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The Need of Colored Medical Missionaries

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Aug 26, 1909

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 86, No. 34.

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The Need of Colored Medical Missionaries

By W. H. Williams

THE OAKWOOD SANITARIUM, HUNTSVILLE, ALA.
THE OAKWOOD SANITARIUM, HUNTSVILLE, ALA.
No work is more fruitful in soul winning than that of medical missionary work. With love and consecration, coupled with a thorough knowledge of the physical man, the medical worker finds easy access to the homes of rich and poor. No worker is better able to follow in the footsteps of his divine Master than the one who goes out in the name of the Lord to heal both body and soul. Experience has shown that in the home land as well as in foreign fields, the medical work is in all cases the best, and in many cases the only entering wedge for the gospel message.
The multitudes of negro people throughout the South are in crying need of gospel medical missionary work. Among the poor, and especially in the country, physicians are seldom called. Sickness is on every hand, and the services of competent nurses are in great demand. The Southern people of superior families cherish in fond remembrance the nurses who watched over them through their childhood and youth, and in time of sickness, when the childish feeling returns, they long for the sympathetic gentleness of the colored nurse. In fact, the representative white people of the South retain a traditional regard for colored nurses.
This condition gives to the nurse a rare opportunity to present the saving truths of the third angel's message.
We quote from Special Testimonies, Series B, No. 12X, just recently published, which sets forth the situation, and our duty as a people:—
“In no place is there greater need of genuine gospel medical missionary work than among the colored people in the South. Had such a work been done for them immediately after the proclamation of freedom, their condition today would have been very different. Medical missionary work must be carried forward for the colored people. Sanitariums and treatment-rooms should be established in many places. These will open doors for the entrance of Bible truth.”
“The Lord has instructed us that with our training-schools there should be connected small sanitariums, that the students may have opportunity to gain a knowledge of medical missionary work. This line of work is to be brought into our schools as part of the regular instruction. Huntsville has been especially pointed out as a school in connection with which there should be facilities for thoroughly training consecrated colored youth who desire to become competent nurses and hygienic cooks. Let us rejoice that the managers of our Huntsville school are now planning to carry out this instruction without further delay. Let us help them make Huntsville a strong training center for medical missionary workers.”
In compliance with instruction received, the Oakwood Manual Training School has erected a small, but neat sanitarium. The building is now waiting for furnishings, bath-room equipment, and medical appliances. No large work can be undertaken in the training of medical missionary evangelists, until after this small sanitarium (shown in the accompanying cut) shall have been completed and equipped.
In all our planning to reach the colored people of the South, we must act quickly, wisely, and heartily, for we are told that this work will be the first to close.
W. H. WILLIAMS.