East Caribbean Mission
By H. C. J. Walleker
As the old year with its many blessings is past, I feel to praise the Lord because of his love and tender care, and for his protection through dangers seen and unseen. We have made some advancement in this field, and only wish that more had been accomplished. During the year a number have been added to our churches in the different islands. The latter part of the year Elder Philip Giddings labored some in Guadeloupe, one of the French islands; and while many of the people are indifferent to religion, he was well received, and was able to dispose of considerable of our literature, and also to read the Bible with many of the people. We are the only Protestants working there. I hope we may soon have a French canvasser for Martinique and Guadeloupe. We are receiving urgent calls from other islands to bring them the message for this time, and we hope soon to start work in more of these unentered fields. Sabbath-keepers are springing up in some of these islands where nothing has been done so far. This shows that God is searching out honest hearts here and there, without the aid of the living preacher. The other day, traveling on a steamer, I met a Methodist minister. When he learned that I was a Seventh-day Adventist minister, he told me that on the island where he lives is a young man, about sixteen years old, who in some way had received our literature, and had begun to keep the seventh day. He said that the boy's parents and himself had done their best to take this notion out of his head, but they had entirely failed. He said to me, “The boy stands as firm as a rock.” Surely the Lord is going before us. Two ladies here at St. Thomas have lately begun to observe the Sabbath, one of whom was a Catholic. Most of her own people have turned against her, and are doing their best to get her to turn back, but she is standing firm. She has heard the call, “Babylon the great is fallen. . . . Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues,” and she is casting her lot with those who have taken their stand on the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. May many others quickly heed the same call.