176
May, 1939
T H E K I N G ' S B U S I N E S S
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Fishing and Feeding By M1LQ F JAM ISON * Los Angeles, California
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with a total enrollment of 8,358,480 young people, a number equal to the total popula tion of Canada. (Statistics from Biennial Survey of Education, published by the Bureau of Education, Washington, D.C., 1937.) 2. Religious surveys reveal that the ma jority of our young people will not go to church. Seven of the ten who attend Sunday-school and church during their earlier years leave after the age of fifteen. Approximately six out of the seven who leave do so without having accepted Christ. Thus the vast majority of the eight million young people in our high schools, universi ties, and colleges not only are unsaved, but also are untouched by the church which has been unfaithful in the fulfilling of its two fold commission. A Response to the Challenge This year marks the tenth anniversary of the incorporation of the University Bible Clubs, an organization which was founded in response to this challenge of winning and holding young people for Christ. The first of these Bible clubs was organized two years earlier, in 1927, on the campus of the University of California at Los Angeles.
"Then Eliashib the high priest rose up with his brethren the priests, and they builded the sheep gate . . . But the fish gate did the sons o[ Hassenaah build I" (Neh. 3:1, 3 ). F EED my sheep,” said the Lord Jesus to Peter, an undershepherd appointed to nourish the flock for which the Good Shepherd had given His life. It was the same Lord who had said to him and his brother Andrew some years before on the shores of Galilee, "Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Peter’s twofold commission is also that of the church, whose task is symbolically and prophetically portrayed in the build ing of the walls of Jerusalem under Nehe- miah. The sons of Hassenaah who obe diently built "the fish gate” prefigure the church’s great ministry of EVANGELISM, that of bringing men into the city of God through “the fish gate.” Eliashib and his fellows who "builded the sheep gate” sug gest the vital mission of EDUCATION, or the training of those who are already Chris tians. In John 10, the Lord Jesus speaks of Himself as the Door or Gate of the sheep- fold through which the sheep go in and out
A f T C R 15 YL fiRS Of AGfcr r ■ 3 atmain in the church -
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m PPROX IM A T ê -LM 6 OUT OF TH KE 7 L IÄ WITHOUT ACCEPT In & CHRIST AS SAV IO !!,;
to find pasture. As His follow ers, we have the double responsi bility to "fish" for men and to "feed" t h o s e within the fold of God by lead ing them to the green p astu res of His Word. A Modern Tragedy Tragic is the fact t h a t the overwhelming majority of the eight m i l l i o n high school and
: TO JO ir \ It I O O
WHO’ HAVÊ NfcVtR ATTENDER church
Bible Club Members at a Midwinter Mountain Conference
The blessing of the Lord has been upon this work in a gracious manner. But the purpose of this article is to center atten tion, not upon any achievement that has been attained, but upon the great task that waits to be grappled with—the meeting of the spiritual needs of eight million high school, college, and university students in the United States, for only a small per centage of these young people have been reached. Through its inertia, the church has given a long head start to the forces of moral and spiritual disintegration. In America we are reaping a harvest of cynicism, atheism, skeptical agnosticism, communism and
university students of the United States today are as sheep having no shepherd, totally ignorant of the Good Shepherd who has given His life for them. Greater trag edy lies in the fact that a large percentage of those who once could be found within the house of God are now astray in the wilderness of atheism and agnosticism, having followed false shepherds heralded as prophets of an educational utopia. This calamity may be summarized in the fol lowing figures: J j There are 29,501 universities, col leges, and high schools in the United States *Director, The University Bible Clubs.
* Recent statistics prove that the majority of our young people WILL NOT COME TO CHURCH. And 70% of those who have attended leave when they reach the age of decision. Because most churches no longer present the message of salvation, 6 out of the 7 who leave have not accepted Christ as Saviour. Should we not GO to those who will not COME to us ?
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