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The Missionary Volunteer Goal for 1914

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Apr 16, 1914

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 91, No. 16.

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The Missionary Volunteer Goal for 1914

By I. H. Evans

EVERY young man and young woman should have an object in life. To attain to that objective should be the study and aim of each one who wishes to make a success. There is no real success in drifting with the tide. It takes neither ambition, application, nor energy to float downstream. But to attain a goal,—to accomplish a purpose in life,—requires determination, forethought, and perseverance.
Our Young People's Department is not simply the outgrowth of an idle thought, but is the result of years of study, prayer, and purpose on the part of the General Conference. Other denominations have young people's organizations which have proved great blessings to these denominations, and a still greater blessing to the young people who have come under their ever-widening influences.
One of the strongest movements today for foreign mission work is the Students' Volunteer movement, which is calling to the front many of the brightest young men and young women from the colleges and higher institutions of learning.
The Young People's Missionary Volunteer Department is an organization created by the General Conference for the purpose of uniting into a solid phalanx all our young people scattered throughout the world, and so training and drilling them in service that they will soon become efficient in the great work we are carrying forward.
The Young People's Missionary Volunteer Department has set its goal for 1914. The objective is worthy of the very best talent and mettle of every young man and young woman in our cause. Let us look at these objectives. We shall take the lesser one first:—
The Young People's Missionary Volunteer Department has resolved to raise $25,000 for foreign missions during this calendar year.
It will require a great deal of work and constant thought on the part of our young people to raise this sum. That is one fourth as much money as was raised for foreign missions in the year 1900 by all our people. It hardly seems possible that our young people in 1914 should be doing one fourth as much in the way of raising funds for mission work in the foreign fields as the entire denomination did fourteen years ago. To do this will require constant application and a steady purpose, but I am sure that our young people will not fail in accomplishing this endeavor.
Twenty-five thousand dollars gathered in by the Young People's Missionary Volunteer Societies this year will mean a great deal for foreign missions. It will mean that twenty-five families can be sent abroad to the needy stations of the world, and kept one year in their chosen fields of labor. If this $25,000 should be invested in native workers in lands like China, India, Korea, and Africa, it would mean the setting to work of about two hundred and fifty native laborers. This number would vary somewhat according to the country in which the workers might be employed, but it would make a large army of recruits for any mission field.
The tendency in endeavoring to raise money for missions is to delay week by week, trusting in the possibility of making a grand rush near the close of the year and redeeming the past. A better plan, however, is that each month every society raise its proportionate share of the $25,000, passing the money on to the Mission Board for its extended operations. Doing this will serve to discipline oneself and the organization in the matter of keeping up its funds.
This certainly is a splendid goal to reach, and one that is worthy of every possible effort our young people can put forth.
The second, which should be the greatest purpose actuating the Young People's Department today, is the grand endeavor of winning 1,500 souls to Christ during the year 1914. I cannot conceive of a greater attainment that one could possibly strive for than the winning of souls to Christ. It is the noblest work in which man has ever engaged. It is worthy of our best endeavor, and our young people should rally to this undertaking with all the united strength and force at their command.
The angel said to the prophet Daniel, ‘They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars forever and ever.’ There is no reward that will ever be greater than the reward that will come to men and women for leading souls from sin and destruction into the kingdom of God.
Henry Ward Beecher said: ‘Every Christian is a pilot boat. He is to cruise about hard by the harbor of salvation, watching for the tempest-tossed soul, if perchance he may guide that soul into the harbor of life.’
Matthew Henry said: ‘I would think it greater happiness to win one soul for Christ than to gain mountains of gold and silver for myself.’
H. Doddridge cried: ‘I long for the conversion of souls more sensibly than for anything besides. Methinks I could not only labor but die for it with delight.’
It was this passion for souls that led Livingstone into the heart of Africa, and Moffat to labor for the deliverance of the poor souls in South Africa from eternal ruin. It is this spirit that sent Carey and Judson to India, Morrison and Taylor to China, and hosts of other men equally worthy to distant fields in order to lead men into the kingdom of God.
Fifteen hundred souls led to Christ during 1914 through the ministry of the Young People's Department is one of the grandest harvests that has yet come to our people.
But I fancy this number of souls will not be won merely by resolutions. The members of the Young People's Volunteer Department will have to set themselves to work in a personal way to bring men to Christ. More souls are won to Christ through personal effort than by almost any other process.
It was personal work that found the lost sheep in the parable of our Lord.
It was personal work that won the woman of Samaria.
It was personal work that drew Nicodemus to Christ.
And nearly all the followers of our Saviour seem to have been won by personal effort.
It would be a splendid piece of work if each young Missionary Volunteer would undertake to bring at least one soul to Christ through his personal effort. You may have to do this in some silent way, but God will bless your endeavor.
In order to win souls to Christ, there must be prayer and the study of God's Word. One can never be a successful soul winner unless he first gets his own soul in touch with Heaven. Then you have the promise of the Holy Spirit, and you are at liberty to draw from heaven's storehouse your supply of grace in order that the work you are striving to do may be accomplished in the name of the Lord.
Fifteen hundred souls born into the kingdom of God during 1914 through the ministry of the Young People's Department is certainly a task worthy of the very best endeavor of each member of our young people's movement. Our whole ministry and our General and local officials are watching with great interest the growth and progress of our Young People's Department. We are anxious that the year 1914 shall bring into this department a large number of our unsaved boys and girls.
We believe the time has come when every Seventh-day Adventist should begin to work for those out of Christ, and we confidently hope that in regard to both the number of souls that shall be led to Christ through the efforts of the Young People's Missionary Volunteer Department and the funds that shall be raised by that department there will be no failure for this year.
I. H. EVANS.