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THE K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S
dents. 2--j-An enquirers’ class for women. "3-^-An enquirers’ class for stu dents. 4—-An open evangelistic service to which people were invited during the day’s work of visitation, and to which \ they came in large numbers. Many turned to the Lord. The people said that their village was an entirely differ ent place since our men had come to them, the children did not fight on the streets, nor did they even quarrel in the homes, and children who before would not study are now studying dili gently. They said that it was a most wonderful religion that would bring about such a- practical change in so short a time. When the day came for the men to leave, men, women and chil- * dren escorted them, mothers with babes in their arms were in the procession, many with tears flowing down their cheeks. Some of the children had poles from which were hanging long strings of fire-crackers, and these went pop, pop, pop all the way down the long street, which is the Chinese way of greeting or escorting an honored guest. We do praise God for the great work of grace in this place, and more especially because the colporteurs went there from a field in which their work had been sadly interrupted by war conditions, and they were feeling rather down hearted and sore, but evidently God had a special work for them in this place, so He thrust them out of the other place that he might bring them here. Oh how these new converts do need our help in prayer, just out of heathenism, left now without any human help, except the occasional visit of the very busy missionary of that field, or the evan gelist associated with him, let us see our responsibility and plead with the Holy Spirit to “Lead them into all the truth.” At a place called Beh-ma-du after a short season of work by our Party No. 3, thirty persons were enrolled as en quirers on the church records of the
13013 Changsha, Hunan, China. December 21, 1918.
That number has gripped me, and I hope that it may grip you in the same ■way. It is the number of homes vis ited by the men of our five parties at work during No- BIBLE INSTITUTE vember. As the IN CHINA reports' came in and I added up the figures representing, so far as sta tistics go, the work of the men the total made a new appeal to my heart, and I felt specially drawn out in prayer for the people living in these thirteen thousand and thirteen homes. Last year many of them had not even heard of Jesus, this year Christmas has a new meaning to. them, especially to those who as a result of God’s blessing on the work of our colporteurs are now rejoic ing in God’s great gift to men. Early in November Party No. 6 began work in the Province of Kiangsi, and I hope that you will pray much both for the people of the 13013 homes visited dur ing October, and for the larger number visited during November, and for tne eighty men who are out in all kinds of weather, and far from their homes doing this blessed work. What have all these visits amounted to? That is the question that will be asked, and which it gives us much joy to answer. A letter to hand a few days ago from one of our leaders tells of the blessed work in a center where they had been for about a month, and of the touching farewell given to them by the people of the village as they left them to move on to a new field. In this center the interest was so deep from the very first presentation of the message that early in the campaign four evening meetings were started and these were continued with a large at tendance to the end of the campaign. The four evening services were as fol lows: 1—An enquirers’ class for stu
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