RELIEVING SUFFERING AND DISEASE IN DARK HEATHEN LANDS—AN OPEN DOOR TO THE CHRISTIAN PHYSICIAN AND NURSE—HOW THEY OVERCOME SUPERSTITION AND DESTRUCTIVE ERRORS
By FRANCIS MONROE BURG
Professor of Biblical Exegesis, College of Medical Evangelists, Loma Linda, California
The primary objective in the coming of Christ to our world to tabernacle with the human family for thirty-three years was the revelation or manifestation of God in the flesh. “Without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh.” 1 Tim. 3:16. “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.” John 1:14. And thus the Saviour said to Philip: “If ye had known Me, ye should have known My Father also: and from henceforth ye know Him, and have seen Him.” John 14:7.
The world had so far lost the knowledge of God that the words of the prophet were fulfilled, “Darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people.” Isa. 60:2. The people of all countries had “changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things.” Rom. 1:23.
ENTRANCE TO SANITARIUM DEPARTMENT, COLLEGE OF MEDICAL EVANGELISTS, LOMA LINDA, CALIFORNIA
Being unacquainted with the great I AM, the one and only true God, and having become strangers to the soul-uplifting experience of faith in the infinite attributes of Him who otherwise is invisible and unapproachable, they followed the natural trend of their limited senses toward that low plane of moral depravity where vice was virtue, and sensualism, lust, and excess had loose rein. The natural concomitant was such indescribable wickedness, misery, suffering, ignorance, and superstition as have in all the ages characterized the people of every country where the knowledge of the living God has not entered to effect its marvelous and desirable transformations.
The one characteristic of the Deity that distinguishes Him from the gods “that are no gods” is His love—His pity and sympathy and tenderness toward His creatures. Says the psalmist, “For Thou, Lord, art good, and ready to forgive; and plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon Thee.” Ps. 86:5.
This characteristic of the Christian’s God is unknown in the religions of the benighted nations. The devotion of the Hindu mother who sacrifices her darling babe by throwing it into the river to be devoured by a crocodile is wrung from her by her fear of the gods and to appease their wrath. The same motive prompts the blind devotee who lacerates his body until the blood flows in streams, or in other cruel ways afflicts himself, in order to win the favor or turn away the anger of his god.
Here is where the medical missionary—the Christian physician or the Christian nurse—finds his open door to the dark hearts of these unfortunate victims of ignorance and superstition.
The primary aim of the gospel worker is to bring the knowledge of God to those who know Him not. How better can he accomplish this than by following the example of Him who, as a missionary from heaven to our dark world, “went about doing good” and “healing all manner of diseases”?
FINDS OPEN DOORS
Says John Lowe, F. R. C. S. E., author of “Medical Missions, Their Place and Power”:
“The Christlike nature of medical missionary work, the opportunities which it affords for the practical manifestation of the spirit of the gospel—the doors, otherwise closed, which it opens in pioneering a way for the entrance of the truth—these are features of this department of work which cannot fail, if intelligently apprehended, to commend the cause to the hearty sympathy and support of the friends of missions.562“As a means of overcoming prejudice, and of gaining access to heathen and often exclusive communities, medical missions present strong claims to the sympathy and support of the friends of missions. The suspicion and prejudice with which the Christian missionary is often regarded in Mohammedan countries, as well as in many parts of the heathen world, render our endeavors to reach the people, and to introduce the gospel among them, a work of great difficulty, and often even of danger. Gross ignorance, superstition, and fanaticism, caste, social habits, and national prejudices, are barriers which the mere missionary finds it difficult to overcome, and which may compel him to remain for years isolated and shunned, if not despised, and thus the opportunity for doing good for which he yearns is utterly denied him; whilst to the missionary physician the hovel and the palace are alike opened at his approach, suspicions are allayed, prejudice is disarmed, caste distinction, for the time at least, is overcome; even the harem, where the brother may not intrude, is not too sacred for the ‘infidel’ when he enters as an angel of mercy to the sick and dying. Thus, as the missionary pioneer, he opens and holds open many a door of Christian usefulness. To these he introduces his brethren, thus enlarging their sphere of service as well as his own.”
NO SUPERIOR MEANS
This author quotes Dr. Parker, who was a leading factor in the formation of the Edinburgh Medical Missionary Society, as follows:
“I have no hesitation in expressing it as my solemn conviction that, as yet, no medium of contact, and of bringing the people under the sound of the gospel, and within the influence of other means of grace, can compare with the facilities afforded by medical missionary operations.”
Quoting further from Dr. Lowe: “The evangelization of the world is Christ’s own work; and those who, as His instruments, are called to engage in it, are commissioned to represent Christ—to represent Him in all His tender pity for the lost, His loving sympathy for the afflicted, His care for the sick, His compassion for the suffering. We turn therefore to Christ’s ministry on earth for the interpretation of His own commission, ‘Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.’”
TOUCHED BY THE SUFFERING MILLIONS
The world is a veritable lazar house. The cries and groans of its suffering millions touch the pitying heart of Him who looks down from His sanctuary in heaven. He sent Jesus “to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound.” Isa. 61:1. In His life here were perfectly blended the teaching of truth and the tender ministry that told as words could not the boundless love of the One who sent Him. As proof of His divine Sonship and His Messiahship, He sent the message to John, “The blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, to the poor the gospel is preached.” So in giving His commission to those who were to represent Him after His departure to heaven, He commanded them “to preach the kingdom of God, and to heal the sick.”
The hands of a suffering world are outstretched, calling for the relief that comes from this double ministry.
