Wilson-Apostle To Islam.pdf - Radical Truth

COPYIl.IGHT, 1952, BY
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INTRODUCTION
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It is eminently fitting that there should be a biography of Samuel
M. Zwemer and that it is under the title Apostle to Islam. It is also
highly appropriate that it is by one who succeeded him in teaching
missions at Princeton Theological Seminary and whose m.vn years
of missionary service \vere spent among 1Ioslems.
No one through all the centuries of Christian missions to Moslems
has deserved better than Dr. Zwemer the designation of Apostle to
Islam. Indeed, if one means by these words to include all of Isium
and alll\Ioslems, it is doubtful whether they could so aptly be applied
to anyone since Raymund Lull. In his young manhood Dr. Z.wemer
joined in initiating a mission in that most difficult of all 1I10s1em
fields, Arabia, the very home of Mohammed and Islam. In later
years he travelled through most of the lands where Islam is found
seeking to strmulate a comprehensive approach to it by the EY2TIgelical
forces. He long attacked the problem from Cairo, the intellectual
center of Islam. It was appropriate and characteristic that
the journal which has been so closely identified with him that it is
difficult to mention the one without immediately thinking of the other
should bear the comprehensive title The M oslem ~Vorld. Through
the years Dr. Zwemer sought to enlist youth for missions to the
Moslems. For a generation he was a familiar and beloved figure
with his stirring voice on platforms and in Christian assemblies. in
many countries.
Yet even the vast and urgent challenge of Islam was not enough
for Dr. Zwemer. Like all great missionaries, he was true to the
commission of his ~laster and dreamed and labored for the proclamation
of the Gospel to every creature. As one long closely identified
with the Student Volunteer J\Iovement for Foreign Missions he
embodied its watchword, Uthe evangelization of the world in this
generation." It will never be known, unless God himself discloses
it in ~'that land of large dimensions," how many missionaries either
first heard the call or had their purpose crystallized through the compelling,
loving appeal of Dr. Zwemer. Nor until that roster is revealed
will it be clear how many countries have been touched by them or
how many thousands have been introduced to eternal life by their
witness.
During his years at Princeton not only were scores of young men
prepared under him for missionary service abroad, but through his
classes and his personal contacts hundreds of future pastors had their
horizons lifted to the entire world and through them the missionary
impulse has been aroused or strengthened in hundreds of congregations.
Dr. Zwemer has reached an even wider public through his
hooks. Some of these have been primarlly for those specializing on
missions to ~Ioslems. Others have been for a still more inclusive
constituency and have covered wide ranges of the Christian faith.