One Hundred and Fifty Thousand Dollar Fund by W. J. Stone

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Apr 11, 1907

One Hundred and Fifty Thousand Dollar Fund

By W. J. Stone

For Special Work at Home and Abroad

The preceding diagram is an illustration of the blackboard plan, or square system, recommended on page 7 of the Review of January 31, for each church to adopt in raising its portion of the $150,000 fund.

Sabbath, March 30, Elder E. J. Van Horn, of Ohio, and I, visited the Boggstown (Ind.) church; and after a discourse by Elder Van Horn, I took a special blackboard that I had previously diagramed as above, with as many squares as there were members in the church, numbering each square to correspond with the number of each member as recorded in the Church Record. After a short talk upon the necessity of raising this money to meet the urgent demands from fields or institutions where this fund is to be disbursed, I had the church clerk turn to the list of membership in the Church Record, and read slowly the list, pausing a moment to give each one an opportunity to say whether he would pay the amount represented by the block, which we have adopted in Indiana as three dollars. As rapidly as the names were read and the persons responded, we wrote their initials in the square. Some of the members were absent, and a few were unable to pay, so after we had passed over the whole list, we went back and gave an opportunity to any who desired, to pay for those not able to pay, or be responsible for those who were absent. Before I returned home, the full amount had been provided for. A large portion of this had already been paid, so the rest was quickly made up, and the full quota for this church was raised.

This is a very simple method, and can easily be worked in all our churches. Where persons are not able to pay the full quota, let some brother or sister assist them. If our church officers will take up this plan at once, and lift all they can themselves, and thus encourage the lay brethren and sisters, it will be but a few weeks till the greater portion of this fund can be raised. It is possible; and when these fields to which this money is to go are in such crying need, why not drop every other interest for the present, and unitedly give the cause of God one mighty forward movement?

Think of Kingston and the West Indies, where four thousand dollars of this money is to be used, and the terrible calamity through which they have just passed, which has prepared the inhabitants for this message. Shall we not step in without delay and do all in our power to let the people know what these things mean? Valparaiso, Chile, is to receive two thousand dollars of this fund, and is in about the same situation. They need their money at once, and that which is true of these places is true of every other field and institution that is to share in the disbursement of this fund.

I wish to request our church officers throughout Indiana to arrange for a special service the first Sabbath in May to take up this matter, using the diagram as illustrated above, and let us make one mighty effort to complete this work.

W. J. Stone.