Meanwhile there has been no sacrificing of home interests.  Never were greater efforts made by Methodism for the evangelisation of the masses in Great Britain.  The Home Mission Fund, first instituted in 1756, was remodelled in 1856.  Its business is to assist the dependent circuits in maintaining the administration of the gospel, to provide means for employing additional ministers, and to meet various contingencies with which the circuits could not cope unassisted.  Our needs as a Connexion demand such a Contingent Fund.  One-third of the amount raised by the Juvenile Home and Foreign Missionary Association is devoted to Home Missions.  The income, which in 1837 was less than L10.000, is now more than L36,000; an increase witnessing to a spirit of aggression and enterprise in modern Methodism.  This fund provides for the support of the Connexional evangelists and district missionaries.

In the year 1882, under the head “Home Missions,” there was a new and important departure, by the appointment of the first “Connexional evangelists,” of whom there are now four; they have already been the means of great blessing throughout the country, showing that the old gospel, preached as in the old days, is still mighty to awaken and convert.

Under the direction of the Home Mission Committee, commissioners visit certain districts, to give advice and discover the best methods for improving the condition of Methodism where it appears to be low.

Special attention is given to the villages.  The “Out-and-Out Band” subscribed for four Gospel Mission vans, each carrying two evangelists, and a large quantity of literature, to the villages; the evangelists in charge conducting services in the village chapels and in the open air.  The sale of books and the voluntary contributions of the people help to defray the expenses.  This agency is now under the direction of the Home Mission committee, and the gospel cars will be known as “Wesleyan Home Mission Cars.”

Another new movement, helpful to village Methodism, is the “Joyful News” mission, originating with the Rev. Thomas Champness, who has been set free from ordinary circuit work to manage it.  He trains lay agents, for whose services there is a great demand in villages where the people are too poor to maintain additional ministers, and where the supply of local preachers is deficient.  Some of these agents are at work abroad.

The energetic Home Mission Committee has also set on foot missions where Methodism was feeble.  Nor are those forgotten who “go down to the sea in ships, and do business in great waters.”  As far as means permit, efforts are made for the spiritual benefit of our sailors in all the great ports of the world; our soldiers, too, are equally cared for.  Methodism has always been interested in the army, in which some of Wesley’s best converts were found; yet there was no systematic work in it before 1839, when an order by the commander-in-chief permitted