We said, that the number of missionaries to the heathen population is
about one to a million of souls; but let not the conclusion be drawn,
that every million of heathen souls has a missionary. By no means. The
few hundred missionaries preach to a few hundred thousand souls. The
millions and hundreds of millions of heathen, are as destitute of
preaching as though a missionary had never sailed, as destitute of the
Scriptures as though a Bible were never printed, and as far from
salvation, I was about to say, as though Jesus Christ had never died.
Men speak of operating upon the _world_. Such language is delusive. The
present style of effort, or anything like it, can only operate on some
small portions of the earth. To influence materially the _wide world_,
Christians must awake to a style of praying, giving, and _going_ too, of
which they have as yet scarcely dreamed. The work of going into all the
world and preaching the Gospel to every creature, has scarcely been
undertaken in earnest. And how vain it would be to expect to make any
material impression on the world, as a whole, when so small a company
from all the ministers in the United States go abroad, and a less number
even of lay members from the vast body of a million and a half.
The heathen are not lost because a Saviour is not provided for them.
"God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son." The
preaching of the cross is "the power of God and the wisdom of God" both
to the Jew and the Greek. Facts show, that in every nation, however
barbarous and degraded, the Gospel of Jesus has power to convert,
purify, elevate and save. These facts are irresistible.
Neither are the heathen lost, because the ocean separating them is
rarely passed. For the sake of gain, men can visit the most distant and
sultry climes. To solve a question of science or merely to gratify
curiosity, they can circumnavigate the globe, or penetrate far into the
icy regions of the poles. The improvements in navigation and the
extension of commerce have united the two continents in one. The
Atlantic ocean no longer separates you from Africa, nor the Pacific from
China. The amount of intercourse between the seekers of wealth from
Christian lands and almost every heathen country, is absolutely immense.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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