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Young Men as Missionaries
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to engage in a work for which they are not qualified, and to which no
amount of training will enable them to adapt themselves. The men
thus sent out leave vacancies which inexperienced laborers cannot
supply.
But the church may inquire whether young men can be entrusted
with the grave responsibilities involved in the establishing and su-
perintending of a foreign mission. I answer, God designed that they
should be so trained in our colleges and by association in labor with
men of experience that they would be prepared for departments of
usefulness in this cause. We must manifest confidence in our young
men. They should be pioneers in every enterprise involving toil and
sacrifice, while the overtaxed servants of Christ should be cherished
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as counselors, to encourage and bless those who strike the heaviest
blows for God. Providence thrust these experienced fathers into
trying, responsible positions at an early age, when neither physical
nor intellectual powers were fully developed. The magnitude of the
trust committed to them aroused their energies, and their active labor
in the work aided both physical and mental development.
Young men are wanted. God calls them to missionary fields. Be-
ing comparatively free from care and responsibilities, they are more
favorably situated to engage in the work than are those who must
provide for the training and support of a large family. Furthermore,
young men can more readily adapt themselves to new climates and
new society, and can better endure inconveniences and hardships.
By tact and perseverance they can reach the people where they are.
Strength comes by exercise. All who put to use the ability which
God has given them will have increased ability to devote to His
service. Those who do nothing in the cause of God will fail to grow
in grace and in the knowledge of the truth. A man who would lie
down and refuse to exercise his limbs would soon lose all power
to use them. Thus the Christian who will not exercise his God-
given powers not only fails to grow up into Christ, but he loses the
strength which he already had; he becomes a spiritual paralytic. It
is those who, with love for God and their fellow men, are striving
to help others, that become established, strengthened, settled, in the
truth. The true Christian works for God, not from impulse, but from
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principle; not for a day or a month, but during the entire life....