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Testimonies for the Church Volume 6
It is also the Lord’s design that our schools shall give young people
a training which will prepare them to teach in any department of the
Sabbath school or to discharge the duties in any of its offices. We
should see a different state of affairs if a number of consecrated young
persons would devote themselves to the Sabbath school work, taking
pains to educate themselves and then to instruct others as to the best
methods to be employed in leading souls to Christ. This is a line of
work that brings returns.
Missionary Teachers
Teachers should be educated for missionary work. Everywhere
there are openings for the missionary, and it will not be possible to
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supply laborers from any two or three countries to answer all the
appeals for help. Besides the education of those who are to be sent out
from our older conferences as missionaries, persons in various parts
of the world should be trained to work for their own countrymen and
their own neighbors; and as far as possible it is better and safer for
them to receive their education in the field where they are to labor. It is
seldom best, either for the worker or for the advancement of the work,
that he should go to distant lands for his education. The Lord would
have every possible provision made to meet these necessities; and if
churches are awake to their responsibilities, they will know how to act
in any emergency.
To supply the need of laborers, God desires that educational centers
be established in different countries where students of promise may
be educated in the practical branches of knowledge and in Bible truth.
As these persons engage in labor, they will give character to the work
of present truth in the new fields. They will awaken an interest among
unbelievers and aid in rescuing souls from the bondage of sin. The very
best teachers should be sent to the various countries where schools are
to be established, to carry on the educational work.
It is possible to have too many educational facilities centered in
one place. Smaller schools, conducted after the plan of the schools of
the prophets, would be a far greater blessing. The money which was
invested in enlarging Battle Creek College to accommodate the minis-
ters’ school would better have been invested in establishing schools in
rural districts in America and in the regions beyond. No more buildings