Our Able Minister by S. H. Lane

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Feb 7, 1884

Our Able Minister.

By S. H. Lane

I DESIRE to speak of the above-mentioned minister in a personal manner, so that our people and his friends generally will encourage him in his field of labor more in the future than in the past. I write of him freely, and shall use some terms of praise in his favor, on account of being so well acquainted with his Christian graces that I know he will not become exalted, as he never gets lifted up because of commendation, or cast down through censure.

He has been laboring in our Conference for several years. His labors have been of a self-sacrificing nature. He has never found fault with the little encouragement he has received from us. He has never sent in a bill against the Conference to be settled by the auditing committee, notwithstanding his converts to the truth have quite often replenished our treasury with means, and have donated to purchase tents for other ministers to preach in. Those who embrace the truth under his labors seem innocent of that spirit which causes some to say, "I am of Paul, and I of Apollos, and I of Cephas." They are ready and anxious to listen to any accredited Seventh-day Adventist minister, and when they hear the truth they often exclaim, with an animation glowing in the countenances which does one good, "Why, that is just as I learned it."

I am now laboring in a new field. A Seventh-day Adventist minister has never preached in the county before. I have a large M. E. meeting-house in which to labor. Commenced meetings Thursday night, November 28. After the discourse, a gentleman and his wife invited me to their home. As I was engaged for the night, I stated to them that I would gladly visit them the next night, if agreeable. They were the first ones to meeting the next evening. I shared the hospitalities of their home, and as we bowed in prayer night and morning, I felt that I had found a home in my new field. Sabbath morning, as I sat down to read, the lady soon joined me, intently reading "Spirit of Prophecy," Vol. 2, which had been loaned to her by one of our missionary workers. As soon as opportunity presented itself, I introduced the subject of present truth, as I had done the night before. I soon learned that she was quite well informed in many points of our faith, and when questioned in regard to the Sabbath, she stated that she was convinced that the seventh day is the only Bible Sabbath, and that she had commenced to observe it. I asked her how she became enlightened and convinced in regard to the subject, and was surprised to learn that it was through the labor of "our able minister."

Do you wonder who that minister can be? Well, we call him THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES. His headquarters are at Oakland, Cal., from which place he is ready to visit your friends whom you may be anxious to have enlightened in regard to the truth, providing you will encourage him by giving to the librarian of your church tract society $1.60, who will immediately order him to visit your friend's house weekly one year, and you may be assured that he will do so, rain or shine.

The writer visited a reading-room at Indianapolis, Ind., November 28, to become acquainted and do missionary work, and in so doing introduced the above-named minister. The proprietor, on looking at his finely marked face, said pleasantly, "We are receiving that paper, and I wish I knew who sent it, I would thank him." He continued, "As I went to do missionary labor this morning, I took several copies with me, and gave to parties who I thought would read." May the Lord bless the one who encouraged "our minister" to visit that reading-room; and I have fully resolved that his visits shall not cease.

Reader, will you encourage this true minister to visit some home or reading-room during the coming year? — S. H. Lane, in Review.