The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1888-02-11
Special Contributors.
HOW WE ALL MAY BECOME HOME
MISSIONARIES.
BY REV. A. G. BARRY. D. D.
Lodi. Wis.,

The subject of Missions seems Just
/ now to be uppermost among us. We
are writing, talking and preaching
about Missions, home and foreign, as
never before; and what is best of all,
we are putting suggestion, argument
and appeal into practical shape, into
organic forms, or embodying them in
movements and substantial doing. AL
ways we have been a missionary church,
our itinerants going into all the Amer
ican world to preach the gospel of uni
versal love and grace. At first they
were set apart by other than the laying
on of mems hands, and they were sent
and sustained by no association or con-
vention. We are what we are to-day
because of the apostolic labors of those
who were commissioned by the Holy
Spirit. No matter that they were men,
for the most part, of limited intellectual
resources, with little or no previous
theological training. Their talents were
.amplifed by the wide range of their
labors, and the results of their ministry
made glorious indeed
So for more than a hundred years
our work has largely been of a mission
ary character, and mainly wrought by
men to whom all sacrifices seemed light,
aud who were wiling to live poor and
endure hardship and privatiOn for the
sake of the cause they loved. Take
away the missionary element of our
church; call home, if it were possible,
those who are toiling alone in distant
fields, or carrying the gospel to the re-
motest pioneer settlement upon the
boundaries of civilization in the great
Northwest, and no little of its strength
would depart. 1t would be better to
reinforce than to call in the laborers
who occupy remote posts of duty, and
with substantial aid make lighter their
burdens of toll and sacrifice.
Now for the first time, almost, we are
seriously agitating the subject of foreign
missions; and by those we do not mean
simply missions to Scotland or Ireland,
but to heather lands, like Japan, and
China, and the Fiji Islands. We
have long been taunted for our indif-
ference and neglect in regard to such
missions, and were bade to see, what
was apparent enough to other churches,
that our system had nothing to beget
the missionary spirit, or to kindle zeal
in behalf of peoples sitting in darkness.
Our sufficient reply has been, that we
have found plenty of employment in
dealing with certain forms of heathen-
ism right at home, and that our re-
sources of men and money would not
admit of our attempting to deal with
that across the seas. Now that we are
of maturer growth and stronger handed,
we propose to try the power of our gos-
pei upon the heathen mind; or, in bet
ter words, to unite with other churches
in carrying the blessings of a Christian
civilization to unenlghtened nations,
and the dark corners of the earth.
But we are to tell how we all-men
and women, young and old, even the
children-may be missionaries, and
help preach the gospel to the poor, the
lost and perishing everywhere around
us. Just as always since Christ lived
and taught, and gave himself to the
cross, it is the work Of they who are
his disciples to help bring men to
knowledge of the one God and Father,
and of the relation they sustain to Him.
To show for what Jesus came into the
world, what the divine scheme of re-
demptiOn, and what the connection of
the life that came down from heaven
with human destiny; to bring the sin
full to recognition and experience of
the wonders and joys of birth into
the kingdom of truth and love-put
into one brief statement-it is to make
an application Of the gospel to the
needs of humanity, to win souls to
Christ by holding up the attractions of
his cross, and by prayer and effort to
bring nearer the kingdom of God day
by day. The mission of every convert
ed man is to so teach, and labor, and
live, as that the divine religion of Jesus
shall be brought into immediate con-
tact with the multitude of untaught
and unsaved people, or with the wants
and maladies of human souls.