July 1905

“Editorial. Preparation for Service” The Medical Missionary 14, 7.

EJW

E. J. Waggoner

There are many people who have been deterred from taking a new course by the thought that in view of the shortness of time they could not allow to take so much time from their work and spend it in preparing to work. Within the past year the writer has talked with several who were strongly inclined live or ten years ago to take the medical missionary training, and who were influenced to decide against it by the consideration just mentioned. If they had followed their convictions they might now be occupying a large field of usefulness, whereas, although they are by no means idle, they labor continually under a sense of being hampered, and of regret at having missed an opportunity. They would like to begin a course of study now, but are kept back by the same thought that held them back before. They feel as though such a course would be equivalent to saying, “My Lord delayeth his coming.” To those who are thus troubled we wish to address a few words.MEDM July 1905, page 213.1

The coming of the Lord is certainly nearer than it was five or ten years ago; but that fact should not hinder anybody from taking a medical course, who conscientiously feels that with such a training he could serve God better. Why repeat the same mistake that you made before? You feel that each follower of Christ has something to do toward hastening his coming; is it reasonable to suppose that his coming will be hastened by your failure to make the preparation necessary to enable you to perform your part in that work? To run without a message, or to engage in work without proper preparation for it, may indicate abundance of zeal, but the zeal is evidently not wisely directed. What would you think of soldiers so eager to engage in a battle that they rushed in without any weapons?MEDM July 1905, page 213.2

The great mistake lies in the seeming supposition that time spent in preparation for the work is in a sense wasted, and that it is just so much taken from the work. Many think that four or five years spent in preparation for possibly no more than a year of work is altogether out of proportion, and too much. But it is not too much, nor out of proportion, if that much time is needed to prepare for the work to which God has called you. God has given “to every man his work;” the duty of every man is to find out what his own particular work is, and then to set about doing it, or to fitting himself for it, if he is not already fitted. With the length of time that you may work after you are fitted for the work, you have nothing to do.MEDM July 1905, page 213.3

No person has ever known that he would have a long life for usefulness, or even that he would live a day, after completing his training; but this has never deterred a wise person from attempting to get an education; and if one dies at the very beginning of his career, his previous work of preparation is not counted as wasted. If one needs a training for work, all the effort put forth without that training is in a measure wasted. It should be remembered that time spent in faithful preparation for more efficient work is counted as put into the work. The farmer pays his man just as much for the time spent in grinding his ax or whetting his scythe as he does for chopping wood or mowing grass. Indeed, he would not count the man’s services as worth anything, and would soon discharge him, if he persisted in trying to chop or mow with a dull tool. Who knows how much the coming of the Lord has already been delayed by the misdirected zeal of those whose faculties have not been sharpened by proper training?MEDM July 1905, page 213.4

Note the time that Jesus spent in obscurity before entering upon what is commonly termed “his ministry.” At twelve years of age he had wisdom and understanding that caused the learned scribes to marvel, yet he spent eighteen years more in quiet preparation for only three years of public work. The salvation of the world was committed to him, and at the age of twelve he was fully conscious of his mission and of the shortness of time yet he did not allow these considerations to hurry him “into the work.” He was in the work all the time. When he said to his mother. “Wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business?” and then immediately returned to his home in Nazareth, he did not neglect what he knew to be his life work. There was no waste of time. We are “saved by his life” at the carpenter’s bench or in the fields just as much as by his life of teaching and preaching and healing. John the Baptist also spent thirty years in training for only half a year’s work.MEDM July 1905, page 214.1

You have no doubt been told by those who speak from experience that there is abundant opportunity for one to do missionary work while pursuing his studies; and the faculty of the American Medical Missionary College are continually endeavoring to impress this truth upon the minds of the students; but aside from this, no student who is doing faithful and wisely directed work in his studies need feel that he is neglecting the work of the Lord. If the Lord should come while he is in the midst of his medical course, he, as well as the qualified medical missionary, would hear from the lips of the Master, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.” E. J.W.MEDM July 1905, page 214.2