The Evangelistic Council in Retrospect

The motivating spirit and implementing actions now stand out in bold relief

By LOUIS K. DICKSON, President, Pacific Union Conference

The Ministerial Council, held just preceding the recent General Conference session in San Francisco, California, constituted in its plan, its personnel, its spirit, and its promise, one of the most significant gatherings of its kind ever held in the interest of evangelism in the history of the advent movement.

Associated in this important meeting were the leaders of our world work, union and local conference presidents, overseas missionaries of long experience, as well as a large number of the foremost pastors, evangelists, Bible teachers, and departmental men within the ministerial forces of the denomination. A group of experienced Bible workers from all sections of North America were likewise pres­ent, and participated. It was truly a most rep­resentative gathering.

Out of the comprehensive program of subjects arranged for this council came an invaluable succession of presentations on the fundamentals of evangelism. The many plans and methods presented for reaping the maxi­mum results from ministerial effort cannot be without fruitage. In all the history of the advent movement, there has never been such a remarkable conjunction of opportunities and crises touching all the principal fields of soul winning as now. And never such a blending of favoring circumstances and possibilities as the evangelist faces today. It was, therefore, most timely that this very helpful meeting should be scheduled at this psychological moment, calling forth from the most experienced among us a presentation of the true spirit and the best methods of ensuring the greatest success, in winning men and women to the gospel Of truth.

Direct evangelism was the central topic which occupied the place of first magnitude, both in the council and in the continuing Min­isterial Association and Bible worker meetings throughout the regular period of the General Conference. In the rank and file of our min­istry today there are unmistakable signs of a great awakening in behalf of a larger evan­gelism. One could not sit and listen day after day in these Ministerial Association meetings, and not feel that really a ferment is in process, spreading among both ministers and laity, to reach the masses quickly with God's final sav­ing message for this hour.

This council will long be remem­bered as resulting in the redirection of the minds of our soul-winning forces into a new and stronger emphasis on larger evangelism. It will long stand out as giving impetus to a more constructive program for the mobiliza­tion of all within our organization toward soul winning in our future endeavors. In the actions passed by the General Conference in session, upon recommendation of the Evan­gelistic Council, we have the far-reaching con= victions of the representative ministry of the denomination regarding how the spirit and the objectives of this great council can be carried out. These actions are the provisions to imple­ment the great program. They have already appeared in the July MINISTRY, but they need to be read again—and yet again—until their principles and stipulations are inwrought into all our beings. Study them, fellow workers, with the prayer that they may become your own motivating plans and principles.

May God grant that every one of these rec­ommendations shall be carried out under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and with the en­thusiasm and devotion which this great hour of opportunity and urgency demands. May the soul-winning forces of the advent movement, both ministry and laity, arise now as one man, in the fear of God and by His blessed power finish the ministry of Christ in all the earth.

By LOUIS K. DICKSON, President, Pacific Union Conference

August 1941

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