By the Rev. D. J. MATHESON.
AT the request of the Canadian Mission Committee to supply Winnipeg for one year, I left Glasgow by the “Caledonia” with my wife and boy on Friday, the 20th March, 1931. On Saturday morning, the 28th March, we disembarked at Halifax where we stayed until Monday morning, when we took train for Winnipeg, arriving there about 8.30 a.m. the following Thursday. The journey by land and sea was very favourable, and we would be blind indeed should we fail to discern the great kindness of the Lord in His goodness to us every step of the way.
Our friends in Winnipeg showed us no little kindness, and, I think no congregation could be expected to do more for a minister supplying them than they have done for me during my sojourn of one year among them.
The attendance at the services was on the whole good, considering there are not many more than ninety persons, including young children, connected with the Congregation. Among them, we believe, there are some who are in the narrow way that leads to life, and some who are asking “the way to Zion with their faces thitherward,” while there are others who are in a way that seems right to them, but the end of it is death.
The Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper was dispensed in the Congregation on the third Sabbath of September, when the Rev. E. Macqueen, on his return from Vancouver, officiated. It was a solemn and most precious time to not a few. Twelve members sat at the Lord’s table. One of them was admitted for the first time. May he continue to be a source of strength to the cause in Winnipeg.
According to instructions received from the Church at home, Mr. Thomas Macdonald, Brock, Sask., was ordained to the eldership. On Friday of the communion season the ordination took place.
On Tuesday, the 22nd day of March, the financial report was read to the Congregation by the Treasurer, Mr. William Sinclair.
It showed that the income for the year was \$1853, and despite the industrial depression the Congregation has done better financially than at any time in the past. There is still a debt of \$2700 on the Church building.
While the Congregation of Winnipeg is very grateful to the Church for sending them supply, they are most desirous to have a minister settled over them. In their isolated position they need and deserve encouragement, and it is to be hoped they will yet have a pastor of their own.
We left Winnipeg on the return journey on Tuesday, the 23rd March, arriving in New York the following Saturday, when we sailed by the “Athenia” for Glasgow. We reached home in safety, having great cause for thankfulness for the Lord’s wonderful kindness to us.