Perhaps some one who reads these lines may wonder whether building, farming, and such manual labor is missionary work. Did not the Great Missionary, according to all accounts—I say it in all reverence—take an apprenticeship in the carpenter's shop where He "increased in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man"? Did not the Apostle Paul, undoubtedly the greatest of His followers, unite tent-making with his missionary work? Should then we, such feeble imitations, belittle manual labor, even though it falls to our lot as missionaries? Any one going to the mission field should not, if he is to be successful, decide in his own mind that he is going to do certain things, he should be willing to do whatever the Lord gives him to do, of spiritual, intellectual, or physical labors.
There are so many sides to missionary work, and who can tell which will result in the greatest good? To preach Christ and lift Him up that others may see and accept Him is undoubtedly the central thought of the Great Commission. The ways of exalting Him, however, are so many and so various. Christ must be lived among the people before He can in truth be preached to them. The heathen of Africa cannot read the Bible, but they can and do continually read the lives of those sent among them. If these do not correspond to the Word read and preached among them, they are keen to discern and judge accordingly. If the Christ-life is lived before their eyes, day by day, many will eventually yield their hearts to Him, even though, they may for a time resist.
[CHAPTER SIX]
Educational and Evangelistic Work
The natives were eager to see inside the new huts. When they had an opportunity to look at the whitewashed walls and the homemade furniture, they stood spellbound, and the first word that broke from their lips was "Muehle" (pretty).
They had another and more personal interest in seeing the huts completed. They had been told that, as soon as the goods were moved out of the tent, school would be opened. Both large and small were exceedingly eager to learn, or at least they thought so. They had never seen books, and writing was like magic to them. To put down some characters on paper and from those to spell out their names when they next visited the mission was little less than witchcraft. Both old and young like to be known. They are pleased if their missionary pronounces their name and seems to know them when they come a second time.
School opened October 11. The first boy to come bright and early was Matshuba, together with two of Mapita's girls. This little boy, then about thirteen years old, had been a very interested spectator of all that occurred from the time the mission opened. Day after day he would be on hand, and his bright eyes and active mind took knowledge of everything that was said or done. His father, Mpisa, then dead, had been one of the most trusted witch doctors of the King, and had been held in great respect by all of the natives in that part of the country. This boy was very eager for school, and the first morning he and Mapita's girls begged us to allow only the Matabele to attend school, and not the Amahole, or subject races. This furnished an excellent opportunity of teaching them that God is no Respecter of persons.
The first morning of school twelve bright-looking boys and girls entered the tent and sat down on the floor, curious to know what school was like. It was a momentous time. It was the beginning of a work the result of which human eye could not foresee. How the teacher, who had often stood before a far larger and more inspiring-looking school in a civilized land, trembled as she stood there before those twelve little savages in the heart of Africa! She knew that those bright eyes were reading her thoughts, and realized that she came so far short of the "measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." The special burden of the prayer that morning was that, as these dear souls learned to read the Word, the Light might enter their hearts and they yield themselves to God.