What Is Medical Missionary Work?
By MERVYN G. HARDINGE, M.D., Assistant Professor of Anatomy, C.M.E., Lotna Linda
Medical missionary work embraces the fundamental truths of religion and health. In place of being incompatible, religion and health are synergistic; that is, they form a smooth-working, integrated unit. Together they produce results greater than those which either, could obtain independently. Christ during His ministry employed this method of working (Matt. 11:4, 5), and it was medical missionary endeavor which formed the basis for the propagation of Christianity by His disciples (Mark 6:12, 13).
Since there is considerable confusion respecting the terms used in reference to the various phases of the health work, a definition of terms seems appropriate. The expressions 'health message, health reform, health evangelism, and medical missionary work are often used loosely and interchangeably. A careful analysis of these terms will clarify their meaning. The principles of healthful living are the physical laws which God has set in operation within us and around us, and are intimately related not alone to our well-being but to' our very existence. The passing on to others of these divine principles, in an understanding and enlightening manner, is included in the simple and concise term health message.
Health reform has a totally different meaning. It is the process operating within an individual resulting from a genuine acceptance and application of the divine principles of healthful living. 'Health refers to the physical and mental well-being of an individual. Reform signifies that a change is being made. When the two words health reform are used together they imply that changes are being instituted, both in the physical and in the mental activities and attitudes of an individual, which are producing a reformation in his life.
To emphasize the misunderstanding of the term health reform, may I cite this not uncommon experience? When the term health reform is used certain individuals will respond with some such statement as: "I think meat eating is an individual matter"; or, "Meat eating is not a test of fellowship." Such an answer reveals that the individual is confusing a part with the whole. Dietary reform is but one phase of health reform, whereas changes made in the selection of protein foods is but one phase of dietary reform. Health reform and vegetarian ism are not synonyms. One deals with the effect produced by the application of the principles of healthful living; the other specifically calls attention to the fact that an individual may or may not obtain part of his protein foods from animal sources.
Health evangelism is the use of these principles or fundamental laws of health by a minister, physician, or layman for the winning of souls. A person may have accepted the health message, and made reformatory changes in his life. But until the laws of health are understandingly explained and taught to others, he is not doing health evangelism. An illustration of this will perhaps be helpful.
A Christian physician practices in a community or institution, using the recognized tools of his profession in healing the sick and treating the diseased. Because of his Christian life, his conduct, and his influence others are drawn to study and accept his religion. Is such an individual doing health evangelism? I do not think so. Again a Christian carpenter goes about his routine work using the tools employed by others in his profession. Because of his Christian character, the quality of his work, his words, and his demeanor, the observer is led to inquire into and later accept the religion of this humble artisan. Was this man engaged in health evangelism? Again, I do not think so
Both the physician and the carpenter faith fully performed their duties as should every true Christian. By their consecrated lives both led others to know and accept the truth. But neither employed the health message as a medium for evangelism. Therefore medical evangelism was not the means of saving souls by either physician or the carpenter. However, when the physician or the layman, in his daily contacts in the office or at his work, utilizes the principles of healthful living, first to interest and later to lead individuals to know and accept the religion of Jesus Christ, then he is truly engaged in health evangelism.
Medical missionary work is a phrase which has wide applications. I would like to discuss it first in its more restricted or specific sense. When the principles of our health message, that is, the laws of our being, are employed in the healing or alleviating of those who are sick or suffering, then is medical missionary work truly being clone. I think this aspect of medical missionary work might be called "medical evangelism" in contradistinction to "health evangelism." As a people we have been told much concerning the right and wrong methods of treating those who are sick. When Ellen G. White speaks of God's method of healing, nature's remedies, and the use of these principles and agencies in the healing of the sick, then I think she is dealing with medical evangelism or medical missionary work in its truest and highest sense.
When the term is used in its broad application medical missionary work embraces any and every effort that is put forth in a missionary spirit in helping those who are sick or suffering. However, when with these efforts the sufferer is also made to understand the laws of his being; and combined with an application of these principles to the specific case, an appeal is made to the sufferer to change his way of life, then medical missionary work becomes medical evangelism in its truest sense.
Perhaps another illustration would be appropriate. I like to compare the principles, or laws, of healthful living to the Ten Commandments, which are the principles, or laws, of spiritual living. When these spiritual truths are under stood and accepted, we describe the change which results as conversion. In a similar way health reform is the change observed when the principles of healthful living have been under stood and accepted. Spiritual evangelism, or evangelism as it is generally called, is the giving of the spiritual truths, the gospel message, to those who do not understand or accept these great truths. Health evangelism in like manner is the giving of the principles of healthful living to those who are not fully acquainted with these divine laws.
Missionary work in its narrow sense embraces those activities dealing with the promulgation or establishment of spiritual truth. Missionary work, in its broader sense, embraces anything done from a philanthropic and charitable standpoint. In the same way the term medical -missionary work used specifically refers to the use of the health principles in alleviating or treating the sick. Medical missionary work in its wider meaning refers to any aid given in a Christian spirit to the suffering or diseased
The same methods used by the minister or evangelist in his public work must be utilized by the gospel worker, doctor, or layman who attempts to do health evangelism. I sometimes have heard a sincere minister, physician, or brother give a health talk and, in a few brief sentences, mention the importance of good nutrition, exercise, rest, recreation, and sleep; and then for good measure throw in water, sun shine, and fresh air. How many souls, do you think, would be converted from their sinful ways if the minister or evangelist were to preach, and in a few brief sentences state that what we need to realize is the importance of the atonement, the great prophecies of the Bible, the seventh-day Sabbath, and the Second Advent of Christ; and for full measure include the state of the dead and baptism by immersion?
My fellow worker, each great spiritual truth or doctrine should be thoroughly investigated and taught with painstaking detail. The Spirit of God thus has opportunity to enlighten, convict, and convert. Thus too the power of the health message will be observed when a minister, a physician, or a church member carefully studies the details of each of the great principles of health, permitting the. message to reform his own life, and then gives it forth in all its power to open doors long barred by prejudice and self-indulgence, and thus enable our great spiritual message to accomplish its purpose of transformation and sanctification.
Conducting a Cooking Class
By ESTHER CHRISTENSEN REISWIG, Syracuse., New York
How to Begin a Cooking Class
1. Set the best time for all concerned.
2. At the first class complete the organization details, including a fee for materials.
3. The class period takes about two hours. Open the class with prayer and spend a little time with the Spirit of prophecy.
4. Allow about twenty minutes for the lesson and twenty-five minutes for the demonstration.5. Use five or ten minutes for the next assignment. Start next time to give a test on the previous lesson.
Items Needed for Cooking Class
1. Full-color food models: National Dairy Council, in North Canal Street, Chicago 6, 111. (Cost, $1.25.)
2. Set of twelve food-value charts: Philadelphia Child Health Society, 311 South Juniper Street, Room 609, Philadelphia 7, Pa. (Cost, 50 cents a set. Free material can also be se cured from this society.)FREE MATERIALS ARE AVAILABLE AS FOLLOWS :
3. General Conference Medical Department (large chart in color of basic seven foods).
4. American Institute of Baking, 1135 Fullerton Avenue, Chicago 14, 111. (The basic seven. From this company you can get a sheet 8J4" x 11" for each class member. Also there is a large chart of the basic seven, 20" x 27". They have other materials too.)
5. The Maltex Company, Burlington, Vt. (Write and ask them for their free materials.)
6. Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., New York City. (They may have an office in your city.) They have many good booklets, but especially get the one on Overweight and Underweight, which contains other things.
7. General Mills, Inc., Minneapolis, Minn. (Materials on enriched bread and other things.)
8. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Washington, D.C. (Write for their material on nu trition and cookery.)
9. -Boston Dispensary, 25 Bennet Street, Boston, Mass. (Write for their list.)
10. Boulder Colorado Sanitarium, Boulder, Colorado. Ask for enough booklets on Scientific Dietetic Suggestions to have one for each member of your class.
11. Loma Linda Food Company, Arlington, California. 56 Selected Recipes.
12. Ralston Purina Company, Checkerboard Square, Saint Louis 2, Mo. A Study of Cereal Grains.
For a flannel board and materials write Story- O-Graph, Box 145, Pasadena, California.
Why a Cooking Class
"We squander health in search of wealth, We scheme and toil and pay; Then squander wealth in search of health Until we reach our grave."
MOTTO: "Something Better," Education, pp. 296, 297.
Some striking statements are found in Counsels on Diet and Foods, pp. 251-257. Read some to the class. "Over many graves might be written : 'Died because of poor cooking;' 'Died of an abused stomach.' "—Counsels on Diet and Foods, p. 257.
Think of it, a well-balanced diet assures us radiance, vitality, energy, life. It aids full physical, mental, and moral development. Correct diet is conducive to active minds, with a capacity for knowledge, teeth without cavities, bodies without degenerative diseases, strong babies without deformities.
"Diet may be said to be a factor in every disease to which man is heir."—DR. HARVEY W. WILEY. The food you eat is exerting a direct influence either toward health or toward disease, according to whether you are eating correctly or incorrectly. Preventing disease is always better than curing it. Preventive medicine is one of the most constructive and helpful forces in modern life.
Consider some of the significant relationships -between diet and health. Why don't we all eat wholesome, well-balanced meals? It is ignorance in some instances. More often we resemble the elderly woman who was distressed as the result of eating clam chowder, but she liked it so well she was willing to endure the distress.
"Health, strength, and efficiency depend largely upon our food. This was emphasized in a recent statement by Victor Heizer, 'Today we know enough about the importance of nutrition to be able to say that the number of planes, guns, tanks that come out of the nation's plants is determined by what the nation's workers put into their stomachs.'"—What's New. (Quoted in "Lessons in Nutrition and Cookery," [Mimeo graphed] Lesson i, p. i.)
"This same principle applies to the progress your child is making in school as pertains to grades and general deportment. Dr. Weston A. Price made the following observation: He gave three children with deep cavities near to or exposing the pulp a special meal of high mineral and vitamin content for five months in addition to their home meals each day. Be sides producing complete control of the dental caries, he says. 'Two different teachers came to me to inquire what had been done to make a particular child change from one of the poorest in the class in capacity to learn to one of the best.' This observation reveals clearly that mental energy is definitely influenced by diet."—Ibid.
"Among adults, dietaries better balanced from the viewpoint of the newer knowledge of nutrition have enabled factory employees to work with higher efficiency and less fatigue, increasing both the quality and quantity of their out-put, with fewer accidents to themselves and their material. Efficiency was also found notably increased in work which involved careful matching of materials."—Ibid.
"These are only samples of a large and growing mass of evidence that, even when the starting point is a dietary apparently adequate and a bodily condition already healthy and efficient, we can build to higher levels of health and efficiency by using the guidance of the new knowledge of nutrition in our habitual choice and use of everyday food."—Ibid.
"A striking aspect of the nutritional improvement of life is that, with food habits guided by present-day knowledge, full adult capacity and efficiency can be reached earlier and held till a later age in the same individual."—Principles of Nutrition and Nutritive Value of Food, U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, Publication No. 546.
COMPOSITION OF FOOD.—What is food? A food may be defined as any substance which, when absorbed into the blood will nourish, re pair waste, and furnish force and heat to the body without causing injury to any part or loss of functional activity; neither must it call for constantly increasing quantities of itself.
—To be continued
Health Evangelism in Ireland
By A. J. MUSTARD, President, Eire and Northern Ireland Missions
For about a, half century the Advent heralds have proclaimed the third angel's message in Ireland. We cannot claim that outstanding success has attended these efforts. At this date we have only 174 members in the entire country. The position is even more challenging when we consider that 150 of our members reside in the six northeast counties of Ulster, the part of Ireland which is separated politically from the rest and is linked with the United Kingdom. In all the twenty-six counties of the republic we have only twenty-four members, and all but one of these reside in the Dublin area.
The six detached counties of Ulster are dominantly Protestant in character, but in the re public 93 per cent of the population is Roman Catholic, and most are intensely loyal to their faith. Apart from a small sanitarium at Ros trevor in Protestant Ulster, which was closed many years ago, all our evangelism has been conducted along the traditional lines we have used in the rest of the British field. We have not given sufficient consideration to the fact that here in Ireland we have a nation strongly anti-British in its sympathies, intensely nationalistic, and with a Catholicism all the more fanatical because of its centuries-long struggle with "Protestant" Britain.
Such a field demands specialized attention and carefully selected methods of evangelism. It needs workers who will take the trouble to understand the sympathies and prejudices of the people, and be prepared to adapt their methods of labor accordingly. We must meet the people where they are, not where we think they ought to be. It seems best to use American workers in Ireland, for there is much respect for the land where so many Irish people have found homes in past years. A year ago three American workers arrived in Dublin to help carry the message to the people of the republic. Brother and Sister Howard E. Nix are now in charge of our new health institute in Dublin, and Mrs. E. N. Stephens is the Bible instructor there. The messenger of the Lord has told us:
"As a means of overcoming prejudice and gaining access to minds, medical missionary work must be done, not in one or two places only, but in many places where the truth has not yet been proclaimed. . . . This work will break down prejudice as nothing else can." —Testimonies, vol. 9, p. 211.
If there is a field where this statement can be tested, surely it is Ireland. We are happy to report that after a few months of opportunity our health institute is proving itself a remover of prejudice. All who enter it as patients quickly learn that its influence is spiritual rather than material. Prayer is offered with the patient before each treatment. In simple faith, the Lord is asked to bless the work being done, and He answers these prayers. One patient, de lighted with the new health she has found, calls herself a walking advertisement for the institute. More than that, she is convinced that the benefits gained are the result of the blessing of the Lord. She is now reading our literature and practicing daily many of the health principles learned during the course of her .treatments. She is living on a vegetarian diet, and has discarded .the use of tea and coffee.
In the institute we have a room with accommodation for thirty to forty people, which we plan to use as a lecture room. Later, on our own plot of ground beside the institute, we shall build a large lecture hall and welfare clinic. The hall will also be used by our members for their regular church services. Health lectures and demonstrations will be given, and cooking schools will be conducted. In the Spirit of prophecy we are told:
"Every gospel worker should feel that to teach the principles of healthful living is a part of his appointed work. Of this work there is great need, and the world is open for it."—Counsels on Health, p.. 390.
"Cooking schools should be established."—Testimonies, vol. 9, p. 161.
Work was begun in preparation for a home and health correspondence course. This will be conducted in conjunction with the work in the institute and the lecture hall, and will itself open many doors for the entrance of our courses in Bible study under the name of the Christian Culture Correspondence School.
Once these avenues of service are established, we even dare to believe that a way will be opened for us to conduct a health broadcast from the national radio system. Paul Wickman has already had one interview with the director of Radio Eireann with this in mind. This is the plan of work we are now seeking to put into operation in Ireland. Some parts of it are already working, that is, the institute and the correspondence school. The rest will be done as time and strength permit.
"Among earth's inhabitants, scattered in every land, there are those who have not bowed the knee to Baal. Like the stars of heaven, which appear only at night,, these faithful ones will shine forth when darkness covers the earth and gross darkness the people. . . . In the Catholic lands of Europe . . . God has in reserve a firmament of chosen ones that will yet shine forth amidst the darkness, revealing clearly to an apostate world the transforming power of obedience to His law. . . . The darker the night, the more brilliantly will they shine."—Prophets and Kings, pp. 188, 189. (Italics supplied.)
With this wonderful promise to encourage us, we press on with the task of evangelism in Ireland.
Health Supper in New Hospital
By: MABLE HINKHOUSE TOWERY
That the pastor of the Pennsylvania Avenue and the Hillside churches in Washington, D.C., J. Lee Neil, is medical-missionary- minded was evidenced by the health supper sponsored by him and the members of the cooking class on the evening of March 7 in the un finished hospital being built by Dr. Henry G. Hadley. Some business was combined with pleasure, in that it was partly a social occasion and partly to make a final report on the In gathering campaign and to boost the new hospital.
The first item on the program was an appetizing supper prepared by the recent cooking class held in the Washington Sanitarium Mission Hospital, and taught by the pastor's wife, Mrs. Neil. The supper was held in what will be the main lobby of the new hospital, just inside the main entrance. The adult members of the two churches and several invited guests ate at improvised tables made out of hospital beds upon which large sheets of plywood had been laid, •with sheets as tablecloths. The children were served first in another room adjoining this.
MENU.—-First, all were seated at the tables, where a fresh green salad had already been placed, also the dessert—cake made without baking powder, and gelatin made with agar, topped with whipped cream. After Elder Neil made a few remarks regarding the menu and where health foods can be obtained, he asked someone to say grace; then the adults filed through an other room and picked up paper plates which contained the hot foods dished up in readiness by the cooking class in the "kitchen."
These plates contained garbanzos, or chick peas, and meat from wheat (gluten steaks), Harvard beets (lemon juice used instead of vinegar), whole-wheat buns, and a baked potato. Each one also picked up a paper cup containing hot Postum.
After this wholesome and satisfying repast, Miss Myrta Corner, head of the culinary department of the Washington Sanitarium, in Takoma Park, gave some interesting demonstrations, showing how to make gluten from flour, and hygienic cake. She also made an at tractive individual salad as the audience watched. The cake was raised without baking powder, the only leavening agents being three eggs and air. She said that the secret was in the way the eggs were beaten, and that the bowl containing them must be placed over a pan of hot water while beating.
After the food demonstrations there was a short program of entertainment. The children meanwhile, were being entertained by motion pictures m another room. As the last item, those present were taken on a tour of the new hospital.
The two church congregations had fellowshipped together in a social way; they had learned much of value regarding a healthful, well-balanced, vegetarian diet; they had celebrated their Ingathering victory day ; and they had been alerted as to the need of finishing the new hospital. As they dispersed for their homes they felt that they had spent a very enjoyable and profitable evening together.
