Thirty years in Madagascar

by Thomas T. Matthews

‘“Then had the churches rest ... and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied”; in some such terms might the peaceful progress of the Malagasy churches of to-day be described. The period of mistrust and suspicion with which those associated with the Society were regarded has ended, and the French Republic recognizes the loyalty of the Protestant native churches, and frankly accepts the labours of the British missionaries as contributing to the progress and enlightenment of their new possession. No word of complaint now reaches us. For the relief thus secured we can hardly be too thankful.’

Thus through God’s overruling providence the London Missionary Society’s Mission has been released from a perilous position, and placed again on a footing of freedom and hopefulness, and if this new and better policy continues—as it seems likely to do—the London Missionary Society and other missionaries may look forward to many years of useful and successful labour in the cause of Christ on the island.

The Imèrina Mission of the London Missionary Society may be in want of much to thoroughly fit it to face the future, and meet and master the many difficulties which are certain to arise under the new régime; but what is most needed—as in hundreds of the churches at home—is an increase of evangelical piety and fervour, and with it a revival of moral earnestness and missionary enthusiasm, which will make itself felt in the Christian work at home and abroad.

This cannot be the outcome of cold-blooded ethical teaching, empty platitudes—‘toothless generalities,’ as some one has called them—or of sensational preaching, the sort of sermon which only entertains and pleases, while it leaves the sinner’s conscience at ease. These, like mere intellectual preaching, are among the abominations that make desolate the soul. The preaching and teaching of the Gospel of Jesus Christ can alone generate the earnestness, enthusiasm, and zeal needful to carry on successfully His work, and raise men up, whether at home or abroad, to the measure of the stature of His perfect manhood.

When the French arrived in 1895 we had 1,300 self-supporting Christian churches or preaching stations, 1,000 native pastors, some 6,000 local preachers, 80,000 church members, 280,000 adherents, 800 day schools, with 80,000 children in them, and 400 Sabbath schools with 20,000 scholars. From the burning of the idols in September, 1869, to 1895, the people had raised for religious purposes upwards of £70,000, which, seeing that money was five times the value to them it was to us, really represented some £350,000! And yet there are still some ignorant, thoughtless people who talk of foreign missions being a failure. If that is a failure, I hope God in His goodness will give us a repetition of such failures all over the mission field, and we shall be profoundly thankful.

It is only fair, however, to the public to say that it is only the grossly ignorant, or the prejudiced, and those more accustomed to speak than to think, that indulge in such statements. Foreign missions have not been a failure, but a great success in Central and Southern Madagascar, in Manchuria, in Livingstonia, in India (recent critics, a certain class of Anglo-Indians and travellers notwithstanding), in China (as 4,000 Chinese converts dying for their faith proved), on the Congo, in New Guinea, in the South Seas, and in South America.

Some cynic has sneeringly remarked that ‘nothing is so false as facts, except figures.’ Statistics, however, can do a good deal, but they can never convey a really accurate impression of the true results of mission work. Facts and figures can tell much; but they do not and cannot tell folks’ feelings, nor can they even tell all they imply.

Foreign missions properly conducted can never be a failure: that is a moral impossibility; for that means the failure of Christianity. Professing Christians may fail to realize their privileges and their responsibilities, and so fail in their duty to the work of extending the kingdom of Christ to the ends of the earth, and thus fail to carry out the divine command: ‘Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature’; but foreign missions can never be a failure. Bishop Butler taught us, even in student days, that it was a moral impossibility that ever evil could be triumphant over good, in a world where God was the moral Governor.

There are still some people, however, who have no belief in foreign missions, or home missions, or missions of any kind. Some say they only believe in home missions, while there are others who are always pitting home missions against foreign missions, forgetting that they are but the two branches of the same great work.

The late Bishop Brooks of America said that a man who opposed foreign missions in the interests of home missions was like a man who had murdered his own father and then appealed to the judge for mercy because he was an orphan!