THE growing list of missionaries entering the great unwarned fields bears cheering testimony to the rapid extension of the advent message. In 1907 fifty-eight missionaries, counting the wives, entered the fields. In 1908 the number was far larger. In fact, every month, and generally every week, saw missionaries bidding good-by to their home lands, and departing for all four quarters of the earth. The message is flying through the midst of heaven to every nation, and tongue, and people.
The following list of departures during 1908 is a token of the hastening end. Where the laborers have gone out from Europe or Australasia to fields beyond, the fact is noted. In all other cases the workers have gone from the United States:—
JANUARY
H. H. Winslow and wife, to China.
FEBRUARY
Louis Mobbs, Miss Tena Judge, and Miss Edith Ward, all of Australia, to Singapore, East Indies.
MARCH
Dr. H. W. Miller (returning) and wife, Elder R. F. Cottrell and wife, Bert A. Roberts and wife, Mrs. B. Moultrup and son, and Miss Pauline Schilberg, to China.
Miss Dehn, to Japan.
Robert S. Greaves and wife to Turkey.
APRIL
Homer C. Olmstead and wife, J. R. Campbell and wife, and S. Konigmacher and wife, to South Africa.
Walton C. John and family, to Argentina, South America.
MAY
W. J. Fitzgerald and family, to England.
E. C. Widgery and wife, to British Guiana.
A. L. Philbrick and wife, to Guatemala, Central America.
N. C. Bergersen and family, to Denmark.
John Bowers, to Mexico.
JUNE
Miss Bertha Fuller, to India.
Mrs. Edith E. Bruce, to India.
R. C. Porter and wife, to South Africa.
Miss Winifred Trunk, to Australia.
Miss Amy Boardman, from England, to India.
S. W. Carr and wife, and Bennie Tavodi, all of Fiji, to New Guinea, East Indies, to open our first work there.
JULY
George L. Sterling and wife, to the Society Islands.
S. H. Carnahan and family, to Cuba.
M. E. Emmerson and wife, to Basutoland, South Africa.
T. M. French and wife, to Sierra Leone, West Africa.
J. A. P. Green, Earl Hackett, John Brown, A. A. Reinke, to Mexico.
E. C. Wood and wife, to Jamaica.
Walter Foster and wife, to Japan.
AUGUST
Dr. Riley Russell and wife, and Miss Mae Scott, to Korea.
L. J. Mookerjee and family, to India.
Miss Jennie C. Nelson, to St. Thomas, Danish West Indies.
SEPTEMBER
J. van de Groep, of Holland, to the Dutch East Indies.
J. P. Novak, to Mexico.
C. L. Butterfield and family, to Korea.
H. Drangemeister and wife, M. Poenig, and W. Koelling, from Europe, to German East Africa.
W. Scholz, of Berlin, and Miss L. Brefin, of Switzerland, to Syria.
George Keough and wife, from England, to Egypt.
Misses Larson and Rhode, from Europe, to Abyssinia.
H. S. Prener and wife, to Brazil.
C. E. Knight and family, to Argentina.
F. E. Lyndon and wife, from New Zealand, to Rarotonga, Cook Islands.
OCTOBER
Miss Edythe Ayers and Miss Belle Shryock, to India.
Thomas J. Grenville and wife, from England, to India.
G. W. Reaser and wife, to Mexico.
J. E. Fulton and wife, and Kenelm Hungerford, from Australia, to Singapore.
E. E. Thorpe and wife, from Australia, to Java.
H. E. Piper and wife, from Australia, to Haapi Island, Tonga or Friendly Islands.
Reid Smith and wife, from Australia, to the Maori country, Tobago Bay, New Zealand.
NOVEMBER
A. N. Allen and family, to Peru.
Miss Annie Williams and Thomas Driver, from Australia, to Fiji.
DECEMBER
Robert A. Beckner, to Burma.
W. E. Perrin and family, and R. H. Leech and wife, to India.
C. P. Crager and wife, and Miss Mary I. Cobban, to South Africa.
Charles F. Knott and wife, to Brazil.7
Arthur Warren and wife, from England, to Argentina, South America.
L. V. Finster and wife, from Australia, to the Philippines.
Miss Louise Scholz, to India.
Misses Calista Nelson, Anna Hansen, Frances Brockman, Meda Kerr, and Lillian M. Voris, to Argentina, South America.
E. C. Ehlers and wife, to Brazil.
W. W. Wheeler and wife, to Ecuador.
SAILING DATE UNKNOWN
U. Augsbourger and wife, and Jose Abella, of the Latin Union Conference, to Algeria, Northern Africa.
R. A. Caldwell and wife, from Australia, to the Philippine Islands.
Miss Nellie Sisley, from Australia, to Tonga, Friendly Islands.
Brother Thomas and wife, from Australia, to Pitcairn Island.
It totals up one hundred thirty-four workers, the largest number by far ever sent out in one year. In this list we do not count Dr. Miller, returning to China, nor have we a complete record of all who have gone from Australia and Europe into fields beyond. We have not counted the laborers sent from Europe into Siberia and Turkestan, nor those who have gone this year into Croatia and Silesia, Austria, to open new countries. These one hundred thirty-four laborers have been sent from the home fields of the message to regions beyond, and such a distribution in one year is a thrilling sign that the Lord is indeed finishing the work. It is a wonderful development. And what a responsibility this lays upon all believers to stand by with their prayers and their means as never before. W. A. S.
The Next Meeting of the General Conference
By A. G. Daniells
THE next meeting of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists is appointed to be held in Washington, D. C., May 13 to June 6, 1909.
The place was agreed upon at the general council held in Switzerland, in the spring of 1907. The time was fixed at the meeting of the committee which convened in Washington in the spring of 1908.
It has been decided to hold the conference on the grounds of the Foreign Mission Seminary and Washington Sanitarium. This will give us the use of the buildings of these institutions. Here we shall be free from the noise and bustle of the city, and have access to all the fresh air and sunshine to be had in the natural groves of the place.
When this conference convenes, it will have been just four years since our last General Conference. This is the longest period that has ever elapsed between sessions of the General Conference since the organization of that body. At first the sessions were held each year. As the territory and scope of the work enlarged, it was thought best to hold the sessions but once in two years. Finally, when our operations had extended around the world, and into nearly every land, it was decided to convene in General Conference but once in four years.
The coming conference will have the largest delegation by far that has ever gathered for counsel in our history. Every union conference in North America is planning to send a full delegation. Between thirty and forty are coming from the European unions. The Australasian and South American unions will have the largest representation they have ever sent. All the principal mission fields will be represented by two or more from each field. And all the departments of the General Conference will be well represented by the members of their respective committees.
In view of the importance of our time, our rapid growth of our work, our unprecedented opportunities, and the large gathering of our leading men from all parts of the world, the coming conference should certainly be better than any we have ever held. It should be great from the standpoint of large, wise plans for the future, and the spiritual uplift to the delegates, and so to all our people. We believe it will be just such a conference, and for this all our people should earnestly and constantly pray. We should have more than a large, pleasant gathering, and a good program; we should have the presence of the Holy Spirit as our teacher and helper. This conference should give us larger views of our work, and greater consecration to it.
More information regarding the plans and details will be given through the REVIEW as the meeting approaches.
A. G. DANIELLS.
Note and Comment
The Modern Sodoms
THE appalling conditions which prevail in some of the great cities of America is beginning to compel attention from those who are called to deal with great moral questions. One intelligent observer, Rev. William J. Dawson, an English evangelist, recently made this statement in a public address in New York City:—
You can not imagine what an awful condition your city is in. The churches are losing their grip, and the ministers are allowing opportunities to slip through their fingers. In twenty years, unless there is a change for the better, the pride of America will be a pagan city; the church will be extinct, and vice will reign uncurbed.
If a dweller in ancient Sodom or Gomorrah should investigate one of our modern centers of population, he could easily be persuaded that the cities of the plain had been restored. Such moral depravity invites the judgments of heaven.
Religion by Edict
ACCORDING to a recent press report, King Edward, of England, has issued an edict forbidding public entertainments in the theaters or music halls on Sundays, Christmas day, or Good Friday. This effort to establish religion by royal authority is consistent with the relation which government sustains to religion in Great Britain, and with the basis upon which Sunday observance rests. The state exercises a considerable degree of authority over the established church in Great Britain, although in issuing this arbitrary decree it is said that “the king has now turned to good account the survival of mediæval despotism,” which has been invoked on another occasion recently, and excited much criticism. In classing Christmas day and Good Friday with Sunday, King Edward indicates his knowledge of the fact that they all rest upon the same authority,—the command of the church. What King Edward of England has attempted to control by royal edict, Sunday-law advocates are seeking to induce legislators to attempt by legal enactment. In neither case is the cause of true religion advanced.
Spiritualism and Fiction
THERE is such an appetite now for anything which deals with the occult that writers of fiction are beginning to exploit Spiritualism in some one of its varied phases. Referring to what is described as “the advance of the novelist into the shadow world of Spiritualism,” the Independent gives expression to its views thus:—
It is to be hoped that such phenomena as Mr. Garland describes, will find their proper place in fiction, if they must be exploited at all, and that his theories may never be widely tested in real life. For, when the time comes in which any man of good or evil intentions can develop in himself enough of this psychic force to say to the Flat-Iron Building, “Go and fall into the sea!” and she goeth, we shall have something worse than anarchy with which to contend. And this is the logic of Mr. Garland’s position. If a table can be made to move an inch without the use of physical force, simply by the will of a medium, by developing the same power the mountains may be made to skip like rams, and nothing that is will be lasting, or beyond the awful power of mind to destroy.
It is perfectly evident that the way is being rapidly prepared for Spiritualism to act its part in the closing days of the controversy between Christ and Satan. Only those who are enlightened by the teachings of the Scriptures upon this subject will escape the great deception.
Parting Words of Instruction
By Ellen G. White
MRS. E. G. WHITE
“LET not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.”
These words were spoken by Christ just before his crucifixion, and were among his last to the disciples. He is not at this time thinking of the sufferings that lie before him, but of his disciples. How will they stand when they have not his personal presence with them? He comforts them with the assurance of his return: “In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.”
Very simple are the words of the Saviour. They can not be misunderstood or misinterpreted. “And if I go and prepare a place for you,” he continues, “I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.” For three years Christ had been educating his disciples in that way; yet Thomas said to him: “Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way? Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.”
O that we all might understand these words for ourselves, and know that Christ is for us the way, the truth, and the life! Only through the Son of God can any soul make his way to the Father. Only he can remedy the injury that was wrought for man by the fall. “If ye had known me,” he declared, “ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.”
“Philip saith unto him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works’ sake.”
Christ came as the representative of the Father, and the works of the Father he was constantly doing. Had not the disciples for three years been beholding these works? Had they not seen the sick brought to him to receive healing, and had he not restored them to health? The needy of all classes had flocked to him in crowds, and he had ministered to all. They had seen him feed a multitude with a few small loaves and fishes, and as the food was passed from hand to hand, they had watched it multiply until there was more than enough for all. After five thousand men, besides women and children, had been fed, the Saviour gave the command, “Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost;” and they gathered up of that which was left twelve baskets full.
This is an object-lesson of the work that the Saviour desires to do through his followers. He wants us to take the blessed Word, to study it, and then to teach it in its simplicity. How simple Christ’s lessons were! Even the children could understand them. The people of his own nation, those who professed to believe in God, were greatly incensed against him because by the simplicity of his daily teachings he was removing the rubbish that was hiding the truth from the comprehension of the people. Even the most ignorant could take in the truths he taught, and be comforted and blessed thereby.
Mothers, hearing and seeing his words and works, desired that their children might come to him to be blessed. On one occasion one mother with her children left their home to find the Saviour. On the way they told others of their desire; and as they pursued their journey, mother after mother, with their little ones, joined the company, until, when they reached the place where the Saviour was, there was a little army of women and children who sought to reach his side. He was ministering the word to the people, and healing the sick; and when the women made known their errand, the disciples told them that the Master must not be disturbed. But Christ had heard the petition of the mothers, and at once his heart responded to their desire. He said, “Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of heaven.”
I am so thankful that the message of salvation was brought in such simplicity to us. The Son of God laid aside his royal robe and crown and his high command, and came to earth to take his place among humanity as a little child, to bear the test of temptation and trial from childhood to manhood. Greater than that of any other were the sufferings and trials he endured. Satan and his host were determined that Christ should not carry out his plan of sacrifice. If they could discourage Christ, and cause him to sin, the world would perish in its iniquity, and the cause of righteousness be lost. But Christ was working out the salvation of the human race, and he would not fail on a single point. He would make it possible for humanity to lay hold upon his divinity, and escape the corruption that is in the world through lust. Man does not need to be corrupted. May God help us to accept by faith the victory that has been won in our behalf, and make it ours.
The Saviour continued: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.” It was a path of suffering and temptation by which the Saviour went to his Father, and we may rejoice that he consented to travel such a path. Had he not, how could the world have been saved? By this he made it possible for us to be accepted with God. When we are in doubt and perplexity and difficulty, let us consider what the Son of God passed through that he might prepare for us a home in the kingdom of heaven. And to-day he stands by his Father’s throne to minister help to every soul who seeks him in sincerity for strength to overcome. He waits to bestow on all the power to do his will.
He will accept the little children, blessing them as he blessed the children in the days of his earthly ministry. Shall we not bring them to him? These little ones are to learn the lessons of God’s Word, and be captivated by the simplicity of his truth. Let the labors of those who work for Christ’s little ones be marked with the simplicity that was revealed in the words that fell from the Saviour’s lips.
“If ye love me, keep my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever.” Here is the test of our love for God. Parents are to teach their children what these commandments are. We need missionary fervor in our homes, that we may bring the word of life before the members of our families, and lead them to seek a home in the kingdom of God. There will be no sickness there, no sorrow, no death. A life that measures with the life of God will be the reward of all who win that eternal home.
In view of all that lies before the believer, his piety should be “always abounding.” He should labor for souls with all his intelligence and powers. Not for eloquence and honor is he to strive, but for simplicity of life and simplicity of speech. Christ had no need to explain any word that he made use of. All were simple, and all were understood9by the most simple. We need to let our faith take hold of Christ; we need to listen to his words, to seek to do his works. We need to take hold of the hope of immortality that will give us life everlasting in the kingdom of glory. To us the promise is, “The works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.”
“I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever; even the Spirit of truth; whom the world can not receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.” To the worldling the truth is too simple; he deems it unworthy of his attention. He does not see Christ in it. But how thankful should the believer be for these promises! I am thankful for the faith I have in God’s Word. I claim his promises, saying, “You said it, Lord. You asked me to come to you. I come expecting you to help me and bless me.” And he proves the truth and the preciousness of his words: “I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you. Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also. . . . He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.”
“If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.” Consider the familiar relation Christ here brings to view as existing between the Father and his children. His presence and guardianship is an abiding thing. While we trust in Christ’s saving power, all the arts and wiles of the fallen host can do nothing to harm us. Heavenly angels are constantly with us, guiding and protecting. God has ordained that we shall have his saving power with us, to enable us to do all his will.
Let us grasp the promises, and cherish them moment by moment. Let us believe that God means just what he says. If we will accept his word with the simplicity of little children, believing that he has given his life that we might have everlasting life, we shall receive power to overcome.
“He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings; and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father’s which sent me. . . . Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. Ye have heard how I said unto you, I go away, and come again unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father: for my Father is greater than I. And now I have told you before it come to pass, that, when it is come to pass, ye might believe. Hereafter I will not talk much with you: for the prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me. But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the Father gave me commandment, even so I do.”
I am very thankful for the privilege of speaking these words to you. I was present at the establishment of this institution. At that time I spoke to the workers here, presenting before them the way in which they might carry on their work intelligently. I spoke also to the patients, and I know that Jesus was present on these occasions. His blessing rested upon those assembled. I want to say to you to-day, There is a battle before each one of us; but as long as we hide self in Christ, we shall not be defeated. When you are provoked, and tempted to make a sharp reply, keep silent. At such times, silence is eloquence. Remember that you are God’s property. When circumstances arise that irritate and annoy, conquer your feelings. We need to look constantly to Jesus. If we will walk in the fear of God, he will not fail us.
If we will seek to teach the truth in its simplicity, the Lord will let his blessing rest upon us. He will impart his Spirit to us, giving us comfort and strength and hope. I appeal to you to do all you possibly can for the help and comfort of others. Show to men and women who is the mighty Healer. He will bless the means you use. If you will do his work, you may expect his blessing. In your efforts for the sick, show them how they may improve their health by forming right habits.
I have said that if we seek to help and bless others, the Lord will let his blessing rest upon us, and I know that what I say is truth; for I have proved the Lord for many, many years. How long the Lord will permit me to speak and to labor for him I can not tell; but I have given my life to do his work, to study the blessed Word of God, and to pass it on to the people as the bread of life. It is possible that we shall never meet again on this earth; but let us remember that there is a grand meeting to take place ere long. Everlasting life is before us, and the city of God. Angels of God will be there. They will bid us welcome to the joys of heaven because we have kept the commandments of God. There there will be no more death, no sorrow, no sin. Let us do all we can to help one another to gain the eternal joys that are awaiting the redeemed. May God’s blessing rest upon his people in large measure, is my prayer.
Our Strength and Stay
By MINNIE EMBREE-PARKER
MINNIE EMBREE-PARKER
O WHAT can we have to lean on
When everything else gives way?
O where can we go in trial,
In the dark and gloomy day?
Some friends of our sunny weather
Forsake us when days are drear;
Then what shall we have to lean on,
O what can our spirits cheer?
There's a Friend that has proved dearer
Than ever a brother can,
The hope of a race of sinners—
'Tis Jesus, the Son of man.
With one hand on the throne of heaven,
With the other he reacheth down
To strengthen and cheer the fainting,
And help them to win a crown.