My subject contains the burden of the Christian world, and the burden of this Convention. Tongue and pen will ever fail to portray its real significance or to assign it the place it held in the thought of the Master. Our satisfaction lies in the increasingly large place it occupies in the minds of men.

      The victories of the past bequeath to us a great faith in the reaching of the goal. When Jesus stood on the soil made sacred by his presence, and proclaimed a system of religion which would ultimately conquer the world, he rose to the very height of his lordship, and placed upon his followers a most stupendous task. None but a God would have dared it, and every recorded word from his lips breathes nothing but the assurance of its final accomplishment. With this assurance Paul entered the pagan lands of his day. In the same spirit Clovis entered France, Boniface moved upon Germany, Patrick upon Ireland, Anskar upon Denmark, Christian upon Prussia. And should we call the roll of a thousand others like Moffat, Livingstone, Morrison, Wharton, [164] Paton, Rijnhart, Butchart, Macklin, Osgood, Dye, and the rest of the noble dead and living, and should we ask, Why and how went you out from us? all would answer, "We went, believing in the revolutionizing power of the gospel, and we have not been disappointed."

      Seventy years ago Japan, China, Corea, Africa, Arabia, much of India, and the republics of South America, were closed to the gospel. To-day the gates are wide open and bid us enter. Verily, the last was a wonderful century for the kingdom, and the poet was none too extravagant when he declared that

      The church has looked upon the larger task with fear and hesitation. The geographical world looked so large, and the types of men so varied. It seemed indeed that

      But science and invention have minimized distance, and the missionary, the explorer and the historian have greatly enlarged our consciousness of the common denominator of human experiences. "The physical structure, the fundamental instinct, the joys and sorrows," and the soul longings, have borne testimony to a most striking unity among the peoples of the world. And to-day we are convinced that

      It is the recognized way of the world that nations and institutions put forth their most worthy efforts when under the spell of some great and specific undertaking. When Rome aspired toward political supremacy, Cato, her most honored statesman, closed every speech in the Senate with the words, "Carthage must be destroyed." Pope Urban stood in the streets of Clermont and sent the Crusaders out with the slogan, "God wills it." Since Japan has tasted Western civilization, she has been forging ahead in the race of nations under the banner, "Foreign Intercourse." The church of Christ needed some such slogan. The great commission had been struggling for a larger place in the program of the church, and Christ's vision of a redeemed world had fallen at her feet and begged to become universal. It was a great day for the kingdom when the student volunteers issued the slogan, "The Evangelization of the World in This Generation."

      The church is putting herself on record. The Dutch Reformed body has openly recognized her obligation to evangelize thirteen million of the unevangelized two-thirds of the race; the

W. F. ROTHENBERGER.

United Presbyterians have accepted fifteen million; the American Baptists, sixty-one million; the Congregationalists of America, one hundred million; the Presbyterians, North and South, one hundred and twenty-five million, and the Methodists, North and South, one hundred and ninety million; leaving a balance of seven hundred and thirty-nine and one-half million for the rest of the church.

      In the midst of this enthusiasm we enter upon our second century. The age is a most auspicious one. The church has awakened to a new sense of her power. She has caught a new vision, and under its spell she is marshaling her battalions into one mighty army, to move forth is her universal conquest. Let us believe that in this united effort and in the forming of the new world consciousness we have had some part. But if we would justify our entrance upon another century, and take our place in this mighty task, two duties force themselves upon us. We must place ourselves on record as accepting our legitimate quota of responsibility in the supreme task of this generation; and, second, we must take care for the foreigner whom God has seen [165] fit to place at our very door. It is to the credit of a part of the church that this latter task is being diligently prosecuted. As long ago as 1906 four of the largest Christian bodies reported over two thousand mission points and nearly one hundred thousand communicants among these people. While we, as a people, have scarcely begun it, the genius of our movement and the call of God demand it.

      We are justified in our vision of the world Christianized, because we have the men, the money and the message for the task. This great commercial age has poured gold enough into the laps of Christian men to "sow every acre of the earth with the truth." Said the Earl of Shaftesbury: "In the latter part of these eighteen centuries the church of Christ has men enough, and means enough, and opportunity enough, to evangelize the world fifty times over." We are believing it as never before. In the unpromising days of the past century Livingstone dared to contend that the time would come when great and rich men would think it an honor to support whole stations of missionaries, instead of spending their money for hounds and horses." The truthfulness of his prophecy is seen in the spirit of modern missions as exemplified in an Eastern home. Yonder sit a father, mother and two daughters. It is an ideal circle as they lift their lives to God in daily devotion, and bless the community with sweet living. A cloud overshadows them; it is the angel of death. And now only three sit by the fireside, but they read the same good Book, and pray to the same good God. Moved by the beauty of her own home, and by the consciousness of the world's great need, the elder daughter sets out to spend her life in the Christless homes of India. Now two sit by the fireside, father and younger daughter. But they read the same good Book, and pray to the same good Father, and rejoice in the letters that tell of a new spirit of love that moves in the homes of a small corner of India. When the message comes that in the midst of success the sister had been called to her greater life of service, the burden of the prayers at the little fireside is that the work so nobly begun may not cease. But who should prosecute it now? One night the little village church was dimly lighted, and filled with townsfolk. Their mission? They had gathered to bid farewell to their friend, the other daughter of this ideal home, for in the silence of a prayerful hour at the little fireside she and her aged father had talked it over with God, and decided that she would be the messenger to continue the work in India. The aged father, rising from his seat at her side, said, with pathos in his voice, yet with admirable firmness: "She is all I have in the world to whom I may pour out my heart's affection, but I gladly give her to the Christless homes of India." And now only one sits by the fireside in the little village home, but he reads the same good Book, prays to the same good Father, and thanks him for a small part in the noblest work among men.

      God has given us the vision, he has given us the men, he has given us the means, he has given us the opportunity. Give us now in the beginning of a new century this spirit of sacrifice and devotion, and the consummation of our task will be realized.

[CCR 164-166]