OUR ROLL OF HONOR.
According to custom, we publish this month a list of our mission stations and the names of the missionaries. It furnishes a fruitful field in which to glean valuable information. A glance at it shows the magnitude of our work. There are 215 stations, in charge of 422 workers. Each station is a centre at which mission work is organized for all the region round about. To him who scans it carefully the list reveals the variety of the work. It is both evangelistic and educational. Church planting and building; Sunday-school work; primary, normal, industrial, collegiate and professional training, are all represented, because the people need to be instructed in everything secular, social and religious, that pertains to civilized life and well-ordered society.
If facts and incidents in the lives of individual missionaries and in the development of work at specified points are ascertained (consult back numbers of The American Missionary) and brought into the public meeting, interest cannot fail to be awakened; nor will the interest be evanescent; it will go home with the people; it will stay with them; it will secure a place in their thought and prayer; it will get into the contribution box; it will reach the field.
Some of the stations, by reason of special agencies, as, for example, Fisk University, have become well known; but for the greater part they are indefinitely thought of in the mass. The same is true of the missionaries. Only a few of them are widely known. Yet in their isolation, bearing obloquy and reproach for their work’s sake, misjudged as to their character and mission, even by Christian ministers and church members who keep aloof from their acquaintance and fellowship, it is natural that they should crave the expressed sympathy of those they represent. It would lighten their burdens and brighten their path to feel that they are known and remembered by name in the churches at home.
There is one thing to be noted which a mere study of the list does not reveal, and that is: our missionaries are a very happy band. Despite the discouragements and trials incident to their work, they are neither cast down nor discouraged. On this point their testimony is strong and continuous. They have the joy of their Lord’s presence and the sustaining power of His almighty grace. “I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee,” has become the gladsome song of their hearts.
They are happy, too, in the knowledge that they have so many friends and such generous supporters. The fact that the list of their names is so long proves to them that their work has taken a large hold upon the churches. The fact that contributions come from so many churches and individuals, in amount sufficient to maintain so great a work as the Association is carrying forward, is a demonstration that they have the love and hearty support of tens of thousands, some of whom make large sacrifices to contribute as they do. They know that there are thousands who eloquently plead their cause and defend their good name before the public, and on bended knee remember them and their work at the Throne of Grace.
They are happy, also, in the knowledge that they are loved and honored by those for whom they labor. Father Riggs was almost worshipped by the Indians who knew him. E. A. Ware is a sainted name that thousands of colored people, young and old, are ready to rise up and honor, and whose very mention is an inspiration in their hearing.
We recall to our readers words spoken by Prof. W. A. Crogman, himself a fine specimen of the Christian scholar and thinker such as his race is capable of producing under Christian training. We quote from an address he made two years ago Thanksgiving Day, before the Atlanta University, of which school he is a graduate: “If I were asked to-day what one thing since the close of the war has contributed most to the permanent prosperity of the South, I unhesitatingly answer, Christian charity. When the victorious army of the North was passing in review before President Johnson in the streets of Washington, another army, vastly inferior in numbers, imbued with a different spirit, and armed with no other weapons than the Bible and the spelling-book, was marching under the eye of God down into this very field from which Grant and Sherman had but recently withdrawn. Silently came they into the field. There was no heralding of their approach, no display. Hopefully came they into the field, notwithstanding they knew that to the majority of the people their presence would be obnoxious. They came with faith in God and love for man. They came, impelled by Christian duty and patriotism, to wage a new war against the more deadly enemies of the Republic—ignorance and vice. I am thankful to-day for the pen of Lincoln and for the sword of Grant, but more thankful, by far, for the patient ‘schoolma’am’ who taught the negro his letters and set a million of us to reading.”