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THE BULLETIN OF THE CATHOLIC LAYMEN’S ASSOCIATION OF GEORGIA
13
FORMER GEORGIA MINISTER.
(Continued from Page 4.)
solemn consecration of myself to Him, as in my vows
of Religion in the Catholic Church, it is only the
precious and mature fruit of the earlier consecration
back there in the days of my young manhood. All
my prayer, reflection, the Grace of God all in a
word, moved me to become a minister of the Gospel,
so that I could give my whole life to Christ and the
salvation of souls.
But now with this decision came a great cross, that
is to tell my father of my purpose. I was the eldest
child and only son at that time, my younger brother
having died; and my father looked forward to the
moment when he should see me launched forth into
my career; business was first and everything to him.
O what hours of anguish and prayer it cost me! But
God gave grace and courage, so I told my father
humbly and frankly of the great obligation weighing
upon my heart and of my changed views of life. He
was outwardly kind and patient, but I knew that it
was only in appearance, for as soon as he was alone
with my mother he gave full vent to his disappoint
ment and chagrin.
At the end of my Junior year I spent the ensuing
vacation in helping Rev. E. M. Stanton in evangelistic
work, such as camp meetings, revivals and tent meet
ings, in different towns of North Georgia. Truly
nothing gave me greater pleasure than to see sinners
.repent and serve the Lord Jesus Christ. When I
had completed my Senior year at college and had
spent the vacation days as in the previous year, I
went in the fall of 1898 to Vanderbilt University, at
Nashville, Tenn. which at that time was under the
jurisdiction of the Southern Methodist Church to
study theology, and thus fit myself for the ministry.
At the University I passed two years completing
the Minor Course in Theology. During my residence
m Nashville, I came in contact with a band of earnest
Christians, who, being tired of the worldliness and
coldness of their respective churches, and longing for
a deeper and more intimate life with God, had organ
ized themselves into a Mission with headquarters at
Old Tulip Street Methodist Church, where they held
their services and gave themselves to much practical
Christian work. Naturally their tenets, as far as doc
trine is concerned, varied much; for the spirit of
division in Protestantism is ever the same, whether in
greater or lesser sects; but the zeal and earnestness
of these young men attracted me and was more a
recommendation for their doctrine than anything else
could be.
Now, one feature of their work was foreign mis
sionary activity; consequently I had occasion to hear
now and then a returned missionary tell of the great
need of the Gospel in pagan lands. At Emory Col
lege missionary interest was not lacking. In fact,
for one of my declamations before Dr. Candler and
the class, I had chosen as a theme Foreign Missions,
and the Doctor had warmly commended the oration.
Moreover, at Vanderbilt University, there was an or
ganized branch or chapter of the Student Volunteer
Movement. I mention all this in order to show what
missionary influence was brought to bear upon my
life. Nothing more fully expressed my ideal at that
time and expresses it yet than the words of two well-
known Protestant missionaries, viz.: Henry Martin,
who said, “Let me burn out for God”; and Carey!
Not ,where I am needed, but where I am needed
most. There were multitudes of workers in the
homeland, but so few to go abroad to the needy and
difficult harvest-field of foreign missions. Why
should I remain at home? Did not Christ need me
a ° ro ^’ How could I refuse Him who had given up
all the glory of Heaven in order to bring to us the
glad tidings of redemption? Love for Him won in
the struggle, for struggle it was for a time.
For me to become a Methodist minister had been
a hard blow for my father, and when I told him of
my intention of going to China (as that field of labor
appealed to me most), it was a veritable climax of
disappointments of all his hopes.
The Mission at Old Tulip Street Church, at that
time, sent both their missionaries and missionary con
tributions through the Christian and Missionary Al
liance, whose soul and leader was the late Dr. A. B.
Simpson, of New York City. In the Alliance were
many godly and zealous men and women laboring in
several mission fields. What attracted me power
fully was their life of comparative poverty and great
confidence in God, as they received no guaranteed
salary, together with their life of spirituality. In a
word, they endeavored to follow a life of great sim
plicity and “literally conformable to Scripture” in
several points of doctrine. This last fact I mention,
merely in passing, to call attention to the fact that
great earnestness and extreme conformity to Scrip
ture (alas! falsely interpreted) do not hinder Protes
tants from falling into error. For there is but one
official interpreter of Holy Writ and its application
to the Christian life, and that is the Catholic Church.
Outside of her, people with the best of intentions go
astray doctrinally. It is a fact too evident to discuss.
Before going to China I spent several months at
the Missionary Training Institute of the Christian
and Missionary Alliance of Nyack-on-the-Hudson.
There I passed through a kind of novitiate, attended
lectures upon the Holy Scriptures, studied foreign
missions, the difficult fields, methods of work, con
versed with returned missionaries, and did all I could
to nurture my vocation and perfect myself for my
future work.
Finally, in the spring of 1901, the year following
the memorable Boxer uprising, I arrived in South
China, my soul aflame with the desire to preach the
Gospel to the Chinese. My first task was to master
the language, which no one who knows anything
about it will say was an easy one. We were given
about two years to devote to language study, but
even before the lapse of the second year I began to
render efficient service. I lived in the interior of
China at Kivei Lin, the capital of the Province of
Kwang Si, and wishing to reach as many people as
possible, I tried to conform largely to Chinese cus
toms, by adopting their dress, shaving my head and
wearing the queue, eating native food, etc. “I be
came all things to all men that I might save all.”
My work at this time consisted of preaching in the
street chapel, on the streets, distributing copies of
the Gospels and tracts, and making occasional evan
gelistic journeys to other towns, villages and market
centers.
In 1903 I was married to Miss Martha A. Beeson,
who had come to China to do mission work among
the women. How faithfully she fulfilled her mission
has been told in her biography, “A Missionary
Heroine of Kwang Si, China.”
Between Wuchow and Kivei Lin is a city called
P ing Loh, which had not yet been opened to the
Gospel. I was sent there by the Mission to open a
station, and, as we were the first white people to
reside there, we had no easy task and some of the
difficulties are told in the book mentioned above.
Two or three years later I was sent with another
missionary to open a chapel at Fin Cheo Fu, a city
still more remote and in a district over-run by
brigands. There my wife and I lived and worked
until our first furlough to the home-land in 1907.
My father passed away several months after my re
turn to the United States of America.
(To be continued next month)
We hope the college students of these days are
not to be judged by a recent “College Wits” number
of a national humorous weekly.