T H E K ING ’S BUS INESS S PAN ISH M ISS ION W O RK L. H . Jam ison, Sup’t.
312
vice were opened up with the new ygar. Because of the present financial depression, great crowds of men are without work, and to the majority of Mexicans (there are about thirty or thirty-five thousand in Los Angeles alone), to be out of work is to be out of “eats” and a place to sleep. Most of these men are befween the ages of fifteen and thirty. They are here with out families or homes, and as men with families are given the preference, many of these single men have found it impossible to get work. To meet this condition we began early in the year to feed the men every evening be fore the Gospel meeting, and have had an average attendance of over one hundred. A large room was also secured where the men can sleep each night on the floor. Some carry blankets with them, but many have nothing to put either under or ~over them, yet it is a great boon to even have a place where they can lie down in safety. Bread and coffee are given to them at six o’clock in the morning, before they begin their daily search for work. Excellent order has been maintained both at the meetings and the sleeping quarters, notwithstanding the large crowd of men. The Gospel meetings have been greatly blessed, many having professed to accept the Lord Jesus Christ as their Saviour, the ma jority of whom we are convinced are really converted. Bible classes are being held for these converts each afternoon, with an at tendance of from fifteen to thirty. is avowedly in a “classification” the posi tion of which is inimical to that very same sentiment, if a man belongs to a class which confessedly, historically, logically and, as far as it can, actually swallows up individ uality, digests and assimilates it into a solidarity that is arrayed against that very principle, that man should be judged “by the company he keeps.” And that is but to judge him "on his own merits
S E V E N years ago, August 1, 1908, the doors of our Spanish Mission were opened for nightly evening meetings among the Spanish-speaking peoples of this city. Open air Gospel meetings at the old Mex ican Plaza, and indoor Gospel meetings at the Mission Hall, have been conducted al most continuously ever since, resulting in the professed conversion of over 1200 per sons. Most of these converts being common la borers, traveling about continually in search of work, are scattered throughout the United States and-Mexico. Frequent let ters from them testify to what God is doing through these living witnesses. Gospel tracts and literature have been freely and judiciously distributed, and have been the direct cause Of many conversions. Our sphere oT operations has broadened until it now embraces work in the hospitals, in the jails and chain gang, in severel labor camps, and a large amount of philanthropic work made necessary by a mission of this kind. Gospel meetings and Bible classes are also conducted, and homes visited, in five out lying towns. ^ In the visitation work the- Bible is read, its truths expounded and in most places an excellent response has been given to the written-Word. Both at Clear water and Montebello the Bible classes have an average attendance of from fifteen to twenty. In one place ten families are rep resented. Almost unbounded opportunities for ser- A late number of The Continent con tains an editorial on "Neighboring the C a th o lic s It claims that "Everyman alive is entitled to be judged on his own merits _ not by some classiñcation of prejudice that lumps a whole division of the populace under one ban.” This is a sound American and Protestant sentiment—in the abstract. But if a man
Made with FlippingBook - Online Brochure Maker