OBSERVATIONS UPON THE CAUSE IN IOWA by Dudley Marvin Canright

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · May 16, 1878

OBSERVATIONS UPON THE CAUSE IN IOWA.

By Dudley Marvin Canright

(Concluded.)

5. One thing I was very sorry to observe about the cause in Iowa, and that is that while the Lord has been blessing them in raising up many new churches, and adding to the old ones, so that they number several hundred more this year than they did last, still their S. B. pledges have actually fallen off $1000. That is, the pledges for 1876 were $1000 more than for 1877. This looks decidedly bad. The brethren have not been getting poor at that rate. It is true that in some parts of the State their crops have been poor, but even there they have raised considerable. In other parts of the State, crops have been good and times are no harder than in all parts of the country. By a little inquiry we found that there were quite a number of men worth several thousand dollars each, who did not pledge a cent last year, nor pay anything either. How such men can expect God to prosper them in their business, or save them from calamity, I don't know.

We also found a very large number who are paying only one-fourth or one-half what they should pay. If the S. B. pledges in Iowa were up to what they should be, it would amount to $10,000. There must be a united effort on the part of the preachers and tract workers to bring this up, or the State will be crippled for want of means. There are men enough in Iowa, who are now offering themselves to preach, to run ten tents, and then quite a number would have to labor without tents. It will take some means to do this. “But perhaps some of these men will prove failures. It will cost $125 to get a forty-foot tent for two of these young preachers; and it may cost another hundred or more, time and expenses, to give them a trial. And then, if it should prove a failure, how terrible that would be! What a dreadful loss!” Well, yes, that would be bad, certainly; but would it not be worse to allow fifty souls to be lost who might be saved if the risk were made? Do our brethren ever think of this side of the question?

Risks have to be taken in everything. There is not a single farmer or trader of any account who is not risking scores and hundreds of dollars every year; and every little while these men lose more or less too. But do they stop working on that account? Do they shut up shop, and refuse to invest anything? No; they never think of such a thing. I can name plenty of men among us, who have gone into some enterprise, and have lost from $500 to $3000 in a year or two. Talk to them about it, and they will say they do not expect to be always successful anyway. They expect to lose something now and then. But if one of these men puts $25 into the cause of God, and it is lost, you never will hear the end of it. They will make that an excuse for not giving for ten years to come.

It is remarkable how little has been lost in this cause. We have reason to thank God that almost every investment brings some success. Iowa is becoming one of our most wealthy Conferences. They will have to be careful, or they will become covetous. The systematic pledges are a good index in this matter.

6. But the one thing that struck my mind more forcibly than anything else in all my travels in Iowa was the fact that the blessing of God has signally followed those who have been liberal in the cause, and have been consecrated to the work; while adversity and losses have invariably followed those who have withheld their means, and robbed God. Were I at liberty, I could give scores of names illustrating these facts.

One brother I knew some eight years ago, who was then worth over $2000. After preaching as plainly as I could, and making an earnest personal appeal to him, all I could induce him to pledge was five cents a week, and that came grudgingly. Now he hasn't a dollar in the world. Another one I knew in the same church who was then worth but a few hundred dollars. He was always liberal; paid the full amount of S. B., and a little more, and gave on other enterprises liberally. God has blessed him remarkably. He has met with no losses, has had good health, and his property has more than quadrupled. Brethren, is this all a happen-so?

Another case I know, where a brother has given on every call that has been made, not simply by tens and fifties, but by hundreds. He kept his systematic up promptly and liberally. It is remarkable how he has been blessed. Everything he turns his hand to seems to prosper. With another brother of large means, who has taken the opposite course, everything has gone the other way. It has been loss after loss. Some eight years ago there was a man who owned six hundred acres of land. Means were urgently needed. But he could not give anything; he had no money; it was all tied up. We urged him to sell off some of his land, and give that to the cause. But no; he could not think of doing that. Land was coming up. He couldn't make such a sacrifice. At that time he could have taken $30 an acre; but he must keep it to have more. Well, his land kept coming up all the way from $30 per acre to about $18. In fact, he could not get that for it now. Poor deceived man! If he had sold seven-eighths of his land, or the whole of it, and put two or three thousand dollars into the cause of God, he would still have had left several thousand dollars more than he now has.

So I found things as I went from church to church. Every single place furnished illustrations of the fact that the curse of God is upon those that are stingy, and withhold their means from the cause; while, on the other hand, the blessing of God follows those who live up to the truth, and do their duty with the substance God has given them. D. M. CANRIGHT.