The Secretaryship of the General Medical Missionary Department
By Arthur G. Daniells
A BRIEF statement was made in last week's REVIEW that Dr. Geo. Thomason had been called from Africa to act as secretary of our General Medical Missionary Department. This step was not taken without much careful consideration and earnest prayer. It is not the desire of the General Conference Committee to call our workers from the mission fields when they are enjoying good health, and meeting with good success in their work. But there are times when this seems best, and really necessary. Our medical missionary work is a most important part of the great work we are endeavoring to carry forward in all parts of the world. In this line of gospel service we come into the closest sympathetic touch with our fellow men. Here we have such great possibilities for doing good that this phase of our work is likened to the “right arm,” and the “entering wedge,” of the work the Master has committed to us. For this reason we must not permit this part of our work to be neglected. Those best acquainted with the Medical Missionary Department realize that its interests have suffered much through lack of steady leadership. Soon after the department was fully organized in 1905, the secretary was released in response to an earnest call to take charge10of the new medical college. It was nearly a year before we succeeded in making even temporary arrangements for the secretaryship. At our recent council in Europe, Dr. D. H. Kress, the secretary of the department, was called to the Pacific Union Conference, which left the secretaryship again vacant. Such frequent changes in the leadership of a large and important movement are very serious, and should not continue. In the interests of this most important department of our work the General Conference Committee felt that the time had come to select a medical man of wide experience and good ability to take the secretaryship, and it is intended that he shall be permitted to remain in charge of the department long enough to make its work strong in all parts of our great field. It was hard for Dr. Thomason to consent to leave Africa. He had given seven years of the most active and devoted work of his life to the medical missionary work in that country. The Lord had blessed his labors. He loved the country, the people, and the work, and desired to remain there; but after a careful study of the whole work and earnest prayer, he felt that it was his duty to respond to the request of the General Conference Committee to take charge of the general medical missionary work. Good arrangements have been made to carry forward the work Dr. Thomason has built up in Africa. Dr. Charles Hayton will take Dr. Thomason’s place. Brother Hayton has spent many years in Africa in connection with the Claremont College. Four years ago he came back to the States to take a medical course, with the full intention of returning to Africa. He was graduated from the George Washington University last June, and after securing medical degrees in Edinburgh will return to Africa. As Dr. Thomason takes up the heavy responsibilities of the General Medical Department, I am sure he will receive not only a hearty welcome, but the fullest cooperation from all our medical workers, and all the rest of our people. I feel sure that God will bless this phase of our work. Dr. Thomason is an ordained minister as well as an experienced physician. He will put forth his highest endeavors to make the medical work a spiritual as well as a physical blessing to men.