1912 Watch Tower - A2Z.org

change will be for the better. The common conception,that all the peoples of India, China and Japan are heathensavages, is very erroneous. Their upper classes, or castes,include some splendid characters of truly noble manhood,the moral and intellectual peers of Europeans and Americans.Indeed, the masses of these people are less vicious,less rude, more kind and considerate than are the massesof Europe and America. Drunkenness and outward immodestyare almost entirely unknown amongst theOrientals.Many of the congregations of Christians in Japan,China and India are self-sustaining. And in such casesthe Orientals prefer to take over the full control of allservices, rather than to have the Missionaries take anypart. The native ministers come closer to the people thanit is possible for the whites to do. Habits and customs oflife make it almost impossible for Missionaries to live inthe very simple style of the Orientals, and it would not bereasonable to require it.V.--"What, if any, change should be made in theteachings and financial administration to make the ForeignMission work more successful?"Answer.--The great change necessary to make Missionarywork more successful is for the Missionaries tohave and to impart to the people a more logical Gospel.To preach to the millions of the Orient that God foreordainedthem to ignorance of the true religion, and condemnedall the generations of their forefathers, on accountR5015 : page 137of that ignorance, to an eternity of torture is notlogical, not loving, not just--not Gospel at all, when weremember that the word Gospel means "good-tidings ofgreat joy which shall be to all people." The Missionswould be much more successful in reaching the hearts ofthose they would serve if they presented the Gospel ofGod's loving provision of Messiah's coming Kingdom.Although the doctrine of the Trinity corresponds considerablywith the teachings of the Hindu religion, it is,nevertheless, difficult for those of other religions to fullyaccept it. They cannot understand the matter of threeGods in one person, as some put it; or three persons in oneGod, as others put it. There is a simplicity and honestyabout these people that is commendable, and which refusesto confess that which they do not understand. Themessage of Messiah's coming Kingdom, in which God'swill shall be done on earth, even as it is done in heaven,would, we believe, appeal to large and increasing numbersof Orientals.VI.--"What hope is there for the conversion of theworld during the present generation, through the Laymen'sForeign Missionary Movement, with their proposedthirty million dollars?"Answer.--No one who knows anything of Orientalconditions would have the least expectation of the world's