Strengthening the Short Campaign (Part 1)

A Seventh-day Adventist evangelistic preaching campaign, whether it is conducted for a few weeks or for several months, will prove effective in propor­tion to proper preparation before the first sermon and the thorough follow-through after the last sermon by the evangelist. This is a prin­ciple that needs to be "graven with an iron pen" in the rock forever.

Oftentimes we are so concerned about getting the preaching started that we fail to plan for these vital precampaign features. We face the peril of being more con­cerned about the immediate count in bap­tisms than about the final count around the throne of God. The only souls for which any of us will have an eternal award are those whom we gather out and who prove true to the end and will be in heaven for­ever.

Paul, the greatest evangelist next to the Lord Jesus, did all his work with an ap­propriate thoroughness for having as many of his converts as possible around the throne of God at the end. See how he sets forth this real goal of evangelism in writ­ing to his converts at Thessalonica: "For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the pres­ence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his com­ing? For ye are our glory and joy" (1 Thess. 2:19, 20).

Statistical reports are necessary and helpful, but the one that will really count for­ever is how many of those we have led into baptism will be around the throne when Jesus comes. Let us ever keep our eye on this as our true goal.

Notice again how Paul stresses this point in writing to the Philippians:

"That ye may be blameless and harm­less, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse na­tion, among whom ye shine as lights in the world; holding forth the word of life; that I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, neither laboured in vain" (Phil. 2:15, 16).

The minister and the Bible instructor who are possessed of the supreme desire to have as many souls as possible around the throne will do their work with appro­priate thoroughness in keeping with this goal. They will not hold back anything that any soul needs for a full experience in Christ. They will not let down a little here and there on the essential standards for baptism in order to have a larger report for the union conference weekly.

In this day of the half-done job in so many worldly lines, we need to read and heed the following counsel on "Thorough­ness" in Gospel Workers:

Ministers should not feel that their work is finished until those who have accepted the theory of the truth realize indeed the influence of its sanctifying power, and are truly converted. . .

Too often the work is left in an unfinished state, and in many such cases it amounts to nothing.—Page 367.

How much better it would have been if the first messenger of truth had faithfully and thor­oughly educated these converts in regard to all essential matters, even if fewer had been added to the church under his labors. God would be better pleased to have six thoroughly converted to the truth than to have sixty make a profession and yet not be truly converted.—Page 370.

This does not mean that any man who brings in sixty is not doing his work in a thorough manner. Under God men can bring in sixty or three times this number and do it with the essential thoroughness. But the statement should help us to make the right evaluation for thoroughness in our endeavors. The odds are ten to one in favor of him who does his work this way.

The San Bernardino Sun of July 28, 1958, contained an editorial entitled "Day of the Goof-off," which scored our day as the day of the half-done job along many lines:

"This period of great scientific achieve­ment is being described with such high-sounding appellations as the Age of the Atom, the Space Age, the Era of Inter­stellar Conquest.

"Future historians may have another name for it: the Age of the Goof-off.

"The term was coined by an advertising executive who said: 'This is the great era of the goof-off, the age of the half-done job. The land is populated by laundry­men who won't iron shirts, with waiters who won't serve, with carpenters who will come around someday, maybe, with exec­utives whose minds are on the golf course, with students who take cinch courses be­cause the hard ones make them think, and salesmen who won't sell.'

"Singular thing about this accusation is that half the American people go along with it."

The editor might have added—and preachers who don't preach, ministers who don't win a soul, and pastors who don't do personal work. No real Adventist will do a half-done job. We who present people for baptism need to be careful that this spirit of the half-done job does not enter into our work.

Not long ago I heard an Adventist min­ister declare before a group of ministerial students that he could go into a town where people knew nothing about the Adventist faith, where no preparation of the field had been made, and raise up a new Ad­ventist church by an every-night three-week preaching campaign. As I heard his statement I said to myself, "Yes, he might raise up a church in three weeks, but it certainly would not be a real Seventh-day Adventist church."

We all know that there is such a large body of doctrines and practices in the Ad­ventist way of life that it is really impossible in any every-night three-week meeting to expound them adequately for intelligent acceptance on the part of those who have no Adventist background. An every-night three-week campaign, or even eight or ten sermons, may be ample to bring to deci­sion and prepare for baptism those who have been taught our doctrines by reading our books, or who have taken the Bible correspondence courses, or have had Bi­ble studies in their home or the films of It Is Written and the Take His Word lessons. But this is not the case generally with those who have no previous acquaintance with Adventist beliefs and practices.

There are some good, honest souls who have no background of the Adventist faith and yet may be made ready for baptism very quickly. But generally no solid, sub­stantial person without any background of Adventist knowledge can be ready for bap­tism in an every-night three-week cam­paign.

We have been advised that "it requires a vast amount of time and labor to convince one soul in regard to the special truths for this time" (Gospel Workers, pp. 496, 497). We must not lose sight of the fact that an evangelistic campaign of the everlasting gospel of God's threefold message is alto­gether different from the revival campaign by the evangelists of other churches. It is different not only in the numerous Christ-centered doctrines and practices which must be presented but in the length of time required for an adequate understanding of the full gospel of Christ, and for the full acceptance of its principles in Sabbath-keeping, eating, drinking, dress, associa­tions, music, reading, and conversation.

After having conducted short campaigns of two, three, and four weeks' duration for the past ten years, and evaluating what has been accomplished, it is our conviction that much more would be gained if we ex­tended the three- and four-week campaign into six weeks. A four-week campaign leaves much undone—not in the declara­tion of every essential of our faith, but in the personal work which is tailored for leading the hearers into harmony with these essentials so that they are truly pre­pared to go all the way with Jesus. Let it not be forgotten—No one has the power to help the interested people like the man who is doing the preaching.