“Perhaps you have heard,” said Mikula, “that the members of the Church have given up the practice of marrying many wives, and those who are married have been wedded to one wife only by holy matrimony. This is the law of God.” And he opened his New Testament and read the various places where this law is clearly stated.
“Yes, I know that is the practice of your Christians,” replied Tutula, "and it will cost me a great amount of money to follow it, for, being a man of importance in my district, I have had the pick of the females, and have given large sums in ‘marriage money’ for the women I have borrowed.[[67]] Cannot I retain three or four of them?"
“No,” answered Mikula, “we deacons and Church members have studied this point very carefully, and the words of Christ are very strong and definite on the subject. Is it not better to go to heaven having only one wife, than to be cast into hell with many women?
“There is one other matter,” continued Mikula, “and I have done: As a Christian man who has received pardon for your many sins and a hope of eternal life through Jesus Christ, you should pass these blessings on to others by giving freely according to your means, and regularly, for the support of native teachers to proclaim the love of God in Christ Jesus. I am a teacher, but I do my work as such without any pay, because I am living in my own town; but there are teachers who are working in towns and among peoples not their own, and they must be supported, and what they receive is very little.”
“I thank God in Jesus Christ for all that He has done for me!” fervently exclaimed Tutula. “And listen! if you will find a good teacher I will give him a house to live in, and pay half the cost of his support, for I want the people in my village and neighbourhood to know of God’s love and pardon.”
In due time a teacher was selected and sent to Tutula’s villages, and he taught Tutula, among others, to read God’s word for himself. Some months afterwards I was present with Mikula when Tutula and many of his neighbours were baptized and received into the Church; counting wine, women, witchcraft palavers, and native dances as mere dross that they might win Christ and be found in union with Him.
Chapter XXV
Mikula at the Christmas Festival
Months glide quickly by while working hard--Deacon’s meeting--Church-meeting--The kind of candidates who were rejected--Baptismal service--The great meeting of the Church--Election of deacons--The balance sheet--A deficit--Native Christians wipe out the debt--Local missionary meeting--The great communion service.
How quickly the months glided by! Mikula, my owner, was a busy man of affairs. As deacon and teacher he voluntarily gave many days every month to his arduous duties--visiting lukewarm members and absentees from communion, investigating charges brought against such as were accused of breaking the Church’s rules, examining and instructing candidates for Church fellowship, receiving the contributions from Church members, paying the teachers of his district their monthly allowances, performing the rites of burial and of marriage, preaching in his own town and frequently visiting other towns and villages to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Besides all these labours for the Church, he helped his wife by doing the roughest work on the farm, visited many of the markets for purposes of trade, for this was his principal means of subsistence--the means by which he met his various obligations as a man, a husband, and a Church member.