Slowly but surely the wheel of Providence is turning. We know not how soon our Lord will say: “It is done.” His coming is drawing nigh. Soon our opportunities for work will be forever past. Only a little while longer shall we be permitted to labor. My brethren, will you not strive with earnest effort to establish memorials for God throughout the Southern States? Churches should be raised up; houses of worship should be built; small schools and sanitariums should be established; and the publishing interests should be strengthened.
(7T 235.1)
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The lines of work to be established in different places in the South will need men and women of wisdom and prayer, men and women who will carry the work forward from stage to stage soundly, intelligently—toiling, praying, working economically, as laborers of God’s appointment. The situation calls for personal, untiring, united effort.
(7T 235.2)
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One brick upon another, and the highest wall is made; One flake upon another, and the deepest snow is laid.
(7T 235.3)
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Patient continuance in well-doing—this is to be our motto. We are to put forth persevering effort, advancing step by step until the race is run, the victory gained.
(7T 235.4)
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When the publishing work at Nashville was started, it was the avowed purpose of the workers to keep out of debt; but in their desperate effort to make brick without straw, our brethren were led to depart from this purpose, and, as the result, the work has become involved in difficulty. But God’s workmen at Nashville are not, because of this, to become discouraged. The work must not cease. Let all now seek most earnestly to avoid the mistakes of the past. Let them guard themselves as with a fence of barbed wire against the inclination to go into debt. Let them say firmly: “Henceforth we will advance no faster than the Lord shall indicate and the means in hand shall allow, even though the good work has to wait for a while. In beginning in new places, we will labor in narrow quarters, rather than involve the Lord’s cause in debt.”
(7T 235.5)
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Let not those become disheartened who have labored so earnestly to bring the work in the Southern field to its present state of advancement. Let all do their best to place the work at Nashville on a solid basis. The Lord has in charge those who have striven valiantly to do that which so greatly needed to be done. In His pity and kindness and love, the Lord has mercy on them. He still accepts them as His co-workers. He knows all about every one of them. They have had to pass through the fire of affliction, as they have done the breaking-up pioneer work. God will be glorified in those who have been laborers together with Him in breaking up the ground in fields that have never before been worked.
(7T 236.1)
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Brethren, we have a great work before us in the Southern field, a work that as yet we have only begun. We must not continue to stand as we have stood for years, dreading this work. There are those who have done stern, hard labor, and the Lord recognizes and commends their self-sacrificing efforts. He has blessed them. They have received their reward by seeing those they helped placing their feet on the Rock of Ages and in turn helping others.
(7T 236.2)
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My brethren in the Southern field, I ask you, in the name of the Lord God of Israel, to quit you like men. The Lord is at the helm. He will give His servants grace and wisdom. It is God’s purpose that men entrusted with responsibility should counsel and pray together in Christian unity. In unity there is a life, a power, that can be obtained in no other way. There will be a vast power in the church when the energies of the members are united under the control of the Spirit. Then will God be able to work mightily through His people for the conversion of sinners.
(7T 236.3)
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