On Leaving Keizan, Chosen
We take the liberty of using a few paragraphs from Brother R. C. Wangerin's last letter to the Mission Board, written before he and his family left their beloved field to return to the States. It shows how reluctantly our missionaries come home. They need our earnest prayers and tender consideration and loving sympathy. He says:— “I must write you once more before leaving our chosen field. You doubtless know before this that it has become necessary for me to leave Korea for a time in search of health. Oh, how we dread to go! It is not our planning or choosing.” “When Brethren Daniells, Porter, and Fulton, together with Brother Butterfield, visited our station a little over one year ago, they viewed the situation at Keizan. Together we climbed the mountain in the rear of our station. It was from that elevation that the brethren saw with their own eyes more than one hundred villages, large and small,—a vast and densely populated country. Then we enjoyed a precious season of prayer. It was there and then, too, that Elder Daniells uttered what has since become a significant statement. He will said:— “‘Now, brethren, suppose Brother Wangerin should get sick and die, or for some other reason be obliged to leave the field, whom would you send to take up his work?’” “Brother Butterfield replied, ‘No one, unless we took a man from another part of the field, and sent him to the south here, thus leaving a vacancy, whatever shift was made.’” “Well, this is just what had to be done. Brother W. R. Smith leaves his well-developed east-coast district without an actual overseer, until more help comes, while he comes south to direct this work.” After speaking of the delay in getting help to them, Brother Wangerin adds: “We are glad and encouraged that eventually some will march forward and take their places at the front.” “Before concluding this letter, I will also pass on the sad word of the loss of our little baby girl, seven and a half months old. After a lingering illness she passed away Sabbath noon, June 3. Dr. Riley Russell and Sister M. Scharffenberg were with us the last few days. That little missionary grave on old Keizan hill endears Korea and its people to our hearts only that much the more. The patient little sufferer is at rest. The glorious resurrection of the saints of God and the soon coming of the blessed Jesus mean more to us than ever before.”