“AND YE SHALL KNOW iTHE TRUTH,; AND THE TRU'm4®KALL MAKE YOU FREE.”—John viii, 32.
*•**'
>fep f- f 4 ‘1
VOL. XLVffl.
? . -.
1 CHARLOTTE, N. C„F$BRUARY 25, 1926.
NO. 3,
HOW CAN OUR CHURCHES AND PASTORS CO
OPERATE IN S. S. EXTENSION WORK j
By Rev. H. M. Scott.
(Paper read at the Annual Workers’ Conference, held at Brain-'
erd Institute, Chester, South Carolina.)
The question for discussion
this morning is one of vital im
portance to our churches, pas
tors and Sunday schools. To do
effective work the church must
work with the pastor and the
pastor with the church, the
-church with the Sunday school;
and the pastor, church and Sun
day school must unite to extend
of God to the ut
of the world,
pting to answer
the major question, there are
two other-questions which lead
tij) to the " question under dis
cussion. First, what is Sunday
school extension work? Second,
why needed ?
''"The extension work of the
Sunday School,” says Mr. Cope,
in his book entitled, “Efficiency
in the Sunday School,” “is con
cerned with two ' matters;—
reaching those who cannot get
to its regular gatherings, and
ministering to that part of the
lives of all neglected by its reg
ular sessions.” Under this exten
sion Work we would include the
Cradle Roll and Home Depart
ment.
The second question is, why
needed? It is not only the morhl
obligation of the church to reach
beyond its own doors and teach
others about the love of Jesus,
but because Jesus commands it.
Too long has the church been
satisfied to administer to % few
while thousands are being neg
Hjs.
gottfenlffie"command of the
iour to Peter, “Feed my lambs,”
ahd to all of His disciples, “Go
ye into all the world and preach
my gospel to every creature.”
Just a few weeks ago I read
these startling facts in The
Christian Herald: “There _ are
more than fifty million nominal
ly Protestant Americans who
are not identified with any
church. Of forty-three million
Protestant or unclassified Amer
icans under 25 years of age, 27
ipillion are without religious in
asoift jo uohiiui 8 • uoijorujs
under; 10 years of age. Seven out
of ten young people under 25—
Jewish, Catholic and Protestant
—are virtually untouched by the
direct influence of any church.
The Jews provide for their
children 335 hours of instruc
tion annually, the Catholic
Church provides 200 hours, but
the Protestant Sunday school
provides a scanty 50 hour course
with an average attendance of
less than 50 per cent. Instruc
tion in mathematics offered in
elementary and high schools,
1,067 hours, is equivalent in
point of time to 41 years of
Sunday School instruction. The
state requires for the adequate
instruction Of its young in En
glish alone, 93,500 minutes, and
/ for their instruction in mathe
matics 128,000 minutes, while
I the Church has been satisfied
I with 1,000 minutes per year for
the instruction of her young in
spiritual things. The next ques
tion then follows: ’‘How can our
churches and pastors cooperate
in Sunday school extension
work?” Schools are to be judged
by their pupils, their work; hos
pitals are to be judged by healed
patients, their work ; and indus
try is to be judged by its pro
duct, says Mr. Henry Ford. So
^ in a large measure the Church
is to be judged by its mission
\ ary activities.
. Out churches and pastors can
cooperate by giving a larger
place; on their program for Sun
day school extension work. No
organisation can function well
without ibme kind of a program.
The success of that organization
depends not upon the amount of
machinery put together, but
hpw well that machinery, is ar
ranged. On our church program
the extension work of the Sum
day school can be made more
effective if more interest is man
ifested on the part of the pas
tors. A number of our church
es are concerned neither with
the magnitude of the modern
missionary enterprise, nor with
the extent to which it has
gripped the imagination and
commanded the loyalty of the
most discerning and devoted
spirits in the Church’s member
ship. Give to the extension
work of the Sunday school a
larger place on your program
and there will be a great ingath
ering into the kingdom of God.
The extension part of the pro
gram should be full, systemat
ically planned, and practical. We
have already too many half-!
baked programs. A full pro
gram means that every talent is
put to use, Harness your young
talent and give it its proper
place on the program. Too often
we have allowed our young tal
ent to be buried. One of the
mam features of ,the “Three
Hour a Week Church School” is
the urgency of giving a more
adequate religious education to
a larger number Of children and
youth than the average church
has reached by its long estab
lished agencies. Organize our
young people into groups that
they may take to the communi
ty the gospel in song and sto
ry. The Yeung People’^ Service
Program gives many suggestions
about this phase" of *the Work.
The chain luoa
BertampTar^tu^entine quar
ters need the spiritual nourish
ment of the energetic pastor.
Magnify the Cradle Roll and
Home Department and let the
church do her part in adminis
tering to them.
From the pulpit many a ser
mon can be preached by the pas
tor on the importance of the ex
tension work. Often the entire
evening’s service can be given
to the young people to have a
missionary play, bringing to the
public some definite object of
missionary activity. Let the
whole congregation be presesd
into service, using its church
building and its teachers for
bringing the children from the
hedges and highways. When
every church gets down to this
work in earnest and from the
most unselfish motives, there
will still be millions of un
reached boys and girls groping
blindly in spiritual darkness and
unable to get in for lack of room.
Let our program be so compre
hensive and complete that the
extension work of the Sunday
school may have its proper
place.
uur cnurcnes aiiu pasturs can
cooperate through the printed
pages. We have often heard
said, “It pays to advertise.” It
would be well for the churches
to put on an advertising cam
paign to the extent that the
world would know that they are
on business for the King. Let
other Churches know of the ex
tension work of the Sunday
school to the end that they
might catch the inspiration and
do something. The Home De
partment will live if a regular
correspondence is kept up
through the pastor. Those shut
ins who know little of the out
side world save through the
printed pages are made glad
when they read of their home
work. A letter from the church
to that mother whose baby lies
nestled in her arms brings hap
piness to that home. Families
destitute of religious literature
are made glad when they read
about what the churches are say
ing of them. That missionary
who often labors under adverse
circumstances gains inspiration
when he gets a letter from the
church and pastor, saying, “We
are with you/' A monthly letter
from the church mid pastor to
some mission school, encourag-?
ing the superintendent and
teachers in their fight against
ignorance, crime and supersti
tion brings joy and causes thebr,
faith to increase so that their
will “mount up with wings *&
eagles, run and not be weary,
'walk.ttnd not faint.”
Our churches and pastors can
also cooperate through the pub®
lie school teachers. Recently tne
Board sent out a little book,
entitled, “Teachers’ Manual for
Week-Day Bible Lessons,” com
piled by one who now sits on the
platform, in the person of our
friend and brother, Mr. JVM*,
Somerndike. If every pa$fco$
would get a copy of this book
and place it in the hands of
some public school teacher with
his compliments, it would be a
new day in the life of that
teacher. She or he who shapes
the lives of many girls and boys
will be greatly blessed, because)
often the majority of the chil
dren attending public school is
not enrolled in any Sunday
school.
In a small town in Florida re
cently the pastors and publi
school teachers took a religious
census of the children and this
was their finding: There were
221 children enrolled in the
public school and all the church
es together had only 80 enrolled
in the Sunday schools. So you
see in this particular town about'
two-thifds c*f the children were;
not enrolled in any Sunday
school. take tig
time we wouldnnd hundreds of
other small towns with similar?
conditions existing. I had anr
other occasion to visit a number'
of public schools and found ill
most cases that the children bad
little or no knowledge .of the Bi
ed at each school visited and
girls and boys who were in the
3rd, 4th arid 5th grades could
not name the books of the Bi
ble. What an opportunity for
our churches and pastors!
Finally, our churches and pas,
tors can cooperate by giving
more time, money and personal
service. In this age of rapid
transportation it' is an easy mat
ter for the church and pastor
to hold special meetings, 10, 15,
or 25 miles from the church on
Sunday afternoons. Every
Presbyterian church • ought to
have two or more mission
schools under its care which
the pastor, elder, or some other
responsible person could visit
each Sunday afternoon and con
duct a Bible lesson, hold Bi
ble classes through the week;
arrange for a D. V. B. S.; have
social gatherings with super
vised games; and teach those
boys and girls how to develop
themselves, mentally, physical
ly, morally and spiritually. Who
knows but that some girl or boy
may come from out of those
back woods and build for her
self or himself a living monu
ment in the hearts of mankind ?
Our money, also, plays a vital
part in the extension work of
the Sunday school. The budget
of our churches ought always to
include the extension work. It
is true that we give meagerly,
through the Boards for exten
sion work, but locally we should
do even more. Let our churches
equip some mission Sunday
school with song books and Bi
bles. Supply them with quarter
lies; erect a small building at
some lumber mill, turpentine
still, and dedicate it to God for
service. The finance of our
church schools should be includ
ed in the budget and let the
church school’s finance be used
for some missionary activity in
the community. Truly, “a lib
eral soul shall be made fat, and
he that watereth shall himself
also be watered.”
In the study of descriptive
botany, we have two kinds of
flower clusters classifined as
centripetal and centrifugal. The
centripetal is a cluster of which
the lower and outer flower opens
first; or from the outside in.
The centrifugal is a cluster of
which the central flower opens
it, or from the inside out. So
is with a large number of our
churches. Some of them are
trifugal, living more and
while others are eentri
tal, dying daily. Let us think
>f our churches in their relation
ar the extension work of the
Sunday school in terms of the
centrifugal, as centers from
nrhich life and life-giving pow
sr must radiate into all lives
md into all places.
Have you done your best to:
(1) Give a larger place on
rour program for the extension
york of the Sunday school?
r (2) Cooperate through the
urinted pages to extend glad
wings to all?
| (3) Cooptrati with the pub*
ic school teachers in shaping
fee destiny of some boy or girl?
(4) Cooperate more liberally
irith your time, money and per
sonal service ?
' Let us do our best and God
iimself will crown our efforts
vith His rich Benediction,
T’S THE NEW NE
GRO?
(From Christian Recorder)
Every now and then we hear
ime one talk about “The New
«gro.”
Undoubtedly there 1® a “New
sfito”—in the making, If not
actuality. What is he? What
? Rather let us ask first
Was the old Negro? The
d Negro was a slave, depend
flt upon the white people for
I® food and his thinking. Be
iase he was a slave and depen
sat for his food and thinking,
s occupations and hi® educa»
ere limited tojhe_white
When Abraham Lincoln is
sued the Emancipation Procla
mation, he made possible a New
Negro—a free Negro. But free
dom was not entirely new to the
Negro as there were in 1860
some half a million free Ne
groes.
To our way of thinking the
New Negro, if there is such, is
a free Negro, dependent upon
himself for his food and think"
ing—a New Negro has the ideal
of a spiritually and economical
ly independent group working in
harmony with and being a part
of the larger American group,
who has thrown off the slave
spirit.
The New Negro is possessed
of a new spirit.
As Bishop Ransom said in his
recent speech here the thing
which oppresses the Negro is
the spirit of slavery in the Ne
gro and not the white people.
And what the Negro needs is a
new spirit of freedom, of man
hood, of independence. Now get
ting a diploma from some uni
versity does not necessarily give
one a new spirit. We know
many conceited Negroes who
have been so puffed up by
a diploma that they think they
are better than all other Ne
groes, and their chief grievance
seems to be that the white peo
ple won’t accept them as social
equals. They don’t care a rap
about the race, and are sorry
they are identified with it.
Nearly every large commun
ity has a few of these. Their
spirit is the same old spirit of
slavery where the house maid
thought she was better than all
’other Negroes and despised them
and where the mulatto concu
bine’s only regret was that she
was not white.
Again there are Negroes who
seek to impress white people to
get donations from them for the
great work of “uplift” they are
accomplishing among their
“down trodden race.” And ev
ery move they make is to keep
in the good graces of and on the
payroll of some rich white peo
ple. These parasites are not
“New Negroes.” They are a
new edition of the old time slave
Negro.
What is the New Negro? The
New Negro is a Negro who be
lieves in himself as a child of
men and
it he can
iood by
has been
self-sap
family;
elation
do this
neces
but to
from a
he can;
ha
God, a brother to
who is striving as
to realize that bro
doing his part—he
born again and no
the spirit of slavery.
1st. He believes
port—he supports
and helps to build a
for racial self-support,
he believes it is not
sary to talk “race p
act it. Hence he buy
Negro grocer where
he goes to a Negro ch . ...
puts his money in a Negro bank;
he has insurance in a Npgro in
surance company; he aka race
pride. Now this Negro may not
be an “A. B.” from t*le or
Princeton or Columbia, hut he
is new. And only by thtt kind
will the Negro ever come Id self
support and gain a place
sun. Talk won’t do the \ ..
2, The New Negro is4a pi
oneer for his people. The old NO
gro looks for sure support, He
has the spirit of the slave. He
may boast of his high educa
tion, but he is not taking any
chances of making a
That’s the old slave Negro,
the New Negro launches o
to business. (He may fail
the “old” Negro may laugf al
him.) The Now Negro encour
ages the pioneer in other lines
He is willing to “take a chance”
to build for the future, the
splendid businesses we have,
built' up largely by quiet, deter
mined pioneers, were built by
‘New Negroes.” We like to think
of John Merrick of North Caro
lina as a “New Negro,” Mr<
Merrick would have resented the
term. For the educated^Jegroes
who are doing nothing had ap
propriated it. But while
ikk- ' education,—^
had the new spirit. He was a
pioneer. He saw the possibili
ties of the future; he was will
ing to take the risk. He did so
He succeeded and the wonderful
North Carolina Mutual is the re
sult. He wag supported by New
Negroes, seme of them “educat
ed,” most of them uneducated
but all of them born of the new
spirit.
3. The New Negro thinks
straight. Because he is born of
the new spirit of freedom, he is
determined to have freedom in
all its phases. He is willing to
bear all its responsibilities. He
wants ail of its privileges. He re
fuses to believe Jie is different
from or inferior to any other of
God’s children. But he is not
raising too big a row about it.
He is like a little brother of ten,
who knows he is potentially
equal to his brother of 15 but he
can’t whip him. But he also
knows that if he studies hard,
works and develops himself, the
time will come when he will be
actually equal to the older broth
er in every respect. But he will
not secure that equality by talk,
'but work.
The New Negro believes in
God. He may be gradually
changing his theology. It is,
perhaps, wise that he should.
But he believes in God. A hun
dred years ago a New Negro
walked out of St. George’s
churcn in Philadelphia and pre
ferred to worship in an old
blacksmith shop which was
bougnt by black people than in
a fine house for which he did
not pay. He believed that self
support is of God. A hundred
years have passed and the in
fluence of Richard Allen still
persists. He did not yield one
inch. He believed that God
was the Father of all and all
are equally his children. This
meant equality of privilege and
equality of responsibility. And
this Church has attracted more
“New” Negroes than any
Church supported from the
charity of white people.
The New Negro has a new
spirit, not necessarily a diplo
ma, a white collar, 1 a salary
from charity organizations—he
believes in God and himself and
his future and’ is hard at work.
Charles Schwab says the way
to be happy is to work.
»-=
TO BE CELEBRATED EVER.
YEAR THE SECOND WEEK
m FEBRUARY.
An Appeal in Favor of that
Class of People Called Negroes
—$20,000 Annually Repaired
to Publish the Whole Truth.
A call to rally to the support
of the Association for the Stu
dy Of Negro Life uni History to
inculcate a higher appreciation
of the Negro’s contribution to
Civilization and thereby to se
cure for him the recognition be
longing to all men.
This in the outgrowth of the
celebration of Negro History
Week. This movement met with
a favorable response throughout
the country. The Negroes
seized upon the idea as a thing
for which they had long bean
waiting, and a considerable
number of the white race man
ifested similar interest, dubs,
fraternities, , schools, and
churches made extensive prep
aration and carried out their
programs With unusual success.
The favorable comment by ’the
leading white and Negro news
papers decidedly stimulated the
movement and presented . the
cause to the public as it
never been before.
*-■ Three definite needs
Negro group were at:
brought out during this
bration. Social workers
ucators are almost unanimous in
urging the following: first, that
there should be prepared a se
ries of historical stones
text books depicting the
egro
and the influence of
in the history of Jgjfis country;
second, that boardVd education
should be induced to adopt cer
tain of these books as optional
texts and supplementary works
in public schools; and third,
that schools and libraries
throughout the country should
be provided with an adequate
number of reference books pre
senting the various aspects of
Negro life and history. ...
To carry out such a program
requires money. The Associa
tion has already spent thous
and of dollars promoting the
celebration of Negro History
Week, and it has not charged
one penny for the service ren
dered. The Association felt
that the first thing to do is to
get the people of the country in
they will support the thing in
which they believe. To a great
er extent than ever before this
very thing has been done. To
carry out this program and
make this celebration in the fu
ture what it ought to be by giv
ing tne work sufficient stimulus
throughout the year, however,
the Association must have an
additional $zu,uou
The present income of the As
sociation is decidedly sipall. . It
receives between $15,000. and
$20,000 a year and it does the
work of a learned society spend
ing $45,000 or $50,000. What, it
has done has been accomplished
by virtue of the fact that the
seven persons whom it has, em
ployed in the prosecution of this
work have been overworked and
underpaid. The Director, has
hardly been paid at all. For the
first five years he practically
nanced the movement himself *
and during recent years he has
sometimes found it necessary. M
contribute to the work what .it
is supposed to pay him. .
To finance this movement the
Association needs $20,000. This
has been apportioned according
to the Negro population and
general interest so far expressed
in the work of the Association.
Each State is asked to contri
bute the amounts indicated be
low:
Alabama_; $600.00
Arkansas — --.500,00
California.400.00
Colorado 280.00
Connecticut -w.w < 500.00
(Continued oh page 8) -(