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“Strengthen, O God, that which thou hast wrought for us. 
 
Northfield, Mass., July, 1887. 
 
 Across the Connecticut River, at Mount Hermon, a great work was begun twelve 
 months ago. One hundred young men, who had come from widely separated colleges 
 for Bible study, olfered themselves for foreign mission service. Since then the Spirit has 
 been moving mightily among the colleges and seminaries of Canada and of the United 
 States, until over two thousand two hundred students (of whom five hundred and fifty are 
 women) have volunteered for the foreign fields. This together with the hundreds in 
 England makes our number about three thousand. 
 
 Of this number one hundred are gathered in Northfield, and we send a word of hearty 
 good cheer to our fellow volunteers in England and America. “ Be steadfast, unmove¬ 
 able.” “Sanctify yourselves: for to-morrow the Lord will do wonders among you.” 
 “ The Lord said unto me, Behold, I have begtm to give Sihon and his land before thee: 
 begin to possess.” 
 
4 
 
 “ The missionary fire needs fuel as well as draught.” The home work is constantly 
 before our eyes, so let us keep the foreign field ever in view; try to grasp its numbers, to 
 examine its critical condition, and to remember that “ we must strike not only when the 
 iron is hot, but where the iron is hot.” Foreign missions have more than a passing 
 notice in the Word of God. Through the Old Testament runs the silver cord, and in the 
 Gospels and Epistles we have the golden bowl. 
 
 Some give a discouraging report of the land to be possessed. But “ Let us go up 
 at once and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it.” Shall the world be evan¬ 
 gelized in our life-time ? Is the idea chimerical ? The Earl of Shaftesbury said, “ During 
 the latter part of these centuries, it has been in the power of those who hold the truth 
 * * * * to evangelize the globe fifty times over.” One hundred and twenty of the mis¬ 
 sionaries in China, representatives of twenty-one Protestant missionary societies, say, 
 “ We want China emancipated from the thraldom of sin in this generation. It is possi¬ 
 ble. Our Lord has said ‘according to your faith be it unto you.’ The church of God 
 can do it.” The Israelites took forty years for an eleven days’ journey. Is the sin to be 
 repeated ? 
 
 Three years ago a missionary volunteer determined to do all he could for foreign 
 missions during his theological course. On entering the Theological Seminary he found 
 none expecting to go. By the time of his graduation twenty had enlisted for foreign 
 work. There is no better opportunity to be a foreign missionary than during a college 
 course. Get another to enlist, and at one stroke you double your missionary life. Not 
 
5 
 
 
 only this. Your united efforts in enlisting others God only can measure. “ Five of you 
 shall chase an hundred, and an huhdred of you shall put ten thousand to flight.” 
 
 Mr. Johnston, of the British Educational Commission for India, says that during the 
 past hundred years the heathen and Mohammedans have increased two hundred millions. 
 For each individual won to Christianity there have been seventy additions to the ranks of 
 the unevangelized. It is estimated that of the two hundred millions in Africa one hun¬ 
 dred and forty millions have not been touched by Christian teachers. This one field 
 would swallow up our three thousand volunteers and cry for more. Then India numbers 
 three hundred millions—or more than double the population of (he Western Flemispliere. 
 And China’s four hundred million souls cry “ We pray help us''* Thousands of square 
 miles, densely populated, have never been trodden by Christian feet. *• There remaineth 
 yet very much land to be possessed.” 
 
 If these numbers call for help, the rush of infidelity on their crumbling faiths calls 
 for haste. Dr. Chamberlain says India is at present wonderfully prepared for Christ, and 
 that if this opportunity is let slip, at least two generations will pass before another such 
 opportunity can be offered. God has cast Japan into a furnace and it is molten. In what 
 mould is it to be set ? History gives us not one example of such a crisis. There is need 
 not only for action, but for action now. The Mohammedans are making prodigious 
 
 * To emphasize the need for more recruits let us circulate far and wide the enclosed 
 diagram. 
 
6 
 
 efforts to convert Africa. They are sweeping through the interior. Thousands of the abor¬ 
 igines are yielding to them hecause the Moslem faith appeals to the sensuous and is 
 propagated by the sword. It is doubtless two or three times as hard to convert Moham¬ 
 medans as to convert Pagans. Therefore delay in occupying Africa multiplies the diffi¬ 
 culties of evangelization. The present crisis is greater than that of Esther’s day when 
 “ the posts that rode upon swift steeds that were used in the king’s service went out, 
 being hastened and pressed on by the king’s commandment.” 
 
 Due prominence is not given to the reflex influence of foreign missions. The mis¬ 
 sionary movement among the university students of England and Scotland resulted in 
 revivals at home. A prominent speaker recently said, “If young men should rise in 
 large numbers and go to the foreign field, there would be such a revival at home that men 
 would flock into the ministry.” Mr. Stanley Smith said in Exeter Hall, “ It is my earn¬ 
 est prayer that there may be such an outlet of men and women from this country as shall 
 lead to an inlet of blessing from heaven.” “ There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth; 
 and there is that withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to poverty.” 
 
 Some say there are heathen enough at home. “ What can be more shameful than to 
 make the imperfection of our Christianity at home an excuse for not doing our work 
 abroad ? It is as shameless as it is shameful. It is like a patricide asking the judge to have 
 pity on his orphanhood.” 
 
 In the United States we have an average of one minister to seven hundred men, 
 women and children. Only one and three-tenths per cent, of our ministry go to the for- 
 
7 
 
 eign field. According to the latest figures, out of each hundred thousand communicants 
 in America, only twenty-one go to the foreign field; and out of each hundred thousand 
 communicants in ail Christendom, (Europe and America) only twenty-three. Hundreds 
 of devoted students in our colleges need only to have the work brought clearly before 
 them and they will enlist. Let meetings for volunteers never conflict with the regular 
 college monthly missionary meeting, which should be the focal point of all our efforts. 
 Upon it let us bring to bear the freshest facts and most telling figures. This meeting 
 would be a power if we realized that forty millions die every year “ without Christ . . . . 
 having no hope.” “When I say unto the wicked, O wicked man, thou shalt surely die, 
 and thou dost not speak to warn the wicked from his way; that wicked man shall die in 
 his iniquity, but his blood zvill I require at thine hand .' 1 ' 1 
 
 Will there be money enough to back the troops ? It is a fact that Christians are not 
 realizing the privilege of giving. But this does not lessen our responsibility to go. Others 
 have worked their way before the mast, why should not we ? If possible, let us support 
 ourselves. Eight missionaries of the Zenana Society of England are self-supporting. If 
 our parents are planning for us a tour through Europe or year^ in a conservatory, might 
 they not instead rejoice to support us as foreign missionaries ? The first missionaries from 
 New England were not sent until they showed a willingness to work their way. Several 
 couples of students making a tour among the churches of Canada have been blessed in secur¬ 
 ing money. When a friend offers to support any one of us, let us make it known. A lady 
 volunteer has found this her richest summer, as in the prospect of soon entering foreign 
 
8 
 
 work she has been helped to present missionary facts to girls. The ladies of one church 
 have engaged to support her, another club of ladies has started a fund for an outfit, and a 
 ladies’ Board has offered to send her. There are two colleges in Canada, neither large 
 nor rich, each of which is about to send a man to China and support him for life. Why 
 should not one hundred colleges immediately fall into line ? Most of us are connected 
 not alone with a college, but a church, a sabbath school, a city Y. M. C. A. We furnish 
 a “living link ” between these and the foreign field and secure constant prayers for our 
 work by enlisting these to support us through our respective church Boards. Eighty-five 
 people, each contributing twenty-five cents a week, will pay the salary of a missionary 
 and of his wife. One Y. M. C. A. has adopted the twenty-five cent plan. The Young 
 People’s Association of a church in Chicago is about to issue cards ranging from five 
 cents to five dollars a month. Out of every dollar contributed to God’s service only two 
 cents go to the foreign field. Every tick of your watch sounds the death-knell of a 
 heathen soul. Every breath we draw, four pass from this world to the next without having 
 heard of Christ. •* The heathen are dying at the rate of one hundred thousand a day, and 
 Christians are giving to save them at the rate of one-tenth of a cent a day.” “ Cry aloud, 
 spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet and shew my people their transgressions.” 
 
 For us volunteers the most vital question is, not are we financially equipped but are 
 we spiritually equipped ? Is the Holy Ghost working in and through us ? The best 
 preparation for winning souls abroad is winning souls at home. I.et each of us daily strive to 
 reach an unconverted person. A college man took for his motto, “ The whole world for 
 
9 
 
 Christ, beginning at my college.” May this year be the most soul-saving year ever 
 known in our colleges. “He that is wise winneth souls.” Already souls have been won 
 by our number. We have seen a cloud the size of a man’s hand. It means abundance 
 of rain. It means winning souls at home while preparing to go abroad. But this rain is 
 conditioned —“ Bring ye the whole tithe into the storehouse . . . and prove me now here¬ 
 with if I will not . . . pour you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to 
 receive it.” It was said of Joseph, “Can we find such a one as this, a man in whom the 
 Spirit of God is ? ’’ And “ the Lord said unto Moses, Take thee Joshua the son of Nun, 
 a man in whom is the Spirit.” 
 
 The command is, “ Be filled with the Spirit.” God says to each of us, “Art thou 
 willing to be emptied in order to be filled?” If so, “The Spirit of the Lord will 
 come upon thee and thou shalt be turned into another man.” This promise is for us all. 
 The hungry and thirsty shall be filled. “ I will pour water upon him that is thirsty.” 
 
 Do we tremble because “weak,” “foolish,” “ despised,” “base ” ? Such are God’s 
 chosen ones. The first heralds of resurrection news started “with fear,” but “ as they 
 went to tell . . . Jesus met them.” Many a missionary has started with fear but assur¬ 
 ance has come in God’s seal on his work. What we need is power. “ The kingdom of 
 God is not in word but in power” “ Ye shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost 
 is come upon you and ye shall be witnesses unto me . . . unto the uttermost parts of the 
 earth.” After our Savior had said these words and had ascended the disciples returned 
 to Jerusalem where they “ all with one accord continued steadfastly in prayer’ 1 '' for ten 
 
10 
 
 days. When “ they were all together in one place ” the Holy Spirit came. They 
 received power. Three thousand were added in a single day. AU pray: all receive 
 power. This Fall some of us sail for foreign fields. Some return to our colleges. But 
 all of us are entitled to be missionaries now—to win souls now—to be filled with the 
 Holy Spirit now. Some of us are asking this blessing of God every day at the noon 
 hour. If every volunteer will join, a volume of prayer will daily rise to God from three 
 thousand hearts. “ They were all together in one place . . . and they were all filled with 
 the Holy Spirit.” They were “ day by day continuing steadfastly with one accord in the 
 temple . . . and the Lord added to them day by day those that were being saved.”* 
 
 Committee in behalf of the One Hundred : 
 
 R. A. Scott Macfie, Cambridge Univ., England. 
 
 H. F. Laflamme, Univ. of Toronto, Canada. 
 
 C. F. Hersey, Bowdoin College, Maine. 
 
 S. C. Mitchell, Georgetown College, Kentucky. 
 
 J. N. Forman, Princeton Theol. Sem., New Jersey. 
 
 R. P. Wilder, Princeton College, New Jersey. 
 
 * As we receive answers to our united prayers let us make them known that we may 
 return united thanks. Will volunteers in Great Britain please report to ‘‘.Foreign Mission 
 Volunteers ” Caius College, Cambridge University, Eng. Those in Canada to “F. M. V.” Knox 
 College, Toronto. Those in the United States to “ F. M. V.” Union Theological Sem., Cor. 
 70th St. and Park Ave., N. Y. 
 
Since this letter has gone to the press, the undergraduates of Princeton College have 
 subscribed $1,460.00 for the support of a college missionary and native preachers. The 
 missionary is a recent graduate and sailed for India within two days after his support 
 was pledged. And the undergraduates of Princeton Theological Seminary have also 
 subscribed $050.00 towards the salary of a missionary, and expect to have the full 
 amount ($700.00) in a few days. 
 
 Sept. 23. 
 
 A Missionary Band. The Bible House, Toronto, Canada. Price 55 c. 
 
 The Crisis of Missions. A. T. Pierson. Carter Bros., 530 Broadway, N. Y. Price 63c, 
 (Special offer to volunteers.) 
 
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