them wait for their money until we can repay them." The financial crisis, due to the recession in business in general, became so acute in 1915 that the Institute, now in its new buildings, was faced with a problem of find ing new sources of income or car rying out a program of retrench ment. Stewart wrote to Horton: "The income from our dormitories and auditorium is falling so far short of what we anticipated, and will be so utterly inadequate to meet the running expenses of the Institute, that we are obliged to face the question of retrench ment." Horton made a trip to the vicin ity of Chicago, Philadelphia and New York during the summer of 1916 in an attempt to raise funds through the sale of Bible Institute Building Company bonds. He had conferences with the founder of the Quaker Oats Company, the publisher of the Chicago News and with John Wanamaker, the millionaire Philadelphia merchant. In all these contacts, Horton was unable to interest anyone in the Bible Institute. During this time the Stewart family dug deeply into their per sonal fortunes to keep the school going. One accounting shows they gave $1,361,000. In addition to this amount the Bible Institute Building Company had sold over $400,000 of its bonds, and still the school was financially in trouble. This was due to the fact that the buildings had cost much more than had been anticipated when they were planned. It was not until 1919 that the debt incurred in the construction of the Bible Institute buildings was Page 24
finally paid. Stewart announced to the board of directors of the Insti tute at its quarterly meeting in October of that year that the en tire indebtedness of the Institute buildings, amounting to $430,000 in bonds, had been liquidated, that funds with which to retire these bonds were in the hands of the trustee, a receipt from whom stated that the bonds were all paid for, and destroyed so far as they had been turned in. With the advent of "the roaring twenties," Biola was a firmly es tablished Bible school, debt-free and robust. Stewart was 80 and could look back with humble sat isfaction on what had been accom plished. He could recall his early California oil prospecting days when each hole was dry and fail ure seemed almost a certainty. He could say, "The world looked pretty dark during all this period. The passage of Scripture contained in Luke 12:33 was impressed very strongly upon my mind, and I could not get rid of it— it kept flashing before me day and night: 'Sell that ye have, and give alms; provide yourself bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that faileth not, where no thief approacheth, neither moth cor rupted.' " He liked to recall, "When the message came to me to sell and give, I did not seem to have any thing that I could sell, and hence had nothing to give, but now I have been able to give .. . and still I have a great abundance left. I can gratefully trace the Lord's hand in His dealings with me, and can say that even my darkest days have been my best days." As early as 1911, Stewart spoke
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