PAM. 
 
 MISCi 
 
 
 
 “ I do not believe in foreign missions. 
 They are too far away. There is too 
 much to be done at home. ” 
 
 5 
 
 GREAT 
 
 REASONS 
 
 ---- F O R - 
 
 FOREIGN 
 
 MISSIONS 
 
 By 
 
 HENRY F. COL EY, D.D. 
 
FIVE GREAT REASONS FOR FOREIGN MISSIONS 
 
 By FIENRY F. COLBY, D.D. 
 
 “/ do 7iot believe ifi Foreign Missions. Fhey are too far away. Fhere is too much to be done at home. 
 
 WATT A T TTTI F MY F R I F" N ' ARE YOU SURE YOU ARE NOT HASTY IN TI^AT CONCLUSION? HERE ARE 
 v\/Ail /I -L pivE GREAT REASONS WHY YOU AS A CHRISTIAN OUGHT TO BE INTERESTED 
 
 IN FOREIGN MISSIONS. KINDLY READ THEM AND GIVE THEM A FEW MOMENTS’ THOUGHT - 
 
 FIRST OF ALL 
 
 The Lord Jesus Christ's own positive command. 
 Read it in Matthew 28, 19, “ Go ye, therefore, 
 
 and make disciples of all nations.” After his resur¬ 
 rection and before his ascension this was the duty 
 he would solemnly impress upon his followers. 
 With it he linked the precious promise: “ Lo, I 
 am with you alway, even unto the end oi the 
 world.” Was the order meant for those first dis¬ 
 ciples only ? Did he expect that they could so 
 complete the work that subsequent generations 
 would have none of it to do? If this is not bind¬ 
 ing on us, are any of his commands ? Can we 
 find a single excuse for disobeying it which could 
 not have been found by the apostles ? What right 
 have we to appropriate the promise and not the 
 command ? And how can we say that we are ful¬ 
 filling it by simply trying to bring to Christ some 
 one who is near us ? It evidently implies a world¬ 
 wide horizon for our thoughts, our sympathies, our 
 prayers and our giving. The Duke of Wellington, 
 it is said, once replied to a professing Christian who 
 expressed doubt as to the expediency of missions: 
 “Look to your marching orders!” So we start 
 with this. How can we get away from it ? The 
 Lord’s own positive command ! 
 
 SECOND 
 
 The very nature of the gospel. The greatest 
 missionary text is “God so loved the zvorld." 
 Note the scope ot that word! Jesus Christ came 
 to express a compassion and offer a salvation limited 
 to no one people. The necessity he came to sup¬ 
 ply is as wide as the realm ol sin and sorrow. If 
 he is the Saviour that you and I need he is the 
 Saviour for all men everywhere. The distinction 
 between “home” and “foreign” melts away 
 under the light that beams from the Cross. As 
 well ask the rays that pour down from the sun to 
 confine their light and heat to limited areas of the 
 earth’s surface as to try to restrain the love of 
 Christ within local prejudices and preferences. 
 The gospel from its very nature must flow over 
 the earth, even if Christ had formulated no Great 
 Commission. 
 
 THIK.D 
 
 Our own personal obligations to foreign missions. 
 Christianity did not originate here any more than in 
 India, China or Japan. It was brought here. 
 Are not we as far away from its first field in Pales¬ 
 tine as are the heathen countries just mentioned ? 
 The first movements of Christian advance were 
 
 determined by the fact that all roads lead to Rome. 
 If the world’s metropolis had then been to the 
 East and not to the West evangelization would 
 have moved eastward and not westward. Then 
 if India had received the gospel thus before us 
 would it not have been India’s duty to send it to 
 England and America ? We have it because the 
 first disciples and many subsequent generations of 
 believers obeyed Christ’s command. Shall we be 
 slack in passing it on? Shall w’e say, “It has 
 now reached its final goal and can rest, because, 
 forsooth, it has come to us? That would be sel¬ 
 fishness indeed. “ Freely ye have received ; freely 
 give ! ” 
 
 FOUR^TH 
 
 The extent to which God has blessed them. Take 
 for example the missions of the American Baptist 
 Missionary Union. There have been in eighty- 
 nine years about 300,000 converts in the missions 
 established or aided by the Union. These have 
 been gathered from twenty different countries. 
 There are living today more than 222,000 church 
 members under the care of the missionaries of 
 the Union. Over 113,000 of these are in 
 heathen Asia and Africa. Think of the rescue 
 of all these souls from the darkness of ignorance 
 
and superstition, the curse of sin and the power 
 of evil! They give as good evidence of real 
 conversion and true allegiance to our Lord as con¬ 
 verts in England or America. Remember also that 
 this statement means not merely so many individuals 
 brought to confess openly their faith in Christ and 
 trained in the Christian life, but all the multiform 
 and uplifting agencies which go with such a work, 
 namely, churches, schools, theological seminaries, 
 hospitals, printing presses, happy homes and en¬ 
 lightened customs. Nor are the Baptists alone in 
 such successes. The missions of several other de¬ 
 nominations have been crowned with similar bless¬ 
 ings. As to the results of foreign missions in 
 general. Sir Bartle Frere, lately English Governor 
 at Bombay, says : “I assure you, that what¬ 
 ever may be told to the contrary, the teach¬ 
 ing of Christianity among one hundred and sixty 
 millions of Hindus and Mohammedans in India is 
 effecting changes, moral, civil, and political, which 
 for extent and rapidity are far more extraordinary 
 than you and your fathers have witnessed in modern 
 Europe.” This is only a specimen of the testi¬ 
 monies that can be produced, not from prejudiced 
 heathen or hasty worldly tourists but from men in 
 high official position. God has put upon missions 
 the sea! of his peculiar blessing. 
 
 FIFTH 
 
 Their reflex influence. How rich has this 
 been! We might in advance expect this to be 
 the case. A fire hot enough to warm the distant 
 corners of a large apartment mi^st surely diffuse a 
 genial glow in the circle close around it. Who 
 are doing the most work at home for Christ ? Are 
 they not always those who are most deeply inter- 
 
ested in the spread of the gospel abroad ? It is an 
 historical fact that our denomination received a 
 wonderful impulse in all its life from the beginning 
 of the foreign missionary enterprise by Adoniram 
 Judson and Luther Rice. Then our churches be¬ 
 gan to draw together in closer unity. Then were 
 started many of our schools and colleges. Then 
 spiritual growth and numerical increase be¬ 
 came at once observable. It is by reaching forth 
 its branches that a tree’s centre of life grows 
 stronger. It has been well said that religion is a 
 commodity of such peculiar sort that the more of 
 it we export the more of it we have at home. Oh, 
 when will all Christ’s people awake to realize that 
 this is the case ! What vast blessings by the work¬ 
 ing of this spiritual law the Lord must have in re¬ 
 serve to bestow upon his churches when they fully 
 respond to the call of his Great Commission ! 
 
 And so we have at least these five great reasons : 
 Christ’s own positive command, the out-reach¬ 
 ing spirit of the gospel, our own obligations to 
 missions, the greatness of God’s blessing upon 
 them, and their beneficent reflex influence on 
 our work at home. Put these five reasons, my 
 friend, on the fingers of your right hand ; then 
 shut your hand and hold them fast! Do not let 
 them get away from you! They are sound and 
 strong and binding upon us all. 
 
 Literature Department 
 American Baptist Missionary Union 
 BOSTON, MASS. 
 
 3 Ed. 11-03-25M 
 
 Eastern Printing & Engraving Co., 287 Atlantic Avenue, Boston