Development by W. A. R.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · Dec 27, 1906

Development

By W. A. R.

About forty years have elapsed since our first medical institution was started. The opening of the Health Institute was an important event in the medical missionary work. Many of the principles that have made the health and temperance cause what it is among us as a people had been brought to light. Health reform, as far as it was understood, was received by every convert to the Adventist faith. The need of an institution was soon manifest. In such a place health principles could be taught more fully. Here people not of our faith could come and incidentally be taught the truth for the times while receiving healing of body. Here those could be trained who could go out into homes and carry the message while ministering to human ills. For many years the Health Institute was the only sanitarium in the world. In fact, the word “sanitarium” was coined for the occasion. With the growth of the health work came a need of institutions in other places. Attempts were made to open these in various localities, but for nearly twenty-five years the parent institution stood alone in the health reform movement. The principles were gradually finding their way to the people. Demands were increasing for new institutions in various places.

The fact gradually dawned upon us that the health work is the advance agent of the message. It is to sustain the same relation to our work that the right hand does to the body. As this idea gained ground, new institutions were started, so that up to 1901 a score of sanitariums had been opened.

During the first quarter of a century we had very few physicians. As demands increased, provisions were made for preparing medical workers. Each year now increases these by twenty to thirty physicians and nearly one hundred nurses. At present there are about two hundred and fifty graduate physicians and nearly one thousand nurses. Of the physicians, about half are in conference institutions, and the others in private sanitariums owned by people of the denomination, or in private practice.

The past five years have witnessed remarkable advancement in institutional development. Since 1901 the number has been multiplied by three, there being twenty-one in that year, and sixty-three now. Forty of these are known as denominational institutions, and twenty-three as private institutions owned and managed by Seventh-day Adventists. The valuation of these institutions approximates two million dollars. Of these sanitariums seventeen are located in twelve countries outside of the United States, and the others in about twenty-five States. The foreign ones are distributed as follows: Canada, two; England, two; Ireland, one; Denmark, two; Germany, one; Switzerland, one; South Africa, two; Australia, two; New Zealand, one; India, one; Japan, one; Samoa, one. Besides these there are more than forty treatment rooms and many health restaurants throughout the world under management of private individuals.

During the present year the Mission Board has sent out four physicians and ten nurses into countries outside of the United States—more than one medical worker a month. Nine new institutions have been opened this year.

How much more are we to expect in this line? and to what are we to work? From “Testimonies,” Vol. VI, page 113, we read: “In every city where we have a church, there is need of a place where treatment can be given. . . . It is the Lord’s purpose that in every part of our world health institutions shall be established as a branch of the gospel work. These institutions are to be his agencies for reaching a class whom nothing else will reach. . . . Make small beginnings, and enlarge as circumstances may demand.” We have also been told that every Seventh-day Adventist home should be a small sanitarium.

What are we doing, brethren and sisters, to meet these requirements? Are we making our homes true exponents of health reform principles? Are we as careful to live up to these principles as we were years ago? If not, why not? Is the health reform movement a part of the third angel’s message? If so, are its principles as sacred as any other part of that message, and as binding? We are jealous that the Medical Department be intimately associated with our denominational work. We have abundant evidence that this should be so. Are we zealous in making the principles of health reform a part of our lives? Health reform is a personal matter. Its principles must be practised by every true Seventh-day Adventist. When this is true, then our medical missionary work will go to the world, and will accomplish what the Lord intends it shall, and not until then. “A house divided against itself can not stand.” “No man can serve two masters.”

God has blessed the medical missionary cause abundantly the past few years. A glance at the facts already mentioned will convince any one of that. Shall we not at the beginning of a new year reconsecrate our lives and bodies to God, and determine that the principles of health reform shall become such an integral part of our lives as we wish them to be of our work for this time.

W. A. R.