Gospel Opportunities Among African Mine Workers
Miss Stillson, who is engaged in mission work at Johannesburg, South African Republic, gives some interesting data concerning the opportunities for Gospel enterprise among the natives. She says that along the gold-bearing reef there are about one hundred mines, employing 100,000 native black men, besides a great number of white miners. These black men do not bring their families, but live in barracks, called compounds, and work on contracts of one, two, or three years. The compounds are situated near each of the mines. They consist of a great yard, or court, inclosed on the four sides by lines of low rooms, in which the men sleep. In the yard they cook and eat, and spend their time when off duty. They work in regular shifts of eight hours each, night and day, so that one may enter at any time during the day and find a goodly number who are ready to listen to him. With few exceptions the compounds are open to the preaching of the Gospel. Many of these natives will return to their homes when their contracts close, and carry the good tidings to their friends. But these thousands of native Africans are by no means all the heathen that work in these mines. There are also thousands of East Indians and Chinese; these are so numerous that in some instances they have their own temples established for heathen worship. Yet the Gospel missionaries are so few! It would seem that these hordes of heathen from widely-separated parts of the world are grouped together in the providence of God for the convenience of His ambassadors; but how slow they are to take advantage of the opportunities that He is constantly opening before them!