Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1919-04-10
METHODISM's COM
MENCENIENT DAY

MENCEMENI DA1
Prize-winning Five-Minute speech
on the Centenary, written by Rev.
Walter A. Morgan of Corydon, la.
If we Methodists have not learned
our lesson, then God pity us, for we
will surely need His mercy. The
Centenary is Methodism's Common
cement Day. We have had one
hundred-year course in missions, and
God says it is time to graduate and
begin doing things with what we
have learned. The course has been
prominently practical, with an
abundance of laboratory work and
many experiments. The results
have all been tabulated. So far we
have worked on school room basis,
have done things in small way, just
to prove what can be done.
The Centenary says we are going
to do in big way the things that
we have found to work in small
way. Or, as a business man would
express it, we are going to put on a
commercial basis the successful ex-
periments of our laboratories.
We have found, for instance, that
a Chinese Christian is not a yellow
peril He is a force for interna-
tional friendship, for the kind of de-
mocracy we have been fighting for,
for the kind of righteousness that
will save the world Therefore, We
must leaven the whole lump of China
with Christians enough to make the
Chinese safe and sane neighbors. If
we do not, If we have not learned
our lesson, then God pity us, for the
peril of the yellow men will outclass
a thousand times the peril of the
Hun.
We have found that a missionary
and hospital and few deaconesses
in little corner of Russia can trans
form the life of the folks they reach
and can make them steady and sane
during political changes. But there
are so many little corners in Russia
where we did not get to go. Rus
STA did not have the salt OF the
earth" to save her in the time OF
great need. God even permitted one
corner of Russia to come over here
to enable us to get at it with less
difficulty We experimental lit
tie, we discovered that converted
Russian can preach the gospel that
says, eye shall know the truth, and
the truth shall make you Free until
a few anarchists became Christians,
and for those few the banner of the
cross replaced the red flag. We did
not preach to the many; out OF the
many came Lenine and Trotzky; and
among the many they found their
followers. 1t would have cost us
a good many thousands of dollars to
have reached all of Little Russia in
America with home missionaries,
and all Russia with foreign mission
aries. We save those thousands
and then spent millions because Rus
STA failed God pity us If we have
not learned a lesson from our neg
lect of the immigrants within our
gates.
We sent a few doctors to India
sent them half-equipped for their
work in material things, such as hos
pitfalls, nurses, instruments and med
icines. Yet they accomplished
wonders, until we dream of what a
sufficiently large force of doctors,
working with sufficient equipment,
could do following Christ's own ex-
ample in healing and teaching.
We sent a few teachers to Africa,
and found that black children with
an equal chance develop even as our
own. Therefore, we know again
that every generation of children
affords an opportunity to make this
world over The Centenary says,
'Let us do 1t with this generation of
little ones"
Then think what we have learned
of the black man at home the chilS
dren of the slums, the settler on the
frontier. We know solution or
the Mexican problem, the race prob
lem, the labor problem, and many
others. We have learned lot dur
ing the last one hundred years. If
after a century at school we cannot do
big things, we Methodists are hope
less lot. But no Methodist will ad-
NIT that.
This is our Commencement Day.
Let's commences!