I have a message to bear in regard to the
Southern field. We have a great work to do in this field. Its
condition is a condemnation of our professed Christianity. Look
at its destitution of ministers, teachers, and medical missionaries.
Consider the ignorance, the poverty, the misery, the distress,
of many of the people. And yet this field lies close at our doors.
How selfish, how inattentive, we have been to our neighbors!
We have heartlessly passed them by, doing little to relieve their
sufferings. If the gospel commission had been studied and obeyed
by our people, the South would have received its proportionate
share of ministry. If those who have received the light had walked
in the light, they would have realized that upon them rested
the responsibility of cultivating this long-neglected portion
of the vineyard.
God is calling upon His people to give
Him of the means that He has entrusted to them, in order that
institutions may be established in the destitute fields that
are ripe for the harvest. He calls upon those who have money
in the banks to put it into circulation. By giving of our substance
to sustain God's work, we show in a practical manner that we
love Him supremely and our neighbor as ourselves.
Let schools and sanitariums now be established
in many places in the Southern States. Let centers of influence
be made in many of the Southern cities by the opening of food
stores and vegetarian restaurants. Let there
also be facilities for the manufacture of simple, inexpensive
health foods. But let not selfish, worldly policy be brought
into the work, for God forbids this. Let unselfish men take hold
of this work in the fear of God and with love for their fellow
men.
The light given me is that in the Southern
field, as elsewhere, the manufacture of health foods should be
conducted, not as a speculation for personal gain, but as a business
that God has devised whereby a door of hope may be opened for
the people. In the South special consideration should be shown
to the poor, who have been terribly neglected. Men of ability
and economy are to be chosen to take up the food work; for, in
order to make it a success, the greatest wisdom and economy must
be exercised. God desires His people to do acceptable service
in the preparation of healthful food, not only for their own
families, which are their first responsibility, but for the help
of the poor everywhere. They are to show Christlike liberality,
realizing that they are representing God, and that all they have
is His endowment.
Brethren, take hold of this work. Give
no place to discouragement. Do not criticize those who are trying
to do something in right lines, but go to work yourselves.
In connection with the health food business,
various industries may be established that will be a help to
the cause in the Southern field. All that men as missionaries
for God can do for this field should now be done; for if ever
a field needed medical missionary work, it is the South. During
the time that has passed into eternity, many should have been
in the South laboring together with God by doing personal work,
and by giving of their means to sustain themselves and other
workers in that field.
Small sanitariums should be established
in many places. This will open doors for the entrance of Bible
truth and will remove much of the prejudice that exists against
those who look upon the colored people as having souls to be
saved as well as the white people.
Had such lines of work been established for the colored people immediately after the proclamation of freedom, how different would be their condition today!