The Progress by F. G.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Nov 10, 1904

The Progress

By F. G.

NEARLY all our schools throughout the world have begun their work for this present school year. It is the will of God that these schools should greatly hasten the coming of the Lord in this generation. This they will do if they are organized and conducted on right lines. It may be truly said that our schools are only in their infancy when we consider the possibilities in store for them. In the closing of this great threefold message these possibilities must be rapidly realized, and it is incumbent upon not only the workers in educational lines to hasten this realization, but upon our workers in all departments, and upon the rank and file of our people as well.

There is a note of courage in the fact that whereas ten years ago there were probably not over twelve church-schools, with perhaps not over fifty children in attendance, there are now several hundred of these schools, with nearly nine thousand pupils. During these last ten years there have been established a number of intermediate schools, now having an attendance of nearly a thousand students. In our training-schools there are over two thousand students. This makes a total of over twelve thousand children and young people now in schools established for the sole purpose of hastening the coming of the King. When it is considered that ten years ago there were probably not two thousand of our children in all grades of our schools, do we not find reason for cheer?

But it is to be acknowledged that much of this rapid growth has been accompanied by many weaknesses and failures. Yet when we consider the great odds against us in this great work to which the Lord called us, we are to have feelings of gratitude that there has not been much more imperfect work done than we have seen. We have had everything to learn, and, indeed, there is very much yet to be learned. Ten years ago we were practically without everything necessary to a system of church-schools. We had neither a plan of support, text-books, nor teachers; nor were the minds of our people awakened to the importance of this great means of salvation for our children, and so for the world. But the Lord had spoken, and it must be done.

That the movement has not been clear to all, and that some have lost sight of the strength of the principles underlying it, in observing the weaknesses to be seen in the working out of these principles, is not to be wondered at. It has always been thus with the work of truth; and in no instance was it ever more manifest than in the work of the Author of truth. The great fundamentals of the plan of salvation were lost sight of because the one who set them forth came from Nazareth, a place from which nothing good could come: he was as a root out of dry ground, with no form nor comeliness, and he was not esteemed. This illustration fails in that this Teacher’s work was as perfect as were his principles of truth, but it holds in the fact that a work is not to be judged alone from the workers, nor to fail of support because of weaknesses. Rather it is always to be judged and supported upon its own intrinsic merits.

F. G.