King's Business - 1918-01

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THE KING’S BUSINESS

ment carried on in Record with the follow­ ing principles: 1. The settlers must understand that he that will hot work shall not eat. 2. So far as possible, work is provided for the settlers, and “now it is up to them to make good.” 3. All the rules and regulations o f the settlement are comprised in the two verses: “All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.” And the other is like unto this one: “I f a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit o f meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted.” So far there have been about ISO con­ verts and they have proved to be very enthusiastic lovers of our Lord. Hindus find it difficult to comprehend disinterestedness in work. Many o f them belieye that the missionaries either receive so- much money from the Government per convert or have come to foreign countries because they couldn’t make a living at home. “ Hinduism is lower than human nature itself. The great difference between the Christian and the Hindu is that the Hindu has a religion that drags his human nature down while a Christian has a religion that lifts his human nature up.” AFRICA Nearly one-fourth o f the earth’s land surface is comprised within the Continent o f Africa. It is as far around the coast o f Africa as it is around the world. Every eighth person o f the world’s population lives in the Dark Continent. The blacks double their numbers every forty years and the whites every eighty years. There are 843 languages and dialects in use among the blacks today. Only a few have been reduced to writing. The coal fields o f Africa aggre­ gate 800,000 square miles; its copper fields equal those o f North America and Europe combined and it has undeveloped iron ore amounting to five times that o f North America. Africa has forty thousand miles

o f river and lake navigation and water power aggregating ninety times that of Niagara Falls. One area in Africa unoccu­ pied by missionaries is three times the size o f New England, a second would make four states like New York, a third would cover eight Iowas, and a fourth is eighteen times the size o f Ohio. Throughout Africa there is one missionary for every 133,000. Almost the entire continent is now under European flags. France has a colony twenty times the size o f France itself, and the British flag flies over a territory as large as the United States. ASIA MINOR. In Asia Minor some of the most hardy, independent, hopeful representatives o f the Greek stock have their home: , These folks use the Bible and' some tell of its mes­ sage holding them spellbound by the fire­ light till cock-crow in the morning. Such persons ate not satisfied in the Orthodox Church ; they come out, and form evangeli­ cal communities that are spiritually alive. Like other Greeks they are individualistic, fond o f dialectics, champion debaters. The best o f their ministers almost more than other men anywhere remind one o f Paul; there is the same intense conviction, un­ sparing devotion, counting o f all things as loss for Christ. A year after the Armenian deportation from the Marsovan field, up to the summer o f 1916, there were seven Greek congregations, each with its earnest minister, and w ith' aggregate communities o f about 1,000 souls, going steadily for­ ward in spite o f the horrors o f war around them .—Missionary Review. By an artificial famine which they have created in Syria, the Turks are _extermi- nating the Christian population o f that land as effectively, if not so conspicuously, as they did the Armenians. It has been said that if the country remains another six months under the control o f Turkey the whole population will be in their graves. The sufferings which the people have passed through have: had the effect of changing their naturally religious tempera-

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