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Young People's Work

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · May 21, 1914

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 91, No. 21.

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Young People's Work

I AM very much interested in the young people's work. There was a time not many years ago when our young people were drifting from the ranks faster than they are today. This young people's work has put the brakes on that tendency, and our young people are being held much better than in the past. I am sure we are all glad of this.
Some years ago a prominent minister of a certain denomination said to me: "Mr. Watson, I would not belong to a church that could not hold its young people." He surprised me a little, but I answered: "My dear sir, if our young people could go to the card party, the dance hall, and the skating rink, I think we should have no trouble in holding them in the church." That man knew that I knew what I was talking about, and he never mentioned the subject to me again.
It is a fact that the world and the devil are bidding for Seventh-day Adventist young people. I tell you it means something to hold the children of Seventh-day Adventists to this great truth during the perilous times in which we live. But while that is true, I thank God from the fullness of my heart that we have a truth that can hold many of the youth in our church schools, in our academies, and around the firesides. And many might have been held who are in the world today if we had bestirred ourselves in the past, organized the young people for service, and given them assurance that we would have places for them after they had become equipped for service.
Now it seems to me that there is nothing that presents itself to this union, or any other union in the United States, that can be compared to the salvation of the young people. I can remember when the foreign fields were supplied with the best-trained ordained ministers in the denomination. The best ministers were picked to go to foreign fields; and when the Mission Board could get no more ordained ministers to go, it began to pick the brightest licentiates. And now whom is it sending to the foreign fields? The great burden of this work rests upon the young people, and some of them are taken from school before they have finished their courses, so great is the need. Now it does seem to me that the most important part of this great work of the third angel's message is the work for our young people. What do you say? [Amen.]
We have a multitude of young people in this union, and I would urge that we search out the best man that can be found to take this work in hand in connection with the union conference committee, and establish the right kind of leadership.
In regard to the Reading Course work and the Standard of Attainment, I believe that no better recommendation can be placed in the hands of our young men and young women if they want to enter the Washington Missionary College than a Standard of Attainment certificate. It tells one thing at least,—that they have stuck to something until they have finished it. Think of the good that has been accomplished by those fifty-three gift books that came into the North Texas Conference during 1913.
I seldom find time to read except when on the trains; but I have set myself this year to read twelve volumes, and I have already finished four of them, besides reading my Bible; and many of them are large books. G. F. WATSON.
I am very much interested in the young people's work. I like the sound of it. You know so many times we see the young people going into the common activities of life. What is the cause of it? It is because of their training. What do they hear at home? It is farming, raising corn, cotton, etc. It is not strange, therefore, that they have no higher ambition than these things. What do they read? It is generally the newspaper and the popular magazine; and it is not strange that they do not have any high ideals.
But now when we turn about and give them information in another direction, it is not strange that they should turn about. And that is the value of the Reading Course. When I began to talk to my students about the value of the Reading Course, one of them said to me, "Those books are not for students; one of the leading workers told me they were only for people who could not go to school. People in school are too busy to read." I told him this was a great mistake. What are we in school for? We are in school to learn to read. When a man leaves school, if he stops with the information he has gathered there, of what use is he in the world? At school he simply has laid the foundation on which to build. He has prepared himself with certain facts, to which he can add, and thus become useful. A man that stops his studying when he gets his diploma, is never worth much in this world.
So I have been very much interested in encouraging our students to take these Reading Courses, and to finish them. I believe they are of special value to students, because they inform us of the work to be done in this world of ours. C. B. HUGHES.
If we want to bring up our children in the truth, I feel that we ought to do our duty right at the start, by having family worship morning, noon, and night. It is not necessary for our young people to drift away from the truth. I knew a family of several children, the oldest boy of which was converted at the noon-hour worship, the second boy in the fields, the second daughter at the close of the Sabbath, the fourth child in a cotton patch, and the fifth on a Sabbath spent at home.
If the parents would be faithful in teaching the little ones the Word of God before they are able to talk, making it a part of their young lives, I am sure there would be no difficulty in bringing them up in the truth. We ought to keep our children in our ranks; I do not like to hear of our children's going into other denominations or out into the world. I believe that if they are trained in the way they should go, there will be no trouble in keeping them in the truth. Therefore I am heartily in favor of this great movement that has been started for our young people. [Brother Taylor has been using the Morning Watch Calendar for three years.] J. I. TAYLOR.
The young people's work is certainly very precious to me; and while we were talking about the Reading Courses, I thought of some of the papers that have been handed in to me. One of the questions on the book "The Black-Bearded Barbarian," is, "What have you learned from this book?" And I thought of the answer of one young man, which was something like this: "That I wanted to be like —, 'burned out for God.'" And then I recalled another young man who thought he was too busy to read. He felt that he could not take the Reading Course. He is a rice farmer. But I talked with him and showed him the books, and he said he would try to read them. He bought the books; and several weeks after the time for the review to come, I received a letter from him, and in this letter was his review. It was written with lead pencil, and blurred and smeared with oil and grease; but it was a review of the book he had read. When he had read the three books, he wrote me: "I never again can do without the Reading Course. I thought it was impossible for me to take it; and I have written these reviews while watching the machines at night." He attended to the rice machines, and would manage to snatch time at night to read the books. I have kept some of the papers of young people who seemingly had no desire to enter the work, and cared little for the truth of God; but by the way they answered the questions it was clear that they had a tender place for God in their hearts and for his work.
On visiting many places where I have previously sold the Morning Watch Calendar, I find that the children have learned a great many verses. And in some places the Morning Watch Calendar has been the means of starting family worship. I believe that no one who will use that calendar and other Missionary Volunteer plans as we are asked to use them will backslide. The facts are that many of our young people are drifting because they do not know the truth. They have never been taught the reason for the points of our message, which they will learn if they study the Standard of Attainment. MRS. G. F. WATSON.