Larger Things Ahead

It would indeed be a tragic mistake to think that our work of organization is finished. Church order is a matter of growth, and if a living organism ceases to grow it dies. The Bible ideal enlarged and explained by the Testimonies is that to every single church member a definite task is given. The Savior’s word, “to every man his work” (Mark 13:34), was explained by Paul to mean that “as the Lord has called every one, so let him walk. And so ordain I in all churches.” 1 Corinthians 7:17. The present organization of the remnant church is possibly the most perfect and effective of any today, but it has not reached that complete ideal of the Lord—there is yet much to be done and new plans to be devised before all members of the advent movement will be fully enlisted for the service of Christ. Our mission activities have taken form as departments. Some of these, such as the Sabbath School and Religious Liberty, have educational and spiritual work. Three departments—the Publishing, Educational, and Medical have much to do in the building and supervision of institutions, as well as other work. All this is fully set forth and applied in the Spirit of prophecy books.FSG 367.3

After World War 1, came a great reconstruction of our publishing work. Before the war we had but a few publishing centers in Europe. It was first thought that the publishing house in Oslo should print for Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and Finland. But that plan was soon given up. The Hamburg house, however, was printing for many countries, producing literature in twenty-three languages. After the war, that was found to be impossible. The General Conference sent H. H. Hall to make a thorough survey of the entire field, and it was agreed to establish new publishing concerns at Melun, France; Budapest, Hungary; Novi Sad, Yugoslavia; Bucharest, Rumania; Brunn, Czechoslovakia; Warsaw, Poland; Kaunas, Lithuania; Reval, Estonia; Florence, Italy; Sofia, Bulgaria; Salonika, Greece; El Matariya, Egypt; and other places. It was further planned to strengthen our publishing work in Finland, Latvia, Spain, Sweden, Norway, and to build a larger and stronger house in England.FSG 368.1

Elder Hall brought us two important principles, explained fully in the Lord’s messages. The first was that every publishing house should pay tithe and further give of its earnings, not to conference work or schools, but to help establish or sustain new or small houses—the earnings made by printing literature should be used in printing more literature. This met opposition at first; but, reading from the Testimonies and speaking from experience, he won out; and the small new houses who claimed they never could follow that plan found they were greatly blessed in so doing. This made the publishing work a real missionary enterprise.FSG 369.1

The second principle laid down was that every country should have literature printed in its own language within its own borders. In response to this the large publishing house in Hamburg generously gave over to the Adventist Church in every land all rights to print, and even donated to each country the stock of reading matter on hand in that language. As they had been printing, sometimes at a loss, in twenty three languages, they had an immense stock on hand, and this was a marvelous help. The literature given by the German believers amounted to over $100,000. The reason for this second principle is easy to see. The people in Finland or Italy, for instance, as well as those in other lands of education and culture, wanted books and papers in good Finnish or Italian, which could only be produced right at home, rather than something that came from abroad and had a foreign flavor. We found this to be especially important in Latin and Catholic nations. Many people harbor a certain dislike or even suspicion concerning literature from another land. They love books printed at home.FSG 369.2

The large-hearted and spiritual instructions concerning our publishing mission in the Spirit of prophecy contain precious light for us today when we have a second and even greater work of rehabilitation on. There is, in fact, one marked characteristic of the Lord’s messages that is outstanding—and for us human beings difficult to understand and follow. It is the constant appeal for broader plans and larger things. We are urged to get more land for our schools, and have seldom bought enough, never too much. We see this divine ideal of “more and bigger” plans most clearly in the instruction given for our publishing plans. It has been a conflict between human plans and divine. In the seventies we had one publishing house in Battle Creek, Michigan. Our men there thought one was enough and the cheapest for the United States. The servant of the Lord said God wanted another house on the West Coast. In spite of really heavy opposition, we got the Pacific Press, and it has prospered so that it is now our largest house.FSG 369.3

Later on, with two good publishing centers in America, light came that there should be another one started in the Southern States. Many saw no reason for that. The house did have a hard time at first, and a few, weak in faith wanted to close it up. The Lord, however, gave us a clear message to the contrary. Today the Southern house in Nashville is large and prosperous. We could repeat many such instances from overseas. And there are still mightier plans and activities on the road of the future. Men have wanted smaller books and cheaper; the Lord pleads for larger books, well illustrated, and more expensive.FSG 370.1

It is distinctly taught by the Spirit of prophecy that the “loud cry” and the final world-wide finishing of the advent movement will to a larger extent than many have realized be the fruitage of our truth-filled literature. More books are to be translated. New books are to be written. Larger canvassing campaigns are to be initiated. Many of our brightest businessmen are to devote themselves to the colporteur work. In Moscow many years ago when I was saying good-by to that strong and godly leader, H. J. Lobsack, at the railway station, he said, “Tell the General Conference as a message from me, ‘Print and circulate more literature.’ Then in a louder voice he urged, “Print and circulate more books.” And as the train pulled out, he almost shouted, “Remember, print and circulate more books and papers while you have freedom to do so!” Then in Hamburg in the fall of 1946, A. Vollmer, manager of our publishing house there, who believes in strong promotion and large sales, sent this greeting to Adventists everywhere: “Let us make our publishing work in all lands less commercial and more missionary.” Today the Lord calls for the broadest publishing plans that the remnant church has ever known. Our goal is to bring every single individual on earth some Adventist reading matter in his own language.FSG 370.2