HARD TIMES by James White

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 3, 1876

HARD TIMES.

By James White

Our remarks last week under the caption, Hard Times, related principally to our periodicals and books. We designed to impress upon the minds of our patrons the fact that the harder the times the more active and faithful they should be in the work of sustaining our houses of publication. And we promised something this week touching the support of the ministry and missions in these hard times.

We are happy to know that the existing hard times is not without a single redeeming feature. With the hard times come also cheap times. Yes, prices have been getting down upon their very knees in the presence of that stern old gentleman, hard times. Clothing, food, and labor have alike been bending down as hard times has been straightening up. And these facts must have a practical bearing upon the support of our missions and the ministry generally, especially when our treasuries are low, and the demands for means to support the cause in new fields greatly increase.

As the field of our operations extends, it is our policy to organize new Conferences as early as possible. At first, the General Conference gives these new Conferences some pecuniary support. But it is necessary to leave them upon their own resources at as early a period as possible, in order to save the funds of the General Conference to extend the work to still other new and distant States and Territories. Hence our more local ministers, who are forming their characters as speakers and laborers in these new Conferences, have to make a very small weekly allowance meet their wants, which are made small by rigid economy.

But the cause is one, and our ministers of the older Conferences should sympathize with those of the feebler ones, and with those who breast difficulties of no small magnitude in entering new fields with little or no support. Our ablest ministers received twelve dollars per week at the close of the American war in 1865. Ten dollars will give more support in these hard, cheap times, than twelve dollars would eleven years ago. Nine dollars will hire as much work from the mechanic and common laborer as twelve dollars would eleven years since. These facts are worthy of notice by our ministers and auditing committees, especially in our stronger Conferences.

The General Conference treasury is low, and more labor is being put forth outside our organized Conferences than usual. Our older Conferences should economize, so as to be able to help the General Conference treasury more liberally than at any former year. And it is of no use for young men to enter the ministry of the last message with the expectation of receiving from the treasury anything like what they might command as mechanics or teachers. This is a work of sacrifice on the part of both people and preachers; and in order that missionary labor be put forth in every place where the providence of God opens the way, ministers must set the example of sacrifice.

We are fully acquainted with the sacrifices and privations of missionary labor of the last message. More than a quarter of a century since we entered upon this work with neither means, publications, nor friends; but rich in promises. God helped us to make both friends and publications, while leaning on the blessed guarantee of the Son of God that he who would leave father, mother, children, and lands for the gospel, would have a hundredfold even in this life, beside the eternal weight of glory indicated by the dazzling stars of an immortal crown.

We have known hunger and cold from want of food and clothing in the early history of the cause. We have had friends turn against us by the influence of fanatics and impostors, leaving only a small fraction of those who professed to believe the present truth to give us the least sympathy for a time. We have known the dark passages in the humble way in which God chose to lead his people in the commencement of the great work, and have felt the power of discouragement such as language cannot express. Was the Lord in his providence giving an example of sacrifice, suffering, faith, endurance, and vigilance for the benefit of those who should at a later period enter upon the work? God save us!

Faith, sacrifice, earnest labor, and the blessing of God go together in this cause. Those who first entered the work with that perfect faith, which was as good to them as knowledge, could afford to sacrifice time, means, and strength, in the cause of truth. And God greatly blessed their labors. The reason why so many of our preachers are doing so very little is want of that faith which makes the truth of God a living reality, and leads the man of God out to sacrifice time, means, and strength, to save perishing sinners.

Such men will go out leaning upon the promises of Christ, that he will be with his ministers, even to the end of the world, and that for all their privations they will have in those persons who are the fruits of their own labor a hundredfold. “Take neither purse nor scrip” does not mean to lean wholly upon the Conference treasury, and run up bills at the hotel. Some ministers carry too long a fish-pole. Jesus came near and touched the afflicted in his day. He taught his disciples to cast themselves upon the charity of the people where they preached his gospel. “The laborer is worthy of his hire.” Amen!

The man of God who has such love for poor sinners, as dwelt in the heart of Christ, will ardently desire to come close to the people at once. And in this will be his power to convert and save them. And the sooner honest men and women take stock in the cause, by lodging and feeding the minister, in getting him a change for that dusty and worn suit, and helping to bear current expenses, the sooner they are brought near the kingdom of heavenly grace.

Save the treasuries of the church, brethren in the ministry, by retrenching expenses. Changes must take place, so that the people shall bear a part, or we shall have to abandon either our present plan of Systematic Benevolence, or our plans to send the last message to the nations, kindreds, and tongues. J. W.