p. 15 | General Mission Notes

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 19, 1902

General Mission Notes

“THE one calling not overcrowded is the missionary’s.”

“INTEREST in missions is only interest in Christ. Let the man be afraid who feels no interest in missions, that his supposed interest in Christ is unreal and vain.”

THE American Tract Society, at its seventy-fifth annual meeting recently held, was able to report additions to its list of publications not only in English, but in German, Spanish, Polish, Italian, Dutch, Bohemian, Chinese, Dakota, Greek, and Zulu. It receives appeals for its literature from all parts of the world.

THE country of Ecuador, which has for decades been closed against Protestantism, is now a country where religious liberty is enjoyed. Notwithstanding the fact that the Catholic faith largely predominates, the colporteur and missionary work and the sale of Bibles are going forward. As yet no worker has gone into this field to carry the third angel’s message.

HINDU women are the most uncompromising enemies of the Christian missions. Though they are the slaves of their husbands in many things, yet they are the guardians of the household gods, and determine the religion of the family. Many a convert in India has been forced back to his old religion by his wife and his mother, his grandmother and his mother-in-law.

THE heathen religions teach that prayer, to be acceptable, must be accompanied with a gift. The Buddhist never goes to the temple without an offering, which is generally made before the prayers are repeated. If he receives that for which he asks, he makes a thank offering besides. How many thank offerings are we owing to-day? This is a lesson which the heathen may teach us.

IN India all burdens are carried on men’s heads and backs. At intervals along their roads large stones are set, called “rest stones,” for the sole purpose of furnishing a rest for these burdens. With this explanation, one may easily understand the beauty of a metaphor used recently by a native Hindu Christian who said, “Christ is all my hope, Christ is my rest stone.”

DIFFICULTIES continually occur in Moslem countries which hinder the circulation of the Bible. One of the Bible agents writes that the Turkish authorities in the Mosul district had seized his books and money, and that licenses for colporteurs were being withheld in and around Bagdad, also that at Bushire, on the Persian Gulf, the authorities had refused to allow cases of the Scriptures to enter Persia.