General Conference Bulletin, vol. 4

THE TRAINING OF WORKERS

Talk by Dr. J. H. Kellogg, 3 p. m., April 3, 1901.

I assure you I feel very incompetent to undertake to introduce to you the subject which has been assigned to me,—the education of missionaries. I do not know how to present to you, in a clear, lucid, and brief way, the details of any plan which would produce a missionary. I am certain that there is no plan of education by which a missionary can be produced. And if we are to understand by the education of missionaries, the education of men and women to be missionaries, I am sure it will be idle for us to spend our time in such a study. GCB April 5, 1901, page 71.2

It seems to me that first of all, we must understand that a missionary can not be made by education. Unless God makes the missionary, he is not a missionary, and he can not be a missionary. No man, no system of education, can make a missionary. GCB April 5, 1901, page 71.3

I will read a few words from the tenth chapter of John, which I will make the basis of what I have to say:— GCB April 5, 1901, page 71.4

“I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from him: for they know not the voice of strangers. This parable spake Jesus unto them: but they understood not what things they were which he spake unto them. Then said Jesus unto them again. Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep. All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture. The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth: and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep. The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep.” GCB April 5, 1901, page 71.5

Now it seems to me that we have here the foundation idea of what a missionary is. Christ came to give life, and the real motive of missionary work is to carry that message to the world. Christ said, I have sheep that are not of this fold. There are other sheep, in many folds, and in many lands; they have not had an opportunity to hear the Shepherd’s voice. Christ came to this world to reveal himself as the life of the world. The true missionary, as I conceive of him, is a man who has learned that Christ is the life and the light of the world, and has become so thoroughly possessed of that truth that his greatest ambition is to give that light to others, to present that truth to others who are in darkness, and have it not. GCB April 5, 1901, page 71.6

Now if a man goes who is simply a hireling, who is what you might call a professional missionary, you would expect, as soon as dangers come, as soon as the wolf appears, this missionary will flee. I want to say that there is a great unwritten history of missionary work that has never been published to the world; but is found upon the secretaries’ and treasurers’ books of missionary societies. There is not very much said about it; but it would make a greater volume if it were published than all that ever has been published in relation to missionary work: and that is the history of men who have gone out to mission fields, looked at the fields, seen the wolf, and gone home again. GCB April 5, 1901, page 71.7

It is not very difficult to find men who are willing to go to a missionary field. I know something of that from my personal experience in interesting people in mission fields, and in opening the way for them to get a preparation for mission fields or mission work. And I have observed that it is not at all a difficult thing to find young men and young women who are willing to take a trip to the other side of the world, or to some of the islands of the South Seas, or almost any place that might be suggested, even the Yukon, or still further up into the Arctic region. In fact, I have had in some instances to lay hold of people with both hands, to keep them from going to mission fields. And I know others who have had to do the same thing. But to find a man who is a real missionary, who is a follower of the Good Shepherd, and who is ready to go to a mission field, and do what the Good Shepherd would do if he were there, is not so easy a thing. GCB April 5, 1901, page 71.8

The best model missionary school was the school that Christ taught when he was on earth: and that really is the only model worth studying. Christ came as a missionary to this world, and he called men to follow him, to be missionaries, as he was a missionary. And those who followed him became missionaries. And how did they become missionaries? Christ did not set up a college somewhere, and say, We will establish a missionary seminary or a missionary college. He simply asked those whom he called to follow him, and as he went about doing good, they watched, they observed, they took lessons. GCB April 5, 1901, page 71.9

It seems, then, that the first thing in a missionary’s education is to have a call; and that is a very important part of it. He must have a call from God, rather than a call from a missionary board. I am afraid too many of our missionaries called by a board, are called by a desire of their own to go to some field to see the world, rather than called by the Lord. And I think the very first thing in the education of a missionary should be his entrance examination, and the examination ought to inquire of the man such things as will ascertain whether he has had a real call from God to be a missionary. GCB April 5, 1901, page 71.10

I have often asked this question of young men or young women who offered themselves to become missionaries: “How do you know that you ought to be a missionary.” “Well, I have had a desire to be a doctor ever since I can remember.” That always says to me, This case is a suspicious case. I must have a double amount of evidence in that case, that he is the right sort of man: because the ambition to be a doctor is not necessary an ambition to be a missionary. It is not against a man to have an ambition to be a doctor. But a man might be a doctor, and not be a missionary at all. A man can be a splendid missionary and not be a doctor at all. And if he sees in the missionary training an opportunity to become a doctor, and nothing else, certainly he has got his mind on the wrong thing. And the very same thing is true with reference to the missionary nurses’ work. GCB April 5, 1901, page 71.11

A young man who thought of seeking preparation as a medical missionary told me he had had am ambition to be a doctor ever since he was a boy. I said to him, “What have you been doing?” He said he had been working on a farm. I asked him if he liked farm work. “No,” he said, “I can’t say that I do.” “You like something about it, don’t you?” “No, I can’t say that I do.” “You like to care for the animals, don’t you? Don’t you like to drive horses, and break colts, and do such things as that?” “Oh, no.” he said, “I can not say that I do.” “Well, don’t you like the raising of sheep, or anything of that kind?” “No, I don’t. I never did.” “Don’t you like the raising of crops, the planting of corn, and such work?” “Well, I do rather like to raise corn.” “You have a sulky cultivator?” “Yes,” he said, “we have.” Now this young man did not like to do anything but ride. Well, I made up my mind that he would not do for a medical missionary, or for any sort of a missionary. He was looking for an easy job. There are a good many missionaries who have an attraction to missionary work, because they think it is an easy sort of job. But I want to tell you that it is not an easy thing for a man to give his life for poor lost sheep. That is what the good Shepherd did, and the man who is to be a missionary, ought to make up his mind at the very beginning that he has to lay down his own life. GCB April 5, 1901, page 72.1

I believe this thing is recognized by many. I was reading in a missionary journal not very long ago a remark by an old missionary, that seemed to me very cruel. He said, “What we need most of all in missionary work is more missionary graves in foreign lands.” He did not mean that he wanted more missionaries slaughtered by disease, or killed by savage natives; but he meant he would like to see more missionaries go to foreign lands with the idea of remaining there, and giving their lives for the people. GCB April 5, 1901, page 72.2

I remember an old missionary who started the work on the east coast of Africa, in Zululand. He first reduced the Zulu language to letters, to written forms, written characters, and translated the Bible into Zulu characters. He came to the Sanitarium a number of years ago, when nearly eighty years old. I asked him if he had come home to spend the remainder of his time. He said, “No; I want to go back to Zululand as quickly as I possibly can, and I want to die there.” I have thought of that man many times. His greatest ambition was to go back to that foreign land, so that he might die with the people, and among the people, to whom he had given fifty years of his life. I think he was a genuine missionary. GCB April 5, 1901, page 72.3

The man who has been a missionary may not show a missionary history. He has been doing missionary work every day, all the time.—yesterday and to-day, and all along. When we have men who have had a call from God, and are real missionaries, what kind of training should they have to help them become more efficient in his field? I do believe that the ideal way to train the missionary is in that mission field, or on the mission field where he is to work, in the field itself. That is the place where the man can get the best kind of training for missionary work. I can not conceive how it can be possible to give a man a training in one country that will fit him exactly for work in another country; or how he can have a training in a civilized land that will make him qualified to work successfully in a different land, when we talk about the details of the training. GCB April 5, 1901, page 72.4

But there is one thing that above all other things is necessary, in what we might call the technical training of a missionary; that is, the training of a missionary’s heart. It is heart training. The missionary finds himself in a foreign field, under circumstances entirely different from what he finds at home. If he is in a real mission field, he is deprived of a great share of the various advantages and privileges that he had at home. The thing that brings a great number of missionaries home, perhaps one half or three fourths of those that come home—is not the hardships that they have to encounter; it is not vicissitudes, climate, it is nothing of the sort; it is simply homesickness. I have found many times that missionaries would go to a country as nearly Edenic as you can find in this world, and work about a year, and then begin to write in, and say that they find they can not stand the climate. Now if we had a sick man, we would send him to that climate to cure him. When they come back, I would ask, What is the matter? Their complaint is just the very thing that we would send a man to that climate to be cured of. GCB April 5, 1901, page 72.5

The fact is, their sickness is not a disease of the nerves, nor a disease of the constitution, but it is a disease of the heart: it is homesickness, or discouragement, or lack of success, or a real lack of interest. They did not see the thing. They did not see the real work, did not see the sheep. They did not see anything but wolves. The consequence is they did not have ambition, courage, to remain in the work. Now it seems to me that a missionary should have such a training at home as will develop the fact before he goes out, whether he is the proper man, whether he has self-denial, self-sacrifice, whether he has the kind of character that will enable him to deal with the difficult, unhappy, and disagreeable conditions that he will have to come in contact with in a mission field. GCB April 5, 1901, page 72.6

Self-control, it seems to me, is a thing of the utmost importance for a missionary to have. The missionary goes into a foreign field, and there are none of the things that he had at home to hold him up. At home he was surrounded by influence, friends, established customs, prejudices, and usages; and popular feeling and popular sentiment have held him up, kept him alive. Now, when he gets into the mission field, perhaps he stands all alone. He has to march at the head of the procession; he has to set the example for others to follow, instead of following the examples of others, and it very soon develops whether that man is the man who has the ability to stand up straight alone, when he has been in the habit of leaning on some one, simply propped up by favorable conditions. GCB April 5, 1901, page 72.7

Missionaries sometimes make lamentable failures because they have not the elements of character that will enable them to walk straight under difficult circumstances. The missionary must have training in self-denial, training in self-control. Many would say then, You would not put the missionary on hardships so that he might have a training in difficulties, would you?—Not by any means. I want to tell you that in the home field there are splendid opportunities. If a man is seeking for missionary work, and has a real missionary spirit, there are plenty of opportunities to give the man a chance to show just what sort of a man he is. It is the greatest possible mistake to send a man to a foreign field to become a foreign missionary before he has had a chance to demonstrate in the home field that he is the kind of man to go to the foreign field to stand up under the circumstances that will surround him. These questions ought to be discussed. Men come forward, and say, I feel a burden for Africa, or for Asia. I want to tell you, I do not take a bit of stock in that kind of burdens. I claim that a man who has a call for Africa in general has not any call for poor suffering men in particular. God’s call for a man is not a call for a country; but it is a call for a man to help his fellows and the man next to him. It is just as much missionary effort as to help the man on the other side of the earth, but he can not see that. If he is incapable of seeing a missionary field in the ignorant brother, and degraded brother right at his side, if he can not see that right before his eyes at home, how do you expect he is going to see that thing in any field, and in a far-off country? It is a sort of glamour, that the missionary writers in the missionary books have thrown about missionary work in foreign fields, that attracts that man, not love for his fellow-men, nor the desire to sacrifice his life, to lay down his life for the sheep. GCB April 5, 1901, page 72.8

It seems to me that is a fair conclusion at any rate; from what experience I have had in this matter, I should certainly say it is just. A man who has a call for a country in general is a man who has no call at all. A man who has a real call from God is the man who has a call to help any man and every man who needs to have his help. The man nearest by is the man for whom he will feel the greatest burden, the man that touches his heart to the utmost. Now when you fit up that missionary, and let him go half-way around the world, put him into a mission field, and the thing he finds there is so different from what he is accustomed to that he will look back home, and think how much better that is than the field he is in, and his whole ambition will be to get back there without discrediting himself,—such a man never has his heart in the work. It may be that when he gets to that country, he will get over it. He may have such a homesickness that it will oppress him to such a degree that he will seek the Lord, and get converted, and become a good missionary, but that will be a rare incident, or almost an accident. GCB April 5, 1901, page 73.1

I have no faith in such a course; I do not believe we should make missionaries professionally. I have not a particle of faith in making missionaries by a medical course, or by a nurses’ course. That is the thing we have been trying to hold up before our students in the Medical College and in the nurses’ course,—that the professional part of the work is not the whole thing, and it is one of the most difficult things in the world to keep professionalism under foot. Some of you have heard that our Medical Missionary Board have declined to grant diplomas for the last three years. Several years ago we used to bring our nurses’ class down here to the Tabernacle, and announce to you that these were trained missionaries, and that they would all receive their diplomas. Some of those missionaries would take those diplomas, and march off and go into the devil’s business with their missionary diplomas: and we said we would have to stop that thing because we were developing professionalism. So we stopped issuing diplomas, and we have been persecuted for it most vigorously, all over the country; but we said, The most important thing is to give the man the knowledge which will help him to help his fellow-men, and we must suppress professionalism. We were frightened, because professionalism would destroy our missionary schools, and so we said we would take away the temptation, and suppress the diploma. GCB April 5, 1901, page 73.2

I would be glad if we did not have to issue any diplomas at all in our medical school, but simply give men an education and send them out. We are doing the very best thing we can do, but we have to issue diplomas because the law demands it. The law requires a diploma, a certificate, and our physicians can not practice medicine without it. In reference to our nurses, we have taken this position: that we will not give any diploma at all to a nurse, until he has shown that God has called him to missionary work, and that he has demonstrated it in a missionary field, and when he has done that, when he has a missionary field, we send him a diploma to be of such assistance as it may. GCB April 5, 1901, page 73.3

There are some things about Christ’s training, and the training of the missionary spirit in Moses, Paul, and Christ’s work,—his missionary training-school—some things I want to focus your attention to if I can. It seems to me they are the most important things for us to consider. Gos chose Moses to be a missionary to bring his people out of Egypt—out of darkness. Now the time has come when we may send missionaries again to Egypt. There was a time when those who represented the children of God on earth were in Egyptian bondage and Egyptian darkness To-day the whole world, the whole human family, are in Egyptian bondage and darkness. Moses was trained in all the learning of all the knowledge of the Egyptians, and he had a professional training, too. He was a great general in Egypt. Josephus gives a great account of the wars conducted by Moses in Ethiopia and in other places. GCB April 5, 1901, page 73.4

Moses evidently thought that because of his great training, because of his great opportunities, and because he could manage vast armies and could manipulate men and organize, that he was eminently prepared to lead the children of Israel out of Egypt. But when he started in to do it, he started in his own strength, and with confidence in himself, and without God to help him. You know how he failed, so that at the very first effort he made he had to flee; and it was only after he had forty years’ instruction in the wilderness, and opportunity to meditate and pray to God, and to study concerning God in the solitude of the mountains and in the wilderness, and, more than that, only when he had come into the actual presence of God in the burning bush, that he got his call for missionary work in Egypt. GCB April 5, 1901, page 73.5

The same thing was true of Paul. Paul was a skilled man, brought up at the feet of the most learned man of his time, and yet Paul was not prepared to do a thing. He had all the training that a man could gain to be a leader in his time, and he was a leader in the devil’s business: but the Lord wanted to make use of him. What was the first thing for Paul to experience?—He had to come into the veritable presence of God. He had to see Christ. Christ said to him, as he did to his other apostles, “Follow me.” GCB April 5, 1901, page 73.6

Christ chose and called the first missionaries of the gospel dispensation in the same way. As he met them one by one, he asked them to follow him. What advantage would they have in following him?—First, they came in touch with Christ. They came to him, and lived in his presence day by day; and they lived near to him. Some got very close to him, and John got closest of all to him. They did not come to see Christ once a week, and then go off and do what they liked; but they followed him everywhere, and were with him all the time. GCB April 5, 1901, page 73.7

Second, they had an opportunity to watch Christ, to see what he was doing, and to study his work. They saw what he did. What did he do? He went about doing good, cast out devils, healed the sick, taught the clear principles. He did not simply work wonders to attract their attention, but he did wonders. He demonstrated before the people that the power of God was in him. They had an opportunity to see that right before their eyes; and by and by, after they themselves had been taught, so that their characters were transformed; after they had beheld the glory of God, not “through a glass darkly;” but “face to face,” as the Father was revealed in the Son, and had been changed, as Paul says, from character to character,—after all this training, they were prepared to go out and do the very same work that Christ did. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.1

It seems to me it is very plain that the first thing the missionary must do is to come to God himself, and live in his presence every day; and then he must do the works which Christ did, and must become, so far as possible, prepared to do it. Whatever he can learn in the way of instruction in medical work, or in Bible work, or in any other line of work which would add to his usefulness to his fellow-men, let him learn that; but the all-important thing is to live in the presence of God. That will do more to prepare missionaries than anything else possibly can do. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.2

I must say that I believe that the most complete missionary is the man that has been trained to do the most for the soul, body, and mind of those with whom he comes in contact. The more complete missionary you can have in the field, the better it will be for the field. I think it is right to say this, because a man who has only half a training is certainly crippled. A man who knows nothing but the Bible work, and nothing at all about the body, when he comes in contact with the people who need help physically, can do nothing for them, and is therefore at a great disadvantage. A missionary goes into Africa, for example, and has no training in taking care of those who are sick, and no knowledge of the body. When some one who is sick comes to him for help, he simply reads the Bible to him; and likely enough that poor heathen will follow after the witch doctor, with his herbs and charms, and put his faith in him, rather than in the Christian missionary, who lost his opportunity to gain an influence over the mind of the poor man, by ministering to his physical needs. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.3

On the other hand, the man who does not have the Bible training, but simply the training of a physician, can merely heal the wound and deal with the disease, but will be able to do nothing of permanent help to the soul of the man with whom he comes in contact. These men who work in separate lines, can go out together and do something; but the ideal training is to have all this in one man—a man who is a gospel minister and a medical missionary also. I do not think that it is necessary that he shall have a whole medical course, or even a full nurse’s course, in order to be a good missionary. I believe that every medical missionary ought to be an evangelical missionary, and every evangelical missionary ought to be a medical missionary. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.4

One may know more than another knows. One may give the greater part of his time to the study of the Bible; but he ought to be prepared to give some attention to the body as well. One may give most of his time to dealing with the sick; but he should be prepared to deal with their souls at the very same time that he is dealing with their bodies. There may be a division of gifts and labor, but it seems to me that the time should come when we could drop any qualifying terms, and say, This man is a missionary, and does missionary work. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.5

I do not wish to occupy any more of your time on this subject. Dr. Paulson has been doing work in Chicago, and helping to train a missionary class there in a home field where they have some hardships, and where they have to cultivate some self-denial and self-control. I think we have been trying there to to carry out some of the ideas I have presented here. I should be glad to hear from Dr. Paulson. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.6

Dr. David Paulson: I think the Lord that I have had the privilege for the past two years to be on the firing line of missionary effort. I thank him that I have had the privilege to labor in Chicago. A great many people have wondered why I was foolish enough to go to Chicago, but I am thankful that the “wisdom of this world is foolishness with God.” The happiest time of my experience has been during the last two years, when I have been in this large city, where I could have a chance to help train missionaries right on the very firing line. When I asked how many of our class of eighty young people who had just begun their medical missionary training in Battle Creek would go into self-supporting work, asking for no aid, and told them that we would draw our help from the Lord, and my wife and myself would help train them, forty-four of them offered to go with us. I thank God for the various providences we have experienced. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.7

There is a scripture I would like to read to you,—Proverbs 24:27: “Prepare thy work without, and make it fit for thyself in the field; and afterward build thine house.” The trouble with so many missionaries is just what the Doctor has been stating. They build their houses at home, and then try to move them to the field. God says, Prepare thy work in the field,, and then build the house, and you do not have to move it. There are so many of these professional and institutional missionaries who are willing to work in a routine, if they have a good salary assured them; but men and women who have felt the woe of the gospel, men and women who can not sleep unless they have a chance to work for human souls, are not so very plentiful yet. Thank God, they are yet to be, and a place like Chicago or any one of our large cities is a grand place to spend time in preparation for a foreign field. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.8

I have myself seen men and women who were on their way to a foreign field, and they would spend three or four days in Chicago, and would go out to see the sights, but would not go over to see how to reach men and women with the gospel; they did not have time to do that. I have also known these people to drift back again. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.9

We have had a most interesting time in Chicago. We have gone out and met the people in the homes. It is much better when you get your experience by actual contact with the people, and we get a great deal of this kind of work, studying the people in their homes, than we could get in any other way. It is one thing to get this knowledge in books, and it is another thing to get the experience among the people. The missionary who has had a training in a certain line in an institution is not necessarily a missionary. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.10

The other day we learned from Manila of some splendid strategy of a young officer from Kansas who had never had the advantages of military training, who made such a master stroke there that the United States gave him a promotion over the heads of men who had spent a life-time in the service. That was a vindication of the truth that the man who can go ahead in the field without professional training is the man who can do something. Perhaps if the young officer had had military training, he could have done still better. That illustrates what our young men and women can do. It is not absolutely necessary for the true missionary to go to a training-school and receive a training. Get that thought banished from your minds at once, if you have not already. Our sanitariums and training-schools can not make true missionaries. These can simply train them, those who are already missionaries, but God must make them missionaries. GCB April 5, 1901, page 74.11

In conclusion, let me emphasize what has already been said that to know that they have been called of God is a good thing for Seventh-day Adventist young men and women to know. I have had something to do with the training of young people, and I have been surprised to find so many who did not know whether or not they had a call for this work. They have said, “We have read about it in our papers, and our church elder said he thought I would make a splendid missionary.” I would say, “What do you think about it?” “O, well, I don’t know; I think I would like to take it up;” and when the first little disappointment was met, they were ready to go home again or go into something else. Paul said, when a wave of trouble came upon him, “None of these things move me.” GCB April 5, 1901, page 75.1

May God help us that we may soon have true missionaries, that no matter what comes, nothing can move them,—nothing but the love of Christ, that will move them on and on and on. GCB April 5, 1901, page 75.2