are now keeping the Sabbath. Three brothers entered another medical school. Their mother was a most godly woman whose prayers had followed them from their earliest years that they might become laborers in the Master’s vineyard. All three are today out of the truth. A letter received

not long ago from a Union Conference president states that every Seventh-day Adventist medical student in one of our largest cities is attending Sabbath classes.

Training in worldly schools is likely to place a wrong mold upon those of us who are physicians, and this, in turn, may bring in principles and practices to our medical work which are not in harmony with the mind of God. Warnings have been sent us concerning this danger:—

“This proposed school at Loma Linda must be molded by the early spirit of the message. . . . We are now farther from the pattern than when our medical work first started.”—Medical Evangelistic Library, No. 4, p. 32.

“I was shown how that now in a special sense we as a people are to be guided by divine instruction. Those fitting themselves for medical missionary work should fear to place themselves under the direction of worldly doctors, to imbibe their sentiments and peculiar prejudices, and to learn to express their ideas and views. . . .

“It is a dangerous thing to catch the spirit of the world; the popularity which such a course invites will bring into the work a spirit which the Word of God cannot sanction.”—The Medical Evangelist, Vol. II, No. 2, pp. 1, 2.

“Some have advised that our students should, after taking some work at Loma Linda, complete their medical education in worldly colleges. But this is not in harmony with the Lord’s plan.”—Id., Vol. I, No. 5, p. 6.

There is great danger that the “popularity” which a medical course invites will lead our youth astray. The practice of medicine is about the only one of the distinctive lines of our work from which money can be readily and easily made. Because of this it is all the more necessary that our medical workers should be trained by men who will constantly impress upon their students the importance of the spirit of self-sacrifice which ever characterized the life of the Master.

NEWTON EVANS, M. D., Pres. College of Medical Evangelists. PERCY T. MAGAN, M. D., Dean.