2. The Word of God, the Fundamental and Final Reliance.

Other factors and influences may intervene, accompany, or follow the administration of the divine Word and ordinances, to prepare the way, remove prejudice, gain a hearing, and the like, but no power or means except the Word of the living God can convert the heart and accomplish the aim of missions. The Word of God. exerts its power in different forms.

The spoken Word. The divine command is not, to begin mission work by sending Bibles to the heathen, but to preach the Gospel. That always implies oral testimony, the living voice, the personal witness. And such proclamation, declaration, or witnessing, in order to be intelligible and effective, must be made in the language of the people to be reached. Whatever use may have been made of interpreters in the past, whether from motives of convenience and ease, or as emergencies required, that method is discarded today in all permanent mission work. The first task of the young missionary, and it is often a trying, laborious task, is to acquire the language of the natives.

This

The Word in the form of "living epistles." is the divine Word as it has become flesh and blood, principle and life, in Christian disciples and workers, as it is reflected in the Christian life and walk of missionaries and their families, as well as in the lives of the native Christians who have been won by the Gospel. These "children of the kingdom" are also a species of "good seed" sown upon the soil of heathendom, and it has the promise of rich fruitage. These Christian lives are an object lesson set before the heathen, one which they can read and understand even before the Gospel has been preached to them or they are able to compre

hend it. Livingstone, Schwartz, Paton, and many other experienced missionaries have given striking illustrations of this important phase of the missionary life. It is this fact that has led heathens to confess: "We have not heard your teachings, but we have seen it."

The printed Word. The Holy Scriptures in the native tongue must accompany and follow the missionary. Sometimes the printed Word has been carried in advance of the missionary and prepared the way for his coming, though this is exceptional. In some cases the printed page goes where the living voice cannot be heard. The printed Scriptures are indispensable to the permanence of the work. The aim is to make Christian disciples and establish Christian churches. And these, in order to be true and enduring, must be built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone. The Nestorian mission in China and the Roman Catholic mission in Japan made no provision for giving the printed Word to the people; and these missions disappeared. On the other hand, the open Bible saved Madagascar amid the bloody persecution that swept for a quarter of a century over the newly established churches.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE MISSIONARY: HIS CHARACTER AND
QUALIFICATIONS.

I. General Importance of the Subject.

Apart from the missionary himself, this topic is of great importance to the Church at large, to the pastor and to every Christian. The Church must supply and select, send forth and sustain the missionaries. The latter go forth and labor in a representative capacity, to do in person and in the service of the Lord and of the Church the work which the Lord of the harvest has assigned to His Church. It is, therefore, important to understand what sort of workers are needed and what qualifications are required. Moreover, such consideration should put Christians in mind of the life which they ought earnestly to cultivate in their churches, seeing that the missionaries, like workers generally, reflect the life of the home church.

To pastors and students of theology this topic is of particular importance because of the need of missionary-spirited pastors in every parish. Dr. A. C. Thompson, in one of his lectures to students, under the heading, "Every minister a missionary," says: "Whoever in the sacred office remains at home is on this account none the less held to service in the general cause.”1 This phase of the subject will be more fully discussed in a later chapter.

1 Foreign Missions, p. 4.

2. Fundamental Character and Characteristics. Certain qualifications are common to all workers in the Lord's vineyard- and that includes all disciples and professing Christians at home and abroad, in mission fields and established parishes, in all ranks and stations, It is to be hoped and desired that they appear in keen and intensified form in leaders, pastors and missionaries, but the latter are not different in kind from the rank and file of Christians. Among such general Christian qualifications may be mentioned: Faith, and love, and profound interest in the work.

The spiritual gifts of faith and love. These make and pervade the Christian life and make it a force in spreading the light and life that Christ brought into the world. And this is a fundamental qualification in the missionary. He is a messenger, sent of God to bear the message of salvation to men. He is to "preach the Gospel of peace," and bring to the poverty-stricken and perishing of mankind the unsearchable riches of Christ. In the preparatory stages of mission work preaching, oral teaching and testimony, precedes the spreading of the truth in written form. And it remains one of the chief functions of the missionary throughout his career. The Lord in His wisdom and mercy has provided that His message to mankind be conveyed and delivered by living agents; men sinful and faulty in themselves, but saved and sanctified by grace, and able and eager to tell to others what the Lord has done for them. It would not suffice to send Bibles to the heathen, even though they were able to read the Word in their own tongue.1 This is the qualification that makes every true Christian a missionary. Living faith is followed by confes

Reflect on Mark 16, 15; Acts 1, 8; Matth. 24, 14.

sion, impels to utterance, as it is written: "I believe, and therefore have I spoken; we also believe and therefore speak." What we have received is not only to be kept, but to be communicated. If Christ has become all in all to us, we will want to make Him known to others, that He may become their possession, too.

Intelligent and whole-souled interest in the missionary enterprise. There must be ability and willingness to get a broad and deep grasp of the work in the light of God's Word. What is needed in the efficient and successful worker is personal devotion that is not fitful and transitory, but abiding and growing. If we have embraced Christ as our Savior and Lord, it is for life, and that implies service for life. That should be the motto and watchword both for the Christian at home and for the missionary abroad-life service. Nothing less than that purpose is worthy of a disciple of Him who said, "My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me, and to finish His work;" and again: "I must work the works of Him that sent me while it is day, the night cometh when no man can work."

If it is a piece of intolerable hypocrisy for a person to be only a nominal Christian, to make a Christian profession with the mouth while the heart is consciously far from God, much more intolerable and abominable is it in the pastor and missionary to presume to occupy the holy office from motives of carnal convenience or advantage, with no heart and life interest in the work. Matthew Henry has well said: "The Gospel ministry is a noble calling, but a wretched trade."