Our Veteran Bible Instructors

Learning the importance of sentiment and the value of public relations and special events

L.C.K. is an associate editor of the Ministry

Adventism is so practical that there is a tendency for sentiment to be crowded out. Our work began under a pressure that left little place for the expression of appreciation when the God-given talents of pioneer workers were being taxed to the limit. Like the apostle Paul, our workers minimized their difficulties and gloried in hard tasks. But in more recent years we have learned the value of public relations, and have come to feature special events and anniversaries.

Our Bible work has not escaped these trends toward recognition and eulogy. Some months ago we were thrilled to observe that one of our large-city Bible instructors had completed fifty years of valiant service, and that the church she had served for half a century had devoted a weekend to celebrations in her honor.

But this anniversary was not the climax of Auguste Meyer's usefulness; she is still conduct­ing the local German Bible course. During her long term of service, the Brooklyn German congregation has grown from thirty to hundreds of members. It is characteristic of this area for these larger churches to transfer their members to more suburban churches. Some are DOW scattered to the ends of the earth, for this church has produced strong leaders and mis­sionaries. A conservative estimate suggests that more than a thousand are included in these transfers. Miss Meyer has seen many pastors come and go while she has remained unmoved at her post. In this respect her service for the denomination is unique. With New York's mil­lions to draw from, she has never been without readers to instruct. And her instruction has been thorough; the writer herself came under her tutelage.

North American Bible Instructors

While recognizing our noble women on the front lines of Christian service, the Bible instruc­tors who often work in the least sheltered conditions of any group in our work, we do well to observe some statistics for the North Ameri­can Division. Bible instructors now retired pro­vide significant service records. About fifteen sustainees have completed between thirty-six and forty years of service in the denomination; twenty-five have served from twenty-six to thirty-five years; and thirty have fifteen to twenty-five years to their credit.

What noble, sacrificing service our North American Bible instructors have rendered! We must keep in mind that at the beginning of our work North America was the base, while today we have other bases. These we shall be hearing from in the future, for their records are equally cheering.

Missionary Bible Instructors

When we consider our overseas work we bow in respect to the large number of ministerial missionary wives who have long served without remuneration. Until more recent decades wives shared their husbands' burdens in the cause on just one salary; at least that was the pattern. But those were perhaps our most fruitful years, when Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, and South America produced workers of real pioneer stamina and true sacrifice. So piecing together the world picture of Adventist women's service, and more specifically the Bible work as a calling, we see a galaxy of luminous stars whose names will yet complete the list in the eleventh chapter of Hebrews—examples of faith in action. Today we merely summarize by stating that Adventist womanhood has been and is a great blessing to the denomination.

The Plea of Our Veterans

Our honored veteran Bible instructors con­tinually urge us to hold our denominational vision clear for the Bible work. As we meet many of them in our travels they frequently express their conviction that Adventism is now in great need of a consecrated womanhood for home Bible teaching and personal work. They pray that our colleges, and the Seminary, will train many of our younger women as Bible instructors. They voice their convictions that no other profession employing women should eclipse this important, heaven-ordained work, and that our administrators should not indi­cate preference for other professions by salary variations.

Leaders would be untrue to their trust of developing a symmetrical gospel personnel if the foregoing pleas were ignored. These con­secrated and hard-working Bible instructors of the past were largely responsible for the training of the many women from the lay ranks who now wear the mantle of service. They humbly transmitted their unique skills, without guides and textbooks, to hand-picked lay workers. No, the line must not break where they stand! And so in behalf of the Ministerial Association we say, God bless our noble veteran Bible instructors!                                                      

L. C. K.

L.C.K. is an associate editor of the Ministry

May 1957

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