“I AM praying, blessed Saviour,
To be more and more like thee;
I am praying that thy Spirit
Like a dove may rest on me.”
“How long have you been praying for this precious gift, Maggie, dear?” asked Aunt Lizzie.
“You mistake, auntie,” replied Maggie. “I was not praying—only singing.”
“But what were you singing, dear?”
Maggie’s face flushed as she replied, “O, I never pay any attention to the words of a hymn! They do not mean anything to me.”
“But, Maggie,” persisted Aunt Lizzie, “such a prayer as you were singing should mean something to you.”
“Well,” said Maggie half angrily, “I should like to know what would be the use of my paying any attention to such words, or praying either. My life is a failure; my hopes are blasted; I have nothing I really desire; and I should like to see another girl who has as hard a time as I. I did make out to graduate from the high school, and now I wonder I ever did that.”
Aunt Lizzie, closing her sightless eyes, said sweetly, “I fear you are too rebellious. You are not trusting, are you?”
“Aunt Lizzie, you don’t know what it is to be deprived of everything as I am. All your life has been so even; nothing ever seems to trouble you.”
Lizzie Leslie sighed half unconsciously as she replied: “Maggie, tomorrow I will tell you something that only one person in the world besides myself has ever known; and I pray that it will be a help to you.”
Maggie Leslie was a very impulsive girl of twenty. Until within the past two years she had lived in a luxurious city home, with no thought of anything but a gay life among her young associates. But in Mr. Leslie’s case, as in many others, riches had taken wings, and he had been obliged to move to a small farm—all that had been saved from his once handsome property. Mrs. Leslie’s health had given way just before the financial difficulty, and upon Maggie fell the trial of housekeeping and the care of the invalid mother. Had she possessed a Christian spirit, her homely duties might have been a source of real happiness to her; but her disappointment seemed greater than she could bear, and she was continually thinking and talking of her trials.
She had received no religious training, and since leaving her old home could see nothing to hope for. Aunt Lizzie was her father’s only sister. But little was ever said concerning her earlier life, only that her blindness had come upon her while she was in college, as a result of too close application to study. But her lovely life and beautiful Christian spirit were admired by all her acquaintances. A few days before her conversation with Maggie, she had come to make a short visit; and noticing Maggie’s fretfulness and almost ungovernable temper, she had resolved at the first opportunity to speak with her on the subject, and the opportune time had just come.
The following afternoon, when the noonday work was finished and the invalid mother made comfortable, Maggie and Aunt Lizzie walked to the shady grove near by. Sitting in its refreshing coolness, Aunt Lizzie asked, “Maggie, have you ever heard much said concerning my younger life?”
“No, auntie, nothing in particular, only that you became blind while in college, but that you were always so resigned that people marveled. To me it seems that your life has been free from the trials that so many have—even if you are blind.”
“Maggie, I am going to tell you today the story of my life, and a secret that has been hidden for more than thirty years,—my heart story,—for I feel it may benefit you. While very young, I became greatly interested in a people who sat in darkness, and I longed to go to them and tell them that a Light had sprung up. As I grew older, and took the vows of God upon me, I saw that I had no time to play with shadows, or to enter into the vain and careless pleasures of the world. So I decided to prepare myself for missionary work, and, knowing that a physician would have entrance into many homes where no one else could go, I decided to take a medical course first. I had already been graduated from our academy, and my indulgent parents willingly sent me away to a distant city to enter the medical department of a university. At this time I was about twenty-two years of age. God only knows how my whole being was stirred as I thought of my future work. I was engaged to be married to a young physician who expected to go to the same missionary field, and my hopes seemed the brightest.
“While I was in the medical school, your Uncle Ray attended the law department in the same university, and we kept house together. I was doing my third year’s work, and was to be graduated in a few months. It was Ray’s second year. During a part of the first year he had been very studious; but near its close he had fallen into the company of some who were very dissipated. The next year he was less inclined to study, and more given to spending his time with wild associates, and I saw with a breaking heart that he was drifting away.
“When I gently remonstrated with him, he would grow very angry, and I would tremble to witness his violent outbursts of temper. One night he returned from a wine supper at a late hour, and, being somewhat under the influence of liquor, he grew very angry at a remark I made, and seizing a heavy inkstand, threw it at my head. It struck me squarely in the eyes. I fell to the floor in a faint; and when I recovered consciousness for a few moments, Ray was bathing my head. We were alone, for he was too frightened to call any one. Thoroughly sobered, he said excitedly, ‘Lizzie, dear, I was afraid I had killed you.’ And then in an agony of remorse he continued: ‘Do you feel better? Can you, will you, forgive me? And, O Lizzie, if you won’t tell of this, I will never get so angry again!’ I tried to speak, but after a vain attempt, I sank into unconsciousness. After some time, so I was afterward told, I again became conscious of my surroundings, and saw I was in my bed, and a physician and some frightened women were doing what they could for me. Violent pains began in my head; delirium came on, and for days I was in a very critical condition. In my delirium I would constantly27moan, ‘No, I won’t tell! No, I won’t tell!’
BROTHER AND SISTER LIEU AND FAMILY, KIANGAU (CHINA) MISSION EVANGELISTS.
‘During my illness, Ray did not write to our parents, knowing that he was the cause of my suffering, and hoping each day that I would be better. But the optic nerve, which is the nerve of special sensibility of the eye, had been injured by the blow, and in a short time total blindness was the result.
‘Maggie, only our Father knows my terrible grief and disappointment when I found that the sweet dream of my life work was ended; but during the night hours, alone with my God, I could gain a victory which would enable me to be calm the next day. Ray was almost beside himself with grief, and finally I said, ‘Ray, if you will solemnly promise me to reform, I will keep back the real cause of this great affliction.’ He promised; and when we returned to our home, no one knew of my deep heart anguish, and my friends have always thought my blindness was the result of overstudy.
‘Especially was my heart bereft when the young man who was in a few months to call me his wife, wrote me that ‘under the painful circumstances’ of course he would expect to be released from his promise to me. But at last I could grasp the precious words, ‘My grace is sufficient for thee,’ with a new meaning, and my life has been a life reconciled to God’s will, and almost continually I hear these beautiful words ringing in my ears:—
“A little while for patient vigil keeping,
To face the storm and wrestle with the strong;
A little while to sow the seed with weeping,
Then bind the sheaves and sing the harvest song.”
“And, Maggie, dear, your Aunt Lizzie is waiting to sing the harvest song. You are so young, my child, I want you to learn the true life, that you may be prepared to wrestle with the strong.”
A MISSIONARY FAMILY OF CONSTANTINOPLE.
Maggie’s tears were falling fast as she said: ‘O Aunt Lizzie, I see myself a selfish and disagreeable girl! To think how brave you have been through your great afflictions, when I have thought my petty trials were so large! I have neglected mamma, too.’
‘Then,’ said Aunt Lizzie in her sweet, persuasive way, ‘Maggie, in the language of the hymn you sang yesterday, will you pray to be more like Him? And will you take up the little duties of home life and be a home maker indeed? If you will, I shall be repaid for giving you the story of my life.’
Maggie replied: ‘I will think about praying; sometime I may. But I will try to control my temper. But, Aunt Lizzie, Uncle Ray is a minister; you said he was in a law school.’
‘Yes, he was; but after he saw how patiently I could bear my trouble, he said: ‘Lizzie, my dear sister, I am the cause of all your blasted hopes. My past life is such a reproach to me, I cannot pass it by; and tell me, if you can, the source of all your comfort.’ The result of the many seasons we afterward had together, was Ray’s conversion. One day he said to me, ‘Lizzie, I must enter the ministry, and tell of the mighty One who can comfort when there is no comfort, and who can give songs in the darkest night.’ So he became the noble man you know today; and, Maggie, perhaps my life would not so fully have reflected the Master’s but for my physical blindness. Ray cannot do enough for me, and many times with broken voice he says, ‘O Lizzie, where should I be today but for your precious influence?’”
It was growing late when Aunt Lizzie and Maggie returned to the house. Aunt Lizzie remained but a few days; but she had sown the seed which in a few years was to bring forth an abundant harvest. No one could fail to see that Maggie was a different girl. There were times when she was very hasty; but gradually she learned to look to One “strong to defend, mighty to save;” and several months after Maggie had begun to bear public testimony for the Master, people said, “Maggie is growing to be like her Aunt Lizzie.”
WASHING VEGETABLES, JAPAN.
Five years later we again meet Maggie Leslie. We find her in a large church which is filled to its utmost capacity with friends who desire to hear Dr. Maggie Leslie give her parting words before sailing to a people who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to tell them that a Light has sprung up.
During the years that have intervened, Maggie has completed a medical course. She was able to do this through the kindness of Uncle Ray, who assisted her when she told him that she would like to take up Aunt Lizzie’s chosen work.
Tonight as she stands before the people, she tells them of her love for those benighted souls for whom Christ died, and in closing she says: “It is through the influence of my noble Aunt Lizzie, who pointed me to the Lamb of God, that I am before you this evening. Aunt Lizzie’s work is done, but her holy life and unselfish devotion for others will ever be an inspiration to me. She triumphed over her sufferings, and eternity will reveal how much she accomplished by her quiet, unconscious influence.”
And here we shall leave Maggie as she starts on her errand of love.
In the case of Lizzie Leslie, whose sweet Christian influence sent a minister and a missionary into the world’s great harvest field, we have seen how full even a blighted life may be. And shall not we watch for our larger opportunities, and grasp them as they come to us?
“The smallest bark on life’s tumultuous ocean
Will leave a track behind forevermore.
The lightest wave of influence set in motion
Extends and widens to the eternal shore.”
MRS. H. H. MILLER.
Washington (D. C.) Foreign Mission Seminary.
The Girl She Might Have Been
“I DREAMED,” said Molly, “that I was alone in a big room, and a man came up to me with a woman who looked like me, but was much prettier. She had red cheeks, such as the doctor said I might have if I’d take more exercise. She was taller, or I guess she just looked taller because she stood so fine and straight. I began to talk to her. She had the sweetest voice, and she knew everything. She’d read all the books that I’ve always meant to read, and she could play the piano wonderfully, as I might if I only hadn’t stopped practicing. And somehow I felt she never lost her temper as I do, and that everybody who knew her must love her. I don’t know how I knew all these things, for she didn’t tell me. I just sort of felt them the way you do in dreams. Still I didn’t know who she was, and she wouldn’t tell me, so I asked the man, and he said: ‘Why, haven’t you found out yet? She’s the girl you might have been.’” —Record of Christian Work.
The Foreign Field at Home
By O. A. OLSEN
“And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven.”
That there is an over-ruling Providence directing and guiding all the events and affairs of our world all must admit. “Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure.”
The Gospel to All the World
The fullness of the time having come for the fulfillment of the great prophetic message of Rev. 14: 6, 7, represented by an angel flying “in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people,” preparatory to the coming of the Lord in glory, we find ourselves in the peculiar position that right here within the confines of our own country, every nation, tongue, and people on the earth is represented, not by a few isolated members, but by thousands and millions, to the extent that one third of our entire population is reckoned as foreigners, and not only that, but they are still coming at the rate of nearly a million a year. During the fiscal year ended June 30, 1913, 1,197,892 immigrants landed on our shores, the second largest number coming in one year, the largest number being in 1907, when 1,285,349 immigrants were added to our population. It is difficult for any one to comprehend these figures. We have eighteen States in the Union that have a population of less than a million each. The immigration of last year was greater than the entire population of Nebraska in 1910, and greater than the population of the two Dakotas in 1910, and greater than the combined population of Colorado and Montana in 1910. Think what that means.
As many as sixty languages, and sometimes even more, are spoken in one city. There is nothing like it in any other country in the world. And to further show how general the foreign element has become, one writer in New America is responsible for the statement that “it was found that 57.8 per cent of the pupils in our schools were children of foreign-born fathers,” and in some of our cities, like “Chelsea (Mass.) and Duluth (Minn.), 74.1 per cent were foreign. New York had 71.5 per cent; Chicago, 67.3 per cent; and Boston, 63.5 per cent.”
QUEEN'S SEMINARY, LAGRANGE, ILL.
These statements show what a vast and important foreign field for missionary effort is present right here in America, and if it is a duty for Christians to be interested in people in far-away countries who are in need of the soul-saving gospel, is it not even more their duty to bring the same soul-saving gospel to these very same people whom the providence of God has brought to our very shores? We answer most emphatically, Yes.
The time has come when the whole earth is to be lighted with the glory of the Lord. This great missionary movement is of the Lord, and the coming of all these millions of foreigners during these past few years is also of the Lord; and with their coming a great responsibility is laid on all Christian people, and especially on those to whom God has committed the great closing message to all the world.
What Is Being Done
Something is being done, and the results, too, are very encouraging. The Congregationalists are working among 26 different nationalities, and support 422 salaried workers; the Baptists (North) are working in 24 languages, with 814 salaried workers; the Presbyterians, in 15 languages, with 319 salaried workers; Methodists (North), in 8 languages, with 1,100 in the field. Besides these the various bodies of Lutherans, Disciples, Moravians, etc., are at work with good success. Mention may also be made of the American Bible Society, American Tract Society, Y. M. C. A., Y. W. C. A., and the Salvation Army.
We Seventh-day Adventists have taken a deep interest in foreign missions. The message due the world at this time demands this. While none too much has been done in foreign lands, our work for the foreigners in the homeland has been too much neglected. If this had been taken hold of with the same energy and earnestness that we have shown for the field abroad, the results would have been different here, and the work among foreigners here would have contributed much to the success of the work among the same peoples abroad. This has been our experience with the work among Germans and Scandinavians in the United States and Canada.
Publications are being issued by us in seventy-five different languages and dialects. We pass by any special mention of the work among the Germans and Scandinavians, as that is well under way and so well known. In America only the smallest beginning has been made in such localities as Boston, New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Cleveland, Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul, St. Louis, Minneapolis, and a large number of our cities and country places, among the Russians, Frenchmen, Hungarians, Slavonians, Jews, Italians, Roumanians, Servians, Finns, Bohemians, and Spaniards. Besides these, we have representatives making what we may call a beginning among the Poles, Austrians, Greeks, Lithuanians, Esthonians, Syrians, Chinese, and Japanese.
IN THE GHETTO, NEW YORK CITY. COPYRIGHT BY UNDERWOOD AND UNDERWOOD, NEW YORK.
Of a recent conference in western Canada the report states that “scriptures were read, hymns were sung, and testimonies were borne in seventeen different languages spoken by various nationalities present.” Space forbids entering into details of experience in various city centers.
The Work Among the Jews
At the beginning of 1914 there were about two and one-half million Jews on this continent, located largely in New York, Chicago, and other large cities of our nation.
The Jews are a difficult people to work among. As one writer puts it: “He [the Jew] knows Christianity from its worst side, and he does not always see it in these missions from its best side.”29
“There have been many obstacles in the way of reaching the Jews, but by degrees these are largely being overcome, especially by the Seventh-day Adventists. The fact that these people believe in the Old Testament as well as in the New Testament, observe the seventh day for the Sabbath of Jehovah, as well as have faith in the Bible as a whole, is doing a great deal to break down the deep-seated and bitter prejudice of the Jews toward Christianity.”
Publishing
Our foreign publishing house for America, the International Publishing Association (College View, Nebr.), employs about thirty-five workers, among whom are editors and corresponding secretaries for the different languages. Ten periodicals are issued, the leading ones being Christlicher Hausfreund in the German, Evangelists Sendebud in the Danish-Norwegian, and Tidens Tecken in the Swedish. Only two post offices in Nebraska — those of Omaha and Lincoln — handle a larger volume of second-class mail matter than the post office at College View, Nebr., handles.
The amount of literature distributed by this institution has steadily increased from a value of $20,000 to $40,000 annually. This literature is divided among thirty-two foreign languages, as follows: Arabic, Armenian, Bohemian, Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian, Danish-Norwegian, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Holland, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Lettish, Lithuanian, Polish, Portuguese, Roumanian, Russian, Servian, Slovakian, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish, Welsh, Wendish, and Yiddish. (A complete catalogue of these publications will be sent free by addressing the International Publishing Association, College View, Nebr.)
The Call for Workers
I need not speak here in detail of the work among the Germans, the Scandinavians, Russians, and French, as this is already on a good footing. In the Russian department in Sheyenne River Academy (North Dakota) we have fine young men in training for the work among the Russians.
The French department at the South Lancaster Academy (Massachusetts) is doing a good work for us. During 1913 we had the joy of ordaining to the gospel ministry from among the foreigners, one Hungarian, one Servian, and two Russians.
While we are glad for every additional worker, we still feel so utterly helpless in the face of such multitudes of foreigners everywhere, for scores of workers are needed where we have, maybe, but one. From the Finns are coming most urgent calls for help, from various parts of the country.
An interesting call that illustrates the demand from many parts came to us from St. Louis. The Servians there were asking for a minister to come and teach them the truth, and a Servian brother has gone to fill that call. Our most urgent need is workers, earnest, God-fearing soul winners, filled with divine love and a passion for souls, and for this purpose we must have —
Training Missions
at important centers, in charge of persons of proper fitness and experience to give instruction and direct the work to the best advantage.
We find numbers of various nationalities that would gladly connect with such a mission training school for the purpose of working for their own people, and it is a fact that we might have a good strong force where we have none today. For the lack of proper instruction many are not doing what they might do, nor what the Lord has called them to do. We plead for the way to open for workers to bring the message of salvation to these benighted souls. I cannot press the urgency of this matter too strongly. We are already far behind where we ought to be.
Our Foreign Seminaries
Our three foreign seminaries — German, Swedish, and Danish-Norwegian — are doing excellent work. The attendance and interest are growing year by year. This is only the fourth year, but already they have furnished sixteen workers for foreign fields abroad, and sixty-two have permanently entered various lines of missionary work — the ministry, Bible work, etc. — in the homeland. This does not include the students that go out as helpers in tent meetings or as colporteurs during the summer vacation, but only those that have entered the work permanently.
An Appeal to Our People
In closing this article, I can but renew my appeal to my Christian brethren and sisters everywhere to take a real interest in this great foreign mission problem, and to make it a subject of earnest prayer. Workers are needed, but we also need funds with which to support the workers. More could have been done had the funds been on hand with which to carry on the work in our great cities.
Then here is our literature in these many tongues and languages. It will do nobody any good so long as it remains on the shelves of our publishing houses and tract societies. This literature must be circulated, it must be placed in the hands of the people who need it. Here is an opportunity for hundreds of our people to help forward the message of salvation among the foreigners. No matter if one speaks only the English language, he can deal out literature to any of these foreigners. The tract societies or our publishing houses will have the publications on hand and will gladly fill orders. And our department will be glad to send catalogues of our foreign publications, and to aid in any way possible. Our time to work is limited; what is to be done must be done quickly.
THE INTERNATIONAL FOREIGN PUBLISHING HOUSE CO., LOS ANGELES, CAL.
O. A. OLSEN,
Secretary N. Amer. Foreign Department.
AN ITALIAN CHURCH IN CHICAGO
Mother Tongues in America
THERE will soon be issued by the Bureau of the Census statistics concerning the mother tongue, or native language, of the foreign white stock of the United States.
These figures possess a peculiar significance in that they offer us for the first time a fairly accurate picture of the ethnic composition of our foreign white stock. Of the total population of this country in 1910, 32,243,382, or a trifle more than one third, were whites of foreign parentage. The eight major mother tongue stocks, accounting for 87.5 per cent of the total, are as follows:—
Mother Tongue
Number
Per cent Distribution
English
10,037,420
31.1
German
8,817,271
27.3
Italian
2,151,422
6.7
Polish
1,707,640
5.3
Yiddish and Hebrew
1,676,762
5.2
Swedish
1,445,869
4.5
French
1,357,169
4.2
Norwegian
1,009,854
3.1
Totals
28,203,407
87.5
Other mother tongues
4,039,975
12.5
All mother tongues
32,243,382
100.0
It is interesting to note that English or German was the ancestral language of nearly three fifths of the foreign white stock of this country. — William B. Bailey, assistant professor of political economy, Yale University, in the Independent.
ARABS LISTENING TO THE ALGERIAN STORY-TELLER.
The Algerian Story-Teller
By J. C. GUENIN
A GROUP of Arabs listening to a story-teller, as seen in the picture, is a common sight in Algeria, where the art of story-telling is recognized as a profession.
We are here, a few of us, trying to tell these people the greatest story of all,—the story of a Saviour's love. Difficulties abound in Algeria. The evangelization of the Mohammedans of North Africa is certainly a problem. They are extremely fanatical and superstitious, and are fatalists.
The very word Mussulman, translated, means a man resigned to the will of Allah. They consider that every step of their lives is regulated by fate. But the gospel message of Christ's soon coming is to be preached to every nation, tribe, and people. This includes the Arab, and we are endeavoring to sow the seed in faith, and in hope of the coming harvest.
