In Some of the Desert Places by William Ambrose Spicer

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 21, 1912

In Some of the Desert Places

By William Ambrose Spicer

THE waste places were to blossom under the closing message. While spending two weeks and more with the brethren in Peru and Bolivia, I have felt to thank God anew for his fulfilling word in this time.

Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia are the least-worked countries in the South American Union Conference. They have seemed truly desert places. We are getting only the barest foothold now in Ecuador and Bolivia; but what we see in Peru gives courage to press the work in these other countries. Peru was opened earlier with systematic work, and at first presented as forbidding an aspect as do these other countries. But the sowing of the seed and the preaching of the message in Peru is surely bringing the results.

At the general meeting in Lima the brethren reported interests here and there, and Sabbath-keepers springing up at widely separated points. Our foreign workers, Brethren A. N. Allen, O. H. Maxson, and W. R. Pohle, have their hands more than full of work, and a little band of Peruvian workers is already raised up. Last year Peru paid a tithe of one thousand dollars, half of which came from the believers raised up in the field. Peru still forbids open Protestant assemblies. But the liberal construction of the law in most places of importance allows sufficient liberty to admit of public meetings. I found our Lima meeting hall opening directly on the street, with only a screen built up a few feet inside the door, to prevent the passer-by from looking in upon the congregation and service. This meets the requirements; and at every evening service our brethren have numbers of strangers standing in the doorway and listening and looking round the screen, besides those who fully enter.

On the Sabbath about fifty or sixty persons are present, and there is every prospect of having a good church company built up in Lima, the capital.

With Elders J. W. Westphal and A. N. Allen, I have visited the scene of our chief Indian work in Peru, on the shores of Lake Titicaca. Though in the mountains near Lima Indian believers are springing up. We have all read the reports from Brother F. A. Stahl and others of this really wonderful development among the Aymara Indians.

Some societies have been specially organized to work for the Indians of Peru, but with meager results. It seems, therefore, a distinct providence that we, who have so slender resources and so few workers, should have suddenly placed upon us the largest Indian work in these countries.

The mission is twenty-one miles from Puna, near the shore of Titicaca. On Sabbath the valley was dotted with men, women, and children coming to the meeting. Between two hundred twenty-five and two hundred fifty, we estimated, were present. Of these about fifty are baptized members. Quite a company are considered ready for baptism, and Brother Stahl will have to attend to this on his return from the union conference. The work is spreading still farther into remote villages. Some came to the meeting from distances of ten and fifteen miles; and these are very regular attendants. Some are regularly at the mid-week prayer-meeting from distances up to ten miles, coming over the mountains.

One can readily see that the truth is doing its sure work in the hearts of these people. They come out of a Catholicism that is but a sprinkled heathenism. The truth has put hope in their hearts, has separated them from vices, and they are growing into a bright, clean, wholesome, and loving body of Seventh-day Adventist believers. They look altogether different from the groups seen in villages all about.

Our brethren have neither the men nor the means to prosecute this work vigorously. But they mean to hold the base that Providence has so wonderfully given them, and to put their strength into training a band of workers among the Indians who can be used in pushing out into other

regions as this leaven of truth spreads. And it is spreading.

The altitude is so high, about thirteen thousand feet, that it seems necessary to have two sets of workers, to labor by turns. A man and wife must be secured at the union conference to work with Brother and Sister Stahl, each couple taking turns of a few months. The brethren hope the way may open for an Indian work at a much lower altitude in Bolivia, where the workers may find relief, while at the same time keeping among the same people. The larger proportion of the population of Peru and Bolivia are Indians; and thus we may see how directly the Lord is leading our brethren into the way by which these lands are to be evangelized.

This rapid development is one of the assurances of the quick work that is some day to be done in these waste places. The vast distances, the mountainous areas to be covered, the dense darkness of centuries of Catholicism and native heathenism, will be no impenetrable barrier, and the message will spread with blessings over these lands as the work closes.

God has wonderfully protected the work and workers on the shores of Titicaca. Their death and destruction had been decreed by the local church authorities, but the Lord has overruled the plans of violence to bring protecting influences to bear from Lima, and altogether the workers and believers rejoice that the covering of the Almighty has been over them.

We are now in La Paz, Bolivia, for a few days, before going on to the union conference in Chile. There are interests here, and one strong Bolivian woman has fully accepted the truth. Here Brother and Sister Stahl have made many friends by their nursing work. Elder I. Kalbermatten and wife are working here, and Sister Stahl will remain in La Paz while her husband is in Chile.

Our workers in these newer fields I find of good courage. They have many perplexities to meet, and unfavorable conditions for their children. Pray for them, and stand by them. W. A. S.