Various

“ Then the money and the men for the grandest and most complete missionary enterprises will be lifted from their moorings amidst worldliness, and transported, freely, graciously, from sea to sea, and up the rivers to the ends of the earth. In these days, when we are especially reminded of the advent of Him who came to bring good tidings of great joy for all people; when we solemnly and joyfully set apart a week for prayer ”

“ We have escaped the bondage of debt, and, better still, have received a munificent gift for additional school facilities, and, like the prophet of Israel, are ready to exclaim, “The God of Heaven, He will prosper us, therefore we, His servants, will arise and build.”
Our missionaries and teachers at home and abroad have been spared and blessed abundantly. Let us rejoice, but not stop in our work. Our best joys spring forth from busiest toil. The work before us is great—greater than ever. ”

“ Every appliance of Christian education and of moral power must be enlisted to uplift the people and unify the nation; and for this work the time favors. For four years, at least, we have an open course; the political signs are more auspicious; and we may hope to push far ahead the forces of intellectual and moral regeneration.
The colored people are intensely loyal to the rule of majorities; they believe, heart and soul, in those who broke their chains; they accept their principles, and receive joyfully the lessons of their teachers and their preachers. ”

“ All is changed now. To-day the missionary is welcomed by many Christian people in Marion. The dreadful past is fading from our minds in the love and friendship of the present.
Sabbath morning I looked out upon the many cottages and cabin homes in the woods and fields all about, while near by I saw the church edifice with its graceful and airy bell-tower in which hangs a choice bell from the foundry of Veasy & White, of East Hampton, Connecticut, and the gift of the people there. ”

“ There are bright, promising girls all over the South, who, to make just such women as these, need only your help. You cannot leave your home duties to go yourself to them, but you can provide the means by which they may be fitted to act as your substitutes among their people. “Ten times one is ten,” you know, and the girl to whom you lend a hand may win many more souls into the kingdom. ”

“ So we feel often as we wake to realize that the rough, awkward girl who came to us has developed into the quiet, refined Christian woman, leaving us for her life work. Nor are we the only ones to see the transformation.
“I am looking to see what kind of a woman you are,” said a child to one of the Talladega students as she opened her log cabin school in the pine wood. “You look to me like a white lady.” ”

“ I often receive letters from pupils in our schools, and still more frequently read letters addressed to their teachers, which I have wished I could show to the Christian friends who are enabling us to carry on our work.
It is encouraging to see how much of saving truth they have contrived to learn, and still more to feel all through the throbbings of a Christian heart. The English is often in a sad tangle, but the effort to get hold of idioms so utterly opposite to their own sometimes gives an appetizing quaintness to their utterances such as freshens even oldest truth. ”

“ It is no uncommon thing for a girl to throw herself, fully dressed, on the outside of her freshly-made bed and there pass the night, having no conception of properly undressing and going to bed.
Our school work, then, includes much more than one would at first imagine. Each girl has some part in the household work, and must be taught the neatest, quickest and best method of doing it. ”

“ Nothing in church order and work can save these people but the freest and most intelligent system; nothing in education but practical training for the duties and competitions with a more favored race, guided and inspired by thorough Christian principle.
Another afternoon was given to an ecclesiastical council, called by the 2d Congregational church of Memphis, to advise as to the ordination of a pastor. The examination of the young man who had been preaching to them for some months was a thoroughly delightful one, specially full and rich in the recital of Christian experience. ”

“ I think He did, Annie. I’m sure we can all now enjoy the luxury of doing good as we never have before. Then just think what a luxury it will be not to weary ourselves with making over worn garments. We can now give them to the needy and help still others by hiring them to make our new clothing,—not that we may be idle, but that we may have ‘a heart at leisure from itself to soothe and sympathize.’ We can have dear grandpa and grandma with us all the time. ”

“ Our call is a call to prayer. That is the one thing lacking. Not that no prayers are offered, but that, as yet, the prayers of God’s people for this object are not sufficiently abundant. The church has not qualified itself to pray as it ought, by right living. More Godly sincerity, more humility, more faith, more charity, are needful to elevate the tone of piety in the Church, until its prayers shall lay hold on the promises, with a power that God himself has already rendered irresistible. Then He will send forth the laborers into His harvest. ”

“ You know how the child loves your little sister Bell. Well, last night while the little darling was saying her prayers, she added, ‘Please, Lord, tell Santa Claus to bring a Christmas gift to Bell just like the one he brings to me.’ Now we had planned getting her a tiny diamond ring, it would be so lovely on her dainty little hand, and I thought if your mother knew of May’s sweet little prayer, she’d like to strengthen the child’s faith by getting one for Bell like it.” Annie thought it was a beautiful idea and hastened home to tell her mother. ”

“ Never do I realize more keenly their deprivations than after talking with Northern children—little children whose precocity, to one fresh from the South, seems almost alarming, suggestive of brain fevers and early death. From babyhood their wits have been quickened by contact with other and mature minds, their many questions wisely answered till they have absorbed knowledge enough to be intelligent companions before their so-called education begins. ”

“ Low wages, poor crops, the cotton worm and inherited poverty keep them where they are, and so far as I can see they must live and die there in their poverty and hopelessness, unless those whom God has more highly favored are moved to help them. Our college expenses are so low that seventy dollars will keep one pupil in school one year, and sometimes, on account of labor done or aid from home, a much smaller amount will suffice. We need more than one thousand dollars to be used in this way this year, above the amounts already pledged. Christian education transforms these boys and girls. ”

“ But, could we turn to you the other view, show the work done, acquaint you with the trials, the sacrifices, the glorious victories over fiery temptations, the patient continuance in well-doing in the face of obstacles almost insurmountable, then, indeed, you might be tempted to [10] take the other extreme and feel that missionaries are hardly needed among a people whose Christian record shines brighter than our own. ”

“ The door of a teacher’s room is suddenly and unceremoniously thrown open, and two or three girls march silently before her to the fire, and standing with vacant faces by its warmth, are perfectly unconscious of any impropriety in such a mode of entrance, or of the need of a single word of explanation. ”

“ Not all people can be aroused into interest for missionary work by any methods; whatever the zeal of the pastor, some indifference will remain. But if he has the missionary spirit, he will not be contented with an occasional preaching. He will determine the tone of worship and the direction of all endeavors by his enlarged view of God’s plan for the redemption of men. New suggestions, allusions, illustrations and prayers will swell the current of sympathy for missions, and increase contributions under any method of giving. ”

“ Into the cabins they carry, as far as may be, a regard for neatness, order, and those little adornments which make home what it is. Happy the young colored minister who wins one of them for his wife, thus establishing a home which shall supplement his sermons and act as leaven in the homes of his people. More than one graduate of the colored theological seminaries is gravely hampered in his usefulness by an ignorant, careless wife. ”

“ New colleges have been springing up over the country, until the list can be reckoned by scores and hundreds. From these classic halls armies of men march forth, brave, sacrificing, full of life and hope, fitted for missionary endeavors, and able—God helping them—to capture the world for Christ. ”

“ We know of no Society that has more occasion for expressing cheerful congratulations than the American Missionary Association; and we wish its patrons and workers a thankful and prosperous Happy New Year.
By the merciful blessing of God and the prayerful liberality of His people, we have been sustained in our work. The number of our pupils has multiplied. The Holy Spirit has been poured out upon our churches. A great improvement in public sentiment South has been witnessed. ”

“ What is needed is the flavor of missions in the life of the churches, the vision of Christ’s kingdom kept continually before the imagination and faith of the people, the proportions of the local, not magnified into excessive size, but brought into true harmony with the greatness of our Redeemer’s work for the race. ”

“ So, coming as pledged witnesses before you to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, we shrink from the vastness of the undertaking, for while exactly fulfilling the last requirement and telling nothing but the truth, we keenly realize the many contradictions, and know that the whole truth cannot be told in a single hour—can never, indeed, be fully known till seen in the light of eternity. ”

“ Field-work is not play. Go to the market-place, and bid guests to the Master’s feast. Go into the army, to fight, to wrestle with the devil, to put forth your strength, and to come home singing songs of victory. ”

“ The white people are waking up to more effort in missionary work. They have commenced in the temperance reform, and already a petition with 5,000 names attached has been presented to the Mayor and Council, asking that no more licenses be granted for the sale of intoxicating drinks. It is a beginning. A noble Christian woman, Mrs. Chapin, has been the prime mover of this endeavor. We hope its influence will not be lost if the petition is rejected. May God give us other and stronger petitions until the authorities see that Christian people mean business. ”

“ Now Annie, if Christian women would all feel that they were Christian stewards of their Lord’s money, and could see what foolish vanity it is to wish the world to know of their wealth, then we should all have some comparatively definite standard of a Christian style of living. ”

“ With all the immense moral evils of a Federal election, they feel that conscience has been stirred, and profound gratitude to God for the result has been awakened among the Freedmen. Thought and energy, it seems to them, are more likely to turn in the direction of religion now than in any other great common channel, and they have courage and cheer for coming work. ”

“ Well, I often see young ladies on the street who always remind me of these advertising boys, as their dress makes them a walking advertisement of their father’s wealth. One Sunday night, after attending service in a very wealthy church, I dreamed that all the ladies wore pocket-books on their heads instead of bonnets. ”

“ The work done is varied, no rigid plan being laid down. Sewing classes for the women and girls, prayer-meetings for the mothers, Bible-readings, visiting from house to house, bearing food and medicine for the sick, clothing for the destitute, and comfort and sympathy for all, health talks—than which nothing can be more needed,—literary societies to develop their untrained minds, foreign missionary meetings to broaden their sympathies; all these and other ways of working for the Lord are reported at their last meeting. ”

“ A few minutes daily are spent in giving the assembled school a brief summary of the important items of news in the great outside world, and more or less time is devoted to plain talks on practical matters, manners, morals and care of the health,—the last a subject, by the way, with which they seem wholly unacquainted, and which the girls especially need to become familiar with. ”

“ Friends envy us, the poor hate us, the irreligious question our sincerity, our own hearts are made vain, if not proud, millions are spent in useless luxuries that might bless the poor, and—well Annie, this is enough for once, isn’t it? When you have been in the city did you ever notice boys slowly pacing the streets and often ringing a bell, who were all covered over with an advertisement of some sale or show? ”

“ The prayers of the pastor may be made more effective for missions than his sermons. If he makes mention in his prayers of the servants of Christ who are toiling among the heathen, or the Freedmen, or the Western settlers, and prays, not with a tedious enumeration, but with fervor and definiteness, he will put missions on the hearts of the people. What has a place frequently in our prayers has a place in our sympathies. ”

“ To this it must be added that the increase of missionary organizations and the natural development of their operations, all multiply the demand for more men to run to and fro throughout the world, heralding the tidings of joy unto all people.
Still another barrier has been virtually removed. Once money was lacking, but now the church of Christ has the means needful to send forth all the men that the new condition of things demands. ”

“ We are all sinners, and have wandered from God like lost sheep that have gone astray from the fold, but God is ready to forgive and take us back again in order to save us; so that we ought immediately to repent and become the disciples of Christ and be always prepared to do the will of Jesus. The Bible is the word of God. Holy men wrote it as the Holy Spirit taught them. The truths of the Bible never change. Every word is true, and God’s truth shall last forever. * * * I write to let you know and two Chinese [are to be] baptized in Stockton Church [24] Congregational the next Sunday. ”

“ Park uttered the strongest and most anxious impressions respecting our national future and the condition of the South. I am sure that he and all deep-sighted and far-sighted men would find them intensified on actual examination of the facts. The task before us is vast, and, but for divine help, overwhelming and impracticable. ”