MELANESIAN MISSION.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1451, 28 May 1912, Page 6

MELANESIAN MISSION.

' THE BISHOP-ELECT. (By Telecraph.— Special Correspondent.) Auckland, May 27. Cabled advice has boon received by Archdeacon Calder that the Key. C. ,1. Wood, Bishop-elect of Melanesia, left London by the steamer lonic on Thursday last, "and will arrive at Wellington on July 9. He will be consecrated at Duncdin on July 14. The workers on the mission field under the control of the Bishop consist of two archdeacons, 17 priests, 1G deacons, six laymen, 12 women lay-workers, and 750 Native teachers. Two clergymen arc- also coming out with the Bishop-elect to take part in the work. . The Rev. C. J. Wood, in a- communication to the English "Log," writes to his friends regarding his appointment:— "jiy first message to you is full of gratitude and hope. Letters from all parts of the country tell me of prayer long offered in preparation for the appointment, and give assurance of continued intercession in the future. Many of you already have experience of the sense of being borne along on the prayers of others, as a ship is borne on the waves with a following wind. Such belief, even apart from experience, is the corollary ot the Communion of Saints. I imagine that this, which has been an experience full of joy at home, will become in the mission field even more a source of strengtn and encouragement—that in the mission field new meanings of the Fellowship ot the 'Snints will be revealed. As soon as we have said this, we are reminded that this fellowship is a spiritual bond liuiviii" the Church militant with the Church at rest, so that your prayers on behalr of the mission are no longer single utterances before the Throne, but they are caught up into the great volume of intercession that besieges the Throne, and are accepted in The Beloved. I can rely upon you, then, to offer your contribution o'f prayer regularly, and we shall be the stronger."