PAM. CHINA ^ JJohn Successes and Opportunities in Evangelizing the World China Rev. JAMES SIMESTER Foochow, China THE MISSIONARY SOCIETY OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH RINDGE LITERATURE DEPARTMENT 150 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK CITY SUCCESSES AND OPPORTUNITIES IN CHINA. Rev. JAMES SIMESTER, Foochow^ China The line between success and opportunity cannot be distinctly drawn. Opportunities improved, by the grace of God, become successes, and every suc- cess opens a wider door of opportunity. I. Successes There are three ways of measuring the success of Christian missions in China — by the numerical results actually achieved, by the moral and spirit- ual transformations which are the direct result of Christian effort, and by the forces which have been set at work as the result of Christian missions but which are themselves not connected with the Church. 1. There are 125,000 iaptized Protestant Chris- tians in China, and as many more who are con- nected with the Church as probationers. When we consider the circumstances under which these results have been achieved these numbers are amaz- ing. China has been one of the most difficult fields ever entered by the Christian Church. In no other country were the people so satisfied with them- selves, their nation, and their religion. In no other field, save Africa and Malaysia, has the climate 2 been so fatal to the life and health of the mission- ary as in South China, where our work was begun. No other country, save India, feels so bitterly the ostracism consequent upon the acceptance of the Christian religion. In no other mission field have the workers been so frequently compelled to flee for their lives. All the obstacles found in any land have been found in China, while here also are found difficulties not found in any other land to any great extent. Attention has been called to the apparent readi- ness of the Japanese to receive Christian truth, as compared with the Chinese. But it should be re- membered that when Japan was opened to inter- course with the outside world it was done by a nation who helped the Japanese carry out their own laws and develop in their own way. When China was opened up it was by nations who com- pelled her, against her own will, to admit the curse which is now dragging millions of her people to ruin. She was compelled to obey laws other than her own and to develop as her oppressors saw fit. America went to the Japanese as the Good Shep- herd that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly. England and the Powers went to China as a thief to steal and to kill and to destroy. And how were the Chinese to know that the missionaries were not wolves in sheep’s clothing? Treated as she has been by the foreigner, the wonder is that any have been found in this land willing to give an attentive ear to any message coming from so hateful a source. In the face of these difficulties the fact that 250,000 are connected with the Christian Church is marvelous. But the numbers added to the Christian Church are not the greatest evidence of success. Better things have been done, and forces have been set at 3 work which increase the efficiency of Christianity in geometrical progression. Colleges dot the land, and in these are found thousands of young men. Intermediate schools for boys and girls are many and are crowded, and day schools can be counted by the thousand. There are nearly a thousand day schools in the Fuhkien province alone. Hospitals are daily ministering to thousands of sick bodies while pointing sin-sick souls to the Great Physi- cian. Printing presses and Bible societies are printing annually millions of pages of the Scrip- tures and of other Christian literature. 2. But a question of vital Importance is asked: Does Christ actually save and transform the Chi- nese? Not, “How many are saved?” but, “How well are they saved?” China has furnished to the world the greatest evidence of Christianity seen since the resurrection of Christ. Ten thousand na- tive Christians dying for their faith bear evidence how well they are saved. Jesus Christ is transforming men in China as effectually as he ever did in America. Highway robbers have become preachers; men deprived of mental and physical strength by the use of opium have been made strong; men guilty of every con- ceivable sin have been gloriously saved ; homes have been transformed so that I have seen family life in China that was as pure and full of love as in a Christian home in America; woman has not only been raised from a life of slavery to liberty, but the estimation in which she is held has been notably raised. Every phase of social and business life has been changed by Him who makes all things new so that it is possible to pick out the Christian Chi- nese by the looks of their faces. 3. Forces have heen set at work hy Christianity which are not directly connected with the Chris- 4 tian Church. Infanticide, once so common in China, is now practically nonexistent. A large so- ciety has been organized the object of which is to stop the barbarous practice of foot-binding. Ten thousand heathen Chinese gentlemen have pledged themselves never to have their daughters’ feet bound, or marry their sons to girls with bound feet. Schools are being established of every grade from the primary grade to the university. A desire for railroads, telegraphs, post offices, etc., all of which are helps to the progress of Christianity as well as the results of Christianity, is manifest all over the land. II. Opportunities 1. For Evangelistic Worh. China has 406,000,- 000 of people that, in spite of differences of dialect and customs, are practically homogeneous. China has been held together during the centuries not by despotism or by force of arms, but by the essential oneness of the people. And this immense popula- tion is now open to evangelization. Ten years ago there were nine hundred walled cities of China and five whole provinces that were closed to the mis- sionary. Now every province has been opened, and the gates of every city swing wide open to the mes- sengers of Christ. In a city less than two hundred miles from Foo- chow, whence three times in the last ten years mis- sionaries have had to flee for their lives, and twice have hidden under the tiles of the roof, I have my- self within the past six months [1903] been wel- comed by citizen and official alike. In the very center of this city are three beautiful hills which command a view not only of the whole city but of the entire surrounding country. On one of these hills is the newly built residence of our Methodist 5 missionarjs and by its side the Tenping Academy is in process of erection. On the second hill the Alden Speare Memorial Hospital is soon to be built, and we hope the Girls and Women’s School will occupy the third. Just in front of all three a large church is building, the money from which was largely raised among the Chinese themselves. Everywhere doors are opened for the messengers of the Gospel of Peace. 2. For Educational Worh. The greatest need of China to-day is education, and the Chinese people are looking to the Christian Church for help in this respect. The efforts of the Chinese government to establish Confucian schools is an evidence on the one hand of the widespread desire for education, and on the other a tacit acknowledgment of the in- fluence of the Christian schools. Open opposition to Christianity died with the Boxer movement, but a silent, subtle death-struggle has been begun in the schools. The government wants Confucian schools ; the people want Christian schools. In the city of Foochow are three government schools, well sup- ported and fairly well equipped. Students are sup- ported while in school, and are assured of good po- sitions when they finish. In the Anglo-Chinese College, just outside the city, students have to pay all their expenses. In three Confucian schools, where students are paid to attend and positions are afterward provided for them, there were less than 150 students enrolled last term. In the one Christian school, where students have to pay to come and no positions are assured, there were enrolled 336. Many of these boys are heathen when they come. Said a heathen gentleman to me not long ago, “Mr. Simester, do you know why I send my boys to your school?” “No,” replied I, “but I suppose you send them to get an education.” “No, I don’t,” said he; 6 “I send them for the moral training they get.” Think of it ! Heathen gentlemen sending their boys to Christian schools for the moral training the boys get. Our intermediate schools are full all the time, and there is opportunity for twice as many of these schools with increased facilities. From thousands of cities and villages come calls for day schools, and the only limit to the number of these schools we might open is the number of trained native teachers who are available. If the Church would improve the opportunity, she might have the edu- cating of the larger part of China’s young people. As go the schools of this generation, so goes the business, social, and national life of the next. 3. For Hospitals and Charitalle Work. Innu- merable diseases, beyond the skill of Chinese physi- cians, are met on every hand. Our hospitals are all full, and our physicians overworked. Christ went everywhere healing them that were sick. More hospitals and more physicians could be util- ized at once. There are thousands of homeless chil- dren that might be brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord if we had orphanages and helpers enough to care for them. The blind are asking to be taught to read and to work ; widows by the hundred are asking for help ; whole colonies of lepers need to be cared for. For all these needs China appeals to the Christian Church. 4. For Publishing Houses. Not only has the press been an important factor in the results al- ready achieved, but its place in the work cannot fail to be more and more important. Christian books and literature are in great demand. A heathen viceroy recently ordered thousands of dol- lars’ worth of Christian books from Shanghai. The Christian presses have contracts for work for years ahead. 7 5. For Work among Women. One of the great- est opportunities lies in the work for women and girls. Husbands who do not care to talk about Christianity themselves are perfectly willing to have missionary women talk to their wives. Fathers who send their sons to a Confucian school send their daughters to a Christian seminary. The average Chinaman thinks it makes little difference what a woman believes, but we know that the most effective individual factor in Christianity is the Christian woman. Let the Church not stand on what it has done, but go forward, entering every one of these open doors, and that with a force large enough and eflBcient enough to bring this land to God. Numerically, intellectually, and morally this peo- ple is the greatest in the heathen world. They tell us that China has been asleep for four thousand years and that her civilization now should be com- pared with European civilization in the sixteenth century. A nation that could go to sleep for four thousand years and wake up only four hundred years behind civilized America is worth saving. The old Chinese junk is covered with barnacles, but scrape these off, cover the outside with a coat of modern civilization, and in place of the old square sails that have driven the ship whitherso- ever the wind listed put the dynamic power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and you will have a ship that can take its place by the side of any the world has ever seen, China aroused and enlightened and filled with the Holy Ghost would sweep through the coming centuries with an impetus and glory impossible to conceive. 50 Cents per 100 Copies Series of lOOd 8