CHAPTER XVIII — Beyond the Western Hemisphere
CHAPTER XVIII --- Beyond the Western Hemisphere XVIII. BEYOND THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE
BY OLAN L. HICKS
I am happy to be present on this occasion, as I feel that we are here today witnessing an event of great historic sig¬nificance. Perhaps none of us here realizes the extent of influence and the changes which may result in the world as a result of the inspiration and encouragement which are being aroused during these lectures.
“Beyond the Western Hemisphere” is the title of the subject I am to speak, about. But I want it clearly understood that I am not here as the special exponent or advocate of either foreign missions or home missions exclusively. I am here as an advocate of going “into all the world and preaching the gospel to every creature.” I cannot say that one type of missionary work is more important than another—whether it is more important to preach in Judea or Samaria or in the uttermost parts of the earth. This much I know: Our job is to preach it in all of them.
Christians are under an obligation to cultivate a large horizon, and to cherish large views. Lord Salisbury, the great English Prime Minister, when seeking to persuade certain of his associates to adopt the world-wide policies which he advocated, said to them, “Gentlemen, you should study larger maps.” My brethren, ;n the past we have studied too small maps.
We have heard much in recent months about the unity of the world. Wendell Willkie.’s One World became a best seller. Men no longer think in terms of isolated little com¬munities; they no longer pass their years in little pastoral neighborhoods, quiet and unaware of the. rest of the world, undisturbed by the rush and hurry of civilization. Our world is so closely knit and linked up that what men in any section of it do and think vitally effects the affairs of men in every other section of the world. The bushmen of Australia, the. junglemen of Africa, the hilimen of India, the remote peasants of China, the Indian peons of Mexico and South America— they are all a part of the world’s confusion and hysteria. Great plantations, mass production, regimentation, world policies and politics, race prejudice, and world trade have become factors in the lives of all people, and thereby have made us “one world.”
Even more significant, the people of all the world are victims if propaganda from all over the world. The spread of isms throughout the world is a serious lesson to the church that preaching the gospel, if it is ever to be done effectively, is a world-wide job. This means that if Christianity is to become a dominating force it must be planted on a world scale. Christianity is a world-religion.
Now we as a people have been glib at quoting the great commission. We have used it perhaps more than any other religious group; but our use of it has been faulty. We quoted it all, but we saw only that part of it dea'ing with baptism. This we used powerfully to discomfit the gainsayer. But while we were lampooning him for ignoring the command regarding Baptism, we were laying ourselves open to even sterner condemnation by ignoring the part which commands us to preach the gospel to the whole world. It comes with poor grace to claim that we have the only true teaching, and then to sit idly with it and not urge it upon the hearts of all the world. In the heaits of thinking men there must be some doubt of our complete sincerity. Others whom we pity and hold to be in error pur us to shame and condemn us by¬proclaiming all over the world what they believe to be the gospel. But we are waking up. The greatly increased amount of evangelistic work that is being done is a gratifying thing to contemplate. The ideal of going into all the world to preach the gospel is really beginning to take fire with hundreds of our congregations. It is cause for rejoicing when we think of the remarkable contrast between conditions along that line now and fifteen years ago. But we must remember that we have not arrived—but only started. The world’s multiplied millions still stand untouched by the gospel. But let us consider some of the fields beyond the western hemisphere. In the Hawaiian Islands where over 500,000 people live we have only one small congregation of about seventy members, most of whom are service personnel. At the present time we face brighter prospects in this great “crossroads of the Pacific” area than we have ever had before. Our work in the Isles, though nothing to boast of, dates back to 1920. It has been largely due to the faith and loyalty of service personnel stationed there from time to time that the church has gained the footing it has. We now have a commodious house of worship in one of the older sections of the city of Honolulu, thanks to the leadership of the Ferris, Texas, church who also sent the evangelist, Osby Weaver, there for two years’ work.
He was followed in the work by Homer Hailey, who is to be assisted by Haskell Chesshir and Bill Patterson. Hailey reports that, with all we have done in the past, the church is not yet firmly established in the Islands. There are only about twelve or fifteen permanent residents among the membership of the congregation. The church is placing special stress upon teaching the local inhabitants of the city. Vacation Bible schools for the children, house to house teaching, more advanced Bible school work for those accept¬ing it, as well as the beginning of a Bible training school to be conducted by Hailey for young men who are to assist in the work in the Islands in the future. Some of these men will attend the University of Hawaii part time also and will receive aid under the GI Bill of Rights.
Among the hundreds of thousands of the isles where the Catholics, the Protestants and Oriental religions have great followings, and where the Mormons have erected a temple second only to the one in Salt Lake City, certainly our efforts to date must seem small. But there is no need for dismay. Here is one of our great opportunities. The ground is broken and recent results show the natives are open to teaching. What we need is scores of trained, earnest workers to go into “the isles of enchantment.”
Still farther away in the Pacific lie Australia and New Zealand. Both of these countries are new in spirit much as our own country. They still have the flavor and spirit of the frontier and much of their heritage is identical with our own. We have a common background in a love for liberty, in fundamental laws, and in our mother tongue. In fact, a person from either of these countries would get along well in your community or mine. Many of our young men who were stationed among them during the war learned that we could live in their country without too many or too great adjustments. At one time the Restoration Movement had a strong hold in each of these countries, but as the division of instrumental music in the worship and the use of the Missionary Society as an agency for preaching the gospel arose, our position in these countries grew more and more precarious. Workers sent out by the Missionary Society carried the church along with them on the wave of popular enthusiasm and by telling them that all the brethren in the States were of the same mind on these matters.
Only a very few remained loyal to the old paths and they were left to shift for themselves, as we did not supply them with preachers or other encouragement. Now we have only handfuls in each of these countries and so far as I know, only one full time preacher is being supported to work among them. This is brother Colin B. Smith and according to reports he is finding the task anything but easy.
There are a number of reasons why his task is hard. There is the dominant strength of the Catholic Church, whose members occupy high places of state and whose officials wield a very great influence on national policies and prac¬tices. It is clearly evident that the Catholic clergy has for¬gotten the resolution passed by their church in Port Phillip in 1839. Their present day intolerance may be seen by an experience told by one of the servicemen who was recently stationed at Gilford. While a meeting in Auborn was in progress, with preaching being held two nights each week, the talents of the young men were being used as much as possible. This young serviceman was a speaker one night After the service he stepped outside the building and was surprised to see a man and a priest conversing in low tones, just beyond the hall. He called this to the attention of one of the young men, who told him that he was late in getting to the meeting and when he arrived these two men were standing outside the doorway in the hall “listening in”-on what was taking place. Not a great deal more was thought about the incident until a few weeks later, when Brother Smith called on the caretaker of the hall to pay the rent. Then he was questioned sharply concerning “the tall American chap who has been preaching here” and whether he “sanctioned the things the American said.” He then stated that there were complaints registered against holding meetings in the hall.
Besides the problem of Catholic opposition there is also a general decline in religious interest among these people during the last generation, which particularly coincides with the growing revolution in political conditions toward intol¬erance and regimentation. The labor party is at present in power, with a strong Communistic element involved. Con¬fusion and turmoil are characteristic of governmental admin¬istration. Many of the high officials are of Catholic faith and some reports indicate that as high as 90% of public service personnel are Catholics.
Importation of literature and books is closely censored. “The most harmless books are peremptorily banned by the Minister of Customs—whoever he may be at the time.” H. G. Wells, after having visited Australia commented, “A barrier of illiterate policemen and officials stands between the tender Australian mind and what they imagine to be subversive literature.” Realizing that loyal Catholic men in practically all cases constitute the “policemen and officials” it becomes understandable that they feel particularly inclined to protect the tender minds of their own faith. As a result, persons of “other persuasions” find it more and more difficult to obtain books or literature except such as approved by the censor or customs officials. During this emergency the printing business is closely regimented and printing of non-essential publications is restricted. Comparatively little religious material is published (and that which is available exhorbi- tantly high priced). The people depend to a large extent on imported Bibles and religious material to supply their needs and this importation is gradually being more and more restricted by customs regulations.
Added to this is the strong negative influence exercised by the group there which nearly corresponds to the Christian Church in the United States. In fact, the ties between them are rather strong. Their prejudices against us are extreme and wherever Brother Smith and his helpers make an effort to plant the gospel, these men are busy with every means at their disposal to counteract it.
I believe it is safe to say that we have no braver or more courageous soul among us today than Colin B. Smith, who has dared to face all of the problems, prejudices, and oppo¬sition in Australia almost single-handed. In the area of Aus¬tralia, New Zealand, and New Guinea there are between twelve to fourteen millions of people. Certainly young men could find no greater challenge than this to go into the new land where the gospel is needed to spend their lives to establish the church in strength. As we look in the opposite direction from our home land we see Europe with its more than four hundred millions of people. Due to the war millions of these people have been displaced. Germany, Holland, Belgium, France, Euro¬pean Russia, Poland, Italy, Greece, Austria, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Switzerland, Spain, and other countries all call for our help in preaching the gospel. Men in the service who were stationed in these countries can testify to the fact that people in all these countries have the same kind of hearts as we—the same needs, the same yearnings, the same joys, and the same need for the hope of the gospel. In various places our men found families or even small groups of people intelligently seeking for the truth and in many instances these groups occupied a position nearly akin to our own. They are seeking for simple New Testa¬ment Christianity without hindrance of Pope, prelate, or denominationalism. In Marseille, France, our men succeeded in baptizing five fine persons. Perhaps there were others in isolated instances. In Germany there were found to be thousands of people who occupy a religious position very closely resem¬bling our own. Even England is a strong challenge to our efforts in preaching the gospel, for there the cause is not too strong in spite of the fact that the church has been in exist¬ence there for over one hundred years.
AFRICA WITH ITS ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY-EIGHT MILLIONS
In South Africa there is a field of labor among English speaking white people as rich as is to be found for gospel labors in almost any other country. We have only a few churches there, among, I believe, its six million English speaking white inhabitants. We have had several families to spend much of their lives in labors among the natives of Rhodesia and their labors have been very fruitful, but even so we have not begun to touch the great task of evangelizing the dark depths of the dark continent. Too long we have dreaded the problem and have felt that missionary work was a thing for somebody else but never for ourselves. We have even discouraged our children from the tasks (and the joys) of becoming evangelists to far away people. We were too selfish and loved the cause too little. But if we are ever to reach the many nations of the earth with the gospel we shall have to sell our children on the idea as denominations do, to encourage our children to go into the dark lands and heavy tasks and look with pride upon a son or a daughter who is far away in such labors. In Asia alone there are one billion and one hundred and fifty-four million inhabitants, exclusive of 175 million in the Russian section, according to the 1943 International Yearbook. When Ave think of the vast lands of China, Japan, Korea and India, the imagination is staggered. In China alone there are four hundred and sixty-five million inhab¬itants and in India there are more than three hundred and twenty millions, or six times as many people in these two countries as in the entire United States. We have begun work in some of these lands only to fold up a few years later and practically surrender the field when usual circum-stances arose.
Closer allied to our own country by ties of protection and common interests are the Philippine Islands, with their seventeen million people. In the past we have done consid¬erable work on these Isles and our present prospects are very encouraging. What we need to do is to catch the tide while it is at the crest, while both opportunity in the lands away and an attitude to preach the gospel on the part of the brethren at home are in evidence. In conclusion, I should like to suggest that our congre-gations seek out methods of closer cooperation for the carry¬ing on of missionary work both at home and abroad and that our schools inaugurate intense courses of training marked out carefully to equip students for entering both the various foreign fields as well as fields at home. We must either start acting upon our preaching or in consistency quit talking about the “great commission.”
We need to learn the urgency of preaching the gospel. Chaplain Shirley Morgan, who was only recently separated from the service, told me of an incident which occurred in the far away Pacific Isles. He was talking with a group of other chaplains from numerous religious bodies, Catholics, Pentecostal, Baptist, and others. Having placed his position firmly and clearly before the group, one of them in all sincerity interrupted, “Chaplain Morgan, do you really believe what you have just said?” To which Chaplain Morgan replied of course that he did. Then the other chaplain answered, “Why, if I believed as you say that you do I could not rest day or night until I had pressed my belief upon the attention of every responsible person I could reach.” We need that sense of the value of the gospel.
WHY MUST THE CHURCH BE MISSIONARY?
The church must be missionary because its message is the only message of salvation for a lost world. All the new knowledge of even the atomic age has disclosed nothing that is at variance with or can supersede this awful fact. Those who claim to be Christian and are not concerned about bringing others to Christ tacitly admit their hypocrisy.
Any church which is not dreaming and planning its work in terms of preaching the gospel to all men is tacitly admitting that it has no message for any man. The church must be missionary because the gospel is for all men—not just for a few fortunate who by no merit of their own chanced to be the ones who have thus far received it. Jesus said, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.” It is not a message for caste, class or clime, but for all men. Its validity knows no limita¬tions either of geography or time. It has survived the end of more than one age and the collapse of many political and economic dynasties. It is timeless in its appeal and power. The church must be missionary from the purely selfish reason of self-defense. The church which is not missionary is a dying church. Those congregations which are most concerned about and doing the most in evangelistic work are the healthiest and strongest from every point of consid¬eration. It is through the medium of such missionary activity that the church keeps its pulse quickened and its life blood pure. Otherwise, we shall become ingrown and wither. The church must preach the gospel to all men if we hope for peace on earth. The experiences and tragedies of the past fifty or one hundred years should teach us that no valid faith can be put in the unilateral treaties of men and nations. We must put our trust in God’s way. If one-ten- thousand ih part as much had been spent to preach the gospel to the whole world during the last fifty years as has been spent as the result of war during the past ten, there would have been no such horrible war. The church must pleach the gospel because, it has the only weapon which can successfully combat the collective evils of our complex and sinful age. It is the leaven which can leaven the whole lump.
Christians must preach the gospel of salvation to all men everywhere in order to be saved themselves. It is useless ico depend on the Lord to save us if we do not try to save others as we make the Christian journey.
“The field is white unto gleaning; pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest that He send forth reapers.”