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Don Sands
Moderator
Username: admin
Post Number: 792
Registered: 05-2006
| | Posted on Monday, May 25, 2009 - 06:14 am: | 
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Solusi Mission readings:
American Sentinel opposed to the Rhodes land grant.
http://www.adventistarchives.org/docs/AmSn/AmSn1894-V09-46/index.djvu?djvuopts&p age=8
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Special Testimonies to Ministers and Workers, No. 3, p. 33
Jan. 31, 1895.
Solemn Times.
Solemn, serious times are upon us, and perplexities will increase, to the very close of time. There may be a little respite in these matters, but it will not be for long. I have letters to write that must go in the next mail to Battle Creek. Our brethren there are not looking at everything in the right light. The movements they have made to pay taxes on the property of the Sanitarium and Tabernacle have manifested a zeal and conscientiousness that in all respects is not wise nor correct. Their ideas of religious liberty are being woven with suggestions that do not come from the Holy Spirit, and the religious liberty cause is sickening, and its sickness can only be healed by the grace and gentleness of Christ. The hearts of those who advocate this cause must be filled by the Spirit of Jesus. The Great Physician alone can apply the balm of Gilead. Let these men read the book of Nehemiah with humble hearts touched by the Holy Spirit, and their false ideas will be modified, and correct principles will be seen, and the present order of things will be changed. Nehemiah prayed to God for help, and God heard his prayer. The Lord moved upon heathen kings to come to his help. When his enemies zealously worked against him, the Lord worked through kings to carry out his purpose, and to answer the many prayers that were ascending to him for the help which they so much needed. {SpTA03 32.1}
Extreme Positions.
I am often greatly distressed when I see our leading men taking extreme positions, and burdening themselves
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over matters that should not be taken up nor worried over, but left in the hands of God for him to adjust. We are yet in the world, and God keeps for us a place in connection with the world, and works by his own right hand to prepare the way before us, in order that his work may progress along its various lines. The truth is to have a standing-place, and the standard of truth is to be uplifted in many places in regions beyond. Be sure that God has not laid upon those who remain away from these foreign fields of labor, the burden of criticising the ones on the ground where the work is being done. Those who are not put on the ground know nothing about the necessities of the situation, and if they cannot say anything to help those who are on the ground, let them not hinder, but show their wisdom by the eloquence of silence, and attend to the work that is close at hand. I protest against the zeal that they manifest that is not according to knowledge, when they ventilate their ideas about foreign fields of labor. Let the Lord work with the men who are on the ground, and let those who are not on the ground walk humbly with God, lest they get out of their place, and lose their bearings. The Lord has not placed the burden of criticising the work, upon those who have taken this burden, and he does not give them the sanction of his Holy Spirit. Many move according to their own human judgment, and zealously seek to adjust things that God has not placed in their hands. Just as long as we are in the world, we shall have to do a special work for the world; the message of warning is to go to all countries, tongues, and peoples. {SpTA03 32.2}
The Lord does not move upon his workers to make them take a course which will bring on the time of trouble before the time. Let them not build up a wall of separation between themselves and the world, by advancing their own ideas and notions. There is now altogether too much of this throughout our borders. The message of warning has not reached large numbers
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of the world, in the very cities that are right at hand, and to number Israel is not to work after God's order. Just as long as we are in this world, and the Spirit of God is striving with the world, we are to receive as well as to impart favors. We are to give to the world the light of truth as presented in the sacred Scriptures, and we are to receive from the world that which God moves upon them to do in behalf of his cause. The Lord still moves upon the hearts of kings and rulers in behalf of his people, and it becomes those who are so deeply interested in the religious liberty question not to cut off any favors, or withdraw themselves from the help that God has moved men to give, for the advancement of his cause. We find examples in the word of God concerning this very matter. Cyrus, king of Persia, made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it into writing saying, "Thus saith Cyrus king of Persia, The Lord God of heaven hath given me all the kingdoms of the earth; and he hath charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Who is there among you of all his people? his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and build the house of the Lord God of Israel." A second commandment was issued by Darius for the building of the house of the Lord, and is recorded in the sixth chapter of Ezra. The Lord God of Israel has placed his goods in the hands of unbelievers, but they are to be used in favor of doing the works that must be done for a fallen world. The agents through whom these gifts come, may open up avenues through which the truth may go, they may have no sympathy with the work, and no faith in Christ, and no practice in his words; but their gifts are not to be refused on that account. {SpTA03 33.1}
It is very strange that some of our brethren should feel that it is their duty to bring about a condition of things that would bind up the means that God would have set
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free. God has not laid upon them the responsibility of coming in conflict with the authorities and powers of the world in this matter. The withstraining hand of God has not yet been withdrawn from the earth. Let the leaders in the work bide their time, hide in Christ, and move and work with great wisdom. Let them be as wise as serpents, and as harmless as doves. I have repeatedly been shown that we might receive far more favors than we do in many ways if we would approach men in wisdom, acquaint them with our work, and give them an opportunity of doing those things which it is our privilege to induce them to do for the advancement of the work of God.
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{SpTA03 34.1}
Feb. 2, 1895.
Activity in Our Churches.
The prevailing monotony of the religious round of service in our churches, needs to be disturbed. The leaven of activity needs to be introduced, that our church members may work along new lines, and devise new methods. The Holy Spirit's power will move upon hearts when this dead, lifeless monotony is broken up, and many will begin to work in earnest who never before thought of being anything but idle spectators. A working church on earth is connected with the working church above. God works, angels work, and men should work, for the conversion of souls. Efforts should be made to do something while the day lasts, and the grace of God will be revealed that souls may be saved to Christ. Everywhere souls are perishing in their sins, and God is saying to every believing soul, "Hasten to their help with the message that I shall give you." {SpTA03 35.1}
Economy.
The Lord has made men his agents, and with heart filled with the love of Jesus, they are to co-operate with
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him in turning men from error to truth. God blesses the earth with sunshine and showers. He causes the earth to bring forth its plenteous treasures for the use of man. The Lord has made man his almoner to dispense his heavenly gifts by bringing souls to the truth. Will my brethren in America inquire how the precious, saving truth reached them when they were in darkness? Men and women brought their tithes and offerings unto God, and as means filled the treasury, men were sent out to advance the work. This same process must be repeated if souls in darkness are reached in this day. But I have seen that there are many who are withholding their tithes altogether, and others are withholding a part, and yet the great missionary work increases year by year. We should learn to economize in our household expenditures. No needless expenses should be incurred, because want and wretchedness, poverty and misery of every description press upon our notice, and we are called upon to help those who are needy and distressed. We must see that those who need food and clothing are supplied, that those who are in soul-poverty may understand the goodness of salvation. {SpTA03 35.2}
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Light Bearers to the Remnant
Rhodesia
Meanwhile the General Conference, at the prompting of the Wessels
family, had decided to try to obtain for a mission station in the territory
north of the Cape Colony land recently occupied by the British South
Africa Company. At the close of what they feared was a rather unsatisfac-
tory meeting with Cecil Rhodes, Adventist representatives A. T. Robin-
son and Pieter Wessels received a sealed letter which they were in-
structed to deliver to Dr. Leander Starr Jameson, Rhodes's representative
in Bulawayo, Rhodesia. The letter granted them all the land they could
use. Overjoyed, they requested 6,000 morgen (slightly more than 12,000
acres), for which they were to pay a nominal $60 quitrent annually.
Development of Solusi Mission on the Rhodes grant began in 1894 and
proved no easy task. At first there was considerable opposition among
some Adventist leaders back in America into accepting a grant of land as a
governmental favor. A. T. Jones feared that this violated Seventh-day
Adventist principles of church-state separation. A letter from Ellen White
admonishing them not to "withdraw themselves from the help that God
has moved men to give, for the advancement of His cause," convinced the
Seventh-day Adventist Foreign Mission Board to proceed with the proj-
ect. Hardly was the settlement of the mission begun before a tribal revolt
forced the missionaries to withdraw for five months. Famine and an
outbreak of rinderpest, destroying all the mission cattle that had survived
the war, followed in quick succession. Shortly thereafter the missionaries'
ranks were decimated by a virulent malaria epidemic. For a time it
seemed the station would be closed, but conversions among the Africans
in the area led the missionaries to disregard a Mission Board directive to
move elsewhere. Solusi, the oldest Seventh-day Adventist mission among
indigenous Africans, was saved.21
During the year that Solusi was founded an attempt was also made to
open Seventh-day Adventist work along the west African coast in
present-day Ghana. Here interest in Adventism had been aroused
through tracts left by a visiting ship's captain. Two nurses arrived in 1895,
and a medical work was instituted. Within two years' time the constant
scourge of fever, which earned the area the title "the white man's grave,"
forced the abandonment of the mission until early in the twentieth cen-
tury.22
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A. T. Robinson Remembers Fifty Years Ago (1944)
http://www.adventistarchives.org/docs/SADO/SADO1944-11/index.djvu?djvuopts&page= 1
The Story of Our Church
http://www.adventistarchives.org/docs/TSOOC/TSOOC/index.djvu?djvuopts&page=304
Declaration of the Seventh-day Adventist Church on Church-State Relations
http://www.adventist.org/beliefs/other_documents/other_doc8.html
also,
http://spectrummagazine.org/files/archive/archive01-05/1-4fleming.pdf
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Don Sands
Moderator
Username: admin
Post Number: 856
Registered: 05-2006
| | Posted on Saturday, June 13, 2009 - 07:23 pm: |
|
Hubert's Post, For the Record on this thread - a duplicate
Two comments:
Some people do not understand Religious Liberty. As I see it there are two basic principles we need to follow: 1) Oppose the establishment or restriction of religion by the state, and 2) to oppose any restriction or coercion in matters of worship.
There are a number of other matters involving religion that are not related to these two issues (abortion for one) on which we do not need to take a stand. Accepting funds from the government to support school is in a gray area. In Africa, such funds are usually accepted gladly. And the schools are looked on as performing a real service to the state.
In this country it is looked on in a different way. Here the issue of establishment of religion seems to be involved in accepting funds from the state. And parochial schools, rather than doing a service to the state, are seen more as in competition with public education. It is not always an easy decision to make.
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Now this comment:
. . . "to number Israel is not to work after God's order."
I have been a little uncomfortable with the issue of counting membership. To say that we have 15 million SDAs in the world may induce complacency. After all, if there are that many what more needs to be done. Isn't there enough members from which to choose 144,000 for their special work before God? Maybe we have already reached all those who are reachable?
Better if we could measure the spiritual tone of our churches, rather than the numbers. Maybe we should count all those who attend church -- or Sabbath School -- regularly, or who come to the communion services, or those who pay tithe regularly? Would that not tell us more about the strength of the church?
Just a thought.
____________________________
Hubert F. Sturges
www.everlastingcovenant.com
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Don Sands
Moderator
Username: admin
Post Number: 854
Registered: 05-2006
| | Posted on Saturday, June 13, 2009 - 07:16 pm: |
|
Hubert's post overlaps this area of Solusi, Religious Liberty and Government funding and a developing discussion on Abortion. I have moved his and subsequent posts to the Ideas: Abortion subtopic found at:
http://www.covenantforum.com/discus/messages/584/2568.html?1244948940
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