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Teaching and Healing
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to develop. A similar work would benefit many of the members
of large churches. They need to be placed where their energies
will be called forth in active Christian effort. They are losing their
spiritual life, becoming dwarfed and inefficient, because they lack
self-sacrificing work for others. Transplanted to some missionary
field, they would grow strong and vigorous.
But none need wait until called to some distant field before
beginning to help others. Doors of service are open everywhere. All
around us are those who need our help. The widow, the orphan, the
sick and dying, the heartsick, the discouraged, the ignorant, and the
outcast are on every hand.
We should feel it our special duty to work for those in our neigh-
borhood. Study how you can best help those who take no interest in
religious things. As you visit your friends and neighbors, show an
interest in both their spiritual and temporal welfare. Speak to them
of Christ as a sin-pardoning Savior. Invite your neighbors to your
home, and read with them from the precious Bible and from books
that explain its truths. Invite them to unite with you in song and
prayer. In these little gatherings, Christ Himself will be present, as
He has promised, and hearts will be touched by His grace.
Church members should educate themselves to do this work.
This is just as essential as to save the benighted souls in foreign
countries. While some feel burdened to win souls in distant lands,
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the many who are at home should feel the burden of precious souls
who are around them, and work diligently for their salvation.
Many regret that they are living a narrow life. They themselves
can make their life broad and influential if they will. Those who love
Jesus with heart and mind and soul, and their neighbors as them-
selves, have a wide field in which to use their ability and influence.
None should pass by little opportunities, looking for larger work.
You might do successfully the small work but fail utterly in attempt-
ing the larger work and become discouraged. It is by doing with your
might what you find to do that you will develop aptitude for larger
work. It is by slighting the daily opportunities, by neglecting the
little things right at hand, that many become fruitless and withered.
Do not depend upon human aid. Look beyond human beings to
the One appointed by God to bear our griefs, carry our sorrows, and
supply our necessities. Taking God at His word, make a beginning