fMi'sd, 
 
 TDrci m Christa 
 
 f^i'saior^uv 
 
 It)o'P- 
 
 AN APPEAL 
 
 > FOR 
 
 World=Wide Evangelism 
 
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 For nearly nineteen centuries the vast majority of the 
 populations of the globe have waited in vain for the gos¬ 
 pel of redemption which was committed to the Christian 
 Church. It was said most truthfully by the late Earl of 
 Shaftesbury, that “the gospel might have been pro¬ 
 claimed to all nations a dozen times over if the Christian 
 Church had been faithful to her trust." It is appalling 
 to think that sixty generations of the unevangelized 
 heathen world have perished in darkness since our Lord 
 established and commissioned His Church as a living 
 and aggressive force in the world. And of all the gen¬ 
 erations ours is the most guilty in proportion to its 
 greater opportunities. We call upon all who love the 
 Lord Jesus Christ to pray with all earnestness that the 
 closing years of our century may be years of special har¬ 
 vest. In some mission fields it is already demonstrated 
 that by the Spirit of God thousands may be gathered 
 where there have only been hundreds or scores. Let 
 us “ ask great things of God and expect great things 
 from God.” 
 
 No age has compared with the present in the facility 
 with which the populations of distant countries can be 
 reached; or in the personal safety under which Christ’s 
 ambassadors may prosecute their work; or in the ap- 
 
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proachableness and cordiality of tlie people; or in the 
 materials ready at hand to convey the message of salva¬ 
 tion in an unknown tongue. The heart of India, Africa, 
 and China are more rapidly reached than was the centre 
 of our own continent a hundred years ago. A whole 
 century of preparation has established the principles, 
 furnished the appliances, and perfected the organization 
 for a movement enlisting the whole Church of Christ. 
 
 The Whole Bible a Missionary Volume. 
 
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 We earnestly call upon every Christian to reex¬ 
 amine the Word of God and see how every portion of 
 it from Genesis to Revelation is instinct with the 
 spirit of missions. It is a field book of universal con¬ 
 quest. The redemptory work of Christ, like a bow of 
 heavenly promise, over-arches all its sacred records. 
 The “promised seed of the woman” at the beginning 
 appears again in its closing Revelation as the Lamb 
 slain from the foundation of the world.” Its Alpha and 
 Omega include the whole alphabet of redemption. All 
 prophesy and all types point to the one sacrifice offered 
 once for all, with a reversionary as well as a prospective 
 efficacy, and embracing the ages. The promise to Abra¬ 
 ham that in him should all nations be blessed, found its 
 counterpart in John’s vision of the redeemed “ of all na¬ 
 tions, and kindreds, and peoples, and tongues, standing 
 before the throne and before the Lamb. 1 he Gospel 
 of Christ even as proclaimed in the Old Testament was 
 not for any one age or for any one race. In the Coun¬ 
 cils of Eternity it was said to the world’s Messiah, It 
 is a light thing that thou shouldst be my servant to raise 
 up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of 
 Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles 
 that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the 
 earth.” 
 
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Not only is Christ the Divine intercessor now ; hut He 
 has always interceded. An eternal covenant is based 
 upon His plea : “ Thou art my Son ; this day have I be¬ 
 gotten Thee. Ask of Me, and I shall give thee the 
 heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts 
 of the earth for thy possession." The decrees of God 
 make the conversion of the world as certain as His 
 throne ! The gospels are simply a history of Divine ful¬ 
 fillments ; the Acts of the Apostles are a continuous 
 missionary record ; the Epistles are missionary letters 
 addressed to infant churches, and John in his prophetic 
 vision anticipating the final triumph of the gospel de¬ 
 clares "The kingdoms of this world are become the 
 kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ.” 
 
 But the most striking bond which identifies the work 
 of missions with Redemption, is seen in the Divine 
 commission of the Apostle to the Gentiles. The com¬ 
 mission given to Paul (Acts xxvi: 18) followed almost 
 the exact terms of Christ’s own commission recorded in 
 Isaiah xlii: <>, 7, and lxi: 1. In the Synagogue of Naz¬ 
 areth, Christ read these prophetic words as the creden¬ 
 tials of Plis great mission to an apostate world. The 
 word of God assures the work of God. All power is 
 pledged to this triumph. All wisdom is concentrated 
 on this problem. If, therefore, the Scriptural founda¬ 
 tion of missions has been more or less overlooked, while 
 this great cause has been looked upon as only a devel¬ 
 opment of nineteenth century enterprise; if our inspir¬ 
 ation has been drawn mainly from heroic examples of 
 self-sacrifice or of distinguished success, let us repent 
 of our error and turn back to the Word of God for its 
 Divine prompting and its promise of omnipotent help. 
 
 Oup Marching Orders. 
 
 The command of our Lord to publish the Crospel to 
 all the world is clear and explicit and admits of no cotn- 
 
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promise. His Great Commission was given on four 
 different occasions and in four different forms; First" 
 To His cliosen band in the mountains of Galilee came 
 His comprehensive command, “Go teach all nations.” 
 Second. On the Mount of Olives, immediately before 
 His ascension. He demonstrated to His church the 
 symmetry and proportions of her great mission to the 
 nearer, the more distant, and the most distant fields 
 alike, and all to be undertaken together. Third. Near 
 Damascus He gave a commission which showed not to 
 Paul only, but to the whole Church that her errand to 
 the Gentiles is uot merely that of a higher cultus or a 
 better civilization, but a veritable deliverance from dark¬ 
 ness unto light, and from the power of Satan unto God. 
 Fourth. His command was given to Paul in a vision of 
 the night, when not a real Macedonian but the risen 
 Christ summoned His apostle to a wider sphere among 
 the world-conquering races of Pagan Europe. 
 
 No Need of Discouragement. 
 
 Possibly many in the Church of Christ are disheart¬ 
 ened by those obstacles which arise in connection with 
 the mission work. But have not obstacles appeared in 
 every stage of the Christian conquest ? What discourage¬ 
 ments confronted the labors of the Apostolic Church, 
 whose greatest successes were wrested from the perse¬ 
 cutions which scattered abroad the disciples as chaff 
 before the wind, but which under God proved rather a 
 seed-sowing of the truth far and near. How were the 
 churches of the first four centuries overwhelmed by 
 heathen persecution ? 
 
 We meet obstacles in the restrictive measures of non- 
 Christian governments; in the false philosophies of 
 proud old systems; in the disturbing influences of false 
 representatives of our own Christian land in all heathen 
 
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marts; in the corrupting contact of pernicious com¬ 
 merce in opium, or whiskey, or fire-arms; in the prev¬ 
 alence of Anglo-Saxon vices where only truth and right¬ 
 eousness should he disseminated; in the over-reaching 
 of more powerful nations against the weaker tribes and 
 races; in unjust legislation and the abrogation of solemn 
 treaties ; in the efforts of our own western infidelity to 
 thwart the teachings of the truth wherever missionaries 
 have proclaimed it. 
 
 But what are all these obstacles compared with those 
 which have appeared again and again in the history of 
 the Church? What have we to compare with the over¬ 
 throw of the sainted Augustine and his North African 
 Churches by Vandal incursions? If all our difficulties 
 and discouragements were summed up together, they 
 would not equal the Hugenot massacres and exiles, and 
 yet that fierce persecution sent Christian colonists to 
 many lands. In the British Isles, from which we have 
 sprung, Christianity was once well-nigh extirpated by 
 our own savage ancestors. And again in the eighth and 
 ninth centuries, when missionary zeal and labor had 
 reestablished the truth, it was almost overwhelmed bv 
 the incursions of the Norsemen, and the religious in¬ 
 stitutions that had been established around the coast of 
 Ireland and Scotland were swept as with the besom of 
 destruction, yet what hath God wrought in and through 
 the British Isles? Shall we then in this age, with all 
 the power that God has placed at our disposal, be dis¬ 
 couraged and lose faith or relax effort on account of the 
 difficulties that arise in our path? If the truth be told 
 one obstacle now outweighs all others; it is found, not in 
 outside oppositions, but in the worldliness and apathy 
 of the church herself. If she were to rise up to the full 
 measure of her power, all the opposing forces of earth 
 and hell could not resist her triumphant march. 
 
Missionary Success an Earnest of Divine Favor. 
 
 
 There is no sublitner story in human history than 
 that which sketches the majestic march of the Christian 
 faith from Jerusalem and Judea to Arabia, Egypt and 
 Africa, to Asia Minor, Greece and Italy, and through the 
 whole Roman Empire; and thence northward and west¬ 
 ward, till French and Spaniards, English and Germans, 
 Scandinavians and Sclavonians were enlightened and 
 modern Europe was won ; and thence across the ocean 
 to the New World; and from the Old World and the 
 New to all the East and South among the mighty Pagan 
 peoples of Asia and Africa and the islands of the sea. 
 And in this march the Church has simply been fulfilling 
 the great prophecies and realizing the grand promises 
 of Scripture. The foreign missionary work of our day 
 represents the later stages of this world-wide move¬ 
 ment, and is as clearly under the inspiration and leader¬ 
 ship of Jesus Christ as the work of Paul in Asia, and of 
 James in Palestine. Nothing in all the Christian era has 
 given a greater proof of God’s favor and blessing than 
 the success of this closing century. In the first hun¬ 
 dred years after Christ’s ascension only about five hun¬ 
 dred thousand nominal Christians received the faith. 
 During the one hundred years of modern missions over 
 three millions have accepted Christianity as the true 
 religion and have been converted from their ancestral 
 errors to the faith as it is in Jesus Christ. 
 
 The conversion of the Sandwich Islands, the New 
 Hebrides, the Fiji Islands, the Georgia and Friendly 
 Islands, Australia, and many other islands of the sea, 
 affords the clearest evidence of God’s favor. They are 
 standing miracles of blessing and success. The annual 
 average of conversions in Africa is 17,000 souls. Fifty 
 years ago there were but six Protestant Christians and 
 two native helpers in China; now there are 50,000 com- 
 
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muuicauts, 1,700 native helpers, and 18,000 youths in 
 Christian schools. Japan has 35,000 professing Christ¬ 
 ians won in twenty-two years. 
 
 India is experiencing a Pentecostal outpouring. In 
 the past three years 60,000 heathens have turned from 
 idols to Jesus Christ and been baptized in the missions 
 of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The North India 
 Conference has more Sunday-school scholars than any 
 Conference of that Church in the United States. The 
 great work of the Baptist Missions in Telegu during the 
 past fifteen years, shows the blessing of a wonder-work¬ 
 ing God. 
 
 The Bible as a whole, or in portions, has been trans¬ 
 lated into more than 300 different languages or dialects 
 
 much the larger part of this work having been done 
 by missionaries—so that probably foup-fifths of the un¬ 
 evangelized population of the world may read or hear, 
 in their own tongue, of the inspired word of God. 
 
 But the great work is but just begun. It is only a 
 score of years since Livingstone ended his adventurous 
 life service on his knees near Lake Banguelo, and laid 
 the evangelization of Africa upon the heart of the Christ¬ 
 ian world. Then mission stations were numerous on 
 the coast, but there were scarcely half a dozen in the 
 interior. During this brief interval Christian mission¬ 
 aries have pressed toward the interior of the continent 
 from the north and the south, from the east and from 
 the west; and still the doors of opportunity open more 
 rapidly than the zeal of Christian nations can enter them. 
 
 Our Manifold Obligations. 
 
 We beg leave to present in briefest form some of the 
 obligations that have been laid upon us who live in this 
 age of the world. First of all is the command of our 
 
blessed Master, accompanied by the fact of His own 
 Divine example of sacrifice for the salvation of others. 
 
 Second. Our obligation to those early missionaries 
 who bore the gospel to our own ancestors who, long 
 after New Testament times, were in the depths of bar¬ 
 barism. 
 
 Third. Our indebtedness to those missionaries and 
 missionary settlers who bore the gospel to this conti¬ 
 nent, and planted those religious institutions whose 
 beneficent influence we have enjoyed from our child¬ 
 hood. Freely have we received; let us freely give. 
 
 Fourth. The duty which rests upon us to follow up 
 the noble work of the pioneers of modern missions who 
 lived down the opposition of a worldly Christian sent¬ 
 iment at home, and overcame heathen prejudice abroad; 
 who translated the Word of God into hundreds of lan¬ 
 guages, and laid many foundations for us to build upon ; 
 and many of whom sealed their labors with their lives 
 in fields where there is now free access. 
 
 Fifth. Ate owe a debt to those who more recently 
 have gone from our owm communities and churches, and 
 from our own circles of kindred, and who now in the 
 heat and burden of the day demand our sympathy, our 
 prayers, and our support. To follow up the work of all 
 these is now easy. We have the opportunity, the facil¬ 
 ities, and the means. How can we excuse ourselves if 
 we selfishly squander our lives and our possessions and 
 die with this accumulated duty unfilled? 
 
 Union Against Unjust Criticism. 
 
 There is need just now for union in missions as a 
 matter of common defense. It is an age which, through 
 various forms of literature, boldly challenges the su¬ 
 preme claims of Christianity in its doctrines, teachings, 
 and its work. The cause of foreign missions is espe- 
 
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daily liable to assailment, as it is far off, anil therefore 
 may more safely be made the subject of ignorant rid¬ 
 icule. It may be impossible to convince the outside 
 world that such representations are erroneous; but the 
 whole membership of the churches should be made in¬ 
 telligent to the end that they “ may be steadfast and 
 immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord.” 
 
 1 he Disciples of Christ now number nearly a million. 
 They are among the most intelligent of all classes of 
 citizens. They are moved by the highest principles, and 
 their effort for the evangelization and uplifting of all 
 mankind is the very noblest and most inspiring of 
 human enterprises. They have an average degree of 
 wealth and influence. If by their common belief and 
 teachings, their harmony of plans and methods, their 
 union in such forms of appeal or published facts and 
 statements as shall instruct and inspire public sentiment, 
 these great masses of Christian believers can be led to 
 act as one united body, there will be presented a spec¬ 
 tacle of Christian union and a volume of moral earnest¬ 
 ness and power which will impress the nation and the 
 world with the Divine reality of the gospel. 
 
 The Final Rally of the Century. 
 
 The eternal purpose of God is that the whole world 
 should be evangelized. Thus it is written, that the 
 Christ should suffer, and rise from the dead on the third 
 day, and that repentance and remission of sins should 
 be preached in His name among all nations. We have 
 His promise that every valley shall be filled; and every 
 mountain and hill shall be brought low; and the crooked 
 shall become straight; and the rough ways smooth ; 
 and all flesh shall see the salvation of God. This prom¬ 
 ise is being fulfilled. Barriers that once seemed insu¬ 
 perable have been taken out of the way. Doors that 
 
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■were closed for ceuturies are now open. Nations that 
 sat in darkness, and sullenly and stubbornly rejected 
 the gospel are now calling for it. God has honored us 
 in inviting us to have fellowship with himself in the 
 accomplishment of this grand design. We are doing 
 something, but we have not begun to put forth our 
 strength. We are playing at missions while a thousand 
 millions are stumbling on the dark mountains and going 
 down to the pit with none to deliver. From every field 
 the cry conies for more men and more means. We 
 ought to be able to respond with something better than 
 apologies for our inability to supply what is needed. 
 We must increase the efficiency of those in the field by 
 thoroughly equipping them for the work. We must 
 strengthen their hearts and hands by sending them the 
 necessary reinforcements. We are able to do tenfold 
 more than we are doing. Our offerings ought to in¬ 
 crease by leaps and bounds, and not by the slow growth 
 of past years. This is the hour of destiny; this is the 
 nick of time. The harvest of the earth is over-ripe. It 
 is for us to cast in the sickle and reap. May God help 
 us to act up to the full measure of our opportunities 
 and ability, that when the redeemed out of every nation 
 and tribe, and tongue and people shall cast upon the 
 jasper pavement their crowns of amaranth and gold, we 
 may be found among them sharing in the universal joy. 
 
 [Issued by the Foreign Christian Missionary Society, Cincin¬ 
 nati, Ohio. Oil? y^nt a copy, or fifty cents a hundred.]