p. 11 | The Message in Greater New York

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Sep 29, 1910

The Message in Greater New York

By William Ambrose Spicer

The Sabbath day of special prayer and fasting in behalf of the work in the cities will surely be answered by a stronger flow of means and workers into the centers of population, and by an added power in the work of witnessing.

In many a city center, we may be sure, the hearts of the believers gathered courage at the thought that throughout the churches special prayer was being offered for the work in the great cities.

So it was, at any rate, that Sabbath in Jersey City, where the four churches—two English, and the German and Swedish—gathered in union meeting, to dedicate themselves anew to service. While calls are being made to the churches and conferences Westward to throw heavier resources of men and means into the populous Eastern centers, the believers in the East are not quietly waiting. They are determined to meet the call of the hour by greater activity and devotion than ever before. Brethren W. G. Kneeland, J. G. Hanhardt, and A. O. Lund had good reports of the English, German, and Swedish work, though having few facilities with which to lead the campaign. As the work for Greater New York is strengthened, Jersey City must share in the benefits; for it is really only one division of the great metropolis.

The Lord was in the midst of the company gathered in the one small tent operating in Jersey City. Some were just beginning to keep the Sabbath, and old and new believers, and others making a new surrender, gave themselves with one heart to seek God. Apparently every soul under the tent received the special blessing of the Lord that Sabbath.

I report it here, as it is a token to the believers in the stronger conferences from which help must come, that, as the help flows Eastward, the believers already raised up in these populous centers will stand loyally at their post to co-operate. They believe thoroughly that a great work is to be done, in a short time and by simple means, through the power of God.

Next day in New York City I saw and felt the same spirit among workers and people. With Brethren R. D. Quinn and O. O. Bernstein, I attended Sunday afternoon meeting in Elder J. K. Humphrey’s tent, pitched in the heart of a fine district, where thousands of colored people reside. In the morning Elder Humphrey had baptized twenty-six more believers, and it was good to hear the joyous testimonies of the new converts and the old in the afternoon meeting. Altogether over fifty have been baptized from these services, and still the interest is keen, and the believers are praying and working in expectation of many more coming fully out on the side of truth. Elder Humphrey knows that the special power of God has worked to bring the people out, and send conviction to their hearts as he has gone forward, presenting night after night the plain, straightforward themes of the third angel’s message. It is only another evidence that the set time and the new time has come, when every unworked and populous field must hear the message.

In the evening I met with the brethren in the large hall on Washington Heights, in which was opened the first Sunday evening meeting since the taking down of the big tent where Elder Bernstein has held his meetings. There was a splendid congregation in the hall, and the Spirit of the Lord was present. At the close of the meeting, Brother Lewis Klebahn, elder of church No. 1, presented to the congregation the financial side of the plan for the winter campaign, and three hundred dollars was at once pledged to cover three months’ rent of the new meeting-place.

About a hundred have already been baptized this season in Greater New York; a goodly number of others are keeping the Sabbath; and all the old believers are encouraged and revived to take hold of the work as never before. There are a thousand Seventh-day Adventists in Greater New York, witnessing to the truth; and somehow, the brethren know, the force of workers

will be increased, and the message be given.

Over in Brooklyn the foreign department has secured quarters in which to open a city mission training-school the moment means can be provided. It quickens the pulse to see the stir and animation and expectancy among the brethren in this largest American city, the second city in the world. They believe in the plan which the General Conference Committee has been urging, and which has brought special blessing to the field in the last year. And New York does not ask for any undue share. All the populous Eastern belt, where the greater body of the people are, and where our work has the fewest representatives, must share in the movement. Japan won in its conflict with Russia, military authorities say, not because it had the most men, but because it had the most men in the right place. Let us seek God to know how to distribute the forces to fit the calls of greatest need, and so to finish the work.

W. A. S.