Part 7

Finding a ship that was to sail for New Orleans we went aboard and set forth, carrying with us many more tracts and Testaments so that we might cast bread upon the waters among other people.

Soon after leaving the port I noticed a man on board whom we had met in another place. He was a gambler, who traveled and gambled on ships all the time. We had spoken to him of the Bible and about the Lord, but he had said he did not think anyone ought to talk about the Bible and religion, as such talk would make people lose their minds. We were only getting people stirred up, and that wasn’t good. I heard him tell the captain we were missionaries, and that wherever we went we talked about God and the Bible, but he hoped we would not be allowed to do so on this trip.

Some of the people looked so very aristocratic that the enemy said to me, “You had better not give out tracts and Testaments on this boat, as the people will not listen, for they will think you are a fanatic.” But I felt I must let my light shine here as well as in other places. So I went to my stateroom to pray. I opened my Bible to read and saw in it a little tract, containing these words:

=“Have you overcome the worldly opinions of the sect which is everywhere spoken against by taking your stand with it? What would Jesus have you do? Have you done that? If the world has nothing to say against you, Jesus will have nothing to say for you. His grace is sufficient. Ask Him.”=

That was a message to my heart. I said, “Lord, I will go through this ship and give out tracts to everyone. Now, Lord, you bless every dear heart, and open to them the Gospel.”

As I passed around the deck giving out tracts, a man and his wife asked what church I belonged to. I told them I belonged to

=“The Church of the First Born.”=

Then I told them about the Pentecostal people, and how we had received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, as the people did on the day of Pentecost, and told them that God was pouring out His Spirit on the earth, and that Jesus was coming again soon. They were Seventh-Day Adventist missionaries from Colombia, South America, coming home on furlough. They had been on the field four years, but had only been selling their literature. Nobody had been saved, but they thought that when, they went back again they would be able to do something, as the people would have an understanding of their religion and the keeping of the Sabbath Day. We could see their lives were empty, and that they knew nothing about worshiping God in Spirit and in truth.

We had many talks together about the law of Moses and the ten commandments. We showed them we are dead to the law through the body of Christ, and that we should serve in newness of Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter. Oh, how these dear hearts did respond to the Word of God! They had been reading the many different books of their denomination, but did not have a Bible. We asked them to read the Word of God that would bring Spirit and Life into their lives and we gave them a nice Bible. As we separated in New Orleans, they took my hand and said, “Thank God for sending you on this ship. We felt empty and dry, and now we know what is the trouble. We shall read and pray until we are filled with the blessed Holy Spirit, and when we return to our mission-field we can preach the Gospel to the people.”

A family coming from South America took tracts and Testaments and called for more. They said they were Lutherans, had been raised in that church, felt a lack in their lives, and wanted to have the power and glory of God in their souls. They believed that Jesus was coming soon.

Every time we went into the parlor and sat down we had a congregation, for the poor people were so hungry they would come and ask us to tell them more about this wonderful way.

A great hurricane was sweeping the Gulf. A wireless message had been received that the storm was terrible, and warning us to prepare for it before leaving the port. The blackness was awful on the waters as we went out. As we moved slowly out of the inner harbor, some battleships were having target practice at sea. Two submarines partly submerged, were slowly moving along to keep ships from coming too close to where the sailors were shooting.

The Lord said to me, “Just as those submarines are placed here to protect the ships from the shooting, so I will place My angels around this ship and the storm shall not molest you.”

=“Only believe and rest in Me.”=

The passengers were frightened, and the captain gave orders to have the storm doors and windows put in, and the ship made ready to meet the terrible hurricane. But on we sailed, and the storm moved on in front of us, all the way to New Orleans. Only once did we get into it a little for a few minutes. The rain came down in floods, the wind blew with great force, thick darkness settled down over the ship, and we were tossed by the great waves that arose. Many became sea-sick and ran to their staterooms for life-preservers. The captain gave orders to have the life boats in readiness.

As we passed into our staterooms, not to get the little cork-and-canvas life preservers that were lying there, but to get in touch with the One Great Life-Preserver, who said He would give His angels charge over us, there came into our hearts a sweet rest and peace. After prayer we arose and went on deck. As I passed through the door I met the captain, who said, “I have been looking for you and your husband, that you might pray for our ship to be saved, as there is no other hope.” He himself lifted up his hand and asked God to drive back the storm. Just then the blackness swept off the decks, the ship straightened up, and the sun smiled down upon us. Surely God giveth His angels charge over us, that we should not dash our feet against a stone.

“Hiding in Thee, hiding in Thee, Thou blest Rock of Ages, I’m hiding in Thee.”

From that time on we were sailing just behind the big black hurricane. A ship that had been following us was caught in the storm, and for three days and nights they were lost and had no hope of being saved. A young man from this ship rode on the train with us from New Orleans to St. Louis. He told us of the terrible things they suffered. How they all had life-preservers on many times, and were ready to get into the life-boats, as they thought the ship would go down.

On our ship every passenger, officer and member of the crew took tracts and Testaments and read them. The captain told us he was glad to have someone on the ship who knew how to pray. On the previous trip he brought some women from Colon who were dope fiends. The whole boat was in a terrible uproar all the way, and he feared God would let them all go down for such wickedness. He himself knew something of the power of God. He took a Bible and tracts and asked for some of our books for the ship’s library. Shall we not give these men some good books to read at sea?

The gambler, whom I heard say we were always talking about the Lord, came to me and said, “I want to get some papers and a Bible. I have always been a wicked man, but since I have been on this boat I have made up my mind to give my heart to God and live different.” He said he had a Christian mother who taught him to kneel at her knee and say his evening prayer, and he wanted to meet her in Heaven, for he knew she was there.

One of the professors from the Northwestern University was on board. He had been traveling through all the Latin-American countries, gathering information for the new history he was writing. He came to talk with us, saying he was interested in mission work. We gave him all the information we could about the different parts of the country we had visited. He said, “I know you people have something I haven’t. What is it?” He was a member of the Presbyterian church, and had been since he was a very young child. His father was a minister, so he had always been brought up in the church.

As we read the Bible to him and prayed with him, telling him of the great outpouring of the Spirit of God in these last days, and the soon coming of Jesus, he wept like a child, and said he was ready for all God had for him. When he returned to Chicago he would go to a Pentecostal mission, as he knew this was the truth of God. He was a very sweet spirited man, open to the Spirit of the Lord. He took with him many tracts on the Baptism of the Spirit and the Second Coming of Jesus.

A young man, on his way to school in the States, asked for a Bible, saying he had never seen one, but had a great desire to read one. Since hearing us talk so much about it, he thought it must be a wonderful Book. He took a Bible to school with him, also tracts and papers. He was a native of Costa Rica.

As we were leaving the ship at New Orleans people came for more Testaments and tracts to carry away with them. One brother and sister, very wealthy people, traveling for pleasure, took many of the little messengers, the sister saying that when she reached her home in Oklahoma she was going to prepare herself for missionary work. She was tired of the life she had been living, and having seen the awful need of the Central American people, she could never be happy again until she went to help them.

In New Orleans we gave out hundreds of tracts and found many hungry souls. I visited some of the missions there, in search of Pentecostal people, but they told us there were none there. Such a needy city! May the God of Heaven stir our hearts until we are awakened and go forth into every city of the Union with this message of the hour, and the people are reached and the Holy Spirit is poured out upon the earth.

On board the train for St. Louis, we found many hungry hearts ready for the truth, having never heard it before. In the Union Station, St. Louis, we found others who were hungry. They took the tracts and went away pleased to have them. Even in our own city we found people who were eager to hear the Word of God. Many were the precious souls reached by the Bread upon the waters, which we freely cast forth.

We traveled from Granite City, Illinois, to Los Angeles, California, giving out tracts and Testaments. From Los Angeles we sailed to Central America and gave out the Word in every port we came to in Mexico, Central America and Panama. From Panama to New Orleans and Granite City we distributed the Word to thousands. We look back over our journey and see a long white line of Bread that was cast upon the waters, reaching our home in Granite City, where also God is working.

“On the resurrection morning, when we rise to meet our Lord, When His glory and His victory we shall share, With un-numbered blood-washed millions we’ll go shouting through the skies, And His bride ascends to meet Him in the air.

“When the roll is called up yonder, We’ll be filled with joy and wonder, When we see the blood-washed number; Some from every tribe and nation will be there.”

THE NEEDS OF CENTRAL AMERICA

There is a land not far away. It lies on our own continent. It is a land of tropical beauty, where cocoanut palms wave their tall green branches in the breeze, and where flowers bloom the year around. The banana, pineapple, orange, and many other tropical trees and plants yield their fruit in rich abundance. The chatter of innumerable parrots and the sweet songs of many birds are heard from the great tall trees of the forests. Scantily-clad brown-faced boys and girls run about. Seeing it, one is made to say, “What a beautiful country!”

But, ah! As one advances inland, leaving the pretty harbor of Corinto, on the Pacific coast, the signs of the enemy’s work are on man and beast.

There is desolation everywhere. The poor people are too weak to withstand the strong rival with whom they have had to battle so long. Homes are broken up. Mothers with their little children are crying for help. Their cries are heard on every side. Powers of darkness sweep over the whole country.

The poor are driven like animals to the plantations to work for a few cents a day, not enough to sustain life. They are paid in advance for the season’s work. The wage is so small the family soon spend it all. Then they are arrested and made to work for what they have already received. Even mothers are put into the coffee and banana fields to work in the hot sun. On the poor tired women go with their babies strapped to their backs all day long, with nothing to eat but a tortilla (a corn cake baked without seasoning of any kind).

In the evening the poor tired people make their way to their little huts, which are made of a few sticks driven into the ground and covered with straw or palm leaves. There they grind corn for tortillas, the children carrying water in little buckets made of gourds that grow on trees, or in a jar made of clay. Their homes are as dirty as pig-pens, for the animals live in the house with the family.

As you travel through the country you find the very poor, who live in the mountains, far away from the cities, often whole families, without clothes. If they wear anything at all, it will be a piece of cloth woven from grass pinned around their bodies with a thorn, for they never saw a pin or button. Many boys and girls fourteen or fifteen years old have never worn clothes.

Both in the cities and in the country women are beasts of burden, for the women or the donkeys furnish the transportation, the men do not work much. The women work in the markets and little stores, and carry great loads of sugar, fruit, water, etc., on their heads in the hot sun. The streets are full of children that never were in school. They grow up to be lazy, fight with each other, and steal. When you have one around who is not saved you have to keep everything under lock and key.

More than two-thirds of the population are of illegitimate birth. Men and women live together and raise families, yet are never married. One of the difficult things the missionary has to do is see that they marry and live clean lives.

The priests charge so much money to perform the ceremony that the poor cannot pay it, so they live on year after year in this way; but they have to pay so much to the priests every year to get them to forgive their sin of adultery, in that way the Church of Rome gets more from them than they would to marry them. The priests prey upon the superstitions of the people to extract money from them at all points. The natives’ religion is a mere form of outward exercises.

For over 400 years the whole of Mexico, Central and South America, as well as the West Indies, have been under the heavy yoke of Romanism. The Spaniards came into the country and, driving the natives at the point of the sword, baptized them into the Roman Church, and took away their language and liberty. They compelled them to carry timber and stone from inland and build temples for the Roman Church.

In Leon, which is the largest city of the Republic of Nicaragua, and where we have our work, there are between seventy and eighty thousand people and forty-two temples. And when one sees those old temples almost ready to tumble down, and covered with moss and grass centuries old, one feels that Rome is certainly coming to the end of herself in these countries. The people are rising up now and calling for schools, and for freedom of the press, and are crying, “Away with the Church! It has never done anything for us.” Many thousands are becoming free-thinkers.

Nicaragua is the only Republic of Central America that has Church and State united. A great fight is now on for their separation. There are over one million people in this Republic alone without the Gospel. Let us pray God to speed the day when these reforms shall be wrought and the Gospel be given the people.

Nicaragua saw her first missionary sixteen years ago. It has been the last of the Republics to receive the Gospel. The persecutions were so severe that the missionaries had to leave in a few weeks. But, thank God! some of the people accepted the glad news and have stood true through flood and flame. But there are very few missionaries there as yet, and thousands are without the knowledge of a Savior who died for them.

All these countries are being flooded with New Thought, Russellism, Christian Science, Theosophy, and Spiritualism. Many are coming into these things now, for the people are fast turning from Romanism. They are like little hungry birds with wide-open mouths ready to accept any poisonous thing presented. Are we, the true followers of Jesus Christ, going to sleep on and fail to wake up to this great opportunity? Let us go forth with the old-time Gospel of Pentecostal power, that will drive the enemy from the land, and give these dear people the truth.

At one place where we were having meetings the people asked us why missionaries had not come to them before. They said, “We saw the first one sixteen years ago, but he was so persecuted he had to leave us in a few weeks, and only a few heard the Gospel, and we have been in darkness for so long. Oh, if some one had only told us before the way of life!”

Many children were brought to us to be placed in school, so that they might learn to read and write, and study the Bible. But as yet we have been unable to open a school. My heart has been torn as I have seen the little children growing up in such ignorance, and especially the young girls. This country, like all other countries without the Gospel, regards the women and girls as no more than animals, and they are the prey to every horrible crime that anyone wishes to inflict upon them. The little girls are often sold into lives of shame by their parents for a few dollars. We knew one mother who sold her four young daughters. One of them found that she was to be sold so she ran away and hid in the mountains, but they hunted until they found her, then they bound her and carried her away, dripping with blood where she had been beaten with clubs and stoned with stones. The man that took her was, I am sorry to say, an American. “It is only the precious Blood of Jesus that can change the human heart, that is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.” Jer. 17:9.

Many foreigners have come here for money, and do not care much how they get it. Some have gold mines, others have plantations, many of them are Americans. They are making every sacrifice for the gold that perisheth. Shall not we, then, who have the treasure of Heaven, break the Bread of Life to these dear hungry souls ere they perish?

There came to us early one morning a bright-faced Indian girl about thirteen years old. Her parents were dead, her sisters were living lives of shame and they had driven the poor little one out from them. She had been sleeping in the markets and parks and was crying in the street. Some one told her to come to us for we were missionaries and we would help her. She said she would be our servant and do anything, that she might have a place where she could be sheltered from the wicked men. She is only one of the many thousands that are here in this dark land crying for some one to help them. Unless we take them in they will be destroyed by sin. Many are found dead, having been killed to hide the crime of some wicked person. It is in behalf of these suffering ones that this little message is sent on its way in the Name of Jesus.

We are having blessed meetings. Many are coming out to hear the good news. Some have already received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. A native brother that has been saved has gone out to another place to preach, and the power of God is falling. Several have received the Holy Spirit, and others have been blessed in soul and healed in body.

Soon after coming into the country God gave me a vision of the blessed Latter Rain falling all over Central America. So I ask you, dear child of the Lord, to pray that the people in the homeland will be stirred up to come up to the help of the Lord against the mighty. Many missionaries have gone to China, India, Africa, and the Islands of the Sea, but few have come to this country. Let us awake and pray that the Lord will send forth laborers, and that the means will be provided for their support, and that this very needy land shall hear the blessed Gospel story. There are a few faithful soldiers of the cross laboring here, but the battle is hard and long.

Some have fallen, and their comrades have laid them away on the green hillside to await their reward at the coming of the One who said: “He that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathered fruit unto life eternal.”—John 4:36.

But there is a great door open, and the enemy is flooding in with all sorts of implements of war. There is urgent need of more soldiers and supplies. Just as Uncle Sam was able to send men and means for the great conflict in Europe, and so defeat the enemy, so our Captain, who never lost a battle, is able to send His soldiers, to defeat the enemy and drive him from the ranks and to send great showers of blessing upon the dry and thirsty land.

Just as some returned from the European battle-front to call for help from their countrymen, so we send out the cry to our brothers and sisters in Christ to let them know the great needs here, that they may join in a petition to the Throne of Grace for help.

The fight is on, the battle sound is ringing out, The cry to arms is heard afar and near, The Lord of hosts is marching on to victory, The triumph of the right will soon appear.

The fight is on O, Christian soldier, And face to face in stern array, With armor gleaming and colors streaming, The right and wrong engage today.

THE INDIANS OF NICARAGUA

(Extract from Article by Brother Schoenich)

From the time that Gil Gonzaloz de Avile reached the peaceful shores of the Chontales—Nicaragua—penetrating to the borders of the great lakes, the Indian has been made to suffer from the hands of the so-called enlightened races. When the above gentleman set his feet on Nicaraguan soil, the land contained some 3,000,000 peaceful and industrious Indians. In less than ten years 2,500,000 of them had perished in battle, were worked to death in the mines, or had starved in the mountain fastnesses.

In 1529 the Indians revolted, and after six terrible battles, the Spaniards succeeded in defeating them; the Indian chiefs were thrown to bloodhounds, who tore them to pieces. The masses were subjected to heavy tributes and severe tasks, and were driven like cattle by their cruel conquerors. Whoever resisted was ruthlessly tortured, towns that rebelled were destroyed and the people put to the sword. The Indians were reduced to the most abject slavery, their property was taken, and they were branded like cattle with hot irons. This cruel practice prevailed for years, and the miserable remnant of Indians who were still permitted to live, moistened their native soil with their bloody sweat, or dragged out a painful existence in the mines or gold placers. Coffee, rubber, sugar and cocoa were not then sought as today.

In 1810, when the first movement toward freedom began to be realized, an impartial observer unhesitatingly estimated the entire aboriginal population of the country at about 90,000 souls. The real Indian is fast going out of existence. The Ladinos, a class of mixed Spanish and Indian, soon may be all that is left of the Indian.