When I entered the ministry in 1929, "money" was flowing freely. I had great plans for an evangelistic company—a paid singer, a robed choir, several Bible instructors, a large tabernacle, and a liberal appropriation from the conference. All I was going to ask of the church members was that they hand out my advertising, and not tell who I was. But before the conference committee could see the light in giving a young minister such leeway, the depression came. Since my name was last on the list of new workers, when "cuts" became the order of the day, the committee seemed most scrupulous in following the Scriptural injunction, "The last shall be first" (to be cut). My salary was cut to $25 a month, and I had no evangelistic budget, no appropriation, no song leader, no Bible instructor, no robed choir, and no tabernacle. Yet, with the Lord's blessing, I led the whole State, with the exception of the conference evangelist and his company, in the number of baptisms.
This is how it was done. To begin with, I had a little more time to read the Spirit of prophecy and meditate on what it meant. I read that the work would never be finished till the church members united their efforts with the ministers'. To me that meant two things: First, the members in my churches were to unite their efforts with mine, and I would have to unite mine with theirs. Second, the work would never be finished in our section of the world field till we both actually did this. Since there was no one else that I could unite my efforts with, and I could not do the work alone, I was forced to unite with the laity. The results were marvelous.
I have no secret to reveal. I simply followed in detail the instruction given by the Home Missionary Department of the General Conference. The members were organized into classes, and the little book How to Give Bible Readings was used as a textbook. When I felt that they were properly trained, I divided the territory and sent them out—lay preachers, lay Bible instructors, literature bands, etc. After they had carried the interested ones as far as they felt they could, we pitched a tent on a school lot, thirteen miles from the nearest town. A farmer led the singing. It was a long cry from a streamlined tabernacle, a robed choir, and a paid singer, but by actual count we had 625 in attendance, and they stayed with us through corn plowing and wheat harvest.
As soon as one effort was over, we moved to the next school district and started another. We worked in a circle, so that the new believers could be brought into one central place for Sabbath school and church. Many of the interested people followed us from one place to another. Some went through as many as four or five series of meetings before taking their stand. I cannot recall that we ever failed to have a baptism.
Stating it simply, the plan worked like this. First the field was prepared by the laymen, then the meetings were started. After the effort those who had taken their stand were placed under the care and supervision of the member who first interested them, for further instruction and training in missionary work. The members were instructed to continue working for those who showed an interest, but did not take their stand. We sometimes returned to the same place as many as four or five times, for short efforts of from ten days to three or four weeks. Again there were always some to baptize, and apostasies were very low.
I have since tried the plan in cities, and it works equally well. The city was divided into sections.
Of course it takes much longer to get started than it would to come in with a fully organized company. However the plan has some decided advantages, or the Lord would not have outlined it to us in such detail. It is less expensive, provides a constant program, and harnesses the energy of the church and the apostasies are low.
The members are much more interested in a person who has accepted the truth through their own efforts than in someone won by the departing evangelist. It is not a difficult form of evangelism, as the burden is carried by many. It helps take the nerve-racking, uncertainty out of the effort.
You know you have an interest, and you know where that interest is before you start. If you have several lay preachers and lay Bible instructors at work, they will find from a half dozen to fifteen or twenty interested people before the meetings start ; so you are sure of two things—a crowd and a baptism. That is an encouragement to any evangelist, old or young.
I followed this same plan when I entered conference home missionary work. I organized the churches and then watched the reports as they came in. When I saw that a church was really working, and there was no evangelist available, I asked for a leave of absence and went out and held a short effort. In this way I was able to report almost as many baptisms as the full-time evangelists. Yet the laity were doing almost all the work.
At present I have a district, and again the laity are at work, and they have several people almost ready for baptism. When I baptize them, I will send a report to the union conference paper and give the laity the full credit. No doubt Heaven will do the same.
I would like to add, and with a bit of satisfaction, that a number of laymen whom I have helped to train in this way are now in the organized work. It is God's plan and we cannot improve upon it. Let us unite our efforts with those of the laity. They want to unite with us, if we will only let them and show them how. Only thus will the work be finished.
