The Conservation of Our Forces by Francis M. Wilcox

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Apr 1, 1915

The Conservation of Our Forces

By Francis M. Wilcox

THE wise general in worldly warfare seeks to conserve his own forces as well as to inflict losses upon his enemy. By pursuing this policy, small but well-organized armies have been enabled to withstand much greater forces. This principle of conservation should be recognized in Christian warfare. While the church of God must carry on active warfare against the hosts of sin, and assault the strongholds of error, it must seek by every means in its power to conserve its own forces. What advantage is there in capturing the forces of the enemy in one field, while at the same time an equal number are surrendered to his power in some other locality?

Had this principle been recognized in this movement in the years that have passed, our membership would have been largely augmented, and there would be associated with us today many who are wandering in the paths of sin. Small value attaches to world-wide missionary effort if valuable positions at home must be surrendered and souls be left to go to ruin. The gospel message which we have to give to the world is not primarily for the purpose of warning men. If this were all, we could sound the warning in one field, and then pass on to another without regard to the afterresults. But the purpose of the gospel is to save men from sin; to perfect them in Christian character; to bring them to a home in the kingdom of God at last. We have fallen far short of what we should have done in other lands. The unwarned millions in Europe, Asia, and Africa make mute appeal to us to enlarge the scope of our operations. But let us remember that with our interest for perishing men in the regions beyond there should exist an equal interest in perishing men at home.

That we have been remiss many, many times in putting forth timely and proper labor for the erring and discouraged among us goes without saying. We have left men and women to die. We have seen them day after day drifting away from God; filled with the spirit of worldliness; losing their interest in sacred things; following the pleasures and vanities of the world; but our voices have not been raised in warning. This is a great sin of which we must repent before the Lord, and in our sorrow we need to bring forth the proper fruits meet for repentance, a reformation of our ways of doing. The standard of church membership should be raised. In the lives of many who are now members of this church there should be decided changes of life-purpose and of experience.

There should be in all our churches more careful, faithful discipline judiciously exercised. Allow no one to entertain the feeling that he may live as he lists and reach heaven at last; that he may go on in indifference and carelessness and still be counted a member of the church in good and regular standing. But in the application of this discipline there should be patient, earnest Christian labor.

Too often in our churches the erring ones, instead of receiving such labor, are criticized and gossiped about. Their misdeeds are told to others but little is said to them, and we find too often that even responsible members in our churches are not backward in this work of tearing down instead of building up.

It is painful to visit some of our churches and have perchance the elder or deacon, or the Sabbath school superintendent, come to you with a long portrayal of the sins of church members. This brother or this sister has done wrong. You inquire whether the proper labor has been put forth and the answer in many cases is that such timely effort has not been bestowed. They have been waiting for the minister to do the work. While this may not be true in the large majority of our churches, it is true in too many instances.

Oh, if we could realize as ministers of the gospel, as officers in the church of God, as members of his church, our responsibility before high heaven! To us has been intrusted the work of saving souls. We are our brothers' keeper. We are God's ambassadors to a lost world. As such ambassadors we hold in our hands the pardon of the Most High for the rebels against the government of God. How shall we answer in the last great day if we are recreant to our trust?

If it shall be our good fortune to stand within the city of God when it is compassed by the millions of the ungodly, and we see in that doomed throng our old-time friends and relatives and neighbors, will the conviction of condemnation rest upon us? Will we feel in that day of final judgment that we did all we could to secure their salvation? That day will come soon in our history. That fearful reality we must sometime face. May God grant that we shall be so true to our calling in Christ Jesus, so faithful in labor for those around us, that we shall have the consciousness in our own souls that we have done all we could, and that through no course of ours, either by sin of omission or commission, have souls gone down to eternal ruin. Today God gives us opportunity to labor for him. Let us work faithfully while the day lasts, before the night of darkness and despair settles down upon the world.

F. M. W.