RUSSIA

"To the Jew first and also to the Gentile." The following extract of a letter from a missionary laboring amongst the Jews on the borders of Soviet Russia is a reminder for us all to continue in prayer, not only for Christians, but for the afflicted Jews within the borders of Soviet Russia.

Ostrog. On the borders of Soviet Russia. We decided to obtain permission to visit the frontier, which is about a mile off the town. Convoyed by two gendarmes we were allowed to cross the border, and walked as far as where the red-green pillar with the emblems of the sickle and hammer stood, marking the Soviet frontier. Very near from where we stood we could see the houses and people of Bolshevia. You can hardly imagine the feelings of one who had such varying experiences in a country, now standing on the very soil of that land which treated him with all the severities of a Red Terror, where he had to face death in the dungeon, knowing that there are still dear ones suffering many hardships for the Lord's sake. Our hearts went out to them afresh in love and sympathy, yearning with compassion. Gladly I would have stretched out my hands to our own dear children who, despite all our efforts to rescue them, and all it has cost, are still there. The little ones suffer from all kinds of sickness as a result of starvation. We trust the Lord will answer and deliver them in His own time from the land of terror and death. A little distance off we saw a house demolished by the Bolsheviks as a penalty for the owners, who refused to join the Collective. The poor woman was bound and thrown on a cart; some time ago her husband had been sent off to Siberia for the same reason.

While in Ostrog we visited refugees from South Russia who escaped from the land of slavery. Living near the frontier they took advantage of the harvest-tide, when the wire fence in the border was temporarily removed, to five more space for the turning of the harvest-carts. They furnished a wagon, similar to those used by the Soviet peasants, and twenty-four people, men, women and children, broke through the borders. The soldiers opened fire at once, one was killed, and two badly wounded, but the rest escaped. They have a shocking story to tell about their experiences there. With a heavy heart we left Ostrog, feeling more than ever the burden for more earnest prayer for the poor sufferers for Christ's sake, just beyond that green pillar in Soviet Russia.

We were much struck by the attitude of a Russian priest, the prior of the monastery in Ostrog, to Christ, the Word of God and the Jews. He told us that he loves the Jews for Christ's sake, who is the Messiah of Israel, and who gave him salvation through Israel.

SOUTH AMERICA

Brother Monttlau writes as follows:

On November 2nd, eleven years ago, we were sailing towards Puntaremas, Costa Rica, with ten children, the oldest eleven years, and the youngest one year old. We landed at Puntaremas on Nov. 16th, 1920, and twelve days later our baby Samuel was born. Among the seven souls baptized a few days ago, there were our two last boys, Daniel and Samuel, who gave a public testimony of their faith in the Lord Jesus before a crowded hall. We wish you to join us in praise to our gracious Lord in this joyful eleventh anniversary. Now it is our privilege to seat all eleven around the Lord's table with a few more added to us, every first day of the week. We praise Him for His grace during eleven years, seven in Costa Rica, two in Spain and the last two here.

We take this opportunity to thank our dear brethren and sisters in the States, Canada, New Zealand, etc., who have shown their Christian love and fellowship in our pilgrimage, wishing you the Lord's richest blessings for 1932, should He tarry.

AFRICA

We are glad to print the following encouraging letters from brother Robert Deans and Gordon Searle:

Dear brother:Lolua, Oct. 18th, 1931.

We all had a fine season of blessing at our conference at Mambasa at the end of September when we worked into the Word, having the First Epistle of Thessalonians before us. We do pray that its profiting may appear to all, for what is the gain of Bible study if the soul is not exercised thereby? The thought of that Blessed Man having redeemed us, and then never satisfied until all the company of the redeemed be with Him filled our souls with holy joy at such condescending love. Praise God, it is a blessed thing to know Christ.

Our building is going on slowly here, but knowing that the things we look upon are only temporal, we can afford to build slowly. He might come for us in the midst of it all.

We have very much to encourage as the people are exceedingly interested and come long distances to hear the gospel.

At the close of our services today, after the meeting was dismissed, three grown-ups accepted Christ Jesus. Yes, we rejoice, beloved brethren, for out of the midst of this gross darkness the people see a light that is Christ; and the gospel is presented in all faithfulness so that, Ezra-fashion, they are made to understand the meaning, and even when they say they have taken Christ as their Saviour we question them individually to be sure they know what they’re talking about.

Our school is in full swing just now, and as the story of the Cross is daily given, we have great hopes, should the Lord be pleased to tarry, of reaching hundreds with this glorious emancipating truth.

We are glad to say they all show an eagerness to learn to read, so that they may understand "Kitabuya Hunger," namely, "The Book of God."

We have one hundred at our daily school, with many more coming in. Their ages range from five to forty. There were one hundred and forty at the services today, which is encouraging.

We are all praying for the saints at home in their trying hour of depression, that our Lord will intervene on their behalf.
We all send our love to all the saints and thank them for their continued remembrance of this work in the Lord. Dr. Woodhams and family, and Miss DeJonge and Miss Creighton, are all well. So are our brother and sister Searle and their families. Love in the Lord to all,

Robert Deans.

From Gordon Searle:

At the end of September we all met together for conference, fellowship, and Bible study at Mambasa, and spent the week-end and Monday very profitably in the study of 1st Thessalonians. We hope to meet again, if the Lord will, at the end of December and for the New Year here at Nyangkundi, and will probably study 2nd Thessalonians together.

Our brother Bill Deans is not teaching further at Nyangkundi, feeling incapacitated by his rheumatism, so that he is now staying at Mambasa under Dr. Woodhams' care, -and will probably be with his parents for a time at Lolua. Ella and Bob Deans are resuming their educational studies at Rethi School for missionaries' children.

Our return is not directed for this time, as the Lord has shown us to stay for the present. When He shall have opened the way we may follow. There is much work for Him here, which may not be left alone.

We would call attention at this time to the pressing need of a furlough for brother Searle and family and hope it may be possible for them to leave Africa this coming spring, should the Lord tarry.

INDIAN WORK

Inasmuch as for years work has gone on in Arizona and New Mexico with little apparent result and blessing, we are now glad to report encouraging news from our brother J. P. Anderson, of Valentine, Arizona, who writes:

Have had much encouragement in the work here of late, and good interest at our out-station at Peach Springs. We go there every other Lord's Day to remember Him in the breaking of bread, and find a good many coming in to look on as well as some old Indians who have confessed the Lord and are in fellowship. They can't read or write, but love Him, and are undergoing some severe trials and tests from their own people. The Lord has sustained them in it all.

We are looking for our brother Steeple in a few days, who is on his way to the San Diego Conference. We have arranged several meetings for him, and expect a great deal of interest from the Indians because he is a blind preacher, and a large number of these Indians are blind, and a great number of them have gone blind since we have been here, which is a most pathetic thing. This particular tribe is diminishing, while some other tribes are increasing rapidly. The Walapai tribe is considered one of the hardest tribes to work with, but the Lord is able to save unto the utmost, and we are thankful for that."

And in another letter Mr. Anderson says:
One old Indian man who was saved last summer is to be the speaker to-night, giving his testimony in that crowded chapel, and oh, I know it will stir our hearts, for he has had to suffer much for the Lord since coming out of heathenism, and so has his wife. But it means much to us to have these older Indians break away from the old life, and it's a big break too. Again we thank you all in His Name.

HARBOR WORK IN NEW YORK

"Blessed are ye that sow beside all waters."

Our brother Ralph West has been enabled to continue in this service for the Lord during the whole of 1931. While it is impossible to give an account of all ships visited and amount of literature distributed, our brother reports that this field is so great that it would require several workers to fully cover it. As a general rule the work is much in the nature of seed-sowing, but from time to time our brother has been much encouraged and cheered by seeing definite results of his labor. We are reminded of the word in Ecclesiastes which says, "Cast thy bread upon the waters, for thou shalt find it after many days." We pray that this may be so in connection with the work carried on at our great seaports.

Mrs. W. P. Knight, Luan, Shansi, writes in Young China:

A little while ago two little twins were born in the Hospital here, a boy and a girl. Now, it is very lucky to have two boys, and somewhat satisfactory to have two girls, but to have one of each sex is unlucky indeed, and the mother was very displeased. She did not want one baby, let alone two!

She had made no provision in the way of clothing and, when the time came for the twins to go home, the question as to what they were to wear became important. The mother was not perturbed; she produced a warm pair of trousers and popped the boy into one leg and the girl into the other, then she turned the top over like a coverlet, and what more could you wish? Wouldn't you like to have had a photograph of those two little heads peeping out?

There have been many patients who have shown great interest in the Gospel during the last few months. One, blind through cataract, recovered a fair degree of sight, and after her return home, sent another in similar case up to us telling her, "The hospital is good, the people are good, and their Jesus is good; so you go up for treatment!"

Another blind woman of seventy was very interested in all she heard. As she could not read I used to have her memorize, using her fingers to help her. In this way I taught her, among other things, the main points of Revelation 21:4.

I found her crying quietly one day. She told me that the doctor had told her he could do nothing for her eyes and she felt she had wasted the ten days' expenses. I asked her if she had received any good through coming. "Oh, yes," she said, "I have heard about Jesus, the Saviour."

I asked her to tell me the five points about heaven, and she repeated, "No death, no mourning, no crying, no pain, no tears." Her old face lighted up; she wiped away her last tears and said. "There won't be any of these there!"

Pray for her. She has gone back to a village where there is no Christian to help her. The children have evidently been in the habit of frightening her by saying, "There comes a big snake"-or it might be a dog, or something else. She took great comfort in Isaiah 41:10. Notice how it lends itself to five-finger exercise! It all appealed to her from the "Fear thou not" at the beginning to the "upholding hand" at the end.

A missionary laboring in the Island of Haiti describes the fearful superstition in which the mass of the people there are still enslaved. What an incentive to prayer such things should be!

The uneducated peasants who constitute seventy-five per cent of the population of the Republic of Haiti are voodoo worshipers, they live in constant dread of the spirits of their ancestors. For the worship of these spirits the Haitians build private or family temples, and public temples called "Houmforts." There are also sacred trees under the shadow of which sacrifices are offered with the object of appeasing the spirits. The voodoo Priests are called "Papa Loi," and "Mama Loi." On the altars in the temples may be seen a human skull, a wooden cross, a. model of a serpent, and sacrificial offerings of food and of drink. The sacred serpent is called "Dambala Oveddo." The family temples are small houses built in the compounds of the homesteads, these temples are furnished with a bed, a table, and a chair, for the unique use of the spirits which are supposed to visit the "Houmforts" at night. The walls of the temples are decorated with plaster images and colored pictures of the saints of the Roman Catholic Church! When the ancestral spirits have shown their displeasure by bringing accident, sickness, or death, on any member of the family, they must be appeased by the sacrifices of one or more white-cock fowls, goats, pigs, or bulls. After the sacrifice, some of the cooked food must be deposited on a plate, and bottles of wine, rum, or Kola, must be placed on the table in the temple, for the use of the spirits. The worship in the public "Houmforts" has a much more elaborate ritual attached to it. The "Papa Loi" is robed, three tom-toms of different size and tone are used, the sacrificial bull is brought in garlanded, and with lighted candles tied to its horns. While the worshipers are drinking rum, chanting and clapping their hands in unison with the drumming of the tom-toms, the white-robed and turbaned medium indicates the kind of animal demanded for the sacrifice by the evil spirits, which may be any domesticated animal, or even a human sacrifice, a child! In the latter instance, as human sacrifices are now illegal, the worshipers usually ask to be excused by chanting in unison, as follows:-

"Please excuse us,

If you ask for a goat we will give it to you If you ask for a bull, we will give it to you But if you ask for a goat without horns (meaning a human sacrifice) from where will we take one to give you?" -(Translated from the Haitian patois.)

At this juncture the medium proposes the substitution of a goat in the place of a child, which is carried out as follows:A young girl is placed "on all-fours" in front of the altar, facing a goat, the worshipers continue to chant in unison, until the spirit of the girl is supposed to have passed into the goat, and the spirit of the goat into the girl, which is indicated by the girl bleating like a goat, and nibbling the leaves of a sacred twig held between the head of the goat and that of the girl! At this psychological moment, the "Papa Loi" cuts the throat of the goat, "Maitresse Ezilie" catches the blood in a vessel, makes the girl drink of it, the priest sprinkles the worshipers with the blood, drinks some himself and passes the rest round to be drunk by all present, The goat is roasted and eaten. Further sacrifices are offered, the hot blood is drunk, more rum is imbibed, and the dance is kept up all night in a clearing in the forest near by.