The following appeared in the Southeastern California Ministerial Association newsletter, The Flame, but it has a much wider application than any single conference. We feel that it gives all of us something to consider as we assess our ministries. Editors.
Have you ever awakened in the night and found your mind running full speed until it seemed inspiration flooded you with thoughts and words and a burden to share them? Two nights in a row recently, I awakened concerned with the apparent apathy toward public evangelism. As I thought about the ministers in our confer ence, I remembered that many of you started out as successful pastor-evangelists.
In fact, that was the way of a generation or two ago. Now many of us middle-aged "old timers" seem to have lost our zeal. In fact, some are saying, "I'm not sure about this business of the Lord coming soon. We've been saying that for years. What we need to do is to live daily so no matter when He comes we will be ready and waiting." The latter statement is certainly true, yet when we lose that evangelistic fervor, that anticipatory feeling of awaiting the Lord's return, we have in fact denied our denomi national name as Adventists, for that is what the name means. We are "Advent ists" because we believe in the soon-com ing of Jesus Christ.
Many of us can truthfully say we had hoped to be in the kingdom before this, yet the waiting should not cause us to give up the blessed hope. How often do we preach on the Second Coming, about our heav enly home, and other messages of hope and decision? It may be true that people are "too busy" to support evangelism. With both hus bands and wives working to support their families and give their children a Christian education, they are too busy. The rich are also too busy. But when we get too busy to witness, too busy to give some time to our Lord, we are just too busy. Could the fault lie to some degree in our lack of evangelis tic emphasis and leadership? I don't feel we need to lay a burden of guilt on our membership; but somehow we find time to support and promote other worthwhile church activities. Are we, .as one minister put it, just "massaging the saints" when we ought to be stirring them up to good works and motivating them to set priorities in their lives? Many of us preach good homiletic messages to our complacent churches, but when was the last call you made for people to accept Christ and join His remnant church? I hear talk occasionally about our evangelists being sort of "out of it," or back in the woods of archaic antiquity. The message of the prophecies of Daniel 2, 7, 8, 9, and 12 still speak as eloquently as they did a hundred years ago. You can't change much about the basics of the millennium, the Second Coming, the United States in Bible prophecy, et cetera. We need more tact and charity toward our Christian friends of other faiths, and I think we have come a long way on that. Still, if one accepts Revelation 13 and 17, he cannot avoid mentioning who Babylon is in the last days. The problem is that many of our younger preachers hardly study these pas sages enough to expostulate on them, and many of our older brethren are not teaching them to give the younger minis ters an example.
Somehow, we are not producing men with a zeal for evangelism. In fact, too many of our younger men are ordained and even getting some years into the ministry without having yet held their own cru sades. In my day, we all did that as a matter of course at least every other year and alternated with a professional evangelist.
I am not the judge, nor can I even guess how God will judge us, but somehow I picture His countenance gathering sorrow over our failure to give emphasis to public evangelism and soul winning.
The other night, I went to a packed church to hear Kenneth Lacey tell of the home of the redeemed. The large attend ance gave evidence that the day of evangelism is not over. Here was a church that was supportive, a pastor who did his homework, and a message that was clear.
My heart thrilled as a young lady in her twenties tearfully pushed into the pastor's study with the words "Pastor, I want to be baptized." A few weeks ago in San Ysidro, I heard a clear message in Spanish. I couldn't understand all that was said, for my Spanish is poauito; but I heard enough to get the feeling of enthusiasm for a millen nium with my Lord. And at the call I saw the crowd come forward to accept the appeal.
It was just as exciting a little later to see a pastor from American Samoa preach this message, dressed in typical Samoan cos tume—a skirt and bare feet. The rest of his clothing looked conventional. The Samoan young men's choir was inspira tional, even though I could not understand a word they sang. Then I thought of God seated on high, smiling down as He listened to the prayers and felt the tug of concern by these audiences as they heard our message preached.
It was thrilling to see the crowds and hear of the results of the recent San Diego black crusade with Helvius Thompson.
More than fifty new souls rejoice in the message.
No, evangelism is not dead! We may be, but it is not. Jesus said, "Go ye therefore, and teach all nations" (Matt. 28:19). Let us heed His call to evangelize. Young men, let us help you get started. Older men, return to your first love. Let's go home soon!
