The American Missionary, Volume 34, No. 11, November 1880Various
Religion
The American Missionary, Volume 34, No. 11, November 1880
Various
Congregational churches -- Missions -- Periodicals; Home missions -- Periodicals
4. Again, we may gather courage from the experience we have
already had in conquering difficulties. If this was the first
difficult matter the American Christian people had ever faced, we
might expect them to be puzzled by its intricacy or appalled by its
magnitude; but it is not, for from the moment our fathers planted
their feet upon these shores, we as a people have had to face
obstacles and to overcome them. A color-line, black as night, lay
in the way of citizenship, education, and Christian labor, but we
have crossed it, and we can cross the yellow line as well.
5. Again we may take courage from the very strait and necessity to
which we are brought. When God brings His people down to the sea,
and all ways are shut up, and still His voice and command are to
go forward, we know that the waters of the sea will be divided,
and we shall go over dry-shod and singing songs of victory beyond.
We cannot shut out the one hundred thousand Chinamen now here,
nor prevent others coming. We cannot go back to the old Chinese
policy of exclusiveness, neither can we permit them to remain as
a foreign element, unsubdued by our institutions or our religion.
Only one thing remains, and that is to subdue them by the power of
the living Saviour brought to them by patient, loving, faithful
Christian hearts and bands. Brethren all, _shall this be done_?
6. And last of all, I mention the moving forward of Christian
thought and Christian feeling in this direction.
When the plan was devised to exclude the Chinese, and the President
vetoed the bill, the Christian public upon the Atlantic coast waked
up to the importance of the matter. They opposed his action, they
began to look at this immigration in its true light, to see in it
a grand opportunity, and to lay their plans to avail themselves of
its advantages for the cause of Christ. The greatness of the work
is touching the imagination; its difficulty is awaking a spirit
of heroism, and it is believed by many that we stand upon the
threshold of one of the grandest missionary movements, one of the
grandest crusades that the world has ever seen. Asia, that once
responded to the call from the West, “Come over and help us,” is
now herself uttering the cry, and the Christian world will not long
be insensible to her voice.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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