p. 122 | SACRIFICING by E. B. Lane

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Apr 17, 1879

SACRIFICING

By E. B. Lane

“Give and spend, and God will send.”

To warn the world of the Judgment day is a great undertaking, but with God's help it can be accomplished. It is an honor to have any part in this work, even at the cost of great sacrifice. When God calls us to his work, our energies, talents, and means are to be brought into requisition in the most advantageous manner. The gospel minister knows what it is to listen to urgent excuses whenever he calls for means to advance the cause of God, and what he obtains is often a mere pittance to what could be given without inconvenience. If men would show as much financial ability in raising money to forward God's work as they do in their own interest, there would be no lack. With the energetic, the future is filled with well-laid plans for obtaining money to either add to their wealth or supply comforts that could be profitably sacrificed to nobler objects pertaining to their eternal welfare. If such are prospered above their calculations, they feel willing to give a portion, but if they come short, they are inclined to withhold. This is not sacrificing. Men will venture on worldly prospects, give their notes, mortgage their property, strain every nerve to succeed, while they would be regarded as fanatical, if not crazy, were they to make a similar effort to advance their eternal interests.

We often hear men of the world talk of hard times, but I have never heard them urged, discussed, and pressed as at a business meeting of a religious character, by those asked to give money for religious purposes. At a meeting of this kind held recently, a motion was offered that hard times should not be mentioned during the session. It had an excellent effect, and quite a large sum was raised. With many, this complaint of hard times becomes chronic, and they will resist all effort to arouse their generosity. I called on a brother to assist in the missionary work, and received in reply unanswerable hard times as a reason why he could do nothing in this direction. I had previously heard his wife remark that she would have accepted an invitation to visit a relative had she received it in due time. The journey would have cost about three dollars and a half. “Hard times” was no obstruction to the visit!

A brother was solicited to aid in supporting the ministry. He gave ten dollars, all he thought he could spare. God blessed him

with a bountiful harvest of corn, but heavy rains raised the streams, and nearly all his crop was swept away. He afterward told me that had he been asked for the value of that corn, he would have thought he could not spare it, but he only wished the cause had it. I reflected: This is the way many will feel in the day of destruction, when their property is swept away, and their lives are lost with it. Another brother, “too poor to help any,” lost a horse, and he procured another and went on farming as usual. If our houses burn, if we lose our stock or crops, or have expense of sickness, we rally and recover. Why not devote our energies and make our plans while in prosperity to lay up a few hundred dollars, perhaps thousands, in Heaven, in “bags that wax not old,” where our treasure will not fail? E. B. LANE.