p. 5 | Join the Church Nearest You by L. L. C.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · May 11, 1916

Join the Church Nearest You

By L. L. C.

CHURCH membership, when it represents a vital experience of fellowship with Christ and not a mere formal connection, is one of the greatest assets making for success. There is something about membership in the local church which brings its members closer than even the ties of family relationship. One of the purposes of the formation of churches is that the believers in Christ in any locality may be so bound together as mutually to help one another in Christian experience and service. This being true, it is a decided disadvantage to continue

one's membership in a church from which he has moved away. How much better it would be if all would join, as soon as possible, the nearest church to the place where their work takes them. It may mean a little inconvenience, and the giving up of close ties of church fellowship with the home church, but it will prove an anchor to the person who has moved, and a strength to the church of which he becomes a member.

The story of a sea captain, which illustrates this, has come to our notice in one of our exchanges. A sea captain traveling on a railroad found that he had as a seat companion a young man going to the city to live. The two entered into conversation. The older man asked, “Have you letters of recommendation?” “Yes,” said the young man, as he pulled some from his coat pocket. “Well,” remarked the old sea captain, “have you a church certificate?” “O, yes,” replied the youth, “but I did not suppose you would desire to look at that.” “Yes,” said the captain, “I want to see that; as soon as you reach the city, present it to the church in that city. I am an old sailor, and as I have been up and down in the world, it is my rule as soon as I get into port to fasten my ship fore and aft to the wharf, even though it may cost a little wharfage, rather than have my ship out in the stream floating hither and thither with the tide.”

The old sea captain’s advice is certainly good. Many young persons have drifted because, when moving from home, they failed to tie up to the church in the place to which they went. Such a transfer of membership also avoids the danger that strangers claiming to be Seventh-day Adventists may obtain under this pretense the confidence of members in small churches who may take these strangers in, give them full use of the church, and sometimes even circulate their literature.

L. L. C.