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T H E K I N G ' S B U S I N E S S
June, 1933
Q loies on CHRISTIAN ENDEAVOR . . . B y M ary G. G oodner
Hear of an old Navajo woman, blind and deaf, brought to a mission hospital. For eighty years she had lived in our midst, but her body was bathed perhaps for the first time when they brought her in, and for the first time her body laid on a bed. For the first time in her life, the gospel was preached to her—but too late. Years ago she could have harkened, but now her ears were deaf. Two weeks she lingered, and each day was spent in terror. All through her waking hours she chanted the Navajo Confession of Faith: ‘I am going to the place of the devils!’ And so she died, without God and without hope in the world. And so they all die, except they have Christ. How much longer will God’s people suffer this spiritual Lazarus to sit at their gate, offering him only the crumbs that fall from their spiritual tables?” JULY 9, 1933 W HAT IS CONSCIENCE? HOW TEACH AND TRAIN IT ? R om an s 2:11-16 Suggestions (or the Meeting Praise Service— “O come and let us wor ship.” One verse each o f : “ O Worship the Lord.” “Revive Us Again.” “ Praise Him.” Intersperse with Bible verses on praise. Prayer Service—-“ Pray without ceasing.” Pray for world-wide revival. Pray for missionaries. Pray for local church and society. Close with prayer hymn—“Have Thine Own Way, Lord.” Program. Vocal Solo—“ Give o f your Best to the Master.” Address by Pastor—Conscience and its Relation to Christ. Benediction—Psalm 19:14. Leader’s Helps Wise is the pastor who visits the Chris tian Endeavor regularly—not too often, lest he embarrass the more timid and hin der their expression, but often enough to encourage, inspire, and maintain a close relationship. For this meeting, ask him to bring a short, pithy message, taking not over fifteen minutes. Much enlightenment is needed on the subject of conscience. A favorite adage is, “Let your conscience be your guide” ; but this is a falsehood of Satan. Our con sciences may be seared, unenlightened, hardened, or stupefied; they can not be de pended upon. The Holy Spirit is the Chris tian’s only safe guide, and He guides us through the Word o f God into all truth. If the pastor is not able to be present, se cure the best speaker you know—one who himself has a “conscience void of offense toward God, and toward man.” JULY 16, 1933 OUR NEED OF FRIENDS P h ilippian s 4:10-20 Suggestions for the Meeting Leader—“ Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”
Oxley declares: “The masses of Negroes crowded in the mean quarters of some cities present problems in human depravity that can only be relieved by slow growth and the planting of desire among these people therriselves to improve their con dition.” II. T he A ppeal of th e M ountaineer W. E. Hudson, himself a mountaineer and at one time Superintendent of Moun tain Missions, thus describes the need: “ Be ing1isolated, the Highlander has had prac tically no chance to receive an education. The superintendent of public instruction in one mountain state said that 75 per Cent of the schools were failures on account of in competent teachers. Often some of these teachers can do little more than read and write.” Dr. Guerrant says'-: “It is not hard to per suade them [the mountain people] that God has a better country for them. It is a continual struggle for bread. The steep mountain sides are soon worn to the rock, and it is a battle with ground hogs, and ground squirrels from the time the seed is planted to the day the crop is gathered. The schools are like the homes. They are only open for a few months. One little girl before entering a mission school said she had attended five schools and added, ‘I never larned nuthin’ at ary one uv them.’ ” III. T he A ppeal of th e I mm igran t Some one has said: “ If the inhabitants of the United States should pass a given point in line, every third man would be a foreigner or son of a foreigner. Only by comparison can we obtain any comprehen sion of this vast army. If Boston and Baltimore were suddenly blotted out of ex istence, in twelve months our incoming im migrants could repopulate both cities.” According to Morris: “ If they should join hands, these immigrants each year would reach from Atlanta to Baltimore. If they marched in single file by any spot at the rate of five each minute, it would re quire six months for the procession to pass, marching day and night.” -; Surely this is a task that challenges. IV. T he A ppeal of th e J ew A leading Jewish rabbi states : “We Jews have given religion to the world, but have little ourselves. We gave God to the world, but we have little of God in our hearts. The Jews are not studying their own Bible; other people are studying it.” Surely, this is a call for service. V. T he A ppeal of th e I ndian Eric C. Walden, a member of the Navajo Indian Evangelization Movement, Oraibi, Ariz., gives the following facts regarding the Navajos—a tribe of 45,000 Indians: “ Though godly men in years gone by have given their lives to bring the light of the gospel to this people, far less than half are evangelized. It is estimated that only two per cent are Christians. The Navajos worship some 300 spirits, all of them evil except one. The one good god they love, but she lives far away. Her home is in the middle o f the Big Water in the west. O f the evil gods, they live in agony o f fear. A Happy Hunting Ground ? They have none.
JULY 2, 1933 HOW CAN WE MAKE OUR NA TION MORE CHRISTIAN? A cts 3:19-21 Suggestions (or the Meeting Hymn—“Jesus Saves.” Hymn—“ Is your Life a Channel of Blessing ?” Prayer. Quartet. Testimonies and Scripture Verses. Leader’s Talk. Presentation o f mission work in the United States represented by: 1. Negroes. ■ 2. Mountaineers. 3. immigrants. 4. Jews. 5. Indians. 6. Foreigners. Quiet Hour. Closing Hymn. Benediction—-Psalm 1, in concert. Let this meeting; be a rousing mission ary meeting. By means of a number of short speeches (from persons in costume, if possible), make vivid and real our coun try’s vital need. Additional material may be secured from the Sunday-school or pub lic library, also from the Christian En deavor World and church missionary papers. The only way we can make our country more Christian is to be more active in evan gelizing the unsaved; in other words, by making more individual Christians. Hence, let this appeal come from those who need evangelizing. Meditation on the Lesson The portion for our study is part of the second sermon that Peter preached in Je rusalem. To rightly understand these verses, we must remember that Peter was preaching to Jews. When we try to apply the words to the whole world, we become confused. Jesus came to the Jews when He was on earth, for John 1 :11 tells us that “he came unto his own, and his own received him not.” Yet once more Peter, His messenger, is offering this same Jesus Christ to them, if they, as a nation, will repent. He promises them that their sins will be blotted out, and because of that, “times o f refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord.” W e also notice, first, the connection be tween the restoration of all things and the second coming o f Christ; and second, the intimate association between Israel and Christ’s coming. To Bible students and es pecially students o f prophecy, the Jew is a fascinating subject for study. “God hath not cast away his people.” He has prom ised to return them to their own land, and we know He will keep His word. Let us pray for the Jew, take him the gospel, and lead him to accept our Lord and Saviour as his. Leader’s Helps I. T h e A ppeal of th e N egro One out of every ten persons in the United States is a Negro. The present Ne gro population is between fourteen and fif teen million.
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