From these tables we should hope to gain a general idea of the direction of the force at work.
We thrust in here an inquiry concerning a form of work upon which many missions lay great stress. It is exceedingly difficult to classify. It is not certainly evangelistic work, though it is commonly organised by evangelistic workers; it is not educational in the sense that educational missionaries accept it as a definitely recognised part of their work, though educational methods are employed and it often has a distinctly educational purpose. It is sometimes a form of Sunday service almost akin to a Church service. It is often a form of children's school where the religious teaching given, or neglected, during the week in the day school is supplemented: it is sometimes a form of elementary school for adults, Christian, or inquirers: it is a form of Bible school for adult Christian workers. It is a method of propaganda for the conversion of heathen children or adults. It is a form of work where untrained Christian voluntary workers find opportunity for expressing their religious zeal; it is a form of work in which experts in certain types of elementary religious teaching revel. It is educational work carried on by those who are not technically educationalists: it is evangelistic work carried on by those who are not technically evangelists.
What sort of information then are we to seek concerning it? It is so important that it cannot be omitted; it is so widespread that it almost demands special consideration; it is so protean that tables designed to reveal all its aspects and values would be with difficulty designed, and tediously minute. From the point of view of this survey it would be futile to ask, as most of the societies ask, simply for the number of Sunday schools, the number of teachers, and the number of scholars. From those bare numbers we can gain no information which really enlightens us. We want to know what the Sunday schools exist for, and whether they are accomplishing the object of their existence. But we cannot define, nor even enumerate all the objects. We therefore arbitrarily select three which are directly related to the establishment of a native Church, and make one table serve. We inquire: (1) How they are related to the Christian constituency; from this we hope to learn the extent to which Sunday schools are a part of the Church life. (2) How the teachers are related to the communicants (or full members); from this we hope to learn the extent to which the voluntary effort of the communicants finds expression in this work. (3) How the scholars are related to baptisms and confirmations (or admission as full members); from this we hope to learn to what extent the Sunday-schools are a recruiting ground for the Church.
The table then is as follows:—
+———————————————————————————-+——-+ District | | +———————————————————————————-+——-+ Number of Sunday Schools. | | +———————————————————————————-+——-+ Proportion of Sunday Schools to Christian Constituency. | | +———————————————————————————-+——-+ Sunday School Teachers. | | +———————————————————————————-+——-+ Proportion of Communicants. | | +———————————————————————————-+——-+ Sunday School Scholars. (M./F.) | | +———————————————————————————-+——-+ Proportion of Sunday School Scholars | | Baptised in the Year. | | +———————————————————————————-+——-+ Proportion of Scholars Confirmed | | or Admitted Full Members in the Year. | | +———————————————————————————-+——-+ Remarks and Conclusions. | | +———————————————————————————-+——-+
CHAPTER V.
MEDICAL WORK IN THE STATION DISTRICT.
Thus far of the force in its general aspect. When we turn to closer consideration of the medical and educational work we meet with a difficulty. Medical and educational work, as we have already pointed out, often, if not generally, have a definitely evangelistic character, but each, nevertheless, appears to be designed to meet a special need of the Church and people. There is a strong tendency in thought, and often in speech, to emphasise this special need and to make it a distinct, separate need. Herein lies a danger. Medical missions are sometimes urged upon our attention as though they were founded to meet a medical need of the people, as if it were the recognised and accepted duty of missionary societies and of missionaries to supplant the native medical practice by western scientific methods as certainly and fully as it is their recognised and accepted duty to supplant native religion by the faith of Christ. But that we for our part emphatically deny. The one may be a philanthropic duty; the other certainly is a religious duty. Consequently we deny that there is a medical need which it is the duty of missionaries to supply in the sense in which we affirm that there is a religious need which it is the duty of missionaries to supply. Medical missions are, and ought to be, evangelistic in their aim, mere handmaids[1] of evangelism. Similarly we deny a separate and distinct educational need which it is the duty of missionary societies to supply. The missionary societies ought not to take upon themselves the supply of every need. We think the Christian Church is misled when it allows the medical need of a country to be presented as a distinct need which it is the duty of missionaries to meet, and when it allows the ignorance of a country to be presented as a distinct need which it is the duty of missionaries to meet. From such a presentation educational missions become detached, medical missions become detached, each designed to meet a distinct and separate need of the people.
[Footnote 1: If any reader experiences a revulsion at this expression, he will know at once what we mean when we say that a distinction has been drawn between evangelistic, medical, and educational missions as though they were three co-equal and separate things. They are not co-equal and they ought not to be separate. Education does not necessarily reveal Christ, medical science does not necessarily reveal Christ, only as education and medicine assist the revelation of Christ are they proper subjects for Christian missionary enterprise, that is, only when they are clearly and unmistakably subordinate to an evangelistic purpose. Of course we do not undervalue medical and educational efficiency: efficiency should increase evangelistic power.]
One result of the sharp distinction which is drawn between medical and educational and evangelistic work is that in some countries there are distinct medical and educational associations which collect information about the state of medical and educational missions in the country, dealing with these missionary activities most prominently, if not wholly, from the point of view of medical and educational efficiency. These associations issue questionnaires and publish reports often more full, detailed, and carefully compiled than any evangelistic reports. Consequently it is peculiarly dangerous for a layman unacquainted with the working of these associations to trespass upon their preserves. These departmental surveys should be treated separately by experts. Nevertheless, since we are dealing with the work of the station in its area, and this work includes often medical and educational work, we cannot pass over it with no more than the general treatment which we have hitherto given. We need to know what is the medical and what the educational work carried on at the station, when these are viewed, as they are viewed, separately, as distinct expressions of missionary zeal.