The divine enterprise of missions

Front matter

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Introduction

BY REV. D. D. DEMAREST, D.D.,

PROFESSOR OF PASTORAL THEOLOGY, NEW BRUNSWICK, N. J.

N introducing to the Christian public this volume of Lectures on Missions, delivered before the Theological Seminary of the Reformed Church in America, at New Brunswick, N. J., it is proper that a brief account should be given of the origin of the lectureship.

On the 1 6th day of April, 1888, Mr. Nathan F. Graves, an Elder in the Reformed Church of Syracuse, N. Y., and an active member of the Board of Foreign Missions of the Reformed Church in America, addressed the following letter to the Rev. Prof. Mabon, of the Theological Seminary :

" Syracuse, N. Y., April 16th, 1888. "Rev. Prof. W. V. V. Mabon, D.D.

" My dear Sir — I understand that there is no Seminary or Professorship of Missions in the United States. I may be mistaken, but I am quite sure that there is no adequate provision made for a service so important. I have noticed that the missionaries that are instructed at Basle have quite an advantage over those who receive io INTRODUCTION.

no special instruction to fit them for their important work.

" I write to enquire if the subject has ever been considered in the Seminary ; and if you consider it desirable and practicable to establish such a professorship, I will be greatly obliged for a reply at your convenience. " Very sincerely yours,

"N. F. Graves."

The Faculty having declared that, in their opinion, it was desirable and practicable that some agency for missionary instruction should be established in the Seminary, conferences were held by Mr. Graves with a Committee of the Faculty, with Rev. John Mason Ferris, D.D., for many years Secretary of the Board of Foreign Missions of the Reformed Church in America ; with Rev. Henry N. Cobb, D.D., present Secretary, and with various friends of Foreign Missions. The result was a proposal by Mr. Graves to provide liberally the means for a course of lectures for the year 1888- 89 ; the lecturer or lecturers to be appointed by the Theological Faculty in connection with the Secretary of the Board of Foreign Missions of the Reformed Church in America, while further action of a more permanent nature was to be left for more mature consideration.

Accordingly, a course of six lectures was delivered in the S. A. Kirkpatrick Chapel, the use of which was kindly granted for the purpose by the authorities of the College. The lecturers and subjects were as follows :

IN TROD UCTION. 1 1

i. Rev. Henry Stout, of Nagasaki, Japan — The Unique Characteristics of the Missionary Work in Japan.

2. Rev. Cyrus Hamlin, D.D., formerly of Constantinople — Fifty Years of Missionary Education in Turkey.

3. Rev. Leonard W. Kip, D.D., of Amoy, China — A Heathen Stronghold.

4. Rev. E. M. Wherry, D.D., of Saharanpoor, India — The Religion of Islam.

5. Rev. F. F. Ellinwood, D.D., Secretary of the Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church — The Undesigned Testimony of False Religions to the True.

6. Rev. John H. Wyckoff, of the Arcot Mission — Brahmanism and Christianity.

In their report made to the Board of Superintendents, May 20th, 1889, the Faculty said: "These lectures were able and instructive, and the impression made was so salutary that we earnestly hope that the thought so generously conceived by Elder Graves will be matured in permanency, and that hereafter our students may be able every year to receive instruction from men of wisdom and experience in this great subject. The thanks of the Seminary and of the Church are due to the Elder whose heart, in its deep sympathy with Christian effort in evangelizing the world, has projected the scheme, and inclines him to provide liberally for its accomplishment,"

1 2 IN TROD UCTION.

Mr. Graves being satisfied with the experiment, very promptly and cordially expressed his wish and readiness to provide for a course of lectures for the year 1889-90, and also for one for the year following, so that the lecturer might have two years for preparation. He has since made provision for the future, including the year 1892-93.

The second course was delivered in the winter of 1890 by the Rev. John Hall, D.D., LL.D., of New York City, embracing lectures on the following subjects :

i. The Bible Basis of Missions.

2. The Missions of the Early Centuries of Christianity.

3. Missions Previous to the Reformation.

4. Missions and the Reformation.

5. Missions from the Reformation to the 19th Century.

6. Modern Missions, their Difficulties and Encouragements.

The Faculty, deeming it to be right and wise that the Christian public should have the benefit of these lectures, and that ample opportunity should be afforded for the attendance of the largest number, obtained from the Consistory of the Second Reformed Church the use of their house of worship for the purpose. The spacious building was crowded every evening with attentive listeners.

The third course, by Rev. Arthur T. Pierson, D.D. ? comprising the lectures contained in this vol-

INTRODUCTION. 13

ume, was delivered in the winter of 1891,* in the First Reformed Church, which was kindly granted for the purpose. The lectures were heard by large congregations with increasing interest to the end of the course.

At the close the following resolutions, offered by Rev. Prof. T. Sandford Doolittle, D.D., of Rutgers College, were heartily and unanimously adopted by the large audience present :

Resolved. — 1. That our hearty thanks are due to Rev. Arthur T. Pierson, D.D., for the zeal and efficiency with which he has presented so much valuable information in regard to the mission field and the claims of the Master upon us to act as missionaries in spirit, if not in person.

2. That thanks are due also to the Faculty of the Theological Seminary for not limiting these lectures to their class-rooms, but for making them public in one of the churches of the city, so that the people of various denominations are allowed the privilege of hearing them.

3. That we take a special pleasure in exhibiting a grateful recognition of the wise and noble generosity of Mr. N. F. Graves in establishing this annual course of lectures for enlarging the knowledge and intensifying the interest in Christian missions.

While the students of the Seminary for whom these lectures were especially intended have derived inestimable benefit from them, it is gratifying to know that many Christian people of all denominations have been sharers in the benefit. It is believed that announcements of future courses * In January and February,

14 INTRODUCTION.

will be received with great satisfaction by the Christian public. It is hoped that they may prove to be a great stimulus to missionary zeal, be promotive of unity in Christian faith and work ; and of intelligent and untiring service in the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be all the glory.

D. D. Demarest.

AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION.

T was a wise maxim of Cicero, that, in the opening of an address, the speaker and his audience should come to a mutual understanding. Let the author thus early acquaint his readers with the supreme aim which has controlled his utterances.

In the preparation of these lectures two paths lay open before the lecturer. He might, acting as an annalist, trace that march of missions, which is the marvel, if not the miracle, of this modern age ; or, like the historian, he might seek to examine into those fundamental laws and philosophical principles which are the keys of history. In the Books of the Kings, for example, we have the historical annals of the Kingdom ; in the Books of the Chronicles, the ethical survey of the Theocracy: in one case a simple record of events; in the other, a lesson on the faithfulness or faithlessness of the kings toward the King of Kings, with the rewards and retributions consequent upon such opposite courses.

I have chosen, as the theme, The Divine E?iter-

1 6 AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION.

prise of Missions; and shall modestly attempt a Philosophy of History, dealing with the " Theocracy " rather than the " Kingdom." The annals, both of ancient Israel and of the modern Church, record mingled success and failure. Whether it be the one or the other cannot depend on any chance or accident. There is no fatalism in history. Our instincts tell us that success must be the consequence and crown of conformity to the pattern shewed us in the mount ; and failure, the result of departure from the divine standard. Some golden calf which some Aaron may have cast, out of unhallowed offerings; some carved altar, which some idolatrous Ahaz may have set up in place of the unhewn altar of the divine simplicity that is in Christ — in a word, some displacing of the pure and perfect type of doctrine and method, prescribed in the Word of God, may account for the withholding of blessing, and for defeat and disaster in our missionary work.

We have need, perhaps, to begin again, and lay anew the basis of missionary enterprise ; or, if we find the former foundation firm and sound, we may need at least to see whether, on that foundation, we have been building gold, silver, precious stones ; or wood, hay, stubble. Possibly, into the structure of our mission work some errors have been built, which are serious if not radical. To get God's own conception of missions informed and infixed in our minds, our hearts and our prac-

A UTHOR 'S IN TROD UCTION. 1 7

tical methods, might lead to the partial and even total revolution of our present mission work.

Feeling the solemnity of this trust, as the incumbent of this lectureship, for my own sake and that of my readers, and for the sake of a cause wider and broader than all, I have given myself, Bible in hand, to a careful, prayerful study of this theme, seeking to be rid of all bias, either of prejudice or prepossession, and to be led into all truth. And, as the studies which, for more than a year before the delivery of these lectures, were largely limited to this one subject, have rent the veil from much that was hitherto hidden or at best obscure to my own mind, it will not be strange if some things which found utterance in the lecture-course may strike other minds as new, and even as untrue. The lecturer ventures to ask the confidence of his indulgent readers and, on their part also, patient study of the principles laid down. Let there be applied to them, not the test of human authority or opinion merely ; but the touchstone of the Word of God, and of His manifest working in the History of Missions.

Human tradition is a dangerous ally of the Bible, for, too often, it " makes void the Word of God." At first only a vassal, it becomes a consort, and finally a sovereign, usurping all authority. And, as Luther found it necessary to question even the venerable traditions of the elders, and separate the infallible Scriptures from all the chaff

1 8 AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION.

and alloy of mere human teaching, it behoves us to pray for grace to go back to the very beginning, and inquire of the Master himself what are the eternal and immutable principles of mission work.

Arthur T. Pierson.

2320 Spruce Street, Philadelphia, October, 1891.

THE DIVINE THOUGHT OF MISSIONS.

HEN, on the 15th of May, 1618, after more than twenty years of patient experiment, Johann Kepler completed his discovery of the so-called " Harmonic Laws," or the relations of the planets ; when the secret doors, that had waited six thousand years for a key, were at last unlocked by the theory of an elliptical orbit, the great astronomer of Magstatt, no longer able to contain his rapture, cried, " O Almighty God, I think Thy thoughts after Thee / "

What the " Legislator of the Heavens " did, in the department of astronomy, we seek to do in the department of missions — think God's thought after God. The words " idea n and " theory " are, to some linguists, sacred, because of a possible derivation of the one from the Latin, deus, and of the other from the Greek, Oeog ; and of a possible design by those words to express conceptions as they lie in the mind of God. If such be the real roots, the word idea (in deo) would mean a thought first conceived in God, and then expressed to men — a theory would be a sacred image, pattern, or plan of God. The ancient Platonists used the word idea, of an eternal immutable and immaterial form or model of an object, an archetype, a pattern.* In this sense, ideas were the pattern according to which the Deity fashioned the phenomenal or ectypal world.f

An idea> therefore, properly implies a perfectiofi of image. If we can, at the outset, get before us the divine conception of missions, what a starting-point will that be, and to what an advanced goal might we hope to reach, if, true to our starting-point, we keep on our course without deviation !

The four Gospel narratives have, at the close of each — as has also the Acts of the Apostles, that " Fifth Gospel," at its beginning, — certain words of our Lord which are evidently meant for the guidance of His disciples, in all time to come, as to their great mission and commission. Each of these accounts contains something, different from the others, yet essential to the full and complete expression of our Lord's will and our duty. As, in a composite photograph, various facial forms and features blend, combining individual peculiarities in one collective result, so, if we may project, as upon one sensitive plate, these five forms of the Great Commission ; and, instead of looking at them separately, behold them all, blent in one composite view, we may at one glance see the mutual relations of these various words of instruction and get the grand total.

* Worcester's Dictionary. f Sir Wm. Hamilton.

With this aim, we may reverently venture to combine these five fragmentary utterances into one, without implying that, in our Lord's original teaching, they were thus blended; or that it is possible to determine either their logical or chronological order. We seek simply to frame a general summary, without omission of any particulars ; and to group together words of instruction or promise which, by affinity, belong together. The attempt so to arrange and combine has been attended with such profit to the writer, that he cannot but hope it may at least prompt abler students of the Word to improve upon the imperfect result. Close study of these farewell words of our Lord will reveal an exquisite poetry of thought, a certain rhythm and rhyme of conception, which need the aid of parallelism to convey this correspondence.

I. And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying

"PEACE BE UNTO YOU!"

And when He had so said He shewed unto them His hands and His side. Then were the disciples glad when they saw the Lord ; then said Jesus to them again : "peace be unto you!"

II. "all Power Is Given Unto Me

IN heaven and in earth.

AS MY FATHER HATH SENT ME,

even so SEND I YOU."

III

Then opened He their understanding that they might understand the scriptures ; and said unto them : " Thus it is written, And thus it behoved Christ to suffer And to rise from the dead the third day ;

AND THAT

REPENTANCE AND REMISSION OF SINS SHOULD BE PREACHED IN HIS NAME

AMONG ALL NATIONS, BEGINNING AT JERUSALEM.

AND YE ARE WITNESSES OF THESE THINGS."

IV. "go Ye Therefore Into All The World

and PREACH THE GOSPEL TO EVERY

CREATURE.

GO, MAKE DISCIPLES OF ALL NATIONS,

Baptizing in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and

of the Holy Ghost ;

Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have

commanded you.

He thai believeth and is baptized shall be saved,

But he that believeth not shall be damned.

AND, BEHOLD I SEND THE PROMISE OF MY FATHER UPON YOU.

Depart ye not from Jerusalem,

But wait for the promise of the Father

Which ye have heard of Me.

Tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem,

UNTIL YE BE ENDUED WITH POWER FROM

ON HIGH.

For John truly baptized with water,

But ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many

days hence.

Ye shall receive the power of the Holy Ghost

Coming upon you ;

AND YE SHALL BE WITNESSES

UNTO ME

Both in Jerusalem and in all Judea,

And in Samaria,

And unto the uttermost part of the earth."

And He breathed on them

And saith unto them,

" Receive ye the Holy Ghost."

VI. "and lo, I AM WITH YOU ALWAY

EVEN UNTO THE END OF THE AGE.

And these signs shall follow them that believe :

In My name shall they cast out demons ;

They shall speak with new tongues ;

They shall take up serpents ;

And if they drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt

them ;

They shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover."