The World Outlook of the Bible

In surveying with a view to appraising the missionary enterprise, it is right that we begin at the beginning, by considering what the Bible has to say on the subject, for if the missionary idea and purpose are not in the very warp and woof of Divine revelation, it is to little purpose that the Christian Church spends its time, talent, and money in an attempt to evangelize the world. That the missionary idea is to be found in the Bible no reader of its pages can deny, but there are comparatively few who know how dominating a place it occupies there. The warrant for the missionary enterprise is not dependent upon proof-texts, though these are many, but is to be found in the very texture of the Biblical revelation. Indeed, it is not an exaggeration to say that if all that relates to God's redemptive purpose for the whole world were to be extracted from the pages of the Scriptures, scarcely any-thing would be left.