CHAPTER IV

A MAN'S RESPONSE TO THE WORLD APPEAL

Efficiency experts, 87--A fourfold program, 89--WIDENING HORIZON, 90--Studying the Church, 92--The missionary committee, 93--UNWITHHOLDING CONSECRATION, 95--Principles of stewardship, 98--Methods, 101--UNENDING PRAYER, 103--Calls forth and energizes movements, 106--Finds a way out in hours of crisis, 107--Fills gaps in thin line of battle, 107--Togo's telegram, 109.

FOREWORD

The four questions which the author has most frequently heard in discussing world problems with men are the following:

What progress is the missionary enterprise making?

How much remains to be done?

What is America's share of world responsibility?

How can men relate themselves in a practical way to the spread of Christianity throughout the world?

It is to give a brief answer to these four fundamental questions that the following pages have been prepared for use in Missionary Discussion Groups, Men's Bible Classes, Brotherhoods, Missionary Committees, and groups of Sunday School Officers and Teachers. It is also confidently expected that many men who cannot meet to discuss these problems in any of the groups mentioned will read and study the book in private. In preparing the manuscript the author has had in mind a large number of men who are now or should become public advocates of missions. The book presents information which they may use in addresses.

Many of the facts given have been taken from the _Report_ of the Edinburgh World Missionary Conference, _The World Atlas of Christian Missions_, _The Statesman's Year Book, 1912_, _The Decisive Hour of Christian Missions_, by John R. Mott, and _The Unoccupied Mission Fields of Africa and Asia_, by S. M. Zwemer.

The author is indebted to his friend, the Rev. W. R. Dobyns, D.D., of St. Joseph, Missouri, for the design on the cover.

It is the hope of the writer that the reading and discussion of the topics outlined in these pages will inspire many men to undertake to master the world plans of Christ and lead them to enthrone at the center of life the missionary purpose--the one purpose around which a man may build all the facts of his life and to which he may cling and let everything else go when he is hard pressed.

New York, September, 1912.

THE CALL OF THE WORLD