Guest Editorial: Raphael Thomas

By Dr Raphael Thomas – ABWE's first missionary

"After Fifteen Years"

Fifteen years have passed for the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism, and is now an adolescent. The uniqueness of adolescence is its abundant life and rapid growth. Such life expands as is evidenced by a tree, "and only God can make a tree." In New England, farmers appear to hate elms, the stateliest of trees. When asked why, they answer, "Their roots go everywhere." They sprawl out, penetrate foundations, enter wells, and keep on spreading. That is what the Association of Baptists is doing, and this ever-expanding life is another evidence that this mission is of God and nothing "can prevail against it."

Expansion has been the watchword for Christian missions from the beginning. Early converts "went everywhere preaching the Word" (Acts 8:4). The marching orders of the Great Captain re-echo the Great Commission: "GO into ALL the WORLD and "PREACH the GOSPEL." The Association has obeyed these commands. It has gone out and "preached the Word," for the "Apostolic Method and Message" has been its slogan, with preaching being the method and the Word the message.

Now the Association is exhibiting the most hopeful characteristic of all for healthy youth; it has penetrated richer soil and taken a firm grip for future development. Trees seem uncanny in that way. They ferret out the rich spots. So should missions! It did not seek out these spots; God found them and offered them to the Association. Such evidence of divine watchcare has cheered the little group from the first. It has been led to expand, never forgetting to make the foundations sure by putting evangelism first, establishing Baptist churches, and raising up a native ministry. Already hundreds have graduated from the two schools for preachers in the Philippines. Indigenous churches, self-governing, self-propagating and, in due time, expected to be self-supporting, are being established to hold the gains. Expansion now, in its youth, is promising a sure foundation for its maturity. Like the elm, its towering branches ultimately will crown this early spreading of its root. Just now the root is the most important. EXPANSION is our watchword. "COME OVER - AND HELP US."

Excerpted from the Message, May1943

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