An Aged Pioneer Fallen
By J. N. Anderson
Brother Abram La Rue, who ended this life April 26, 1903, at the advanced age of 80 years, 5 months, and 1 day, was by report well known to the great majority of our people, although few of those who thus knew him ever had the privilege of seeing his face. He was born in the State of New Jersey in the year 1822, and hence he was ten or eleven years old at the time of the notable meteoric shower of 1833, which he witnessed, and to which he so often referred as a sure token of the near coming of the Lord. So far as earthly relations are concerned, he was practically alone in the world, since he had but one cousin, and the whereabouts of even that one was unknown to him. He was the only surviving member of a rather large family. The early part of his manhood was spent in California and Idaho, where, after having amassed a considerable fortune through gold mining, he lost by fire and bad investment all he had gained. Baffled and sadly disappointed in his financial affairs, he next set his face toward the Hawaiian Islands, urged on by an old friend who had preceded him to those parts. He went, and found, not his friend, nor even earthly goods, but as he so often put it, “the pearl of great price.” Some time after, he returned to California, where he heard and accepted the advent message, by which means he found fathers and mothers and brothers and sisters, of whom he often spoke in terms of praise and endearment. To him California was quite the best country in this world, and not less so because he had brethren and sisters there who held a warm place in his otherwise lonely heart. It was here also that he offered himself as a worker for the message; and being given his choice of all the islands of the broad Pacific, he almost transcended his commission by choosing the island of Hongkong, which, though an island, and withal in the Pacific, belongs more properly to the mainland of Asia. Hongkong is indeed a small island, being only about eight miles long by three miles wide; but, containing as it does the great commercial and shipping center, Victoria (almost universally called Hongkong), which in point of tonnage is said to rank second in the world, it becomes by that fact one of the most important ports in the Orient, a fact which Brother La Rue never failed to recognize. Here for the last thirteen or fourteen years he has acted as a colporteur, doing ship-missionary work mainly in the Hongkong harbor, although during that time he has made extended trips to the Holy Land, Sarawak (North Borneo), Singapore, Shanghai, and Japan, selling books and other literature on board vessels, and in the harbors where his vessel chanced to stop. He was a man of great energy and ceaseless activity, to which was added a rare gift in meeting people and making sales. Hundreds of our books have thus been scattered in these parts. His work was for the Europeans. He made no attempt to acquire the Chinese language. However, in the translation and distribution of two of our tracts, he put forth at least one earnest effort to bring the truth before this people. Nor was this effort barren of results. Although a man of solitary habits and experience, yet he was sociable and affectionate; and despite his extreme age he possessed a warm, genial, enthusiastic spirit. To those of us who were so much younger, he was not merely a tender father, but a sympathetic, congenial brother and fellow worker. He was a man of deep and pronounced convictions. His love for, and his loyalty to, the cause he represented were unquestioned. His belief in the soon coming of Christ was strong, and to the last he cherished the hope that he might live until Jesus comes. His last sickness, an attack of pneumonia with malaria and typhoid complications, was neither severe nor prolonged. His vital forces seemed to be spent, and gradually he sank lower and lower until he breathed his last almost as in natural slumber. He was laid to rest in the beautiful Hongkong cemetery, where he awaits the call of the great Life-giver who brought life and immortality to light. Thus another pioneer has fallen; he rests from his labors. He began the work which now falls upon us who remain. Let us then in the name of our God and by his grace renew our consecration to this glorious message, and so speedily bring that glad day when our Lord shall come and take to himself his own.