N.R. Dower: I am sure your heart thrills as does mine at the opportunity that is  ours this evening of listening to a report from the great China Division;  and I think of no more fitting scripture with which to open this service than the words of the prophet Isaiah in the forty-ninth chapter, verses 12 and 13: “Behold, these shall come from far: and, lo, these from the north and from the west; and these from the land of Sinim.  Sing, O heavens; and be joyful, O earth; and break forth into singing, O mountains: for the Lord hath comforted his people, and will have mercy upon his afflicted.”  It is a pleasure to introduce N.F.Brewer, secretary of the China Division, who will have charge of the program for this evening.  Elder Brewer.

N.F. Brewer: Thank you, Brother Dower.  The China Division delegates and workers welcome you all to this meeting.  We are glad to have on the platform with us our first missionary sent to China by the General Conference.  I will him to stand-J. N. Anderson.  He arrived in Hong Kong February 2, 1902.  We do not have time to introduce all these people here tonight, but there are a few that we will introduce.  I would like to ask the group here, how many have served forty years or more in China? Will you please stand?  Three have served forty years or more.  I would like to ask, how many have served thirty years or more? Will you stand? Eight have served thirty years or more.  I would like to ask, how many have served twenty years or more? Will you please stand? Well, we have some very fine workers who have stayed by the work a good long while.  The total years of service represented by the workers on the platform are approximately sixteen hundred years.  I would like to introduce to you, also, R.H.Adair, who has served as the treasurer of our division for the past two years.  We are very glad to have on the platform with us a former president of the China Division – our beloved Professor Griggs.  He will announce the opening song.  After the song Wang Fu Yuan, the president of the Northwest China Union Mission, will offer the prayer in Chinese.  Brother Wang has been a worker in this cause for twenty-seven years.

F. Griggs:  We will sing No.185, “In a Little while We’re Going Home.”  Thank God for that.

Prayer:  Wang Fu Yuan.

N. F. Brewer:  I am glad that we serve a God who can understand all languages, aren’t you? C. H. Davis, the president of the South China Island Union Mission, will announce the special music.  Elder Davis has spent thirty-five years in China.

C. H. Davis:  We wish to thank the General Conference for sending to our division a singing evangelist.  Henry Meissner, who has been with us for two years, has with Fordyce Detamore, conducted four large evangelistic efforts in shanghai and in the territory of Hong Kong. He is going to sing for us tonight. The song that he has chosen is entitled “Because His Name Is Jesus.”

HENRY MEISSNER: (Violinist and vocalist.)

N.F. BREWER:  W. H. Branson needs no introduction to this audience.  He has served as the president of the China Division for the past four years.  We have sincerely appreciated his strong, spiritual leadership during these most difficult years.  He will report in part for the China Division tonight.  You may not at first recognize him when he comes in, for he is in Chinese dress.

Native Workers Bring Greetings

W. H. BRANSON:  Just before I begin to render a short report, I want to ask a few our Chinese brethren who are here to come and give you just a word of greeting from our believers and membership in China.  Pastor Wang who offered prayer, is the first one whom I will call.  He is president of our North-west China Union, far into the interior of China.  Brother Wang will give you a word of greeting in English, for he can speak English as well as Chinese.

WANG FU YUAN:  This is my first trip to America.  I am very happy to be here and to see the progress of the work in your great country.  Tonight I want to represent our nineteen hundred Adventist believes in the Northwest China Union Mission and bring you greetings.

W. H. BRANSON:  Thank You Brother Wang.  Now T.R. Shen, who is president of the Central Union Mission.

T. R. SHEN:  Dear friends, tonight may I bring you greetings from our brethren and sisters in the Central China Union.  They thank you for your liberal donation in the past.

W. H. BRANSON:  Thank You, Brother Shen.  Now, we are going to call for Dr. Paul Lee, who is one of the men who stood during the war years as head of our sanitariums in China.  Dr. Lee has just come to us now from the shanghai Sanitarium.  He followed Dr. Miller as the superintendent of that institution.

DR. PAUL LEE:  With great pleasure I am bringing you the happiest greetings of doctors, nurses, and other workers of the sanitariums, hospitals, and clinics in China. I am very happy to tell you that all hospitals, sanitariums, and clinics are running now with a heavy program.  I am representing the medical workers of China in my request for your 

continuous support and prayers for the medical evangelistic work and the health-re-much for your past help.

W. H. BRANSON:  Thank you, Dr. Lee.  Now Dr. Paul Hwang has been at the head of three of our institutions in China.  He also stood there as a great leader in our medical work during the war.  He is over here taking a little post work at this time.  Dr. Hwang.

DR. PAUL HWANG (speaking first in Chinese, then in English):  Greetings from the advent youth in China to all the youth in the world of our Adventist Movement.  We request the prayers of you fellow young people for the time and the test that they are going through.

W. H. BRANSON:  Thank you, doctor.  And now we have T. C. Chen.  He is connected with our work in the South China Island Union at the present time and has been one of our leaders in the south of China for many years.

T. C. CHEN:  I am indeed happy to be here at this General Conference session, and I am happy to bring you Christian greetings from the workers and believers of the British colony of Hong Kong.  You have just heard that the work entered the colony of Hong Kong about half a century ago.  During recent years the evangelistic work there has made marked progress.  In behalf of our work in Hong Kong and Kowloon, I express to you our heartfelt appreciation for your support.  And may I solicit your continued support in money and prayers.

W. H. BRANSON:  Thank you, Brother Chen.  Will Dr. Caleb Chu come and say a word to us?  Dr. Chu has stood at the head of our sanitarium in the great Northwest, where pastor Wang is in leadership of the work.

DR. CALEB  CHU:  I am so happy to be here, and I want to tell you that the place where I work has great big water melons, and other melons, everything.  I wish that the people there could come to you, and I wish that you could go there and enjoy those delicious things.  The great Northwest China has many people in the dark, and we need your help.

W. H. BRANSON:  I am sure if you could see those watermelons, you would all want to go. The only trouble is they have no way to ship them out to Shanghai and Hong Kong, where we lived.  Now we are going to call for Dr. B. W. Loh, who for many years has served as the leader of our medical institutions in the city of Nanning, in South China.  Dr. Loh has come over here to get a little post work before he goes back.

B.W. LOH:  I am very glad tonight that I may have this chance to see so many of  our brethren and sisters.  I come from South China in a little town called Nanning, about 120 miles from French Indochina.  Just now we are having a hard time over there, but our work is keeping on, and I think God will still open the way for us.

W.H. BRANSON:  Amen.  Dr. Abraham Liu has been over now for a year or a little more, taking some special work, and I suppose will soon be ready to go back to China again and take up his medical work there.   Dr. Liu. While he is coming we will hear from Stanley Ho, who has been over here a little while taking some post work in X-ray and is now ready to return to China to resume his work there.

STANLEY HO:  In this wonderful opportunity I take the greatest of pleasure to express my sincere greeting to the brethren here.  In a little while we are going home.  What a wonderful song!  I will report the blessing of God on the council, and convey your love and your kindness to my country and my people.  Thank you.

W. H. BRANSON:  Now Dr. Liu.

ABRAHAM LIU:  I want to express my happiness and my gratitude to this wonderful truth that I have received, and especially for this provision of receiving further training in medicine.  I plan to go back and hope to educate more Chinese young people in medical evangelism, and I hope to follow what Sister White has laid out for the health reform work for our denomination.  Thank You.

W. H. BRANSON:  Now we have a Chinese sister, Miss Claudia Yen, who has been for a number of years our nursing supervisor and head of our nursing service in the Shanghai sanitarium clinic.  She has just completed a course of training here, post-graduate work, and is now returning to China.  Miss Yen, come down here and say a word to these folks.

CLAUDIA YEN  [Greeting in Chinese]

W. H. BRANSON:  Now Brother Chen, you come and tell us what she said, will you please?

T.C. CHEN:  Dear friends, tonight I am very glad for this good gathering.  I appreciate your kind help and your liberal donations, support, and prayers.  Thank you.

Trophies of Missions Sacrifice

W. H. BRANSON:  Now I want to tell you, brethren and sisters, that there are 24,000 people in China just like these folks who have spoken to you tonight, members of our churches gathered out since Brother Anderson landed in China. I am sure you cannot see these fine, cultured Chinese gentlemen and ladies here on the platform, trained as doctors and ministers in our own institutions, without realizing the fact that it is really worth while to send our money and our young men and women out to those lands to bring the gospel to those who have never known it before.

It seems to me that if there is any one blessing that comes to us through our General Conference gatherings it is that of seeing in the flesh the trophies of our sacrifice.  We can see what is actually being done in our mission service out at the ends of the earth in actually winning men and women to Christ.

I shall not read all of my report, because there are so many things we want to do this evening.  All of it will be in the bulletin, and you will be to read the rest of it there.  I will read parts of it, however.

[Elder Branson’ report appeared in Bulletin No.7, on page 164]

Now I want to present to you the new president of the China Division, the man upon whom my mantle fell when we finally had to close the office in Hong Kong because we were entirely cut off from all access to our churches and institutions in China.  The office was returned to Shanghai, and Pastor Hsu Hwa and his associates took over the burden of the work there.  He has just been re-elected to that position in this meeting, and I am very happy to present to you tonight the new president of the China Division.

HSU HWA:  The first thing the missionary does after he settles down in China is to learn Chinese, and tonight I am going to ask Dr. Paul Hwang to teach you a brief lesson in Chinese.  Dr. Hwang.

[Dr. Paul Hwang, in a very interesting way, explained the meaning of the Chinese  characters which stand for the name of the China Division, and taught the congregation how to pronounce the Chinese words.]

W. H. BRANSON:  When I was first asked to go to China I met one of the Chinese brethren in the hall at the Autumn Council and he said, “Of course you’ll learn the language as soon as you arrive there.”  And I said, “I understand it’s very difficult.”  He said, “Oh, no, Brother Branson, quite the contrary. Even our little children learn it.”

New Division President Speaks

HSU HWA:  I wish to express our appreciation again for your strong support and earnest prayers in behalf of the work and people in China.  We regret that it is not possible for our foreign missionaries to return at this time, but we assure you of a hearty welcome when the doors are open again.

In taking over the work of the China Division, we, inexperienced and lacking in wisdom, can only pray for the guidance of the Almighty and your continued interest and prayers on our behalf. There is much we have to learn, much to pray for.  Our desire and determination is to continue with the present plan for evangelism first promoted by Elder Branson in 1948.  Thus under the merciful care and blessing of God the action taken early this year to hold fifty  efforts in the spring, each lasting from two to three months, is being carried out in the nine union and mission fields of the division.  We are already beginning to receive reports of baptisms from a number of places where Bible classes are held after the effort.  There is no opposition from the new regime against the holding of public efforts in large cities and towns.  In smaller places permission for conducting such meeting is usually granted after an explanation of our aims and activities is given to the police.  At present an effort is being conducted nightly in our east chapel in Peking, the capital of the new government.  Most of the seats were taken when I was present there about a month ago.  Three efforts have been held simultaneously in Shanghai this spring.  

The closing meeting in the Central church drew such a large crowd that the police had to be called in to keep order.  It reminded us of the opening night of F. W. Detamore’s first public effort in the same building two years ago.  In northeast China, better known as Manchuria, where public efforts could not be held for a number of years, pastor Liu, the president, writes that nightly meetings are being held or planned for, in the cities of Mukden, Changchun, Harbin, Kirin, Hulan, and Kungchuling, Yingkow, and Chinchow.  We thank God for this remarkable opening.

I have with me today a piece of decoration taken from the gown of a Mohammedan priest who was recently baptized in Chinwangtao, North China.  He took this from his gown and presented it to the pastor.  I am going to leave this with Elder Branson to keep in the General Conference.

W. H. BRANSON:  Thank You.

Evangelistic Plans for China

 HSU HWA:  Time does not allow me to tell you of evangelism in the other unions. Another fifty efforts will begin this fall, and we believe with the blessing and help of God our goal of three thousand souls will be reached at the close of 1950.  Our publishing plant in Shanghai, known as the Sign of the Times publishing House, is continuing with its good work of preparing and publishing truth-filled literature for the Chinese people all over  the world.  Thanks to the Reviewand Herald Publishing Association, it was furnished with a full complement of machinery and supplies after the war.  As a result of present conditions our sale of books and magazines has been greatly curtailed in recent months.  With the lifting of the blockade along the China coast we hope it will be possible to ship literature out to other parts of the world.

We are making a special effort to translate, revise, and publish a number of Sister White’s books in the Chinese language.  John Oss is working most untiringly with his associates toward the early realization of this project.  We believe that the Spirit of prophecy are especially needed in China at this time. Our workers in China have pledged  one per cent of their year’s salary as a contribution to this program.  At the close of 1949 the Sabbath school membership in China stood at a little over twenty-five thousand.  Under the able leadership of Chen Ming this department has been able to carry out all the activities promoted by the General Conference Sabbath School Department. This has wonderfully helped in developing and strengthening our church in China.  On Sabbath afternoon Dr. Paul Lee told you something about our medical work, so I shall not cover this phase of our work now.

For a time it looked as if no radio work of a religious nature would be permitted under the new regime, but early in this year David Lin, our radio secretary,  made 

arrangements with a private station to broadcast in Shanghai the message both live and recorded.  A request to read the contents of our program before the broadcast was recently made by authorities, but this is only done as routine and not regularly.  The Bible correspondence school has been the means of winning many interested students who later become regular attendants at our public effort.  In these few years, under Pastor Lin’s leadership, this school has grown remarkably. The English section in Shanghai is still being continued under E. L. Longway, who has a long list of students, a number of whom regularly attend our English Sabbath school and church services.

 Educational Problems Noted

 I must not conclude my remarks without mentioning our schools and young people of China. Our educational work is facing many problem today, especially concerning the teaching of evolution and the prohibition of religious instruction in schools.  The government has definitely announced that religious subjects are not to be included in the educational curricula, but the teaching of such subjects will not be interfered with in the home or the church.  As this rule is not yet fully enforced, we are still teaching Bible in most of our schools, and in a few places this work is being done in the chapel building after school hours.  Our college, which moved to Hong Kong near the close of 1948, is returning to its former site at Chiaotoutseng, and we expect to resume regular work in September.

About forty to fifty students, most twelfth- to fourteenth-graders, from our central training school, are being employed in our missions and institutions this coming fall.  This is, we believe, the largest number of students being assigned at one time for work in the China field.  We pray that God will richly bless these young people in their labor for Him.  Of these, five have volunteered to work for the tribespeople in west Hunan.

Work Is Onward

In spite of the political changes in China the work of God is onward.  We may have to adapt ourselves at times to meet the changing conditions around us, but we know that if we remain loyal to Him, the God in heaven will open new ways and means for us to labor without the sacrifice of religious principles.

In China conditions generally seem to be taking a turn for the better.  The government in power seems to be doing more for the welfare of the people.  We have not had increased inflation during the last two months, which is quite a record for China in recent years, and, good news!  The famine which threatened the whole nation is now past.  

This does not mean that we shall have no trouble or difficulties in the future, for we live in a troubled world.  I am confident that among our believers in China we have a group of workers and laymen who are just as loyal as any you find in any part of the world.

Just before we came on the platform Elder Branson received a telegram from the China Division Committee in Shanghai.  He has asked me to read it: “We praying for You and Delegates. Efforts progressing as planned. Colporteurs Active.  Sanitariums Busy.  Workers Courageous.  Advancing in Faith.” Signed, “China Division Committee.”

We need the Holy Spirit to finish the work in our hearts and in our country.  We sincerely appeal for your support and prayers.

N. F. BREWER:  I thank God for true, loyal Seventh-day Adventist workers that carry on the work in China.  Don’t you? And I am sure that we want to express our support and our prayers for these faithful workers who will soon be going back to that troubled land.  How many of you would like to do that?  Will you raise your hands?

And I would like another thing.  How many of you would like to have your greetings sent back to the church in China, will you raise your hands?  Well, you can take them back, Brother Hsu, when you go, and I am sure they will very much appreciate receiving the greetings from this great meeting.

George J. Appel, who served as secretary for the home missionary department with the China Division, and who has spent thirty years in China in service, will show us some pictures of the work in China.  But before he does that, I would like to have him explain a little bit of his dress.

G. J. APPEL:  The costume I am wearing is the costume worn by the Mongolians and Tibetans. The Mongolians live in the north of China proper, and the Tibetans live to the west.  That is a very high plateau occupied by about six million nomads.  Some may wonder why I have this large knife on. This commonly carried by every Tibetan and Mongolian as he travels over the plains.  The rifle is used as protection.  No one goes out without some firearms, but this knife is used only for the carving of meat, such as we use our jackknives over here in America.  This pouch is not a pocketbook but is a place to carry the old steel flint to kindle a fire.

N. F. BREWER:  The closing musical number will be announced by Brother E. H. James, the president of the North China Union.  He has spent thirty-five years in China.

E. H. JAMES:  I think music was invented in China, but they arranged only for five tones. When missionaries went over there years ago with Western music they added two half tones, which caused quite a little difficulty; but many of our young people now have learned to sing these songs and they are carrying on the gospel message in song through all of China. We are going to have four of these young men sing for us tonight.  They are Pastor Chen, Dr. Dju, Dr. Hwang, and Dr. Lee.  They will sing “Faith of Our Father.”  They will sing the first two stanzas in Chinese, and we would like you all to join in the third stanza.

N. F. BREWER:  T. C. Chen, engaged in evangelistic work in Hong Kong, who has been a Seventh-day Adventist worker for twenty-five years, will give the benediction.  

BENEDICTION:T. C. Chen.