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 REV. WILLIAM E. LAMPE, PH. D. 
 
 I. The Field. 
 
 The Christian Church was instituted 
 that the gospel might be made universal. 
 Every part of the Church, every denom¬ 
 ination, every congregation, and every 
 individual is in duty bound to take its 
 or his part in the evangelization of the 
 world. Our first duty is to those next 
 to us and right about us, but our respon¬ 
 sibility includes every person everywhere 
 in the world. We must, however, local¬ 
 ize and make definite our responsibility, 
 and this has been or is being done by 
 practically every denomination. What 
 then is the definite missionary responsi¬ 
 bility of the Reformed Church at home 
 and abroad? 
 
 The population of the United States, 
 according to the census of 1910, not in¬ 
 cluding Alaska or our island possessions, 
 is 91,972,266. Everyone of these persons 
 is entitled to the blessings and privileges 
 of Christianity. The communicant merm 
 
 1 
 
bership of all Christian Churches in the 
 United States, Protestant and Catholic, 
 but omitting the Christian Scientists and 
 Mormons, is 35,207,444. There are thus 
 56,764,822 men, women and children in 
 the United States, who are not full mem¬ 
 bers of any Christian Church. These 
 are the home missionary field of the 
 thirty-five millions of Christian Church 
 members. 
 
 The communicant Church members are 
 22,208,359 Protestants and 12,999,085 
 Roman and Greek Catholics. Assuming 
 that the entire responsibility for the evan¬ 
 gelization of the fifty-six millions of peo¬ 
 ple here in America, who are not now in 
 the Church, rests altogether upon the 
 twenty-two millions of Protestant 
 Church members, there are two and a 
 half persons outside of the Church to 
 every member in the Protestant Church. 
 
 On this basis the 300,000 (or 297,829, 
 to be exact) communicant members of 
 the Reformed Church are responsible for 
 the evangelization of 750,000 people here 
 in the United States, who are not full 
 members of the Church. It is a big task 
 for the Reformed Church to bring three- 
 quarters of a million of people into the 
 Church, but fortunately not all of these 
 are altogether outside of, or in any sense 
 opposed to the Church, for this number 
 includes our children and relatives of 
 whom 133,056 are already baptized, but 
 unconfirmed, members of the Reformed 
 Church. This leaves us about 650,000 
 
 2 
 
people still to reach. It is not the pur¬ 
 pose to state here where these other 650,- 
 000, who are the direct home missionary 
 responsibility of the Reformed Church, 
 are to be found, nor what is their nation¬ 
 ality. The several Home Mission Boards 
 of this country are now outlining their 
 policies and are accepting responsibility 
 for certain races or classes of people, or 
 for certain parts of states or other geo¬ 
 graphical divisions. 
 
 The Christian Churches of Europe and 
 America must evangelize the one thous¬ 
 and millions of people in Asia and Africa 
 who are still without the gospel. Every 
 country and practically every large field 
 in the non-Christian world has been en¬ 
 tered by some denomination of Europe 
 or America, but there are still 122,000,- 
 000 living in unoccupied fields for whom 
 no missionary provision whatever has 
 yet been made. Each denomination ac¬ 
 cepts the responsibility for'the evangel¬ 
 ization of the field in which it is now at 
 work. On the basis of work that is now 
 being done and of the strength of the 
 Christian forces in Christian lands, there 
 has been projected a world survey of 
 missionary occupation. 
 
 It is recognized that the Protestant 
 Churches of the United States and Can¬ 
 ada are responsible for the evangeliza¬ 
 tion of six hundred millions of non- 
 Christians. All of the leading denomina¬ 
 tions of the United States and Canada 
 have taken official action, assuming re- 
 
 3 
 
sponsibility for the fields in which they 
 are now at work and of some portion of 
 the fields as yet untouched. Some de¬ 
 nominations which are strongly mission¬ 
 ary in spirit have assumed a larger re¬ 
 sponsibility than their proportionate 
 Church membership. This is especially 
 true of the Presbyterians, North and 
 South, and of the Northern Methodists. 
 The Southern Presbyterian, a denomina¬ 
 tion just the size of the Reformed 
 Church, officially accepts responsibility 
 for twenty-five millions. The United 
 Presbyterians and Dutch Reformed, 
 neither of which denominations has half 
 as many members as we, will attempt to 
 evangelize fifteen millions and thirteen 
 millions respectively.. 
 
 The Reformed Church in the United 
 States in proportion to her membership 
 is responsible for the evangelization of a 
 little more than eight millions of people. 
 Our Board of Foreign Missions, in 
 March, 1909, adopted a policy, accepting 
 responsibility for the evangelization of 
 ten millions of people in non-Christian 
 lands. This has been ratified by the Gen¬ 
 eral Synod, all of the District Synods 
 and many of the Classes of the Church, 
 and has thus become our Foreign Mis¬ 
 sionary policy. 
 
 The ten millions of people in foreign 
 fields, for whom our Reformed Church 
 is responsible, are three and a half mil¬ 
 lions in North Japan, three and a half 
 
 4 
 
millions in Central China, in both of 
 which countries we have foreign mis¬ 
 sionaries now at work, and three millions 
 in the Mohammedan world, possibly 
 Arabia or Persia. 
 
 THE FIELD 
 
 The missionary task before the Re¬ 
 formed Church in the United States thus 
 involves a home missionary responsibility 
 for 750,000 people in America, and a for¬ 
 eign missionary responsibility for 10,000,- 
 000 in Japan, China and the Mohamme¬ 
 dan world. If we are faithful and if 
 each other denomination reaches the peo¬ 
 ple in its field the saving blessings of 
 Christianity may be offered to every per¬ 
 son living. 
 
II. The Force. 
 
 There are more than two hundred 
 thousand organized Protestant churches 
 in the United States. There are 148,431 
 ordained Protestant ministers, or one to 
 620 of the entire population, one to 149 
 Protestant members, or one to 382 per¬ 
 sons who are not yet members of any 
 Christian Church. In addition, there are 
 many Christian church members who are 
 giving all of their time to the work of 
 the Church in schools, hospitals, orphan¬ 
 ages and in other departments of church 
 work. 
 
 The Reformed Church has 1,193 min¬ 
 isters and 28 licentiates. Of the min¬ 
 isters 1,172 are in America and 21 in 
 Japan and China. Most of our min¬ 
 isters are pastors of self-supporting con¬ 
 gregations, but some are teachers, ed¬ 
 itors or secretaries. There are quite a 
 few in America who are not active pas¬ 
 tors, and usually three or four of our 
 twenty-one abroad are at home on fur¬ 
 lough. One hundred and sixty-six Re¬ 
 formed ministers are home missionaries 
 under the General Synod’s Board of 
 Home Missions and the Home Mission 
 Boards of the German Synods of the 
 Church. These 166 home missionaries 
 are in charge of 180 missions, which 
 have a membership of 21,539. We have 
 
 6 
 
here in America one ordained minister 
 to 254 Reformed Church members. 
 
 If we add together our present mem¬ 
 bership of approximately 300,000 and 
 the 750,000 people who constitute our 
 home missionary responsibility, it may 
 be said that the parish of the Reformed 
 Church in the home land is in round 
 numbers one million souls. If it were 
 possible to evenly distribute the 1,172 
 ministers and the 1,000,000 people—our 
 members and those without the Church— 
 each Reformed minister would have as a 
 parish 854 men, women and children. 
 Christian work in all denominations in 
 America is being retarded because of a 
 lack of ministers, and this is especially 
 true in the Reformed Church, for while 
 throughout the country there is one or¬ 
 dained minister to every 620 of our pop¬ 
 ulation, we have one minister to every 
 854 people in our field. We need more 
 ministers, both to become pastors of our 
 self-supporting congregations and to 
 carry forward our home missionary 
 work. 
 
 Every member of our Church should 
 be a home missionary. If every one of 
 us did his or her part and led three 
 others to Christ and into church mem¬ 
 bership, our home missionary problem 
 would be largely solved. But it is upon 
 our 1,172 ministers who reside in Amer- 
 
ica upon whom rests primarily the re¬ 
 sponsibility for bringing into the Re¬ 
 formed Church the 750,000 people who 
 constitute our home missionary responsi¬ 
 bility. This means that every one of our 
 ministers has still to reach 640 men, 
 women and children. This is the force 
 we have in America with which to do 
 our home missionary work, to solve our 
 home missionary problems, and to bring 
 into the Reformed Church the 750,000 
 non-church members for whom we are 
 responsible. 
 
 In foreign lands, where there are one 
 thousand millions of people yet to be 
 reached, there are 19,280 Protestant for¬ 
 eign missionaries at work, of whom 
 5,522 are ordained ministers. The parish 
 of each foreign missionary is thus about 
 fifty thousand people. There is one or¬ 
 dained foreign missionary to 181,094 
 people. This proportion would mean 
 two ordained ministers for our whole 
 Reformed Church, and four more for 
 our entire home missionary work. There 
 are missionaries’ wives, native workers, 
 pastors, evangelists, Bible women and 
 earnest Christians in foreign lands, just 
 as there are elders, Sunday School super¬ 
 intendents, pastors’ wives, deaconesses 
 and other workers in Christian lands, 
 who are of very great help in Christian 
 work. 
 
 s 
 
The Reformed Church is responsible 
 for the evangelization of ten millions of 
 people in foreign lands. We have made 
 beginnings in both Japan and China. No 
 provision whatever has yet been made 
 for any of the three millions of Moham¬ 
 medans, who will not be reached except 
 through our Church. Our foreign mis¬ 
 sionary forces are twenty-one ordained 
 men, two laymen and fifteen single wo¬ 
 men in Japan and China, a total of thir¬ 
 ty-eight missionaries for our ten millions 
 of people. This is a responsibility of 
 263,158 persons for each missionary, or 
 476,190 for each one of our ordained 
 missionaries. 
 
 Native Christians in foreign mission 
 lands are almost without exception active 
 propagators of their faith. They are 
 more earnest in evangelistic work than 
 the average Christian in America. In 
 our fields in Japan and China there are 
 2,308 communicant church members. 
 Nearly all of the seven millions of people 
 in those two countries, for whom we are 
 responsible, are still largely unevangel¬ 
 ized. There have been many statements 
 by representative missionary conferences, 
 of the conviction that one missionary 
 family or an unmarried missionary to 
 every 25,000 people to be reached, is the 
 lowest reasonable basis on which to hope 
 to preach the Gospel to every creature, 
 so as to make it intelligible to them all. 
 
 9 
 
Twenty-five thousand people to be 
 evangelized, as a result of work which 
 one missionary may be able to set into 
 motion, is a tremendous task, but even 
 on that basis four hundred missionaries 
 will be required to evangelize the ten mil¬ 
 lions of people in Japan, China and the 
 Mohammedan world for whom our Re¬ 
 formed Church is responsible. We shall 
 need several hundred more ministers, 
 physicians, nurses, teachers, and other 
 men and women to go out as foreign mis¬ 
 sionaries of our Church to become the 
 missionary force of the Reformed 
 Church in foreign lands. 
 
 THE FORCE 
 
 At home 
 2 Ministers 
 to 854 
 
 sons 
 
 21 Ordained/Men 
 2 Lay mi 
 15 Single Women 
 
 1 Minister to 
 476,190 
 Persons 
 
 10 
 
III. The Funds. 
 
 It has been frequently stated by com¬ 
 petent authorities that the twenty-two 
 millions of Protestant Church members 
 in America give every year more than 
 two hundred millions of dollars for local 
 church work in America. This amount 
 provides for the support of the one hun¬ 
 dred and fifty thousand ordained Prot¬ 
 estant ministers, for the erection, im¬ 
 provement and repair of church build¬ 
 ings, and for the maintenance of public 
 worship. 
 
 No one can state the amount of the 
 total gifts for benevolence from Ameri¬ 
 can Protestants. Not all of the money 
 for benevolence goes through Church 
 treasuries, and even if it did it would be 
 very difficult to tabulate, for the several 
 denominations do not include the same 
 items under the head of benevolence. 
 
 The members of the Reformed Church 
 contributed more for congregational ex¬ 
 penses last year than in any other year 
 of our history. The amount reached $1,- 
 917,012, an average of $6.44 per member. 
 This is a lower average than in other 
 denominations of which accurate statis¬ 
 tics are available. But it shows that the 
 Reformed Church is not a small denom¬ 
 ination when our three hundred thousand 
 members spend almost two million dol¬ 
 lars a year to keep up our congregational 
 work. 
 
 li 
 
The benevolent contributions of our 
 entire denomination, as reported to the 
 General Synod last year, amounted to 
 $569,476. Of this total sum the Board 
 of Foreign Missions received $97,400, the 
 Boards of Home Missions about $125,- 
 000, and the educational institutions of 
 the Church approximately $200,000, 
 while the remainder was given for other 
 benevolent objects. It is impossible to 
 state accurately in detail for what pur¬ 
 poses the benevolence in America was 
 contributed, but, deducting the amount 
 for foreign missions, there remains $472,- 
 076 for benevolence in America. 
 
 Adding together the amounts which 
 our Reformed Church spent for congre¬ 
 gational expenses—$1,917,012—and con¬ 
 tributed for benevolence in America— 
 $472,076—the total is $2,389,088, which 
 was the total amount spent by our de¬ 
 nomination in America. This is an aver¬ 
 age of $8.02 per member spent here in 
 America. The $97,400 given for foreign 
 missions, is an average of 33 cents per 
 member. For all Christian purposes, as 
 represented by the Reformed Church, for 
 our local work and for all benevolences, 
 both at home and abroad, the total 
 amount given by our Reformed Church 
 was $2,486,488. Each member of our 
 Reformed Church thus gave on the aver¬ 
 age $8.35, a little more than two cents a 
 day per member, for the cause of Chris¬ 
 tianity at home and abroad. 
 
 12 
 
The money for foreign missions from 
 our Church was spent for our work in 
 Japan and China and for expenses here 
 in America. The salaries of our thirty- 
 eight missionaries which are paid entirely 
 by our Church, the expenses in connec¬ 
 tion with more than fifty churches and 
 preaching places in Japan and China, in¬ 
 cluding part of all of the salaries of fifty 
 pastors and unordained preachers, the 
 larger part of the salaries of about fifty 
 teachers in our six schools, the salaries 
 of Bible women and other evangelistic 
 helpers, and of native helpers in the med¬ 
 ical work, constitute the largest items of 
 outlay for our foreign missionary work. 
 In addition to the item of salaries, thous¬ 
 ands of dollars are required every year 
 to help build churches and chapels, hos¬ 
 pitals, additional school buildings, resi¬ 
 dences for missionaries, etc. Our work 
 in the foreign field includes not only 
 the work of the church as it is carried on 
 here in America, but also educational 
 work in all of its phases, medical work, 
 literary work, industrial work and all 
 forms of charity. For all of these pur¬ 
 poses our Reformed Church spent last 
 year a little less than $100,000. 
 
 We have better church buildings than 
 has the average denomination. Our 
 equipment in almost every line here in 
 America is up to the average. But our 
 pastors are not as well paid as are others, 
 
 13 
 
and our gifts for the current expenses of 
 the Church are far below the average. 
 We need to enlarge our giving for con¬ 
 gregational expenses. This amount 
 should be increased immediately to two 
 million dollars a year. 
 
 We have a great home missionary task 
 ahead of us, to train up our children and 
 lead them into full Church membership, 
 and to reach 650,000 other people who 
 are still altogether outside the Church. 
 This will necessitate an outlay of several 
 hundred thousand dollars annually. In¬ 
 dividual congregations and Classes must 
 give sustentation to weak charges in their 
 vicinity, and this will require thousands 
 of dollars every year. Our educational 
 institutions all over the Church need help 
 and our Reformed members should give 
 them hundreds of thousands of dollars. 
 The causes of beneficiary education and 
 of ministerial relief must be pushed with 
 vigor and given greater attention than 
 has hitherto been the case in our Church. 
 Caring for the orphans, training up dea¬ 
 conesses, providing for the sick and in¬ 
 firm in hospitals and old folks’ homes are 
 forms of Christian work in which our 
 Church should have its full part. All of 
 this benevolent work together may re¬ 
 quire as much as one million dollars 
 every year. 
 
 14 
 
THE FUNDS 
 
 At Home 
 Congregational 
 Purposes $1,91 £ 012 
 
 Benevolences 
 In America M72,076 
 
 Total $2,389,088 
 In America 
 
 For 
 Forei] 
 Missions 
 
 $<>*400 
 
 We are responsible for the evangeliza¬ 
 tion of ten millions of people in Japan, 
 China and the Mohammedan world. To 
 accomplish this there must be a force of 
 perhaps four hundred foreign mission¬ 
 aries to be sent out by our Church, sev¬ 
 eral thousand native pastors, evangelists, 
 Bible women, teachers, physicians, 
 nurses, etc. We must also help in the 
 erection of a number of buildings of dif¬ 
 ferent kinds, churches, chapels, schools, 
 hospitals, residences, etc. Abundant ex¬ 
 perience, based on the work now carried 
 on by our own and other denominations 
 throughout the world, shows clearly that 
 
 15 
 
to evangelize the ten millions of people 
 in our field will require about one mil¬ 
 lion dollars every year. 
 
 It thus becomes evident that to carry 
 on the work of the Reformed Church our 
 members must annually give about four 
 million dollars, which is an average of 
 $13.46, or less than four cents per mem¬ 
 ber a day. Of the total amount two mil¬ 
 lion dollars will be needed for congrega¬ 
 tional expenses, one million for benevo¬ 
 lence in America, and one million for 
 foreign missions—50 per cent, for con¬ 
 gregational expenses, 25 per cent, for 
 benevolence in America, and 25 per cent, 
 for foreign missions. 
 
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