ndia today in order to appreciate
what a complicated organism it is. He then will see how it has sent out
its ramifications into all departments of life and of Christian activity.
It has laid its hands, in organized power, upon every department of
Christian work which can be made to contribute to the furtherance of the
cause of Christ in that field. In this way have come into existence the
following departments, which are represented in more or less fullness in
all the missions of India today.

(_a_) The Evangelistic Department.

This, as we have seen, is the oldest as it is the most fundamental, of all
organized missionary activities. And it should retain its prominence in
missionary effort. It was preeminently the method of Christ. He was the
Heavenly Messenger proclaiming that the Kingdom of God was at hand. He was
first of all the great Preacher; "and the people everywhere heard Him
gladly." The missionary of the Cross never feels that he is more directly
in the footsteps of his Master than when he is preaching to the unchurched
and Christless masses. There is to this work a joy and an exhilaration
which are peculiarly its own, even though it is a work fraught with
physical weariness. I have felt, in the prosecution of this work, more
satisfaction than almost in any other. Not that I regard it as the most
successful form of labour. It is not. Even as a direct evangelizing
agency, I believe that it must yield precedence in India to school-work.
The faithful Christian teacher is now a more successful evangelist in that
land than the preacher himself. And yet the preacher reaches and offers
light and gracious opportunity to the more benighted and the more
neglected members of the community. Without making special choice of any
favoured class he sows broadcast the seed, preaches the divine Word,
praying that the Lord himself, who also preached to the common people,
bestow his richest blessing upon the labour which he has done in his name.

This work of preaching Christ to those who know him not, must be carried
on by missionaries and agents. It is usually the custom to expect that
every mission agent shall devote some of his time in visiting neighbouring
villages and in gathering the people together and in presenting to them,
in all simplicity, the message of salvation. Frequently these teachers,
catechists and pastors take with them some of the members of their
congregations to help them, by song and by the in