Christian mission

“ Unite with a church that has a real active interest in the salvation of the lost, where young Christians are looked after and helped, where minister and people have a love for the poor and outcast, a church that regards its mission in this world to be the same as the mission of Christ, “to seek and to save the lost.” ”

“ To believe in Christ is to believe in missions, missions unto the uttermost part of the earth." It would be a shame to appear to apologize for what is of the essence of Christianity. So we turn away from all smaller reasoning, to the one great spring and impulse of mission work far and near. The Christian has to see those whom Christ sees, for the follower looks through his master's eyes; the Christian has to love and serve those whom Christ loves and serves, for the follower lives only in his master's spirit. ”

“ In the increase of mission interest, in the tidings of revivals in places where all were dead or cold, in the hosts of our young [p181] gathered into Students’ and other Associations or Christian Endeavour Societies, in doors everywhere opened in the Christian and the heathen world, in victories already secured in the fields white unto the harvest, wherever believing, hopeful workers enter, they find the assurance of a time of power and blessing such as we have not known. The Church is about to enter on a new era of increasing spirituality and larger extension. ”

“ In presenting this declaration of our Christian faith, we desire that all our members may be afresh encouraged, in humility and devotedness, to renewed faithfulness in fulfilling their part in the great mission of the Church, and through the Church to the world around us, in the name of our Crucified Redeemer. Life from Christ, life in Christ, must ever be the basis of life for Christ. ”

“ Is there a race of men on earth to-day who stand in greater need of light on spiritual subjects, and of the services of good, earnest, clean, pure-minded Christian Missionaries, who shall call men and women to repentance, and by precept and example lead them to shun the fearful evils named above, and many others, as sins against God, more than the people of the United States? ”

“ Wherever the Christian missionary goes there is renewed interest in education, in the development of the mind. The church and the school, the Bible and the spelling book, go hand in hand. Christianity is the handmaiden, not the foe, of education and of intelligence.
Missions help the spiritual man. The supreme aim of Christian missions is to care for the human soul, to have it redeemed by the blood of Christ and kept by the power of the Holy Ghost after it has been redeemed. This is the end of all missionary work. ”

“ This, then, is the End of Christian missions, whether to heathens or to Christians, namely, to make better men and better citizens—to raise the whole of society by inspiring it with a higher view of duty, with a stronger sense of truth; with a more powerful conviction that only by goodness and truth can God be approached or Christ be served—that God is goodness and truth, and that Christ is the Image of God, because He is goodness and truth. ”

“ There is no place on this earth where greater good can be done than here, preaching the gospel to this people and getting them to be Saints indeed. I would say to my young friends and to the middle-aged brethren, though I believe all who are going may be called young men, that if you go on a mission to preach the gospel with lightness and frivolity in your hearts, looking for this and that, and to learn what is in the world, and not having your minds riveted—yes, I may say riveted—on the cross of Christ, you will go and return in vain. ”

“ The appeal that is made for the American Missionary Association, in the name of the witness to the gospel, and in the name of Christian patriotism, gains its height when it is made in the name of Christ.
Every argument by which this work appeals to us to-day, is a prophecy of its success in our hands. Work among the despised races, work that sets the seal of power on the Christianity of our time, work that is to realize God’s thought for the land, work so Christly cannot fail! ”

“ We wish the brethren to understand the facts just as they are; that is, there is neither man or woman in this Church who is not on a mission. That mission will last as long as they live, and it is to do good, to promote righteousness, to teach the principles of truth, and to prevail upon themselves and everybody around them to live those principles that they may obtain eternal life. ”

“ And last, but not least, the full and faithful preaching of the gospel, for which our missionary brethren have ever been distinguished, and the employment of Christian education, have made a marked impression upon heathenism; have broken its prestige, have silenced its objections, and have prepared the way for future victories, more triumphant in their grandeur than anything the Society has yet seen. ”

“ The supreme question of missions is how to multiply the number of Christians who, with truthful lives and with clear unshaken faith in the character and ability of God, will, individually or collectively, or coöperatively as a church, wield the force of intercessory prayer for the conversion and transformation of men, for the inauguration and energizing of spiritual movements, and for the breaking down of all that exalts itself against Christ and his purposes. ”

“ As has already been made plain, the Church, while recognizing the importance of advancing along lines of largest immediate promise, should, under divine guidance, direct special attention to the most difficult fields of the non-Christian world. ”

“ But we do not only pray that the kingdom of God would come to us and remain with us, we also pray that it may come to all men who as yet are not members of this kingdom. We pray that all men may become true believers in Christ through the preaching of the Gospel. This work, preaching the Gospel to all nations, we call mission-work. The Second Petition is the great mission-prayer of the Church. The Lord admonishes us: "Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest that He will send forth laborers into His harvest." ”

“ When appeals are made to the Latter-day Saints for aid, they are always willing to comply; but we have also our mission to perform; to preach the gospel, to establish peace, secure plenty, and promote happiness in the land; and our people have learned through the commandments of God how to take care of themselves and are trying to help others to do likewise. ”

“ Protestant societies have done much to bring the Bible to the knowledge of the nominally Roman Catholic population.
Results of Missions
The Christian Church bases its missionary enterprise upon the spirit, the example, and the commandment of its Founder, and regards the duty as just the same whether the results be large or small. It appeals to common sense, saying in effect, “If it be a fact that a Divine Person came into the world to bless mankind, all men ought to know it, and have a right to know it. ”

“ I can talk to the brethren to-day on the same principle—there is not a man in this Church but what is capable of doing good if he has a mind to do so. Here are Elders who say, "I want a mission; I want to go and preach ”

“ Such lives in the churches of mission lands are the weightiest arguments for Christianity. But conversion to Christ goes, in its influence, farther than the individual. It has a far-reaching social influence. ”

“ The mission exists in the midst of a people and influences the people; it makes converts, it establishes them in the faith, it cares for them in mind and body, it prepares them to set the moral and religious standard for any Church of the future. It is not concerned directly with the widest possible preaching of the Gospel. When the native Christians whom it is painfully and slowly educating and training come to maturity they will spread the Gospel throughout the length and breadth of the land. ”

“ I only ask God, my Father, in the name of Jesus, to help me to live my religion, and to give me ability to save my fellow-beings from the corruptions of the world, to fill them with the peace of God, and to prepare them for a better kingdom than this. ”

“ For the transmuting of character the mission of Christ was a witness to the universe that the last might be first, and that the lowest might be lifted to the highest position of honor and glory, as the result of the Divine condescension, the deep down-reaching love of the Son of God. ”

“ This work of preaching Christ to those who know him not, must be carried on by missionaries and agents. It is usually the custom to expect that every mission agent shall devote some of his time in visiting neighbouring villages and in gathering the people together and in presenting to them, in all simplicity, the message of salvation. ”

“ THE MISSION OF THE CHURCH. Our mission has been to save men. We have been laboring all these eighty-odd years of the Church to bring men to a knowledge of the gospel of Jesus Christ, to bring them to repentance, to obedience {88} to the requirements of God's law. We have been striving to save men from error, to persuade them to turn away from evil and to learn to do good. ”

“ Our evangelists have so presented Christ, and so magnified the duty and the blessing of brotherly love, and so exercised, also, their gifts of Christian diplomacy, as to become peace-makers, and to restore a truly spiritual order at points where chaos seemed impending. ”

“ The mission of the church is to participate in the reconciling dialogue between God and man. Here is the source of the true life of the world. Here, too, is the source of the life of the church and its worship. ”

“ Such is the connexion of verse 13 with the foregoing context. The aim of the Christian ministry is to make itself superfluous, to raise men beyond its need. Knowledge and prophesyings, apostolates and pastorates, the missions of the evangelist and the schools of the teacher will one day cease; their work will be done, their end gained, when all believers are brought “to the unity of faith, to the full knowledge of the Son of God.” The work of Christ’s servants can have no grander aim, no further goal lying beyond this. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The churches in America, which have aided in sustaining the mission by their offerings and their prayers, have seen fewer results, than have crowned their labors in other fields; their faith has been sorely tried; but they have been permitted to hear, from time to time, of souls ransomed from darkness and sin; echoes of the songs of triumph sung by departing saints have been borne to their ears, and they have felt that their labors have not been unrewarded. ”

“ It also became plain that if the Church would fulfil its mission it must serve all the interests of the people. I was brought up with the idea that its mission was largely, if not exclusively, spiritual. Its chief and almost only concern was the soul of the individual man. It was thought that a man has a soul, and that that soul was in peril. ”

“ All Missions have come or are coming to this. It needs but a simple knowledge of the love of God and the redemption of the world by the Lord Jesus Christ, to fit a man to go home and tell his neighbors the good news which has come to him. ”

“ Human nature has never felt influences more deeply religious than those set at work by missions, recalling the effects of the preaching of the Apostles themselves. Remorse of conscience, loathing for sin, terror at the divine wrath, confidence in God, sympathy for our crucified Saviour, the ecstatic joy of the new-found divine friendship, utter contempt for the maxims of the world, iron determination to love God to the end—these are the sentiments which, by the preaching of missions, are made to dominate entire parishes in a degree simply marvellous. ”

“ Converts are multiplying; the fruits of the gospel abound. Both missions need reinforcement. Men filled with the spirit of Christ, able to endure hardness, of practical wisdom, [Pg 22] which knows how to do good, and not to do only harm when good is meant, men of faith, energy, meekness and prayer, who will commend themselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God as his servants, are required. It gave me pleasure to assure the missions of the strong desire of the Prudential Committee, and of my future personal endeavors, to obtain such men for them. ”

“ That this is the true theology of missions, the history of missions is the best of all proofs. We need not only to touch the intellect, but also to touch the heart. We need to furnish a motive that will win to action the sluggish and selfish devotees of systems century-old that have enslaved them. One message, and one only, has accomplished this result, and that is the message of the Cross. Not the presentation of God's greatness and power, but the story of the personal Jesus and his giving up of his life for sinners, has moved men to give themselves to him. ”

“ It is the peculiar mission of the Church to be the channel of grace to each soul by her spiritual and pastoral action—she alone has this mission; but it is not her only work. She has also to govern and educate, so far as government and education are needful subsidiaries to her great work of the salvation of souls. ”

“ Having considered Christ's preparatory work, His earthly mission, we wish now to consider His office and work as mediator between God and men. Christ sought no additional honor because of His message to men and suffering on their account. ”