EFFICIENCY OF PRIMITIVE MISSIONS. BY REV. BARON STOW. The word of God grew and multiplied.-ACTS 12: 24. THE success of the first Christians in their missionary enterprises, has long been regarded as one of the most remarkable facts in history. Their beginning was small, and peculiarly unpromising; but in less time than has elapsed since William Carey commenced in Bengal, they had preached the gospel and organized churches throughout all Palestine, and almost all Asia Minor, through Macedonia, Greece, the islands of the Ægean sea, and along the sea-coast of Africa, and passed on to Rome, the mistress of the world. In a few years more, they were found doing their Master's work, and rejoicing in their Master's blessing, in every known nation, from Cape Comorin to Britain, from Scythia to the Pillars of Hercules. A historian of the second century says that in his time, Asia, Africa and Europe "abounded with Christians." Yet such were the circumstances under which Christianity was then propagated, that upon the ordinary principles of human calculation, any man, not a lunatic, would have pronounced the enterprise impracticable. A candid consideration of these circumstances has wrought conviction in favor of the divinity of our religion in many a mind that was utterly impervious to every other species of evidence. Who were the first preachers and advocates of the Christian religion? What was their number? What their origin, their standing, their education, their personal influence? Were they the agents that human sagacity would have selected for such an undertaking? What was the character of the religion which they would propagate? Was it such as the world, Jewish and Pagan, would be likely to welcome with grateful enthusiasm? What were its doctrines? What its precepts? What did it prohibit? What require? What was the state of the world, the whole world, to which they were commanded to preach the gospel, and for whose subjugation to Christ they were pledged to labor even unto the death? Had Judaism become superannuated and decrepit, so that its hold of the children of Abraham could easily be relaxed, and Christianity, with little difficulty, be substituted in its place? Was paganism in its dotage, and "ready to vanish away?" Did the systems of philosophy, then popular, pre-dispose the mind of the age to a prompt reception of such a system as that of Jesus of Nazareth? What were the malignant and persevering efforts, not only to obstruct the progress of the new religion, but to suppress and exterminate it from the earth? So far did one emperor, Diocletian, proudly imagine that he had succeeded, that he caused a medal to be struck with the inscription, Nomine Christianorum deleto,-the Christian name obliterated. Yet the disciples of Christ, nothing daunted, went forward as bidden by their Lord, and, transcending all barriers, and pressing their way through all difficulties, conveyed the lifegiving doctrine to millions of the perishing, and caused earth and heaven to exult together over its wide-spread and salutary triumphs. This we have called a remarkable fact. The unbelieving Gibbon so considered it, and, without venturing to question its reality, exhausted his rare ingenuity in the attempt to account for it upon principles that should exclude all recognition of the divine original of the system. There is another remarkable fact, that we are sure will be so regarded by future generations, and that will be no less perplexing to the philosophic historian;—and that is, The slow progress of the gospel in the nineteenth century. The Karen inquirer says to our missionary, "If so long time has elapsed since the crucifixion of Christ, why has not this good news reached us before? Why have so many generations of our fathers gone down to hell for want of it?" But these are not the questions which we would now propose. We ask not, How is it that, after eighteen hundred years, so much of the world is covered with pagan darkness? We ask not, How has it happened that for more than a thousand years so large a proportion of the pagan world has been suffered to remain unvisited by Christian heralds? We leave it for our fathers, now in eternity, to answer for themselves to their holy Judge. We simply inquire, How is it that now, as the church professes to understand her obligation, she does not feel its pressure and act in accordance with its dictates? How is it, that with her present knowledge of the heathen world, her aggregate of numbers, her intellectual and physical resources, her triumphs are so comparatively limited? Just in proportion as our missionary endeavors, in character, motive, spirit, resemble those of the primitive church, they are unquestionably as effective. But let us compare our circumstances with theirs, and who will account for the mighty difference between the results of their missions and ours? They had no better truth, nor more of it than we have. The gospel which we preach to a sinful world is precisely the same as they preached. It has lost none of its adaptedness to man's condition,-none of its power to regenerate and save. They had no better hearts to deal with than we have. It does not appear that man has deteriorated, either in intellect or morals, so as to render our task more difficult than theirs. He was then totally depraved; he is only that now. They did not find the heathen more accessible or more susceptible of impression than we find them. The minds which they addressed, like those which we address, were pre-occupied by opinions, and moulded into habits, all directly and sternly repugnant to the spirit of Christianity. Every thing that most powerfully influences and tyrannizes over the human soul, as superstition, custom, policy, interest, pride, passion, law, philosophy, religion,-was decidedly hostile to the genius and claims of the gospel. The divine influence that accompanied their labors, and without which even they would have been unsuccessful, was not different in any respect, except perhaps in amount, from that with which we are favored. They lived under the dispensation of the Spirit. We live under the same dispensation. If the Holy Spirit rendered them peculiarly successful, it was not an act of arbitrary sovereignty, but an equitable adjustment, proportioning the blessing to their measure of fidelity and devotedness. Such were the character and extent of their labors, that he could consistently show them special favor. In blessing them, therefore, he offered no premium to indolence, gave no countenance to antinomian presumption. When we shall live and labor as they did, we shall find, either that there is no truth in the promise, or that our exertions are rendered equally effectual by the Spirit's energy. In what respect did the ability of the primitive church surpass ours? Had she greater wealth or intelligence, or more of anything which we reckon under the denomination of resources? Was her ministry distinguished by extraordinary talent, or superior intellectual training? A few, we admit, and only a few, were divinely inspired, and they especially for the purpose of filling up the canon of Scripture; but who can show that their inspiration gave them power over a single heart, or added a single convert to the church of Christ? All the external advantages are decidedly in our favor. We have knowledge of the state of the world which they had not. We have greater facilities of intercourse both by land and water. We have the printing-press, a potent instrument, whose powers, not yet half developed, shall astonish and bless the nations. We have equally with them the force of the argument from miracles and prophecy, and we have the additional argument derived from the propagation of Christianity, its indestructibleness either by internal corruption or external oppression, the perpetuity of its institutions, the preservation of the Scriptures, the continued fulfilment of prophecy, and the benign influence of the gospel upon individual, domestic, and national welfare. Nor should we forget the fact, that the missionary enterprise has in our day secured to itself no small portion of secular respectability. Multitudes, who have no sympathy with its nobler aims, are disposed to regard it with favor, and to aid it forward, merely on account of its indirect results. If in our main object, the salvation of souls from sin and death, they see no point of attraction, yet in the subserviency of missions to literature, science, commerce, civilization, they find something that is congenial to their taste, something which as scholars, philanthropists, merchants, they can admire, something to prompt them to be liberal to a degree that ought to shame the Christian for his parsimony. Foreign missions have acquired a character and a position in the public mind, to which in the days of the apostles they were strangers. Yet notwithstanding circumstances are so much in our favor, they made advances in the production of effect, such as we have never witnessed. Without the world's favorite instrumentality, learning, eloquence, wealth, arms, - nay, with all these leagued against them, and in the face of them all, the primitive church expanded, and achieved triumph after triumph, - all the triumphs of truth and holiness. All the apparatus of torture and death was brought out and arrayed in her path to arrest her progress, but heedless of its terrors, she moved forward to the execution of her lofty purpose. Some of her most malignant foes became her devoted champions, and even martyrs, and every day new territories were added to her growing empire. Persecution often kindled her fires, and with her blood she as often extinguished them. Her progress from place to place was marked by the dethronement of idol deities, and the fall of idol temples; on the high places of idolatry she planted her banners; and in all lands, known to the merchant, the traveller, the warrior, the trophies of her power were multiplied. "So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed.” The question recurs: How shall we account for this difference in efficiency, between their missions and ours? The suggestion of a few considerations by way of reply may not be unsuitable. I. THE TYPE OF THEIR PIETY. The piety of not only the ministry, but of the church in general, was missionary piety. Just suppose that the great majority of Christians were as spiritual, as dead to the world, as active for God, as we require our missionaries to be, and as some of them actually are, and you have an approximation to the true idea of the religious character of the early church. When believers then gave themselves to Christ, it was a bona fide transaction. They did not enter his service as an experiment, or on probation, but unconditionally, unreservedly, and for eternity. They gave up all for him, they consecrated all to him. In "simplicity and godly sincerity," with a lively sense of his worthiness, and of the legitimacy of his claims, they surrendered themselves, body and soul, to him as their proprietor and ruler, as well as Saviour and friend. Willing to be his, desirous to be his, they became his by voluntary covenant, "his own," in every possible sense, nominally, really, and for ever. The distinguishing traits of their piety were strongly developed, and obvious to all. -- 1. Great love. On no part of the Christian character does the New Testament so frequently and strenuously insist, as on this on none does it pass so many and deserved enco 1 |