In the prophecy which foretold Christ, centuries before he came it was written, “He shall not fail, nor be discouraged.”  Fellow workers, it is not the consecration of a year, nor of a generation, that is to restore the millions for whom we work to the places where God would bring them.  The pitiless centuries cannot be redeemed in one day.  Doubtless the work may seem slow and the time may seem long, but every good deed counts, and no prayer is unheard.  The good work is not in vain.  The progress already made is wonderful.  The workers who have consecrated themselves may die in their unfinished work, but God has pledged himself that the work shall go on.  His promises and his providences will work together like cogs in a wheel.  We shall not fail, and we need not be discouraged.  Such lives as that of JAMES POWELL are not too common in human history, but they show us how the divine can endue the human with its own power, and how God can make souls great witnesses for God.  Some tell us that the heroic ages have passed away, but they have not.  No!  They will last until the world shall be saved, for the inspirations which come from the spirit of God and from the cross of Christ will live in hearts which will burn to save those who need to be saved.

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Since the death of Dr. Powell, we have received numerous letters from all parts of the country expressing sympathy in our great bereavement, which the writers shared profoundly with us.  The admiration and love entertained by the writers, and uttered in these letters, toward our beloved brother, is gratifying to us, as it is also to his family.  In the pressure of duties consequent upon his death and burial, we have not found time to reply to these letters, and take this occasion to acknowledge their receipt and to express our heartfelt thankfulness to the writers.

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We shall not be able to make the stirring appeals to provide for the exigent demands of our great work which our readers have been wont to recognize as coming from the heart of Dr. Powell, who had the oversight and burden of the collecting fields.

Never was our work more critical, never more urgent and never more hopeful.

The winter months, on which we must chiefly rely, are here, and are fast moving into the past.  The work has been laid upon us and it would seem faithless to our sacred trust to sacrifice any part of it.  But we must not take on a debt.  We can only be saved from putting the knife to our work or of trying to do what we cannot pay for, if the faithful pastors of the churches will give their very present help.  If the pastors who believe in the work, which includes the education and salvation of the needy among four races, will give their churches and Christian stewards a good chance to know how great the cause is and what its honest appeals are, we are confident that the Lord will deliver us from impending trouble.