THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL – VOLUME 6
Table of Contents
Title Page
Chap 1. A RECORD, PREFACE., 1880
Chap 2. JANUARY, 1880. – OUR FIRST SERMON.
Chap 3. FEBRUARY, 1880. – THE PEARL OF PATIENCE
Chap 4. APRIL, 1880. – OUR SABBATH SERVICES IN THE HOTEL
Chap 5. JUNE, 1880 – INAUGURAL ADDRESS
Chap 6. JULY, 1880. – INAUGURAL ADDRESS
Chap 7. SEPTEMBER 1880 – THE COVENANT
Chap 8. OCTOBER, 1880. – THE THREE THENS OF ISAIAH’S TEMPLE VISION
Chap 9. NOVEMBER, 1880. – SWEET FRUIT FROM A THORNY TREE
Chap 10. DECEMBER, 1880. – CLOSING THE YEAR
Chap 11. A RECORD, PREFACE, 1881.
Chap 12. MARCH, 1881. – PREACH CHRIST IN A CHRISTLY MANNER.
Chap 13. MAY, 1881. – GOOD CHEER FROM PAST AND FUTURE SERVICE.
Chap 14. JULY, 1881. – INAUGURAL ADDRESS
Chap 15. AUGUST, 1881. – INAUGURAL ADDRESS
Chap 16. OCTOBER, 1881. – WHY WE HAVE NOT
Chap 17. A RECORD, PREFACE., 1882
Chap 18. JANUARY, 1882. – UNTO THE END
Chap 19. FEBRUARY, 1882. – “EVER THIS OUR WAR CRY! VICTORY! VICTORY!”
Chap 20. APRIL, 1882. – EDITORIAL APOLOGY.
Chap 21. JULY 1882 – MEALTIME IN THE CORNFIELDS.
Chap 22. AUGUST, 1882. – INAUGURAL ADDRESS
Chap 23. SEPTEMBER, 1882. – INAUGURAL ADDRES
Chap 24. OCTOBER, 1882. – COMMUNION ADDRESS
Chap 25. NOVEMBER, 1882. – SWEET VARIETY IN THE GARDEN OF GOD.
Chap 26. DECEMBER 1882 – THE SOUL-WINNER’S REWARD
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Title Page
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL,
.
VOLUME 6
.
by
Charles H. Spurgeon
Chap 1. A RECORD, PREFACE., 1880
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL
A RECORD
OF
COMBAT WITH SIN AND OF LABOR FOR THE LORD.
EDITED BY C. H. SPURGEON. 1880.
1880
“They which builded on the wall, and they that bare burdens, with those that laded, every one with one of his hands wrought in the work, and with the other hand held a weapon. For the builders, every one had his sword girded by his side, and so builded. And he that sounded the trumpet was by me.” — Nehemiah 4:17-18.
.
PREFACE.
OUR preface is written after the volume is finished, and therefore it must be rather a summary than a program. We cannot come forward like the Chancellor of the Exchequer with his budget for the forthcoming year, but we put, in an appearance as a steward who renders in his account for the year which is just past. Our one feeling in doing so is gratitude, — gratitude both to God and men.
First of all, we bless and adore the great Father of all good that he has continued to employ so feeble an instrument for the accomplishment of his gracious purposes, and has removed difficulties out of our way, and continually supplied the necessities of the work. Truly we serve a faithful God, who never tries his servants above what they are able to bear, and who makes it his delight to deliver them out of all emergencies in a manner least expected by them. To his sacred name be all the honor of work done and success achieved.
But the law of gratitude has two tables, and it is not enough to render that which is due to God; we must do justice to man also. Happy are we to comply with this requirement, for if ever a man owed much to his fellow Christians it is the editor of this magazine.
Breaking away from all modes of speech which are usual in such circumstances, I must upon this point speak in the first person singular. Beloved readers, I am under deep obligations to many of you. Some of you are my hearers, and I thank you for bearing with my “often infirmities,” and remaining content with a crippled minister, who has been away from his pulpit more than three mouths out of the twelve. Dear helpers at the Tabernacle, you are kindness itself; the Lord reward you. Many more Sword and Trowel subscribers are readers of the weekly sermon. I am grateful to all who help me to preach to an immense congregation of persons whose faces I have never seen. I am glad to have my discourses widely circulated: if a truth is worth preaching it is worth hearing, and if worthy to be heard by six thousand why not by six hundred thousand?
My gratitude breaks forth at the remembrance of a cloud of prayers which have ascended on my behalf from all parts of the earth. Of this fact I have abundant personal assurances, and the comfort which these have yielded me no tongue can tell. Nor is this all. I am bound to express personal thanks of the most fervent kind for the generous help rendered to all the institutions under my care. Whenever there has been a need some one has hastened to supply it: hence the usual efforts have been carried on during the year 1880 without flagging, and fresh work has been joyfully attempted and accomplished. Kind friends evidently watch the whole enterprise, and consider what they can do to keep it all in healthy operation. God bless them one and all, and give a thousandfold return. How much certain donors have relieved my care, and cheered my heart, I will not attempt to write.
The College has steadily proceeded on its way, educating suitable men and sending them forth. In this department there has been no lack either of new men or of spheres for them when their terms of study have ended. Our brethren all over the world are doing good service for the Master, and in some instances singular blessing has rested upon their endeavors. In these days of laxity in doctrine, it is of the utmost importance to keep up those Colleges which hold by the old orthodox faith, and give forth no uncertain sound.
The Evangelists have had an eminently successful year, and have aroused in my heart the desire to see many more such agents occupied in this admirable service. Hundreds, and even thousands, profess to have found the Savior through the testimony of our three brethren. The Colporteurs have had a hard year, but a better one than 1879. Their number has somewhat diminished, for we cannot get friends to take up this branch of service with enthusiasm, though it is one of the cheapest and most efficient means of scattering gospel light in the darkest places. It is no small thing to have kept more than seventy men hard at work selling good books and instructing the poor.
The Orphanage has had sufficient supplies for current expenses, and besides this, the Girls’ Orphanage has been in process of erection. All the money for the first contract has been provided by a grand burst of generosity, some few having surpassingly distinguished themselves by noble gifts. We shall need several other buildings to render the whole of the girls’ houses available as dwellings and schools. Infirmary and dining hall must be built, and a large building is needed to serve us on our great days of public meetings, and to be on ordinary occasions the chapel for the whole of the children, their teachers, and other friends. It may be that some one friend will give this or that building, and if not, a bazaar at the end of 1881 will go far towards it. Then there will be five hundred children to keep: an anxious look out if faith in God did not perceive infinite supplies.
Mrs. Surgeon’s Book Fund has sent into poor ministers’ libraries hundreds of parcels of books. The gratitude expressed is abounding. Congregations must be the better for their ministers having a fresh store of mental food. I am very grateful to all who have aided my invaluable wife in this specially useful work, and I hope that others will be found who will see how this agency waters the very roots of the tree, for it’ preachers are supplied with sound literature, which they value, their ministry must be influenced for good.
I cannot mention all the other agencies, all of which have received liberal help from my many friends, but for all such aid I feel myself a debtor — a debtor who has nothing to pay with but good wishes, prayers, and thanks.
“Oh that we could do more for Jesus.” This was the sigh of last year, and it is my inward groaning now. Perhaps the Lord may entrust me with more means, and it’ not, if he is pleased to send a larger blessing I shall be equally content.
Dear Readers,
I Am Yours To Serve For Christ’s Sake,
C. H. SPURGEON.
Chap 2. JANUARY, 1880.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
JANUARY, 1880.
OUR FIRST SERMON.
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
WE remember well the first place in which we addressed a congregation of adults, and the wood-block which illustrates this number of the magazine sets it dearly before our mind’s eye. It was not our first public address by a great many, for both at Newmarket, and Cambridge, and elsewhere, the Sabbath-school had afforded us ample scope for speaking the gospel. At Newmarket especially we had a considerable admixture of grown-up folks in the audience, for many came to hear “the boy” give addresses to the school. But no regular set discourse to a congregation met for regular worship had we delivered till one eventful Sabbath evening, which found us in a cottage at Teversham, holding forth before a little assembly of humble villagers.
The tale is not a new one, but as the engraving has not before been seen by the public eye we must shed a little light upon it. There is a Preachers’ Association in Cambridge connected with St. Andrew’s-street Chapel, once the scene of the ministry of Robert Robinson and Robert Hall, and now of our beloved friend Mr. Tarn. A number of worthy brethren preach the gospel in the various villages surrounding Cambridge, taking each one his turn according to plan. In our day the presiding genius was the venerable Mr. James Vinter, whom we were wont to address as Bishop Vinter. His genial soul, warm heart, and kindly manner were enough to keep a whole fraternity stocked with love, and accordingly a goodly company of true workers belonged to the Association, and labored as true yoke-fellows. Our suspicion is that he not only preached himself, and helped his brethren, but that he was a sort of recruiting sergeant, and drew in young men to keep up the number of the host; at least, we speak from personal experience as to one case.
We had one Saturday finished morning school, and the boys were all going home for the half. holiday, when in came the aforesaid “Bishop” to ask us to go over to Teversham next Sunday evening, for a young man was to preach there who was not much used to services, and very likely would be glad of company. That was a cunningly devised sentence, if we remember it rightly, and we think we do; for at the time, in the light of that Sunday evening’s revelation, we turned it over, and vastly admired its ingenuity. A request to go and preach would have met with a decided negative, but merely to act as company to a good brother who did not like to be lonely, and perhaps might ask us to give out a hymn or to pray, was not at all a difficult matter, and the request, understood in that fashion, was cheerfully complied with. Little did the lad know what Jonathan and David were doing when he was made to run for the arrow, and as little knew we when we were cajoled into accompanying a young man to Teversham.
Our Sunday-school work was over, and tea had been taken, and we set off through Barnwell, and away along the Newmarket-road, with a gentleman some few years our senior. We talked of good things, and at last we expressed our hope that he would feel the presence of God while preaching. He seemed to start, and assured us that he had never preached in his life, and could not attempt such a thing: he was looking to his young friend, Mr. Spurgeon, for that. This was a new view of the situation, and I could only reply that I was no minister, and that even if I had been I was quite unprepared. My companion only repeated that he, even in a more emphatic sense, was not a preacher, that he would help me in any other part of the service, but that there would be no sermon unless I gave them one. He told me that if I repeated one of my Sunday-school addresses it would just suit the poor people, and would probably give them more satisfaction than the studied sermon of a learned divine. I felt that I was fairly committed to do my best. I walked along quietly, lifting up my soul to God, and it seemed to me that I could surely tell a few poor cottagers of the sweetness and love of Jesus, for I felt them in my own soul. Praying for divine help, I resolved to make an attempt. My text should be, “Unto you therefore which believe he is precious,” and I would trust the Lord to open my mouth in honor of his dear Son. It seemed a great risk and a serious trial, but, depending upon the power of the Holy Ghost, I would at least tell out the story of the cross, and not allow the people to go home without a word. We entered the low-pitched room of the thatched cottage, where a few simple-minded farm-laborers and their wives were gathered together; we sang and prayed and read the Scriptures, and then came our first sermon. How long or how short it was we cannot now remember. It was not half such a task as we had feared it would be, but we were glad to see our way to a fair conclusion, and to the giving out of the last hymn. To our own delight we had not broken down, nor stopped short in the middle, nor been destitute of ideas, and the desired haven was in view. We made a finish, and took up the book, but to our astonishment an aged voice cried out, “Bless your dear heart, how old are you?” Our very solemn reply was,” You must wait till the service is over before making any such inquiries. Let us now sing.” We did sing, and the young preacher pronounced the benediction, and then began a dialogue which enlarged into a warm, friendly talk, in which everybody appeared to take part. “How old are you?” was the leading question. “I am under sixty,” was the reply. “Yes, and under sixteen,” was the old lady’s rejoinder. “Never mind my age, think of the Lord Jesus and his preciousness,” was all that I could say, after promising to come again, if the gentlemen at Cambridge thought me fit to do so. Very great and profound was our awe of those “gentlemen at Cambridge” in those days.
Are there not other young men who might begin to speak for Jesus in some such lowly fashion — young men who hitherto have been mute as fishes? Our villages and hamlets offer fine opportunities for youthful speakers. Let them not wait till they are invited to a chapel, or have prepared a fine essay, or have secured an intelligent audience. If they will go and tell out from their hearts what the Lord Jesus has done for them, they will find ready listeners.
Many of our young folks want to do great things, and therefore do nothing at all; let none of our readers become the victims of such an unreasonable ambition. He who is willing to teach infants, or to give away tracts, and so to begin at the beginning, is far more likely to be useful than the youth who is full of affectations and sleeps in a white necktie, who is studying for the ministry, and is touching up certain superior manuscripts which he hopes ere long to read from the pastor’s pulpit. He who talks upon plain gospel themes in a farmer’s kitchen, and is able to interest the carter’s boy and the dairymaid, has more of the minister in him than the prim little man who talks for ever about being cultured, and means by that — being taught to use words which nobody can understand. To make the very poorest listen with pleasure and profit is in itself an achievement, and beyond this it is the best possible promise and preparation for an influential ministry. Let our younger brethren go in for cottage preaching, and plenty of it. If there is no Lay Preachers’ Association, let them work by themselves. The expense is not very great for rent, candles, and a few forms: many a young man’s own pocket-money would cover it all. No isolated group of houses should be left without its preaching-room, no hamlet without its evening service. This is the lesson of the thatched cottage at Teversham.
CROOKED PALM TREES
“UPRIGHT as the palm tree” is an accurate proverbial expression, yet we have seen many palms which have been crooked and twisted as if they suffered from spinal curvature. Did these disprove the general statement? Far from it. “Upright as a palm-tree” is a perfectly correct expression. In the same way it is true that Christians are the excellent of the earth, though there are some among them who are far from being worthy examples. The exceptions cannot justly be made to disprove the rule. It is only prejudice which would quote one or two failures against a whole community. Candor does not permit us to condemn a class because of a remnant who dishonor it. No one says that the palm is a crooked tree because here and there one may be contorted, and only those who are unjust will say that Christians are cants and hypocrites because occasionally some professors are found to be so.
“THE HORNLESS DEACON.”
WE notice in an American newspaper a letter signed “THE HORNLESS DEACON.” There is no accounting for our Transatlantic cousins, but what can the good man mean by such a title? A hornless buffalo or a hornless cow we could understand, but what is the reason for applying that adjective to a deacon? We have been lying back in our most serious arm-chair, and have been revolving in our meditative soul the various senses which can be drawn out of this expression, or imputed to it, but we cannot make head or tail of it, and without a head there may well be no horns. The owner of the signature is evidently a deacon, and therefore he must be fully aware that deacons do not possess horns and hoofs. Some pastors, when hardly driven, have thought they did, but this was a clerical error. We believe that all evil reports about deacons arise from nightmare, and are slanderous and absurd; but still they do arise, and therefore this good deacon may have felt it necessary in his own case to assert that he had no horns, and was not related to any individual whose head is thus adorned. Had not deacons been a much-abused order of men the foul insinuation as to horns would never have cropped up, and none of the race would have found it needful to claim to be hornless. Our own opinion is that when deacons have horns it will generally be found that the minister has a tail. There is six of one and half-a-dozen of the other in most cases of disagreement between the two classes of church-officers.
We would earnestly hope, however, that our friend, “The hornless deacon,” had no thought of the evil one, but simply meant to say that he was not a fighting man, but was of necessity peaceful because he had no provision in his nature for making an attack.
A horn is an offensive weapon, and a hornless deacon is one who cannot give offense, resent an injury, or inflict a wound. What a splendid acquisition to a quarrelsome church! He would be sure to rule well, and reduce chaos to order by the mere force of Christian patience. Few men believe in the power of non-resistance, but our faith in it is unbounded: he who can yield will conquer, and he who will suffer most for the sake of love will wield the greatest power if he will but bide his time. The longest horns that were ever borne aloft will yet be broken by the submission of “the hornless.” To be utterly unable to give offense to anybody would be a sublime incapacity, most useful in these ticklish days when nine people out of ten are ready to take offense where none is intended. We hope “the hornless deacon” is not such a gentle, inoffensive body that he would let people forget quarter-day, and their subscriptions, or would allow the minister to draw twice the amount of his salary. This would be carrying a virtue to an extreme, and would be a grave fault, especially in the latter case. We are bound to add that we have never met with such a want of principle as would be implied in this instance: the former error is far more common. The kind, gentle, but earnest deacon is invaluable. He is as an angel in the church, and does more than angel’s service. Excellent man! We cannot say, “May his horn be exalted!” for he has none; but we trust that the place where it ought to be will never ache through the ingratitude of those whom he serves.
Feeling that we had not translated this signature satisfactorily, and not liking to give it up, we consulted a learned friend, who gave us the following elucidation of the mysterious title of “The hornless deacon.” We are not quite sure that we believe in it. He says that it is the minister’s place to carry the horn and blow it, and that “the hornless deacon” was evidently a non-preacher, one who minded his own business, and left his minister to blow the ram’s horn. We do not think any the better of him for this, for we like a man all the more if, like Stephen, he can both care for the widows and preach the gospel. It would be well for our country churches if more of the deacons would exercise their gifts, and keep the village stations supplied with sound doctrine. Our learned friend suggests that there may be in the term “hornless deacon” a covert allusion to the modesty of the individual who never blew his own trumpet, who in fact had not so much as a horn of his own to blow. This may be, and it may not be. We had excogitated that idea before, and did not feel very proud of it, but there rosy be something in it. Certainly we know of deacons who from year to year plod away at the pastor’s side, glad to perform services of any kind so long as God is glorified, and the church is prospered. Seldom are their names mentioned in public, and yet they are the mainstay of the church, the regulators of her order, and the guardians of her interests. Some of them have held the fort in troublous times: they have seen a dozen pastors come and go, but they abide at their posts, faithful under discouragement, hopeful under difficulty. They deserve great praise, and as they are “hornless” we would for once sound the horn for them.
This guess hardly satisfied us, and so our friend gave us another. We sometimes drink out of a horn; and a deacon, according to the apostle, is not to be “given to much wine.” Is it, therefore, claimed by our friend that if he erred at all he erred on the right side, for he had no horn at all, and was a pledged teetotaler? Very good, Mr. Deacon. The more of your brethren who will copy you in this the better, so long as they do not make the water-jug the symbol of their lives, and pour cold water over everything and everybody, in season and out of season.
This interpretation we feel also to be a failure, and therefore we will try once more on our own account. Can it mean that the good deacon did not sound a trumpet before him, as the hypocrites do, when he was distributing his alms? Was he so quiet in his generosity that not even a penny whistle or child’s horn proclaimed his deed of liberality? Let him be blessed in secret if this was his true character, but surely the very taking of the name of “hornless” is a little like blowing a horn. He who denies a fault claims a virtue; did you forget this, my unhorned friend?
The above expository observations, so far as they come from our learned friend, are exceedingly clever, tolerably far-fetched, and in all respects worthy of his breadth of forehead; but they do not quite enable us to see through the expression, and we abandon it for the present with the consoling reflection that our Yankee brethren have a vivacious style of speech which needs one of themselves to interpret it. C. H. S.
VISITING THE POOR
JOSEPH Cook says, “In every great town there are six or ten strata of society; and it is, one would think, a hundred miles from the fashionable to the unfashionable side of a single brick in a wall. Superfluity and squalor know absolutely nothing of each other, such is the utter negligence of the duty of visiting the poor in any other way than by agents. I do not undervalue these, nor any part of the great charities of our times; but there is no complete theory for the permanent relief of the poor without personal visitation. Go from street to street with the city missionary or the best of the police; but sometimes go all alone, and with your own eyes see the poor in their attics, and study the absolutely unspeakable conditions of their daily lives. Live one day where the children of the perishing poor live, and ask what it is to live there always. I know a scholar of heroic temper and of exquisite culture who recently resolved to live with the poor in a stifling part of this city (Boston), and who, after repeated and desperate illness, was obliged to move his home off the ground in order to avoid the necessity of putting his body underground. You cannot understand the poor by newspapers, nor even by novels.”
Rather a sly poke, Mr. Cook, at those who fancy they can see mankind through the spectacles of novels. The world which is depicted in fiction is strangely different from the realm of fact in which men and women starve and die, or end their days in the workhouse, of which they have felt from their childhood a mortal dread. Novel-readers know a great deal which it will cost them vast pains to unlearn. True knowledge of the poor will not come even out of “Jessica’s first Prayer,” and the like, it must grow out of actual contact with them.
There is much truth in what Mr. Cook has said; indeed, a great deal more than at first meets the eve. Wealthy Christians are to be educated in the most Christ-like of graces by coming in contact with the poor, and it is a great pity that they should refuse to enter the appointed school; poor saints are to be consoled and cheered by the presence of their richer brethren, and it is cruel for the ordained comforters to refuse their task. More would be given in charity if it were given personally, and it would be more wisely distributed and more gratefully received. The kindly word and sympathetic look would be worth more than the silver or even the gold expended upon the needy, and would often prevent the recipient from becoming a pauper, or rouse the pauper to a desire for independence. Personal visitation is good all round; like mercy, it blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
Our churches have visiting societies connected with them, but we fear they are not quite so flourishing as they ought to be. A few ladies manage the whole business, and do all the work. We wish that all the members of the churches who have anything to spare would become visitors of the sick and the poor, either in connection with the societies or on their own account. Of course, those whose time belongs to their employers, and those whose home duties occupy every minute, are to be excused, but we have hundreds of ladies without occupation who ought to spend their time in being true sisters of mercy And why not the gentlemen too? Men of leisure could not do better than hunt out needy merit in the back slums. It would afford more excitement and pleasure than shooting over the moors, or watching the fly on the rivers. Gentlemen could safely pioneer the way for ladies, and there are rooms which they might enter more safely than the gentler sex. When we speak of ladies and gentlemen we mean men and women of gentle hearts and generous hands, who would go really to pity and help the poor; we mean working-men’s wives who would sit up at night with a sick neighbor, and artisans themselves who would not mind whitewashing a sick man’s room, if needed, to make it sweet and healthy. Anyhow, the salt wants to be rubbed in, and not to be kept by itself in the salt-box. There is the city with its sorrows, and here is the church with its heaven-born love; the question is, how shall these be brought into contact so that the evil shall find its remedy and the medicine shall reach the disease?
It is of no use waiting till one universal Charity Organization scheme shall be carried out; we might as well tarry till an organized providence drops quartern loaves and pats of butter at every householder’s door. Schemes and plans are all very well, but he who waits till a scheme has put a chicken into his pot will go without a pullet for a life-time. The better way is for those who visit to go on with their work, and for those who do not visit to begin at once, and make one call a day if possible. Just take a walk down Paradise Place, as a commencement. Look up Jinks’s Rents and down Sheridan’s Alley, and pick up an acquaintance with the woman who goes out chafing when she can get it, and the widow who has four children, one born since the husband’s death — the consumptive widow, we mean, who cannot earn a penny for herself because three of the little ones need nursing, and the eldest can barely run alone. To give up an evening party in order to make a call in the slums may seem to be insane advice, but we venture to back it up by the assertion that it would afford more sensible entertainment than the most of the stuck-up assemblies where twaddle and ceremony sicken thoughtful minds. Life is never slow to those who live to do good. True romance comes in the way of those whose hearts love the sorrowful. Nobody ever complains of ennui who spends his strength in relieving human need for Jeans’ sake. Gratitude for our own favored lot is excited by the inspection of a hospital, a workhouse, or the squalid dens where poverty herds with vice.
Society wants to be made into a stir-about. We must mingle for mutual advantage. The walls are getting higher and the ditches deeper, let us each one try to scale the ramparts and bridge the moats. We are one family, and we refuse to be divided. We cannot be content to be pampered while our brethren pine in want. Down with the barriers, and let the rich and poor meet together, for the Lord is the Maker of them all. C. H. S.
NOTES
OUR SICKNESS. — The way appointed of the Lord is surely right, but sorely sorrowful, to many of his chosen. We fled from the land of cold to escape from our annual assault, and in this we acted upon the best judgment of human foresight, and yet we missed our aim. A wandering blast swept round the Mediterranean and found out our retreat, and we fall before it like the sere leaves, which still were lingering on the trees. Doubtless the attack was less in force and duration than it might have been at home, but even in its mitigated form it has brought us very low, depressed a spirit far too often given to be sad, and left us so weak that every word we write costs a pang, and every thought is a labor. This is our portion, and the Lord’s will be done in it. We value greatly the prayers of our readers and friends, and believe that restoration will the more freely be given to as if they will seek it in prayer on our behalf. It is to us a great sorrow to be thus annually laid aside by severe pain; what can the end of it be? Either we shall have to count upon a certain period of retirement every year, or we may look for the close of a life whose wheels go round with a motion clogged and painful. If the last, we should at least hope to see all our enterprises kept in good order even to the final hour. The Lord send it may be so. One thing seems pretty certain, we cannot be at our post at the expected time, but must take time to recover strength. This is no matter of choice, but of sheer necessity: these heavy blows take a great deal out of a man, and he cannot soon shake off their effects.
MR. GLADSTONE’S SPEECHES. — The grand blasts from Mr. Gladstone’s war-horn should arouse our nation. Their one note is a call to make righteousness and peace the guides of the nation instead of selfishness and blustering. Will men hear the call? Alas, it is to be feared that self and pride have greater charms. “British interests “are regarded as solid matters of consideration, while humanity and justice are treated as mere sentimental superfluities. “The Times,” which is ever the faithful mirror of the national mind, says about Afghanistan, which we have been so wantonly trampling under foot, — “ whatever is done must be done with a sole view to the future safety of India. No notion of what may be best for the Afghans ought to come in the way. It is their business, and not ours to pay attention to this.” It is our business to destroy all settled government in their country, and after we have ravaged the land to leave the poor wretches to make such arrangements as they can. Under such tutors we shall soon become a nation of demons. Time was when high principle ruled British hearts, and all parties in the State paid homage to liberty, to justice, and even to humanity; but now we are another people, ruled by other lords. Can there be too .much speaking against this? Can Christ-runs be too excited and too eager to save their country from the evil which now sits dominant upon it? We think not. he who shall be backward when the time comes to deliver his land, let this great sin cleave unto him. If’ he will not rise to rescue his people from the huge crimes into which her present rulers are plunging her, he will be himself a partaker in their sins, and on his own head must the curse descend.
SCHOOL BOARD. — The results of the School Board elections in London are worthy of study. There were no great party questions to arouse controversial zeal, and consequently, the affair was left to drift. Never did results more fully illustrate the blind way in which the public rushes hither and thither, unless led and guided. Our fellow-electors are willing enough to vote aright, but they do not know who is who, and consequently, the man who will spend a few pounds in advertising himself can secure his own election. It would not be impossible in the present condition of things for an organization of Papists, or Atheists, to secure places for all their candidates. As it is, some of the best men were not elected, and we mean by best, the most popular and most valued men, who would have headed the poll for certain if there had been a real contest, and the mass of the electors had voted. Many such men are elected, but they do not occupy leading positions on the list. This is a serious business. The education of our youth has been by Providence entrusted in part to us as Christian men. Are we going to leave such a charge as if it were of no consequence? Is it, after all, a trifle how the rising generation shall be trained? Are Christian people so oblivious of their duties to their fellow-men that when asked to train the children, they reply, the work is beneath our notice, let the rowdies and the sectaries settle such worldly matters? It seems to us to be the bounden duty of each Christian man to vote for the best men for the School Board, and that it is equally the duty of some men among us of wealth and education to undertake the useful and philanthropic work of the Board. Ought not each district to have its own committee of Christian men, who shall meet before an election, consider the candidates, and advise the general public? Would not a good proportion of upright, God-fearing men, of generous sympathies and expanded views, be thus placed upon the Board? It is not for the Christian to descend into the dirt and trickery of politics, but in this case, as in others, to draw up politics into the light and power of the gospel of Christ. We advise that the Christian men of a district should form a Christian Consultation Committee, to watch for the public good upon such points. The United States has shown us what horrible corruption is engendered by Christian men refusing to be the salt of the world; let it not be so among us. Let us salt the meat before its corruptness utterly conquers us.
VERY PERSONAL. — As we must be absent through the Lord’s afflicting hand, we are compelled to make the following observations. For some reason or other subscriptions slacken and almost stop as soon as we leave home, nor do they rally till we return. If this continues we must come back at all hazards, for otherwise we shall have our ships aground. The Colportage is always the most in need, though one of the most deserving of our enterprises. The payment for the ground for the Girls’ Orphanage has made, we fear, but slow progress. For the other works little has come, but there are funds in hand which place us beyond absolute need. We are sure that the Lord will provide; but when one is very ill and weary, it is pleasant not to have your faith much tried. At such a time it is a double comfort to be remembered by friends, and to see that they will not allow the holy cause to suffer because the chief worker is laid aside. Satan loses one of his fiery darts when he can no longer whisper, “God forsakes you, and your friends forget you.” This weapon is forged out of lies, but he is none the less ready to use it in the dark and dreary hour.
COLLEGE. — Each Friday afternoon after our departure, until the Christmas vacation commenced, Dr. Sinclair Paterson delivered a lecture to the students on behalf of the Christian Evidence Society. We have received most glowing accounts from many of the men of their appreciation of the Doctor’s discourses on “Theism and Science,” “Cause and Purpose in Nature,” “Evolution and Design,” and “Man and Conscience.” The high ability and intense earnestness manifested in the lectures will make the Doctor a great favorite with the Pastors’ College.
Mr. F. G. Marchant, pastor of the Baptist Church, Hitchin, will, after Christmas, become the Junior Mathematical and Classical Master of the Pastors’ College. Our friend has no intention of ceasing his ministry, but comes to work with us with the full consent of his church. Up till this date the vacancy has been most happily filled by the joint labors of Dr. Davies (York Road), and Mr. Wrench (Parish Street), from whom we part with most respectful regret.
During the past month Mr. J. S. Geale has accepted the pastorate of the church at Queen Square, Brighton.
Mr. C. H. Thomas, of Warwick, has come to London to help us in the secretarial work of the church, college, etc.
Mr. G. Stanley, of Whitstable, has removed to Eythorne, Kent; Mr. T. H. Smith, of Shefford, has gone to Hadden-ham, Cambridgeshire; and Mr. G. Dunnett, of Newcastle-under-Lyme, is going to Darkhouse Chapel, Coseley, Stafford-shire. Mr. H. Marsden, of Mansfield, Nottingham-shire, has been compelled, through ill-health, to resign his pastoral charge. Under medical advice he has sailed for Australia, where we hope, with renewed vigor, he will be able to get into harness again, He left on the 13th ult., in the Melanope, which is bound for Melbourne, but he thinks of going on to Brisbane. Friends in the colonies will please note that Mr. Marsden is a first-rate man, worthy of the utmost confidence, a man to be seized upon for a pastor by any church in need of a live minister.
The news has reached us that Mr. T. Cannon, late of Torquay, is dead. He was one of our earliest students, but inclined somewhat to the Plymouth Brethren.
India. — Mr. Maplesden reports his safe arrival at Madras, after a very trying voyage. The members of the church, and ministers of other denominations, gave him a most hearty welcome, He writes that he considers the prospects of work are exceedingly encouraging.
Mr. Blackie has resigned the pastorate of the Lal Bazar church, Calcutta, having accepted the unanimous invitation of the church at Bombay. As the result of his. two years’ work in Calcutta, the church has prospered numerically, financially, and spiritually. The church writes to us for a pastor. May guidance from on high, be given us in making the choice.
Africa. — Mr. Hamilton, of Cape Town, reports the opening of the “converted” wine-store at Rondebosch, five miles from the city where he lives. This is the first Baptist Chapel at Cape Town, and also in the western province of South Africa. Mr. Hamilton hopes soon to begin building his own chapel. Now that Mr. Batts has gone he greatly needs a co-pastor, as he has frequently three services on Sunday, and one every evening during the week, either in Cape Town or the surrounding villages. We are looking out for the man, and two of the Lord’s stewards promise the means to send him out.
Mr. Batts sends us good news from Port; Elizabeth. where he seems to be filling Mr. Stokes’s place very satisfactorily. He thinks there is a fine field for the right sort of men in South Africa. “The climate is almost perfect, we have in reality perpetual summer; fruits are plentiful, so is money, and above all, the fields are white unto the harvest . . . I could mention several places in which a work would at once open up if men could only get their passage expenses provided for them.” Now is the time for Baptists in South Africa, and as the Lord enables us we will not let the tide pass by us.
Our beloved friend, Mr. Johnson, sends us a very touching account of the illness and death of his dear wife. a few extracts from which will, we feel sure, evoke the heartiest sympathy and prayers of those of our readers who made their acquaintance while they were with us. It appears that the journey from Victoria to Bakundu occupied nearly three weeks, in consequence of the opposition raised by the king of Mungo to the passage of the missionaries through his dominions. They were within six hours’ march of their destination when they were stopped by a large band of armed natives, who compelled them to return to Mungo, where they were heavily fleeced, and sent back to Victoria. The exposure to the hot sun by day, and the heavy dews by night, together with the threatening attitude of the natives, seriously injured the health of the whole party. After a week’s rest they started again, Mrs. Johnson and Mrs. Richardson being carried in hammocks. The men who were carrying Mrs. Johnson stumbled over a stone or stump of a tree, which hurt her back very much; and, to crown all, poor Mr. Johnson was seized with fever, so that he also had to ride in a hammock. After they reached Bakundu Mrs. Johnson took the fever; and, although she rallied for awhile, she was never really well. Much of the time both husband and wife were ill together, and so unable to help each other. Of the later weeks of Mrs. Johnson’s life her sorrowing yet rejoicing partner thus writes: “The blessed Bible, which gives comfort and consolation such as nothing else can do. was her constant companion. Day utter day and night after night she would seek to know more of its contents. The rest which remains for the people of God was a theme she much delighted to dwell upon. The ‘Morning by Morning; or, Daily Bible Readings,’ was indeed a source of great comfort to her. The ‘Sermons,’ which are sent to me every month by Mr. Wigney’s class, were read and reread by her. About six weeks before her death she was much better, and the fevers all left her. Her favorite text was. ‘I shall be satisfied when I awake With thy likeness.’ On Sunday morning, June 29, while Brother Richardson and his wife were at the service, I was not well, and she came and sat by my bed and talked over our married life of over fifteen years. The following Friday she was taken with a chill, followed by a severe fever. On the Monday she slept all day. and complained at night that it had been lost time, as she had been unable to read the daily portion. As she had previously read the one for that day I selected, mother passage, ‘ I will never leave thee,’ which she enjoyed very much. During the night she was delirious, but in the morning she said. ‘Although my mind leaves me at times I have not lost sight of that rest. He whom the Son sets free is free indeed.’ Just before noon her speech failed her, and she never spoke again. On Wednesday afternoon I said, ‘Henrietta. do you love Jesus?’ Her lips moved, but she was too helpless to lift her hands. Just before candlelight I asked her if I should read the Bible. Her lips again moved, so I read part of John 14. At eight o’clock she commenced to breathe hard, and looked at me as though she wanted to speak. This lasted just a minute or two, and then she went home to live with my blessed Jesus. She is indeed now at rest and free. Little did I think when she sang with us, ‘Wait a little while, and then we’ll sing the new song,’ that she would leave us to sing it so soon. But so it seemed good in the sight of our Father to call her home from the land of her fathers to be crowned. Since the death of my dear wife I thought at one time that I should soon follow her. My heart seemed to be affected in some way, and I suffered also from fever and neuralgia; but God has seen fit to raise me up again. I am match better, but far from being well. I wish sometimes I could come home and stay five or six months. I sometimes fear that I shall not be able to do the good I had hoped to do in Africa. but my Father knows all about it. If he wants me to serve him in this way, Amen God’s way is always the best way. . . Please ask the friends at the prayer-meeting to pray for the success of our work at Bakundu. I am now praying for the conversion of the young king.
“Yours truly for Africa.
“THOMAS L. JOHNSON.”
EVANGELISTS. — After we had completed our “Notes” for the December magazine we received from Scarborough even more cheering news than that already published. The success of the services was so great that the evangelists were entreated. to remain a week beyond the time allotted. To this they gladly consented, and the re-suit proved the wisdom of the arrangement. As the circus was not available for the week-night services, the two next largest buildings in the town were simultaneously occupied each. evening, and. even then hundreds were unable to gain admission. The attendance at the noon prayer-meetings increased to seven hundred, Mr. Fullerton’s afternoon Bible readings attracted all congregations, while the closing meetings were of a very remarkable character. Nearly two thousand people attended the early morning prayer-meeting, and at least as many had to be shut out of the circus at the evening service. During their visit Messrs. Smith and Fullerton had their usual special gatherings for children, and for working men; and, in addition, they held a meeting for Band of Hope children, to which the little ones from the workhouse were invited. Some of the spiritual results of the mission may be gathered from the fact that the invitations to tea were given to about two hundred persons who were believed to have been brought to a knowledge of the truth through the instrumentality of the evangelists. At one of the services they collected over £14 for the local Dispensary, and we are to receive as a thankoffering to our Evangelistic Fund the noble contribution of one hundred guineas. We might fill many pages with interesting accounts of the work in Scarborough, but we must insert an extract from a report of services sent to a local paper by Mr. Adey: — “ Of the character of the preaching we can only say that both brethren have been trained in Mr. Spurgeon’s school, and that they have imbibed the steady faith and indomitable perseverance of their tutor and director. Conscious that they have following them the prayers of three thousand Christian people at the Metropolitan Tabernacle itself, who frequently send telegrams to them from their London meetings; conscious of the fact that their beloved pastor at Mentone, laid aside as he is by exhausting labors and painful sickness, is ever watching their work with interest; and, above all things, sustained by their own firm belief in the promise, ‘Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world,’ these brethren, whether singing or preaching the gospel, are not plagued with doubts as other men are, and God is clearly blessing alike their faith and their works. Their theology is that of the old Puritans. They preach ruin by the Fall; redemption, regeneration, and justification by faith, in the old style and. with the old results. Mr. Fullerton, who is young, a circumstance which his critics cannot forget, and which his friends thankfully remember, has a grasp of the great primary truths of Christianity which is simply wonderful, and a power of adapting himself to the varying needs of each audience, that can only be appreciated fully by those who have followed him from place to place as we have done.
“They have left behind them in Scarborough work for the churches of the town in gathering up the fruit of their labors, which will occupy the ministers and helpers of the Scarborough churches for a long time to come…. Whilst Christian people must rejoice as they see the old gospel winning its way victoriously, there are many people not professing Christianity who acknowledge that a work has been wrought in the town which demands record, which promises well for its true prosperity, and which shows that steady, unselfish, and well-directed efforts to reach the masses of the people meet with a rich reward.”
Mr. Fullerton mentions one very interesting instance out of many answers to prayer received at Scarborough. Special subjects were selected for each day’s petitions, and on the morning assigned to “seamen” prayer was asked for the crews of some boats long overdue, and almost given up in despair. At the last meeting a man came to give thanks that in answer to prayer he had been rescued by the lifeboat, and it turned out that all the men prayed for had been brought into port in a most remarkable manner.
From Nov. 30 to Dec. 14, the evangelists were engaged at Cambridge, where they held daily noon prayer-meetings in the Congregational, Wesleyan, and Baptist chapels; and services every evening, and twice each Sunday, in the Barnwell Theater. This month they will be hard at work on the home farm, where we trust they will reap greater results from their sowing of the good seed of the kingdom than in any place they have visited before.
MR. BURNHAM was at Thetford, Norfolk, from Nov. 10 to 16. Pastor G. Monk writes, — “ At our meetings for prayer for several weeks before he came the burden of our petitions had been that much good might result from his coming. Our largest hopes have been more than realized. At no time during my pastorate have I seen so much interest awakened and sustained as during our brother’s stay with us; the chapel was well filled every evening except Saturday; several inquirers remained to speak with us, and best of all’ souls were saved and enabled to rejoice in Christ.”
From Nov. 17 to 30 Mr. Burnham was at Burton-on-Trent. The special feature of the services there was a daily open-air meeting in front of the chapel, which faces a large factory. Every day during the dinner hour, from three to four hundred working men were thus induced to listen to the gospel in song or story, the result of which cannot be known at present, but it must be productive of good. The indoor services were also well attended, and an earnest spirit prevailed, although but few actual cases of conversion were met with at the time. Mr. Burnham has since visited Naunton and Ginting, near Cheltenham, and Melford, Suffolk; and for this month he is fully engaged at Eye, Suffolk; Piss, Norfolk, and Driffield and Cranswick, Yorks.
ORPHANAGE. — It was a golden hour for the Orphanage when Mr. Charlesworth proposed to train a choir of boys who should hold services of song for the Institution. The project has succeeded delightfully. We accord to Mr. Charles-worth and his helpers, and the orphans, all the credit which is due to them, and then it remains to be said that the main cause of success lies in the love of our many friends. During our illness we have had deep draughts of refreshment through the tours made by the boys in Kent and Hampshire. The boys have been treated like little princes, and the cause has been helped as by princes and queens. We had a long account prepared of the success of the meetings at Folkestone, Dover. Deal, and Chatham, but after reading it over, and feeling very moist about the eyes at the remembrance of many dear names in those places, whose kindness never fails, we thought it would not be well to print it. It seemed as if we should be sure to forget somebody if we entered into details, and as high-constable and mayors, churchmen and dissenters, all united with our special friends, we think we had better bow our sincere acknowledgments all round, and say, “God bless you all.” £82 4s. 6d. appears to be the net results of this week’s tour.
At South Street, Greenwich, the choir sang £20 into the treasury: at the same time aiding our dear son. May our children after the flesh and after the Spirit partake in one common blessing. At Dacre Park, Lee, our brother Usher entertained the choir, but the weather was unutterable. Proceeds unknown as vet.
The Hampshire tour commenced December 2nd. Mr. Medhurst’s friends, ever among our foremost helpers, received the lads right gladly. The collection came to £22 10s. The members of Mr. Medhurst’s Bible Class have during the year collected £50 thus., thus bringing up their help in one year to the noble amount of £73 6s. The first student is not to be excelled in his love to his old friend. How sweet, how uplifting to our heart is such true brotherly love! We invoke a thousand blessings on our brother and on the many who deal to us according to the same spirit.
When the lads moved on to Southampton, Mr. Mackey and his friends were equally alive and enthusiastic. Our dear old friend, Trestrail, with his glorious warm heart welcomed the lads at Newport, and with the aid of many friends made the matter a great success. The same may be said of Mr. Craig at Cowes, and Mr. Sparkes at West Cowes. In each case the institution was taken up either by the mayor or by some other leading gentlemen, while not only our own ministers, but those of other denominations joined in the effort of love. One who writes to us says, “You ought to be a very happy man.” Right, good friend, right. Undeserved affection to us personally has been our happy portion, for the Lord’s sake, and we know that his love to us for Christ’s sake has produced much fruit for the orphans, and we are happy. We feel utterly unworthy of a thousandth part of the kind things which have been said and done, and we are glad that the friends make such a generous error in esteeming us far too highly, since it leads them to help the fatherless. Thank you, dear friends, thank you from the deeps of my heart.
During the present month Mr. Charles-worth has arranged meetings, commencing on the 12th, at Bath, Bristol, Gloucester, Cheltenham, and Hereford; and he is negotiating a series in Liverpool through the kindness of the executive of the Local Baptist Union.
The first troop of girls has been received at the new Orphanage. We may therefore say that “The Hawthorns” have put forth their first blossoms in midwinter. Behold a miracle of grace!
Friends, please remember that the next Collectors’ meeting will be held at the Orphanage on Friday, January 9. Make it a good meeting to give the girls a hearty welcome.
Most generous was the impulse which led Dr. Parker on a sudden to make a collection for the Orphanage. May God bless him in return. Our intercourse with him has been but slender, hence the utter spontaneousness of his kindly deed was the more striking and refreshing to our heart. The cause deserves everybody’s help, but presented as a personal token of sympathy the Doctor’s unexpected aid is most grateful to our heart. This is the warm brotherly letter which came to us when in our lowest plight. It was not meant for the press, but we hope we do no wrong in printing it: —
“Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — Last Thursday morning I asked my hearers to make a collection on behalf of the Orphanage, and they gave about £15 in the boxes. The matter was gone into without the slightest notice or preparation, or the result would have been larger. We do not like to send a cheque for anything under £ 20, hence the difference between the collection and the enclosed. Use it for the boys or girls just as you like, and always remember that the City Temple pulpit is open when you care to occupy it in the interests of your Orphanage. t want you to be young for ever, and strong to do the work you love. God bless you with rest and hope.
“Ever sincerely yours,
JOSEPH PARKER.”
COLPORTAGE. — This work is being car-lied on by the agents and Committee and Secretary with all their might, but nothing which we write about it seems to elicit sympathy or to bring help. There is great present need for this agency, God has greatly blessed it in former years, it is a work which deserves the earnest help of all Christian men: — but if others do not think so we must leave it. We will carry it on as we have means; but we confess that we are greatly disheartened. No other enterprise of ours has ever dragged along like this work, and yet there is not one which exceeds it in value.
PERSONAL NOTES. — In recent numbers of The Sword and the Trowel several instances have been given of the good effects of “Spurgeon’s Sermons,” will you allow the writer to add one more? In one of our resorts for invalids in the Midland Counties is a man of almost world-wide distinction, but who was better known thirty or forty years ago than he is to-day. His history is brimful of interesting incidents, and, when written, will be one of the most remarkable in modern times. He has seen eightyeight summers, and though his natural force is abeted, and his eyes somewhat dimmed, he can, with the aid of a lens, see to read the daily papers, and is conversant with all the current events in national and social life. He is as sensitive as a barometer to any change in the diplomacy of the courts of Europe, and especially is this the case with anything connected with the tribes of Israel, and their restoration to their own land. He has crossed the desert to visit Palestine, and on his first visit was accompanied by Dr. Black (who spoke nineteen languages), McCheyne, and Bonar. He has been the contemporary of some of the most distinguished divines, physicians, and writers that Scotland has ever known. He is now confined to his bed, from which he knows he will never be lifted until he is carried to the place of sepulcher. Not a murmur, however, escapes his lips. He has the piety of a saint and the simplicity of a child; but you can see the old fire burn when the foundation truths are assailed by men of modern thought. His chief joy on the Sabbath, dear Mr. Editor, is to hear one of your sermons. The reader is a little maid; and he avows that he has the best preacher and hears the best sermon in the town. Need I say that our aged friend is Dr. Alexander Keith, the author of “The Evidence of Prophecy” and other valuable works. I am not commissioned by the seer to send you the above, but I am commissioned to give you his grateful thanks for the rich feast you give him. He, moreover, wished me to say that, while spending the winter at the Bridge of Allan, two or three years ago, your sermons were read by invalids in five separate rooms of the same establishment every Sunday. Many prayers go up daily to heaven for the continuance of your health and life, but not the least fervent come from the lips of this dear old man. W.B.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle. — October 23rd, fifteen; 24th two: 27th, seventeen; 30th, thirteen; November 27th, fifteen; December 4th, twenty. Statement of Receipts from November 15th to December 14th, 1879.
Chap 3. FEBRUARY, 1880.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
FEBRUARY, 1880.
THE PEARL OF PATIENCE
A SERMON PREACHED IN HIS OWN ROOM AT MENTONE,
TO AN AUDIENCE OF FOURTEEN FRIENDS.
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
“Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.” — James 5:11.
WE need to be reminded of what we have heard, for we are far too ready to forget. We are also so slow to consider and meditate upon what we have heard that it is profitable to have our memories refreshed. At this time we are called upon to recollect that we have heard of the patience of Job. We have, however, I trust, gone beyond mere hearing, for we have also seen in the story of Job that which it was intended to set vividly before our mind’s eye. “Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord.” The Romish priest professes to make men hear the voice of the gospel by seeing, but the scriptural way is to make men see the truth by hearing. Faith, which is the soul’s sight, comes by hearing. The design of the preaching of the gospel to the ear is to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ. Inward sight is the result of all fruitful hearing.
Now, that which is to be seen in the Scriptures is somewhat deeper, and calls for more thought than that which is merely heard. “Ye have heard of the patience of Job” — an interesting history, which a child may understand; but it needs divine teaching to see to the bottom of that narrative, to discover the pearl which lies in the depths of it. It can only be said of enlightened disciples, “Ye have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.” At the same time, that which is seen is also more precious to the heart, and more bountifully enriches the soul than anything which is only heard. I count it no small enrichment of our mind to have heard of the patience of Job, it comforts and strengthens us in our endurance; but it is an infinitely better thing to have seen the end of the Lord, and to have perceived the undeviating tenderness and pity which are displayed even in his sorest chastisements. This is indeed a choice vein of silver, and he that hath digged in it is far richer than the more superficial person, who has only heard of the patience of Job, and so has only gathered surface-truth. “The patience of Job,” as we hear of it, is like the shell of some rare nut from the Spice Islands, full of fragrance; but “the end of the Lord,” when we come to see it, is as the kernel, which is rich beyond expression with a fullness of aromatic essence.
Note well the reason why the text reminds us of what we have heard and seen. When we are called to the exercise of any great virtue, we need to call in all the helps which the Holy Spirit has bestowed upon us. All our wealth of hearing and seeing we shall have need to spend in our heavenly warfare. We shall be forced full often to gird up the loins of our mind by the recollection of examples of which we have heard, such as that of Job, and then to buckle up that girdle, and brace it fast with what we have seen. The patience of Job shall gird us, and that “end of the Lord” which we have seen shall be the fastening of the band. We shall need all ere our work is done. In the present case, the virtue we are called to exercise is that of patience, and therefore to help us to do it we are reminded of the things that we have heard and seen, because it is a grace as difficult as it is necessary, and as hard to come at as it is precious when it is gained.
The text is preceded by a triple exhortation to patience. In the seventh verse we read, “Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord”; and again, “Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain. Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.” Further on, in the tenth verse, we read, “Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction, and of patience.” Are we thrice exhorted to patience? Is it not clear that we have even now much need of it? We are most of us deficient in this excellent grace, and because of it we have missed many privileges, and have wasted many opportunities in which we might have honored God, might have commended religion, and might have been exceedingly profited in our own souls. Affliction has been the fire which would have removed our dross, but impatience has robbed the mental metal of the flux of submission which would have secured its proper purification. It is unprofitable, dishonorable, weakening; it has never brought us gain, and never will.
I suppose we are three times exhorted to patience because we shall need it much in the future. Between here and heaven we have no guarantee that the road will be easy, or that the sea will be glassy. We have no promise that we shall be kept like flowers in a conservatory from the breath of frost, or that, like fair queens, we shall be veiled from the heat of the sun.
The voice of wisdom saith, “be patient, be patient, be patient; you may need a three-fold measure of it; be ready for the trial.” I suppose, also, that we are over and over again exhorted to be patient, because it is so high an attainment. It is no child’s play to be dumb as the sheep before her shearers, and to lie still while the shears are taking away all that warmed and comforted us. The mute Christian under the afflicting rod is no everyday personage. We kick out like oxen which feel the goad for the first time; we are most of us for years as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke. “Be patient, be patient, be patient,” is the lesson to be repeated to our hearts many times, even as we have to teach children over and over again the selfsame words, till they know them by heart. It is the Holy Ghost, ever patient with our .provocations, who calls us to “be patient.” It is Jesus, the unmurmuring sacrifice, who charges us to “be patient.” It is the longsuffering Father who bids us “be patient.” Oh! you who are soon to be in heaven, be patient for yet a little while, and your reward shall be revealed.
So you see that it is not without reason that we are by the text called to strengthen ourselves by what we have heard of things encouraging and stimulating. We shall need ere we become adepts in the science of patience to learn from what we have heard of the patience of Job, and we shall need to fortify ourselves with the clearest perception of the exceeding pitifulness of the chastening Father.
Upon these two things we will indulge a brief meditation. Firstly, we are bidden to be patient, and it is not an unheard of virtue — “ Ye have heard of the patience of Job “; and, secondly, we are bidden to be patient, and it is not an unreasonable virtue — for ye “have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.”
I. IT IS NOT AN UNHEARD OF VIRTUE TO BE PATIENT: “Ye have heard of the patience of Job.” Observe well that the patience of Job was the patience of a man like ourselves, imperfect and full of infirmity; for, as one has well remarked, we have heard of the impatience of Job as well as of his patience. I am glad the divine biographer was so impartial, for had not Job been somewhat impatient we might have thought his patience to be altogether inimitable, and above the reach of ordinary men. The traces of imperfection which we see in Job prove all the more powerfully that grace can make grand examples out of common constitutions, and that keen feelings of indignation under injustice need not prevent a man’s becoming a model of patience. I am thankful that I know that Job did speak somewhat bitterly, and proved himself a man, for now I know that it was a man like myself who said, “The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; and blessed be the name of the Lord.” It was a man of flesh and blood, such as mine, who said, “Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?” Yea, it was a man of like passions with myself who said, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him.” Ye have heard of the patience of your Lord and Master, and tried to copy it, and half despaired; but now ye have heard of the patience of his servant Job, and knowing as Job did that your Redeemer liveth, ye should be encouraged to emulate him in obedient submission to the will of the Lord.
“Ye have heard of the patience of Job,” that is, the patience of a greatly tried man. That is a very trite yet needful remark: Job could not have exhibited patience if he had not endured trial; and he could not have displayed a patience whose fame rings down the ages, till we have heard of it, if he had not known extraordinary affliction. Reflect, then, that it was the patience of a man who was tried in his estate. All his wealth was taken! Two or three servants were left, — left only to bring him evil tidings, each one saying, “I only am escaped alone to tell thee.” His flocks and his herds were gone, the house in which his children had met was a wreck, and the princely man of Uz sat upon a dunghill, and there were none so mean as to do him reverence. Ye have heard of the patience of Job in loss and poverty; have ye not seen that if all estates should fail God is your portion still? Job was caused to suffer sharp relative troubles. All his children were snatched away without a warning, dying at a festival, where, without being culpably wrong, men are usually unguarded, and in a sense unready, for the spirit is in dishabille. His children died suddenly, and there was a grievous mystery about it, for a strange wind from the wilderness smote the four corners of the house, and overthrew it in an instant; and such an occurrence must have connected itself in Job’s mind either with the judgment of God,. or with satanic influence, — a connection full of the most painful thoughts and surmises. The death of his dear ones was not a common or a desirable one, and yet all had so been taken. Not a son or daughter was left him. All gone! All gone! He sits among the ashes a childless man. “Ye have heard of the patience of Job.” Oh, to have patience under bereavements, patience even when the insatiate archer multiplies his arrows! Then, and I here speak most to myself, “Ye have heard of the patience of Job” under personal affliction. It is well said by one who knew mankind cruelly well, that “we bear the afflictions of other people very easily”; but when it touches our bone and our flesh trial assumes an earnest form, and we have need of unusual patience. Such bitter pain as Job must have suffered, we have probably none of us known to anything like the same degree: and yet we have had weary nights and dreary days. Each limb has claimed a prominence in anguish, and each nerve has become a road for armies of pains to march over. We know what it is to feel thankful tears in our eyes merely for having been turned over in bed. Job, however, far excels us; “Ye have heard of the patience of Job,” and ye know how he sinned not when from the crown of his head to the sole of his foot he was covered with irritating boils.
In addition to all this, Job bore what is perhaps the worst form of trial — namely, mental distress. The conduct of his wife must have much grieved him when she tempted him to “Curse God, and die.” However she meant it, or however her words may be translated, she evidently spoke like a foolish woman when her husband needed wise consolation. And then those “miserable comforters,” how they crowned the edifice of his misery! Coldblooded mortals sneer at sentimental grievances, but I speak from my heart when I affirm that griefs which break no bones and take not a groat from our store may yet be among the sharpest whips of sorrow. When the iron enters into the soul we know the very soul of suffering. See how Job’s friends fretted him with arguments, and worded him with accusations. They rubbed salt into his wounds, they cast dust into his eyes, their tender mercies were cruel, though well-intentioned. Woe to the man who in his midnight hour is hooted at by such owls; yet the hero of patience sinned not: “Ye have heard of the patience of Job.”
Job’s was in all respects a most real trouble, he was no mere dyspeptic, no hysterical inventor of imaginary evil; his were no fancied losses nor minor calamities. He had not lost one child out of a numerous family, nor a few thousands out of a vast fortune, but he was brought to sad bereavement, abject poverty, and terrible torment of body and mind; but, despite it all, “Ye have heard of the patience of Job”; heard more of his patience than of his afflictions. What a mercy to have heard of such a man, and to know that one of our own race passed through the seven-times heated furnace, and yet was not consumed!
The patience of Job was the patience of a man who endured up h the very end. No break-down occurred; at every stage he triumphed, and to the utmost point he was victorious. Traces of weakness are manifest, but they are grandly overlaid by evidences of gracious power. What a marvelous man was he with all those aches and pains, still bearing witness to his God, “But he knoweth the way that I take when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.” He reasons well even in the heat of his passionate zeal for his character, he reasons bravely too, and catches up the points of his adversaries like a trained logician. He holds fast his integrity, and will not let it go, and best of all, he cries, “I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though, after my skin, worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God.” Oh, glorious challenge of a dying man to his immortal Kinsman!
The enemy could not triumph over Job, he threw him on a dunghill, and it became his throne, more glorious than the ivory throne of Solomon. The boils and blains with which the adversary covered the patriarch were more honor to him than a warrior’s gilded corslet. Never was the arch-fiend more thoroughly worsted than by the afflicted patriarch, and, instead of pitying the sufferer, my pity curdles into contempt for that fallen spirit who must there have gnawed his own heart, and drank deep draughts of gall and wormwood as he saw himself foiled at all points by one who had been put into his power, and one too of the feeble race of man. Surely, in this he experienced a foretaste of the bruising threatened at Eden’s gate as to be given him by the woman’s seed. Yes, Job endured unto the end, and hence he stands as a pillar in the house of the Lord. Cannot we endure unto the end too? What doth hinder grace from glorifying itself in us?
We may once more say that the patience of Job is the virtue of one who thereby has become a great power for good. “Ye have heard of the patience of Job,” yes, and all the ages have heard of the patience of Job, and heaven has heard of the patience of Job, and hell has heard of it too; and not without results in each of the three Worlds. Among men, the patience of Job is a great moral and spiritual force. This morning, when musing upon it, I felt ashamed and humbled, as thousands have done before me. I asked myself, “What do I know of patience when I compare myself with Job?” and I felt that I was as unlike the great patriarch as I well could be. I recollect a minister who had been somewhat angered by certain of his people, and therefore preached from the text, “And Aaron held his peace.” It was remarked that the preacher’s likeness to Aaron reached no further than the fact that Aaron held his peace, and the preacher did not. May we not penitently confess that our likeness to Job is much of the same order: he was patient, and we are not? Yet, as I thought of the patience of Job, it caused me to hope. If Job was patient under trial and affliction, why should not I be patient too? He was but a man; what was wrought in one man may be done in another. He had God to help him, and so have I; he could fall back upon the living Redeemer, so can I; and why should I not? Why should not I attain to patience as well as the man of Uz? It made me feel happy to believe in human capacity to endure the will of God, the Holy Spirit instructing and upholding. Play the man, beloved friend! Be not cast down! What God hath done for one he can do for another. If the man be the same, and if the great God be the same, and be sure he is, we too may attain to patience in our limited circle; our patience may be heard of among those who prize the fruits of the Spirit.
II. I will not detain you, lest I weary you, except just to say, in the second place, IT IS NOT AN UNREASONABLE VIRTUE TO BE PATIENT, for according to our text there is great love and tenderness in it, “Ye have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.” We must have seen in Job’s story, if we have regarded it aright, that the Lord was in it all. It is not a narrative in which the devil is the sole actor — the great Lord of all is evidently present. He it was who challenged Satan to consider Job, and then questioned him as to the result. Less seen than the evil one, the Lord was nevertheless present at every act of the drama. God was not away while his servant suffered; in fact, if there was any place where the thoughts of God were centered more than anywhere else in providence at that time, it was where the perfect and upright man was bearing the brunt of the storm. The Lord was ruling too. He was not present as a mere spectator but as still master of the situation. He had not handed over the reins to Satan; far from it, for every step that the enemy took was only by express permission from the throne. He allowed him to strip his servant, but he set the limit, “Only upon himself put not forth thine hand.” When to complete the test the enemy was permitted to plague his body, the Lord added, “But save his life.” The ruling hand is always on the curb. The dog of hell is allowed to snap and snarl, but his chain is not removed, and the collar of omnipotent restraint is on him. Come, dear friends, you that are in trouble, remember that God is in your sorrow, ruling it to a desired end, and checking it that it should go no further than according to his will; and you neither have suffered, nor in the future will suffer, any more than he in infinite love permits.
Moreover, ire Lord was blessing Job by all his tribulation. Untold blessings were coming to the grand old man while he seemed to be losing all. It was not simply that he obtained a double portion at the end, but all along, every part of the testing process wrought out his highest good. Now have we seen the end of the Lord, and that end is unmingled goodness. The Lord was standing by every moment to stop the refining process when it had come to the proper point, so that no more of it should happen than was really beneficial, and at the same time no less than should secure his gracious purpose. True mercy is bound at times to seem untender, for it might be a great and life-long evil for the surgeon to stop the knife before its work was done: the Lord was wisely tender and tenderly wise with Job, and even in his case the sore affliction was not allowed to proceed a single degree beyond the needful point of intensity.
And when we come to look all Job’s life through, we see that the Lord in mercy brought him out of it all with unspeakable advantage. He who tested with one hand supported with the other. Whatever Satan’s end might be in tempting the patriarch, God had an end which covered and compassed that of the destroyer, and that end was answered all along the line, from the first loss which happened among the oxen to the last taunt of his three accusers. There was never a question in the heights of heaven as to the ultimate issue. Eternal mercy was putting forth its irresistible energy, and Job was made to bear up through the trial, and to rise from it a wiser and a better man.
Such is the case with all afflicted saints. We may well be patient under our trials, for the Lord sends them; he is ruling in all their circumstances, he is blessing us by them, he is waiting to end them, and he is pledged to bring us through. Shall we not gladly submit to the Father of our spirits? Is not this our deepest wish — “Thy will be done”? Shall we quarrel with that which blesses us? Shall we repine when the end of the trouble is so near and so blessed? No, we see that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy, and therefore we will be patient.
Beloved, let us accept future sorrow with joy, for it is love divine which will add to our years whatever sorrowful seasons may yet come to us. Job’s life might have ended in the first period without the trial, but if the patriarch, with perfect knowledge of all things, could have had his choice, would he not have chosen to endure the trial for the sake of all the blessing which came of it? We should never have heard of the patience of Job if he had continued in his prosperity; and that first part. of his life would have made a very poor commonplace history as compared with what we now find in the pages of Scripture. Camels, sheep, servants, and children make up a picture of wealth, but we can see this any day; the rare sight is the patience, this it is which raises Job to his true glory. God was dealing well with his faithful servant, and even rewarding his uprightness, when he counted him worthy to be tried. The Lord was taking the surest and kindest way to bless and honor one who was a perfect and an upright man, one that feared God and eschewed evil.
It was pitiful of the Lord to permit sharp trial to come upon Job for his good; there was more tender mercy in subjecting him to it than there would have been in screening him from it. False pity would have permitted the good man to die in his nest, but true pity put a thorn into it, and made him mount aloft as the eagle. It was great mercy after all which took him out of the state in which he washed his steps with butter, and cast him into the mire, for thus he was weaned from the world, and made to look the more eagerly for a better portion.
No doubt in Job’s character the Lord saw certain failings which we cannot see, which he desired to remove, and perhaps he also marked. some touches of grace which needed to be supplied; and divine love undertook to complete his perfect character. Perhaps his prosperity had. sunned him till he had grown somewhat hard in tone and sharp in judgment, and therefore the Lord would soften down and mellow his gracious spirit. The things lacking were no common virtues, for in these he was perfect, but certain rich and rare tints of the higher life; and these could not be imparted by any other means than severe suffering. Nothing more could really be done for Job but by this special agency, for doubling the number of his camels and sheep would only enlarge his cares, since he had enough already; of children, too, he had a sufficient family, and of all earthly things abundance; but to give him twice the grace, twice the experience, twice the knowledge of God, perhaps twice the tenderness of character he had ever possessed before, was a mode of enrichment which the tender and pitiful Lord adopted out of the greatness of his wisdom and favor. Job could only thus be made doubly rich in the rarest of all treasures, and the All-merciful adopted that method.
Examining the matter from another point of view, it may appear that Job was tried in order that he might be better able to bear the extraordinary prosperity which the Lord had resolved to pour in upon him.. That double portion might have been too much for the patriarch, if he had not been lifted into a higher state. If abundance be hard to bear, superfluity is even worse; and, therefore, to those he loves the Lord giveth more grace.
Job by his trials and patience received not only double grace, and double wealth, but double honor from God. He had stood very high in the peerage of the excellent as a perfect and an upright man before his trial, but now he is advanced to the very highest rank of spiritual nobility. Even our children call him “the most patient man under pains and sufferings.” He rose from the knighthood of sincere goodness to the peerage of heroic endurance. At first, he had. the honor of behaving admirably amid wealth and ease, but he was. in the end elevated to sit among those who glorify God in the fires’ Benevolence, justice, and truth shone as bright stars in the sky of his heavenly character, but now the moon of patience silvers all, and lights up the scene with a superior beauty. Perhaps the Lord may love some of us so specially that he means to put upon us the dignity of endurance, he will make us knights, not of the golden fleece, but of the iron cross.. What but great pitifulness and tender mercy could plan such a lot for our unworthy selves?
Once more, Job by his trials and the grace of God was lifted up into the highest position of usefulness. He was useful before his trial as few men of wealth and influence have been, but now his life possesses an enduring fruitfulness which blesses multitudes every day. Even we who are, here this afternoon “have heard of the patience of Job.” All the ages have this man for their teacher. Brothers and sisters, we do not know who will be blessed by our pains, by our bereavements, by our crosses, if we have patience under them. Specially is this the case with God’s ministers, if he means to make much of them: their path to usefulness is up the craggy mountain’s side. If we are to comfort God’s afflicted people, we must first be afflicted ourselves. Tribulation will make our wheat fit to be bread for saints. Adversity is the choicest book in our library, printed in black letter, but grandly illuminated. Job makes a glorious comforter and preacher of patience, but no one turns either to Bildad, Zophar, or Eliphaz, who were “miserable comforters,” because they had never been miserable. You, dear sisters, whom God will make daughters of consolation to your families, must in your measure pass through a scholarship of suffering too; a sword must pass through your own hearts if you are to be highly favored and blessed among women. Yet, let us all remember that affliction will not bless us if it be impatiently borne; if we kick at the goad it will hurt us, but it will not act as a fitting stimulus. If we rebel against God’s dispensations we may turn his medicines into poisons, and increase our griefs by refusing to endure them. Be patient, be patient, be patient, and the dark cloud shall drop a sparkling shower. “Ye have heard of the patience of Job”: imitate it. “Ye have seen the end of the Lord”: rejoice in it. “He is very pitiful, and of tender mercy”: yield yourselves to him. Divine Spirit, plant in us the sweet flower of patience, for our patient, Savior’s sake. Amen.
THE JIBBING HORSE
THE carriage would have ascended the hill very pleasantly, but one horse of the pair refused to pull. The other was a first-rate creature, but what could it do alone? Everything was kept waiting by the one jibbing animal While our patience was having its perfect work we thought upon families where happiness and prosperity would be enjoyed were it not for the willfulness of one individual. In most, cases it is the husband whose drunken habits pull down with both hands what his frugal wife endeavors to build up. Were we cruel when we wished a horse-whip could have been brought to bear upon a brutal fellow who sold the furniture which his wife had earned, and drank up the money which he thus procured? A little touch of the cat might not be too severe a medicine for such a rascal. Very rarely, we have known the wife to be the hindrance to success. A slovenly house and an extravagant expenditure have wasted the substance of an industrious man, and made his labor of no avail. Great pity is needed by a team which has a jibbing horse in it, but we have no pity for the jibber. Surely, if either man or woman could see how the case appears to an onlooker, for very shame jibbing would be given over, the neck would press the collar, and the family coach would climb the hill.
THE PULPIT AS A WARMING APPARATUS
“IN addition to the pulpit there is a hot-air warming apparatus.” This sentence occurred in the description of Mr. Culls Tabernacle at Shoreditch, which we inserted in last month’s magazine, and a gentle critic at once pounced upon it as a singular combination. So indeed it looks, and we may perhaps confess that it was a slip of the pen, but at the same time it is a highly suggestive one: the pulpit and the hot-air apparatus may be fitly put together. We remember once preaching in a small chapel, and after the sermon was over, and the collection was about to be made, we inquired of the pastor to what object the contributions were to be allotted. He replied that they were to purchase a stove for warming the chapel. Knowing that the congregation was exceedingly slender, and the minister remarkably dull, it occurred to us that the best place in which to put the stove would be the pulpit, for if the minister could be warmed, the people would not long be cold in so small a place.
Full many a discourse is enough to chill a man in the heat of summer, but on the other hand we know of places where the crowded congregations suffice to warm themselves, and a thoroughly red-hot sermon makes the hearers almost forget the weather. A pulpit may be a refrigerator, but it ought to be a furnace, or rather it should be the fire-place in the house to which all the family turn for warmth. What can be done to stoke the pulpits? The fire in many instances burns very low in that quarter, how can the expiring hearths be turned into more useful sources of heat?
The first thing needed is a live coal from off the altar. One will do to begin with if a seraph will but bring it. This coal will have a wonderful effect. Sermons set on fire in this fashion are glorious flare beaux burning up all that chills and freezes. Without this fire what a dreary thing preaching may become! Who can stand before its cold? Many discourses are comparable to salmon packed in ice, with the one exception that there is no salmon when you come to unpack, the parcel. When his words are cast forth as morsels of ice, and his sentences hang like icicles around his lips, the preacher is not likely to create fervor in the audience. A very proper style, a drawling utterance, a lifeless spirit, and common-place matter make up a fine freezing mixture. Under such influences the spiritual temperature falls far below zero, and abides there. Fire is wanted, and fire from heaven is at once the purest and the fiercest flame. Oh, for an Elijah to bring it down
As we cannot give the preacher this, it may be more practical to remark that some of our Lord’s servants are doubtless chilled in their hearts by a want of love on the part of their churches. They see prayer-meetings deserted, all good work left to them alone, and an utter indifference to them and to their office, and they are depressed. A few kind words of approbation fitly and seasonably spoken would set many a preacher on a glow, and the knowledge that he lived in the hearts of his friends would stimulate him, set him in the sunshine, and melt his frost. Let those who have been quick at blaming try the effect of a little love, and see what wonders it will work. If it does not benefit him who receives it, it will bless him who gives it, and so there will be no loss.
A larger measure of generosity on the part of those who support the man of God would also be well spent in many instances. The farmer who saw his neighbor using the whip very lavishly was as wise as he was merciful when he cried out, “Put the whip in the manger, neighbor. Give the poor creature fewer cracks and more corn.” Instead of finding fault with your minister find the good man more provender A burdened mind cannot exhibit the fertility and vivacity for which hearers are craving. In many a case it may be said of the preacher-
“Chill penury repressed his noble rage,
And froze the genial current of his soul.”
The knowledge that one’s children are badly clad and scarcely shod, that the cupboard is bare and the purse is empty, is enough to kill the enthusiasm of an otherwise burning spirit, especially when it is coupled with the fact that in the pews there are those who can indulge themselves in luxuries, and who could remove the pressure of their pastor’s want without suffering a self-denial. Thoughtlessness about this matter is one of the crying sins of the age, and tends greatly to withhold the blessing from the hand of God. It’ men care so little about the servant that they half starve him, the Master is not likely to pour out a blessing so large that there shall not be room enough to receive it. When the priests fainted at the altar for want of bread, the Lord frowned on Israel, and when his ministering servants are exposed to needless poverty he will not smile upon his church. If those who are able to do so would make our poor pastors the objects of their guardian care and constant liberality, it would be one of the surest and swiftest modes of securing a genuine revival.
A few well-chosen books, sent as a present to the pastor, would in many cases, by the divine blessing, kindle quite a beacon flame in the pulpit, and, without knowing why, the whole church would perceive with astonishment that cold platitudes had fled, and that holy freshness had taken their place. They must be good standard books, mind, and not a litter of old magazines, not worth the carriage. The best are the cheapest. Better one real book than a score of the sham volumes with which the press teems every day of the week. Send in a few pounds’ worth, or even less, of solid literature, and watch the result. If any doubt the success of this method, we would urge them to try it once, and if it does not succeed to try it again, and if still there is no beneficial result, to use in addition more frequently the bellows of prayer, and see if the holy breath does not excite the flame. Paul bade Timothy stir up the gift that was in him, and we would add to the apostolic advice that our brethren in the churches should stir up the gift which is in their pastors, not by cold words of criticism and fault-finding, but by such kindly methods as we have here suggested, and as many others as affection and wisdom can devise. You cannot get a good fire without fuel. Heap on abundance of glowing coals, and while you are hoping and praying, cheering and refreshing, the fire will burn. C.H.S.
HOLY ARITHMETIC
SERMON BY C. SPURGEON, PREACHED AT SOUTH-STREET,
GREENWICH.
(Abridged from short-hand notes.)
“Mercy unto you, and peace, and love, be multiplied. “ — Jude 2.
A TRINITY of blessings is often to be met with in God’s word. Here we have three choice gems — mercy, peace, and love — which seem to sparkle as we gaze upon them, and happy is the man who, while looking on them can say, “They are mine.” It is God’s happiness to crown all his people with goodness. For awhile, indeed, we may have to wear a crown of thorns, as our Master did; but even this shall be a glory to us. What is it you have on your brow now? Is it not a golden diadem wrought by a gracious Lord? It is as if God would weave a wreath for our heads out of his mercy, and intertwine it with the lily off peace, and adorn it with the rose of love. May this trio of blessings be given to each one of us, and be multiplied. God’s gifts always come in company, lie is God, and gives as a God. Man, indeed, has limited means, and so must be limited in his gifts; but God’s blessings are unbounded, and they come in triplets to us. Mercy is accompanied with peace and love, and since God blesses his children thus, when we come to him in prayer let us ask for a full supply of his favors. Jude would crave for a three-fold benediction to abide upon the saints of God. Do you. say, “If we have mercy, that is enough”? No, there is more to be enjoyed, for peace and love are to follow. When we are speaking for others let us be very bold. We may be somewhat backward when we seek blessings for ourselves, we are so sinful, and we know it; but when we ask for others “large petitions let us bring “ — for them let us seek mercy, peace, and love.
I want now to indulge in a little holy arithmetic. First, there is a SUM IN ADDITION — “ Mercy, and peace, and love.” Add these together. Then there is a SUM IN MULTIPLICATION. — “Mercy, and peace, and love, be multiplied; and then, by way of application, a SUM IN PRACTICE.
I. In the first place, we have a SUM IN ADDITION. As Christians we must never be content with the measure of our grace. Do not be satisfied to remain dwarf trees, but seek to be growing higher and higher, and at the same time sending your roots deeper and deeper. Like giant palms let our heads be lifted up to heaven, where the warm sunshine of divine love shall cherish growth, while our roots derive nourishment from the deep springs of secret grace. A sacred thirsting and hungering after celestial delicacies is what the Christian should at all times possess. We have sipped of the precious liquid only; let us take the cup salvation which overflows and drink it dry if we can: a crumb will not feed a famished soul; let us partake to the full of this heavenly bread. The first figure in this sum is “mercy,” and it is a very high number indeed. It stands foremost, for it is the chief of God’s dealings with us, whereby he pities us in our helplessness. We have already received much, but we are to add to it: for” He hath not dealt with us after our sins,” but favor has been shown to the undeserving, mercy to those who are full of sin. He has shown not only clemency in bestowing pardon, but his bountiful mercy whereby he supplies sufficiently our wants, “even the sure mercies of David.” So that whatever we need let us seek the stream bearing on its tide blessings for our souls to-day. Pray for this to God, who is rich in mercy, and he will add mercy to mercy. The best way to complete this sum is by coming to the mercy seat. Therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that you may obtain mercy. The Father of all mercies will hear and bless. We cry, “Have mercy upon us according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies.”
Then add to mercy “peace.” What a glorious numeral is this! As soon as we gain pardon there must come peace. For what soul shall dwell ill at ease that feels its sins forgiven? It is iniquity that causes pain; when this is removed there is a holy health of soul. The peace of God rules in our hearts, and keeps them too. Now are we reconciled to God through the death of his dear Son — we are at peace with him. The enmity of our hearts has been slain, and it is our delight to be in his company. We want to have more of this peace; how shall we gain it? Only by seeking to hold more communion with our God. If this fair flower is to grow within our hearts the dew of heaven must fall upon it during the hours of calm fellowship with God. We must dwell in him and he in us. Then there will come also a peace with self. Having no longer the consciousness of guilt, but of satisfaction; being right with God we are happy in ourselves, and peace pervades our spirits. The uprising of evil is quelled by the tranquilizing influence of a clear conscience, and so a holy peace abides within our hearts. Reign on, O powerful yet pacific Prince, and peace shall evermore crown us with prosperity! Have we got that peace with God? It is only by justification that we can obtain it. Through Jesus Christ, who is our peace, we enjoy this blessing. Shall we not add, then, to our heart’s content? In him are the springs of peace and love. Oh that this peace may flow as a river within us!
Yet again, there is another figure to add, and it is “love.” Surely there is no more room! We are already full now that we have the “mercy of God” and the “peace of God;” what more can we have? Add to all this the “love of God,” a boon beyond all calculation, a prize of infinite value. Many have got a little of this treasure: would to God all had more. Love lies smoldering in our hearts. O breath divine, blow these sparks into burning fires! Grace changes all within us, for while we receive such mercy and enjoy such peace from the hands of our loving Lord we feel we must love in return. “We love because we are loved,” and this love is a habit wrought in us by God himself, who is love. Do we hear the Master say, “Lovest thou me?” We answer, “Lord, thou knowest that we love thee;” and we might add more than Peter said, “We do not love thee as we should, nor even as we would.” The true mother would not have her child divided, neither would God have the hearts of his true children divided in their affections.
“Burn, burn, oh, love, within my breast
Burn fiercely night and day,
Till all the dross of earthly loves
Is burned and burned away.”
Let the love of God be shed abroad in our hearts as the sunlight gleaming through the painted window of a cathedral sheds a beauty upon all, adorning yet not disarranging aught. So the love of God should shine in our hearts, making everything beautiful, our thoughts, our words, our actions all being lit up with his love. Now, put these three together — mercy, peace, love — and what a grand total they make! Items in the grace of God for all to enjoy.
II. Now we come to our SUM IN MULTIPLICATION. If I want to increase rapidly let me have the multiplication table, and let it be by compound multiplication too. Multiply by that which has been itself multiplied. Mercy, and peace, and love, multiplied by mercy, and peace, and love, which have been multiplied. Is this shard sum? God can help us to do it if we also help ourselves. The first thing that affords aid is memory. Think of the mercies of yesterday, put them down, then multiply them by the mercies of to-day, and so on and on, meditating upon the favors of years past, and you will find by this mental exercise that the mercy you now enjoy will be multiplied. Let every mercy have a dot over it to show that it is a recurring one. And memory will refresh you concern-Lug peace too. Remember when the heart was broken, and the spirit was tried with anguish, how Jesus spake to you in words of tender love and blessed comfort. After the thunder and the whirlwind there was the “still small voice” which whispered peace. The dashing billows bore upon their crested summits the all-powerful voice of a loving Savior, who said, “It is I; be not afraid,” and immediately there was a calm. Recollect the morning of bright joy which followed the nights of sadness. Love, too, must be remembered if it is to be multiplied. Review all the tokens received in the past, all the choice souvenirs. Take down that bundle of letters, and let memory refresh herself by re-reading all the words of love written by a gracious God. Thus shall memory help us in our multiplication.
Another help we may have is mutual intercourse. As a boy at school runs to another older and wiser than himself when a sum is hard, and he needs help in doing it, so should Christians endeavor to find counsel and support from intercourse with their fellow-saints. A brother may tell you something you never knew before, for he has just received a mercy that you are wanting, and the way he obtained it may serve as a direction for you. Then get into the peaceful company of believers, and you will find your peace will be multiplied. Do not lie down with the lion, or you may learn to fight, but rest beside the lamb, and peace shall abound. Love also begets love, and in the fellowship of those who love the Lord you will derive much benefit and an increase to your love.
But the very best way is to go to the Master. If the sum is difficult, it may be well to take down the exercise-book and see the examples already worked out, Study God’s word and see how mercy, and peace, and love have been multiplied to others, so shall you learn the way to have your own multiplied, if you cannot get on with this aid, go straight away to the Headmaster. He is merciful, he is full of mercy, he is plenteous in mercy. Here, then, shall you find a way out of your difficulty. If you cannot multiply, he will do it for you; he is the Prince of Peace, submit yourself to his gentle reign, and peace shall be yours. Dwell in the atmosphere of his love and this grace shall be more and more in you. Thus, Teacher Divine, help thy scholars to rise and make progress while here below, until it shall please thee to call us home for the holidays, where our lessons shall be at an end, for then shall we enjoy the fullness of thy mercy, the sweetness of thy peace, and the bounties of thy love.
III. Now, a SUM IN PRACTICE, and a very short one too. Unto you who have been called, sanctified, and preserved, are these words of exhortation sent. Be merciful, for “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.” Be peaceful for “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.” Be loving, for “Love is of God, and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.” Evermore may this trinity of blessings abide with us: the mercy of the Lord which is from everlasting to everlasting, the peace of God which passeth understanding, and the love of God which passeth knowledge, for his name’s sake. Amen.
NOTES
The Person of Christ: the perfection of his humanity viewed as a proof of his deity. By PHILIP SCHAFF, D.D. NISBET AND CO.
“THE object of this book is to show, in a popular style, that the person of Christ is the great central miracle of history, and the strongest evidence of Christianity. The very perfection of his humanity is a proof of his divinity.” This design the author has earnestly pursued, and the result is a valuable treatise which is as complete as the size of the book would permit. It is a very useful thing to have collected into a handy form impartial testimonies to the character of Christ, such as were borne by Tacitus, Julian, Chubb, Rousseau, Napoleon, Goethe, Strauss, Theodore Parker, Stuart Mill. Renan, and others. That men of all sorts, and even those who have rejected his claims, have been compelled to admire, and almost adore his perfections is a wonderful proof that though our Lord was man he was more than other men. Think of Rousseau, saying, “If the life and death of Socrates were those of a sage, the life and death of Jesus are those of a God.” Why, then, did he not believe on him? Since he did not believe, what must have been the dearness of truth which forced an unbeliever to make such a confession? How plainly is Jesus in character surpassingly great when he brings from the lips of a Napoleon such words as these — “ Everything in Christ astonishes me. His spirit overawes me. From the first day to the last he is the same, always the same; majestic and simple infinitely firm, and infinitely gentle? Our Lord needs no witnesses, but it is refreshing to hear from one man and another of varied character and constitution the common confession that his character has convinced them, and that “truly this is the Son of God.” Dr. Schaff has produced a very admirable book for young students, and to them we earnestly recommend a thoughtful reading of his pages. The more they can store away in their memories the facts which he here records the better for the establishment of their faith, and the more thoroughly will they be armed against the adversaries of the gospel.
NOTES.
January 15th. — Just as we send off these notes from Mentone we receive the following telegram from Mr. Charlesworth, who was conducting a service of song with our boys in Bath. The telegram started on the 14th, but they do things leisurely in France. “Mrs. Hillyard passed away while our meeting was proceeding. Her last words were, ‘My boys! My boys!’“ So falls asleep an almost unknown saint of God, whose life was spent in the Redeemer’s service, and to whose memory thousands of orphan children for years to come will be living monuments. Further particulars shall be given in our next. She was ripe for the garner.
Writing on January 15 we are able to report more than six continuous weeks of dry, warm, sunshiny weather at Mentone, and therefore, by the good hand of the Lord, we have shaken off the gout and rheumatic pains, and hope to start for home on February 2. God has been very gracious in renewing our strength, and we hope to pass the rest of the winter in full home work, though we cannot venture much abroad. We have been refreshed by calls from some of the best of Christian people, and by innumerable communications from many lands, full of sympathy and love. A letter has followed the telegram from New York, which we insert among our “personal notes,” hearing the heartiest salutations of one hundred or more Baptist ministers. What can we say but thank God and take courage?
FROM TABERNACLE. Every report has been cheering. Some of the ablest divines have filled the pulpit, and maintained the congregations. Our thankfulness is great to each one of them, and to the beloved people who have remained faithful to their place, and to its work and servicer The offering to the College for the year was made up to £1879, some of the collections being very. special love-tokens to the pastor. Mr. Murrell’s telegrams have been much in little, every word breathing encouragement and comforting our spirit. Nothing but love have we received, and what but love can we return?
SPECIAL SERVICES. We have had several detailed accounts of the services at the Tabernacle conducted by Messrs. Fuller-ten and Smith: they all agree in praising the Lord for these two valued workers, and in the expectation that very large in-gatherings must follow the present series of meetings. The sketches of Mr. Fullerton’s addresses which have been sent us manifest great power of thought, soundness of doctrine, and zeal for the salvation of souls. Mr. Smith’s music and singing also occupy a very important place in the work. All the gatherings have been marked with the divine blessing, but that which most of all surprises us is the noon prayer- meeting, which we feared would not succeed, but which has reached the number of five hundred. Our good people are mostly engaged in the City, and Newington ‘seemed to us rather an unlikely place for a noon-day meeting; but where there’s a will there’s a way, and accordingly the people did come, and are coming still. This ought to encourage other churches which think themselves to be awkwardly located, nevertheless, to announce special seasons for prayer. To alter the usual hour is often a good thing. A meeting which has been held for years at 7 p.m. with a scanty attendance might .greatly rally if held on a summer’s morning at 5, or in the depth of winter at 3 in the afternoon. Anything is better than ruts.
There has evidently been great prayerfulness and hearty union of spirit, and these working under energetic commonsense leadership will be sure to win a bless-rag; for by such means the Holy Spirit usually works.
As a mere summary of meetings would not interest our readers we give the telegrams as they came to us from Mr. Murrell: —
Dec. 30. Evangelistic meetings began well Congregation hearty. Noon prayer-meeting successful. LAUS DEO. Pax vobis.
Jan. 6. All goes well Meetings increase in numbers, interest, power, and blessing. Monday prayer-meeting largest ever held. Collection for Colportage £90 last Sunday morning.
Jan. 13. Vitality, power, interest, numbers keep increasing. Rest contented. Thank the Lord you are better.
Here is a history in few words, which will be all the more complete if we add: the officers are all united and earnest, the church aroused, and the people full of expectation. Inquirers come forward after each service, and many are anxious to be united with the church. Oh that their minister, who is growingly conscious of his own weakness, may return to them in the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of peace!
We insert the following letter which we sent home, because it may show to other churches how all the members can aid special services, and under the divine blessing secure success:—
“My beloved Friends, — Now that our Special Services are beginning I entreat you to labor as one man to make them a success. It is the Lord’s work to send the blessing: but as a rule he begins to work upon sinners by first of all arousing his own people. We believe in grace, and in grace alone, but we know by experience that true revival is not a gourd which springs up on a sudden while men sleep, but like the angel of Bethlehem it visits those who keep watch over their flocks by night. Grace to us is as new wine, refreshing and inspiring, and not as a soporific potion creating the slumber of inaction. Messrs. Smith and Fullerton, who conduct the Services, have proved their fitness for the position by their success in other congregations. If the pleasure of the Lord does not prosper in their hand among us, it will be our fault, and not theirs. What is wanted is, first, much prayer. In this, all the Lord’s people can join. Attend the noon Prayermeeting, if possible, and if not, pray all the same. Without the Holy Spirit we are nothing, and prayer alone can win his aid. The next practical step is to make the meetings known. The people cannot come to the services if they do not know of them. The expense of advertising is very great if left to be done by the home authorities; but if every person will spread the news, this method of gaining publicity is the most effective, and it can be done on the largest scale with very little outlay. If you cannot preach the gospel you may yet win a soul by letting it be known that the gospel is preached. The third needful work is to bring in the people. Persuade friends and neighbors to attend.’ Canvass a district. Visit from house to house with invitations, ‘ Compel them to come in,’ and when this is done, give a personal word. Speak for Jesus, if it be with faltering lips, both before and after the addresses of the preachers. Good sermons need following up by personal entreaties. God often blesses feeble efforts; indeed, he suffers no true endeavor to fall to the ground. How I wish I could persuade ALL the church-members to rally to the Holy War ] God knoweth how much I wish I could be with you myself. My infirmities detain me from the field of sacred action, but my heart watches you. As ye have served the Lord in my. presence, so do I pray you much more in my absence; that if possible my lack of service may be made up by your overplus of labor. You have not only your own work to do, but mine also. Be pastors to the lambs, and to the wandering sheep. If you cannot fill the pulpit, yet tell out the same ‘old, old story’ which is the one sole message with which it has for many years resounded. To your beloved deacons and elders, and to you all, I send my fervent Christian love, beseeching you all, all together, with all your strength, to unite in the service of love.
“Yours most heartily,
“C. H. SPURGEON.
Mentone, December 28, 1879.”
WELL-DESERVED PRESENTATION. — The workers at the Tabernacle spontaneously united in giving a token of their esteem to our worthy friend and brother, Mr. Murtell, to whose energetic services we are all so much indebted. It was well done of the brethren, and well deserved of the receiver. That we have worshipped in comfort these many years, without accident or disturbance, is mainly due to the prudent management of our honored friend. We cannot love too much the man who is the servant of us all for Christ’s sake. His pastor, his fellow-deacons, the elders, the workers, and all the brotherhood know that he does for us what none of us would feel able to attempt, and therefore we .glorify God in him, and wish him long life .and happiness.
COLLEGE. Mr. E. L. Hamilton, of our · College, has received a unanimous invitation to the church at Hay Hill, Bath. Mr. W. Thomas, who still remains in College, fills up the vacancy at Putney caused by Mr. Geale’s removal to Brighton. Mr. J. J. Knight has accepted an invitation to the pastorate of Circus Baptist Chapel, Bradford-street, Birmingham.
Mr. J. Cole, late of Coseley, has accepted the pastorate of the churches at Marlborough and Salcombe, Devon; Mr. R.J. Beecliff, formerly of Bedale, Yorkshire, has become pastor of the church at Leeds-road, Bradford; sad Mr. D.C. Chapman, of Oakengates, Salop, has removed to Acre Mill, Bacup, Lancashire.
Canada. — Mr. H. F. Adams, having finished his college course, has gone to take charge of a newly-formed church at Lewis-street, Toronto. Mr. R. Holmes, who has done a most satisfactory work at Minesing, has removed to Aylmer, Ontario; and Mr. H. Cocks, late of Bally-mena, has become pastor of a newly-organized church at Walkerton, Ontario.
India. — Mr. Norris, of Bedminster, has accepted an invitation to the church in Circular Road, Calcutta; and we expect that Mr. G. H. Hook, of Thaxted, will sail in the same vessel to become pastor of the church in Lal Bazar, in the same city.
Australia. — All our friends will rejoice with us to hear that the good ship Sobraon, which carried our son Thomas, and Messrs. McCullough and Harrison, arrived at Melbourne on December 16th. May he and his comrades become a living seed for the church of God in the southern world.
Mr. Edgar Booth, who came to us from Victoria, Australia, has just sailed for Melbourne. He intends devoting himself, for a time, to evangelistic work in the country districts of the colony.
Australian papers to hand contain a glowing description of the reception of Mr. A. J. Clarke, our late evangelist, by the church at West Melbourne. He has evidently entered into a sphere for which he is well adapted, and will we trust prove to be a great blessing to the colony. Mr. Garrett, who sailed with him, has settled at Brighton, Victoria.
EVANGELISTS. — Pastor J. Kemp, who is himself an earnest evangelist, sends us the following account of Mr. BURNHAM’S visit to Bures; — “ It was a time of refreshing to us all. The attendance throughout the week was very good, and the interest seemed to deepen at each meeting. Two services were held at a village two miles away, where we have a chapel which was well filled each evening. The closing meeting at Bures was just simply delightful. The prayers were full of thankfulness, and some very touching letters were read from those who professed to have found peace in believing during the week. Mr. Burnham was once more the means of blessing to two of the youthful inmates of the home in which he stayed. The two most special features of the work were the large attendance of strangers, and the earnest prayerfulness of our own people. What fruit we have already seen greatly cheers us, and we are confident there is much more to follow.”
One incident will show the effect of the work of Mr. Burnham at Melford. The day after he left the hall a band of strolling players, who before had been great favorites in the place, arrived in the village. At the first performance very few were present, and on the second evening only three, so they were glad to move on to another place, where the gospel had not been so recently preached.
Mr. Burnham has since visited Eye, where a most gracious work was effected by the Holy Spirit through the instrumentality of our brother. Each evening the audience increased, and inquirers were seen after every service. On the Sunday night the chapel was packed full, and there were so many seeking souls that Mr. Burnham could not personally speak with each one, The meetings were only arranged for one week, but the interest and blessing seemed so manifestly on the increase that the services were continued for a week longer.
From Eye Mr. Burnham went to Driffield and Cranswick, and this month is to visit Sheepshed and Preston.
Mr. E. J. Parker, one of our students who is being trained for the work of an evangelist, has been singing the gospel at the special services conducted by Mr. A. G. Brown and Dr. Seddon, at Burnley, where he tells us many souls were added to the Lord. The best helpers of the evangelists were a number of young people who were converted during the visit of our brethren Smith and Fullerton.
During the Christmas vacation Mr. Parker sang and spoke for Jesus on the sea-shore, and in the drawing-room of a lady who had gathered together some of the neglected upper classes to hear the gospel. Many of them seemed to be impressed by the touching song, “So near to the Kingdom,” and it is hoped that some who listened to it will not be content until they are “safe within the Kingdom.”
As funds are entrusted to us, this brother and others whom the Lord has evidently intended for evangelists, will be set apart and sent out on their mission of mercy to those who will never be reached by any other agency.
ORPHANAGE. — CHRISTMAS FESTIVITIES. — The best thanks of the orphans and of the President of the Orphanage are due, and are hereby heartily tendered, to all those who by their generous help made Christmas at the Orphanage to be a time of great enjoyment. Our son Charles, who took our place on Christmas-day, sent us the following lively account of the day’s proceedings: —
“Dear Father,
“Christmas has vanished fleeting,
Gone its merry hours of meeting;
Hearty fun and hearty eating,
Gone like Christmas-days of yore.
so I write to tell you how happy all were at the Stockwell Orphanage. To commence with, the morning service at Newman Hall’s was very good. The fog was very dense, so a large congregation could not be expected, but all were gratified to see so many there. The collection will realize £50. A fine Christmas-box indeed! The walk, no doubt, gave the lads a keen appetite for the beef.:Before they set to I read your kind letter, amid perfeet silence (for a pin might have dropped, as Tom used to say) until I had finished the first sentence — ‘ I wish you all a merry-Christmas.’ Then they burst out, ‘ The same to you, sir,’ and Mr. Charlesworth observed that it was no fault of yours if you did not hear it. There was not one heart that did not fervently desire joy for you while absent from the Orphanage. The boys did the cheering well for everybody named in the note, but none exceeded the hurrahs given for the eleven little girls when, with Miss Moore leading the foremost, they walked down the hall to dinner. Dear little mites, they stood on the form for the boys to look at them, and then listened to your loving words. As per usual, ample justice was done to the dinner. Then the grandees had their dinner. A vacant chair again occupied the center position at the table; I could not fill it, and regretted that my dear father was not there to do so, although I am truly glad you are away from these awful fogs. None forgot the President when they spoke, but all mourned his absence. It fell to my lot to receive a present from the ‘ old boy’s’ consisting of a case of cutlery — a very handsome gift indeed, and one that will be useful, too, by-and-by. In the evening we heartily enjoyed ourselves. May the time come-round when you will be there to rejoice with those who do rejoice.”
The following is the letter which we sent to the Orphanage: — “Mentone, Dec. 20.
“Dear Boys, — I wish you all a merry Christmas. My son, Mr. Charles Spurgeon, will tell you that it is a great trouble to me to be away from you all at Christmas, but I hope you will all enjoy yourselves none the less, and be as happy as kittens. I am very pleased to hear that as a rule you are a good let of fellows, obedient, teachable, and true; therefore you have a right to be happy, and I hope you are. I always wish everything to be done to make you love the Orphanage and feel it to be your home, and in this all the Trustees join, and so does Mr. Charlesworth. We want you to be very jolly while you are with us, and then to grow up and go out into business, and to turn out first-rate men and true Christians.
“Boys, give three cheers for the Trustees, who are your best friends, and then the same for Mr. Charlesworth, the matrons, and the masters. Don’t forge; the gentlemen who send the shillings and the figs. Hip, hip, hurrah!
“Where are the girls?
“Dear Children, — I hope you will be happy too with Miss Moore and the other kind folks. You cannot make quite so much noise as those uproarious boys, but your voices are very sweet, and I shall be glad one day to hear them when I get well and come home. Enjoy yourselves all you can, and try to make everybody happy in your new home. I hope my first little girls will be specially good ones. Ought not the first to be the best?
“Your friend always,
“C. H. SPURGEON.
“Any old boys about? God bless the young men, and make them our strength and honor.”
On Friday, January 9. the Quarterly Collectors’ Meeting was held at Stockwell, and, considering that it was the coldest and dullest of dull days, a goodly number of friends brought in their Collecting Books and Boxes. Our young friends were greatly in the majority, and we heartily thank the children of our many helpers for their loving and earnest help in collecting for their orphan brothers and sisters. Mr. Charlesworth, who well deserves the honorable title of “The Children’s Friend,” had thoughtfully provided an amusing entertainment for he juvenile collectors in the school-room, after which all gathered for tea in the dining-hall. After tea, Mr. J. J. Headington gave a very interesting Lecture, entitled “A Visit to the Afghans and Zulus,” illustrated by seventy Dissolving Views, which were among the best we have ever seen. The amount brought in was slightly over £ 70.
PERSONAL NOTES. — Among the many expressions of brotherly kindness and sympathy which have reached us during our sojourn abroad, one calls for special mention. Just as we were retiring to rest one night, a soft pillow for our head and heart arrived by telegraph from the other side of the Atlantic. This was the form in which the sweet love-token came to hand: — “To C. H. Spurgeon, Mentone, France. From New York Baptist Ministers’ Conference. — Prayers. Sympathy. 2 Corinthians 1:2, 7 — Potter, Secretary.” The full text of the message is as follows: — “Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ….. And our hope of you is steadfast, knowing that as ye are partakers of the sufferings, so shall ye be also of the consolation.”
May the ever-blessed Giver of peace and Lover of concord return to these brethren ten-thousand-fold this their deed of love towards their afflicted fellow-servant-Such costly acts of spontaneous sympathy go far to prove that, degenerate as the age may be, there is life and love in the old church yet.
This telegram was followed on Jan. 15 by the following most touching letter, for which we feel the utmost gratitude: —
“Rev. Charles H. Spurgeon: — Beloved Brother, — The sorrowful tidings reach us that you are entirely prostrated, not being able even to address your weekly epistle of love to your own church. Your sufferings touch the hearts of your American brethren most tenderly, and the New York Conference of Baptist ministers, numbering more than one hundred, has appointed the undersigned a committee to express their de? sympathy with you in your present
“Be assured, precious brother, that this expression is most heartfelt and real: you live in our hearts so truly that your affliction is ours, on the divine principle that if one member suffers all the members suffer therewith. In health, you have sent thrilling words of cheer to the afflicted disciples of the Lamb all round the globe. And now, in the hour of your darkness, their affections cling closer to you than ever. Your pain meats with little mitigation through the live-long day and night while the sun makes his rounds over all lands, and we believe that in most of the nations that see his light the prayers of your brethren are rising to the God of all consolation as from a common altar, that divine succor may be vouchsafed to you every hour.
“Truly, infinite grace has chosen you in the furnace of affliction. How far your terrible pains in the past have contributed, as a holy discipline, to the creation of that noble Christian manhood which has marked your life and labors so long, can be known only to our heavenly Father. But we believe that as our Captain was made perfect through sufferings, be will so sanctify yours, that even a more mellow and gentle ministry will mark your coming years than those which are past. Should our hopes be thus gratified, the sorrowing people of God will draw strength, once more, from your weakness, and sweetness out of your bitter cup.
“Dearly beloved one: we commend to you now those broad and bright promises of our Lord which you have so forcibly applied to the souls of his people in their distresses. Let your Christian fortitude bind you indissolubly to the fidelity of your covenantkeeping Savior, till a holy courage can humbly say, ‘Though thou slay me, yet will I trust thee.’ We shall not cease to pray that our sympathetic Redeemer will be at your right hand, that he will fill your room with heavenly light, and your heart with sacred joy. ‘Be of good cheer’; lift up thine eyes, and see thy Lord coming to thy help on the wave, and in the darkest watch of the night. Can he not say to the crazy, creaking vessel that years are added to its days P This he has said in similar stress heretofore. And we confidently hope that your valuable life will be still spared to do a glorious work for that general Church of Christ which claims you as its pastor, in common with the brethren at the Tabernacle. The Conference tenders its Christian condolence to your beloved household, in these days when with them hope and fear are struggling so hard for the mastery. May Jehovah keep and bless you all. “Yours affectionately,
“THOS. ARMITAGE.
“CHRISTOPHER RHODES.
“JESSE B. THOMAS — COMMITTEE.
“New York, Dec. 30, 1879.”
We have had a singular request concerning our sermon “Among the Lions” (No. 1,496). A Christian sister, who has read the sermons for thirteen years, felt that this one exactly fitted her experience, and she asked permission to have it reprinted, that she might frame it, and hang it up where it might be seen by the workpeople in her neighborhood. We consented at once to the proposal, but suggested that instead of having it reprinted, two copies should be cut and the portions pasted together in a form suitable for framing. It is right and natural that we should wish others to read that which has been useful to ourselves.
Our excellent contemporary The Freeman says: — “The New Year’s gift of the proprietors of the little French monthly, L’Echo de la Verite, to the subscribers, is a translation of Mr. Spurgeon’s 1,500th published sermon. The promoters of the enterprise wish to be placed in funds to repeat the gift, for they desire the continuance and extension of the wonderful blessing vouchsafed through these sermons. It may well cheer the heart of our dear brother, during his forced retreat, to know that the gospel, through the instrumentality of these addresses, is ever active, and that he is truly transmitting the divine influence and light whilst in his darkened chamber, as much as if he were in the face of day. The vitality of the truth concerning the work of Christ is equaled only by its continual novelty. It is exceedingly appropriate that in this manner Mr. Spurgeon should now be daily speaking to the French in their own tongue whilst enjoying the benefit of their sunny shores.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle: Dec. 18th, 1879, seven.
REASON FOR A SONG OF PRAISE
THE reflective mind finds objects of interest everywhere: in the stones of the beach, the dust of the road, the flowers of the field, or the stars of the midnight sky, it sees instruction and finds delight. The ignorant and the unreflective tread under their feet a thousand causes of pleasurable thought, and pass through a very paradise as drearily as if it were a desert. It is much the same with the emotion of gratitude. The mass of mankind seem never to praise the name of the Lord; and many among them are perpetually murmuring and grumbling, and even more are steeped in dissatisfaction. God’s goodness surrounds them on every hand, and they perceive it not. For the heart which is full of gratitude there are a thousand well-springs of thankfulness: among them is one which is very common, and is as commonly forgotten. If it were removed, the wail would be pitiful; but being present, the song which it deserves is frequently stifled in forgetful silence. When we are reasonably healthy, relieved from acute pain, and free from depression of spirit, we ought to be profoundly thankful. Even if we are poor, or toil-worn, or aged, health is in itself an unspeakable boon. Many would give a fortune to possess it, and yet thousands live from year to year with scarce an ache or a pain, and have hardly the common decency to say,” Thank God.” Like swine they tread the pearls of health and strength under their feet, and perhaps by misusing their powers they even turn again and rend the Giver of these priceless jewels. To balance such ingratitude, the writer of these lines cannot refrain from paying his personal thanks to the All-bountiful Lord. To me it is a cause of overwhelming joy to find myself delivered from the anguish caused by a painful disorder. It is enough of pleasure to be free from pain. It is a delight to wake in the morning and find that I can use my limbs, that I can dress myself without assistance, and that I can go down the stairs without aid. What a holiday it seems to take a walk, leaning a little on my staff, but yet able to pace the garden! When I can enjoy my food without suffering from speedy indigestion, and can sit down with a clear brain to pursue my literary labors, I feel as if a stream of joy rippled through my veins, and my whole nature was bathed in peace. Then my soul lives hymns, and breathes psalms. What if stern toil lies before me, and scanty rest, and the care of a flock numerous beyond precedent; yet because pain is gone, and the head is clear, my heart rejoices before the Lord.
Perhaps it needs that we should suffer much before we can be duly grateful for the boon of health. There are few joys equal to those of convalescence after months of suffering. It is something like beginning to live anew, and being introduced into a new world. The poet did not exaggerate when he said: —
“See the wretch that long has lost
On the thorny bed of pain,
At length repair his vigor lost,
And breathe and walk again.
The meanest floweret of the vale,
The simplest note that ‘swells the gale,
The common sun, the air, the skies,
To him are opening paradise.”
To make honey sweeter than its natural sweetness one must have tasted gall. There was true philosophy in the language of Socrates when he discoursed with his friends in prison, and stroked his leg, which had been chafed by the galling of his fetters, and said, “What a wonderful thing is this which we talk pleasant and agreeable; and what a wonderful relation does it bear to that which seems its contrary! The pain which was before in my leg, through the stricture of the fetter, is now succeeded by a pleasant emotion.” Do the nerves gain tone and tune for the melody of pleasure by the rough strokes of anguish? Is there a tenderness infused into them by agony, which else they would never have known? It may be so, or it may not: but this is certainly the fact, that every man who is in good health is a great debtor to his Maker, and should take care daily to acknowledge his immense obligation. If you need to be stirred up to cheerfulness and thankfulness, think of the hospital, of the painful operation, of the iron bed of pain, of the sleepless nights, of the weary days, and of the heaviness, the weariness, the torment and dread which may come to the soul through an encumbering frame. If these thoughts do not suffice to make you thankful, go to the spot and see with your own eyes the sufferings we have asked you to imagine. Look on the sufferers, and wonder that this poor, mortal frame should be capable of so much woe, that even one poor limb of the body should contain such awful possibilities of misery. Remember, too, that much of human disease is endured by those whose poverty denies them necessary alleviation: they are forced to toil for bread, and to die as they toil. The eye is failing, but the day’s needlework must be done, though blindness should succeed; the head is aching, and the heart is palpitating, but yet hourly the burden must be borne till death shall bring relief. The family would starve if the invalid did not perform the labors of sturdy health; at what expense of agony must those labors be achieved! What must it be to be sick and penniless, to need all your strength to bear your pain, and yet to be loaded to the last ounce with a burden only fit to be borne by giant strength? Have we bread to eat, and raiment to put on, and health and strength with which to perform our daily labors? Let us then arouse ourselves to praise. One of our revival ditties says, “I feel like singing all the time,” and that is the kind of feeling a healthy man should cultivate. We do not sing enough. We should be healthier, stronger, richer, gladder, if we would abound in the praises of our God. The man who told us the other day that he was near sixty, and had never spent a couple of pounds on a doctor, should give the fees which he has saved to the Lord’s work, and then lead the song of the grateful The working man who finds his daily labor easy and agreeable should be one of the chief musicians in the house of the Lord. Frederick of Prussia executed a picture by way of amusement, and then wrote at the bottom of it, “Painted in torments!” What that man must have known of the gout! How glad ought we to be who can write an article, or preach a sermon, or plane a deal, or plough a field, and then say, done in comfort! If we have forgotten the salt of gratitude, let us flavor our life with it more abundantly, and in this we may follow the liberty given in the words of the old Book — “ Salt without prescribing how much.” C.H.S.
UNDER HIS SHADOW
A BRIEF SACRAMENTAL DISCOURSE DELIVERED AT MENTONE TO ABOUT
A SCORE BRETHREN. BY C. H. SPURGEON.
“He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.” — Psalm 91:1.
I MUST confess of my short discourse, as the man did of the ax which fell into the stream, that it is borrowed. The outline of it is taken from one who will never complain of me, for to the great loss of the church she has left these lower choirs to sing above. Miss Havergal, last and loveliest of our modern poets, when her tones were most mellow, and her language most sublime, has been caught up to swell the music of heaven. Her last poems are published with the tide, “Under his Shadow,” and the preface gives the reason for the name. She said, “I should like the title to be ‘ Under his shadow.’ I seem to see four pictures suggested by that: under the shadow of a rock in a weary plain; under the shadow of a tree; closer still, under the shadow of his wing; nearest and closest, in the shadow of his hand. Surely that hand must be the pierced hand, that may oftentimes press us sorely, and yet evermore encircling, upholding, and shadowing.”
“Under his shadow,” is our afternoon subject, and we will in a few words enlarge on the scriptural plan which Miss Havergal has bequeathed to us. Our text is, “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.” The shadow of God is not the occasional resort, but the constant abiding-place, of the saint. Here we find not only our consolation, but our habitation. We ought never to be out of the shadow of God. It is to dwellers, not to visitors, that the Lord promises his protection. “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty”: and that shadow shall preserve him from nightly terror and ghostly ill, from the arrows of war and of pestilence, from death and from destruction. Guarded by omnipotence, the chosen of the Lord are always safe; for as they dwell in the holy place, hard by the mercy seat, where the blood was sprinkled of old, the pillar of fire by night, and the pillar of cloud by day, which ever hangs over the sanctuary, covers them also. Is it not written, “In the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion, in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me “? What better security can we desire? As the people of God we are always under the protection of the Most High. Wherever we go, whatever we suffer, whatever may be our difficulties, temptations, trials, or perplexities, we are always “under the shadow of the Almighty.” Over all who maintain their fellowship with God the most tender guardian care is extended. Their heavenly Father himself interposes between them and their adversaries. The experience of the saints, albeit they are all under the shadow, yet differs as to the form in which that protection has been enjoyed by them, hence the value of the four figures which will now engage our attention.
I. We will begin with the first picture which Miss Havergal mentions — namely, THE ROCK sheltering the weary traveler.
“The shadow of a great rock in a weary land” (Isaiah 32:2).
Now, I take it that this is where we begin to know our Lord’s shadow. He was at the first to us a refuge in time of trouble. Weary was the way, and great was the heat; our lips were parched, and our souls were fainting; we sought for shelter and we found none; for we were in the wilderness of sin and condemnation, and who could bring us deliverance, or even hope? Then we cried unto the Lord in our trouble, and he led us to the Rock of Ages, which of old was cleft for us. We saw our interposing Mediator coming between us and the fierce beat of justice, and we hailed the blessed screen. The Lord Jesus was unto us a covering for sin, and so a covert from wrath. The sense of divine displeasure, which had beaten upon our conscience, was removed by the removal of the sin itself, which we saw to be laid on Jesus, who in our place and stead endured its penalty.
The shadow of a rock is remarkably cooling, and so was the Lord Jesus eminently comforting to us. The shadow of a rock is more dense, more complete, and more cool than any other shade; and so the peace which Jesus gives passeth all understanding, there is none like it. No chance beam darts through the rock shade, nor can the heat penetrate as it will do in a measure through the foliage of a forest: Jesus is a complete shelter, and blessed are they who are “under his shadow.” Let them take care that they abide there, and never venture forth to answer for themselves, or to brave the accusations of Satan.
As with sin, so with sorrow of every sort: the Lord is the rock of our refuge. No sun shall smite us, nor any heat, because we are never out of Christ. The saints know where to fly, and they use their privilege.
“When troubles, like a burning sun,
Beat heavy on their head,
To Christ their mighty Rock they run,
And find a pleasing shade.”
There is, however, something of awe about this great shadow. A rock is often so high as to be terrible, and we tremble in presence of its greatness. The idea of littleness hiding behind massive greatness is well set forth; but there is no tender thought of fellowship, or tenderness: even so, at the first, we view the Lord Jesus as our shelter from the consuming heat of welldeserved punishment, and we know little more. It is most pleasant to remember that this is only one panel of the fourfold picture. Inexpressibly dear to my soul is the deep cool rock-shade of my blessed Lord, as I stand in him a sinner saved; yet is there more.
II. Our second picture, that of THE TREE, is to be found in the Song of Solomon 2:3, —
“As the apple-tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons. I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste.”
Here we have not so much refuge from trouble as special rest in times of joy. The spouse is happily wandering through a wood, glancing at many trees, and rejoicing in the music of the birds. One tree specially charms her: the citron with its golden fruit wins her admiration, and she sits under its shadow with great delight; such was her beloved to her, the best among the good, the fairest of the fair, the joy of her joy, the light of her delight. Such is Jesus to the believing soul.
The sweet influences of Christ are intended to give us a happy rest, and we ought to avail ourselves of them: “I sat down under his shadow.” This was Mary’s better part, which Martha well-nigh missed by being cumbered. That is the good old way wherein we are to walk, the way in which we find rest unto our souls. Papists and papistical persons, whose religion is all ceremonies, or all working, or all groaning, or all feeling, have never come to an end; we may say of their religion as of the law, that it made nothing perfect; but under the gospel there is something finished, and that something is the sum and substance of our salvation, and therefore there is rest for us, and we ought to sing, “I sat down.”
Dear friends, is Christ to each one of us a place of sitting down? I do not mean a rest of idleness and self-content — God deliver us from that; but there is rest in a conscious grasp of Christ, a rest of contentment with him, as our all in all. God give us to know more of this. This shadow is also meant to yield perpetual solace, for the spouse did not merely come under it, but there she sat down as one that meant to stay. Continuance of repose and joy is purchased for us by our Lord’s perfected work. Under the shadow she found food; she had no need to leave it to find a single needful thing, for the tree which shaded also yielded fruit; nor did she need even to rise from her rest, but sitting still she feasted on the delicious fruit. You who know the Lord Jesus know also what this meaneth.
The spouse never wished to go beyond her Lord. She knew no higher life than that of sitting under the Well-beloved’s shadow. She passed the cedar, and oak, and every other goodly tree, but the apple-tree held her, and there she sat down. “Many there be that say, who will show us any good? But as for us, O Lord, our heart is fixed, our heart is fixed, resting on thee. We will go no further, for thou art our dwelling-place, we feel at home with thee, and sit down beneath thy shadow.” Some Christians cultivate reverence at the expense of childlike love; they kneel down, but they dare not sit down. Our divine Friend and Lover wills not that it should be so; he would not have us stand on ceremony with him, but come boldly unto him.
“Let us be simple with him, then,
Not backward, stiff, or cold,
As the’ our Bethlehem could be
What Sinai was of old.”
Let us use his sacred name as a common word, as a household word, and run to him as to a dear familiar friend. Under his shadow we are to feel that we are at home, and then he will make himself at home to us by becoming food unto our souls, and giving spiritual refreshment to us while we rest. The spouse does not here say that she reached up to the tree to gather its fruit, but she sat down on the ground in intense delight, and the fruit came to her where she sat. It is wonderful how Christ will come down to souls that sit beneath his shadow; if we can but be at home with Christ he will sweetly commune with us. Has he not said, “Delight thyself also in the Lord, and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart”?
In this second form of the sacred shadow, the sense of awe gives place to that of restful delight in Christ. Have you ever figured in such a scene as the sitter beneath the grateful shade of the fruitful tree? Have you not only possessed security, but experienced delight in Christ? Have you sung,
“I sat down under his shadow,
Sat down with great delight;
His fruit was sweet unto my taste,
And pleasant to my sight”?
This is as necessary an experience as it is joyful: necessary for many uses. The joy of the Lord is our strength, and it is when we delight ourselves in the Lord that we have assurance of power in prayer. Here faith develops, and hope grows bright, while love sheds abroad all the fragrance of her sweet spices. Oh! get you to the apple-tree, and find out who is fairest among the fair. Make the light of heaven the delight of your heart, and then be filled with heart’s-ease, and revel in complete content.
III. The third view of the one subject is, — THE SHADOW OF HIS WINGS — a precious word. I think the best specimen of it, for it occurs several times, is in that blessed Psalm 63:7:
“Because thou hast been my help, therefore in the shadow of thy wings will I rejoice.”
Does not this set forth our Lord as our trust in hours of depression? In the psalm now open before us, David was banished from the means of grace to a dry and thirsty land, where no water was. What is much worse, he was in a measure away from all conscious enjoyment of God. He says, “Early will I seek thee. My soul thirsteth for thee.” He sings rather of memories than of present communion with God. We also have come into this condition, and have been unable to find any present comfort. “Thou hast been my help,” has been the highest note we could strike, and we have been glad to reach to that. At such times, the light of God’s face has been withdrawn, but our faith has taught us to rejoice under the shadow of his wings. Light there was none; we were altogether in the shade, but it was a warm shade. We felt that God who had been near must be near us still, and therefore we were quieted. Our God cannot change, and therefore as he was our help he must still be our help, our help even though he casts a shadow over us, for it must be the shadow of his own eternal wings. The metaphor is of course derived from the nestling of little birds under the shadow of their mother’s wings, and the picture is singularly touching and comforting. The little bird is not yet able to take care of itself, so it cowers down under the mother, and is there happy and safe. Disturb a hen for a moment and you will see all the little creatures huddling together, and by their chirps making a kind of song. Then they push their heads into her feathers, and seem happy beyond measure in their warm abode. When we are very sick and sore depressed, when we are worried with the care of pining children, and the troubles of a needy household, and the temptations of Satan, how comforting it is to ran to our God — like the little chicks to the hen — and hide away near his heart, beneath his wings. Oh, tried ones, press closely to the loving heart of your Lord, hide yourselves entirely beneath his wings. Here awe has disappeared, and rest itself is enhanced by the idea of loving trust. The little birds are safe in their mother’s love, and we, too, are beyond measure secure and happy in the loving favor of the Lord.
IV. The last form of the shadow is that of THE HAND, and this it seems to me points to power and position in service. Turn to Isaiah 49:2, —
“And he hath made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of his hand hath he hid me, and made me a polished shaft; in his quiver hath he hid me,”
This undoubtedly refers to the Savior, for the passage proceeds: — “And said unto me, thou art my servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified. Then I said, I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for nought, and in vain: yet surely my judgment is with the Lord, and my work with my God. And now, saith the Lord that formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob again to him, Though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and my God shall be my strength. And he said, It is a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth.” Our Lord Jesus Christ was hidden away in the hand of Jehovah, to be used by him as a polished shaft for the overthrow of his enemies, and the victory of his people. Yet, inasmuch as it is Christ, it is also all Christ’s servants, since as he is so are we also in this world; and to make quite sure of it, we have got the same expression in the sixteenth verse of the fifty-first chapter, where, speaking of his people, he says, “I have covered thee in the shadow or’ mine hand.” Is not this an excellent minister’s text? Every one of you who will speak a word for Jesus shall have a share in it. This is where those who are workers for Christ should long to be — “ in the shadow of his hand,” to achieve his eternal purpose. What are any of God’s servants without their Lord but weapons out of the warrior’s hand, having no power to do anything? We ought to be as the arrows of the Lord which he shoots at his enemies, and so great is his hand of power, and so little are we as his instruments that he hides us away in the hollow of his hand, unseen until he darts us forth. As workers, we are to be hidden away in the hand of God, or to quote the other figure, “in his quiver hath he hid me”: we are to be unseen till he uses us. It is impossible for us not to be known somewhat if the Lord uses us, but we may not aim at being noticed, but, on the contrary, if we be as much used as the very chief of the apostles, we must truthfully add, “though I be nothing.” Our desire should be that Christ should be glorified, and that self should be concealed. Alas! there is a way of always showing self in what we do, and we are all too ready to fall into it. You can visit the poor in such a way that they will feel that his lordship or her ladyship has condescended to call upon poor Betsy; bat there is another way of doing the same thing so that the tried child of God shall know that a brother beloved or a dear sister in Christ has shown a fellow-feeling for her, and has talked to her heart. There is a way of preaching, in which a great divine has evidently displayed his vast earning and talent; and there is another way of preaching, in which a faithful servant of Jesus Christ, depending upon his Lord, has spoken in his Master’s name, and left a rich unction behind. Within the hand of God is the place of acceptance, and safety; and for service it is the place of power, as well as of concealment. God only works with those who are in his hand, and the more we lie hidden there, the more surely will he use us ere long. May the Lord do unto us according to His word, “I have put my words in thy mouth, and I have covered thee in the shadow of my hand.” In this case we shall feel all the former emotions combined: awe that the Lord should condescend to take us into his hand, rest and delight that he should deign to use us, trust that out of weakness we shall now be made strong, and to this will be added an absolute assurance that the end of our being must be answered, for that which is urged onward by the Almighty hand cannot miss its mark.
These are mere surface thoughts. The subject deserves a series of discourses. Your best course, my beloved friends, will be to enlarge upon these hints by a long personal experience of abiding under the shadow. May God the Holy Ghost lead you into it, and keep you there, for Jesus’ sake.
POPE’S OFT-QUOTED LINE
IT is a well-known and oft-used expression —
“For differing creeds let godless bigots fight,
He can’t be wrong whose life is in the right.
Not to notice the somewhat unnecessarily hard words, and confining ourselves to the sentiment, what is the conclusion? Of course he cannot! “He can’t be wrong,” as it is put so antithetically if his “life is in the right.” But is it? That is a subject for previous inquiry If a man’s creed is that of Mahomet, “the Koran or the sword”; or that of the Ultramontanes, that every Pope is, and has been, infallible; or that of the Mormons, that polygamy is a most Christian institution; — if it be any false creed; will his life be right if he acts up to it? Will he be an honest man if he does not? It is a poor compliment to humanity to say that “men are better than their beliefs.” But, in fact, you might as well put a disturbing mass of iron ‘by a magnet, and then insist that the ship can still be steered safely, as think to have a man’s “life in the right,” while he has no fixed principle, or when his creed is “in the wrong.” There is scarcely any crime that has not been committed, and justified, at the bidding of a false, creed, and under its authority. We would say to Mr. Pope,
“Sweet poet! cease thy most mistaken song!
He can’t live right whose creed directs him wrong!”
Canon Ryle says, “The man who wrote the famous line, ‘ He can’t be wrong whose life is in the right,’ was a great poet undoubtedly, but he was a wretched divine.” — From Proverbial Folk-Lore. By Alan B. Cheales, M.A.
MRS. SPURGEON’S BOOK FUND.
CONDENSATION OF THE REPORT FOR 1879.*
Mrs. Spurgeon’s Report is sent to all her subscribers, and to very few beyond that circle. We so enjoyed its perusal that we determined to give our readers a part of it. The great interest of the subject claims for it a prominent place in a magazine which treats of “service for the Lord,” and we may also add that the intrinsic excellence of the writing will be an enrichment to our pages.
How deep is our own interest in Mrs. Spurgeon’s most useful and needful work we need scarcely tell; we trust that our readers will feel a measure of the same sympathy, and exhibit it in tangible form. A famine of books to a teacher of others is almost as distressing as want of bread. Want of good books has, we doubt not, tended greatly to impoverish the ministries of many preachers. How could they fill the minds of ethers when they had no food for their own? To our friends and readers we commend these extracts most earnestly, but we sincerely wish that we could have issued the whole report without abridgment, for it is deeply interesting throughout. A report will be sent gratis to any one who becomes a subscriber, and those friends who wish to know about the work and cannot at present send a donation can obtain a copy of the report by sending sixpenny worth of postage stamps to Mrs. Spurgeon, Nightingale-lane, Balham, London. — C. H. S.
IN 1880 the Book Fund enters upon the fifth year of its existence. Very many of the old friends, who saw its formation, have lovingly watched its advance, and generously contributed to its increase; they are as well acquainted with its aims and ambitions as with its origin; but for the sake of the new friends who may be led to sympathize with me in the endeavor to help “poor bookless ministers,” I will give a brief account of the nature of the work which has become so dear to many hearts.
The Book Fund makes grants to “poor pastors of every evangelical denomination, who are in actual charge, wholly devoted to the ministry, and whose income from all sources does not exceed £150 per annum.”
These grants consist of seven or eight volumes, and usually comprise the “Treasury of David,” or some of Mr. Spurgeon’s Sermons — not to the exclusion of other books, but chiefly because they are the works most sought after by applicants to the Fund, — and, I am not afraid or ashamed to say it, because I know I could not, with the slender means at my command, give any more precious or more helpful. Seldom are requests made for other authors, nor do I profess to supply them, but if reference be made to the titles, at the close of this report, of books distributed, it will be seen that when opportunity offers, I gladly make the addition of new and standard works to my stock. There are several special books for ministers which I would at once add to my list if friends who wish for their circulation would supply me with the means.
It is sad to know that the limit of £150 in income gives me as wide a field as I can compass for the bestowal of these coveted blessings. -Poor ministers are the rule, not the exception; they are not restricted to the Baptist denomination, or to our own land, but abound in every connection and in all climes — their needs are very urgent, their prospects seldom brighten, and their ranks never seem to thin; my work for them is as great a necessity now as it was at its commencement; nay, I think its importance has increased with its extension, the latent thirst for knowledge has been developed by its gifts, and a keener appetite for mental food has been produced by the provision it has furnished. I need not enlarge on the absolute necessity which exists for a minister to possess books, — if he would be an efficient teacher and preacher, — the mind which is itself not fed, cannot very long feed others; but I would point out the impossibility of procuring these essential helps and appliances, when a man has to provide for himself and a wife and family on a pittance of £60, £80, or £100 per annum.
To such weary “workers with a slender apparatus” my Book Fund stretches forth a helping hand: it fills the empty basket with tools, gives a key to a well-stocked storehouse, replenishes an exhausted brain, supplies ammunition for the combat with evil, makes sunshine in shady places, and by God’s own blessing does a vast amount of good wherever its gifts are scattered.
It is the joy of my life thus to serve the servants of my Master, and the daily blessings and tender providences which surround my work are more precious to me than words can express. “Some of the subjects of my thankfulness may seem small and inconsiderable to others, but to me they are of constant interest and importance”; my retired life shuts out the usual pleasures of social intercourse, but opens wide a world of glad delight in thus “ministering to the necessities of the saints.” I have scores of friends with whose circumstances I am intimately acquainted, yet whose faces I have never looked upon. I hope to know and greet them on the “other shore;” and, meanwhile, their love and prayers are a sweet reward for such pleasant service as the Lord enables me to render to them. In these pages will be found some of the expressive outpourings of grateful hearts, and though the letters here given fore but a small portion of the great mass of affectionate correspondence connected with the Fund, they will serve to reveal some of the daily comfort and encouragement I receive through this channel. Ah! if by His grace we can but win from our Master the approving words, “Ye did it unto me,” the joy of service is then only “a little lower” than the supreme felicity of heaven!
January. — Two years since a few thoughtful, kindly friends proposed a regular distribution of the “Sword and Trowel” Magazine to a certain dumber of poor country ministers who could not afford to take it in, and they generously forwarded donations for this special purpose. I find written in the report for that year that “the prospect of this indulgence has greatly cheered many hearts,” and that one to whom the offer was made, remarked, “I have not been able to take in a religious periodical for five .years; the monthly visit of the magazine will indeed be a great boon.” The new work then commenced has been continued, but not increased, though there can be no doubt as to its value and good influence, and I regret that it only comes to my hands as a divergence from the main business which fills my heart. All my time and strength are given to what I feel to be the more urgent work of furnishing empty book-shelves, and the profit and pleasure which would undoubtedly arise from a well-ordered monthly distribution of religious literature by the Book Fund is but partially developed on this account. We must hope for better things by-and-by; meanwhile I believe that those pastors now receiving the magazine are greatly pleased and delighted with their visitor, and I hope not only to retain all the names .at present on my list, but during the year to add to their number.
March. — The following tenderly kind little note contains such a testimony to the value of the Book Fund that I am tempted to give it, even though I have to include its unmerited commendation of my own small service: —
My dear Mrs. Spurgeon, — Please accept the enclosed mite toward the Book Fund. -If it please God, may you long be spared to carry on this great and blessed work, which has been sanctified to the good of so many of the Lord’s servants, and through them to so many of His people. Surely this must redound to the praise and glory of the Lord .Jesus, whose we are and whom we serve. I believe, dear Mrs. Spurgeon, that every day there is praise ascending to Almighty God for the blessings many have received through the books you have been enabled to send, and also through the encouraging little notes you write. I have to thank God for two or three of those little notes, and, oh! how precious they are! I shall ever treasure them, for they have been made a means of great blessing to my soul. May God’s richest blessing continue to rest upon you may you be sustained by grace divine when called upon to suffer and endure: if it be in accordance with God’s will, may you be relieved from pain altogether. Perhaps this may never he on this side Jordan. How precious you must have found those words, “My grace is sufficient for thee.” Good Matthew Henry says that if God is pleased to lay a heavy burden upon us at any time, and yet fits the shoulder to the burden, we certainly can have no reason to complain, however heavy the cross may be. Is not true? I pray that all the strength and grace you need may be given from on high, supplied by a loving Father out of His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.
To ministers who are not quite so necessitous as those for whom the Book Fund was specially founded, yet who can ill spare the published price of the “Treasury of David,” or the Sermons, I offer these books at a somewhat reduced rate, and I have much satisfaction in knowing that the privilege is warmly appreciated. The following letters are fair samples of the spirit in which the favor is sought, and the warm gratitude evoked by itsaccordance: —
My dear Mrs. Spurgeon, — In the libraries of my friends I have very frequently-perused that most choice and savory work of your husband, “The Treasury of David”; and if I have not actually incurred the guilt of breaking the tenth commandment I fear I have come near to doing so, and from time to time I have been looking how I could contrive to purchase it, but have found as often that my income has been fore-stalled by family and other claims. I have long known that you have been doing a most valuable work for the Master, by helping poor pastors to some good books, but hitherto I have not ventured to write lest I should be standing in the way of some brother more necessitous even than myself. This week, however, I was in the library of one of my brethren, and again looking over some parts of the “Treasury,” the desire to possess it for myself returned with such strength that I felt somewhat as I suppose a hungry ox would feel tethered outside, but just in sight of, a luxuriant field of clover! After ruminating over the matter again and again, I came to the conclusion that I could manage part of the price, so I have determined to say to you that I should esteem it a great favor indeed to receive a copy from your hands, if I shall not stand too much in the way of some other poor brother.
It was, indeed, a great joy to open the gate of the clover field! May the good brother “go in and out and find pasture.”
On the same subject a pastor in one of our great Midland towns writes: —
I note on page 30 of your little Report for 1878 that “When an applicant is able to purchase, books are sent on the most advantageous terms.” Now, I hope from time to time to be able to purchase a volume of the “Sermons,” whose true. gospel ring is indeed music to one’s soul. Will you -kindly jot down on enclosed post card the price at which I might get the sermons through your hands, so that I may know what to lay by from time to time, in order to add to my store? I am almost ashamed to trouble you so soon after receiving so much from you, but I am hungry for books, and cannot help it.
There is also a goodly number of workers for the Lord, evangelists, local preachers and others, who, having no pastorate, are ineligible for the free gift of the “Treasury,” yet covet earnestly this precious aid in their work; these, many of them, save up a little money, and sending it to me by degrees have in time the joy of receiving the longed-for treasure, which, doubtless, they value none the less for the self-denial which has procured it. I often regret that I cannot give books to all Christian workers, but a strict boundary line is absolutely necessary in a work carried on, not by a “Society,” but by one pair of hands, and those not over strong or capable.
June 5. — To day £200 is mine from the great Testimonial Fund raised last Christmas; £100 is allotted to the Book Fund, and £100 to the Pastors’ Aid Society. My dear husband’s kindness secures this splendid help to my work, and I bless God both for him and his delightful gift. If “John Ploughman’s wife” might say here what she thinks of “John” in this, and all other matters, it would be an easy task to fill these pages with his praises; but since such a wifely eulogy might be deemed out of place, Mrs. J.P. may at least record in her little book her hearty and appreciative thanks to the hundreds of true friends who have lately done honor to the “Prince of her life,” (Name for Mr. Spurgeon suggested by a Welshman.) and furnished him with the means of more abundantly blessing all the poor and needy ones who look to him as their best earthly friend and comforter. If I knew anyone who doubted the truth of that Scripture, “There is that scattereth and yet increaseth,” I could bring no more unanswerable proof of its veracity than is found in the unselfish life and loving deeds of the Godhonored man I reverence as my head and husband. I find a graceful appropriateness in the gift of part of this money to Baptist pastors, seeing that to one of themselves the whole magnificent sum is offered as a tribute of devoted admiration and love. What a joy it will be to use this consecrated gold in their service! What heavy burdens it will lift! What aching hearts will be consoled! What praise to God will be given by joyful lips! When I think of all it will do, I wish it were ten times as much! I get greedy for their sakes — my poor weary, toiling brethren — but that only lasts a moment, for indeed I am most fully “satisfied with favor” on their behalf, both from the Lord, and from man.
July 19. — These times of depression and disaster tell heavily on my poor friends the pastors of country churches. “Burdens grievous to be borne” seem laid on their hearts and lives, and with the universal social troubles, personal trials come in sad fellowship of suffering. Sickness, and consequent doctors’ bills, are heavy items in the sum of misery, and even those who do their best to “provide things honest in the sight of all men” are just now bowed to the very earth by the terrible pressure of obligations which they are powerless to avoid, and are equally unable to fulfill I have had some appeals lately which reveal a state of things among our country pastors greatly to be deplored, and though immediate relief was given, the problem of permanent amendment is still left unsolved. How is a man (and that man a minister) to house, and feed, and clothe, himself, his wife, and a varying (I was on the point of writing “unlimited “) number of children on £80 a year? I know scores who are trying to do it, but can we blame them if they fail? “I have had but one new suit for the last nine years,” writes one who knows what Paul meant by “enduring hardness.” How can the good man spare £4 or £5 for orthodox broadcloth when meat graces the table but once or twice a week, and the children’s clothes are almost too shabby for them to wear in the House of God? I heard of a good man the other day, who is thankfully wearing in the pulpit a secondhand coat of dark bottle-green, the gift of some commiserating friend, who noticed the pitiful seediness of his best suit! I do not suppose his sermons are deteriorated by the mere fact that he wears a bottle-green garment, but I do think that the man himself would be vastly bettered, and helped to a modest share of self- respect if he had becoming apparel in which to “minister in holy things.” Is it any wonder if sometimes the “cares of this world” choke and cramp the spiritual energies of poor needy pastors? “We have had a dull enough sermon this morning,” says a hearer, who has all that heart can wish for; “what can have come to our minister to make him so listless and uninteresting?” If that good brother were to try the effect of a little loving help and sympathy, (a £5 note for instance, delicately and tenderly given,) he would see a wonderful lifting and lightening of the clouds and darkness which encompass his pastor’s spirit, and be quite surprised at the life, and energy infused into his next discourse. “My people do all they can for me,” many a distressed pastor writes, and it may be so in some cases, but I question whether in the Master’s presence they would themselves dare to say this, for He still “sits over against the treasury,” and must note how little even “of their abundance” his people cast in for His servants and His cause. “It is a tale often told to you, I imagine, by such as myself, whose incomes are so pitifully small,” wrote a minister the other day, “that to buy books, when there are little hungry mouths and wistful faces at the table daily, is an IMPOSSIBILITY.” The good man has deeply underlined this last word, and well he may, for his church only raises £80 a year for him, while a grant from the Augmentation Fund barely rescues them from absolute need. Ah! some of us who can not only “make both ends meet,” but “have enough over to tie a bow and ends,” can scarcely realize the toiling and striving, the anguish of longing, which must tear at the hearts of a poor pastor and his wife, as they try to eke out the scanty store of coin, and make one shilling do the duty of a score ‘. “Wry wife sends you her heartfelt thanks,” says one of “our own” men, “she says you cannot know what good you are doing, or how much you gladden the hearts of poor pastors’ wives, though you cannot feel as they feel, for you have never been in the same position.”
No, not quite; yet I can tenderly sympathize with them, for well do we remember, in the early days of our married life, a time, nay, many times, when “God’s Providence was our inheritance,” and our mouths were “filled with laughter and our lips with singing” by the signal deliverances He afforded us when means were straitened, and the coffers, both of college and household, were well-nigh empty.
August 14. — Though in these bad times there is not much money coming in for the Book Fund, the supplies have not by any means failed; there is just enough to show that the Lord has not ceased to care for it, and does not mean it to fall to the ground, and yet little enough to make me ask earnestly at His Treasury for more. I feel much encouraged by the steadfast kindness of some dear friends, who seem to have enrolled themselves as monthly, quarterly, or annual subscribers, and so send me constant and regular help. This is manifestly of the Lord; He has thus inclined their hearts to remember my work, for I never ask except from Him, and no articles in the “Sword and Trowel” this year have brought the Book Fund prominently into notice. More distinctly and blessedly than ever, therefore, the Lord has been my helper, and from His hand have proceeded the stores which have relieved and refreshed His servants.
I have been very pleased during this year to see my work extend among the poorly-paid curates of the Church of England, and I trust a great blessing will follow the introduction into their libraries of such books as the “Treasury,” the Sermons, and “Lectures to my Students.” These gifts are sought with avidity and welcomed with eager joy, and of all the pleasant letters which I receive none are more courteous in spirit or graceful in language than those penned by clergymen of the Established Church.
“Two years ago,” writes one, “you presented me with the ‘Treasury of David,’ expressing a wish that it might prove a ‘ treasure ‘ indeed. Your wish has been more than gratified, and now I have an acute appetite for the whole of your respected husband’s works. I have the privilege of preaching the gospel five times every week, and if this is to continue to be a pleasure to me, I must keep my soul and mud well fed. Being still ‘ a poor curate ‘ I have to supply my wants on the lowest terms, so I write to ask whether in gratifying my ardent desire, any assistance may be obtained from that source of benevolence which formerly supplied the “Treasury of David.’”
My readers will be rejoiced to learn that with some little help from the Book Fund, this clergyman has now on his shelves a complete set of the Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, in addition to the “Treasury of David,” and some smaller works of Mr. Spurgeon’s.
Oct. 4. — Truly this has been a “red-letter day” in Book Fund experience. “My mouth has been filled with laughter and my tongue with singing.” My heart praises and extols the goodness of the Lord, and my hand shall at once record the mercy which, like a blessed rain on a thirsty land, has so sweetly refreshed my spirit. This afternoon a constant and generous friend brought £100 for the Book Fund. This was cause for devout thankfulness and great joy, for lately an unusually large number of books has been going out week by week, though funds have flowed in less freely. But it was not till a few hours after receiving this noble donation that I saw fully the Lord’s tender care and pitying love in sending me this help just when he knew I should most sorely need it. By the late post that night came my quarterly account for books, and so heavy was it, that in fear and haste I turned to my ledger to see the available balance, and with an emotion I shall not easily forget I found that but for the gift of £100 a few hours previously I should have been £60 in debt!
Did not the Father’s care thus keep the sparrow from falling to the ground? A sleepless night and much distress of spirit would have resulted from my discovery of so serious a deficit in my funds, but the Lord’s watchful love prevented this. “Before I called he answered,” and though trouble was not very distant he had said, “It shall not come nigh thee.” O my soul, bless thou the Lord, and forget not this his loving “benefit!” A tumult of joy and delight arose within me as I saw in this incident, not a mere chance, or a happy combination of circumstances, but the guiding and sustaining hand of the loving Lord, who had most certainly arranged and ordered for me this pleasant way of comfort and relief. “I am poor and needy, yet the Lord thinketh upon me.” i fresh revelation of His wonderful love seemed to be vouchsafed to my soul by this opportune blessing, and a cheque became “an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace.” I hastened to my dear husband that he might share my joy, and I found in him a willing listener to the sweet “old story” of his Master’s grace and power. Then, after a word or two of fervent praise to God on my behalf, he wrote the following letter to the friend by whose liberal hand our gracious God had sent this notable deliverance: —
Dear Friend, — I should like you to know why you were sent here this afternoon, and what an angel of mercy you were to my dear wife, and so to me. The Lord bless you. Soon after you were gone, my wife’s quarter’s bill for books came in for £340, and she had only £280 apart from your cheque. Poor soul, she has never spent more than her income before, and if you had not come, I fear it would have crushed her to be £60 in debt. How good of the Lord to send you in the nick of time! We joined our praises together, and we do also very gratefully join our prayers for you. God bless you, and make up to you your generous gifts above all your own desires. I could not refrain from telling you this; it is one of the sparkling facts which will make happy memories to help to stay our faith in future trials if they come. Again, God bless you.
Yours heartily,
C.H. SPURGEON.
Oct. 28. — As part of the proceeds of his last lecture in London, I have the pleasure of receiving to-day £25 as the generous and graceful gift of Mr. John B. Gough to the “Book Fund.” Such a gift from such a man is precious and noteworthy, but not unusual, as I believe it is the constant habit of Mr. Gough to bestow blessings as well as to recommend them. Long as his name has been honored in our household, and his special work admired and appreciated, it was not till his recent visit to England that we had the happiness of his personal acquaintance, Now he has been twice to see us, (once accompanied by his excellent wife,) and a friendship has been contracted between us which, though interrupted by absence from each other on earth, will find its true fruition and best enjoyment in heaven. The hours we spent in his company have left fragrant memories not only of pleasant mirth at the droll tales so inimitably told, but also of sacred joy in sweet and goodly words which “ministered grace unto the hearers.” Cannet my friends imagine that it was a rare treat to listen to the converse of John Ploughman and John Gough? No “pen of a ready writer” was there to record the good things they said, or to immortalize the brilliant “table talk” which graced each repast; but the sweet communion which knit our hearts together will never be forgotten by us, and so deep a flood of enjoyment came in upon my usually quiet life that day, that it will for ever ripple pleasantly upon the shores of memory. To our very dear friends, Mr. and Mrs. Gough in their far-away home in the West,! send loving greeting; and for this £25, which means so much joy and comfort for the Lord’s poor servants, I give the warmest thanks of a grateful heart.
Nov. 1. — Two dear ladies brought me £50 to use in the Lord’s work as! please. What bountiful kindness, its preciousness enhanced by my necessity! I divided it between the “Book Fund” and the “Pastors’ Aid,” for in these times of universal pressure I can scarcely confine my gifts to books in those eases where! know that, though the daily bread is sure, it is often unaccompanied by more substantial nourishment. It was only the other day I heard of a minister whose last Christmas dinner was to have consisted of a loaf and steak because he could not afford better fare; and I know many whose most creditable fear of debt compels them not only to keep their book-shelves empty., but the cupboard very bare. One ceases to wonder at the oft-recurring sickness of many ministers’ wives, and the extreme delicacy of their children, when one remembers their many privations, their lack of nourishing food, and their need of suitable clothing. “My income barely enables me to find plain food and scanty clothing for my wife and three children,” writes a country Independent pastor. “Frequently I have saved a few shillings with the view of purchasing a volume of the ‘Treasury,’ but a pair of shoes or a little dress put the book aside.” In this last matter of clothing for pastors’ families there is very much now being clone by kind friends for their relief. I have elsewhere mentioned the many presents I receive for them, and to-day (mercies never come singly) a large chest arrived from Scotland containing the wardrobes of two deceased gentlemen, sent by the desolate wife and mother. It has been a somewhat sad work to allot this valuable gift to seven needy pastors, but their joy in receiving the good warm clothes will not be damped by any sorrowful remembrances of departed friends, and I rejoice beforehand in their joy.
Coming now to the conclusion of these sadly irregular chronicles, I should like to promise — if the Lord spare my life, and prosper the Book Fund — to do better next year. The “happy thought,” if it be a happy one, of reporting this little service in “diary-fashion,” ought to be more satisfactorily carried out, and I hope to gather more discreetly and carefully the material to be used at the close of the year 1880. Experience has taught me that there is sure to be a fullness of goodness and mercy to supply the record, but the same teacher sadly proves to me that the “recorder” fails and is at fault in not keeping her “book of remembrance” well posted up. But what memory can keep pace with God’s mercies? or what uninspired pen can tell the thousandth part of Els loving-kindnesses? “If I should count them they are more in number than the sand.” Could I cull the choicest flowers of language, and bind them in one delightful bundle of thankfulness, it might be an acceptable offering of gratitude to the dear friends who have helped me; but how can I worthily praise and extol the bounty of my gracious, loving God? “Thou hast dealt well with Thy servant, O Lord, according to Thy word.” Blessed be Thy name, Thou hast daily loaded me with benefits, Thy hand has supplied all my need, Thy strength has been made perfect in my weakness. Thy loving care has watched over my work, and “there hath not failed one word of all Thy good promise upon which Thou hast caused me to hope.” And what can I say more unto Thee? “Is this the manner of man, O Lord God?” Oh! poor dumb lips, that cannot speak His praise aright! Oh, faltering tongue, that as yet cannot “frame to pronounce” the syllables of heaven’s own language!
“How shall I praise Him?
Seraphs when they bring
The homage of their lyre,
Veil their bright face beneath their wing,
And tremble and retire. Lost in thy love, yet full of humble trust
I close the worthless lay,
Bow down my reverent forehead in the dust,
And in meek silence pray.”
Truly there are times when silence is more eloquent than speech, and we are constrained to worship “afar off” from very awe of His goodness. Such a season comes to me now as I sit pondering over all the Lord’s marvelous lovingkindness, and looking back on the great and manifold mercies of the fast-closing year; — my spirit is overwhelmed within me, — the weight of blessing seems almost too much for me, and I lay aside my poor, useless pen to bow the knee before Him in silent adoration and thanksgiving.
“I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies, and of all the truth which thou hast showed unto thy servant.”
NOTES
FRIENDS will please note that as the accounts take up a considerable space we have added four extra pages. We are behind hand also with notices of books, but hope to give all the publishers their due before long.
On Sunday, February 15, it was our .great delight to return to the Tabernacle and its well-beloved work. This was a week later than we at first intended, but it was no less than a special providence which kept as out of the worst fog of the year, and brought us home just as the weather changed. How glad. were we to see old friends and fellow-workers! How glad. were they to see us! The mutual joy was felt too deeply to be expressed. The great house was thronged up to the utmost endurance, and hundreds, and even thousands, were turned from the doors because there was no more space in which to pack them. We are greatly refreshed by the rest, and glad to be at work again. Friends are requested to judge of the sermons preached at the Tabernacle by the printed copy, and not by extracts made by newspaper reporters, who, of course, can give only portions, and naturally select those which are most likely to excite remark. A sentence in its connection reads very differently from what it does when set apart, and discussed as if it were an independent and complete utterance.
On Wednesday, February 18, the Annual Church Meeting was held. About eighteen hundred of the members were present to tea, and a much larger number assembled afterwards. It was a most delightful evening, full of affection and enthusiasm. Speech is free, and affection has greater liberty at a select meeting than upon occasions when “a chiefs among us taking notes.” The pastor’s spirits were raised, and his heart cheered by the loving words of his officers and people, and all were happy and grateful to God. The financial accounts were exceedingly satisfactory, especially when we remember what a trying year 1879 has been in this respect to all institutions. Nothing is lacking to any branch of church work. All that is needed is a continuance of the blessing, and more grace.
The statistics were as follows: — Increase, by baptism, 305; by letter, 100; by profession, 37; by restoration, 3; total, 445. Decrease, by dismission, 13l; by exclusion for non-attendance, 68; by joining other churches without letters, 43; removed for other causes, 11; emigrated, 4; died, 65; total, 322; — leaving a net increase of 123, and making the number of members on the books 5290.
The annual meeting of our Tabernacle Sunday School was held in the Lecture-hall on Tuesday evening, February 10, Pastor J. A. Spurgeon presiding. The platform was occupied by a choir of the children, who sang several sweet hymns and anthems during the evening. Pastor J. A. Spurgeon, after explaining that this was the annual meeting of the home school, which only represented about one-fifth of the actual Sabbath schools associated with the church, gave an interesting address upon the necessity and influence of the work, and the great responsibility which rested upon teachers, parents, and the entire Church of Christ, in order that the great end of the work might be at-rained, that of sound scriptural instruction and the conversion of the young. Drs. MacAusland and Sinclair Patterson, Deacons W. Olney, and J. H. Olney, and Mr. Pearce, superintendent of the schools, also addressed the meeting. We extract the following particulars from the report read by the secretary: —
“The school consists in the aggregate of 105 teachers and about 1,200 scholars; the large schoolroom in the Tabernacle basement being occupied by the juniors, and the two rooms in the college buildings by the seniors; beside which there are separate rooms for the infants, library, and elder scholars. There are 103 of our scholars who are members of the church, of whom 42 have joined during the past year. All the teachers are church members, this being a condition of service.”
The Missionary Society in connection with the school has raised during the past year the sum of £131 3s. 3d., which has been expended as follows: — Towards the support of Mrs. Brown, late a teacher in the school, now in the Zenana Baptist Mission, Calcutta, £50; to the Baptist Missionary Society, £25; to the Tabernacle Colportage Association, £20; to Mrs. Spurgeon’s Book Fund, £20; to the Continental Sunday-school Mission, £5; and to Messrs. Johnson and Richardson in Africa, £5; leaving a balance in hand of £3 17s. 9d. In connection with Mr. Wigney’s class, the sum of £50 is raised annually for the support of Mr. Easton, a missionary of the China Inland Mission, and formerly a scholar in the class.
There is a Band of Hope, in connection with which sixty pledges were taken during the past year; and a Dorcas Society, the object of which is to make up clothing for the poor, specially those connected with our own school. Scholars may purchase articles at the cost price of material only, by periodical payments of ld. or 2d. An annual grant of £5 is made by the church to this society.
Scholars’ Examination. — At the Scripture examination held last February by the Sunday School Union, 47 scholars from our school attended, of whom 33 were successful in obtaining certificates.
COLLEGE — God is with us in this work, and all things move along in admirable order. We are well supplied with men and funds, and spheres open up for the brethren quite as rapidly as they are prepared for them: we should even be glad to retain the men a little longer, but the churches are not always willing to wait for the man of their choice, and are unwise enough to tempt men to begin running before they have fairly pulled their boots on. As to funds, we have now a solid balance. The large item of legacies — £ 4,112 — which appears in the Balance Sheet has put us into a wealthy condition. Our friends will see that we have spent more than £1,000 of the legacies during the year, and we shall be glad to have our expenditure continue at about that rate, so that this unusual item of income may last over four years.
On January 29 another of our students, Mr. R. E. Ludlow, fell asleep in Jesus before completing his College course. Thus happeneth it in the mystery of providence that one fights the battle for half-a-century and another falls asleep before his sword is well out of the scabbard.
Since our last notice Mr. A. Parker has accepted the pastorate of the church at Colne, Lancashire; and Mr. W. Osborne has resigned the charge of the Thrissell-street Church, Bristol, and has removed to Carlisle, with the view of forming a Baptist church in that important northern town. We beg our brethren in Carlisle rally to the standard, and make this attempt a success.
The following brethren have also removed during the mouth: — Mr. H. Abraham, to Lumb, Lancashire; Mr. F. Aust, from Coldstream, N.B., to Little London, Willenhall; Mr. E. P. Barrett, from South Wingfield to Cornwall-read, Brixton; Mr. G. E. Ireland, from Every-street, Manchester, to Eccles; Mr. W. Seaman, from Newquay to Hawick, N.B.; and W. Usher, from Dacre Park, Lee, to Great Victoria-street, Belfast.
Mr. J. J. Kendon, who went out to Jamaica some months since, has accepted the pastorate of the churches at Jericho and Mount Hermen.
Our colored friend, Mr. T. L. Johnson, has returned to England, through the failure of his health and the loss of his wife. He will probably go back to America to labor among his countrymen there.
A sister in Christ, near Torquay, sends us the following particulars of our highly-esteemed former student, Mr. T. Cannon, thinking we should be interested in hearing a little of his holy, godly walk. She judges rightly. We are much cheered by her account. “Although he did lean towards Plymouth Brethrenism (not exclusive), his heart was large enough to love all who loved the Lord Jesus, while of you he ever spoke with affectionate esteem. As an evangelist he labored, more especially in Devonshire, for the last thirteen years; while his holy, blameless life was a true witness for God. Of him it may be truly said, ‘ he walked with God,’ not fitfully, but habitually; and wherever he visited, the savor of the Master’s presence was always felt. I can assure you that rich and poor alike deeply feel his loss. He was engaged up to the very last in the work he loved and did so well, ministering the word with unusual earnestness and power, at both services, on the last Sunday he was on earth, and visiting the sick until two days before his departure. For this Christlike work his loving sympathizing heart was specially adapted. He was only thirty-seven when the Master called him to rest, but he lived long enough to do a good work, and to do it well. Four dear children are now left orphans.”
ORPHANAGE. — The Services of Song held by our Orphan Choir have been remarkably successful. We are under renewed obligations to our ever generous-hearted friends at Liverpool for the noble help there given; nor may we forget the zealous aid of brethren in Bath, Stroud, Cheltenham, Bristol, Hereford, etc.
Mr. Charlesworth’s series of Services of Song we can heartily commend to the notice of all choirs who wish to utilize their abilities for the spread of the gospel, and the assistance of works of benevolence. His Stockwell Reciter also will be of great use to Sabbath-schools, Bands of Hope, and such like juvenile institutions. The Services are threepence each, and the Reciter is one penny each number.
No more forms of application either for boys or girls can be issued for the Orphanage. It would be cruel to encourage hope. We have many waiting to fill all vacancies which can possibly occur for months to come. -Please take note of this.
The next Quarterly Collectors’ Meeting will] be held at the Orphanage on Tuesday, March 30.
EVANGELISTS. — Messrs. Fullerton and Smith, having achieved under God a great work at the Tabernacle, rested a short while, and then commenced a series of services at Bradford in conjunction with our beloved brother, Pastor C. A. Davis. We are only able to report concerning the opening meetings, but these augur well for the future. The noon-prayer meeting was attended by 100 on the first day, 200 on the second, and 350 on the third; the chapel was crowded every evening at the services, and, best of all, souls were being saved. May Bradford see the arm of the Lord made bare.
At the Tabernacle the best results have followed the special meetings. ‘We have in type a lengthened account of a meeting of converts on January 30, but we cannot find room for it. God be thanked the seed sown has already sprung up!
Mr. Burnham’s visit to Driffield was the means of great blessing to Christians, but the outsiders were not so numerously in-gathered, for special services were being held at the same time by the two bodies of Methodists in the place. So long as souls are saved the agency signifies little. At the neighboring village of Cranswick, however, the chapel was not nearly large enough to hold the people, and therefore the board School was secured, and twice as many were accommodated. The pastor, Brother C. Welton, found so many who were impressed at the services that he was occupied during a whole day in conversing and praying with them at their homes. The services were so successful, that on Mr. Burnham’s departure they were con-tinned for some time with the help of local ministers.
At Sheepshed, Leicestershire, the blessing was even more marked. On the Sunday evening, not only every part of the chapel but the school-rooms also were closely packed, and the word was accompanied with signs following. Mr. Burnham saw between fifty and sixty inquirers during the week, and many of them were led to the Savior. The evangelist attributes the success of the services to the prayerful and zealous efforts of the Christians in the place for some weeks before his visit.
From Feb. 16 to March 7 Mr. Burnham was to have been at Rawtenstall and Preston, but as he was too ill to go we sent our other singing evangelist, Mr. E. J. Parker: may the Lord be with him. We hope Mr. Burnham will be sufficiently restored to fulfill his engagements at Southwell from March 8 to 14, and Minchin-hampton from March 30 to April 4.
The labors of these three brethren are so largely used of God for saving sinners, and building up churches that we shall with gladness add to the number of this little band as soon as the sinews of war are in our hands.
The alteration of time of special services at the Metropolitan Tabernacle rendered it impossible for the Evangelists to hold meetings at Mr. Cuff’s Tabernacle. We regret this, and are anxious that the reason should be known and understood.
COLPORTAGE — Things are looking more hopeful for the Colportage Association, one feature of the outlook being that friends who had been compelled to suspend the work in some districts for lack of funds again apply for a colporteur, which shows that where the agency has been fairly tried, its great value was appreciated, though local circumstances compelled a temporary suspension of the work. Then again, the reports of blessing resting upon particular books sold and tracts given away are more than usually nume-rolls and encouraging. One special feature has been very noticeable in many of the cases of good reported, viz., the indirect yet continuous way in which the truth, has passed through one channel to another. There have been “branches running over the wall.” A book is sold and read, and has led the reader to Jesus. He lends it to another, who is also converted by its perusal — in one case a whole family was saved through reading a tract which had been left by the colporteur in a Shropshire district, and was sent by post to relatives in America. A gentleman who takes great interest in the work reports the following interesting case which occurred in the New Forest: —
“A woodman and his wife living away in the forest, with no neighbors within a mile or so, were among those visited. We believe the visits (of the colporteur) were instrumental, through God’s blessing, in leading both into the light of the gospel. The wife died last year, rejoicing, and full of faith and hope; the husband, crippled with rheumatism, looks eagerly for the visits, and with tears of joy has said, ‘ bless God for putting it into your heart to come and see me, and pray God to bless those who sent you.’“ And our friend continues — “I can assure you from my own personal experience that the visits have in many cases been productive of the happiest results. Indeed, five or six thousand magazines and books cannot go into the homes of these people every year, replacing bad literature or none at all, without, through the divine blessing, gradually but surely elevating, refining, and Christianizing them.”
The Association has a very nice Bible-carriage, kindly placed at its disposal by a Christian lady, and would be glad to see it at work in London. Will any friends provide the £40 a year necessary to start a new colporteur in some Metropolitan or suburban district?
If the value and success of colportage are well pondered, our friends will soon enable us to again increase the staff from, our present number, sixtyfour, to at least the eighty employed during last year. Will friends in their own locality try and aid us by collecting, or giving a guarantee of £40 a year towards employing a colportour, or if unable to do this, by contributions to the general fund, which continually needs help?
PERSONAL NOTES. — The following pleasing note comes to us from Russia: — “I came to this country about twenty-four years ago, and have been about in various parts of the interior ever since. Beyond having one volume of your sermons, I have not been much acquainted with the extent of your progress until the past year, during which I have taken in ‘ The Sword and Trowel.’ Through it I have watched you with great interest and earnest prayer, and the first thing I fly to now on receiving a new number is your ‘personal notes.’ I have a wife and eight children. A few weeks ago I explained to them the meaning of the Orphanage, and appealed to their feelings: the result was that I was authorized to go to their Savings’ Bank and take out 3 roubles 40 kopecks as the children’s contribution. We have now made up the sum to 55 roubles, which will be forwarded to you from St. Petersburg by a cheque. The amount should not be less than £5. Please accept it. I am so deeply interested in all your noble institutions that I scarcely know how to divide it, but I think if you will give £1 to Mrs. Spurgeon for the Poor Ministers’ Clothing Fund, £1 to the Colportage Fund, and the balance to the Orphanage, we cannot do better.”
A Methodist minister in Ireland writes: — “Many a time these few years I have wondered whether you know that you are preaching in unnumbered pulpits every Lord’s day, in many cases word for word as reported in your volumes. You are aware, I suppose, that the weekly sermon is read by two-thirds of the Portestants in Ulster. In some cases ten families join in taking it, and lend it from one to another.” The deacons of a church in South Australia, in sending a donation for the Girls’ Orphanage, say, “We have for years past received substantial help from your printed sermons. Christians have been helped on their way, and others have through their instrumentality been introduced into the light and liberty of the gospel.” A sailor friend, who distributes our sermons and other works wherever his ship goes, writes from Jamaica: — “We have given away nearly all the books and sermons that we had. We are saving a few for the poor negroes at the other ports to which we are going. They were so thankful for them at the Falkland Islands, and enjoyed reading them so much. In one house I went in, I saw ‘ Morning by Morning,’ and ‘Evening by Evening’; they looked quite homely to me, as we use them every morning and evening on board ship.” F. J. S. informs us, “Though it may be known to you already, I venture to mention one incident which was brought to my notice. The little island of Bryher (one of the Scilly Isles), though it only has 120 inhabitants, contains a church and a chapel. Service is held at the church occasionally, and then the chapel is closed. On other Sundays the service is held at the chapel, and the sexton, who is also clerk at the church, reads one of your sermons, and they sing ‘ Wesley’s Hymns.’“ Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle. — January 28th, seven; February 12th, thirteen.
Chap 4. APRIL, 1880.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
APRIL, 1880.
OUR SABBATH SERVICES IN THE HOTEL
THE genius of the gospel is the “free Spirit” of the Lord. The Lord Jesus has not multiplied precepts and ordinances as to his worship, as though we were still under the law; he has preferred to leave his people to the motions of the Holy Ghost within them. It does not appear to us that there is any positive command as to the time for the observance of the Lord’s Supper, so that believers are bound to attend the table once in each month, or upon every Lord’s-day. Yet, if we regard apostolic precedent, it seems clear that the sacred feast was observed often, and that it was usual to meet to break bread on the first day of the week. We prefer, therefore, without judging our brethren, to keep to the apostolic practice. Law or no law, what was found good for early saints will, we feel sure, be good for us.
Away upon the Continent, we use on the Sabbath morning such means of grace as we can find: sometimes these are admirable, frequently they are all but intolerable. Be these as they may, our wont is to meet with three or four, or twelve, or twenty, as the case may be, and to remember our Lord’s death, showing it forth in his own pre-scribed manner. There is no need to prepare a sermon, the bread and wine are text and discourse all ready to hand. Simple prayer, and suitable song, with the reading of the word, make up a complete service, requiring no laborious study, always preserving its freshness, and evermore bringing before the mind the most weighty of all themes.
Our audience in our sitting-room at the hotel has varied from twelve to twenty, but there has been no variation in the faithfulness of our Lord to his promise to be with his waiting people. The seasons have been exceedingly sweet and profitable, and we have praised the great Father’s care who has spread for us such a table in the wilderness. After the breaking of bread we have usually had a meditation, and we have been glad to take our turn as spokesman with a brother minister, whose sojourn in the same hotel has been the means of much comfort to us. As several of the guests at the table were invalids, as in fact the sojourn of each one at Mentone had in almost every case a connection with personal or relative affliction, the meditations were usually of a consolatory character, and touched upon the special trial of sickness. It was thought well to preserve a brief memorial of one of these choice seasons, and a ready scribe was found who made notes of the good word which was spoken on January 18th, 1880, by our brother Mr. G. Buchanan Ryley, pastor of the church meeting in Hanover Chapel, Peckham, which church was once presided over by the well-known Dr. Collyer.
Supper being ended, Mr. Ryley selected for his text John 11:15 —
“I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, to the intent ye may believe.”
He said from the latter part of the chapter we gather that four days elapsed between the actual death of Lazarus and the time when the Lord stood by his burial-place, and that afternoon the preacher’s desire would be to explain the reason why Jesus permitted his dear friend to die. There was evidently a deliberate intent on the part of Christ to let Lazarus die; his words could have no other meaning than that he kept away from Bethany in order that Lazarus might pass for awhile into the unseen world. This gives to the faithful heart a strong standing ground in any time of trouble and care: the trouble, the care, the sickness, or the death that might almost break our hearts becomes in a measure illuminated when once we can recognize that it is of the Lord’s allowing, the Lord’s willing, and even at times of the Lord’s doing. This abstention of Jesus from going to Lazarus is built on some such truth as this — that the presence of Jesus with his friends somehow or other wards off death. We do not affirm that no one could die in the presence of Christ, though it is clearly stated in the gospels that, whenever he came in contact with death, death ceased to be; and even when he himself was on the cross the two malefactors did not die so long as there hung between them the breathing Son of God. Spiritually the Lord’s presence has already robbed death of its old meaning, and practically destroyed it. He that believeth in him shall never die. But some one may say “Do you not profess that the Lord Jesus is with his people at all times and in everything? Did he not himself say, ‘ Lo, I am with you to the end of the ages? ‘ Why, then, these troubles and cares, these pains and agonies. these losses and crosses? What is the difference between the believer and the worldling?” In answering these questions by the expressions found in the text the preacher laid down two propositions — first, that faith in Jesus is a greater good than sorrow and death are evils; and, second, that sometimes faith in Jesus is wrought out by the sufferings and sorrows of Christ’s people.
Lazarus is dead; that is sad and weary for Mary and Martha, and Jesus himself when he stood by the grave “groaned in spirit,” and “wept.” Yet he says, “I am glad that I was not there.” Sad as the death was, the disciples’ faith was of more importance, and for their sakes the Lord permitted the sorrow to come. The Savior’s rejoicing did not arise from any lack of sensitiveness to sorrow and trouble; never did any one feel for men and women in grief and pain as he did; but he knew that spiritual life is a far greater good than bodily suffering and death are evils, and therefore he was glad that he was not at Bethany to save Lazarus from dying, for that death was to infuse new life into the faith of his followers. Better that Lazarus should die, better that Mary and Martha should know a little of the heart break than that eleven apostles should lack one degree of intense faith in him who is the resurrection and the life. Better, too, that the people of God should suffer than that the world should miss the opportunity of our thereby witnessing to the power of divine grace in the hour of trouble. Better, too, that the Lord Jesus himself should suffer the infinite agonies of Calvary than that his people should lose the blessings of redemption, and be outcasts for ever. This truth sheds a wondrous light upon Christian suffering, and shows how we may even have fellowship with Christ in his sufferings. Does not Paul speak of filling up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in his flesh for his body’s sake, which is the church? Christ’s sufferings are in a class by themselves when we consider the vicarious character of them, but our afflictions are lifted up to something of the level of those of Jesus when they are made the means of blessing to others, even as the Father made his Son’s sufferings the means of blessing, strengthening, vivifying, and faith-reviving to his covenanted people.
The Lord Jesus Christ rejoices even in our suffering when it promotes faith in himself. He not only wanted his disciples to be perfected in faith, but he was glad when by another’s sufferings their faith was strengthened and raised to a higher level. When suffering is thus received as the chosen means for the sanctification of souls, it is no longer a cause of grief, it is no more to be looked on as a misfortune, but is rather to be welcomed as God’s chosen way of working for the edification of his church, the promotion of his kingdom, and the glorifying of his Son. What is the explanation of those wonderful words of Isaiah, “It pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief”? It is not that the Father had delight in the sufferings of his Son in themselves, but it pleased him to put him to grief that thereby his prodigal ones might be brought home. In like manner the same Lord who rejoiced that he was not there wept as he stood by the grave-side. It is that blessed union of the divine and human that makes us fall on our knees and adore him, and at the same time makes us take him to our heart of hearts as the brother born for adversity.
Notice, said the preacher, that the Savior’s joy is more on our account than on his own. He was glad for his own sake, yet he was unselfish in his very joys, just as he was in his sorrows. He said to the daughters of Jerusalem, “Weep not for me “; so here he rejoices, not for his own sake, but for the sake of his disciples. He knew, as we have never known, what the value of faith in him as the resurrection and the life really is; and therefore he rejoiced that he was absent when Lazarus was sick, because the end of that sickness and death was the strengthening of the faith of his disciples, and so for the advancement of the glory of God. This gladness of Jesus is a grand plea with Christians. What higher, better, sweeter, intenser motive can we urge than that of pleasing Jesus, gladdening his heart, and giving him joy? And this, over which he rejoices, has been made to run side by side with our spirit’s perfecting. He rejoices over the faith that makes us meet for the inheritance of the saints in light. This will give a new meaning to our being by-and-by welcomed into the joy of our Lord. If we accept suffering as the Father’s way of liking us into closer union with himself, and as the Savior’s appointed means of making us adorn his doctrine, and glorify himself, we shall not only minister comfort to our own hearts, and to those dear to us, but we shall gladden the heart of Jesus. In pleading with sinners nothing is more mighty than such an argument as this, — believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will gladden him whose heart we broke on Calvary; you can compensate him for his sufferings; you can make him glad that ever he died. To such work are we called. May God help us to respond. Amen.
Our engraving represents Mentone a few years back. Since it was drawn a breakwater has been carried out and a harbor has been formed, so that vessels lie in the corner near the old tower. The old town, however, with the Corniche road running along below it, remains the same as ever, and the rocks, which look like gigantic frogs or crocodiles, are as they were in those days when Mentone was a mere village. The wood-block gives a very fair idea of our winter’s shelter.
JOHN ANGELL JAMES AND THE HUNDRED AND THIRD PSALM
THE value and beauty of family worship in the time of bereavement are illustrated by an incident in the life of the Rev. J. A. James, which has almost a touch of the sublime. It was his custom to read at family prayer on Saturday evening the hundred and third psalm. On the Saturday of the week in which Mrs. James died, he hesitated, with the open Bible in his hand, before he began to read; but, after a moment’s silence, he looked up and said, “Notwithstanding what has happened this week, I see no reason for departing from our usual custom of reading the hundred and third psalm, — ‘ Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me bless his holy name.’“ What must be the effect upon a household of such a scene! What a picture is thus presented of holy resignation and thankfulness! The greatest sufferer recognizing, as the head of the family, the hand that has smitten his home and made it desolate, and in the depth of his sorrow blessing the name of the Lord! — From “Christian Home Life.”
BE A WHOLE MAN AT EVERYTHING
JOHN JOSEPH GURNEY wrote to his son, “Be a whole man at everything. At Latin, be a whole man to Latin; at geometry or history, be a whole man to geometry or history; at play, be a whole man to play; at washing and dressing, be a whole man to washing and dressing; above all, at meeting, be a whole man to worship.” We would earnestly enforce the good Quaker’s advice. Whatever is worth doing is worth doing well. God deserves to be served with our very best. When we put forth all our powers we shall do none too well; therefore, whatsoever we do let us do it heartily. Be a whole man in praying, preaching, teaching, giving, hearing, or praising. It is a silly thing to make two bites of a cherry, and our whole manhood is really so small a thing in the service of God that to divide it is absurd.
ON BEING IN TIME.
PUNCTUALITY is one of the minor moralities, but it is one which every young man should carefully cultivate. The very smallness of the virtue makes its opposite vice the less excusable. It is as easy to be in time as it is to be five minutes late when you once acquire the habit. Let it be acquired by all means, and never lost again. Upon that five minutes will depend a world of comfort to others, and every Christian should consider this to be a very weighty argument. We have no right to cause worry and aggravation to others, when a little thoughtfulness on our part would prevent it. If the engagement be for twelve o’clock, we have no authority to make it 12.5, and by doing so we shall promote nobody’s happiness. That odd five minutes may create discomfort for ourselves throughout the entire day, and this perhaps may touch the sluggard a little more keenly than any less selfish consideration. He who begins a little late in the morning will have to drive fast, will be constantly in a fever, and will scarcely overtake his business at night; whereas he who rises in proper time can enjoy the luxury of pursuing his calling with regularity, ending his work in fit season, and gaining a little portion of leisure. Late in the morning may mean puffing and blowing all the day long, whereas an early hour will make the pace an easy one. This is worth a man’s considering. Much evil comes of hurry, and hurry is the child of un-punctuality.
The waste of other people’s time ought to touch the late man’s conscience. A gentleman, who was a member of a committee, rushed in fifteen minutes behind the appointed hour, and scarcely apologized, for to him the time seemed near enough; but a Quaker, who happened also to be on the committee, and had been compelled to wait, because a quorum could not be made up to proceed with the business, remarked to him, “Friend, thou hast wasted a fall hour. It is not only thy quarter of an hour which thou hast lost, but the quarter of an hour of each of the other three; and hours are not so plentiful that we can afford to throw them away.” We once knew a brother whom we named “the late Mr. S____,” because he never came in time. A certain tart gentleman, who had been irritated by this brother’s unpunctuality, said that the sooner that name was literally true the better for the temper of those who had to wait for him. Many a man would much rather be fined than be kept waiting. If a man must injure me, let him rather plunder me of my cash than of my time. To keep a busy man waiting is an act of impudent robbery, and is also a constructive insult. It may not be so intended, but certainly if a man has proper respect for his friend, he will know the value of his time, and will not cause him to waste it. There is a cool contempt in unpunctuality, for it as good as says, “Let the fellow wait; who is he that I should keep my appointment with him?”
In this world matters are so linked together that you cannot disarrange one without throwing others out of gear; if one business is put out of time, another is delayed by the same means. The other day we were traveling to the Riviera, and the train after leaving Paris was detained for an hoar and a half. This was bad enough, but the result was worse, for when we reached Marseilles the connecting train had gone, and we were not only detained for a considerable time, but were forced to proceed by a slow train, and so reached our destination six hours later than we ought to have done. All the subsequent delay was caused through the first stoppage. A merchant once said to us, “A. B. is a good fellow in many respects, but he is so frightfully slow that we cannot retain him in our office, because, as all the clerks work into each other’s hands, his delays are multiplied enormously, and cause intolerable inconvenience. He is a hindrance to the whole system, and he had better go where he can work alone.” The worst of it is that we cannot send unpunctual people where they can work alone. To whom or whither should they go? We cannot rig out a hermitage for each one, or that would be a great deliverance. If they prepared their own dinners, it would not matter that they dropped in after every dish had become cold. If they preached sermons to themselves, and had no other audience, it would not signify that they began consistently seven minutes behind the published hour. If they were their own scholars, and taught themselves, it would be of no consequence if the pupil sat waiting for his teacher for twenty minutes. As it is, we in this world cannot get away from the unpunctual, nor get them away from us, and therefore we are obliged to put up with them; but we should like them to know that they are a gross nuisance, and a frequent cause of sin, through irritating the tempers of those who cannot afford to squander time as they do. If this should meet the eye of any gentleman who has almost forgotten the meaning of the word “punctuality,” we earnestly advise him to try and be henceforth five minutes too soon for every appointment, and then perhaps he will gradually subside into the little great virtue which we here recommend. Could not some good genius get up a Punctuality Association, every member to wear a chronometer, set to Greenwich time, and to keep appointments by the minute hand? Pledges should be issued, to be signed by all sluggish persons who can summon up sufficient resolution totally to abstain from being behind time in church or chapel, or on committee, or at dinner, or in coming home from the office in the evening. Ladies eligible as members upon signing a special pledge to keep nobody waiting while they run upstairs to pop on their bonnets. How much of sinful temper would be spared, and how much of time saved, we cannot venture to guess. Try it. C.H.S.
SLAVISH TIMOROUSNESS IN PRAYER
A PETITIONER once approached Augustus with so much fear and trembling that the emperor cried, “What, man, do you think you are giving a sop to an elephant?” He did not care to be thought a hard and cruel ruler. Sometimes when men pray with a slavish bondage upon them, with cold set phrases, and a crouching solemnity, the free Spirit of the Lord may well rebuke them. Art thou coming to a tyrant? Does he want slaves to grace his throne? Holy boldness, or at least a childlike hope, is more becoming in a Christian. The believer is not for ever to be wailing out misereres, but he may with delight draw near to him whose delight it is to draw near to his people.
NOTES
GOD has made us our own governors in these British Isles, for, loyal as we are to our Queen, we practically are Caesars to ourselves. We are now called upon to exercise one of the privileges and duties which go with liberty, let no man be negligent in it. Every God-fearing man should give his vote with as much devotion as he prays. Vote for those whose principles denounce needless war, and whose watchword is justice at home and abroad. For temperance, thrift, religious equality, and social progress let the Christian vote be one and indivisible.
We are delighted to hear that Mr. Sampson, of Folkestone, is to become secretary to the Baptist Union. We are truly sorry for Folkestone, since it will suffer a great loss by his removal; but Mr. Sampson is the man for the position, and. indeed the only man who struck us at once, the moment his name was mentioned. If the brotherhood will once for all lay aside all differences, and go in heartily for real work for Jesus, something may yet come of THE UNION. Our heart was always with our late secretary, Mr. Booth, and though we are rather hard to please, we feel quite an enthusiasm for Mr. Sampsom. Not that we had any hand in his selection, for we carefully abstain from any connection with the ecclesiastical politics of the denomination; but we admire the choice of the committee, and. would ask our Baptist readers to seal it with many prayers for Mr. Sampson’s success.
We are pleased to call attention to The Missionary Herald and the Juvenile Missionary Herald, of the Baptist Missionary Society. Of old these productions were always solid and usually sleepy, but now they are admirably conducted, abundantly illustrated, and thoroughly readable. Our mission deserves the liberal aid of all Christian people, for its tone and spirit are right, and a blessing will come of it.
On Monday evening, March 8, the Annual Meeting of THE LADIES’ WORKING BENEVOLENT Society was held in the Tabernacle Lecture hall. Addresses were delivered by Pastor C. H. Spurgeon, who presided, and Messrs. B. W. Carl J. T. Dunn, and J. W. Harrald. The amount given to the poor by this Society during the year was slightly under £100. The pastor expressed an earnest desire to see the amount greatly increased, and lamented that the ladies of the congregation did not more humorously take up the work. Churches which lie in the thickly populated parts of London suffer greatly from the loss of the personal services of the wealthier members. Families best able to help the poor remove into the suburbs, and the ladies naturally join societies near their own homes, and thus the mother church is unable to do the work expected of it. At the Tabernacle this evil is not crushingly felt, but still it operates de-pressingly. Sunday schools can scarcely find teachers from the same cause. The better educated are leaving the poorer people to themselves: is this right?
COLLEGE. — During the past month Mr. R. Smathers has settled as pastor of the church at Whitehurch, Hants. Mr. D. Bruce has removed from Peterhead to Forres, N.B.; and Mr. M. Cumming is leaving New Burner to take the oversight of the church at Bury St. Edmunds.
Early this month Mr. W. Mann will sail for Cape Town, to reinforce our devoted Brother Hamilton. We are glad to learn that Mr. and Mrs. Stubbs have reached Allahabad in safety, and received a most hearty welcome from the church and congregation, who had furnished their pastor’s house throughout in readiness for his reception. Mr. Norris and his family and Mr. Hook were also reported “all well,” as far as Malta.
Our son Thomas sends us good news of his companions. Mr. McCullough has commenced preaching at Longford, and Mr. Harrison at Deloraine, Tasmania, “with many encouraging tokens;” and our noble friend, Mr. Gibson, is preparing to build chapels in both places. Mr. H Wood has settled at Saddleworth, South Australia; and Mr. H. Marsden, late of Mansfield, has reached. Melbourne in safety.
Mr. C. Dallaston, of Christchurch, New Zealand, reports the addition of sixty-nine members during the year, and informs as that services have been commenced in the south part of the city, where it is hoped a church will soon be formed.
The church at West Melbourne thanks us very heartily for having sent such a suitable pastor as Mr. A. J. Clarke, our late evangelist` Already a gracious revival has commenced, forty-four having been added to the church, the weekly prayer-meetings are very largely attended, and the school-chapel is so crowded that it has been decided to start a fund for build-Lug a Tabernacle to hold 1,250 people.
The Annual College Conference will be held in the week commencing Monday, April 19. There will be a public meeting at the Shoreditch Tabernacle that evening, and another at the Metropolitan Tabernacle the following Thursday evening, April 22, at both of which the president hopes to take the chair.
All our enterprises, but especially the College, will sustain a great loss in the death of Mrs. Ann Tyson, of Norwood, whose continual bounty has been shown for many years in helping our various works. She leaves the residue of her estates to the Orphanage and the College, but the property is charged with some ten annuities, which will prevent any large assistance coming immediately to either institution. We lose in her a faithful friend, of whom we never asked even as much as a farthing, for she watched the work with earnest care and gave to it with unprompted eagerness, regarding it as the joy of her life to help her pastor in the service of the Lord. Her husband, who was taken home some years ago, was of the same mind, and for the help which they have both rendered to us we shall feel eternally grateful to God, and we shall fondly cherish their memories.
MESSRS. SMITH AND FULLERTON IN BRADFORD. — Messrs. Smith and Fullerton have spent a month in Bradford, in connection with the church at Zion Jubilee Chapel. It has been a time of great and solid blessing, and has resulted, we believe, in the conversion of hundreds of persons.
They came to the town on Saturday, February 14th, and held a preliminary meeting of Christian people the same evening. The following day they conducted the two services in the chapel, and Mr. Smith addressed in the afternoon a great meeting of Sunday scholars, five schools being gathered together in the spacious building.
Meetings were conducted every evening except Saturday during the following week, the chapel being filled; and on the next Sunday seventy teachers and scholars gathered to an early prayer-meeting, and the throng at the regular services was so great that hundreds were unable to gain admission. An extra crowded service was held by Mr. Smith in the afternoon.
During the succeeding week the nightly throngs were greater than ever, and on Saturday the evangelists gave a song service entitled, “From Egypt to Canaan,” two thousand people being assembled in the chapel to hear it. The next day the tide of interest was found to be still rising. It seemed as though the whole city was come together to hear the word of God. The chapel was filled at seven in the morning, and. very solemn was the feeling when the pastor requested prayer for one of the members, from whose’ deathbed he had just come, and who was at that moment passing away into eternity. At half-past ten the building was again thronged; at three in the afternoon St. George’s Hall was filled with scholars and. teachers, an overflow meeting being held in Old Sion Chapel, close by. At 6.30 the chapel was again crowded, an overflow meeting being held in the school and lecture rooms; and at eight o’clock St. George’s Hall was thronged with a vast multitude, many being unable to get in.
During the next week hundreds had to be turned away from the crowded chapel; and on Saturday St. George’s Hall was thronged to a second song service, in-spiriting in the highest degree, entitled — “Valor and victory,” in which the Christian life, in its martial aspect, was vividly set forth before the listeners.
The following Sunday, which was the last in the series, was a wonderful day. The chapel was thronged at seven in the morning and again at 10.30. At three the communion service was held, and 1,200 communicants gathered around the Lord’s table; 576 of them being representatives of 57 other churches of 12 denominations in the town, including the Church of England, and of churches’ in 29 other towns in various parts of England. At a quarter to six the doors were opened again and in ten minutes the chapel was packed so that the doors had to be closed. Then St. George’s hall was once more thronged, 5.000 people hanging on the preacher’s lips as he set before them life and death and bade them “choose life.”
The closing week was spent in meetings at two other Baptist chapels in the town, which were greatly blessed; in a converts’ meeting held at Sion Chapel, at which 400 persons professed to have been led to Christ during the month; and in a great tea meeting in celebration of the pastors’ settlement at Sion Jubilee Chapel, at which about 1,400 persons sat down.
The daily noon prayer-meetings during the month have been seasons of refreshment, the gracious influences and glorious results of the inquirers’ meetings will never be forgotten; the whole town has been affected, as may be seen from the fact that the converts are persons connected, with 33 other congregations in Bradford, besides that at Sion Chapel.
On two Saturday afternoons the evangelists held services in the neighboring town of Shipley.
It only remains to add a word concerning our beloved brethren themselves. Mr. Smith conducts the singing with his cornet in a delightful manner, and his solos have been almost as greatly blessed to the arousing and conversion of sinners as the preaching of his coadjutor. Mr. Fullerton proclaims the gospel with surpassing dearness and wealth of illustration. His forcible sermons are saturated with Scripture. Their solidity and fullness go far to ensure the reality and permanence of the work wrought by them. “If the truth shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.”
Our beloved brethren go from us with our unfeigned admiration and affection. God has anointed them for a great work, and the honored church at the Tabernacle, from which they are sent to their blessed work, may thank God on every remembrance of them. — C. A. Davis, Pastor.
Mr. Burnham’s substitute, Mr. PARKER, was very successful at Rawtenstall. The chapel was crowded, and about twenty young people were brought to the Savior. After the evangelist left the services were continued with local help.
Mr. Parker afterwards conducted a fortnight’s services at Moor-lane, Preston, when a large number professed to be converted.
Mr. BURNHAM was sufficiently restored to go to Southwell, Nottinghamshire, from the 8th to the 14th ult. Pastor J. H. Plumbridge thus writes of his visit:-”Although Southwell is a hard town to move, I believe it has been thoroughly stirred by this effort. The week evening services were well attended, and on Sunday evening we had to provide extra sittings. Best of all, the Lord was with us. The word has been blessed to many, and several are now rejoicing in the Savior.
The following are Mr. Barnham’s engagements for the present month:— March 30 to April 4, Minchinhampton; April 5 to April 11, Lock’s-lane, Frome; April 12 to April 18, Wedmore, Somersetshire.
Messrs. Fullerton and Smith commence .at Northampton March 21, for a fortnight, and then open a campaign at Wrexham.
COLPORTAGE. — The Association is now beginning to regain some of the ground lost last year by the discontinuance of so many districts. Guarantees of £40 a-year have been received for the following new districts, to which colportents have either been sent, or will be shortly, namely: — Church Gresley, Staffordshire; Chariton-le-Moor, Oxford-shire; Birchington-on Sea, Kent; also Deptford, where the Bible carriage alluded to last month will be worked. We thank all our friends who have thus aided in the extension of this important agency. Further applications from other districts will be very gladly considered, and appointments made as far as funds will allow. The object of the association is to help all churches without distinction, whilst the aim is to be an aggressive evangelistic agency, both by counteracting the baneful effects of evil literature by the sale of the Word of God, and books and periodicals in harmony with its teachings, as well as by the direct personal appeals of the Colporteurs. That these objects are largely realized the continual reports from the districts abundantly prove. The work is a very economical one, the profits on sales making it partially self-supporting, but it still requires liberal aid, in the form of subscriptions and donations to the general fund, which will be thankfully received, and may be sent direct to the Secretary, Sir. Corden Jones, Pastors’ College, Temple Street, London, S.E.
ORPHANAGE. — Another dear lad has been called home to heaven during the past month. Mr. Charlesworth will tell the story of his happy life and triumphant death in next month’s magazine, but we refer to it now to call attention to the new list of contributions, which we publish in the present number, for THE GIRLS’ ORPHANAGE BUILDING FUND. A week before little Bray died we visited him, and received from his own hands his store of savings towards the new buildings. As we took the four shillings for “Bray’s Bricks,” and the same amount from “Brays Friend,” we felt that they were the first installments of the £8,000, which we shall want for the first block of buildings for the girls. We reckon that the “Hawthorns” and the adjoining meadow have now been paid for, and that we have received in addition sufficient to defray the cost of the fixtures, furniture, and alterations of the house which is now used for the Girls’ Orphanage. We shall be glad to have a large part of the cost in hand by June 19, when we hope the foundation stones of the new buildings will be laid. Friends wishing to have collecting cards or boxes brought in on that day can be supplied with them by applying to the Secretary, Stockwell Orphanage, Clapham Road. We see our way to £4,000 out of the sum which will be required. As yet we have no tenders, but hope next month to give the details; and, meanwhile, we trust our beloved helpers will be estimating how much each one should personally send. The Lord will provide for this also.
A GEM FROM MRS. SPURGEON’S BOOK FUND REPORT
(* We were unable to give all this Report in The Sword and the Trowel, and therefore we struck out many passages which were excellent, but not exactly necessary in a summary. This passage, however, is too good for any of our readers to lose: at least, we think so, and we speak here as an editor, and not merely as a husband. — C. H. S.)
A CURIOUS little incident happened lately during a time of prolonged sickness. At the close of a very dark and gloomy day, I lay resting on my couch as the deeper night drew on, and though all was bright within my cozy little room, some of the external darkness seemed to have entered into my soul, and obscured its spiritual vision. Vainly I tried to see the hand which I knew held mine, and guided my fog-enveloped feet along a steep and slippery path of suffering. In sorrow of heart I asked, “Why does my Lord thus deal with his child? Why does He so often send sharp and bitter pain to visit me? Why does tie permit lingering weakness to hinder the sweet service I long to render to His poor servants?” These fretful questions were quickly answered, and though in a strange language, no interpreter was needed save the conscious whisper of my own heart. For awhile silence reigned in the little room, broken only by the crackling of the oak-log burning on the hearth. Suddenly I heard a sweet soft sound, a little, clear, musical note, like the tender trill of a robin beneath my window. “What can that be?” I said to my companion, who was dozing in the firelight; “surely no bird can be singing out there at this time of the year and night!” We listened, and again heard the faint plaintive notes, so sweet, so melodious, yet mysterious enough to provoke for a moment our undisguised wonder. Presently my friend exclaimed, “It comes from the log on the fire!” and we soon ascertained that her surprised assertion was correct. The fire was letting loose the imprisoned music from the old oak’s inmost hear! Perchance he had garnered up this song in the days when all went well with him, when birds twittered merrily on his branches, and the soft sunlight flecked his tender leaves with gold; but he had grown old since then, and hardened; ring after ring of knotty growth had scaled up the long-forgotten melody, until the fierce tongues of the flames carne to consume his callousness, and the vehement heat of the fire wrung from him at once a song and a sacrifice. Ah! thought I, when the fire of affliction draws songs of praise from us, then indeed are we purified, and our God is glorified! Perhaps some of us are like this old oak log, cold, hard, and insensible; we should give forth no melodious sounds were it not for the fire, which kindles round us, and releases tender notes of trust in him, and cheerful compliance with his will ‘, “As I mused, the fire burned,” and my soul found sweet comfort in the parable so strangely set forth before me! Singing in the fire! Yes I God helping us, if that is the only way to get harmony out of these hard, apathetic hearts, let the furnace be heated seven times hotter than before.
TO THOSE WHO ARE HAPPILY MARRIED OR
HOPE TO BE SO
A PLEA BY C. H, SPURGEON,
WE do not write for those people who are married but not mated. When a cat and a dog are tied together they seldom sorrow much at the prospect of separation. When marriage is merry-age it is natural to desire a long life of it; but when it is mar-age the thought of parting is more endurable. Mr. or Mrs. Naggleton will be sure to put on mourning should one or other of them decease, but the garb of sorrow will be all the sorrow he or she will know; the black will soon turn brown, if not white, and the weeds will probably give place to flowers. We address ourselves to those who have the happiness of being joined together by wedded love as well as by wedlock. We write for happy husbands who are able to say with Mr. Robert Walker, a clergyman of the Church of England, who lived in the seventeenth century: “I owe the deepest acknowledgments to God for the constancy of our mutual affection. If we sometimes differed in small matters, we never once disagreed, or once closed our eyes in sleep in thirty-nine years and seven months in discontent or dissatisfaction on either part.” We hope that there are many yet alive upon the face of the earth who could understand Mr. George Muller’s picture of his married life. “Our happiness in God and in each other,” he says, “was indescribable. We had not some happy days every year, nor a month of happiness every year, but we had twelve months of happiness in the year, and this year after year. Often and often did I say to the beloved one, and this again and again even in the fortieth year of our conjugal union — ‘ My darling, do you think there is a couple in Bristol, or in the world, happier than we are?’“ We write for all those young couples who, having begun prudently, and in the fear of God, are looking forward, as they may, to a life of domestic peace and: satisfaction: we feel sure that we shall have their ear upon our tender topic. We write also for those who in the middle passage of life, with the children all round them, find the Lord very kind to them in providence, filling their hearts with thanksgiving for the bliss which arises out of their happy married life. We shall have a worthy audience if all happy husbands and delighted wives will do us the favor to listen to the end of our ditty. Mr. and Mrs. Caudle may do as they like about it.
It is a very painful reflection that in proportion to the happiness of the marriage union must be the sorrow of the separation which sooner or later must occur. “Till death us do part” is the limit to the relation, and that limit must be reached sooner or later. “The parting pang unspoken, unspeakable,” must be felt. It is in reference to that matter that we seek a hearing, and especially for all those bereaved ones to whom the loss is that of the husband and the household’s head. Can the reader put himself or herself into the condition of the new-made widow? She is convulsed with overwhelming grief as she stands by the beloved body of her husband, the body from which the life has just fled. What sorrow! What agony! All the supports of religion will now be needed; faith in God must put forth all its strength, and call in divine succors to produce hearty resignation. Now it will be seen why the Holy Spirit has condescended to take upon himself personally the office of Comforter, for the urgent need of consolation and the great difficulty of communicating it, manifest his kindness and his wisdom in himself espousing the cause of the afflicted. He can meet the case, and he alone. Friends will come in with tender words and sympathetic tears, but the void is great, and the blank is terrible. Those only can enter into the trial who have passed through it themselves. It well behoves those who still retain their beloved partners heartily to pity, console, and assist those whose hearts bleed beneath the separating stroke. We will not trust our pen to ask for sympathy from true Christians; it would seem an insult: let it freely flow.
Widowhood alone is a sufficient sorrow, but much more remains. The orphans — for that is the new name for her children — come clustering about their mother. Some are too young to know their sorrow; ochers of them know it, but scarcely apprehend its import, and of those who have the clearest perception of their loss there may be none able to give her real help. Her children are fatherless, and who shall tell all that is included in that word. She had hoped that the father would have aided her in bringing up the little household, of which he was the mainstay, prop, pillar, priest, and king. The little community is now like a ship without a captain, tossed upon the perilous deep. She is all alone, as to comfort and succor, a dove without her mate; and yet she is not alone as to responsibility and anxiety, since she has around her a full nest for which she alone must care. Brothers and sisters and friends see her difficulty, but as a general rule they are either powerless to help, or else they readily discover an excuse in their own expensive families, and in the burdens which they themselves have to carry. The possession of children may in some lights be regarded as a comfort, but alas! to the poor widow it is a bitter increase of sorrow. What can she do without the bread-winner? How can a woman’s feeble frame sustain the whole burden of a household? The most pitiable case of all is where another little one is added shortly after the husband has been laid in the silent tomb. Benoni, the child of sorrow, is born, and often born to a hard, hard lot. What a rush of anguish overwhelms the mother of such a progeny!
When the surviving parent is possessed of some little property, or the couple have been able to make provision for death, the grief is not lessened, but its consequences are greatly lightened. Poverty on the back of bereavement is terrible. We ask our friends who never knew what it was to lack a meal or a garment to put themselves in the condition of the woman who suddenly finds herself with five, six, or seven children round about her to provide for, and no means whatever of so doing. What is before her? What a gulf yawns at her feet! If she were alone in the world she might gird up her loins, and by stern toil might gain a scanty dole of daily bread; certainly she could not do more, for female labor is worse remunerated than that of slaves. But what can she do with all these children clinging to her skirts? She cannot leave the baby, and the other helpless little creatures, and she cannot do anything with them upon her knees. .Even if she could leave the family, it is highly probable that she knows no form of handicraft, and could not find work if she did. All her time, her strength, and her ability were taxed to keep the house together when the husband brought home his wages: how can she now become the bread-winner into the bargain? Here and there a woman in good health and gifted with superior energy can fight her way, but what can an average widow do? She looks to the right and to the left; every door is closed, she aces no way except to utter want. Friends suggest what might have been done under certain circumstances which are not her circumstances. Very wise people propose to her sheer impossibilities. The kinder sort talk of a subscription to set her up in a business of which she knows nothing: if nothing comes of it, she is no great loser, for little businesses in unskillful hands usually mean a hard struggle, failure, and debt. Her husband’s employers and other friends help for a time, and then the temporary aid ceases, but the real battle is not over. The more hardhearted say that she ought to exert herself: she is exerting herself, and is ready to drop with exhaustion. In a short time the lack of necessaries frequently brings her into such a condition of weakness that she is scarcely able to perform the household duties which her family requires of her, and her spirits sink at the prospect of that slender household being utterly dissolved. Her wedding ring is pawned; she will soon be without house or home for herself and children; and then, where shall they go? There is the “blessed” shelter of the workhouse — we say blessed, but that is not the word we mean; the thoughtful reader shall change it at his pleasure. If she is of gentle descent, and has been respectably brought up, the very mention of the place is a horror of horrors to her. Possibly, her father and mother are both dead, or else in their old age they are almost as straitened as she can be. She was once accustomed to send them a little help in her better times, and she knows how useless it is to look to them now for any material assistance. Perhaps one or two of the elder children can go out to earn a little, although they are thereby deprived of the education which they ought to receive, and are driven too early into the world by that necessity which knows no law. In many instances there is not even this alleviation, no child can earn a farthing, and one, if not two, may be sickly or deformed, so as to need incessant care. Alas, poor mother!
Even after all is done with the elder children, three, four, or five tiny mites still remain with the delicate mother, who has no means of support for them. What can be done for them? We cannot leave them to the cold streets! What can be done for them? Now, gentle readers, married readers, happy readers, you who are going down the hill of life together arm in arm, you who are rejoicing in the middle of life to see your family about you, and you who are enjoying the early days of the married state with the sunshine fall in your faces — we appeal to you. If you will help us, we can provide for one or two children, and take them under our care at the STOCKWELL ORPHANAGE. There we have a family of 250 boys, and we hope ere long to have the same number of girls. When there is a vacancy we shall be delighted to fill it up with one of these youngsters. There will be food and raiment and Christian nurture, and in a few years there will be suitable situations, and to that extent the mother’s burden will be lightened. Will you have a share in the good work? Happy is the man who can build an orphanage at his own expense, endow it and maintain all the children at his own cost, but as we cannot many of us do this, we can club our shillings and pounds and bank-notes, and do it as a joint-stock company, and share the dividend of benevolence. As an acknowledgment of our indebtedness, the great Giver of all good asks of us that we should remember the sorrowful. We who are happy couples may count it but the payment of a pepper-corn rent if we give liberally towards the support of orphans. Widows and orphans need no advocates with us, our hearts are at once open to their needs. The case of the widow might have been ours, and our children might have been in the same plight as hers. They may be in such a case even yet, for all we can tell; for reverses of fortune are not unusual, and we, too, may leave behind us fatherless children who will have need of the kindness of the generous. Such an overwhelming evil might seem a righteous retribution upon us if in our happier days we had refused assistance to the needy. Some of us are not inclined to run the risk of such a penalty, nor will our thoughtful readers tempt such a stroke of providence.
Did we hear an objection whispered? Did a critic observe that married people should make provision for their families by life insurance? We quite agree with the remark, and believe that it is a sin for those who have the means to pay for insurance to neglect making that needful provision. Persons with a fair income ought not to spend all that they have, and leave their children to be taken care of by other people. It is not common honesty for them to do so. Yet, even in the most unpardonable case of unthrift, who is to be made to suffer for it? Are the children to be left to run wild in the street, and to suffer hunger and cold and nakedness because of the improvidence of their dead father? Is it any business of ours to visit the sins of the fathers upon the children? If any think so, we did not write these lines for them. We would not waste our time upon them. We regard them as eligible candidates for the hangman’s post, and we fancy they would take to it con amore if the situation were vacant. However that may be, in many instances which have come under our observation little or no blame could be imputed even by the most severe to the departed parent. We know several cases in which what appeared to be ample provision was made by life-insurance, but the father’s disease was that of slow decline, and during the long period of his illness, in which he could earn nothing, all his savings were consumed, and the life-insurance policy was mortgaged up to the very hilt, so that there was absolutely nothing for the frugal wife to begin her widowed life with. In an instance which has lately come before us, the young people began by endeavoring to purchase from a Building Society the house in which they lived. To do this they lived with the utmost frugality. They were earnest Christian people, and thorough temperance folks into the bargain. The husband had every expectation of rising in his position, and he was a young man who richly deserved to do so: but upon him there fell the hand of consumption: employers were considerate for a time, but ere long the situation had to be vacated, the income stopped, and nothing could be done but to eat the house over their heads. When even the furniture was melting away the good man died, and the wife, who had never wasted a farthing in her life, found herself, with health enfeebled by her long watchings, utterly destitute, and a family to feed. Fault there was none, of sorrow there was an overflowing cup. We confess that if we had the heart of a flint, and the lynx eyes of a professional detector of impostors, we could not discover in many of the cases that come before us a point as large as a pin’s head upon which to fix blame. There is in the painful circumstances absolutely no raw material which can be fashioned into an excuse for denying a contribution.
We have heard it objected to Orphanages that the children are dressed uniform]y, and in other ways are made to look like paupers. This is earnestly avoided at the STOCKWELL ORPHANAGE, and if any friend will step in and look at the boys and girls, he will have to put on peculiar spectacles to be able to detect a shade of the pauper look in countenance, garments, speech, limb, or movement.
Another fault that has been found is that the boys and girls by living in one great institution are unfitted for domestic life in small families. There is probably much truth in this allegation, but at Stockwell we have labored to avoid it by dividing the children into different families, which are located in separate houses. The lads do the domestic work: there is a matron to each house, and no servants are kept, the lads do all, and thus become as handy as young
“But,” it is said by some one, “there is such a deal of trouble in getting a child into an orphanage, and the practice of canvassing for votes is very laborious to the widow, and in many other ways objectionable.” We are of much the same opinion, and we heartily wish that everybody else would think in like manner. There is a good deal to be said for the plan of election by votes given to subscribers, and if it is not the best possible way, it has nevertheless served a very useful turn, and many institutions have been founded and successfully carried on under that system. Still, we shall be glad to get rid of it, and supply’ its place with a more excellent way. We have found it possible to leave the choice of the orphans with the trustees, who are pledged to select the most destitute cases. In the STOCKWELL ORPHANAGE no canvassing can be of the slightest use, for the trustees personally, or through appointed visitors, examine each application, and endeavor to allot the vacancies where the need is greatest. They do not deviate from their rules under pressure or persuasion, but as much as possible exercise impartiality. Even if the child is not received, the mother, having been put to no expense, is not a loser, which is far better than for money to be laid out without the end being gained.
We have tried to answer for our own institution, leaving managers of other orphanages to speak for themselves, as they can do, and ought to do. We shall be glad to hear that our readers have sent subscriptions to any of the numerous excellent institutions in the United Kingdom, and we shall be personally grateful if they will inquire into the character and claims of the Stockwell Orphanage, and give it at least a portion of what they can spare. Just now we are building the Girls’ Orphanage, and there is a call for £5,000 by June 19th, or as near that day as possible. It is of little use to ask every subscriber to The Sword and the Trowel to give a sovereign, for people seldom give uniformly in great numbers, but we earnestly wish it might be so, that through this one appeal the money would come in. It will do so if the Lord touches all hearts by these our words written under an olive tree at Mentone, where our thoughts seldom left our dear life-work. It would be a great relief to a mind which is more than enough burdened, and very apt to sink. Loving eyes will read these lines and think over the suggestion, and feel that the Girls’ Orphanage must not be made a matter of toil, but be done at a leap, through the liberality of many. While we are writing, a friend, finding her balance in the bank to be on the right side, has sent in £100. Heart, be of good cheer!
The Institution receives Fatherless BOYS AND GIRLS, between the ages of 6 and 10.
It is supported by VOLUNTARY CONTRIBUTIONS and by the revenue from the Capital Fund, which yields less than one-fourth of the income required.
It is conducted on the COTTAGE SYSTEM: each home is presided over by a godly matron.
It is UNSECTARIAN. Children are received, irrespective of their denominational connection, from all parts of the United Kingdom.
That the most NEEDY, HELPLESS, and DESERVING may secure the benefits of the Institution, candidates are SELECTED by the Committee, and are NOT 109 ELECTED by the expensive and objectionable process of polling the Subscribers.
No UNIFORM DRESS is provided, but the children’s garments differ, in order that no peculiar garb may mark the children with the badge of poverty.
The children receive a plain but thorough ENGLISH EDUCATION AND TRAINING.
The supreme aim of the Managers is always kept in view — to “bring them up in THE NURTURE AND ADMONITION OF THE LORD.”
THE WORLD’S WINTER SUN
A SUMMER’S sun, even when beclouded, yields more comfort and warmth to the earth than a winter’s sun that shines brightest. The comforts of the Spirit at their lowest, are far superior to the joys of the world at their highest pitch. When saints are mourning, their inward peace is still superior to that of worldlings, when their mirth and revelry overflow all bounds. Lord, I had rather take the worst from thee than the best from thine enemy. Only do thou graciously shine within me, and let mine outward condition be as dull as thou pleasest.
PRAISE OF MEN
THE youthful worker is very apt to be exalted should he receive a little praise, and there are many injudicious persons who are ready to lavish eulogiums upon any young beginner who seems to be at all promising. How many these foolish talkers have seriously injured it would be hard to say. It may be well to whisper in the young man’s ear that very little store is to be set by the approbation of those who will praise a youth to his face; they are mostly fools, and sometimes knaves. “There are that kiss and kill,” say the cautious Italians. When a man with a loud mouth praises me, I have good reason to be wary in my dealings with him. The boa-constrictor first covers its victim with saliva, and then swallows him; and we have known serpents, of both sexes do the same with young preachers. Beware of the net of the flatterer, and the bait of the maker of compliments. Human opinion is so changeable, and even while it lasts it is of so mixed a character, that it is virtually worth nothing at all. We all remember how the men of Lystra first offered to worship Paul, and then within an hour began to stone him. Who cares to run for a crown which melts as soon as it wreathes the winner’s brow? The flash of a wave, or the gleam of a meteor, is not more fleeting than popular applause.
Besides, if we are applauded by some, we are sure to be obnoxious to others, and it is well to set the one over against the other. It is related of Mr. Kilpin, of Exeter, that, going through the streets of that city, he heard a person say of him as he passed, “If ever there was a good man upon earth, there goes one.” This was elevating, but in the next street the effect of this praise was counteracted by Mr. Kilpin’s hearing another bystander exclaim, “If ever a man deserved to be hanged, that fellow does. He makes people mad with his preaching.” The victim of unwise compliments has only to walk into another room, and hear how roundly certain persons are abusing him, and he will find it a very useful tonic. It is never summer all over the world at one time, and no public person is being everywhere esteemed. Probably it is well for the interests of truth that excesses in judgment are relieved by their opposites.
Another consideration is suggested by experience, namely, that praise is exceedingly weakening. If we allow ourselves to feel its soft and pleasant influence, it lays us open to feel the caustic and painful effects of censure. After a judge had passed sentence upon a certain prisoner, the foreman of the jury that had convicted him began to compliment his lordship upon the remarks which he had made, and the term of imprisonment which he had awarded, but the judge at once stopped him, knowing well that if he had allowed himself to be praised by one jury, he would be liable to be blamed by another. If we are pervious to one influence, we shall be subject to its opposite. We are quite sure to be slandered and abused, and it is well, therefore, for us to have a somewhat thick skin, but if we listen to commendation it makes us tender, and deprives us of that which might have been like armor to the soul. If we allow ourselves to be charmed by the tinklings of flattery, we shall be alarmed by the harsh notes of detraction. We must either be proof against both influences, or against neither.
A man who becomes dependent upon the opinions of others lays himself open to contempt. It is impossible to think highly of a person who fishes for compliments. To value esteem so much as to go out of our way after it is the surest possible way to lose it. When we consider how unevenly the human hand holds the balances, we may feel but small concern when we are weighed by our fellow-men. If we consider how infinitely precious is the divine regard, we shall live to gain it, and so shall rise above all slavish consideration of the opinions of our fellows. What said the wise apostle Paul?
“But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you, or of man’s judgment: yea, I judge not mine own self. For I know nothing by myself; yet am i not hereby justified: but he that judgeth me is the Lord.” (1 Corinthians 4:3, 4.)
Individuals there are abroad who can suck in any measure of praise, and retain a large receptiveness for more: they take to it, and thrive in it, like fish in water. You may choke a dog with pudding, but you could never satiate, nor even satisfy, these people with praise. To such we tender no advice, for to bid them shun praise would be as useless as to urge the ox to forsake the pasture, or the ass its master’s crib; such persons are, however, of small worth as a general rule. We have known exceptions. We remember well a man of admirable parts, and real graces of character, who was, nevertheless, ridiculously vain; but he was manifestly eccentric, and had to be left as a lot out of catalogue: the rule is that the vain are worthless, and to them the epigram might be applied —
“Of all speculations the market holds forth
The best that I know for a lover of pelf,
Were to buy Balbus up at the price he is worth,
And sell him at that which he sets on himself!”
C. H. S.
A JOURNEY TO MENTONE WITH MR. SPURGEON
BY JOSEPH W. HARRALD.
* Our companion has made such really readable notes that we cannot withhold them from our readers. The most is made of everything.
ON Monday, November 10th, 1879, the daily tidal train to Folkestone left Charing Cross Station amid the ringing of bells in many a church steeple, and the cheering of thousands of London’s good people; but whether this rejoicing was caused by the fact that Mr. Spurgeon and some one else were starting for Mentone, or because the new Lord Mayor was riding in his state carriage through the City, must be left to the individual judgment of each reader of these lines. The Editor of The Sword and the Trowel kindly suggested that his traveling companion should take notes of any objects of interest that might, he met with, and afterwards transcribe them for insertion in his magazine; the result being what is here published. The pressure of numerous duties prevents the presentation of anything more than extracts from the entries in our diary, but this may be an advantage to some readers, for if they find the notes uninteresting they will not have to wait until the end of a long chapter before they get the moral of each incident, or the teaching of any illustration, but they can leave off at any part without destroying the connection. If these who read what we have written have only half the joy that we have had in meditating upon the scenes which we have witnessed, and above all, if any word here recorded may, through the blessing, of God, comfort even one of his children, or attract one sinner to his feet, we shall be more than repaid for the effort we have put forth in preparing this paper.
Nothing of particular note occurred on the journey between London and Folke-stone, except that we then read an article which had appeared on the previous day in a weekly paper which had selected as No. 5 of “Eminent Radicals out of Parliament,” one well known to readers of The Sword and the Trowel, viz., “CHARLES HADDON SPURGEON.” One sentence in this exceedingly friendly notice is so striking an illustration of the Word of God that it deserves to be quoted and preserved. The writer says, “My heart is entirely with this pure-minded, unsophisticated believer, but my unsanctified head will not, alas! follow it. I go to the Tabernacle and I admire the vastness of the audience, the simple, unconventional eloquence of the preacher, the pith and mother-wit of many of his sayings; but, on the whole, the phraseology, if not strange, is almost meaningless to me, and I return to my place about as little edified as if the good man had been talking in some dead language to which I had no key.” Surely, no man has ever afforded a better illustration of the words of Paul:— “The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” Of the passage across the Channel the less we say the better will it be for our reputation, but we well remember that long before we reached Boulogne we were heartily sick of the whole affair, and looked with eager longings for the moment when we should exchange the Imperium of the Steamship Napoleon III. for the Libertas of the terra firma of Republican France. Mr. Spurgeon told one of the sailors that the road wanted mending, and that a steam roller was needed to smooth the path of the sea, but in our humble opinion it was the steam roller that. did all the mischief. A good night’s rest, however, soon set all right, and put us in proper trim for pursuing our journey as far as Paris, which we reached on the evening of Nov. 11.
Nov. 12. — After several hours’ refreshing sleep, and a visit to the salle-amanger, we spent a few hours in visiting the historical sights of the fair capital of France. We first surveyed the Church of the Oratoire, which is the principal Protestant church in Paris; and then went into the Church of St. Germain l’Auxerrois, from the tower of which the tocsin was rung for the massacre of St. Bartholomew on August 24, 1572. We also saw the window from which Charles IX. looked out upon the dread scene of bloodshed, crying, “Kill! kill! kill!” As the terrible drama reappeared before our mind’s eye we could not help praising God that within sight of the very spot where the work of death began on that dark night, the descendants of the murdered Protestants now meet to worship God as their forefathers were not permitted to do. Two other buildings are photographed upon our memory — Notre Dame and the Sainte Chapelle. The latter vision of beauty should be gazed upon by every human eye, for it can never be described as it deserves to be; but in “The Metropolitan Church of Our Lady” we saw several objects that can be more easily pictured. We were most of all pleased with what was shown to us in the treasury. The value of a martyr to the church of which he was a member appeared in a new light as the sacristan exhibited and explained the choice relics of the three archbishops who have been killed in Paris within the last twenty years, or thereabouts.
In this holy place we picked up an illustration or two. We noticed that before certain doors were opened, and the gold and silver and precious stones therein were exposed to view, the attendant very carefully closed one window and opened another, and rolled up one blind and pulled down another, so that the light should fall at just the right angle to set off to the best advantage the treasures committed to his charge. We thought to ourselves, — here is a lesson for all preachers and teachers of the truth. The treasures we have to display are far more valuable than those at Notre Dame, then let us take care that we always exhibit them in the best possible light.
From the room where we had seen bullets and bits of the backbones of bishops, and other equally precious things, we were conducted into an inner sanctuary, the very sanctum sanctorum of the place. Here we were permitted to gaze upon vestments gorgeous enough to make ten thousand man-milliners turn green with envy, and we also saw the choicest, and most precious relics that had from time to time been presented by pope, prince, or emperor. We were informed that the best of the treasures had. been stolen by the Communists during their reign of terror, and our informant seemed most of all affected by the fact that, even where the gold and silver cases had been left behind, the thieves had run off with such invaluable relics as “a piece of the real cross” on which our Savior died, and “a portion of the crown of thorns” which was put upon his head. Mr. Spurgeon said that he thought this was a very kind action on the part of the Communists, and that it would be well if more people would imitate them, and remove crosses and thorns whenever they found them, for there would still be far too many left for the peace of this poor world. For a time we could scarcely understand the intense animosity of our venerable guide towards the Communists, but it became quite clear when he told us that they had taken him prisoner, and threatened to kill him when they pillaged the church. In like manner, any man who has been led captive by the devil at his will, and who has been under condemnation through sin, may be expected, when he is set at liberty, to speak in strong terms of the cruel power which for a while held him in bondage. The children of God, too, when wicked men would rob them of the precious treasures of truth committed to their care, may well be pardoned if they use great plainness of speech when describing the attempts that have been made to steal from the saints any portion of the faith once delivered to them by the Lord Jesus and his apostles.
Nov. 12-13. — Our long ride from Paris to Mentone occupied us nearly thirty hours, in consequence of the break-down of a luggage train on the rails we bad to pass over soon after leaving’ Paris. The first part of the journey was in the night, and therefore little or nothing of note was to be seen, although we passed many places of historic or mercantile fame, such as Fontainebleau, with its memo-ties both of the splendor and shame of the kings and emperors who have resided there since Louis Vii. built the castle in 1162; Montbard, the residence of Buffon the naturalist; Dijon, the center of the trade in the wines of Upper Burgundy; Macon, sweet sound in the ears of lovers of the wine of that name; and other towns of less importance or interest. About six o’clock in the morning we were at Lyons, the second city of France, and the chief seat of its silk manufactures, and also the place at which the roaring, rolling, rushing, rapid River Rhone first becomes navigable.
Shortly after leaving Lyons we had a magnificent view of the rising of the sun, and a little later passed Vienne, the town to which, according to Eusebius, Pontius Pilate was banished after his return from Judaea to Rome. In another half hour we were at Valence, the ancient town which Louis XII. erected into a dukedom for the infamous Caesar Borgia. We delight more to recollect that it was one of the headquarters of Protestantism in the dark days of persecution. Close by stood the Castle of Soyons, now in ruins, which was once a stronghold of the Calvinists, who by means of it held the key of the Rhone, and intercepted the communication between Lyons and the south, until the castle was captured and demolished by the Prince of Conde. A little further on we passed Montelimart, the birthplace of Daniel Chamier, the Protestant pastor who drew up the edict of Nantes for Henry IV. It is worth mentioning that about nine miles distant is the village of Allan, where the first white mulberry tree was planted in France. It was brought from Naples in 1494, and from this place has spread all over the south of France, where the culture of the silkworm is now one of the chief sources of agricultural industry and prosperity. The mulberry tree is the model of what a Christian should be in self-denial; it lives only to be stripped, it exists solely for the benefit of others. “None of us liveth to himself.”
For some hours we had been traveling through some of the principal vinegrowing districts of France, but we must confess that at first the appearance of the vines, of which we had heard so much, greatly disappointed us. Remembering those which we had seen in our own beloved native land, we were surprised to find acres upon acres of ugly, low, straggling, twisted sticks, that, in winter at least, did not make the slightest pretension to beauty. The more we thought of our first impressions the more clearly did we see how fitting was the simile that our blessed Master used when he said, “I am the true Vine.” Many who looked upon him saw no beauty in him that they should desire him, and, alas! we must admit that for a long time we were as blind as they. In our eyes he had no form nor comeliness, and he was only as a root out of a dry ground. But now, since we have tasted of the new wine of his love, our eyes have been opened, we see that he is altogether lovely, and we declare that none can be compared to him for beauty or for glory, there are none so fair as he; he is chiefest among ten thousand. How sweet a thought it is that he who said to his disciples “I am the Vine,” also added” ye are the branches”! We must not marvel if we too are despised, for the branches must expect no greater honor than the stem received. Our highest glory is to be as he was. May all of us who are in him remember and exemplify his gracious words. “Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.”
About nine o’clock we saw the ruins of the castle of Mornas, from which the Huguenot leader, Baron des Adrets, forced the popish prisoners whom he captured to leap down upon the pikes of his soldiers who were stationed below. We shudder as we think of such a terrible way of settling religious questions, but when we remember all that the Protestants had to endure from their Romish persecutors, we are not surprised that at last they were goaded to madness, and committed deeds that appear to us horrible to the last degree, though they were at the worst only mild measures of selfdefense compared with the cruelties and enormities that were perpetrated upon them. Happy are we that our lot is east in a more favored time, and that we have such a goodly heritage! But let us never forget that our privileges were many of them purchased with the blood of those who counted not their lives dear unto them, but cheerfully laid them down rather than surrender the truths that holy men had taught them as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. May we be as, faithful in these favored days as they were in the dark ages in which they lived! May we be the worthy sons of noble sires!
As we passed Orange, we thanked God for the city of refuge to which so many of our brethren in the Lord fled when the blood-hounds of the Papacy were on their track; this little town, with the principality surrounding it, having belonged to the Protestant princes of Nassau, who successively held it until the death of William III, when the king of Prussia claimed it, and handed it over to the kin,, of France in exchange for territory elsewhere. At Avignon, once the country-seat of the popes, and afterwards the residence of the and-popes in the days of the great schism, we smiled at the practical proof of the papal fallibility which was afforded by the back-handed blessings which the opposing, nontiffs sent to their Roman rivals, who returned the compliment in language about as forcible and elegant as that of a Billingsgate fish-woman, or an infuriated costermonger. Our guide-book reminds us that John Stuart Mill died here in 1873, and was buried in the cemetery.
At Avignon, and indeed for some time before, we saw specimens of the olive, though they were very small trees compared with those we afterwards become so familiar with in and around Mentone. One advantage of their diminutive size is that it is tolerably easy work to trim them into a pretty and uniform shape, a task which would be quite impossible with the grand old trees of the Riviera. Just so is it with Christians; if they are to be trimmed and fashioned according to the best models of true spiritual beauty, they must be taken in hand while they are young and pliant; it will be too late if we wait till their habits and peculiarities have become unalterably fixed. A twig can be bent at will, but an old, gnarled, knotted trunk cannot be made straight. An olive branch can be trained with very little effort, but a full-grown olive will “gang its ain gait” whoever may say it nay, or try to prevent it.
The next place of special interest was Tarnscon. which is said to have received its name from Tarasque, a dragon that infested the borders of the Rhone, and lived upon human flesh, until it was overcome by Martha, the sister of Mary and Lazarus. The tradition is a very silly one, yet it is possible to learn a lesson from it. According to the story, Martha conquered the monster with no other weapon than the cross, and made him a prisoner with her girdle. Truly, we can defeat the old dragon with nothing so well as with the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; the very sight of the cross will make him cower down like a whipped cur, and then with the girdle of truth which we have about our loins we can bind him fast, and lead him forth as our conquered and captured foe. The devil can never hurt us while we fight him in the name of Jesus the crucified, and we are quite safe as long as we tie him up to the Word of God. This Jerusalem sword and strong cable will effectually prevent him from doing us, and others who are similarly armed, any mischief; only let us always keep to these weapons, for there are none like them, and he who tries to make others for himself, or to borrow from men those that they have manufactured, will certainly smart for it in the day of battle with the great adversary. Anyone who wishes to know what became of Martha’s brother and sister may like to learn that, according to tradition, Lazarus went to Marseilles, and the three Maries and “their servant Sarah” landed on the Island of Camargue, near Arles, when they were driven by persecution away from Palestine, and afterwards Mary Magdalene left them, and lived and died at St. Baume, near Aubagne.
Soon after leaving Aries we came to the vast stony plain called the Crau. It is 30,000 acres in extent, and is covered with rolled boulders and pebbles. According to Aeschylus, these stones were hurled down from the sky. by Jupiter to furnish artillery for Hercules in his combat with the Ligurians. The greater portion of the Crau is a semi-desert, but under the stones which cover it grows a short, sweet herbage, which the sheep accustomed to the locality obtain without much difficulty. They literally pick up a living where we could see nothing but shingle and sand. So, in the wilderness of this world, the Lord’s sheep and lambs find food where the natural man cannot perceive it, and he who of old led his people through the desert by the hand of Moses and Aaron will take care that all who are purchased by the precious blood of his dear Son, the great Shepherd of the sheep, shall want no good thing on earth, and afterwards shall all pass under the rod, to show that not one of them is lost, in the day when they enter the heavenly fold to go no more out for ever. Have all the readers of this magazine the marks that will be looked for in that day? If not, let them seek to have them imprinted at this moment by him who said, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.” Each one who has these marks may say, with the full assurance of faith, “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.”
The cultivation of the Crau is gradually extending eastwards. Murray says, “Every portion of it which can be reached by irrigation is exceedingly fertile, producing vines, olives, almonds, mulberries, and corn.” Another writer says, “The meadows I viewed are among the most extraordinary spectacles the world can afford, in respect to the amazing contrast between the soil in its natural and in its watered state, covered richly and luxuriantly with clover, chicory, rib-grass, and Avena elatior.” The irrigation is effected by means of a canal thirty-three miles long. The difference between the barren portion of this desert and the part that has been reclaimed is an exact picture of the contrast between a man in his natural state and another who has been renewed by grace. When the purifying and life-giving Word of God courses through our whole being, like the canal runs through the Crau, the desert of our heart begins to rejoice and blossom like the rose, and soon it becomes as beautiful and fruitful as a well-watered garden.
Long before we reached the Crau we heard and felt, even in our comfortable sleeping-car, enough of the dreaded mistral wind to make us appreciate the precautions that are taken to protect gardens, vineyards, houses, and sheepfolds from its furious blasts. Sometimes a high wall or fence is erected as a shelter from this cruel blast, but in many instances a long line or square of cypresses, standing like giant sentinels, gives complete immunity from harm to everything placed under their protection. What a beautiful image do these trees afford of the true arbor vitoe, our Lord Jesus Christ, the Man who is a “hiding-place from the wind and a covert from the tempest”! When we are sheltered behind him we are at all times safe
“From every stormy wind that blows.”
The cypress, too, in another aspect is the emblem of the Savior, and also of his disciples. Whether it stands alone upon the mountain side, or is found in company with its fellows, its desire always appears to be to get its head as near heaven as possible. Surely this upright tree is the pattern of the upright man. Let others grovel as they will, his continual aim, even while upon the earth, is to rise as near his God as grace can enable him to do, and when he is made meet for the inheritance of the saints in light, the change will not be so great for him as for those who “grovel here below,” for already he lives on high and has his conversation in heaven. He talks with God as a man talks with his friend, and walks with God as one who wants no other company, and finds his heaven begun below in the foretaste of the bliss of the better country.
Through the delay at the earlier part of our journey we reached Marseilles just too late to go on by the train which we ought to have caught, and consequently, we had to wait some time, and then proceed by a slow train which called at almost every station on the line. The mistral was blowing so fiercely at Marseilles that we did not dare to put so much as our noses outside the station, and therefore had to content ourselves with what we could see of this important city from the railway. From our point of view, the most interesting object was the Church of Notre Dame de la Garde. This building is held in the highest veneration throughout the Mediterranean by the sailors and fishermen and their wives, who here have not only come to pray for success when starting out to pursue their callings, but on their return have come again to give thanks for preservation and prosperity. The walls of the church are covered with the offerings of those who, in answer to prayer, have been delivered from shipwreck, accident, peril, or disease; and one corner is filled with cast-off crutches, the gifts of grateful cripples, and with pieces of rope by which men have been saved from drowning. Many Christians might with profit imitate these poor Romanists, and when they have received any deliverance from the hand of God set up a memorial of his goodness in the house of the Lord. How often when ten are cleansed only one of them returns to give glory to God for having healed him!
A ride of about two hours brought us to Toulon, the fortifications of which we had seen long before we reached the station. As we saw the ugly, frowning fortresses, and other works of defense we felt that, strong as they were, they could not afford such protection as every believer has in Christ Jesus. “The name of the Lord is a strong tower, the righteous runneth into it, and are safe.” Hidden away in the Rock of Ages, and guarded by Omnipotence, the feeblest saint can sing with joy:
“Should earth against my soul engage,
And hellish darts be hurled;
Still! can smile at Satan’s rage,
And face a frowning world.”
In consequence of the delay at Marseilles we had to pass through some of the finest parts of the road after sunset, instead of seeing them as we ought to have done by bright daylight. We might just as well have been traveling through a desert for anything that we could see, and worst of all, we were in a double sense in the dark, for the conductor of our car, expecting to be at Mentone before sunset, was not provided with oil for the lamps in the carriage. This twofold darkness, while speeding through such a lovely land, reminded us of the condition in which many pass through this world, ignorant of the beauties by which they are surrounded because they are spiritually in the dark. It is a very paradise through which they are journeying, they cannot but perceive its loveliness, for
“Dark is all the world before them;
Darker still eternity.”
Cannes of course brought to mind Lord Brougham, who lived and died there, and the adjacent islands of Honorat and Marguerite awakened useful memories of the holy preacher and his loving sister, whose names the islands still bear. The student of history will remember that Marguerite was the prison of the Man in the Iron Mask, and in more recent times of Marshal Bazaine.
Our slow train occupied an hour in getting from Cannes to Nice; another hour elapsed before we reached Monaco and Monte Carlo, “where Satan’s seat is “; and so by the time we reached our hotel at Mentone it was nearly midnight. What we saw and learned during our stay in this sheltered sunny spot must be left for a future paper if’ the Editor does not think we have quite exhausted the patience of his readers by what we have already written. We cannot help adding the following stanzas from Violet Fane’s poem “Sunny South,’ that our readers may realize something of our feelings before and after we reached Mentone: —
“Against the windows sleet and snow
Beat, as determined to the last
To bear me company: I passed
Bleak sandy tracts where dwarfish pines
And stunted olives, tempest-stirred,
Swayed desolately to and fro. “But by-and-by, by slow degrees,
Chili nature thawed to greet the dawn;
The clinging frost and snow were gone,
The sky beamed blue behind the hills,
The birds were singing on the trees. “The sun rose gaily; all the earth
Seemed warm again with love and spring,
The olive leaves swayed glistening
With silv’ry luster, and the rills
Leapt frost-freed to a brighter birth. “A thousand scented southern bairns
The zephyr wafted to my brow;
The orange hung upon the bough,
The almond flowered fair beneath
The tufted majesty of palms. “The wavelets of a tideless sea
Crept softly to the rosy shore,—
The overhanging mountain bore
Myrtle and mignonette and heath
And fragrant tangled bryony. “‘Twas then I felt my soul revive;
The winter chilled my heart no more;
I looked upon that sunny shore
And said, ‘ I come to life and love, —
I come to thee to love and live.’”
NOTICES OF BOOKS
The Postman. A Paper for the People. Passmore and Alabaster.
A FIRST-RATE little paper for giving away. Each number is an improvement on its predecessor. It is only one halfpenny, and ought to be scattered thick as autumn leaves.
The Biblical Museum By JAMES COMPER GRAY. Old Testament. Vols. VI. and VII. Psalms to Solomon’s Song. Elliot Stock.
WE are right glad to see this admirable work nearing completion. It must be a great boon to those students of the Bible whose libraries are small. A great deal of useful exposition is given in small compass, and for a small price. Mr. Gray has labored well and wisely, and he will have his reward in the gratitude of thousands.
The Stars of the Reformation: being short sketches of eminent Reformers. By J. MILTON SMITH. S. W. Partridge and Co.
THIS book is calculated to keep alive the Protestant feeling of the country wherever it has survived the choking smoke of Ritualism. It is the sort of volume to place in a Sunday-school library, or to give to young men and women. The engravings assist in attracting attention to the history, which is very well written. That a second edition should be so soon called for is a cheering fact; but we shall not be at all surprised if the book should even reach a seventh edition, for 3s. 6d. is a reasonable price, and the volume is prettily got up and well illustrated. The more of such records the better.
The Union Jack: Tales for British Boys. Edited by W. H. G. Kingston Griffith and Farran.
THIS strikes us as being the very thing that was wanted to cope with the shamefully bad literature which is prepared for boys. Mr. Kingston is a master in the art of writing boys’ stories; he would have written “Robinson Crusoe” if Defoe bad not happened to have done it before him. The style of this paper, the order of the wood-cuts, and the whole spirit of the thing exactly suit its object. Other papers have been too good for the lower class of boys, but this condescends to their weakness, satisfies their love of sensation, and withal gives them wholesome reading instead of garbage. We do not recommend the paper for our own homes, but as a substitute for the bad papers which have such influence over the lower order of youths. It would not be so good for them if it were better. It suits the class it aims at, and for that very reason is hardly the thing for good and gracious youth.
A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures: critical, doctrinal, and homiletical. By J.P. LANGE, D.D. Vol. III. Numbers and Deuteronomy. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark.
WITH this volume the English issue of Lange’s great Commentary is completed, and all ministers and students are deeply indebted to Dr. Schaff and the Messrs. Clark for so great a boon. The several volumes differ in value according to the ability of the various authors and translators, but we could not spare one of them. It is well that the publishers will now sell separate volumes at 15s., for thus a poor minister may purchase a volume or two when be picks up a windfall; but our younger men who are not yet compelled to devour the library in the nursery ought to possess themselves of the complete set as soon as possible. Homiletically, these commentaries are of high value. Often by a single sentence they will start the mind and give it a push along a line of thought, and this is the chief thing that most of us need.
The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living and Dying. By Jeremy TAYLOR, D.D. Edited by Rev. F. A. Malle-son, M.A. Ward, Lock and Co.
AN exceedingly cheap edition of this famous work. No one expects us to review the book at this time of day, or else we might say that it is not altogether sound in its teaching, and needs to be read with discretion. Its poetry is unrivaled, but its gospel light is somewhat dim.
NOTES
We greatly rejoice that the Government of bluster and invasion has received its dismission from the British people, and we now urge all those who have power in prayer to ask for special guidance for those who will succeed it. Much wisdom will be needed, and we trust it will be given.
COLLEGE. The Missionary Prayer Meeting at the Tabernacle on Monday evening, April 5, was a season of unusual power. Mr. W. Mann, who has since sailed for Cape Town, was present, and asked the prayers of the friends for the work in South Africa.
Mr. N. Rogers, who has been pastor of the church at Stratton, near Swindon, is obliged, on account of the state of his own health and that of his wife, to go to Australia. Will friends on the other side of the globe be on the look-out for the Steamship Liguria, which should reach Adelaide on or about June 26th? Mr. Rogers’s removal is much regretted by his people at Swindon. There was no alternative but to see his with sicken before his eyes, or to seek a milder climate. We commend him to our many friends in the southern world, and we trust he will be very useful among them.
Mr. T. L. Edwards, of Wynne Road, Brixton, is removing to the church at Wellington Street, Luton; Mr. G. J. Knight, late of Chelsea, is about to take the oversight of the church at Trinity Road, Tooting; and Mr. J. A. Soper has left the Fast End Conference Hall to become the pastor at Lordship Lane, Dulwich. Mr. J. Easter, having completed his College course, has settled at Bridestone, Suffolk.
The Annual Conference is being held just as the Magazine is in the hands of the printers, but we shall hope to give our readers a report of the proceedings next month.
ORPHANAGE. The Quarterly Collectors’ Meeting was held at the Orphanage on Tuesday, March 30. The President, C. H. Spurgeon, was in the chair, and there was a good attendance of collectors and friends. A little over £100 was sent by post or brought in on the day. During the evening the boys and girls sang and recited, the President gave a report of the progress of the Girls’ Orphanage Building Fund, Mr. Nicholas, Secretary of the Earlswood Asylum, delivered his interesting lecture on “Dogs,” and Mr. Courtenay and the Southwark Choral Society gave a selection of vocal music in their usual first-class style. We believe that everybody was delighted with the meeting.
Special Notice to all friends of the Orphanage. In consequence of June 19th falling on a Saturday this year, we hope to hold our ANNUAL FETE on the following Tuesday, June 22. We give timely notice in order that all our friends, both far and near, may arrange, if possible, to be with us at the laying of the foundation stones of the new buildings for girls. If we could see the larger part of the needful funds it would be indeed a happy day for us. Why should it not be so?
COLPORTAGE. — The work of the Colportage Association continues to move a little in the desired direction, and we are glad to report the addition to our list of two new districts — one being in Preston, Lancashire, and the other at Malmesbury, Wiltshire. There is a good opening for work in both districts, and friends have come forward to guarantee £40 a-year towards the support of the colporteur. May a rich blessing accompany the new efforts. Subscribers should, however, remember that for every new man we take we need £20 over and above the guaranteed amount.
The annual meeting is fixed for Monday, May 3rd, when the president, Pastor C. It. Spurgeon, will preside; and Dr. Manning, Secretary of the Religious Tract Society, will give an address. There will also be the addresses of the colporteurs themselves, which are always full of interest. About twenty-five of the agents will be brought up from their respective districts, and. will meet for conference and prayer with the committee, and other friends, on the previous day, when we hope for much spiritual blessing. In the meantime, our General Fund needs the generous help of all our friends. Contributions will be thankfully received by the secretary, from whom full information may be obtained. The annual report for 1879 will also be sent to any address on receipt of a halfpenny postage stamp. Address Mr. W. Corden Jones, Secretary, Colportage Association, Pastors’ College, Temple-street, London, S.E.
EVANGELISTS. The general election has somewhat interfered with the movements of the Evangelists during the past month, but on the whole much good work has been done. On March 20 Messrs. Smith and Fullerton started at Northampton. It was deemed an unfortunate time for special services, but at the end of the first week Mr. Spanswick’s chapel was not large enough, and an adjournment to Mr. Brown’s larger building took place. This was quite crowded, even on the day of the election, when many were kept indoors out of fear of riots. The Afternoon Bible Readings gradually grew in size and power, and were blessed to many. During the fortnight that the Evangelists were in the town several waverers decided for Christ, and some backsliders were restored. A correspondent writes to us: — “The amount of good done by their simple but deeply spiritual services only the Searcher of hearts can know, but from the lively interest manifested in them all, I have no doubt a rich blessing will be the result, and many, many in this wicked town will be brought to the Savior.”
On Sunday, April 4, services were commenced at Wrexham, where about a dozen churches united in the work. No less than seven meetings were held on the first day in both Welsh and English chapels. As the election fever was at its height, and an invitation had been received from Brymbo, a mining village close by, for the Evangelists to go there, two evenings were spared for the purpose. The pastor of the church, Mr. J. Davis, thus writes of the services: —
“Eager crowds thronged the chapel each evening, every available place being occupied. On Tuesday afternoon a children’s service was conducted by Mr. Smith. About 300 children came together; the singing was lively, and the discourse of Mr. Smith was listened to with rapt attention by both young and old. The beautiful style in which the singing was conducted by Mr. Smith throughout the services by means of his silver cornet, as well as the clear, powerful, and effective preaching of Mr. Fullerton, will, we trust, lead to the quickening of the churches in the district, and to the salvation of souls. The congregations were composed of three classes — (1) English-speaking peoples (2) Welsh people, but able to appreciate the English preaching; and (3) a few Welsh people unable to understand the English tongue. The latter would come, and they seemed to enjoy themselves wonderfully. It was with surprising delight that the whole audience (especially those unable to understand the English) listened to Mr. Fullerton on Tuesday evening read his text, “Behold,! stand at the door, and knock,” in Welsh, pronouncing the words with almost the accuracy of a thoroughbred Welshman. We are only sorry that we did not get more than two nights. However, we had the treat, which we will never forget, and the privilege of hearing the Evangelists in our own village for two nights. Our prayer for them, wherever they go, is ‘ God bless them, and make them a blessing to thousands.’”
Mr. Fullerton tells us that he and his co-worker have received good news from Rhyl, which they visited for three days just before Christmas. No result was apparent at the time except that the people were interested, but the ministers of the town took up the work, and now over a hundred persons, and according to. one report several hundreds, have joined the various churches in the town.
This month Messrs. Smith and Fullerton are to be at Smethwick, Smallheath, and. Leamington. Just as we go to press we hear that the Bradford churches are sending to us the magnificent contribution of £144 14s. 3d. towards our Evangelists’ Fund as an acknowledgment of benefit derived from the visit of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton.
On Good Friday and Easter Sunday Mr. Burnham preached at Sandy, Beds. The services were well attended, and some inquirers were spoken with at the close. The Evangelist was greatly cheered by the news of several cases of conversion as the result of his visit in Oct., 1878, of which he knew nothing at the time. From March 30 to April 4 Mr. Burnham was at Minchinhampton, and there also he met with some who had been blessed during his previous visit although he did not then know of it. The town was full of excitement about the elections, and the congregations were therefore not so large as they would otherwise have been, but a few inquirers remained after the services. Of the following week’s work at Frome Pastor J. J. Dalton writes:
“Though we have returned a Liberal member to the House of Commons the people are very conservative in their notions of propriety, and do not like to be disturbed. It was with some hesitation that they fell in with the idea of receiving a ‘singing preacher,’ yet for several weeks previous to our brother’s appearance our fervent petitions had been that great good might be accomplished. We have not been altogether disappointed in our expectations, but have cause to rejoice that ‘ the arm of the Lord hath been revealed’ in our midst. Several other public meetings being held in the town on the same evenings affected our congregations, but on the last evening, notwithstanding the annual missionary sermons being preached at other chapels the same evening, our congregation was large, sinners were convicted, souls saved, and saints refreshed and greatly stimulated. Could we have retained our brother for another week we believe much greater blessings would have been the result.”
Mr. Burnham’s engagements for May are — 3rd to 9th, Watton, Norfolk; 10th to 16th, Winslow, Bucks; 17th to 24th, Naunton and Guiting; and 25th to 30th, Charlton Kings, near Cheltenham.
PERSONAL NOTES. — An esteemed brother, an evangelist, sends us the following notes of instances he has met with of the usefulness of our sermons. We insert them that glory may be given to God, to whom it all belongs, and that friends may be encouraged to seek still further blessings. Our correspondent gives dates and places, which we judge it better to omit.
(1.) A few years since my father hated the name of Spurgeon, not from any personal knowledge of him, for he had never seen or heard him, but from a deeply-rooted prejudice against “dissenters,” of whom he regarded Mr. Spurgeon as the very worst. Some time after my conversion I came to London. A few weeks later my father was up for a few days, and wishing to see me, I proposed Sunday morning as my only convenient time, and the Metropolitan Tabernacle as a mid-way meeting-place. I so arranged that we met there just as the crowds were flocking into the building. As I guessed would be the case, seeing such crowds pressing in, my father could not resist the temptation to follow. Passionately fond of singing, he was quite overcome, and wept under the opening hymn — “All hail the power,” etc. Thus the way was prepared for what followed. “Deep calleth unto deep” was the text. So impressed was my father by that sermon, that from that Sunday he took in the sermons weekly until the time of his death. Of the particular sermon, “Deep calleth unto deep,” (No. 865,) he purchased many and lent them to his neighbors. From that time there was no man in his estimation like the preacher, and for some time before his death the weekly sermon was his only spiritual food. He did not die triumphantly as an experienced Christian, but peacefully passed away, assuring all teat he had now no fear of death: and I am thankful to testify that what light and peace he had came through the Metropolitan Tabernacle Sermons.
(2.) A very popular and useful evangelical clergyman passed to his reward a few years ago. At the height of his popularity, when traveling through Kent, he happened to leave his small bag at a certain railway station. After the train was gone a porter found the bag, and brought it to the stationmaster, whose duty it was to open it, and search for some mark of ownership. All that the bag contained was Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons, well worn, and marked here and there. An hour later came a telegram, saying, “Kindly forward to — the bag left by the Rev. _____
(3.) Some time since, when laboring at S, in conversation with my host — the only stationer in the place — I inquired if he had many readers of Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons. He replied, “Only two; one a Ritualistic churchwarden, and the other a Roman Catholic priest.” Right glad was I to find the sermons read by such un-likely persons. May God bless them.
(4.) At in , a good old Christian informed me that he was led to publicly confess Christ by hearing Mr. Spurgeon. Many years since, he was sitting in the gallery as a spectator during the Lord’s supper at the Tabernacle, when the pastor, addressing a few words to spectators, looked straight at him, and said, “You ought not to be there; this is your place, at the table with God’s people; having yielded your heart to Him, why longer remain outside?” The old man returned to his country home, and at the very first opportunity was baptized, and joined the church of Christ in that place.
(5.) At E the most useful pair in connection with the Baptist church informed me that they were both awakened, and gradually led into the light, and then convinced of their duty to be baptized and unite with God’s people, all by reading. Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons, although they have never seen nor heard the preacher.
(6.) Recently at B — , in reply to the question, “Are you a Christian?” I received the following answers” Oh, yes; bless the Lord, I have known him these twenty years! I found him under Mr. Spurgeon’s sermon on Jonah, which he preached here twenty years ago. That was the only time I ever saw or heard him.
(7.) At N, a young man informed me that he had not seen Mr. Spurgeon, but that he had a deep affection for him, for his sermons had shown him his lost condition, and led him to trust in Christ; and the weekly issue of the sermon was his weekly feast.
(8.) At the same place, an old man came up to me and said, “You know Mr. Spurgeon, do you not?” “Yes.” “Then, will you give my love to him?” “What name, sir?” “Oh, Mr. Spurgeon will not know me by name, But by and by he will know me, for I shall know him and make myself known to him; he is my spiritual father. Twenty years ago I heard him at Aberdare. The word woke me up. I struggled against it for a whole year; and at last grace conquered me. My wife and I have ever since been members of the Baptist Church at A _____; and my two daughters are both in church fellowship.”
A clergyman of the Church of England, writing to Mrs. Spurgeon for a grant of books, says: — “Your husband has, by the publication of a most useful book, Commenting and Commentaries, done more than a little in forming my taste, and adding to my desire for books. This book was my consulting guide while at college, and has been of great service to me since in using the libraries of friends, and in making purchases.” We are glad of this testimony, for the work cost us great labor and expense, and it is not known as it should be.
A Baptist minister in North America, writes: — “ Mr. Spurgeon’s writings have done more for me than the writings of any other uninspired man. Indeed, his influence is felt the wide world over. In the back-woods of this island a dying man the other week confessed that his soul had been impressed and enlightened by a sermon published in the Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit; while Baptists out here speak of ‘ praying for Mr. Spurgeon’ as a special duty. I have ‘also discovered that preachers of other denominations are using these sermons, from introduction to conclusion, and after the service it is somewhat amusing to find the volume under the seat of the sleigh.”
The following touching epistle comes from far-away Florida: —
“My dear brother in Christ, — Once upon a time a wealthy man, who owned many gardens, sent one of his gardeners to water the plants. The gardener went and adjusted the hose, turned the tap, and watered them far and near. Many of them were near him, but far away in a corner of the garden, farthest from the gardener, was a frail flower, that had long been pining for the refreshing showers. The gardener, not knowing its need, nevertheless turned the hose in that direction, and the drooping plant revived and bloomed afresh to delight all who chanced to come near it, and it loved the master and the instrument, though the latter was unknown.
“Several weeks ago I lay ill, far away from London, in the wilds of Florida. Weak and faint-hearted I lay pondering on the strange providence of the Master when one of your sermons was placed in my’ hands. The refreshing shower revived me and gave me fresh hope and courage, and I rose from my sick couch to strive still more earnestly to gain access to the hearts of those by whom I am surrounded, and to-day, in a small class that I have formed out here in the wilderness, the Lord made his presence felt, and blessed us with an awakening that I have never seen here before, and tears of repentance were shed by many. I was so full of joy and gratitude to God that I felt,. indeed I longed, to let you know that your influence as an instrument had even, reached this place.”
We have received a quaint letter from Michigan, from which we take a few extracts: — “ I have read your sermons many years, they are marrow and fatness to my soul. Toil on, O servant of Jesus. You gave me a pretty good lesson in your sermon entitled ‘The Dromedaries’ (No. 1504). I enclose you twenty-five dollars to buy ‘ straw’ for your dromedaries; I leave the word’ barley’ for such persons as the lady who gave £20,000. I have just been reading John Ploughman’s Talk. I think you are pretty tough on us slow folks, but if we all could keep up with you don’t you think the world would run off her track in less than twenty-four hours?”
The following cheering testimony reaches us from the province of Quebec:—
“My dear Sir, — Since reading a sermon delivered by you a long time ago on the text ‘Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt he saved’ (No. 293), and in which you set forth the great sin of unbelief, I have felt a strong desire to write to you and strengthen your hands by letting you know that your labor is not in vain, as I for one can testify to the great good derived from that and other sermons of yours. My father, before we left Scotland seven years ago, always got your sermons, as well as your Sword and Trowel, and having derived great benefit from them he carefully put them away. About a year ago my brother sent me a few of those old sermons, which I read, and glory be to God, opened my eyes while reading that sermon, and since then I have found peace in believing.”
A friend in Sydney writes as follows: —
“Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — It seems natural when help is given to acknowledge it, and I hope, therefore, you will not think that I am taking a liberty in writing to thank you for the great assistance you have been to me personally through the medium of two of your published sermons.
“The two sermons I refer to were entitled ‘Prayer perfumed with praise’ (No. 1469) and ‘ Mistrust of God deplored and denounced’ (No. 1498). By reading these I have been led to exercise faith in a way never thought of before, and as a result have experienced a confidence sufficient to secure a long-desired blessing of a very practical kind, and though the responsibility attaching to such new circumstances is great, the assurance given that I shall be upheld according to his word, and not be ashamed of my hope, is far greater.
“Allow me, then, to thank you on my own behalf, and also on the part of another, for the blessing your sermons have been.”
A sister in Christ in Victoria says:—
“My dear Sir, — I have often felt inclined to write you these last twelve years. At that time I lost a darling boy; everything seemed dark, and nothing brought me any comfort. The Word of God, that had been my stay through many similar trials, was all darkness to me. A friend brought me one of your sermons, and asked me to allow her to read it. At first I refused, but at last consented. I forget the title, but it was that everything was ordered by God — no chance. I felt all the time my friend was reading afraid to breathe. I could only say,’ Go on, go on.’ When she had finished it I leaped from my couch, and said, ‘ All is right, thank God, my dark mind is all light again.’ I have had similar trials since, and many other trials, but I could say from my heart, ‘ Thy will be done, it is all right. At this time my husband ordered your sermons monthly, and we still continue to do so. Every Sunday evening we read one of them aloud for all to hear, and afterwards I send them into ‘the bush.’ My dear sir, go on and preach what you feel. It has often been a great comfort to as that you seemed to feel just as we felt.”
“The son of red Kaffirs or raw Kaffirs” sends us the following note from Port Elizabeth, South Africa:—
“Dear Sir, — I don’t know how to describe my joy and my feelings in this present moment. We never did see each other face to face, but still there is some thing between you and me which guided me to make these few lines for you. One day as I was going to my daily work I met a friend of mine in the street. We spoke about the Word of God, and he asked me whether I had ever seen one of Mr. Spurgeon’s books. I said, ‘What Mr. Spurgeon is that? One of the independent ministers in London?’ and I said, ‘No, I never saw such a book in my life.’ He said he bought it from the bookseller. I asked the name of the book, and he said it was the Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, and I went straight to the shop and bought one. I have read a good bit of it. On my reading it I arrived on a place where Job said, ‘Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him.’ I am sure I can’t tell how to describe the goodness you have done to us, we black people of South Africa. We are not black only outside, even inside; I wouldn’t mind to be a black man only in color. It is a terrible thing to be a black man from the soul to the skin; but still I am very glad to say your sermons have done something good to me. May the Lord bless your efforts, and prosper your work. May it please him to gain many sons into his glory through you as his instrument, not only in London, but also in Africa.”
From Denmark we have received a most interesting communication, from which we extract the following: — “ Through twelve of your sermons, which are translated into Danish, I and my household have this winter been acquainted with your Christian announcement, and we thank you for every clearing and edifying word. We seceded from the Established Church a year ago, because we have so evidently seen the tragical consequences of the connection between the Church and the State, and we could not possibly act contrary to the conviction forced upon us by the reading of the New Testament, viz. the incorrectness of the infant baptism.”
Two missionaries in one of the isles of Greece write: — “ We read every Sunday a sermon; many times it is one of .your sermons. Last Sunday the one we read was ‘The Good Samaritan’ (No. 1360). It made a deep impression on our minds. Your sermons are to us like rain upon a dry land. We have no church to attend, and no friends to associate with.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle. — March 18th, fourteen; 25th, thirteen;. April 1st, fourteen.
Chap 5. JUNE, 1880
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
JUNE, 1880.
INAUGURAL ADDRESS
AT THE SIXTEENTH ANNUAL CONFERENCE OF THE PASTORS’ COLLEGE ASSOCIATION,
BY THE PRESIDENT, C. H. SPURGEON.
BELOVED fellow-servants of Christ, our work requires us to be in the best possible condition of heart. When we are at our best we are feeble enough, we would not, therefore, fall below our highest point. As instruments, we owe all our power for usefulness to the divine hand; but, since tools should always be kept in order, we would have our spirit free from rust, and our mind sharp of point and keen of edge to answer at once to the Master’s will. It is because I fear we do not always keep up to the mark that the subject for this morning’s address shall be “A New Departure,” or in other words, a renewal, a revival, a starting afresh, a return to our first love, even the love of our espousals, when first our soul was wedded to our Redeemer’s work.
The subject is exceedingly needful to us all because the process of running down is such a very easy one. Upon that topic let me speak for a few minutes. To run down requires no care or effort: it can be accomplished without a wish; it can come to pass, in a measure, in opposition to our wish: we can decline and decay without so much as being conscious of it, and all the more easily because we fancy that we are rich and increased in goods. By a law which asks no help from us we gravitate to a lower level. Do not wind up the weights, and the wheels will soon cease to move, and the old clock on the stairs will remain motionless, useless, silent, dead, like a coffin set on end. To keep a farm in good order needs constant labor and watchfulness, but to let the land get out of heart till it would starve a lark is a very simple matter, which can be accomplished by any sluggard: simply let it alone, or take crop after crop from it and give it neither manure nor rest, and you will change a fruitful land into barrenness, and turn a garden into a desert. It is just so with ourselves. Only do not wind up your soul with daily prayer, and you will soon run down; only neglect the culture of the heart, and thorns and briars will grow uninvited. Neglect your inner life, and your whole being will deteriorate.
I do not know, my brethren, that we can expect to see energy continuous at its fall in any one of us. I suspect that he who burns like a seraph knows moments in which the flame somewhat abates. As the sun itself is not at all times alike powerful, so the man who like the shining light shineth more and more unto the perfect day is not uniformly bright, nor always at his noon. Nature does not hold the sea for ever at flood; ebbs intervene, and ocean pauses a while ere it returns again to the fullness of its strength. The vegetable world has its winter, and enjoys a long sleep beneath its bed of snow. It is not wasted time, that ebb or that winter; flood and summer owe much to ebb and frost. I suspect that because we are in affinity with nature we, too, shall have our changes, and shall not abide at one elevation. No man’s life is all climax. Let us not despond if our spirit is at a low ebb: the tide of life will roll up as before, and even reach a higher point. When we stand leafless and apparently lifeless, our soul having become like a tree in winter, let us not dream that the ax will cut us down, for our substance is in us though we have lost our leaves, and before long the time of the singing of birds will come, we shall feel the genial warmth of returning spring, and our lives shall again be covered with blossoms, and laden with fruit.
It will not be wonderful if there should be lulls and pauses in our spiritual work, for we see the like in the affairs of men. The most eager after worldly objects, who can by no means be accused of a want of earnestness in their endeavors, are yet conscious that, by a sort of law, dull times will come, wherein business necessarily flags. It is not the tradesman fault that sometimes trade must be pushed, and that after pushing it remains as dull as ever. It seems to be the rule that there should be years of great prosperity, and then years of decline: the lean kine still devour the fat kine. If men were not what they are there might be a perpetuity of equable progress, but it is evident that we have not reached that point yet. In religious affairs history shows us that churches have their palmy days, and then again their times of drought. The universal church has been thus circumstanced; it has had its Pentecosts, its Reformations, its revivals; and between these there have been sorrowful pauses, in which there was much more cause for lamentation than for rejoicing, and the Miserere was more suitable than the Hallelujah. I should not, therefore, wish any brother to condemn himself if he is not conscious just now of all the vivacity of his youth, — he may find it return before our meetings close. I would have the husbandman long for spring, and yet not despair because of the present cold; so would I have a man lament every degree of decline, and yet not despond. If any man walk in darkness, and see no light, let him trust in God, and look to him for brighter days.
Still, taking all this into account, and allowing all margin and discount, I fear that many of us do not maintain our proper elevation, but sink below par. Many things tend that way, and it may do us good to think of them. A degree of running down in spirit may be purely physical and arise out of the evaporation of our youthful vigor. Some of you enjoy all the force of your early manhood; you are fleet of foot as the roes of the field, and swift of movement as birds on the wing; but others of us wear a tinge of grey in our locks, and middle life has sobered us. Our eye has not yet waxed dim, nor has our natural force abated; but yet the flash and flame of our youth have departed, and from the style of our speech and the manner of our action men miss that morning dew which was the glory of life’s young hours. Older men are apt to ridicule young fellows for being too zealous: let them not retaliate, but cautiously abstain from ever charging the elder brethren with excess of fervor. Surely malice itself would not dare to invent such a libel. For my own part, I would have remained a young man if I could, for I fear I am by no means improved by keeping. O that! could again possess the elasticity of spirit, the dash, the courage, the hopefulness of days gone by! My days of flying are changed to those of running, and my running is toning down to a yet steadier pace. It is somewhat cheering that the Scriptures seem to indicate that this is progress, for such is the order which it prescribes for saints — “They shall mount up with wings as eagles”; away they go, out of sight. In your first sermons — how you mounted up! Your first evangelistic efforts-what flights they were! After that, you slackened and yet improved your pace, but it grew more steady, and perhaps more slow, as it is written — “They shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.” God grant that we may not faint, and if our running days are over, may we walk with God as Enoch did, till the Lord shall take us home.
Another cause which frequently conduces to the abatement of vigor is the possible cessation of early success. I do not mean that it is always so; but usually when a man goes to a new field, there are many un-reaped portions, and he gathers a large harvest, which he does not find afterwards because there is less to reap. If you have a narrow pond you cannot keep on catching as many fish as you did at first, because there are not so many fish remaining. In London we are, as it were, in an ocean, and we may spread our nets as often as we please, but in a small town or village a man may soon have done all his direct converting work if the Lord greatly blesses him, and if after a time more souls ax not saved it may be because few unconverted persons attend his ministry. God may have given the brother all those whom he intended to bless by him in that place, and it may be wise for him to fish in other waters. I have read of a lighthouse-keeper who puts a rope round the lighthouse, and then to this line he attaches a number of lines and hooks. These are all under water at high tide, and at favorable times the fish bite, and when the tide goes down the lighthouse is festooned with fish of all kinds; there they hang, and the successful fisherman has nothing to do but to gather the spoils. Thus it was at first with us: we baited our hooks, and we drew in the fish without stint. But perhaps later on the lighthouse-keeper peers out from his tower, and he cannot see, for the fog is dense, the storm-cloud has settled down around his light, and the wind rages furiously;. he is obliged to keep every door and window dosed, or he could not live, and then he thinks it hard to be a lighthouse-keeper, and wishes himself ashore. We also are, at times, in a similar condition. We are asked, “Watchman! what of the night?” And the answer is, “No morning cometh, but the night thickens, and the darkness grows denser.” We do not every day draw the net to land full of great fishes, but we experience dreary intervals of fruitless toil, and then it is no wonder that a man’s spirit faints within him.
The natural wear and tear of an active life also tend to our running down. Some of our people think that we have little or nothing to do but to stand in the pulpit and pour out a flood of words two or three times a week; but they ought to know that if we did not spend much time in diligent study they would get poverty-stricken sermons. I have heard of a brother who trusts in the Lord and does not study, but I have also heard that his people do not trust in him; in fact, I am informed that they wish him to go elsewhere with his inspired discourses, for they say that when he did study his talk was poor enough, but now that he gives them that which comes first it is altogether unbearable. If any man will preach as he should preach his work will take more out of him than any other labor under heaven. If you and. I attend to our work and calling, even among a few people, it will certainly produce a friction of soul and a wear of heart which will tell upon the strongest. I speak as one who knows by experience what it is to be utterly exhausted in the Master’s service. No matter how willing we may be in spirit, the flesh is weak, and he who made a tender apology for his sleeping servants in the garden knows our frame, and remembers that we are dust. We need that the Master should say to us every now and then, “Come ye apart into a desert place and rest awhile;” and he does say so, for he is not a hard taskmaster, and whoever may use the lash and cause the weary steed to die in harness, our gentle Lord doth not so.
Besides this, we are very apt to run down through our duty becoming routine work, by reason of its monotony. Unless we are careful we shall be likely to say to ourselves, “Monday evening here again, I must give an address at the prayer-meeting. Thursday evening, and I have to preach, although I have not yet a topic! Sunday morning, Sunday evening: I have to preach again! Yes, preach again! Then there are all those extra engagements; it is for ever preach, preach, preach! I am always preaching. What a weariness it is!” Preaching ought to be a joy, and yet it may become a task. Constant preaching should be constant enjoyment, and yet when the brain is tired pleasure flies. Like the sick boy in the prophet’s day, we are ready to cry, My head. My head!” We ask, How can I keep up my freshness? It is hard to produce so much with such scant leisure for reading; it is almost as bad as making bricks without straw. Nothing can maintain us in the freshness of our beginnings but the daily anointing of the Spirit.
I do not wonder that some brethren run down through want of association with others of warm heart and of kindred spirit. I will give you another lighthouse illustration: a gentleman who called to see the keepers of a lone light said to one of them, “I suppose, after all, you fellows are quite happy in this tower? …. We might be happy,” he replied, “if we had a chat with one another; but my mate and I have not changed a word with each other for a month.” If you are banished to a country place where you have no superior or even equal mind to converse with, no intellectual or spiritual friend near at hand, I can feel for you. “Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend,” and when that sharpening is missed, it is no marvel that the mind grows dull. We cannot live alone, brethren, and yet a dreadful solitude as to our higher cares is one of our sorest trials. O for a twin spirit to converse with’, The worst of it is that if we have few to refresh us with their conversation we have many to vex us with their chatter, and when we would fain be uplifted to noble themes, we find ourselves dragged down by the dreary gossip of a hamlet. What wonder if with such surroundings we lose force and run down!
Yet, dear brethren, none of these things furnish us with an excuse for falling into a low state, and it may possibly be true that our menial decline is the result of our weak spiritual condition. It may be that we have left our first love, that we have wandered away from the simplicity of our faith, that we have backslidden in heart, and grieved the Holy Spirit, so that our God walks contrary to us because we walk contrary to him. Perhaps the rain is withheld because prayer has been restrained, and the heavenly wind has ceased to blow because we have been too indolent to spread the sail. Has there been no unbelief to hinder the blessing? We often talk of unbelief as if it were an affliction to be pitied instead of a crime to be condemned. For us to give the lie to him who has unveiled the secret of his heart to us, and almost, I was about to say, gone out of his way to bless us in an extraordinary and unusual manner, must pain the great Father’s heart. Perhaps we feel less love to Jesus than we once did, less zeal in doing his work, and less anguish for the souls of others; if so, it is no wonder that we enjoy less of the presence of God, and are soon cast down. If the root is not strong, how can the branches flourish?
May not self-indulgence have mixed with unbelief? Have we made provision for the flesh? Have we lost the intimacy with Jesus which we once enjoyed? Have we violated the consecration with which we started? If so, the blue mould will settle on the unsound place. Selfishness will mar our strength and destroy our usefulness. I will not suppose that this is the case with any of you, or at least I will suppose it, and let it remain a supposition.
It is a dreadful fact that sometimes these runnings down end in a catastrophe. After secret backsliding comes a sin which is publicly reported, and men cry, “Shame!” Yet it is not that one sin, but the general state of the man’s heart which is the saddest part of it. No man becomes bad all at once. True, the single lightning flash slew its victim, but the bolt had not fallen if there had been no previous gathering of the elements into the condition of storm. The overt scandal is only the development of what was in the man — the evil lies deeper still. When we hear of a man who has ruined his character by a surprising act of folly, we may surmise, as a rule, that this mischief was but one sulfurous jet from a soil charged with volcanic fire; or to change the figure, one roaring lion from a den of wild beasts. As you would on your bended knees cry day and night that no moral catastrophe may occur to you, beware of the sin which leads to it, beware of the backsliding which culminates in it; for if we have not the cause the effect will not follow. The Lord will preserve us if day by day we cry unto him to cleanse our way.
There is an evil under the sun which is as terrible as an open catastrophe — indeed, it works greater ill to the church in the long run, — and that is, when a man’s ministry is eaten through and through with spiritual dry rot.
I heard an old Indian describe the way in which furniture may be devoured by the white ants. The ants will come into the house and eat up everything, and yet to all appearance nothing is touched. The bookcases stand just where they did, and the trunks and everything else remain exactly as they were; at least, it is so to the eye; but directly they are touched they all crumble, for the ants have eaten the substance out of them. In the same way men still remain in the ministry, and yet the soul of their ministry has gone. They have a name to live and are dead: what is worse than this? One might almost sooner have an explosion and have done with it than see men continuing to maintain the form of religion after vital godliness has gone, scattering death all around them, and yet maintaining what is called a respectable position. God save us from this last as much as from that first. If I am a rotten bough, let me be cut off; but to hang upon the tree all verdant with parasitical lichen and moss is deplorable. A respectable ministry devoid of spiritual life is little better than respectable damnation, from which may God deliver us.
When men drift into this condition they generally adopt some ex-pedant to hide it. Conscience suggests that there is something or other wrong, and the deceitful heart labors to conceal or palliate this fact. Some do this by amusing themselves with hobbies instead of preaching the gospel. They cannot do the Lord’s work, and so they try their own. They have not honesty enough to confess that they have lost gospel power, and so they ride a hobby; and it is a very mild form of evil when they raise some side issue, which has no other fault about it than that it diverts them from the main point. Many are these playthings: I have no time for more than one. I have known certain brethren give themselves solely to expound prophecy. Now, a man full of the life of God may expound prophecy as much as he likes, but there are some who, having lost their love of the gospel, try to win back what little popularity they once had by taking up with guesses at the future. They may be quite sure that if they cannot profit men by the manger and the cross they will make a complete failure of it if they handle the seals and the vials. Did you ever notice in Calvin’s Commentaries that there is no exposition of the Book of Revelation? Why not? He said, “I have not expounded that book because I do not understand it.” When! hear a man say, “I have found much in Matthew which does not belong to the church, I have outgrown much of the Romans and Galatians, and I cannot enjoy the Psalms, for they do not rise to the perfection of my experience; I want something more elevated and spiritual, more abstruse and wonderful “; I conclude that this brother is spinning his last hank, and spending his last pennyworth of sense.
I have been amused by observing the manner in which speculators have been taken in when they have left the old ship of the gospel to become prophets. The beast of the Revelation was reported to be Napoleon I., and then the creature suddenly re-appeared in his nephew, Napoleon III. By and-by the deadly wound was healed, and the Prince Imperial wore the dreadful honors of the prophetic book; but the prince is now dead, and it will be needful for the seers to invent a new theory. There is no fear but what they will do it before long, and meanwhile “our Israelitish origin” will do to fill up the time. In the story of Sindbad the Sailor it is said that as they sailed along they saw an island, and at the sight thereof they greatly rejoiced. The crew left the ship and feasted on the island, and were going to take possession of it in the name of the king, when suddenly it began to quiver and to plunge, and finally it went down altogether, for it was a whale’s back and not an island at all. I have known brethren disport themselves upon the back of some novel speculation, when suddenly the facts of history have gone against them, and the whole thing has gone down very like a whale. I have mentioned one of the more harmless hobbies, but some have taken to fancies which have bred greater mischief. Speculation is an index of the spiritual poverty of the man who surrenders himself to it. His flour has all been used, and so he tries plaster of Paris: he has no more gold or silver, and so he coins the baser metals. He cannot prophesy after the measure of faith, and so he exercises his immeasurable imagination. His own experience does not serve him with topics for his ministry, and therefore he takes airy flights into regions of which he knows nothing.
Far worse is it when a man so runs down in heart and spirit that he has no principles left, and believes nothing at all He is a Baptist, but he would very cheerfully minister to a Paedo-Baptist church. He is a Calvinist, but he is not narrow, and will promise to offend no one. He holds certain views, but “a view to the pastorate” is the chief of them, and in that view the salary is the charm. He boasts of possessing large-heartedness, and receptivity of spirit, and all that. He has dry rot in his soul! That is the truth of the case, and he tries to cover it up with this nonsense! Such persons remind me of an advertisement of a school in France; its concluding paragraph was to this effect: “The pupils will be taught any religion which may be selected by their parents.” It is abominable when ministers as good as .say, any religion will be taught which may be selected by the deacons. Pray inform me whether the church likes a high-toned Calvinism, or prefers Arminianism. It is with such as it is with the showman who exhibited the battle of Waterloo, and in answer to the question, “Which is Wellington, and which is Napoleon?” replied, “Whichever you please, my little dears; you pays your money and you takes your choice.” These broad-churchmen are prepared to supply any article for which there is a demand. This is a terrible condition of things, but men do not generally rest there: in the lowest depth there is still a lower deep.
When the heart has got out of order and the spiritual life has run down, men soon fall into actual doctrinal error, not so much because their head is wrong, for many of them have not much of that, but because their heart is in an ill condition. We should never have known that some men had brains at all if they had not addled them. Such departers from the faith usually fall by little and little. They begin by saying very little concerning grace. They serve out homeopathic doses of gospel: it is marvelous what a very small globule of the gospel will save a soul, and it is a great mercy that it is so, or few would be saved. These snatches of gospel, and the preacher who gives them, remind us of the famous dog of Nile, of whom the ancients said that he was so afraid of the crocodiles that he drank of the river in a great hurry and was away from it directly. These intellectual gentry are so afraid of the critical crocodiles that the moment they touch the living water of the gospel they are away again. Their doubts are stronger than their beliefs. The worst of it is that they not only give us very little gospel, but they give us much that is not the gospel. In this they are like mosquitoes, of whom I have often said, I do not mind their taking a little of my blood, but it is the poison which they put into me which is my great cause of quarrel. That a man should rob me of the gospel is bad enough; but that he should impregnate me with his poisonous doctrine is intolerable.
When men lose all love to the gospel they try to make up for the loss of its attractions by sparkling inventions of their own. They imitate life by the artificial flash of culture, reminding me of the saline crystals which cover the salt deserts. There is a lifeless plain in the heart of Persia, so sterile and accursed that even saline plants do not thrive; “but the salt itself, as if in bitter mockery, fashions its crystals in the form of stems and stalks, and covers the steppe with a carpet of unique vegetation, glittering and glistening like an enchanted prairie in the dazzling light of the eastern sun.” Woe be unto the poor congregations who behold this substitute for life, this saline efflorescence of dainty errors and fascinating inventions. Alas, whatever a man may now propound he will find learned personages to support him in it! Fontenelle used to say, that if he could only get six philosophers to write in its favor, people could be made to believe that the sun is not the source of light and heat; and I think there is a great deal of truth in the remark. We are told, “Well, he is a very learned man, he is a Fellow of Brazenface College, and he has written a book in which he upsets the old dogmas.” If a learned man writes any nonsense, of course it will have a run, and there is no opinion so insane but, if it has the patronage of so-called scientific men, it will be believed in certain quarters. I have myself watched the labors of novelists in theology, and have tried to get what I could out of their books, but I have been struck with the remarkably poor results of their lucubrations. I have stood by the shore at Mentone and seen fishermen with miles of line and a vast net buoyed up by great tubs, visible far out at sea. A dozen men are hauling at one rope, and as many more are pulling in another, drawing this great net to land. Pull away! Ahoy! Pull away at the ropes and bring the fish to land. I believe that on one occasion I did see them produce a fish not so long as my little finger, but that was a rather successful occasion! Our German friends have diligently made vast nets with which they have enclosed the sea of thought, and upon drawing them out what a noise there has been, and what a sensation, and what a trembling and a fainting among the old ladies of Christendom; but when we have seen their mighty catch it has not been the tenth part of a sardine. The next philosopher that came along has fitted on his spectacles with due gravity, after wiping them most solemnly, and then he has put his critical fork into this small fish, and, holding it up to be admired of all, he has discoursed upon its species, till another philosopher equally wise has declared that it was rotten, and pitched it back into the deeps. This kind of game is everlastingly going on, and many young ministers have been fools enough to give up the apostolic fishery to join in this stupid waste of mental effort. What have they ever done, these doubters, since the world began? What will they do? What can they do? All that they can do now is to wriggle into our churches, and hiss from pulpits which were once filled by the orthodox. They cannot build places of worship of their own, they could not build a mouse-trap; as a rule, there is not power enough in their teaching to gather a congregation, or to keep one when it is gathered. All the vitality, force, and energy they possess are spent, cuckoo-like, in laying their eggs in the nests which we take the trouble to fashion, for they cannot build their own.
God forbid that we should ever try to cover our decline of heart by the invention of our self-conceit.. I hope that when our ministry begins to lose power we shall be driven to our knees, and to our God, that he may quicken us again by his good Spirit.
[To be concluded in our next.]
A CONTINUAL TOOTH-DRAWING
WHEN Sir Thomas Fewell Buxton was wearied all day long by incessant requests to alter his procedure upon a great political question, he told his daughter that he could compare the importunities of the members of the House of Commons to nothing but a continual tooth-drawing. This is an image far too striking to be left to Sir Fowell’s sole use. Many other persons have been made to know what a continual tooth-drawing means, and we feel persuaded that many more are subjected to similar processes.
We should think that a miserly man, who takes a sitting in a place of worship frequented by a liberal and energetic people, must frequently feel, when he is asked over and over again for a subscription, that he had almost as soon sit in a dentist’s chair, and feel the operator’s forceps upon his precious dentals. His best plan is to give at once, and so end the pain of the extraction.
The same sort of misery must be experienced by the Christian who is always sighing —
“‘Tis a point I long to know,”
and incessantly turning over the experience of his own heart to see if he can extract from it some assuring evidence of his being in Christ. Most of us have undergone this unhappy experience, and even a moment of it is torture: to have to endure it month after month would be agony indeed. Oh for a childlike faith in Jesus to decide the question at once!
Personally, we have heard utterances in prayer-meetings which were painfully like a continual tooth-drawing. They were hard, cold, heartless, dreary, and both as long and as dismal as a winter’s night. All of a sudden we thought and hoped that the brother had done; but, alas, he took up a fresh lease, and entered upon another lengthened period. To all appearance he was coming to a conclusion a second time, when off he went, like a shot which ricochets, or a boy’s stone which when thrown into the water goes — duck-duck — drake — upon the surface. The prayer was diluted to the dregs of nothing, but end there seemed to be none. Oh that the tooth were out! The beloved brother had said all that could be said, and prayed for all that could be prayed for; but he evidently felt it necessary to begin again. We can have too much of a good thing in such a case, and we wish the friend thought so. Preachers, too, have caused us the same memorable sensation. The style and manner have been painful, and the length of the discourse has made the agony a protracted one. Dragging away at some metaphysical subtlety, which they could not bring into the light; tugging at some unimportant difficulty whose fangs defied their power; or explaining with marvelous perspicuity what was clear as daylight when they began, and marvelously foggy before they came to the end, they have inflicted upon us “a continual tooth-drawing;” at least, our patience was almost as much strained as if a grinder had been slowly drawn from our aching jaw. We were ready to cry, “Out with it, and have done, there’s a good man; for we can’t stand it much longer.”
Worst of all, however, and fullest development of Sir Fowell’s simile, is the click, clack, click, clack of a fluent female who has gained your ear, and means to hold it.
“She never tires nor stops to rest,
But on and on she goes.”
We have felt ready to open our mouth, and let her draw all our teeth set, the, if she would but leave off talking. She had nothing to say and she said that nothing at extreme length, with marvelous energy, and with unwearied repetition. We have turned our head, we have shut our eyes, we have wished we had gun-cotton in our ears and dynamite in our brain; but our wishes did not deliver us, we were given over to the tormentor, and must abide the fulfillment of our sentence. When the operation has been over we have sometimes asked ourselves what we have done to deserve such a punishment, and with every desire to make a fall confession of our faults, we have not been able to discover anything which deserved so severe a torment under the present rule of mercy. At the second sight of the operator we have fled, feeling that it would be worth while to go a mile round, or leap over hedge and ditch, rather than again experience “a continual tooth-drawing.”
MORAL. — Let us all be considerate of the feelings of others, for when we imagine we are merely tickling their ears we may be causing them as much pain as if we were drawing their teeth. — C. H. S.
A JOURNEY TO MENTONE WITH MR. SPURGEON
BY JOSEPH W. HARRALD.
(CONTINUED)
NOVEMBER 14, 1879. — Our first morning at Mentone was spent at Dr. Bennet’s beautiful garden just across the Italian frontier. In order to get to it we had to cross the Pont St. Louis, an engraving of which appears in “Spurgeon’s Illustrated Almanac” for the present year. On one side of the bridge French soldiers are stationed, and on the other side are the representatives of the King of Italy. We did not feel in the least frightened at the sight of these men of war, well knowing that we had no intention of smuggling anything in or out of either country. As we passed them, almost unchallenged, we felt the value of a good conscience, and understood the meaning of the reclaimed street Arab’s definition of the difference between his wild and tame condition: “Now I can look every bobby in London in the face, without blushing.” The Italian guards not only have to perform their usual work of searching for contraband goods, but recently they have had to make most minute inquiries and to carry out most stringent, and almost ridiculous, regulations with the view of preventing the further ravages of the Phylloxera, the little insect which has already committed such deadly havoc among the vines of France and other European countries. This tiny parasite, which when full-grown does not exceed one thirty-third of an inch in length, is believed to have been introduced from America on certain vine-stocks imported at Bordeaux. Since its presence was first observed in Europe, in 1865, it has spread so rapidly that already in France alone nearly a million acres of vines are all but destroyed, while half a million more are in imminent danger. Such is the mischief wrought by these little creatures, thirty-three of whom laid lengthwise would only measure one inch! After that, let no man despise the day of small things, whether they are good or evil. It was a comparatively small thing that “brought sin into the world, and death, with all its woe,” yet its effects are far too terrible to be despised Sin seems to be, in the estimation of some people, a very insignificant affair; but, like the Phylloxers, unless it is removed, it will do irretrievable mischief. Can it be removed? If so, how? One of the most successful remedies for the vine disease is the injection of a chemical compound into the roots that are affected; and the only effectual cure of the soul infected by sin is the pouring of the Holy Spirit into the very root of the matter. This will arrest the progress of the fatal malady, will destroy the sin which infests the soul, and will make its possessor able to bring forth all the fruits of the Spirit in due season.
Writing of insects, we are reminded that we reached Mentone before all the mosquitoes had lost their power to sting. For the first few nights they annoyed us exceedingly; indeed, we are not at all certain that they did not hasten the illness which seized upon Mr. Spurgeon shortly after our arrival in this lovely land. We were not surprised to hear him say that, like the devil, if mosquitoes were not omnipresent, it was at least impossible to tell where they were not to be found. Night after night we heard and saw them buzzing around, seeking whom the might devour, and all the while trumpeting their war-song, like Jingoes thirsting for blood. The lesson to he learned from the mosquitoes is that little things may be a great nuisance. A thorn in the flesh, a mote in the eye, or the slightest stain on the conscience, may cause intense annoyance. One mosquito is quite enough to prevent a man from resting, and one sin unconfessed and unforgiven will keep a soul from the enjoyment of peace and rest to all eternity.
Possibly the bite of a mosquito, painful as it is, is not an unmixed evil, anymore than sea-sickness, and other unpleasant sensations. It is said that if a man is in good health the mosquito-bite will do him no harm, if he leaves the wound alone; whereas, if his blood is in an unhealthy condition, there will be considerable irritation and inflammation, and he will do well to search for the cause of the mischief much deeper than the insect’s sting has penetrated. Thus, Satan’s fiery darts fall harmless upon the Christian who is spiritually in robust health, but they cause grievous injury to the soul that is weak through the want of the food which God has provided in his Word, or through neglect of the holy exercise of prayer, or through living in the unwholesome atmosphere where sin breeds a deadly miasma. The Lord Jesus Christ was proof against temptation, for it was his meat and drink to do the will of his Father He spent much time in gathering fresh force by communion with God, and the pure, fresh breath of the Holy Spirit was given without measure unto him, and therefore he could say, “The prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing, in me.
Having passed the guards, and noticed the insects, we reached the garden upon a rock, which shows in every part how much can be accomplished on the most unpromising soil, if only the sun will shine upon it. The descriptions that we had read in The Sword and the Trowel, or heard from Mr. Spurgeon had made us quite familiar with the various objects of special interest with which the place abounds, and as they were pointed out to us we seemed to recognize in them friends with whom we were well acquainted, although we had never met before. Here, for instance, are the young palm-trees, which afford a lesson for beginners in business, or youthful Christians: they will take a long time to get firmly rooted and established, and after that will come the season of bearing fruit. There is the palm which stretches its branches far above all the others that were planted at the same time — the only one in the garden which has large clusters of dates upon it; the reason for its extraordinary growth and early fruitfulness being that it has struck its roots right down into a large tank of water, and so obtained unusual nourishment: true picture of the Christian who forces his way through every obstacle, that he may have constant communion with his Lord, and so become fruitful in every good word and work. Here, too, is the great water-tank, which for lack of space could not be made broad, and therefore was sunk deep down into the very heart of the rock. All who heard our beloved President’s address at last year’s Conference will remember how he exhorted us to be like this tank, and to make up in depth what we lacked in breadth, that each one of us might be a vast reservoir, from which dry and thirsty souls all around us might be plentifully supplied with the water of life. Here, also, is the tree which at one time bore no less than four different kinds of fruit, viz., lemons, oranges, citrons, and shaddocks None of these are left now except the lemons, the stronger nature having conquered all the rest: type of the man upon whom truthfulness, honesty, and temperance have been grafted, but whose nature has been unchanged by grace. For a time the new grafts may produce some apparently goodly fruit, but sooner or later the original stock will assert itself,, and nothing will be left but the old nature, and the old habits, and the fruit of these things, which is death.
To us who had just come from England the garden appeared like a little paradise, but the gardener told us that it sadly wanted rain in order that it might recover from the effects of the sirocco which had visited Mentone some weeks previously. After this wind has been blowing for only an hour or two everything that it touches becomes scorched and shriveled up, just as if it had been set on fire. Dr. Bennet explained to us the reason of this. It appears that, as a rule, the hot wind from the Sahara passes over high mountains, and crosses the Mediterranean before it reaches Europe, and by that means when it gets as far as Mentone, its great heat is so modified that it sweeps like the warm and gentle wing of an angel over this sheltered, sunny nook. It so happens, however, that there is a break in the chain of mountains, and when the current of hot air passes through this gap, instead of over the snowy summits, it reaches the opposite shore at very nearly as high a temperature as when it started from the sandy desert; and then, woe betide anything on which it lays its fiery fingers! Just like this, it seems to us, is the unveiled glory of God. No man can see him and live. The breath of his mouth will scorch us up, and destroy us utterly, unless it comes to us after it has passed over the hill called Calvary. It is only through the medium of a crucified Christ that there can be any safe union between an offended God and offending sinners. It is in Christ alone that God reconciles the world unto himself.
Our first day at Mentone would scarcely be complete if we did not report one or two of the table d’hote sayings concerning the place. We had noticed how hard the women seemed to work, but were scarcely prepared for the ungallan explanation that the reason why the men left them to carry such heavy burdens, and to perform such long journeys, was that “they are more sure-footed than donkeys, and cheaper than mules.” We had heard such marvelous descriptions of Mentone that we did not think we could be surprised by any vision of beauty that might burst upon us, but our first sight of the place made us declare that the half had not been told us, and nearly every change that we witnessed during our stay brought before our eyes new pictures of delight. We were almost ready to believe the legend which says that, when our first parents were driven out of the garden of Eden, mother Eve lingered behind and plucked an apronful of oranges and lemons, intending to carry them till she found another spot as charming, as the one from which sin had caused her to be expelled. The story goes that the fallen couple traveled on for many a weary day until at last they reached this beautiful region, and then the woman said to her husband, “We shall never find a place more like paradise than this is, let us plant our fruit, and make our abode here.” The oranges and lemons that flourish so freely throughout this district are, of course, supposed to be the descendants of those that came from the garden of Eden; whether they are or not, it is quite certain that the Mentonese are the lineal representatives of the ejected gardener and his wife.
Paul Joanne says “such is the fertility of the soil here that upon one occasion, a stranger coming to pay a visit to a Mentonese, stuck his cane into the ground, and when going away forgot it. Some days afterwards he went to reclaim it, but great was his amazement to find that his cane was already putting forth leaves and young branches.” It is said that this little tree, which has grown considerably since, is still to be seen in the Rue Saint Michel. The same writer states that “the citron harvest lasts at Mentone from the first of January to the thirty-first of December,” so that it may well be called a second paradise. Would that Christians could be thus fruitful all the year round!
The “table-talk” at the hotel was not always very edifying or instructive, but on one occasion, at least, the silence was suggestive. We noticed that when the guests were busy with their knives and forks their tongues were unusually quiet. “So,” remarked Mr. Spurgeon, “a well-fed church will be a peaceable church. Ministers who wish to keep their people from talking twaddle, and making mischief, should give them spiritual meat: if they are half-starved they are almost certain to get quarreling.” November 18. — To-day we had a delightful excursion up one of the Mentone river-beds, which was almost as dry as the Jordan was where the Israelites passed through it into the Promised Land. On our way we saw a splendid villa, which, it is said, has never been opened since a certain Empress dined there. It reminded us of the story of the old lady in whose cottage the Queen had taken shelter during a storm, who, after her august visitor had departed, carefully covered up the chair in which her Majesty had sat, and declared that no one should ever sit in that seat again as long as she lived. This was no doubt intended as a compliment to royalty, but we think we know a more excellent way; and yet some Christians err in a similar direction. They seem to think that, when Christ has once visited their hearts, the work of salvation is all completed, and that nothing is left for them to do, forgetting that what the Lord has worked in them of his good will and pleasure is to be worked out with fear and trembling. Instead of becoming useless as soon as we are converted, it is only then that we begin to be truly useful. The heart that has received Jesus should not be shut up like the unoccupied villa, or covered up like the old lady’s chair, but every one who comes near it should feel that it has been consecrated by the presence of One greater than the kings of the earth. Does anyone suppose that the house of Zaccheus was closed after that memorable day when the Savior abode in it, a self-invited but welcome guest, and carried to it that choicest of all blessings — salvation? Does anyone imagine that the favored spot in Bethany where dwelt the sisters and brother whom Jesus loved was kept shut up after the departure of the royal guest who often visited it? Certainly not. Most likely they both became sacred meeting-places for the saints of God, who there met to talk of the things touching the King who had for a while condescended to stay there during his sojourn upon the earth. No man or woman has ever been honored by a call from an earthly monarch as the Virgin Mary was when the Lord of life and glory visited her in her low estate, and made her feeble frame the dwelling-place of the Incarnate Deity; but instead of shutting herself away from the world, as .her supposed followers have done, she fulfilled her duties as a wife and mother just as any other godly matron might have done; and in the last picture that we have of her in the Word of God we see her taking her place with the rest of the disciples, who continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, waiting for the outpouring of the Holy Ghost.
After proceeding for a long distance up the river-bed already mentioned, we sat down where several mountain-streams unite to form the river. While we were resting a man passed us, and began to ascend the high hill right in front of us, apparently to get to his home. We were greatly interested in watching him as he went, first to the right, then to the left, sometimes a long way on one side, and anon as far in the other direction, but always ascending, until he disappeared above the crest of the hill on which his house was built. Thus, divine sovereignty and human responsibility are in truth but the windings of one road which brings us to our home above, the city that hath foundations whose Builder and Maker is God.
November 19. — Today we drove to Bordighera. the Italian “city of palmtrees,” Which we found en fete in anticipation of the visit of the Queen of Italy. As we viewed the various preparations for the royal reception, we thought of another Monarch, who often comes where none are ready to receive him, though he brings with him blessings richer than any earthly sovereign ever can bestow. He asks for no outward pomp and show when he appears, but what he craves is a hearty welcome to our inmost souls. Like those of whom we read in Luke’s gospel, who “gladly received him, for they were all waiting for him,” let us prepare for the coming of the King to us, and have everything in readiness, so that at the first signs of his approach, like the wise virgins, we may go out to meet him, and give him the greeting which he rightfully deserves.
For several days from this time few entries of general interest appear in our diary, the principal items being reports of the daily state of the health of the beloved editor of The Sword and the Trowel, who had been once more laid quite prostrate by most painful affliction.
December 1. — This morning we had a very heavy snow-storm, a phenomenon which had only been observed in Mentone twice before during the last twenty years. It caused the poor sufferer a further relapse, and inflicted terrible loss upon the peasants of the district, whose whole property consists in their lemons, oranges, olives, and vines. Dr. Bennet told us that the damage to the lemons alone was estimated at from one to two millions of francs. The olives being hardier, were not so much injured, although many of their branches were broken by the weight of the snow upon them. What struck us most of all was the exceeding beauty of the olives while the snow was falling upon them, or resting upon their leaves and boughs. It seemed to give us an exquisitely lovely picture of the child of God exposed to unusual trial. During our sojourn here we have seen the olives when the first rays of the rising sun have made them glow like the bush that Moses saw, which burned but was not consumed, and they have reminded us of the sight that must have met the Savior’s eyes at the end of his all-night comings with his Father on the Mount of Olives; we have seen them beneath a cloudless sky glistening in the clear, calm sunlight, like a myriad drops of dew; we have seen them when the setting sun has flung his imperial robe around them, and clothed them as with a mantle of purple velvet, ready for some great state ceremonial; we have seen them when the moon has given to them the same soft, silvery light that their companions saw on that dread night when in Gethsemane, the Lord of the olives was pressed, and bruised, and crushed until “his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling to the ground “; we have seen them when the clusters of berries have been so thick that the branches have been bent almost to the earth with the weight of the precious fruit which was to repay all the owner’s care and labor; — we have seen the olives under all these conditions, and many more that cannot now be mentioned, but we still feel that to our eyes, charming as they appear in all their ever-changing aspects, they never looked so beautiful as when they were covered with the
“Beautiful snow from heaven above,
Pure as an angel, gentle as love.”
The beauty of the olive is the beauty of the child of God. “His beauty shall be as the olive tree.” The olive at sunrise is like a Christian when Sun of Righteousness first rises upon him with healing in his wings; the olive in the bright, glad sunshine is like the believer when all is well with him, and he can sing —
“But I am calm with thee, my God,
Beneath these glorious skies;
And to the heights on which I stand
Nor storms nor clouds can rise.”
The olive at sunset is like the dying saint, clothed with honor, and glory, and immortality, and about to be ushered into the august presence of the King of kings and Lord of lords; the olive by moonlight is like the believer who takes his place in the ranks of his fellow-saints, and shares in the reflected luster which shines in the church, which is “fair as the moon”; the olive at the time of ingathering is like the Christian when he brings forth the fruits of the Spirit: but the olive in the snow-storm is like the child of God when he is exposed to the heaviest trial that ever beat upon his head, standing unmoved and unmurmuring amid it all, retaining his faith in the loving Father who chastens him for his good, and pouring out his very heart of hearts in the triumphant but not boasting language of Job, Though he slay me yet will I trust in him.”
The beauty of the olive is of such a peculiar character that it is almost impossible to destroy it. A few days after the snow-storm, our beloved pastor being somewhat better, we drove round Cape Martin, where the trees had suffered most from the severity of this unusual winter. Many large branches were broken off, but the olives were as pictureque and pleasing to the eye as they were before the storm spent itself upon them, and so far as we could judge they were just as likely to bear as much fruit as before they were exposed to this sharp test of their powers of endurance, which had apparently at one stroke done the work of the pruning-knife for a whole year. So is it with the Christian of whom the olive is one of the most instructive types. Trial only increases both his loveliness and his fruitfulness. With many saints, it is only as they are made bare that they are made to bear. The psalmist is not the only child of God who has found it good to be afflicted; even the great Captain of our salvation, the true Olive, was made perfect through suffering. Sometimes the wise Husbandman sees fit to cut off an olive branch, or to root up an olive-plant, and set it in his garden above, that the parent-tree may yield its whole force in bringing forth fruit unto his praise. The olives have to be beaten before they pour their purple berries at their owner’s feet; and alas! Often it is the case with Christians that they give but a poor return for all the time and trouble that have been spent upon them until the long rod of affliction beats every part of the, and brings to their Lord a full return for all his labor in planting, p purging, and perfecting the them. We noticed that the olives that grow near the public roads are often covered with dust, and so present a very unlovely appearance. We remarked in fun that they represented unbaptized believers, whose bodies needed to be washed with pure water; but in solemn earnest they are the type of Christians whose low spiritual life leaves little distinction between them and “men of the world, who have their portion in this life.” If any of us are like these olives, may we hear the divine voice saying to us, “Shake thyself from the dust,” and may we in our turn cry mightily unto the Lord to pour out upon us a stream of his all-powerful grace to cleanse and purify us from the defilement of worldiness and unholiness.
We have mentioned that the lemons were the greatest sufferers from the frost and snow, and of this we had ocular demonstration when the weather moderated sufficiently to permit us to go out to examine then. We found that in low and sheltered situations they were comparatively uninjured, but upon the hill-sides, where they were exposed to the full force of the storm, the devastation was most pitiable to behold. We could not help thinking at the time of one whom we love more than tongue can tell, who has been lifted up by God high above his fellows, but who in his exalted position full often feels the keen blast of most painful affliction, while others whom the same Lord has planted lower down the hill of service live year after year unscathed. The man greatly beloved is the man greatly afflicted. The family at Bethany that is specially loved is sorely tried.
(To be continued.)
THE GIRLS’ ORPHANAGE, STOCKWELL
IN faith in God we entered upon the enterprise of erecting an Orphanage for Girls, and struck the first stroke on Monday, May 19, 1879, by uttering the following words at the meeting for celebrating the 25th year of our ministry at the Tabernacle: “Here” is one point of a new departure. Listen, and consider it. A day or two ago the lady who founded the boys’ orphanage sent me £50 for the girls’ orphanage. I answered somewhat to this effect: ‘ I am very grateful for the proposal, but, at the same timer I am not very well, and the times are not very hopeful, and therefore I had rather not begin any new work just yet.’ I proposed to keep the £ 50 in case we did build a girls’, and, if not, to put it over to the boys’. ‘No,’ said our friend, ‘ you are right in your judgment, but take the £50 as the first brick, for I am fully assured that many more bricks will shortly be added.’ Now I propose that £ 50 of the testimonial should be placed with my dear friend’s £50 that we may found the girls’ orphanage together. I will not say more, because she never has been outdone, and I do not think ever will be. I do not mean to press this new enterprise just now, but only to moot it, and see whereabouts this thing will grow. Other eggs will come to the nest egg, and the nest will become full, and then we shall have another family of little chicks. I feel as though I was laying the first stone of the girls’ orphanage, and you were all saying ‘ Go ahead.’ This is a good note of our present page of history — ‘ Second twenty-five years of pastorate commenced by the inauguration of project of girls’ orphanage.’”
With this beginning we set to work to raise money to purchase the necessary ground. First, we had to buy “The Hawthorns” for £ 4,000, and then the intervening meadow, and other matters had to be paid for.
This amount has been forthcoming, and we are in full possession of the land. The house called “The Hawthorns” is occupied by a nice little family of girls, and we are cheered and comforted by what has been done.
Our next step is to build a block, containing houses for the residence of 250 girls, with schools for the same upon the top. Of this building we have given an elevation as our frontispiece. The bills of quantities are in the hands of the builders, and before this magazine is issued we believe that the lowest tender will be accepted, and the work commenced. We do not as yet know the amount which will be needed, but by a rough calculation we cannot make it less than £8,000. Of this we consider that we have in cash and promises about £4,000, of which the following is a summary:—
We have received up to the present time (May 14) for the new buildings, and acknowledged in the magazine lists, £ 412 1s. 0d.; from H. E. S., for one house, £500; towards the Deacons’ house, £ 310; and “a twenty years’ reader of the sermons” has sent us £ 100, making a total in hand of £1,322 1s. 0d. In addition we have promised, C. H. Spurgeon, £500; Messrs. Passmore and Alabaster, £500; for Deacons’ house, £ 190; and Samuel Barrow, Esq., £500. Added to this, a beloved friend promises to build and furnish completely one house to be called “The Limes,” in memory of five beloved children. The actual value of this noble gift we must leave in a measure to the donor, but added to other offerings in kind we may confidently put it down at £ 1,000.
We originally estimated a house at £500, but as we have had to carry up’ the building a story higher, and make the houses larger, that amount will not build a house, and yet we cannot ask the donors of £500 to do more. To our great grief our friend Mrs. Tyson was taken away before she could fulfill her promise to build one of the houses; an instance of the need to do at once whatever we intend to do. We reckon that we have £4,000 towards the new work. It will not appear upon the balance-sheet that we have £1,300 in hand for Girls’ Orphanage: the fact being that it is not actually in hand, but we have included a legacy of £1,500 which is not yet received. After this block of buildings shall be completed, we have then to erect, first, the covered play-hall and bath, then the dining-hall, and chapel; and then the infirmary. These details will come one by one as each is paid for. We cannot go into debt, but must advance step by step, as God sends means. When completed, the Orphanage will make a noble square, and hold 500 orphans. This we consider to be quite large enough for one management, and as much as we can bear the burden of. Meanwhile we ask for help both to complete the building and to keep the orphans.
If by June 19th, which is our actual birthday, or by June 22nd, when we shall celebrate it, we could see the amount needed, it would indeed fill our tongue with singing. Why not? The Lord has done great things for us before and he will not leave us now.
The writer’s heart is often heavy through mental weariness, and those who desire his health and vigor for the ministry of the Word can best promote it by assisting this benevolent design. What better deserves our help? It is for our Lord Jesus’s sake that we have undertaken this labor, and in his name we ask his disciples to remember us and our large family of little ones. C· H. S.
A LETTER UPON C.H. SPURGEON’S PREACHING TO SAILORS
DEAR MR. EDITOR, — You have often been called a many-sided man; I shall therefore address your editorial personality, and consider for the moment that you are not the preacher I heard on Thursday evening last. I venture to think the Metropolitan Tabernacle had more sailors and sailor workers to this service than ever before. The good Manager of the Sailors’ Home sent up two wagon-loads, while Miss Macpherson’s lady friends marched at the head of a splendid column of hardy, well-dressed sailors. Very few ports of the world were unrepresented, while captains, officers, and missionaries helped to fill the first gallery. Much prayer had been offered and, enthusiasm awakened by Mr. Spurgeon having promised to preach a sailors’ sermon. At seven he came down to his quarter-deck looking careworn and overworked as though he had been watching a week in the Channel. But as he looked at his crew on the starboard and port sides inspiration came, and the buoyancy of his spirit returned.
The intercessory prayer for those at sea and those on shore waiting for missing ships, led many hearts to the throne of grace. As to the sermon, having graduated in God’s university, the Sea, with wind and wave, rock and sand, sun and star for my professors, I would, as a qualified judge, pronounce it A I at Lloyds’. It was simply first-rate, and worthy of the great preacher and his glorious theme, “The sea is his, and he made it.” I want, believing that it is calculated to bless the sailor and his cause and to glorify the God of the sea, to send it out as a tidal wave of blessing to the ends of the earth. Give me 50,000, and I can supply every light-house and light-ship on our coast, every lifeboat and coast-guard station, every British consulate and sailors’ mission in the world, and the great British mercantile marine. Give me 100,000, and Her Majesty’s ships and the American navy shall be supplied as well. But fifty thousand copies I must have, and I solemnly ask, Who is going to do this for Jesus, the Lord High Admiral of the Seas? Some £200 would cover the entire cost, and I would undertake with our staff of the British and Foreign Sailors’ Society, and associate societies, a proper distribution. Your readers are not aware that in January of this year the effective tonnage of the mercantile navies of the British Empire was 16,000,000, while the rest of the world only had some 11,500,000. This means that under one flag, and that flag the British, there is now 58 per cent. of the shipping of the whole world. Storms that hurled the Tay Bridge into the sea have played havoc with our shipping both sail and steam. In the past year (1879), not counting the exceptionally disastrous months of this year, no less than 1,688 vessels were reported to have been wrecked, with an estimated value, including cargoes, of £25,500,000!
But what became of those on board? — About five thousand perished! People have no conception of our ocean empire. Why, there are 50,000 fishing boats around the coasts of Britain alone!
Is it, then, too much to ask for 100,000 copies of this special sermon? The sailors are absent, they cannot plead for themselves. This is why they are too often forgotten. It will cheer Mr. Spurgeon if we could thus serve the sailor. Who dare estimate the outcome of this effort for the extension of the Redeemer’s kingdom? Who will thus help to make the sailors the unpaid evangelists of Christ to all the nations? All hands lay hold of this rope and give us a pull; but you, Mr. Editor, must give the command, or few will obey.
Yours faithfully,
EDWARD W. MATTHEWS,
Secretary, British and Foreign Sailors’ Society,
Shadwell, London.
NOTES
On Monday evening, May 3, the thirteenth annual meeting of the COLPORTAGE ASSOCIATION was held at the Tabernacle, under the presidency of the Pastor, C. H. Spurgeon. Extracts from the report were read by the secretary, Mr. W. Corden Jones, and addresses were delivered by the chairman; by two of the colporteurs, and by Dr. Samuel Manning, of the Religious Tract Society. We delight in this work, for its practical usefulness is beyond measure great as compared with the expense. But, as yet, we cannot get such a measure of public sympathy as the enterprise deserves. The report is encouraging, but we cannot conceal from ourselves the fear that the free subscriptions are so small that the capital is being month by month consumed. We have never had sufficient capital for this enterprise, and what we have had must all melt away in keeping the work going unless more help is given. The comfort is that it all goes in real work for the Lord.
On Thursday evening, May 6, in accordance with a request from the secretary of the British and Foreign Sailors’ Society, our week-night sermon was addressed specially to sailors, many of whom were present, with the representatives of various missions to seamen at home and abroad. We insert the letter which we received from the secretary, although it is too much in the preacher’s praise. Sailor fellows are so hearty, that when a sermon pleases them, they do not use moderate language. The sermon can be had as a little book for one penny at our publishers.
On Sunday evening, May 9, the seat-holders vacated their seats to allow the general public to worship at the Tabernacle. As usual on such occasions, not only was the house crowded in every part, but probably as many persons were shut out as were admitted. All classes were represented, from the wealthy down to the poorest. O that a blessing may follow upon our earnest endeavor: In order to invite to this service those who are not regular church-goers, we advertised in the Sunday papers, and we were grateful to find that they for the most part inserted our letter about the service, and made a kindly remark upon it. Special services for the most part only draw together those who are church-goers already; we wish we knew how to reach the outsiders. Our plans were in a measure successful; but yet when we heard the congregation join so well in the singing, we felt that still the preponderating number were not of the class that we longed to gather. O for an hour’s talk about Jesus and the gospel to utter worldlings! What brave warriors of the cross might we not find among those who are now the devotees of pleasure!
COLLEGE. — The following students, having finished their College course, have settled in the ministry: — Mr. F. G. Steward, at Calne, Wilts; Mr. A. Hamer, at Chatham Road, Wandsworth Common; Mr. B. Binks, at Workington, Cumberland; and Mr. G. A. Webb, at Godstone, Surrey. Mr. T. G. Churcher has gone to Edinburgh to complete his training as a medical missionary; and Mr. E. Isaac is conducting evangelistic services in Lancashire previous to his departure for Australia.
Mr. G. West has removed from Boston to South Shields, Mr. M. H. Whetnell from Ulversten to Blackburn; Mr. J. J. Ellis from Gosberton to Bedminister, Bristol; and Mr. W. Hetherington from Sudbury to Great Whyte, Ramsey, Hunts.
We are glad to hear of the safe arrival of our student, Mr. Edgar Booth, at Melbourne. May he be useful!
One of the passengers in the steamship American, which foundered off the African coast, was our student, Mr. Mann, who was on his way to reinforce Mr. Hamilton, at Cape Town. We had a cheery letter from him, written at Madeira, but how soon was the scene changed! He was wrecked, and then, after being picked up, he was wrecked a second time. Our prayers ascend for his safety, and ere this reaches our readers we hope he will be safe at the Cape. Still, he has lost all, and will need Christian sympathy and substantial assistance. We aided him to buy books and clothes, and all this is gone. However, some one will make it up, and, since the dear friend is, we hope, safe, we will sing of mercy, and praise the Lord.
CONFERENCE — The sixteenth Annual Conference of the Pastors’ College Association commenced on Monday afternoon, April 19, by a wellattended prayer-meeting at the College. At its close, the ministers and students wended their way to the Shoreditch Tabernacle, where they were entertained at tea by Mr. Cuff and his friends. In the evening our friend’s great building was nearly filled for a public meeting at which C. H. S. presided, and addresses were delivered by Pastors W. Cuff, C. Welton (Driffield), H. Wilkins (Cheltenham), and George Hill, M.A. (Leeds). The collection for the College realized £17 9s. It was a soul-stirring meeting, and struck the key-note for us. At the same hour the friends gathered at the Tabernacle prayer-meeting, under the presidency of the Vice-President, were pleading for a special blessing upon the week’s meetings.
Tuesday, April 20. — The first hour was occupied with thanksgiving and prayer, in the course of which the President read a letter from Mr. Gregson, containing suggestions for a special evangelistic mission to the English-speaking populations of India. He then delivered the address, which is published in another part of the magazine. After a short interval the Conference business was transacted. This included reports of the deaths of Brethren H. A. James (Strafford-on-Avon), T. Cannon (Torquay), W. Miller (formerly of Lewes), and R. L. Ludlow, who had not; completed his college course. The names of 48 students were added to the Conference roll, and all the officers were unanimously re-elected. The accounts of the Assurance Community showed that the payments for the year had been £85, and the receipts £75 11s. 6d., and that the balance of £8 9s. 6d. had been generously given by the late manager of the fund, Mr. Thomas Greenwood, who was heartily thanked for his kind help. The College owes a deep debt of gratitude to this invaluable brother. The manager for the present year is Mr. C. F. Allison, 161, Buckingham Palace Road, S.W., to whom all communications relating to this matter should be sent. Some brethren having suggested that the object of the community should be enlarged, the President was requested to appoint a committee to consider the subject. This will be done, and meanwhile any suggestions from members of the Conference will be heartily welcomed.
At the soiree at the Orphanage in the evening some of the boys recited and sang. Professor Fergusson delivered an earnest address on “The Source and Results of Spiritual Life,” Pastor W. McKinney (Port Jervis, New York State) gave us an account of “Religion in the United States,” Messrs. Mayers, J. M. Smith, and Chamberlain sang solos, in which sweet music helped to set forth the preciousness of grace, and we closed the meeting feeling that it had been “a good day” in the highest sense of the word. We hope that this visit to the Orphanage will maintain the interest of all the ministers in our orphan work: they have helped it often, and will again. Some of the orphan boys of their deceased brethren are there, and their presence rivets the College to the Orphanage in enduring unity.
Wednesday, April 21. — After a season of prayer, the Vice-President, who was suffering from a pain in his tongue, spoke to us briefly: but appropriately, from Ezra 6:14. The President announced the receipt of a telegram from the Canadian branch of the Pastors’ College Association, which held its first Conference during the visit of the Vice-President last year. Our venerable friend, Professor Rogers, then read us one of his charmingly characteristic essays on “Individuality in its relation to ourselves and others,” and Pastor W. William’s (Upton Chapel) followed with big paper on “Fuel for Heart Flames,” which we shall hope to present to our readers in a future number of the magazine. It was agreed that Monday, June 21, should be set apart as a DAY OF SPECIAL PRAYER by all the churches connected with the Conference. BRETHREN PLEASE NOTE THIS. It is the day before the Orphanage Fete. If it can be universally observed among our brethren, we shall rejoice: we will prepare a little letter which can be distributed to excite an interest in the day of prayer.
In the evening the annual meeting of the subscribers and friends was held at the College, under the able chairmanship of J. B. Mead, Esq. The president pre-seated the annual report, a copy of which will be sent to all subscribers. If any have not received it, will they please write? Addresses were delivered by the chairman, the Vice-President, Pastor W. Cuff, our evangelists, Messrs. Smith and Fullerton, Rev. E. Wilkinson, Vicar of Snargate, Dr. Green, of the Religious Tract Society, and Mr. H. Varley. At the close of the meeting the company, which was larger than usual, adjourned to the Tabernacle lecture-hall, to partake of the sumptuous supper given by Mr. Spurgeon and two friends, and prepared by Mr. Murrell and his assistants. Too much praise cannot be given to our esteemed friend and fellow-helper for the admirable manner in which the whole of the arrangements were carried out, not only on this evening, but throughout the whole week. The subscriptions at the supper-table amounted to £1,800, and various sums sent to us afterwards made the total about £1,900. As we miss two donations which usually amounted to £ 300, we consider that there is no falling off, but rather an increase in the supper gifts.
Thursday, April 22. — This morning’s meeting was commenced with thanksgiving for the mercies of the past day, and prayer for continued and increased blessings in the future. Pastor J. C. Thompson (Paisley) read an admirable paper on “Our ministerial attitude towards those who differ from us in fundamentals”; Pastor E. E. Walter (Liverpool) read one on “The unused energy of the church, and how to utilize it”; and Pastor F. A. Jones (Cross Street, Islington), on “Colportage.” We were all profited by the morning’s mental food, and by hearty communion with each other.
A large number of friends met for tea, and afterwards the Tabernacle was almost full for the public meeting. The President presided, Mr. Frisby’s evangelistic choir led the singing, addresses were given by the VicePresident, Professor Gracey, Messrs. Fullerton and Smith, and Pastors G. W. Tooley (Dumfries), J. J. Knight (Birmingham), and C. A. Davis (Bradford). Messrs. Burnham, Parker, Chamberlain, and Mayers, our Asaphs and Hemans, illustrated the way in which they go about singing the gospel. The ministers and students were then right royally entertained to the supper, which had been prepared by Mr. Murrell, to whom, and to the president and Mrs. Spurgeon, for all their kindness and help to the brethren, thanks were heartily given.
Friday, April 23. — During the devotional exercises of this the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles, we were reminded of the uncertainty of life by the announcement of the death of our friend Mr. Leach, the editor of The Freeman. He served his Lord well and faithfully. He was one of our own children, and for years helped us with this magazine. His wife and family are but scantily provided for, and a subscription is on foot to help them. We will gladly hand over any help that may be sent to us.
After a few words of encouragement from the President’s father, Professor Gracey gave us an exposition of Ephesians 4:8, and our new tutor, Professor Marchant, read his paper on “The power of the Holy Spirit, the preacher’s need and honor.” This was followed by our closing communion service, and the singing of Psalm 122, as usual, by the whole assembly standing with linked hands in token of the bond of brotherhood which unites them to one another. We never had a better conference. The life infused and awakened is felt by many to be a great help throughout the rest of the year. God be praised.
At the dinner-table Pastor F. H. White reported that 113 of the ministers had contributed or collected for the College during the year, the amount received from them having been £334 19s. 4d., to which the students had added £181 17s. 7d. It will be a good time when every man sends in something, however small. Hearty cheers were given for the Vice President, who responded, and for all helpers, for whom Messrs. Murrell, Allison, and W. Olney replied, and the sixteenth annual conference was brought to a fitting close by the singing of the doxology, and the pronouncing of the benediction.
At the end of all this we felt weary and worn, but full of inward thankfulness. Amid burdens and cares we are upheld by the all-sustaining arm, and comforted by the Eternal Spirit. To have trained more than 500 heralds of the cross is a great privilege: whatever of labor and anxiety it has involved has been a thousandfold repaid. Yet do we need the prayers of all, and the help of many, which also we shall have.
EVANGELISTS. — Messrs. Fullerton and Smith have been in Birmingham and the neighborhood during the past month, and they expect to be there during the first fortnight in June. They are trying an experiment which, if it succeeds, will guide them in working other large towns. They started at Smethwick, moved on to Smallheath, then to Heneage-street, and Circusstreet, and intend to finish at the. Town Hall and the Curzon Hall. The special correspondent of a local paper thus describes one of the services at Smethwick: —
“Arriving some time prior to that announced for commencing the service, in the hope of obtaining a good seat, I found that, large and spacious as the building was, it was well filled. The moment they appeared a something seemed to tell you that the evangelists sent were the right ones. Their first impressions were good. There was nothing pompous, stiff, or patronizing in their manner. If their conduct could have been put into-words it would have said something of this sort: ‘Well, friends, we come with credentials from our beloved Master and Teacher. We are not come to glorify ourselves, or to show off our abilities. We have come in a plain fashion to have a plain talk on serious things. If you are ready and willing to hear, we are ready to. begin?’ Such were the ideas which went through my mind while they paused for a moment. The appearance of Mr. Smith must have impressed the people that a gentleman of very homely ways was before them, that all parsondom manners would be eschewed by him, that he was merely one of themselves, selected to talk with them. His good, honestlooking face must have inspired confidence instantly. I do not think first impressions will be deceptive. In Mr. Fullerton the congregation could see the features of a student, and one who seemed anxious for the great work he was undertaking ….
“The sermon was founded on St. Mark, 10:47: ‘ The healing of the blind man.’ My anticipations of the preacher were more than realized. His genial countenance and pleasantness drew at once the affection of the people towards him, and rarely has a speaker had such a sympathetic audience. He is a fluent speaker, and never at a loss for language. He possesses powers of description of a high order, f was pleased to notice that the extravagances of some so-called evangelists were conspicuous by their absence. Being an educated man he indulged in no vulgarity or unseemly familiarity with sacred things. His discourse was a happy combination; for while the educated man and scholar could listen with pleasure, the wayfarer and unlettered man could derive equal benefit. There are some engaged in missions who pander to the ignorant, forgetting that thereby they are doing much to render nugatory the good they otherwise might do. I have known even the ignorant themselves to be disgusted when the preacher has come, as he thinks, down to their level. These evangelists, I am pleased to say, steered clear of all these difficulties. They treated their fellow creatures as being possessed of common sense and reason. While Mr. Smith did not pander, neither did he soar into lofty flights of oratory. There could have been none among his hearers who did not comprehend all he said. His sermon was a beautiful string of poesy. This was just what we might have expected from first impressions. Mr. Spurgeon’s discretion in the selection of these gentlemen is fully justified.”
Pastor E. Edginton sends us an encouraging account of Mr. Burnham’s visit to Wedmore, Somerset, from April 12 to 18, when many were led to seek the Savior, and some rejoiced to find him.
After the Conference Mr. Burnham rested for a few days, and on May 3 commenced a week’s services at Watton, Norfolk. Here also souls were saved, and, as usual, the household where the evangelist stayed received a special blessing. Many who attend no place of worship were attracted to the services, and all regretted that our brother had so soon to leave the town. This regret seems very common in connection with Mr. Burnham’s work, and it should suggest to those who are arranging for a visit the desirability of making the series as long as possible, as frequently the evangelist has to depart just as the fullness of blessing is being realized.
From May 10 to 16 Mr. Burnham was at Winslow, Bucks.
ORPHANGE. — The following letter, recently received, speaks for itself: — “Dear Sir, — Will you use this £5 for the ‘ Boys’ Orphanage’? I have just read in The Daily Telegraph that 204 boys are entered on your books as belonging to the Church of England, so it seems but fair to send you something. — Yours most truly, A CHURCHWOMAN.”
The Annual Fete. — Will all friends, far and near, kindly note that THE ANNUAL FETE AT THE ORPHANAGE will be held this year, not on the President’s birthday, June 19, but the following Tuesday, June 22? May God send as a right royal day. We hope that Mrs. Spurgeon will be able to lay the stone of one of the houses.
BOOK FUND. — Mrs. Spurgeon wishes it to be known that she cannot attend to requests for books during the month of July. This work proceeds in fall vigor, and makes many a hungry mind rich in spiritual food, but the invalid worker must now have a little breathing time.
PERSONAL NOTES. — We have received recently quite a number of illustrations of the text, “Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days.” Here are a few of them: — “Dear Brother in the Lord, — I was led to believe in Jesus through hearing a sermon delivered by you at the Surrey Music-hall, May 31st, 1857, (‘Elijah’s Appeal for the Undecided,’ No. 134). Hitherto the Lord. hath helped me, and his promise is, ‘I will never leave thee nor forsake thee.’ I have your ‘Morning by Morning,’ for daily reading, with the chapter of Scripture from which the page is headed as text, and I find much comfort therefrom. Before I heard the voice of God saying to me through you on that eventful day, ‘How long halt ye between two opinions?’ I was a follower of the Church of England and the pleasures of the world, and the name Waverer was meant for me that day. When at the hall I was led to say from the heart, ‘No longer, Lord, do I halt, but this day I decide for thee; ‘and now I follow the church of Christ, and seek to be conformed to his image, which is the end of God in the predestination of his church through all eternity.”
“Dear Sir, — I may tell you that I was one of the lowest grade of public drunkards for at least thirty years, so you will understand me when I tell you that I have felt bound with the cords of sin. I have been a constant reader of your sermons for seventeen or eighteen years, and I made thousands of struggles to break away from sin, but it was all in vain, and it was not until I let go all earthly hope, and by faith went to Jesus Christ himself that I found the result of faith in your Master. God bless you.” One of our elders writes to us:—
“My dear Sir, — At a meeting last night I heard the following statement, which I think you will be pleased with: — A member of one of our London churches said that, being an engineer, he had to reside for some little time in a foreign town, the name of which I did not catch, where he was entirely surrounded by Portuguese. He said it was very sweet to meet an Englishman anywhere under such circumstances to converse in his native tongue. He heard that there was an Englishman confined for life in the prison, and he determined to call on him, and speak to him respecting the love of God to sinners, tie got permission to see him, and having entered the prison, commenced at once speaking to him through the iron grating. The poor convict then told him that a few years before that, a young Englishman called upon him in a similar manner, and left behind some English novels, but between the leaves of one of the novels there was a sermon which had been preached in Exeter-hall, in 1856, by C. H. Spurgeon. The convict read it. It was upon ‘ Salvation to the uttermost’ (No. 84), and it referred to the murderer Palmer, then under sentence of ‘death. The words entered into his heart, and he immediately knelt down in his cell and cried for pardon, and he received a sense of forgiveness on the spot, and he was still rejoicing in the assurance that God for Christ’s sake had forgiven him. He told Mr. B. that he bad no hope of liberty in this life, but he was nevertheless rejoicing in the glorious hops set before hun in the gospel.”
The following letter refers to our fifteen-hundredth published sermon, “Number 1,500; or, Lifting up the Brazen Serpent,” preached in October last: — “Dear sir, — Yesterday morning my brother passed from us at daybreak. Though unknown to you, I think you will like to hear something he said. On Tuesday evening I asked him, ‘What can I do to be as happy as you?’ He answered with difficulty, ‘It’s all in “Instant Salvation” and “Number 1,500.”’ Many times he has talked of ‘Number 1,500,’ and has directed me to send one to his brother. A member of your congregation sent me ‘ Number 1,500’ in a letter to him, a sort of sly way, perhaps, of giving it to him. A passer-by on St. Leonard’s Parade gave him ‘ Instant Salvation.’ Sir, my brother’s words were ‘Only Jesus, nothing but Jesus; Jesus! Jesus!’ and he passed away without suffering, perfectly easy, pleasant, contented, joyous, and triumphant, and fully conscious up to five minutes from his death, so gently that I, a medical man, cannot say when he died — not the slightest struggle, only a gradually increasing stillness. Sir, if this letter be like a ‘ well done’ from the Lord through the voice of my brother to you, I am glad, as it will give you pleasure. Don’t trouble to answer, I am not a Baptist, but a Church of England man.”
Chap 6. JULY, 1880.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
JULY, 1880.
INAUGURAL ADDRESS
AT THE SIXTEENTH ANNUAL CONFERENCE OF THE
PASTORS’ COLLEGE ASSOCIATION,
BY THE PRESIDENT, C. H. SPURGEON.
(CONTINUED)
PERHAPS I have at too great length spoken upon the former part of my subject; I now propose to dwell upon the necessity of renewing grace. If any of us have come down from the heights, it is time that we returned to them again. If we have fallen from our first love, it is most needful that we should renew the ardor of our youth at once. If we have gone down even in a small degree, it behoves us to ask for help to gain back what we have lost. This is necessary on account of our own happiness; for I appeal to any brother who declines in heart, and grows weak in faith, and doubtful in spirit, whether he is not unhappy. Do you not derive the purest joy and the most solid satisfaction from walking with God? Those who are saints indeed are doomed to be unhappy apart from Christ. It is a doom which destiny has fixed upon you, that if you depart from Christ you must depart into hell; for it is hell for you to depart from Christ. If, therefore, in any measure you have roamed away from Christ, mind that you fly home again at once. Last year, when sojourning in Southern France, I went for a mountain ride to the foot of Castiglione, an old, half-deserted town. It was clear and bright at the time, and when the friends who were with me went up the hill to survey the place I remained a little lower down. I soon observed that the clouds were coming from the other side of the mountains, and in a few minutes I was in a fog, chilled to the bone. I could just see Mentone under the bottom of the clouds, and I said to my man- servant, “Get the horses in, for I must get down again into the sun at once.” Soon the fog was all round me, and I hastened to descend until I reached the sunlight again. You must feel like that, my brethren; if you are caught in a mist, and a chill is upon you, you must hurry back to Christ. You may joyfully repose in Christ, and find every blessing and comfort surrounding you; but if you have climbed into high notions and entered upon the cold regions of speculation, you must hasten down again. You must say of the old gospel, “I can see the blessed spot of my repose and I will get back to it at once.” This is good argument for those of us who are conscious of lost comfort through having left the good old way.
We cannot afford, I am sure, to be in a State of running down, for we were never too much alive. Our shortcomings at our best are quite sufficient to warn us against what we should be if we were worse. I can imagine some men losing a part of their courage and yet remaining brave; but if mine were to evaporate I should be a coward indeed. There would have been power in Calvin even if half the steadfastness of his mind had gone, for he was a man of mighty faith; but if I were to lose any measure of my faith I should be a sorry unbeliever, for I have not a grain of faith to spare.
Dear brethren, have we ever reached our right condition as compared with our early ideal of what we hoped to be? Do you recollect when you first entered the college or the ministry? Do you remember what a high standard you set up for yourself? You did well to fix the mark high; for if you aim at the moon you will shoot higher than if you fired at a bush. You did well to have a high standard, but you do not well to fall short of it: and yet who does not fall short? Do you not wish to hide your head when you contras yourself with your Lord? He saved others, and could not save himself; but we are keen to guard ourselves and our reputations, and often act as if we thought self-preservation the highest law of nature. Our Lord endured such contradiction of sinners against himself,, while we are provoked if we are thwarted in any degree. He loved his sheep and followed them when they went astray; but we have far too little pity even upon those who gather at our call. We are far, far, far below the true glory of the Well-beloved, and even fall short of our poor idea of him. Neither in private in his prayers, nor in public in his life, nor in his ministry, nor in his teaching, do we approximate to him so nearly as we should, and yet to fall short of him ought to make us blush and weep. We cannot afford, therefore, to run down. Indeed, if we do not compare ourselves with our Master, but only with our brother ministers (for certain of them have done right noble work for Jesus), we shall come to the same conclusion. Some of our brethren have held on under fearful discouragements, serving the Lord faithfully; others have won souls for Christ, to whom the winning of one soul has cost more self-denial than the winning of hundreds has cost certain of us. I could sit with delight at the feet of such consecrated brethren as I am now thinking of, and look up to them, and glorify God in them. Such have been found among men of inferior abilities, slender powers, and small attainments; but how they have worked, and how they have prayed, and how God has blessed them! It may be that, with ten times their ability and opportunity, we have not done anything like as much as they have. Do we not mourn over this? Can we afford to decline?
Beloved brethren, we cannot afford to remain in any state lower than the very best; for, if so, our work will not be well done. Time was when we preached with all our might. When we began to preach, what preaching it was for zeal and life! In looking back it must increase our self-humiliation if we perceive that in our younger days we were more real and intense than we are now. We preach much better, so the critics say, and we know that there is more thought and more accuracy in our sermons, and that we use better elocution than we did in our young days: but where are the tears of our early ministry? Where is the heart-break of those first sermons in our first sphere? Where is the passion? where is the self-annihilation that we often felt when we poured our very life out with every syllable we spoke? Now sometimes we go into the pulpit resolved that we will do as we did then, just as Samson went out to shake himself as aforetime. He had snapped the cords and bands before, and he was going to do the same again; but the Lord had departed from him, and he was weak as another man. Brethren, what if he Lord should depart from us, Alas for us and for our work! -Nothing can be done if the Holy Spirit be withdrawn; indeed, nothing truly good will be attempted. I have marveled at the way in which certain persons avoid preaching the gospel when they profess to be doing it. They get a text which you think must cut into the conscience, and they contrive to speak so as neither to arouse the careless nor distress the self-confident. They play with the sword of the Spirit as if they were mountebanks at a show, instead of thrusting the two-edged sword into the hearts of men, as soldiers do in actual combat. The Emperor Gallienus, when a man hurled a javelin many times at a bull without hitting him, and the people hissed at him, called the performer to his seat and placed a wreath on his head, saying, “You are most clever to be able to miss so large a mark so many times.” What shall we twine for a crown for those ministers who never strike the heart, never convince men of sin, never drive a Pharisee out of his own righteousness, never influence the guilty so that he casts himself as a lost sinner at the feet of Jesus? He may expect one day to be crowned with shame for such a crime. Meanwhile, twine the deadly nightshade about his brows. Be it ours to be like the left-handed men of Benjamin who “could sling stones at an hair breadth, and not miss.” We cannot reach to this unless the life of God be in us and abound.
A man ought to take care of himself, merely as a man, for the sake of himself and his household; but much more should a man who is a minister take care of himself for the sake of those who are committed to his charge. A captain was observed in the South Seas to go beyond the usual point for turning into the harbor, taking a longer but a safer course. On some one remarking to him that he was too careful, he replied, “I have so many souls on board, I cannot afford to run any risk.” How many souls there are on board of some of us! How many souls, ay, notwithstanding that the doctrine is unfashionable, how many souls, not of creatures which will die out like cats and dogs, but priceless, immortal souls, are committed to our charge! Since upon our ministry, under God, hang everlasting things — life and death, heaven and hell, what manner of persons ought we to be? How careful we ought to be as to inner health! How anxious to be always at our very best! If I were a surgeon, and I had to operate upon a patient, I should not like to touch either the knife or his flesh if I felt bilious, or if my hand was quivering; I would not like to be in any but the calmest, coolest, most forceful condition at the moment in which the difference of a hairs breadth might touch a vital chord, and end a precious life! God help all soulphysicians to be always at their best!
I believe the headway of God’s cause in the world depends upon our being in prime condition. We are come to the kingdom for such a time as this. As much as ever Simon Menno was raised up to preach believers’ baptism in Holland, and keep the lamp burning for God there, and as surely as ever in our own land such men as Hansard Knollys, and Kiffen and Keach, and the like, were bold to stand the brunt of the battle for the Lord, so I believe that you are intended to be in lineal succession defenders of the purest form of gospel truth. We have it in charge to pass on to the next age the everlasting gospel which our venerable sires have handed down to us. As Neander said, there is a future for the Baptists. There is a future for any church which has faithfully kept the ordinances of God, and is resolved in all things to be obedient to its covenant Head. We have neither prestige, nor wealth, nor the State at our back: but we have something better than all these. When a Spartan was asked what were the boundaries of his country, he replied, “The limits of Sparta are marked by the points of our spears.” The limit of our church is also determined by the points of our spears; but our weapons are not carnal: wherever we go we preach Christ crucified, and his word of solemn proclamation, — “ He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.” The enquirer tamed and said to the Spartan, “You have no walls to Sparta.” “No,” he replied, “the walls of Sparta are the breasts of her sons.” We have no defenses for our churches, either in Acts of Parliament or enforced creeds; but the regenerated hearts and consecrated spirits of men who resolve to live and die in the service of King Jesus have hitherto sufficed in the hands of the Spirit to preserve us from grievous heresy. I see no beginning to this business, this battle of truth commenced so long ago; and I see no end to it, except the coming of the Master and the eternal victory. Yet some trembling persons say we ought to stop, and let the young men already in college learn a trade, and forego the ministry lest England should become over-ministered, and they add that there is no use in preparing men for the foreign fields, for the Missionary Society is in debt, and its expenses must be curtailed. God bless the Missionary Society; but the condition of a society is not the limit of our personal endeavor: besides, the society will soon throw off its burden. If you, my brethren, are worthy of your calling, you will be bravely independent, and not hang too much upon the help of others. Sparta could not have been defended by a race of timid creatures armed with pointless spears, neither can young men of timorous spirit do great things of God. You must be braced to heroism, brethren, if you are to meet the demands of the hour. May God make the feeblest among you as David, and the house of David as God. (Zechariah 12:8.)
I have a proposal to make before I come to my conclusion, and it is this: let this be the time of renewal to each one of us: let us each seek for a personal revival by the divine Spirit. It is a fit time if we take an outlook upon our own nation. Politically, we have come back to a condition in which there will be a respect to righteousness, justice, and truth, rather than for self-assertion and national gain and conquest. We shall, I trust, no longer be steered by a false idea of British interests, and the policy which comes of it; but by the great principles of right, justice, and humanity. This is all I want to see: parties, as such, are nothing to us, nor individual statesmen, except so far as they represent right principles. We are for those who are on the side of justice, peace, and love. And now, instead of lying still year after year, and making no progress, — no laws amended, no home legislation attended to, but time wasted upon glittering foreign adventures — something will be done. At this period, also, our schools are educating the people, and I thank God for that. Though education will not save men, it may be a means to that end; for when all our peasants can read their Bibles we may surely hope that God will bless his own Word. It will be a grand thing for all our agricultural laborers to escape from receiving their religion at second-hand, by going to the New Testament for themselves. Godly people must take care to supply them with good books, and so feed the new appetite with healthy food. All light is good, and we, who most of all prize the light of revelation, are on the side of all kinds of true light. God is raising up the people, and I think our time is come to avail ourselves of their advance; and as our one business is to preach Jesus Christ, the more we keep to our work the better, for true religion is the strength of a nation, and the foundation of all right government. Whatsoever things are honest, true, kind, humane, and moral, may reckon on our aid. We are on the side of temperance, and therefore on the side of the limitation of the abominable traffic which is ruining our country, and we are opposed to all that licenses vice among men, or allows cruelty to animals. We are up to the hilt advocates of peace, and we earnestly war against war. I wish that Christian men would insist more and more on the unrighteousness of war, believing that Christianity means no sword, no cannon, no bloodshed, and that if a nation is driven to fight in its own defense, Christianity stands by to weep and to intervene as soon as possible, and not to join in the cruel shouts which celebrate an enemy’s slaughter. Let us always be on the side of right. To-day, then, my brethren, I beg you to join with me in seeking renewal. Now is the time for a man to buckle on his harness, and bestir himself.
Surely our holy fellowship at this happy hour should help us all to rise to a higher level. The sight of many of our brethren is cheering and stimulating. When I remember concerning some their holiness, their depth of piety, their perseverance, I feel comforted in the belief that if the Lord has strengthened others, he has yet a blessing in reserve for us also. Let this Feast of Tabernacles be the time for renewing our vows of consecration unto the Lord our God.
Let us begin it with a repentance for all our mistakes and shortcomings. Let each one do this for himself. You remember how the ancient giant fought with Hercules, and the hero could not overcome him, because every time he fell he touched his mother earth, and received new strength. Let us, too, fall upon our faces, that we may rise invigorated: let us go back to our first simple faith, and recover lost strength. Men who have been sore sick have cried, “Take me back to my native air, and I shall soon be well. Among the buttercups and daisies of the meadows, in which I used to play when I was a child, and near the brook where I caught the minnows, I shall soon revive.” Ah, it does our soul good to get back to our days of childlike faith, when we sang —
“Just as I am, without one plea
But that thy blood was shed for me.
And that thou bidd’st me come to thee,
O Lamb of God, I come.”
This will help you to renew your youth: it seems an easy way, but it is the only way.
Let us renew our consecration. I do not invite any of you literally to stain the door-post of the college with your blood, but I ask you to think upon that Israelitish slave whose time had run out, who chose to remain in service because he loved his master and his master’s children, and therefore he put his ear against the post of the door, and they bored it through with an awl. May the Lord bore the ear of each of us, that we may be his servants for ever. We love our Master, do we not, brethren? We love our Master’s work? And we love our Master’s servants and his children, and for his sake we will serve them all, for better or worse, till death doth part us from this lower service. Oh to get back to the old moorings! I would like for us to preach our old sermons; I do not mean the same sermons, but with the same force as when we began to —
“Tell to sinners round,
What a dear Savior we had found.”
People said, “That dear young man does not know very much, but he loves Jesus Christ, and he talks about nothing else.” I would like to preach again as I did at first, only a great deal better. I intensely believed and meant every word I spoke; I do so now, but doubts will arise now which never vexed me then. I would like to be a child again before the Lord, and to keep so, for I am sure that questions and doubts are a sad loss to any man. Return, my brethren, to your earliest Bible readings, when you were wont to let the promise lie under your tongue as a dainty morsel. Ah, this Book, as I turn it over, wakes up many a memory, its pages glory with a light which I cannot describe, for they are set with stars which in my many hours of gloom have been the light of my soul. I did not then read this divine volume to find a text, but to hear my Lord speak to my own heart; I was not then as Martha, cumbered with much serving, but as Lazarus, who sat at the table with Jesus.
God grant us also a revival of the first aims of our spiritual career. Then we thought nothing of pleasing men, but only aimed at pleasing God and winning souls: we were rash enough to care for nothing but the fulfillment of our mission; is it so now? We can preach now, can we not? We feel that we are proficient in our art. It might be better if we did not feel quite so well equipped. I find it better to go to the pulpit in prayerful weakness than in self-reliant strength. When I groan out, “What a fool I am,” and come down after the sermon ashamed of my poor attempt, I am sure it is better with me than when I am pleased with my performance. Are any of us such babies as to feel that? What a sense of responsibility we had in our first services; do we retain that solemnity of spirit? We then prayed about the choice of every hymn and the manner of reading the Scriptures; we did nothing carelessly, for a heavy anxiety pressed upon us. I always read the Scripture carefully at home and tried to understand it before I read it to the people, and I thus formed a habit from which I have never swerved; but it is not so with all. Some say, “I have been about all the day, and I have to preach to-night, but I can manage.” Yes, but it will not please God for us to offer him that which costs us nothing. Others have a stock of sermons, and I have heard that just before the time for entering the pulpit they turn over their precious manuscripts, pick out a likely one, and without further preparation read it as God’s message to the people. The Lord deliver us from a state of mind in which we dare to put on the table of shewbread the first loaf which comes to hand. No; let us serve the Lord with growing carefulness and reverence.
It would be well for many to get back to their first prayers and watchfulness, and all else that is good; for the word of command at this moment is, “Remember whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works.”
Can it be done? Brother, it can be done. You can have all the life you had, and more, by the blessing of the Holy Spirit. You can be as intense as you ever were. I have seen old horses turned out to grass, and come back fresh and vigorous. I know a pasture wherein if a worn-out steed doth graze, it shall come back to be harnessed to the gospel chariot with strength renewed. Let us remember those hallowed spots where Jesus in former days has met with us, where, or ever we were aware, our soul was made like the chariots of Amminadib. Lord, renew thy former mercies, and we shall rise, like the phoenix, from our ashes.
It may cost you a great deal to be set right again. John Bunyan speaks of one who lost his roll, and had to go back for it, so that he traveled three times over the road, and then found the sun setting ere he reached his lodging. But cost us whatever it may, we must get right with God. I read a dream the other day, which was the means of a man’s conversion. He thought that he was going with his friend into one of the Eastern towns, and as he was about to enter, the portcullis above the gate began to fall. As it descended he stooped; but it fell so fast that he could not get through, stooping, kneeling, crouching, or even lying down. He felt that he must enter, and so he made a desperate effort. He had on a very fine laced vest, and he pulled that off, but the portcullis still descended, till he found that the only thing he could do was to strip himself, and then, close to the earth, and grazed by the gravel, he crept through. When he was safely inside the gate a shining one covered him from head to foot with glittering garments. It may be that to get right we shall have to part with that fine vest, that splendid theory, that love of popularity, that rhetorical flourishing; but oh, if we once get through that gate, and God covers us with the robe of acceptance in the Beloved, it will well repay us for anything that the struggle may cost us.
I am sorry to say that I am made of such ill stuff that my Lord has to chasten me often and sorely. I am like a pen that will not write, unless it be often nibbed, and so I have felt the sharp knife many times; and yet I shall not regret my pains and crosses so long as my Lord will write with me on men’s hearts. That is the cause of many ministers’ afflictions; they are necessary to our work. You have heard the fable of the raven that wished to drink, but the pitcher had so little water in it that he could not reach it, and therefore he took stone after stone and dropped it into the vessel until the water rose to the brim and he could drink. So little grace is in some men that they need many sicknesses, bereavements, and other afflictions to make their graces available for usefulness. If, however, we receive grace enough to bear fruit without continual pruning, so much the better.
It is expected of us, brethren, that from this time we rise to a higher point. It is the Lord’s due, if we think of what he has done for us. Some of my comrades in arms now before me have gone through battles as hard as any men may wish to fight, and after such success they must never say die. After what the Lord has done for us we must never strike our flag, nor turn our backs in the day of battle. Sir Francis Drake, when it was feared that he would be wrecked in the Thames, said, “What! Have I been round the world, and am I now to be drowned in a ditch? Not I.” So say I to you, brethren: you have done business in stormy waters, and will you sink in a village pond? We shall not be worse treated than we have been. We are now in fine fighting trim, for we are hardened by former blows. A great pugilist at Rome was so battered, his nose, eyes, face were so disfigured, that he was always ready to fight, because he said, “I cannot look worse than I do.” Personally, I am much in the same plight. Men cannot say anything worse of me than they have said. 1 have been belied from head to foot, and misrepresented to the last degree. My good looks are gone, and none can much damage me now. Some of you have had more to batter you than you are likely to endure again; you have had trial and tribulation and affliction as heavy as you can have them; and after having stood in the lists so long, surely you are not going to yield and slink away like cowards? God forbid it. God forbid it. God grant, on the contrary, that the elder ones among you may have the pleasure, not only of winning battles for Christ, but of seeing others who have been saved under your instrumentality trained to fight better than yourselves for Jesus. I read the other day a story, and with that I will conclude, desiring that I may in spiritual things have the same joy myself, and that it may be the lot of you all. Diagoras the Rhodian had in his time won many wreaths at the Olympian games. He had two boys, and he brought them up to the same profession. The day came when his own force abated, and he was no longer able to strive for masteries in his own person; but he went up to the Olympian games with his two sons. He saw the blows they gave and received, and rejoiced when he discovered that, they were both victorious. A Lacedaemonian said to him, “You may die now, Diagoras “: meaning that the old man might die content, because he had in his own person, and in that of his sons, obtained the highest honors. The old man seemed to feel that it was even so, for when his two sons came and shouldered their father, and carried him through the camp amid the ringing cheers of the great assembly, the old man, flushed with excitement, died under the eyes of the assembled Greeks. It would have been a wiser thing to have lived, for he had a third son, who became more renowned than the other two; but he passed away on a wave of victory. Oh, brethren, may you have spiritual children who shall win battles for the Lord, and may you live to see them doing it; then may you say with Simeon, “Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word.”
In the name of the Ever-Blessed this day we set up our banners. Our watchword is “Victory.” We mean to win for the grand old cause of Puritanism, Protestantism, Calvinism — all poor names which the world has given to our great and glorious faith — the doctrine of Paul the apostle, the gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We can both strike, and bear the strokes which are returned. Through divine grace, we have given to us both energy and patience; we can work and we can wait. May the divine life in us put forth its mightiest force, and make us strong to the utmost of human possibility, and then we shall seize the victory, shouting, “Grace, grace, unto it.” The Lord be with you. Amen.
AGAINST HASTENING TO REMOVE FORM OUR POST OF DUTY.
HE was a wise man who said “The roundest peg seldom fits into the roundest hole without some paring.” There is no position in life which, at the first, has not something irksome and trying about it. New comers cannot expect to feel at home at once. We remember our first wretched night at a school where we afterwards became supremely happy. Well do we recollect the misery of the first few months of, a calling which we afterwards valued and enjoyed. Our mind was sorely depressed on first coming into that sphere in London which has since been the delight of our life. Let no man, therefore, when he at first commences work in any place feel at all discouraged by the uneasiness which may come over him. It is natural that he should feel strange in a new position. The burden is not yet adapted to the shoulder, and the shoulder is not yet hardened to the load. While feeling the irksomeness of a fresh position, do not be so foolish as to throw it up. Wait a little while, and time will work wonders. You will yet take pleasure in the very things which are now the source of discomfort. The very worst thing will be to hasten away and make a change, for the change will only bring trial in a fresh form, and you will endure afresh the evils which you have already almost mastered. The time which you have already spent at your new place will be lost, and the same weary first steps will have to be taken upon another ladder. Besides, you may readily leap out of the frying-pan into the fire. Change has charms to some men, but among its roses they find abundant thorns.
Has the minister just entered upon a fresh sphere, and does he miss the affectionate warmth of his old acquaintances? Does he find his new people strange and singular? Do they appear cold and distant? Let him persevere, and all this will wear off, and he will come to love the very people to whom he now feels an aversion, and find his best helpers among those who now seem to be utterly indifferent to him. The call of Providence has brought him where he is, and he must not venture to leave because of inconveniences: often it will be his wisdom to regard these as a part of the tokens that he is in the right way, for the appointed path is seldom easy to the feet.
Has our young friend commenced teaching a class in the Sunday-school, and does she find it far less pleasant work than she imagined? Are the children wild and careless and inattentive, and does her own power of teaching appear to be smaller than she hoped? Let her give double application to her holy toil, and she will come to love it. Should she leave it, she may incur the blame of those who put their hands to the plough and look back. The ice has been already broken; the edge has been taken off from the difficulty; let her persevere, and all will be well.
There is no position in this world without its disadvantages. We may be perpetually on the move to our continual disquiet, and each move may bring us under the same, or even greater, disadvantages. We remember a Scotch story of an unlucky family who attributed all their misfortunes to their house being haunted by mischievous spirits, known to our northern countrymen as “brownies.” These superstitious individuals became at length desperate; nothing prospered in house or field, they would therefore pack up all and begone from a spot so mysteriously infested. All the household goods were loaded up, and the husband and the “gude wife” and the bairns were all flitting, when one of them cried out, “Brownie is in the churn. Brownie is flitting, too.” Just so, the matters which hinder a man’s success are generally in himself, and will move with him; and wherein it is not so, he may yet be sure that if by change of place he avoids one set of brownies, the will find another awaiting him. There is bran in all meal, and there are dregs in all wine. All roads must at times be rough, and all seas must be tossed with tempest. To fly from trouble will need long wings, and to escape discomfort will require more than a magician’s skill.
It is wiser to “bear the ills we have, than fly to others that we know not of.” It is probable that our present condition is the best possible for us, no other form of trial would be preferable. What right have we to suspect the wisdom and the goodness of God in placing us where we are? It will be far more prudent to mistrust our own judgment when it leads us to murmuring and discontent. Occasionally it may be prudent to remove, or to change one’s form of Christian service; but this must be done thoughtfully, prayerfully, and with a supreme regard to the glory of God, rather than out of respect to our own feelings. A tree that is often transplanted will make but little growth, and bear but slender fruit. A man who is “everything by turns, and nothing long,” will be a sort of “Jack of all trades, and master of none.” An increase of spiritual strength by greater communion with God, and a more resolute determination to glorify him in every possible way, will usually conquer difficulties and win success. An extremely hard substance in the world may be cut by something harder: even the adamant can be forced to yield. Double force will make that easy which now seems impossible. Do not, therefore, change the work, but change yourself. Attempt no other alteration till a distinct improvement in your own self has resolutely been carried out.
We speak thus because we believe that many are discouraged at the outset of a career which, if they could see its end, would fill them with thankfulness; and Satan raises these discouragements to tempt them to leave a position in which they may damage his kingdom and glorify Christ. Courage, dear friend, you have a great Helper; look to the strong for strength. Say with Nehemiah, “Should such a man as I flee?” Who are you that everything should be made smooth for your feet? Are you such a little babe in grace that only the slightest tasks should be allotted to you? Be a man, and play the man. Resolve that even at this present, and where you now are, you will set up the standard, and hold the fort. Many are the instances in which men have commenced their life-work under every possible disadvantage, and for months, and even years, they have seemed to make no headway whatsoever, and yet they have ultimately triumphed, and have come to bless the providence which called them into a place so well adapted for their gifts. It would have been their worst calamity if, under a fit of despondency, they had changed their station or relinquished their vocation. The church would have been the poorer, the world would have been the darker, and themselves the feebler, if they had shifted at the first even to the most promising spheres which tempted them. That rock on which they stood, and mourned the hardness of the soil, was more full of the elements of fruitfulness than the softer soil at a little distance, which invited them to leave. Tarrying where they were, exercising indomitable perseverance, they have softened the granite, cultured it into fertility, and reaped a golden harvest. He is the greatest man who achieves success where stronger men might have failed. If we desire to glorify God, we must not select the comfortable positions and the hopeful fields; it is best to make no selection, but to yield our own will to the will of God altogether. The hole is round enough, it will be difficult to make it any rounder; the proper plan is to round ourselves. If we will but adapt ourselves to our position, the position will adapt itself to us.
It may be that these lines will furnish counsel to a brother whose choice now lies between being a rolling stone and a pillar in the house of our God. To turn tail under present pressure may be the beginning of a cowardly career, neither honorable to God nor to man: to stand fast at this distressing juncture may be the commencement of an established position of supreme usefulness and honor.
C. H. S.
A JOURNEY TO MENTONE WITH
MR. SPURGEON.
BY JOSEPH W. HARRALD.
(Continued from page 281.)
DECEMBER 8, 1879. — Having walked to the Pont St. Louis this morning before breakfast, we saw a good illustration of the believer’s safety in Christ. A pair of doves flew out of the clefts of the rock, but returned almost immediately, having apparently seen the falcons that were high up in the air ready to swoop down upon the pretty creatures whose only protection against their cruel and powerful foes was to hide in the rifts of the rugged rock. So, timid saint, when the bird of prey seeks to destroy thee, fly to the cleft side of the Rock of Ages, for there and there alone shalt thou find perfect security and rest.
Dec. 14. — To-day being the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, there was a grand procession through the old part of the town at the close of the afternoon “service” in the church dedicated to this ridiculous dogma. In addition to the usual array of priests, acolytes, images, candles, etc., there were nine-and-thirty females, varying in age from three years to seventy, all dressed in semi-bridal costume, and carrying long candles. As they passed slowly through the narrow streets they chanted, or, to speak more correctly, the men howled and the women wailed a mournful dirge, which we were quite unable to associate with that
“Religion that can give
Sweetest pleasures while we live.”
A more miserable performance throughout we have seldom witnessed. Whatever solemnity there might have been about the poor affair was effectually dispelled by the conduct of the boys who carried the large lanterns and candles, which for the greater part of the time were like the candle of the wicked, “put out,” or like the lamps of the foolish virgins, “going out.” Before the procession started from the church, clouds of incense were presented to the principal image of the Virgin just in the same way that we burnt pastilles in our bedrooms at night in order to send the mosquitoes to sleep. We were not informed whether this ceremony was observed for the same reason; if so, what a poor protector must Mary be to those who trust to her if she cannot even defend herself from the bite of a little gnat!
Dec. 16. — This morning we copied the following inscription from the first villa erected at Mentone in 1855 for the entertainment of strangers: — “LE SOLEIL, LE CLIMAT DOUX ET SALUBRE, ET L’EAU DE LA MER, REUNIS CONSTITUENT LES PRINCIPAUX REMEDES CREES PAR LE BON DIEU; LOUANGES A LA GLOIRE DU BIENFAITEUR SUPREME QUI A DAIGNE DE NOUS EN FAVORISER,” which being interpreted is: — “The sun, the soft and salubrious climate, and the water of the sea combined, constitute the chief remedies created by the good God: thanks to the glory of the supreme Benefactor who has deigned thus to favor us.” We heartily join in this ascription of praise, for Mentone is a hospital for the sick, and a place of rest for the weary.
Dec. 18. — At the cemetery this afternoon we saw many curious and even amusing decorations of the graves of the Mentonese and their visitors, but one design especially interested us. It was the representation of two hands clasped beneath the image of the risen Savior. What a beautiful thought — husband and wife, parent and child, or brother and sister, reunited at the feet of their ascended Lord! This may have been only a delusion on the part of those who put it up, but it is the sure and certain hope of the children of God. They will meet again to be no more parted for ever, and their reunion will be perfect bliss because it is consummated at the glorified feet of him to whom they owe their all.
Dec. 22. — A little before seven o’clock this morning we had a very clear view of the Island of Corsica, and a few minutes afterwards realized, as we had never done before, the beauty of Malachi’s prophecy, “Unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise, with healing in his wings.” As the bright, warm, wide wings of the natural sun were outspread our beloved patient felt their healing influence, and thousands of others blessed the Lord for another morning’s light and heat. In like manner Jesus comes to heal all that fear his name. We were somewhat surprised to find that, as the sun gradually emerged from the bosom of the waves, Corsica, which had been so distinct a little while before, completely faded out of sight. Yet just thus is it when the Sun of righteousness arises upon one who fears his name; all other objects become dim, and pass away, and he sees “no man save Jesus only.” We could not help thinking of the contrast between the land of Beulah, where we were, and the frost and fogenveloped country we had left a few weeks before. The air was so clear that we could see this island, although it was a hundred miles distant, and the mountains on it, which were twenty miles further from us: indeed, a lady in the hotel asserted that she could see the chimney-pots on the houses, and the smoke issuing from them. This was more than we could credit. Mr. Spurgeon said that she might just as well have told us that she had seen a woman going across the back yard to get a jug of water, or that she had smelt the bacon that was being fried for breakfast in one of the kitchens. Still, the objects within range of our vision made us feel as if we were with Bunyan’s pilgrims on the Delectable Mountains; but by faith we saw much that our mortal eyes could not perceive. Across the sea of time we caught a glimpse of the land that is very far off, and the everlasting mountains of the heavenly country; but presently, like the island at which we had been looking, even these objects disappeared from view as the Sun of righteousness arose upon us in all his glory, and then we had “The Best of All Sights” as we experienced in our own souls the truth of the text of the short sermon written by Mr. Spurgeon at Mentone, and published this week, “But we see Jesus” (No. 1,509 in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit).
Dec. 23. — To our great joy Mr. Spurgeon was well enough to go to-day to Mr. Thomas Hanbury’s wonderful garden at Mortola, where we afterwards spent many happy hours of our sojourn abroad. At various times we picked up the following illustrations, and notes of interest. Mr. Hanbury showed us a kind of gourd, the seeds of which are furnished with a sort of parachute, which enables them when released from their shell to travel some distance. By this means the plant may be propagated over a wide area: and just thus does the gospel win its way in the world; the living seed is like a bird or winged insect, all we have to do is to set it flying, trusting to the Spirit, that bloweth where it listeth, to carry it to the spot where the Lord will cause it to germinate, and bring forth fruit. Every Christian should not only sing —
“Fly abroad, thou mighty gospel,”
but by personally scattering the good seed of the kingdom should help it to extend its blessings far and near.
On another occasion the esteemed owner of the garden pointed out to us a plant, the leaves of which are eaten by the Arabs to keep them awake. Some Mahommedans were of opinion that the plant belonged to the opiate family, and accordingly “a committee sat upon it.” Their decision was that “the faithful” might still continue to chew it, especially as it had the futher property of making those who ate it good-tempered as well as lively. We were all sorry to learn that there was not much likelihood of this peculiar shrub becoming acclimatized in England, as otherwise every church and chapel-yard might be filled with specimens of it, so that the congregations might pluck some leaves to keep them awake while listening to their ministers, and to make them good-tempered when going to their homes There is, however, in every land where Jesus is known, “a Plant of renown,” whose virtues far exceed those of any other plant which God has created. — We also saw several magnificent flowering aloes, which, having produced their one splendid blossom, were dying away. It seems but a small return for a life’s work to have but one flower, and then to die; yet how many lives are there that come to an end without so much as one bloom or bud of grace appearing upon them! In another sense this aloe is a grand illustration of the man who has said in the strength of the Lord, “this one thing I do,” who has given all his powers to the accomplishment of that one object, and who has succeeded in attaining it, well content to pass away with the conviction that, whatever other lives have been, his certainly has not been a failure. One thing done, and that done well, is better than a thousand begun and left unfinished.
As we entered the garden, and again as we left it, we drank some of the fresh cold water that flows out of the very heart of an olive, reminding us of him who is the true Olive, and who when on earth stood and cried, “If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.” Each Christian, too, should have a well of water springing up within him, and rivers of living water flowing out from him, and so should be like this olive-fountain standing by the wayside, and inviting the inhabitants of the place, and all passers-by, to partake of the cooling stream. — On our way home we passed the cold part of the road, which is almost always in the shade as far as a rough cross, erected on a little mound, and thus felt the force of Mr. Spurgeon’s re-mark, “It is all cold till you come to the cross.” There is no warmth of light and life and love for a guilty sinner until he comes to the cross, and trusts in him who there died, “the Just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God.”
Dec. 24. — Christmas Eve at Mentone was made as much as possible like Christmas Eve at home, by a happy gathering around a huge Christmas tree, to the furnishing of which every guest had contributed more or less, and by addresses from the three ministers in the hotel, — not the least interesting of which was the one delivered by the Editor of The Sword and the Trowel, who on this evening, to the great delight of the whole company, appeared at the table d’hote for the first time after his enforced absence of several weeks.
Dec. 25. — The weather being so bright and hot, we went for an excursion up the Gorbio Valley, at the entrance of which we saw some of the ingeniously-constructed houses of the trap-door spider. Since our return we have had the pleasure of reading a most charming book, (Harvesting Ants and Trap-door Spiders. Notes and observations on their habits and dwellings. By J. Traherne Moggridge.) in which the habits of these clever little insects and the equally wise harvesting ants are fully described It appears that there are in various parts of the world no less than 215 species of the trap-door spider, of which 36 belong to the Mediterranean region These Territelarioe, or under-ground weavers, as their name signifies, are so called because of the beautiful nests, sometimes twelve or fifteen inches long, which they make in the earth. The construction of these silken homes is very wonderful, especially so in the case of the double-branched nest in which the spider has one of its trap-doors by which it can escape along the free passage when one of the corridors of its house is invaded by an enemy. The entrance to the nest is very carefully concealed by a door which on the outside is made to resemble as closely as possible the surrounding soil, and inside is lined with several folds of fine silk. During the daytime this door is usually kept closed, but at night the spider holds it a little way open, and watches for any stray ants, beetles, flies, or other insects that may come near. When one of them approaches close enough, Madame Cteniza or Nemesia, for the lord and master of the establishment is rarely to be seen, darts out her two forelegs, drags the unwilling captive into her pretty parlor, the door swings back on its hinges and closes up the nest, and the lady of the house and her family make as good a supper as they can of the prey that has been trapped. If it be possible, Mr. Moggridge’s description of the harvesting ants is more marvelous than what he writes concerning the trap-door spiders. He furnishes undoubted proof of the truth of Solomon’s words, “Go to the ant, thou sluggard: consider her ways and be wise; which, having no guide, overseer, or ruler, provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest.” “The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the summer.” They build granaries several inches underground, collect and store away their winter’s food in large quantities, and even take precautions to prevent the seeds they have gathered from germinating and so becoming unfit for them to eat.
Horses and carriages cannot go all the way up the glorious Val de Gorbe, as the little piece of highway that should unite the road from Mentone with that from Gorbio is left unfinished, although the trouble and expense of completing it would be slight compared with the amount which has been already laid out upon the part that is made. How exactly this is like a great deal of Christian work, which is all but completed, and yet the small portion that is unfinished spoils all the rest! Whether it was left incomplete through want of money, or from a lack of union on the part of the two parishes that here join, or from any other cause, there stands the unfinished road as a monument to the folly or obstinacy of some person or town unknown. The Christian worker who begins to build without counting the cost, or who leaves his work unfinished through a fit of jealousy or laziness, or a want of resolution or perseverance, must not be surprised if he becomes the object of the ridicule of those who suffer through his neglect. Some attempt too much, and achieve nothing; forgetting that a small thing completed is of more service than a large one left only half done. It is better to leave a finished cottage as a memorial of the builder’s industry and skill than an uncompleted castle at which every man will shake his head in scorn, and every boy will cast a stone in derision. Jesus said, “It is finished,” before he bowed his head and died, and each of his true disciples will seek to be able to say with him when rendering up his account to the Father, “I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.”
One of our favorite songs at Mentone was the lively chorus so well known at the Tabernacle: —
“Let us walk in the light,
Walk in the light;
Let us walk in the light,
In the light of God.”
To-day we had a singular illustration of the appropriateness of this admonition. Mr. Spurgeon had told the coachman to return for us at three o’clock, forgetting that it was the depth of winter here, and that the days were almost as short as in foggy, frosty England; so about half-past one we made tracks home-wards, our one anxiety being to “walk in the light” till the carriage came to pick us up, well knowing that five minutes in the shade would probably mean five weeks more illness for the beloved pastor who had, we hoped, become convalescent. As the sun gradually descended behind the mountains we were compelled to descend the valley with him so as to keep in his warmth, for in the shade there was a hard frost. Through the good hand of our God upon us our object was attained, and the threatened danger averted; but our fears had taught us that spiritually our safety lies in walking in the light of God until the chariot comes to bear us to our home in the city that hath no need of the sun to shine in it, for the glory of God doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. Those who would comfort themselves with the sweet words of the apostle John, “The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin,” must remember that there is a condition attached to the assurance, which is this — “If we walk in the light, as he is in the light.”
Dec. 31. — One of the ladies of our party this morning was regretting that she had so few opportunities of speaking French, as almost every one in the hotel talked English. She made us think of the children of God who, having acquired the language of Zion, find but few of their friends or acquaintances who can converse with them in it. — A friend who had come over from Cannes to spend a day or two with us, told us of rather a good remark which he overheard in the railway carriage as he came along. Some Americans were going to Monte Carlo, and as they were passing through one of the tunnels near that famous gambling place, one of them complained that there was no light in the carriage, when a lady who was with them observed that she supposed the railway, company knew that they loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. Many a true word is spoken in jest. — We closed the year with a short praise and prayer-meeting, a little before midnight, in which about twenty friends of various denominations heartily united.
Jan. 1, 1880. — This afternoon some of us went to the opening of the new schools, which Mr. Hanbury has erected for the children of the three parishes of Mortola, Grimaldi, and Ciotti. They are situated on the Corniche Road, just opposite the cross before mentioned. The position of the schools, and the surroundings of the inaugural ceremony were very suggestive, but we have only space just to mention the thoughts that passed through our mind, leaving our readers to work them out for themselves. We have no respect for emblems of themselves, but for once we will forget the superstition which has encrusted that of the cross, and use it in all simplicity. We felt that, as the school was to be for the children of the three villages, so in a higher sense all who would be truly educated must meet at the cross and learn there. We rejoiced that the people began the year by gathering at the cross, and we were especially charmed by the sight of a young mother nursing her babe beneath its shade. The proceedings were all conducted in Italian, but we could understand enough of what was said to make us wish “God-speed” to this most praiseworthy effort to supply the rising generation of this part of Italy with sound, unsectarian education, free from the interference of the priests.
Jan. 4. — To-day we drove again to Bordighera, the city of palms, the place which is a good illustration of what a Christian should be, for it is “always in the light,” or at least it basks in the sunshine long after all the neighboring towns are enveloped in shade. On our way we stopped at Ventimiglia, and went in to see the old temple of Juno, which is now a Roman Catholic church. We also visited the Domo, but we were most of all interested in inspecting the ancient baptistery in the rear of the cathedral. This massive structure is similar to many others in Italy, which were built and used until men “changed the ordinance.” The whole appearance of the place proves that those who erected it contemplated nothing but the immersion of adults although a font with an extinguisherlike covering on the top of it has since been placed in the center, and even this has been discarded, for on the morning that we were there we saw a basin out of which the precious drops had been recently taken for the observance of man’s perversion of God’s ordinance. The baptistery at Ventimiglia is doubly interesting to the pastor of the Tabernacle Church, not only because of its testimony to the truth of his practice as a Baptist, but also from its having been the scene of a triumphant vindication of his principles. At a social gathering at Mentone, at which Mr. Spurgeon was present, a certain facetious gentleman gently ridiculed believers baptism. It was a matter of surprise to many that he did not at once get the answer that he might have been sure he would receive sooner or later. The party broke up, however, without anything having been said upon the question, but it was arranged that the next day all of them should visit Ventimiglia. The other “lions” of the place having been examined, Mr. Spurgeon led the way to the baptistery in the crypt, and when all the company had gathered round the old man who was explaining the objects, Mr. Spurgeon said to his anti-immersionist friend, “Mr.____, you understand Italian better than any of us, will you kindly interpret for us what the guide is saying?” Thus fairly trapped, the assailant of the previous evening began, “This is an ancient baptistery. He says that in the early Christian church baptism was always administered by immersion, etc., etc.” The crypt at once rang with laughter, in which the interpreter joined as heartily as any one, admitting that he had been as neatly “sold” as a man well could be. He is not the only one who has been taught that the combatant who crosses swords with Mr. Greatheart may not find the conflict to his permanent advantage.
(To be concluded in our next.)
NOTES
ON Friday evening, May 14, the eleventh annual meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE COUNTRY MISSION was held in the Lecture- hall under the presidency of C. H. Spurgeon. The Orphanage choir sang at intervals selections from Mr. Charlesworth’s Service of Song,” Valour and Victory.” Friends would find these “services” very useful for their choirs: they are cheap and excellent. The report referred to the fact that, through the agency of the mission, churches have been formed at Putney, Carshalten, Waltham-stow, and St. Mary Cray; and then described the present position of the work at Tooting, Southgate, Teddington, Bell Green, North Cheam, Pope Street, King’s Langley, Tiptree, Great Warley, Brent-wood, Stratford, and Isleworth. The treasurer, Mr. R. Hayward, read the balance-sheet for the year, which showed receipts £183 11s. 9 1/2d., and expenditure £167 3s. 0 1/2d. Special attention was called to the fact that the pastor had furnished £96 of the income of the mission, and requests were made that he should be somewhat relieved of this burden. If all churches would maintain a vigorous lay-agency, much might be done for districts destitute of the gospel, and the present distress would be greatly relieved.
The same work as that which is done by the Country Mission for the suburbs is done for London itself by our TABERNACLE EVANGELISTS’ ASSOCIATION, which held its meeting on Monday, May 24, in connection with the prayer-meeting. Mr. Elvin, the secretary, stated that in the five months since the beginning of the year 1,004 services had been conducted by members of the Association. The pastor cordially commended the work as one of the cheapest and most direct forms of carrying the gospel to the people. Messrs. Cox and Hunt gave interesting reports of their evangelistic labors. We have to find a large proportion of the money which is needed for the carrying on of this admirable effort, and we shall be very glad if more friends will share with us the privilege of supporting its operations. We do not mention in this magazine the donations given to this work because our space is limited, but the mission is a labor of love to the workers themselves, and therefore there should never be any difficulty about the expenses of halls, bills, etc. Evangelists will visit any London churches which will write Mr. Elvin.
On Tuesday evening, June 1, we presided at a happy gathering in RYELANE BAPTIST CHAPEL, PECKHAM. This was held for the double purpose of celebrating the anniversary of the pastor’s settlement, and presenting to Mr. Congreve, the superintendent of the Sunday-school, a bust of himself, executed by one of the members of the congregation. We were right glad thus to show our hearty love to a neighboring church, and our esteem for Mr. Congreve, towards whom we feel much gratitude because he has always cheerfully helped our sick poor, and we have seen among our members, our students, and our own servants the result of his medicine in relieving cases of sickness which had every appearance of consumption.
On Friday evening, June 4, the ROYAL HAND-BELL RINGERS, Polandsteer, London, gave an entertainment to the Tabernacle Sunday-school, as the commencement of a series of similar gatherings of Sunday-scholars. The pastor presided, and at the close of the entertainment, expressed his hearty approval of the manner in which Mr. Duncan S. Miller and his merry men had combined useful moral lessons with the sweetest of music and the happiest of talk. No greater treat could be given to a Sabbath-school. It is important that our children should be attached to the school, first by its holy Scriptural teaching, and next by its becoming to them a place of cheerful enjoyment. Let pastors and teachers show the children that there are pleasures unalloyed by the roughness and sin which the people of the world too often mix with their mirth. Too often excursions have thrown the young into doubtful company, and we would beg all leaders of our schools to see that what is done in this direction really answers its end, and is not perverted to evil results.
On Monday evening, June 7, the annual meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE MISSIONARY WORKING SOCIETY was held in the lecture-hall. The pastor presided, and spoke in praise of the object of the society, which is to supply clothes to the families of poor pastors, missionaries, and colporteurs. Addresses were delivered by Pastor H. R. Brown (whose church has formed the first auxiliary of this society), and Messrs. W. Olney, J. W. Harrald, and Stubbs. We hope next month to give extracts from the annual report.
On Wednesday evening, June 9, the annual meeting of the SPURGEON’S SERMONS TRACT SOCIETY was held in the Lecture-hall. The chair was taken by C. F. Allison, Esq., our last elected deacon; addresses were delivered by Messrs. Murrell, Cart, Charlesworth, Goldston, Perkins, and Dunn; Mr. Cornell’s report stated that upwards of 17,000 of the Pastor’s sermons had been circulated by the Society during the past year, many of them going to places where no gospel preacher is laboring. By supplying these sermons to those who lend them out from door to door their usefulness is greatly promoted. This is a capital idea, and it is vigorously carried out. Many of our readers may be glad to know that such a society exists; some may help, and on the other band some may be helped by it. Write to Mr. Cornell at the Tabernacle.
METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE FLOWER MISSION. — Miss Higgs asks us to mention that flowers and texts are much needed for the Flower Mission. She says: — “We have several applications from City Missionaries who find that the flowers give them an easy introduction into houses where otherwise they would not be received, and we are sorry not to be able to let them have as many as they want.” Hampers should be sent off, carriage paid, addressed to
The Secretary of the Flower Mission,
Metropolitan Tabernacle,
Newington,
in time to arrive on Wednesday morning. Surely those who have an abundance in their gardens will help our poor Londoners to see a flower, and will aid our beloved sisters by this means to spread the sweetness and perfume of the Rose of Sharon. All cur societies delight us. Each one seems to be the best: but assuredly the Flower-mission is the pink of them all, or as the lily among all the beauties of the Tabernacle garden.
COLLEGE. — During the past month Mr. G. Goodchild has accepted the pastorate of the church at Pole-street, Preston. Mr. A. Hewlett has removed from Shepton Mallet to Wick, N.B.; Mr. J. Markham from St. Alban’s to Shefford, Beds.; and Mr. W. A. Davis from Melton Mowbray to Rushden. With all that is being done for the Orphanage we get a little jealous lest our first-born child, the College, should be forgotten. To train ministers must ever remain the noblest work to which we have been called. There is none like it.
On Friday afternoons, June 4th, the students paid a fraternal visit to their brethren at the East London Institute, Harley House, Bow. The President of the Pastors’ College addressed the united assembly, and wished Mr. and Mrs. Guinness abundant blessing upon their noble work. It was a feast of true brotherly love.
The midsummer vacation will extend from June 24 to August 9. We have already filled up all vacancies that are likely to occur for some time, and therefore other applicants must wait awhile.
Our son Thomas sends us good news of his health.
Mr. H. Marsden, late of Mansfield, reports his happy settlement at Kew, “a very healthy place just outside Melbourne “; and sends good tidings of our brethren Clarke and Garrett. Mr. H. Wood informs us that his health is much improved, and that the Lord is blessing him at Saddleworth.
Our former student, Mr. Carey B. Berry, has been obliged to come home from Jamaica for a short time, on account of the state of his health. He is greatly benefited by the voyage, and is now collecting funds for necessary repairs and alterations to his chapel. He deserves to be kindly received and aided.
Mr. Lyall sends us an account of some of the difficulties that have to be encountered in the Cameroons, West Africa. Two of his native assistants were returning from Victoria, and when near home they encountered a tornado. The lightning struck the boat, and killed four of the eight men on board, including the two teachers, who were both excellent young men. Some time later, Mr. Lyall himself had a somewhat similar experience, though providentially on that occasion no lives were lost. He was going to visit a place eighty miles distant, when his boat was caught in a tornado. For nearly three hours they could do nothing but drive before the storm, and when it was over they were glad to rest and dry their clothes and provisions. During the night “the tail end of several tornadoes” swept over them, and in the morning they only escaped being destroyed by another by running out to sea, a proceeding which was accompanied with very great risk. We are not surprised to hear that “this settled the Batanga journey.” Mr. Lyall says that he has been laid low with fever and dysentery twelve times, and that his wife has suffered so much from the same causes that she is obliged to return to England.
Mr. and Mrs. Richardson are holding on at Bakundu, but they suffer greatly from fever.
Mr. Maplesden reports that he is gradually getting acclimatized in Madras, after a very painful experience of tropical rheumatism, fever, dysentery, boils, and a slight sunstroke. Mr. and Mrs. Blackie have suffered in a similar manner, though to a smaller extent, in Bombay. We rejoice, however, to learn that, notwithstanding these drawbacks, good progress is being made in both these important Indian stations.
Mr. Mann writes us a full account of his two shipwrecks, and his two nights and two days upon the deep, and we are glad to learn that he has been able to telegraph to his parents from Cape Town, saying that he has arrived “Well.” Mr. Hamilton has already written to say that his friends will see that their new pastor shall be supplied with all he needs as far as it is in their power.
Mr. Batts has been presented with a plot of ground, and £100, towards the erection of a Baptist chapel at Walmer, Port Elizabeth. May South Africa become full of true gospel ministers!
EVANGELISTS. — Messrs. Smith and Fullerton are still hard at work in Birmingham. One of our friends who has been with them says that the fifty days’ mission has brought a pentecostal blessing, and that the town is stirred to its very center.
Pastor G. T. Bailey writes of the services at Smethwick as follows: —” Large audiences have gathered each evening, and a steady work of conversion has been going on, for which we magnify the Lord. Not the least pleasing result of the work is the beneficial effect it has produced on the minds of Christians. Many wanderers have been brought back, and some who were suffering from spiritual declension have been restored. When we see results like these it is a grand testimony to the power of the simple gospel as proclaimed by our brethren.
At Smallheath, Heneage Street, and Circles Street chapels the evangelists had crowded congregations, and many conversions; but the crowning blessing was reserved for the Town Hall and Curzon Hall meetings. Our brethren have had unusual difficulties to surmount in Birmingham, but the latest report from them is, “We have now reached high tide, but it is all of grace.” Just as we are making up the “notes,” Pastor W. G. Hailstone sends us a long and interesting account of the campaign at Birmingham. He mentions with special pleasure a service held in his chapel, at which 1000 working-men who do not usually attend any place of worship were present. He says that the secret of the blessing that has rested upon the work is that every day at noon the lecture-hall of the Young Men’s Christian Association has been filled with believers, praying for the outpouring of the Holy Ghost. His only fear in connection with the evangelists’ visit to “the metropolis of the Midlands” is that the thank-offering to be sent to our funds will not be at all proportionate to the good which has been received, in consequence of the great expense necessarily incurred in laying siege to such a large city.
Mr. Burnham is working away with his usual diligence and earnestness. He has had great blessing at Winslow, Naunton, Charlton Kings, and Long Melford, but we cannot spare space this month to mention the details of the services.
ORPHANAGE. — The Girls’ Orphanage has made grand progress since last month’s magazine was issued. The general contributions up to the date of closing the lists, i.e. June 14th, amounted to £976 4s. 1d., which in addition to the other sums previously acknowledged — H. E. S. £500, and the Deacons £310, made a total received of £1,786 4s. 1d. Our list of promises now stands as follows: — C. H. Spurgeon, £500; Messrs. Passmore and Alabaster, £500; H. E. S., a second £500; Samuel Barrow, Esq., £600; the Deacons, £690; W. R. Rickett, Esq., £1,000: so that up to the time of writing we see our way to more than £5,500 of the £11,100, which is the lowest contract for the first block of buildings. When the tenders were opened we found that our estimate of £8,000 was short of the mark, and therefore we arranged to leave for six months the erection of the houses at each end, so that we might engage to spend only £8,000. As funds are coming in, and it will be advantageous to build the whole at once, the entire block will be proceeded with. God has helped us, and he will. The work can only be done by the hearty help of all our brethren, but this we feel sure the Lord will move them to render. Therefore the word is — “FORWARD.”
After writing this we are able to add another word. By God’s wonderful help we shall accomplish, we see clearly that we shall complete, this work with a leap if friends continue to do as they are now doing. Our heart is exceeding glad.
Stockwell Orphanage Band of Hope. — On March 31, and April 7, two lectures were given by Professor G. R. Tweedie, on “The nature and properties of Alcohol,” and “Are Alcoholic Drinks Food?” Mr. Tweedie’s genial delivery, and his chemical experiments, rendered the lectures both amusing and instructive. The boys much enjoyed them.
COLPORTAGE. — The general secretary, Mr. W. Corden Jones, writes as follows:—
Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — I am glad to be able to report that in two new districts £40 a year have been guaranteed for colporteurs. One is in the locality of Horley, in Surrey, and the other at Norwich, while we expect to start another at Islington in connection with our friend, Mr. F. A. Jones. As this addition to our staff will mean an increase of expenditure from the general fund, we hope that our friends will support our action in this extension by sending in at once liberal contributions. A gentleman who has had a colporteur for about six months, writes me to say: “I have seen him once a month and am quite satisfied, not only from his statements, but from other sources of information, that he is well qualified for his duties, and is discharging them most faithfully and successfully. He is most acceptable to the people. Altogether, I am most thankful to feel we have such a man in a neighborhood where there is most ample scope for his labors. I shall hope when I can see my way to apply to you for another man like him.” Thus the work is appreciated by those who see its efficiency and success, but it can only be maintained by regular and liberal aid to our general fund.
The following description by the colporteur himself shows how he can push his work in the most unlikely places. “Before commencing my labors in this district, I was determined to visit all public-houses as well as private ones. The first public-house I came to I entered, and sold some books, and spoke to the inmates upon the salvation of their souls, I have found it rather a hard task to gain the affection of some of the landlords, but I believe that in almost every case I succeeded in doing so before I left, and in most cases I sold them some books and received an invitation to call again.
“In a village I entered a public-house. It was crowded with men, I must say of the ‘baser sort,’ many of whom seemed to have fallen as low as possible. I could scarcely see across the room for tobacco smoke, but made my way into the midst of them, and called order in a kindly manner, and then apologized for intruding. The next thing I did was to try and make them understand that I was a friend, which I succeeded in doing. The poor men seemed astonished as I told them of the love of Jesus, and what he had done for them, and what he would do if they would only accept his offers of mercy. One man said, ‘Sir, we are not used to have men of your stamp coming into a place like this, and speaking of the love of Jesus.’ I then tried to show them that they were the very men Jesus died to save — he came to save the lost, and surely I must not be above bringing my Master’s message. I then sold them a great many Bibles and Testaments, and other good books, and went round and shook hands with them all, giving each a tract. I then proceeded to another public-house, and had much the same experience; sold out in pack.”
In addition to such work as this, the colporteurs visit the sick and dying, canvass every accessible house to push the sale of books, and often give simple gospel addresses. We cannot all go as these men do, and visit the neglected and outlying districts, but we may help to support them in their work by our prayers and donations. The Secretary, Mr. W. Corden Jones, will attend to all communications directed to him at Pastors’ College, Temple Street, S.E.
PERSONAL NOTES. — A request to preach in Scotland was obliged to be declined, although it was pressed with this plea: — “We have a kind of right to this, for the fact is that you have to consider us part of your wide parish. Your sermons are regularly read among us. The various branches of your work are as well known here as in the immediate neighborhood of the Tabernacle. You and your work are remembered at the mercy seat by many who love the gospel, and have never had the pleasure of hearing you. Your name is dear among the households of this district. You are in a great measure our minister, and I do think that once in a lifetime a people have a right to ask that they see the face of their minister.”
Two young men in Wales write to tell us that they were led to commence a Sunday-school through reading our sermons. They began in two workmen’s houses, where they had on the first Sunday three scholars in one house, and two in the other. Soon they had to engage three more houses, and now they have erected and filled a building in which 250 can be taught; and they distribute weekly from eighty to ninety copies of The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle. — April 12th, twelve; 29th, twenty; May 13th, fourteen; 27th, twenty-two; June 4th, twenty.
MR. FROTHINGTON’S SERMON
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
“WELL,” said Brown, “there’s no finding fault with Mr. Frothington’s sermon this morning, for I am sure it had nothing in it which could offend anybody.” “True,” answered Smith, “there was nothing in the sermon to offend because there was nothing at all in it. It was the essence of vacuum, delivered with great elegance and dignity. Look at those holes which the swallows have made in the sandbank; take the sandbank away and you have the sermon which we have heard. When we were boys we used to talk of dining upon roast nothing and no turnips, and this morning’s sermon brought the meal vividly to mind: there was not a single thought in the whole discourse, from beginning to end. I do not believe that the greatest master of metaphysics could discern the thinnest possible thread of connection between the text and the sermon. Having given himself so wide a range the preacher ought to have imported some commodity from the east, west, north, or south; but he had neither drug nor diamond, cheese nor coffee, in the whole shop. He talked, and talked, and talked, and reminded me of the child’s windmill in the garden which goes round and round, but never grinds anything.”
Smith’s description of Frothington’s sermon may apply to a great many more besides that by which his Sunday was wasted. Benches grow very hard, and even the cushions have rocky lumps in them as we sit under certain ministries. It does not occur to dreary preachers that it is necessary that there should be real instruction in their prelections. If they ever felt that need they would dig, or beg, or borrow, or steal, or invent something or other, and would never have the face to come before an audience with an altogether empty mind. To us it seems to be a primary rule of homiletics that, however a sermon may be arranged, composed, and delivered, there ought to be something in it. It is an impertinence to call together a hundred or so of reasonable people, and invite them to sit still and listen, to the merest commonplaces: commonplaces so bare that one is ready to wish to be deaf that we might never hear them again. As the husband, when he saw the old dish brought up time out of mind, exclaimed, “Cold mutton again,” so might many patient hearers cry out against stale meat; only the dish is not so good as cold mutton. Some precious doctrine, some stimulating exhortation, some cheering experience, ought to be brought forward on every occasion. We are invited to a gospel feast, and there ought to be something to eat. No one has a right to invite his friends to dinner, and set them down to a bare board. However white the cloth, and neat the napkins, and clean the china, and bright the knives, empty dishes disappoint you. A sermon with nothing in it is worse than useless, and he who has delivered one such should feel that he has sinned too much already, and should offend no more. Our fear is that empty platitudes weary men of hearing the gospel, drive intelligent persons into heresy, and make sensible hearers either quite silly or half mad. Dear Mr. Frothington, in the name of all that is good and holy, do say something when you preach, or give up the business. Set up as a tailor, and make coats without cloth; but sermons without instruction in them should never be forced upon a Christian congregation.
JOHN PLOUGHMAN’S PICTURES
WE have now in the press a second book by John Ploughman, which we think will amuse and interest our friends. At about the same time we shall issue a new edition of the first book, which will then make 300,000. It may be thought that such books are of small utility, but we have received continual evidence to the contrary. Persons who read the quaint proverbs of John Ploughman are induced to read Spurgeon’s sermons, and by this means are led to Christ, while others are helped on in the paths of temperance and thrift. “John Ploughman’s Pictures” is our new shilling book. We give a short specimen chapter:
HE HAS A HOLE UNDER HIS NOSE AND HIS MONEY RUNS INTO IT.
This is the man who is always dry, because he takes so much heavy wet. He is a loose fellow who is fond of getting tight. He is no sooner up than his nose is in the cup, and his money begins to run down the hole which is just under his nose. He is not a blacksmith, but he has a spark in his throat, and all the publican’s barrels can’t put it out. If a pot of beer is a yard of land, he must have swallowed more acres than a ploughman could get over for many a day, and still he goes on swallowing until he takes to wallowing. All goes down Gutter Lane. Like the snipe, he lives by suction. If you ask him how he is, he says he would be quite right if he could moisten his month. His purse is a bottle, his bank is the publican’s till, and his casket is a cask: pewter is his precious metal, and his pearl (Purl.) is a mixture of gin and beer. The dew of his youth comes from Ben Nevis, and the comfort of his soul is cordial gin. He is a walking barrel, a living drainpipe, a moving swill-tub. They say, ‘loth to drink and loth to leave off,’ but he never needs persuading to begin, and as to ending — that is out of the question while he can borrow two-pence. This is the gentleman who sings —
He that buys land buys many stones,
He that buys meat buys many bones,
He that buys eggs buys many shells,
He that buys good ale buys nothing else.
He will never be hanged for leaving his drink behind him. He drinks in season and out of season: in summer because he is hot, and in winter because he is cold. A drop of beer never comes too soon, and he would get up in the middle of the night for more, only he goes to bed too tipsy. He has heard that if you get wet-footed a glass of whisky in your boots will keep you from catching cold, and he argues that the best way to get one glass of the spirit into each boot is to put two doses where it will run into your legs. He is never long without an excuse for another pot, or if perchance he does not make one, another lushington helps him.
Some drink when friends step in,
And some when they step, out;
Some drink because they re thin,
And some because they’re stout.
Some drink because ‘tis wet,
And some because ‘tis dry;
Some drink another glass
To wet the other eye.
Water is this gentleman’s abhorrence, whether used inside or out, but most of all he dreads it taken inwardly, except with spirits, and then the less the better. He says that the pump would kill him, but he never gives it a chance. He laps his liquor, and licks his chaps, but he will never die through the badness of the water from the well. It is a pity that he does not run the risk. Drinking cold water neither makes a man sick, nor in debt, nor his wife a widow, but this mighty fine ale of his will do all this for him, make him worse than a beast while he lives, and wash him away to his grave before his time. The old Scotchman said, ‘Death and drink-draining are near neighbors,’ and he spoke the truth. They say that drunkenness makes some men fools, some beasts, and some devils; but according to my mind it makes all men fools whatever else it does. Yet when a man is as drunk as a rat he sets up to be a judge, and mocks at sober people. Certain neighbors of mine laugh at me for being a teetotaller, and I might well laugh at them for being drunk, only I feel more inclined to cry that they should be such fools. O that we could get them sober, and then perhaps we might make men of them. You cannot do much with these fellows, unless you can enlist them in the Coldstream guards. As long as drink drowns conscience and reason, you might as well talk to the hogs. The rascals will promise fair and take the pledge, and then take their coats to pledge to get more beer. We smile at a tipsy man, for he is a ridiculous creature, but when we see how he is ruined body and soul, it is no joking matter. How solemn is the truth that “No drunkard shall inherit eternal life.”
There’s nothing too bad for a man to say or do when he is half-seas over. It is a pity that any decent body should go near such a common sewer. If he does not fall into the worst of crimes it certainly is not his fault, for he has made himself ready for anything the devil likes to put into his mind. He does least hurt when he begins to be topheavy, and to reel about: then he becomes a blind man with good eyes in his head, and a cripple with legs on. He sees two moons, and two doors to the public-house, and tries to find his way through both the doors at once. Over he goes, and there he must lie unless somebody will wheel him home in a barrow or carry him to the police-station.
Solomon says the glutton and the drunkard shall come to poverty, and that the drinker does in no time. He gets more and more down at the heel, and as his nose gets redder and his body is more swollen he gets to be more of a shack and more of a shark. His trade is gone, and his credit has run out, but he still manages to get his beer. He treats an old friend to a pot, and then finds that he has left his purse at home, and of course the old friend must pay the shot. He borrows till no one will lend him a groat, unless it is to get off lending a shilling. Shame has long since left him, though all who know him are ashamed of him. His talk runs like the tap, and is full of stale dregs: he is very kind over his beer, and swears he loves you, and would like to drink your health, and love you again. Poor sot, much good will his blessing do to anyone who gets it; his poor wife and family have had too much of it already, and quake at the very sound of his voice.
Now, if we try to do anything to shut up a boozing-house, or shorten the hours for guzzling, we are called all sorts of bad names, and the wind-up of it alt is — “What! Rob a poor man of his beer?” The fact is that they rob the poor man by his beer. The ale-jug robs the cupboard and the table, starves the wife and strips the children; it is a great thief, housebreaker, and heartbreaker, and the best possible thing is to break it to pieces, or keep it on the shelf bottom upwards. In a newspaper which was lent me the other day I saw some verses by John Barleycorn, jun., and as they tickled my fancy I copied them out, and here they are.
And prevent him from beating his wife,
From being locked up in a jail,
With penal employment for life.
“What! rob a poor man of his beer,
And keep him from starving his child!
It makes one feel awfully queer,“What! rob a poor man of his beer,
And give him good victuals instead;
Your heart’s very hard, sir, I fear,
Or at least you are soft in the head.
“What! rob a poor man of his mug,
And give him a house of his own;
With kitchen and parlor so snug!
‘Tis enough to draw tears from a stone.
“What! rob a poor man of his glass,
And teach him to read and to write!
What! save him from being an ass!
‘Tis nothing but malice and spite.
“What! rob a poor man of his ale,
And I’ll thank you to draw it more mild.”
HOLY SERVICE ON BEHALF OF POOR MINISTERS.
THE Christian love of the church meeting in the Tabernacle manifests itself in many ways. Like the tree of life in the celestial city, it bears twelve manner of fruits, and yields its fruit every month. One of its least known but most useful developments is the society for providing garments for the families of poor ministers. This grew out of an association which made up boxes of clothing for foreign missions, and the society has not altogether forsaken its first love, for this year it has sent out two parcels to Delhi for the native girls of the mission in that city. The home need has however been so pressingly felt that raiment has been given with no stinted hand to the households of forty-eight ministers, and five colporteurs; this raiment consisting not only of flannel and linen garments, to which ladies’ needles contribute so much, but comprising hats, coats, boots, and apparel of all kinds, to meet the varied wants of the families assisted; to this should be added 666 yards of dress material for the ministers’ wives to make up in their own way. These gifts have exceeded in value the sum of £240, and how many pounds’ worth of pleasure and comfort they have bestowed our ready-reckoner does not enable us to estimate.
To many brethren it seems a very humiliating fact that any of our ministers should be in need of clothing, and we agree with them that in every instance in which the pastor’s poverty is caused by a want of liberality in the people, it is humiliating, not to say disgraceful. Such cases there are, and we grieve ever them. We know useful, earnest, and successful preachers, whose people might with ease double their stipends at once, but it never occurs to them to think upon the matter. The salary given is not equal to the wages of an artisan, and the poor pastor is pinched and cramped, and forced to great deprivations, in his endeavor to avoid the dishonor of debt. His table is poorly furnished, his library is bare, his coat is shabby, and his heart is heavy, and yet he is surrounded by an affectionate people, who never think upon the fact that he is half starved, for if they did think of it they would alter it at once. Farmers who grow nearly all that they consume in their own housekeeping are very apt to set a high value upon money, and judge the minister to be well off on £80 or £100 a year, because they unconsciously assume that he has no more to buy than they have, whereas every morsel that he eats has to be purchased out of the scanty quarter’s allowance. The evil is caused by want of thought, and not by want of heart: it is caused, however, and the sooner the want of thought comes to an end the better for all concerned. How we wish that in every congregation some one good man or godly woman would have a mission, and that mission the poor pastor’s decent maintenance. It would roll away a great reproach from many a church if the minister, whose spirit is crushed by poverty, could be cheered by a sufficiency, and so delivered from the gnawing care which eats up a man’s energy, and makes his ministry as lean as himself.
At the same time while we would not needlessly make any man a martyr, it is no dishonor to the church that when sacrifices are needed she has self denying men ready to make them. It is the glory of a poor denomination that its gifted sons are willing to accept her ministry and the hard fare which it involves. Where the scantiness of the population and the poverty of the church necessitate a choice between a poor minister or none, it is an honorable fact that gracious men are to be found who for the joy of serving Christ Jesus their Lord are ready to endure hardness. Were there no such willing sufferers the gospel might lack one of its most convincing proofs, but these men set before the most careless an argument of self-denying enthusiasm which the candid are unable to resist.
It is plainly the duty of Christian people to help those who for the Lord’s sake are bearing the burden and heat of the day. They have given the most conclusive evidence of their sincerity, and they ought not to be allowed to bear a single ounce more of pressure than the necessities of the case lay upon them. If any needy ones in all the world ought to be relieved, these are among the first claimants. Here there can seldom be imposition, for we know the men and their communications. Their want does not arise from vice or extravagance; their incomes are well known, and their expenses can be accurately gauged, and hence there is no danger that any will receive too much. Our brethren in the ministry ought not to be allowed to want any necessary, and assuredly they should not be left short of raiment, for this is likely to bring a public reproach upon them and upon their churches. If an appeal were made to any one of our readers for any minister whom they know, and a little shoeless child of his family were pointed out, we are sure that no Sword and Trowel friend would be able to refuse help; yet there are hundreds of godly preachers in such a plight, and it needs no great imagination to realize their daily tribulations. The wife, too, has to take the heaviest share of the load, and it is easy to picture the anxious mother who sees the youngsters’ garments dissolving in rags, feels her own weary heels very near the ground, and marks her husband’s Sunday coat descending from stage to stage of seediness. What is to be done for the poor lady? Help the good woman at once is the universal answer. But how is it to be done? Sympathy is all very well, but it is only worth as much as the metal which can be melted out of it.
Our excellent Mrs. Evans and a hearty band of working ladies have made this dire necessity the subject of their thoughts, and something practical has come of their meditations, for they have rigged out 236 children, and made 1,848 garments for them and their mothers. The ministers themselves have been enabled to keep up a decent appearance by being supplied with new coats and other apparel, and thus all the members of the family have rejoiced together, often wondering how the clothing should have been made to fit them so well, without their having been measured for it. No one who has spent all his lifetime in easy circumstances can readily conceive the joy which the receipt of a parcel of clothing will bring into a poor minister’s household; we cannot convey a better idea of it than by quoting from letters received during the past year of the Society’s operations. J.C. writes:—“Last evening on my return home from preaching I found to my joy that the parcel had arrived quite safe, and had you seen how I was met by my dear children, and welcomed home to share their joy, you would not have easily forgotten it. The youngest came running to me saying ‘the parcel is come, the parcel is come’: all were full of joy and glee, and, though it was crowing late, sleep had departed from them. No Christmas festivities could have filled a home with greater merriment and gladness than mine was filled with last night: the dear children clapped their hands again and again, and my dear wife and myself joined most heartily with them. And now, here comes a pause, for I know not how to write the remainder of this letter. I am at a loss: to say ‘thank you’ is easily done, but to use words to convey my feelings, and those of my dear wife, is quite impossible. We are filled with gratitude, and please accept our warmest and most sincere thanks for your valuable and seasonable present.” J.E.S. says: — “Your letter arrived this morning. The list was too much for us, and moistened eyes and a fall heart hindered my reading it aloud to my dear wife; but when the parcel came even our babe crowed with delight, at seeing its parents so happy. Truly these things cause great joy; prayer has been answered, Matthew 6:30 has been fulfilled, and I have a reply to unbelieving fears. The articles sent are just what we needed, and we are all well clothed without getting into debt, blessed be God; and, lastly, the loving and sympathizing way in which our appeal for aid has been met has endeared the friends of the Tabernacle to us, and led us to trust in and thank our promise-keeping Father, who has not and will not forsake us in our times of difficulty. We do most heartily thank you. If the friends to whom God has given much only knew the burden they lift from our shoulders through your noble society, and the pleasure they give us in this way, you would soon be deluged with materials from loving hearts who would feel that it was more blessed to give than to receive.”
Those who would like to have a finger in this pie can do so in several ways. “Money answereth all things,” and it can be forwarded in various forms to MRS. EVANS, METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, but articles of clothing are equally valuable, and so are materials. Some of our shop-keeping friends help much by contributions of goods; and others might do the same if they would send on remnants and articles which are out of fashion: poor ministers wives care little enough how people are being dressed in Paris, so long as they can appear decently among the good people of Little Silkington. One Welsh friend among other valued gifts sent a number of waterproof coats, and perhaps no gifts have been so welcomed as these by the ministers. A man who has many miles to tramp over country roads is glad to be spared the misery of getting wet through, and preaching in his damp clothes. It is certainly bad for the parson to be dry in the pulpit, but he thinks it no improvement to be wet before he gets to it. Remnants do not long remain unused if they once drift into the hands of Mrs. Evans and her armed band — armed we mean with scissors and needles, and fastgoing sewing machines. Even half-worn suits are not despised, but they are not so good as new, and when they get beyond the half-way house, and are nearly worn out, they are more suitable for other needy ones than for ministers. No fault will be found whatever the gifts may be: the best will be made of them, — all donors may be sure of that.
Perhaps these few words will find out and stir up some other workers like Mrs. Evans in other churches, who will do the like service to preachers of small incomes. If so, this mode of doing good will soon be carried on to the full of the demand; and it will be well for the good ladies to be in communication with each other, so that none of our worthy brethren may be left out in the cold, and none may have double turns till help has gone all round. Mrs. Evans will, we know, be very glad to be communicated with. These remarks of ours will bring her quite a company of applicants for her parcels; we only hope that there will be a balance kept up by an equal force of donors coming to the rescue.
C.H.S.
NOTES
DURING the early part of July the Editor has been resting at the hospitable mansion of James Duncan, Esq., of Benmore. Two services upon the Lawn were attended by great masses of people from the country all around, and from the example of former years it is hoped that many were led to Jesus by hearing the word of God in the sweet eventide of the Sabbath beneath the open arch of heaven.
We have been persuaded by many friends to remove to a dwelling upon higher ground, and therefore we have resolved to rise to “Westwood,” Beulah Hill, Upper Norwood. Towards the end of this month all letters should bear the new address. On the top of the Delectable Hill we trust that the fresh breezes may tend to give health and prolong life. “If thy presence go not with us, carry us not up hence.”
On Friday evening, July 2, the teachers and friends associated in celebrating the Robert Raikes’ Centenary concluded the week’s proceedings by meeting at the Lord’s table in the Tabernacle. Brethren from many lands were there, of various languages, and of differing Christian denominations, but the prayers and praises of the evening proved that one Spirit was in all and over all. United in one body and living with one object, it was must fitting that these believers in Jesus should meet at the great family feast, and openly declare their common love to the one glorious sacrifice. Christ has not two bodies, but one body. neither are there two lives within the body, but one only. Where there is life in a body there must of necessity be fellowship: the hand cannot refuse to commune with the foot, nor the foot with me eye; it is not a matter of choice but a necessity of vitality. All the members of the mystical body of Christ which are in a healthy condition are in constant communion the one with the other, because they are in fellowship with the one living Head, and his life fills the whole system. This blessed fact of the abiding fellowship of all spiritual men is very dear to us in these times of strife and division. The prayer of Jesus was heard, and all those whom the Father gave him are one even as he is one with the Father.
COLLEGE. — During the past month several of Our brethren have sailed for the United States or Australia. Our colored brother, Mr. T. L. Johnson, whose health has become re-established during his stay in England, has returned to Chicago; and Mr. J. Wilkins, late pastor of the church at Maidenhead, has gone to Boston, U.S.A. Messrs. McKinney and W. Ostler after taking rest here are now returning to the States. Mr. F. G. Buckingham, of Woodborough-road church, Nottingham; Mr. G. W. Pope, recently assistant minister with Mr. Silverton, at Exeter-hall, Nottingham; and Mr. D. M. Logan, an earnest brother, who for a time attended certain of the College classes, have all left this country with the hope of finding suitable spheres at the Antipodes. It gives us much pleasure to commend them to the friends with whom their lot may be cast: they are all good men and true. Mr. Logan will probably pursue his business and preach the gospel too: the more of such laborers the better.
Mr. J. N. Rootham is removing from Stourbridge to Barnstaple. Mr. E. H. Edwards, one of our Medical Missionary Students, has recently passed the final examination for the degree of Bachelor of Medicine at Edinburgh University.
The following students have just accepted pastorates: — Mr. S. Lyne, Chenies, Bucks; Mr. W. Sexton, Boston; and Mr. H. C. Lake, East Street, Southampton.
Our students are away for the holidays. We have some twenty fresh men coming in August. This first work of ours in training men for the ministry still retains the first place in our heart. Nothing can be more important than to fill the pulpits with earnest men who love the gospel of Jesus. Our friends will not, we hope, permit the College to languish. Natural humanity leads many to help an Orphanage who would never aid a College, and it is therefore mainly to intelligent Christians that we must look for aid in this enterprise, — we say” intelligent” because there are many pious people who still seem to think that ignorance is a better qualification for the ministry than knowledge. We believe that only the Spirit of God can make a minister or cause saving results to follow upon ministry, but we conceive that a good education is a valuable talent which grace can enable a man to use both for the glory of God and the profit of the church. Those who hold sound doctrine ought to know how to defend it in these evil days. We have from time to time raised the standard of our students’ education in accordance with the growing knowledge of the age, but we remain entirely dependent upon the Holy Spirit even as aforetime. If learning necessarily took men off from dependence upon God we should loathe it, but so far as we can see, ignorance and self-confidence have considerable affinity, while grace makes men humble, however much they know.
EVANGELISTS. — Messrs. Smith and Fullerton have been resting for the past month, both of them having been nearly exhausted by their long and successful campaign at Birmingham. Nothing can be more encouraging than the success of these beloved brethren. Ministers of all the Christian denominations in Birmingham rejoice in their labors, and are now ingathering their converts. Some twelve hundred gave in their names as having obtained a blessing. These names, with the addresses, were forwarded to the different pastors that they might look after them. Thus our evangelists work with the churches and for the churches. Aid will soon be needed for this branch of service, which the Lord has made to yield abundant fruit.
Mr. Burnham, in conjunction with our venerable friend Jonathan Grubb, of Sudbury, and Pastor J. Kemp, of Bures, has recently laid siege to three Suffolk villages — Melford, Lavenham, and Glemsford. Every evening for a fortnight congregations numbering from three to eight hundred gathered in the open-air or halls, and listened with eager interest to the word of life. One of the chief workers at the services was a man who was converted during the evangelist’s previous visit. Many other instances of blessing were brought under Mr. Burnham’s notice. Our brother reports that these villages are ripe for evangelistic effort, and the enthusiasm evoked is really marvelous. The only opposition came flora a church clergyman, a hyperCalvinist minister, and the performers at a circus! Successful services have since been held by Mr. Burnham at Driffield, Nafferton, Scarborough, (where he found many gracious evidences of the work of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton), Cranswick, Hull, Southwell, Cheltenham, Charlton Kings, and Sheepshed. Most of these engagements were either anniversary services or evenings of sacred song, as circumstances were scarcely favorable for a long series of meetings. The usefulness of Mr. Burnham is attested in all places. We were pleased to see the newspaper of the Society of Friends highly commending his work.
Mr. Parker has been spending his holidays in the north of Ireland, holding evangelistic services. We trust our friends in that region will lend him their aid. May God bless all such workers!
ORPHANAGE. — When we made up the “Notes” for last month’s magazine we were able to report the receipt of contributions and promises amounting to about half the £11,100 needed for the first block of buildings. Most of our readers are already aware from other sources that before June closed we had not merely half but more than three-quarters of the sum required; and all will rejoice with us that at the present time we have considerably over £10,000 in hand or pro-raised for this object.
Monday, June 21. This memorable day was observed at the Tabernacle as a day of supplication and thanksgiving. It was the time set apart, in connection with the College Conference, for special simultaneous prayer all over the country, and at morning, noon, and night many found it good to be with our brethren at the throne of grace. It was agreed that the day of prayer should be a day of thankoffering, and throughout the livelong day we sat at the receipt of free-will offerings from our beloved people. It was a day to make a man die of joy and gratitude. The friends poured in continually, each one bringing a gift to the Orphanage. The amounts as a rule were small, but when they were counted up we found that over £900 had been added to the funds. This was done most lovingly, for in every case kind words went with the gift. We felt exhausted with excess of blessing. The poorest gave as gladly as the richest: all felt it to be a joy to bring the Lord a portion, and where self-denial was needed to accomplish it the joy was all the greater.
On reaching home that evening the first letter we opened contained a promise of £600, and we went to our chamber half dead with the excitement of the day, and burdened with a sense of unworthiness of mercy so great and love so generous.
Tuesday, June 22, was the day fixed for the Annual Fete at the Orphanage, and the laying of the first stones of four of the girls’ houses. During the greater part of the morning heavy showers threatened to overthrow our plans, but by-and-by the sun shone out again, and the only effect of the rain was to keep away a few friends, for whom we otherwise could scarcely have found accommodation. The afternoon proceedings commenced with a procession of the orphan boys and girls, headed by the band of the Children’s Home, Victoria Park. At three o’clock a dense crowd gathered around the memorial stones. Prayer having been offered by the Rev. Canon Hussey, Rector of Christ Church, Brixton, the President explained that the first stone to be laid was that of “The Sermon House,” which was to be the joint gift of himself, the author of the sermons, and Messrs. Passmore and Alabaster, the publishers. The stone was then duly laid by Mrs. Spurgeon, who used the same silver trowel which she employed at the foundation of “The College House” of the Boys’ Orphanage on June 19, 1868. It was a great joy to see the beloved sufferer thus able once more to appear in public. All the Tabernacle friends were the happier for her brief presence. Mr. Spurgeon himself laid the next stone, that of “The Limes,” erected by Mr. W. R. Rickett in memory of five beloved children; and in doing so, called special attention to this practical and useful way of making a memorial, and of manifesting a holy submission to the Lord’s will. Mr. Samuel Barrow had promised £600 towards the erection of a house, but not satisfied with this noble contribution he asked for a number of collecting books, and went to work in such admirable style that, as will be seen by the cash lists, he has made up the amount from himself and his friends to between £1,600 and £1,700. After Mr. Barrow had addressed the assembly, the Vice-president introduced Mrs. Barrow, who then laid the stone of “The Olives.” Our honored Treasurer, Mr. Win. Higgs, had been selected to lay the first stone of “The Trustees’ House,” and in doing so he explained that the Trustees had promised to defray the entire cost of the house, schoolroom, paving, draining, etc., their contribution in the aggregate amounting to £2,220. Mr. Wm. Olney then delivered one of his stirring speeches, and the afternoon engagements concluded with the doxology and benediction.
It was a second day of joyful excitement to the Pastor and President, who found himself utterly spent. The love of the people displayed itself in eager rushes to give their contributions to him. Assuredly no crowd was ever more eager to receive an alms than these friends were to give of their substance to the Institution for poor orphan girls.
In the evening the rain again descended, but a large open-air meeting was held under the presidency of Mr. Barrow and two other meetings were held in the covered play-hall and the dining-hall, Messrs. James Stiff and Wm. Olney being the respective chairmen. It is hardly possible to tell even the names of all the speakers, as we had to run from one gathering to another, and give a short address at each, but as far as we can remember, the following ministers took part in the meetings: — The President, C. H. Spurgeon; the Vice-president, J. A. Spurgeon; the President’s father and son, J. and C. Spurgeon; and the Revs. Charles Bullock B D., H. Sinclair Paterson, M.D., Newman Hall, LL.B., G. B. Ryley, A. G. Brown, and W. Cuff. The proceedings of the day were brought to a close by a capital concert by the members of the Southwark Choral Society, under the able leadership of Mr. Courtenay.
An analysis of our building fund lists shows that the following is our present financial position:- Received for “The Sermon House,” C. H. Spurgeon, £500; Messrs. Passmore and Alabaster, £500: received for “The Olives.” Mr. Samuel Barrow and friends, £1,623 8s. 7d.: received for “The Trustees’ House,” £1,570 promised by trustees £650: received towards general building expenses, £3,627 3s. 7d. Promised, W. R. Rickett Esq., £1,000; A Friend, £600; and various smaller amounts, £131 5s. 0d., making a total of £10,201 17s. 2d., in addition to bricks, slates, timber, etc., from various donors. We have, therefore, felt perfectly justified in giving the order for the erection of the end houses, which we had postponed, and as soon as possible we shall arrange for the laying of the two memorial stones, when we hope the remaining £1,000 to complete the contract will be in hand or promised. Surely after doing so much our readers will not let us ask again for the last thousand. A splendid instance of the power of willinghood only needs the finishing stroke. Glory be to God for ever and ever. Our heart rejoices in the Lord.
COLPORTAGE. — Mr. Jones writes: “The only note of progress this month is in connection with the appointment of a colporteur for the new district of Arundel, Sussex, where he will work under the superintendence of Rev. R. Halley, the Congregational minister. We trust that much blessing will accompany the effort in this very promising field of labor. I should like. also, to say that I fear some of the readers of The Sword and the Trowel are misled by the large sums which often appear under the heading of District Subscriptions, and imagine that our Association is very well off for funds: but it should be remembered that the larger the sum total of subscriptions for districts, the more we have to add from our General Fund, which at the present time is much behind the average receipts.”
PERSONAL NOTES. — The following testimony comes from Pennsylvania:—
“Dear Brother, — Your sermons have always proved a blessing to me. I am a local preacher in the Methodist Episcopal Church, trying to work for the Master. In dark seasons your words have brought light. Encouragement follows in the wake of discouragement, and illumes my soul with heavenly beams. Others in our town and community, who read your sermons, find them to be a source of joy and comfort to their souls. Your words are heavily freighted with good news from the heavenly country, bringing with them refreshing seasons from the Lord. My dear Christian mother reads them with delight, treasures them in her heart, and feasts upon them, especially the sermon, ‘A woman of a sorrowful spirit’ (No. 1515).”
Similar tidings reach us from Kansas: — “My dear sir and brother, — though never seen, yet greatly loved, in the blessed Lord. Pray pardon me, a poor American missionary, the few years of whose life-service have been given to the home missionary work, sometimes in the city and sometimes in the country, for craving a little of your time to say how much real food for his soul he has received from your discourses. They have, whenever I could get them, afforded me delight and edifying next to the blessed Word itself, notwithstanding I am a Methodist; and I have felt sure that the few of your sermons, lectures, and various articles which have fallen into my hands, were so many extra blessings from the kind Father. They are greatly prized, and well taken care of; some time since a friend who once sat under your ministry gave me some copies of The Sword and the Trowel, which I greatly prize.”
Pastor W. Norris, of Calcutta, sends us the following letter from one of his friends: — ‘‘My dear Mr. Norris, — To understand the little episode of which I spoke, you will need to be informed of our situation and circumstances at the time. It was about June, 1857, a little after the first terrible outbreak at Meerut. At Barrackpore, sixteen miles from Calcutta, were five native regiments. We had a full regiment of Sepoys in the city, called the Calcutta militia; and Sepoys partly garrisoning the fort and on guard at the mint. Our European force was half a regiment in the fort, and a half at Dum Dum, to whom the government would not deal out ball cartridges. The authorities were dallying with the danger, pooh-poohing every warning, and assuming an attitude of supine indifference. They refused to arm us, or allow us to organize ourselves for the de-fence of our wives and children, and declined our offers of volunteering. They even mocked our anxiety by inviting us to swear ourselves in as special constables, and ordered us a supply of wooden staves to meet disciplined troops armed with muskets and bayonets!
“In these circumstances the Sepoys at Barraekpore laid plot after plot for the sack of Calcutta. The time fixed upon was when the native guards at the fort and over the mint used to be relieved, for at such times the relieving Sepoys and the relieved Sepoys formed together twice the usual number. A rocket discharged into the air was the preconcerted signal to apprise their confederates in Calcutta of their approach, and in two or three hours the city would have swarmed with bloodthirsty mutineers, whose numbers would have been swollen by prisoners let loose from the gaols, the fanatic Mahommedan population about town, and all the rabble and canaille who were waiting to repeat the atrocities of Meerut and other places.
“Sunday after Sunday was appointed for the execution of the plot, and Sunday after Sunday were their hopes disappointed — and how? Not by the wisdom of men, for we were in profound ignorance of this at the time; but by the watchfulness of those ‘eyes’ which ‘run to and fro throughout the whole earth,’ to show the Lord strong in the behalf of those whose hearts are perfect towards him. The means employed were the periodically recurring thunderstorms, which used to take place exactly at the time when the designs of the mutineers were to have been developed. It was on one of these occasions, on a Sunday evening, when the rain was pouring in torrents, and the dense darkness of the night was only relieved by vivid flashes of lightning, and we were prevented from going to chapel, where indeed there was no meeting held on account of the weather, that we agreed to meet around the domestic altar, and to enjoy one of Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons. Little did we know how close was the terrible danger which the storm was averting. Many of my dear wife’s family lived with me, and one of us read a sermon by Mr. Spurgeon on Providence. It was a wonderful sermon, and it did us yeoman service. It brought God close to us, and made us feel that the divine arm was closing in around us. Twenty three years have elapsed since then, and yet some of the words of that discourse have not been forgotten, so deep was their impression, and so spirit-stirring their tones of lofty cheer. Even now, at this distance of time, they are as fresh in my recollection as if I had heard them but yesterday. We heard, as it were, the rush of the mighty wings of Providence, like those of a guardian angel, sweeping past us. Mr. Spurgeon closes a magnificent passage with the following apostrophe, which thrills me even now as I recall it: ‘Providence, thou ever rollest on; thy revolving wheels never cease their everlasting circles!’ The unconscious truth which lay in these words, and their singular adaptation to our surroundings at the time, were profoundly, yet somewhat after a mystic fashion, felt by us then; it was only afterwards that they were clearly discerned and fully appreciated, and we saw eventually how the wheels of Providence had indeed revolved for our safety, and borne us beyond the reach of imminent peril.”
An Indian agent of the London Missionary Society writes: — “In common with many all over the world I have long been a reader of your sermons. Your fifteen-hundredth came to hand a short time ago, and I read it to a delighted European and native audience here a Sunday or two since. A few days subsequent to that I had a visit from a young Brahmin graduate, a B.A. of the Madras University, to whom I had previously given some of your sermons to read. I gave him ‘Number 1,500,’ and to-day he has sent it back with a note which is somewhat of a curiosity, and, as such, I have resolved to send it to you. I think you will be pleased as well as a little amused with this Brahmin’s critique; so excuse my taking this liberty. I wish I had two or three hundred of your fifteen-hundredth for educated Hindus.”
The following is the critique referred to: — “Dear sir, I send by the bearer the sermons you gave me the other day. The few minutes I have been reading these sermons daily were spent very agreeably. I always considered Dr. Spurgeon the best orator. I see even the best can improve; as Dr. Spurgeon excels all orators, so his fifteen-hundredth sermon excels all his other sermons. I doubt very much whether himself can deliver such another sermon, but that is going too far. I envy those that hear personally Dr. Spurgeon preach.”
O that God would by the sermon convert many of all nations, and he who is no doctor will be willing to be called either an orator or a babbler if men are but saved.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle: June 17th, eleven: July 1st, twenty-one.
Chap 7. SEPTEMBER 1880
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
SEPTEMBER 1880
THE COVENANT
SERMON NO. 3261 BY C. H. SPURGEON
“He will ever be mindful of his covenant.”-Psalm 111:5.
Another Sermon by C. H. Spurgeon, upon the same text, is No. 2,681 in Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, “Covenant Blessings.”
IT is a wonderful thing that God should enter into gracious covenant with men. That he should make man, and be gracious to man, is easily to be conceived; but, that he should strike hands with his nature, and put his august majesty under bored to him by his own promise, is marvelous. Once let that God has made a covenant, and I do not think it wonderful that he should be mindful of it, for he is “God that cannot lie.” “Hath he said, and shall he not do it?” Hath he once given his pledge? It is inconceivable that he should ever desert from it. The doctrine of the text commends itself to every reasonable and thoughtful man: if God has made a covenant, he will over be faithful of it. It is to that point that I would now call your attention with the desire to use it practically.
For God to make a gracious covenant with us is so great a boon that I hope every one’ here is saying within his heart, “Oh, that the Lord had entered into covenant with me!”
We shall practically look into this matter, first, by answering the question, What is this covenant? Secondly, by putting the inquiry, Have I any portion in it? And, thirdly, by bidding each one say, “If indeed I am in covenant with God, then every part of that covenant will be carried out, for God is ever mindful of it,”
I. First, then, WHAT IS THIS COVENANT?
If you go to a lawyer, and inquire how a deed runs, he may reply, “I can give’ you an abstract, but I had better read it to you.” He can tell you the sum and substance, of it; but if you want to be very accurate, and it is a very important business, you will say, “I should like to hear it read.” We will now read certain parts of Scripture which contain the covenant of grace, or an abstract of it. Turn to Jeremiah 31:31-34: “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house, of Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the Lord. But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God and they shall be my people. And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord; far I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”
Print every word of that in diamonds, for the sense is inconceivably precious. God in covenant promises to his people that, instead of writing his law upon tables of stone, he will write it an the tablets of their hearts. Instead of the law coming on a hard, crushing command, it shall be placed within them as the object of love and delight, written on the transformed nature of the beloved objects of God’s choice: “I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; “what a covenant privilege this is! ‘And I will be their God.” Therefore ale that there is in God shall belong to them. “And they shall be my people.” They shall belong to me; I will love them as mine; I will keep them, bless them, honor them, and provide for the as my people. I will be their portion, and they shall be my portion. Note the next privilege. They shall all receive heavenly instruction upon the most vital point: “They shall all know me.’; There may be some beings they do not know, but “they shall all know me.” They shall know me as their Father; they shall know Jesus Christ as their Brother; they shall know the Holy Spirit as their Comforter. They shall have intercourse and fellowship with God. What a covenant privilege is this! Hence comes pardon, “For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” What a clean sweep of sin! God will forgive and forget; the two go together. “I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” All gone,-all their transgression blotted out, never to be mentioned against thee any more, for ever. What an unutterable favor! This is the covenant of grace. I call your attention to the fact that there is no “if” in it, there is no “but” in it, there is no requirement made by it of man. It is all “I will” and “they shall.” “I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” It is a charter written in a royal tone, and the majestic straining not marred by a “perchance” or a “may be,” but dwells always on “shall” and “will.” These are two prerogative words of the divine majesty; and in this wondrous deed of gift, in which the Lord bestows a heaven of grace upon guilty sinners, he bestows it after the sovereignty of his own will without, anything to put the gift in jeopardy, or to make the promise insecure.
Thus I have read the covenant to you in one form.
Turn over the pages a little, and you will come to a passage in Ezekiel. There we shall have the bright-eyed prophet-he who could live among the wheels and the seraphim-telling us what the covenant grace is. In Ezekiel the eleventh chapter, nineteenth and twentieth verses, we read: “I will put a new spirit within you, and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh; that they may walk in my statutes, and keep mine ordinances, and do them; and they shall be my people, and I will be their God.”
You will find another form of it further on in the thirty-sixth of Ezekiel, beginning at the twenty-fifth verse. How intently ought you to listen to this! It is a deal better than hearing any preaching of mortal men to listen to the very words of God’s own covenant, a covenant which saves all those who are concerned in it. Unless you have an interest in it you are indeed unhappy. Let us read it: “Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean; from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you. A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you; and I will take away the stony heart out, of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and you shall keep my judgments, and do them…. And you shall be my people, and I will be your God.” This promise always come in at the close, “I will be your God.” In this form of the covenant, I call you again to witness that God demands nothing, asks no price, demands no payment, but to the people with whom he enters into covenant he makes promise after promise, all free, all unconditional, all made according to the bounty of his royal heart.
Let us just go a little into detail about this. God has made a covenant with certain people that he will do all this for them, and in each case it is of pure grace. He will take away their own hearts: it is clear from the promise that, when he began with them, they had stony hearts. He will forgive their iniquities: when he began with them, they had my iniquities. He will give them a heart of flesh: when he began with them, they had not heart of flesh. He will turn them to keep his statutes: when he began with them, they did not keep his statutes. They were a sinful, willful, wicked, degenerate people, and he called to them many times to come to him, and repent, but they would not. Here he speaks like a king, and no longer pleads, but decrees. He says, I will do this and that to you, and you shall be this and this in return. Oh, blessed covenant! Oh, mighty, sovereign, grace!
How came it about? Learn the doctrine of the two covenants.
The first covenant of which we will now speak was that of works, the covenant made with our first father, Adam. This is not first in purpose, but it was first revealed in time. It ran thus: you Adam, and your posterity shall live and be happy if you will keep my law. To test your obedience to me, there is a certain tree; if you let that alone, you shall live: if you touch it, you shall die, and they shall die whom you represent.
Our first covenant-head snatched greedily at the forbidden fruit, and fell: and what a fall was there, my brethren! There you, and I, and all of us, fell down, while it was proven once for all that, by works of law no man can be justified; for if perfect Adam broke the law so readily, depend upon it, you and I would break any law that God had ever made. There was no hope of happiness for any of us by a covenant which contained an “if” in it. That old covenant is pub away, for it has utterly failed. It brought nothing to us but a curse, and we are glad that it has waxed old and, as far as believers are concerned, has vanished away.
Then there came the second Adam. You know his name, he is the ever blessed Son of the Highest. This second Adam entered into covenant with God somewhat after this fashion:—The Father says, I give thee a people; they shall be, shine: thou must die to redeem them, and when thou hast done this,—when for their sakes thou hast kept my law, and made it honorable, when for their sakes thou haste borne my wrath against their transgressions,—then I will bless them; they shall be my people; I will forgive their iniquities; I will change their natures; I will sanctify them, and make them perfect. There was an apparent “if” in this covenant at the first. That “if” hinged upon the question whether the Lord Jesus would obey the law, and pay the ransom; a question which his faithfulness placed beyond doubt. There is no “if” in it, now. When Jesus bowed his head, and said, “It is finished,” there remained no “if” in the covenant. It stands, therefore, now as a covenant entirely of one side, a covenant, of promises, of promises which must be kept, because the other portion of the covenant having been fulfilled, the Father’s side of it must stand. He cannot, and he will not draw back from the doing of that which he covenanted with Christ to do. The Lord Jesus shall receive the joy which was set before him. “He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied.” By his knowledge shall the Christ who became God’s righteous Servant justify many, for hath he not borne their iniquities? How can it be otherwise than that they should be accepted for whom he was the Surety? Do you see why it is that the covenant, as I have read it, stands so absolutely without “ifs”, “buts”, and “peradventures”, and runs only on “shells” and “wills”? It is because the one side of it that did look uncertain was committed into the hand of Christ, who cannot fail or be discouraged. He has completed his part of it, and now it stands fast, and must stand fast for ever and ever. This is now a covenant of pure grace, and nothing else but grace: let, no man attempt to mix up works with it, or anything of human merit. God saves now because he chooses to save, and over the head of us all there comes a sound as of a martial trumpet, and yet with a deep, inner peaceful music in it: “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.” God observes us all lost and ruined, and in his infinite mercy comes with absolute promises of grace to those whom he hath given to his Son Jesus’.
So much, then, with regard to the covenant.
II. Now comes the important question, “HAVE I ANY PORTION IT?” May the Holy Ghost help us to ascertain this, truth on this point! You who are really anxious in your hearts to know, I would earnestly persuade to read the Epistle to the Galatians. Read that Epistle through if you want to know whether you have, any part or lot in the covenant of grace. Did Christ fulfill the law for me?” Are the promises of God, absolute and unconditional, made to me? You can know by answering three questions.
First, Are you in Christ? Did you not notice that I said that we were all in Adam, and in Adam we all fell? Now, “as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so, by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.” Are you in the second Adam? You certainly were in the first; one, for so you fell. Are you in the second? Because, if you are in him, you are saved in him. He has kept the law for you. The covenant of grace made, with him was made with you if you are in him; for, as surely as Levi was in tile loins of Abraham when Melchisedek met him, so were all believers in the loins of Christ when he died upon the cross. If you are in Christ, you are a part and parcel of the seed to whom the promise was made; but there is only one seed, and the apostle tells us, “He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ.” If, then, you are in Christ, you are in the seed, and the covenant of grace was made with you.
I must ask you another question, Have you faith? By this question you will be helped to answer the previous one, for believers are in Christ. In the Epistle to the Galatians, you will find that the mark of those who are in Christ is that they believe in Christ. The mark of all that are saved is not, confidence in work, but faith in Christ. In the Epistle to the Galatians, Paul insists upon it, “The just shall live by faith,” and the law is not of faith. Over and over again he puts it so. Come, then, do you believe in Jesus Christ with all your heart? Is he your sole hope for heaven? Do you lean your whole weight, the entire stress of your salvation, on Jesus? Then you are, in him, and the covenant is yours; and there, is not a blessing which God hath decreed to give but what he will give to you. There is not a boon which, out of the grandeur of his heart, he has determined to bestow upon his elect, but what he will bestow it upon you. You have the mark, the seal, the badge of his chosen if you believe in Christ Jesus.
Another question should help you; it is this, Have you been born again? I refer you again to the Epistle to the Galatians, which I would like every anxious person to read through very carefully. There you will see that Abraham had two sons: one of them was born according to the flesh; he was Ishmael, the child of the bondwoman. Though he was the firstborn son, he was not the heir, for Sarah said to Abraham, Cast out this bondwoman and her son; for the son of this bondwoman shall net be heir with my son, even with Isaac.” He who was born after the flesh did not inherit the covenant promise. Is your hope of heaven fixed on the fact that you had a good mother and father? Then your hope is born after the flesh, and you are not in the covenant. I am constantly hearing it said that children of godly parents do not want converting. Let me denounce that wicked falsehood. “That which is born of the flesh is flesh,” and nothing better. They that are born after the flesh, those are not the children of God. Do not trust in gracious descent, or in holy ancestors. Ye must be born again, every one of you, or you will perish for ever, whoever your parents may be. Abraham had another son, even Isaac: he was not born of the strength of his father, nor after the flesh at all, for we are told that both Abraham and Sarah had become old; but Isaac was born by God’s power, according to promise. He was the child given by grace. Now, have you ever been born like that,—not by human strength but by power divine? Is the life that is in you a life given by God? The true life is not of the will of man, nor of blood, nor of natural excellence; but it comes by the working of the eternal Spirit, and is of God. If you have this life, you are in the covenant, for it is written, “in Isaac shall thy seed be called.” The children of the promise, these are counted for the seed. God said to Abraham, “In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed,” and that was because he meant to justify the Gentiles by faith, that the blessing given to believing Abraham might come on all believers. Abraham is the father of the faithful, or the father of all them that believe in God, and with such is the covenant established.
Here, then, are the test questions:—Am I in Christ? Am I believing in Jesus? Am I born by the power of the Spirit of God according to the promise, and not by the fleshly birth, or according to works? Then I am in the covenant; my name stands in the eternal record. Before the stars began to shine the Lord had covenanted be bless me. Or ever evening and morning made the first day, my name was in his book. Christ before the world’s foundation struck hands with the Father in the council chamber of eternity, and pledged himself to redeem me, and be bring me and multitudes of others into his eternal glory; and he will do it, too, for he never breaks his suretyship engagements any more than the Father breaks his covenant engagements. I want you to get quite sure upon these points, for, oh, what peace it will breed in your soul, what a restfulness of heart to understand the covenant, and to know that your name is in it!
III. This is our last point. If indeed we can believe, upon the good evidence of Gods Word, that we! are of the seed with whom the covenant was made in Christ Jesus, then EVERY BLESSING OF THE COVENANT WILL COME TO US. I will put, it a. Little more personally,—every blessing of the covenant will come to you.
The devil says, “No, it, won’t.” Why not, Satan? “Why,” saith he, “you are not able to do this or that.” Refer the devil to tile text; tell him to read those passages which I read to you, and ask him if he, can spy an “if” or a “but”; for I cannot. “Oh!” says he, “but, but, but, but, but you cannot do enough, you can’t feel enough.” Does it say anything about feeling there? It only says, “I will give them a heart of flesh.” They will feel enough then. “Oh, but!” the devil says, “you cannot soften: your hard heart.” Does it say that you are to do so? Does it not say “I will take the stony heart out of their flesh”? The tenor of it is,—I will do it; I will do it. The devil dares not say that God cannot do it, he knows that God can enable, us to tread him under our feet. “Oh, but!” says he, “you will never hold on your way if you begin to be a Christian.” Does it say anything about that in the covenant further than this, “they shall walk in my statutes”? What if we have not power in and of ourselves continue in God’s statutes; yet he has power to make us continue in them. He can work in us obedience and final perseverance in holiness; his covenant virtually promises these blessings to us. To came back to what we said before; God does not ask of us, but he gives to us. He sees us dead, and he loves us even when we are dead in trespasses and sins. He sees us feeble, and unable to help ourselves; and he, comes in, and works in us to will and to do of his good pleasure, and then we work out our own salvation with fear and trembling. The bottom of it, the very foundation of it, is himself; and he finds nothing in us to help him. There is neither fire nor wood in us, much less the lamb for the burnt offering, but all is emptiness and condemnation. He comes in with “I will,” and “you shall,” like a royal helper according free aid to destitute, helpless, sinners, according to the riches of his grace. Now be sure that, having made such a covenant as this, God will ever be mindful of it.
He will do so, first, because he cannot lie. If he says he will, he will. His very name is “God that, cannot lie.” If I am in Christ, I must be saved: none can prevent it. If I am a believer in Christ, I must be saved; all the devils in hell cannot stop it, for God has said, “He that believeth in him is not condemned.” “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.” God’s word is not yea and nay. He knew what he said when he spake the covenant, and he has never changed it, nor contradicted it. If, then, I am a believer, I must be saved, for I am in Christ to whom the promise is made; if I have the new life in me, I must be saved, for is not this spiritual life the living and incorruptible seed which liveth and abideth for ever? Did not Jesus say, “The water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life”? I have drunk the water Christ gave me, and it, must spring up into everlasting life. It is not possible for death to kill the life that God has given me, nor for all the fallen spirits to tread out the divine fire which Christ’s own Spirit, has cast into my bosom. I must be saved, for God cannot deny himself.
Next, God made the covenant freely. If he had not meant to keep it, he would not have made it. When a man is driven up into a corner by someone who, says, “Now you must pay me,” then he is apt to promise more than he can perform. He solemnly declares, “I will pay you this day fortnight.” Poor fellow, he has no money now, and will not have any then, but he makes a promise because he cannot help himself. No such necessity can, be imagined with our God. The Lord was under no compulsion: he might have left men to perish because of sin; there was no one to prompt him be make the covenant of grace, or even to suggest the idea. “With whom took he counsel, and who instructed him?” He made the covenant of his own royal will, and having made it, rest you sure that he will never run back from it. A covenant so freely made must be fully carried out.
Moreover, on the covenant document there is a seal. Did you see the seal? The grand thing in a deed of gift is the signature or seal. What is this,—this red splash at the bottom, of it? It is blood! Yes; it is blood. Whose blood? It is the blood of the Son of God. This his ratified and sealed the covenant. Jesus died. Jesus’ death, has made the covenant sure’. Can God forget the blood of his dear Son, or do despite to his sacrifice, Impossible. All for whom he died as a covenant Substitute he will save. His redeemed shall not be left in captivity, as if the ransom price had effected nothing. Hath he not said, All that the Father giveth me shall come to me, and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out”? That covenant stands secure, though earth’s old columns bow, for despite to the blood can never be possible on the part of the Father.
Again, God delights in the covenant, and so we are sure he will not run back from it. It is the very joy of his holy heart. He delights to do his people good. To pass by transgression, iniquity, and sin is the recreation of Jehovah. Did you ever hear of God singing? It is singular that the Divine One should solace himself with song; but yet a prophet has thus revealed the Lord to us, “He will rest in his love; he will joy over thee with singing.” The covenant is the heart of God written out in the blood of Jesus; and since the whole nature of God runs parallel with the tenor of the everlasting covenant. you may rest assured that even its jots and its tittles stand secure.
And then, last of all, O thou who art in the covenant, thou dost not doubt but that God will save thee, keep thee, bless thee, seeing thou hast believed on Jesus, and art in Jesus, and art quickened into newness of life! Thou darest not doubt if I tell thee one thing more: if your father, if your brother, if your dearest friend had solemnly stated a fact, would you bear for anybody to say that he lied? I know you would be indignant at such a charge; but suppose your father in the most solemn manner had taken an oath, would you for a minute think that he had perjured himself, and had sworn a lie? Now turn to the Word of God, and you will find that God, because he knew that an oath among men is the end of strife, has been pleased to seal the covenant with an oath. “That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us” God has lifted his hand to heaven, and sworn that Christ shall have the reward of his passion, that his purchased ones shall be brought under his sway, that having borne sin, and put it away, it never shall be a second time charged on his redeemed.
There is all of it. Dost thou believe in Christ? Then God will work in thee to will and do of his good pleasure; God will conquer thy sin; God will sanctify the; God will save thee; God will keep thee; God will bring thee to himself at last. Rest thou on that covenant, and then moved by intense gratitude, go forward to serve thy Lord with all thy head, and soul and strength. Being saved, live to praise him. Work not that you may be saved, but because you are saved,—the covenant his secured your safety. Delivered from, the servile fear which an Ishmael might have known, live the joyous life of an Isaac; and moved by love of the: Father, spend and be spent for his sake. If the selfish hope of winning heaven by works has moved some men to great sacrifice, much more shall the godly motive of gratitude to him who has done all this for us move us to the noblest service, and make us feel that it is no sacrifice at all. “We thus judge, that, if one died far all, then were all dead; and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died far them, and rose again.” “Ye are not your own, ye are bought with a price.” If you are saved under the covenant of grace, the mark of the covenanted ones is upon you, and the sacred character of the covenanted ones should be displayed in you. Bless and magnify your covenant God. Take the cup of the covenant, and call upon his name. Plead the promises of the covenant, and have whatever you need. Amen.
THE TORMENTOR BAFFLED
ONE would hardly have thought it worth an author’s while to compose a treatise upon “The Art of Tormenting;” yet such a book exists and contains many ingenious instructions by which masters, husbands, wives, and friends may torture their servants, relatives, and acquaintances to an intolerable degree. To quote any of the writer’s suggestions in these pages would be useless, since none of our readers wish to learn the science of plaguing others. The ingenious writer, a lady, by the way, does not recommend the clumsy methods of Roman emperors and Popish inquisitors, by which it is possible to torment the bodies of men and allow the mind and spirit to remain at peace; but she deals with subtler arts, by which the mind can be lacerated beyond all cure while yet no wound is seen. To torture the heart and spirit of a man is far more cruel than to tear his flesh, or break his bones. One sentiment in this amusing treatise struck us as singularly instructive to those who are the victims of malicious criticism: the author says, “Be very careful daily to observe whether your patient continues in good health, and is fat and well-liken; for, if so, you may be almost certain that your whole labor is thrown away. As soon, therefore, as you perceive this to be the case, you must (to speak in the phrase of surgeons when they hack and hew a human body) immediately choose another subject. All the pleasure of tormenting is lost as soon as your subject becomes insensible to your strokes.” We are almost reconciled to being corpulent as we read these lines. Herein is wisdom. Patience baffles malice: the malicious themselves confess their defeat; what can we do better than to offer the passive resistance which is seen to be so effective? Let us no longer gratify our enemies by taking notice of their cruel observations and venomous insinuations. If we are callous we at once defeat them: there can be no virtue in cultivating a sensitiveness which makes us vulnerable. The more we smart, the more they will scourge; but a back of leather laughs at the cat-o’-nine-tails. By doing our best at all times we shall be able to defy all the criticisms of onlookers, who, doing nothing themselves, have all the more leisure to find fault with our honest endeavors. In all probability we shall never succeed in any one instance in pleasing all who call themselves our friends; and as to our enemies, they will never be gratified unless they see us guilty of gross folly; therefore our wisest course is to make sure of being right in the sight of God, and then to proceed in a straight line with firm tread, whether we offend or please. The desire to inflict pain is ingrained in some natures, and against these there is no defense except a manly insensibility. As chemists plunge a fabric in a solution of alum and thus enable it to defy the flames, so should we immerse ourselves into the consciousness of desiring to do right before God, and we shall be superior to the fires of slander. We are not able to abate the fury of Nebuchadnezzar’s furnace; but if we can walk in the midst of it unharmed the result will be equally harmless and far more sublime.
Over against the art of tormenting let us set the philosophy of enduring; our bane and antidote are both before us. C. H. S.
A HORSE WHICH CARRIES A HALTER IS SOON CAUGHT.
(Inserted as a specimen of Mr. Spurgeon’s new volume, “John Ploughman’s Pictures,” price One Shilling.)
WITH a few oats in a sieve the nag is tempted, and the groom soon catches him if he has his halter on; but the other horse, who has no rope dangling from his head, gives master Bob a sight of his heels, and away he scampers. To my mind, a man who drinks a glass or two, and goes now and then to the tap-room, is a horse with his bridle on, and stands a fair chance of being locked up in Sir John Barleycorn’s stables, and made to carry Madame Drink and her habit. There’s nothing like coming out fair and square, and standing free as the air. Plenty will saddle you if they can catch you; don’t give them the ghost of a chance. A bird has not got away as long as there is even a thread tied to its leg.
“I’ve taken the pledge and I will not falter:
I’m out in the field and I carry no halter;
I’m a lively nag that likes plenty of room,
So I’m not going down to the ‘Horse and Groom.’“
In other concerns it is much the same: you can’t get out of a bad way without leaving it altogether, bag and baggage. Half-way will never pay. One thing or the other: be an out-and-outer, or else keep in altogether. Shut up the shop and quit the trade if it is a bad one: to close the front shutters and serve customers at the back door is a silly attempt to cheat the devil, and it will never answer. Such hide-and-seek behavior shows that your conscience has just enough light for you to read your own condemnation by it. Mind what you are at, don’t dodge like a rat.
I am always afraid of the tail end of a habit. A man who is always in debt will never be cured till he has paid the last sixpence. When a clock says “tick” once, it will say the same again unless it is quite stopped. Harry Higgins says he only owes for one week at the grocer’s, and I am as sure as quarter-day that he will be over head and ears in debt before long. I tell him to clean off the old score and have done with it altogether. He says the tradespeople like to have him on their books, but I am quite sure no man in his senses dislikes ready money. I want him to give up the credit system, for if he does not he will need to outrun the constable.
Bad companions are to be left at once. There’s no use in shilly-shallying; they must be told that we would sooner have their room than their company, and if they call again we must start them off with a flea in each ear. Somehow I can’t get young fellows to come right out from the black lot; they think they can play with fire and not be burned. Scripture says, “Ye fools, when will ye be wise?”
“April the first stands, mark’d by custom’s rules,
A day for being, and for making, fools;
But, pray, what custom, or what rule, supplies
A day for making, or for being, wise?”
Nobody wants to keep a little measles or a slight degree of fever. We all want to be quite quit of disease; and so let us try to be rid of every evil habit. What wrong would it be right for us to stick to? Don’t let us tempt the devil to tempt us. If we give Satan an inch, he will take a mile. As long as we carry his halter he counts us among his nags. Off with the halter! May the grace of God set us wholly free. Does not Scripture say, “Come out from among them, and be ye separate, and touch not the unclean thing”?
“WELL STRUCK, PARSON!”
IN the middle of the last century Henry Venn was one of the most godly curates in the City of London, but during his student days at Cambridge he had been more famous for cricket-playing than for studious industry. After taking part in a well-contested game between Surrey and All-England, he stated to his disconcerted friends that he would play no more. He was about to settle in the ministry, and therefore resolved that he would never again earn the compliment, “Well struck, parson.” He kept his word, and became what he termed “a public brother in Christ.” Things harmless in themselves, if indulged in without discretion, may prove injurious to the character of a minister, who, above all things, should set forth Christ in his daily life. A good man will suspect danger when he earns the compliments of the world.
NOTES
FRIENDS will please direct all letters to Beulah Hill, Upper Norwood. Dropping the editorial “we,” I would remark that I have removed under the advice of a physician, and at the earnest desire of many friends, solely on grounds of health. If a worker, by God’s goodness, becomes stronger, he can do more, and if he is graciously permitted to escape the attacks of disease, so that he is able to continue preaching at home through the winter, it will be to himself, at least, the cause of great thankfulness. Simple as the matter of change of residence may be, it has sufficed to create all sorts of stories, among which is the statement that “Mr. Spurgeon’s people have given him a house.” My ever-generous friends would give me whatever was needful, but as I had only to sell one house and buy another, there was no necessity for their doing so. Having once accepted a noble presentation from them, and having there and then handed it over to the Almshouses, it would by no means be according to my mind to receive a second public testimonial. One friend who heard of my change of residence right generously sent help towards the expense of removal, but beyond this it is entirely my own concern, and a matter about which I should have said nothing if it had not been for this gossip. As the subject is mentioned, will friends kindly give us a house-warming by praying that myself and my dear wife may find the benefit we seek?
When the Wesleyan Conference was in full session I called at the City-road Chapel vestry upon a business errand, for I wished to see the manager of the refreshment department. The commissariat for the proposed visit of the Baptist Union was under discussion, and it seemed a practical thing to see how others attended to that matter. I hoped to steal in and out, and go home in quiet; but scores of hearty brethren pounced upon me, and in a few minutes Dr. Punshon was conducting me into the Assembly. The whole host of divines received me in a manner which melted me to tears, and bowed down my soul with a weight of love. The President spoke in chosen terms of affection, and invited me to address the Conference. I was utterly unprepared, but I cried for help to the Lord, and I trust that the word was not quite so broken and confused as it might have been. Then Dr. Osborn and Dr. Punshon spoke right warmly, and I left with a deep sense of gratitude for the generous reception. These brethren know that I differ from them in many points, but they love me none the less for speaking out plainly what I hold to be true. The remark was made that neither of us would be willing to ignore those differences, nor anxious for others to do so: but then we agree in many vital truths which are broad enough for mutual love to dwell upon and walk at large in. The whole scene was a spontaneous outburst of brotherly love in Christ Jesus — love which has a solid foundation. Both Baptists and Wesleyans believe something, and this is rather a rarity in these doubting times. We alike dread both the superstition and the rationalism of the age, and it is well that we should heartily unite in the defense of the essential doctrines of salvation through faith in the blood of Jesus, and regeneration by the Holy Spirit. I thank all the brethren, and again wish them the baptism of the Holy Ghost.
The following resolution has been forwarded by the secretary of the Conference: — “That the Conference has much pleasure in receiving a fraternal visit from the Rev. Charles H. Spurgeon, and tenders to him the hearty assurance of the esteem and Christian love of its members. They rejoice in his long career of extensive usefulness, and they earnestly desire for him the continuance and increase of all spiritual blessings.”
COLLEGE. — During the past month Mr. James Young has accepted the pastorate of the church at Ilford, but remains with us till his term is completed; Mr. H. W. Childs has removed from Camberwell to Sudbury, Suffolk.
On Tuesday, August 10, the summer session was commenced with a visit to Park Hill, Streatham Common, kindly lent by our generous friend and deacon, Mr. W. Higgs. The weather was all that could be desired, Mr. Murrell and his band of helpers provided abundantly and in their best manner, and the whole proceedings passed off most happily. By bringing the men together, and giving them an opportunity to enjoy intercourse with the tutors in a pleasant manner, we hope that no ice is ever allowed to form, and College life is kept pleasant and simple.
Mr. H. F. Adams sends us notes of his progress in Toronto, and we greatly rejoice therein, and in the great work achieved by our brother Dyke.
EVANGELISTS. — Mr. Fullerton spent a few days with us while we were at Benmore. He went over to Dunoon, and preached with much acceptance. In company with Mr. Smith he has paid a visit to Dublin, and also to the Isle of Man, and they are now in full work again in Scotland, where they will be occupied for the next two months at Dumfries, Galashiels, Greenock, and Paisley. In a letter recently received, Mr. Fullerton tells us that reports of the most cheering character are arriving almost daily from Birmingham. God blessed their ministry there to many souls. The names of those who professed to be converted were taken, and the lists were sent to the various pastors whom they elected to hear, with the hope that they would look after them. We want to see the corn harvested, and this plan will, we hope, succeed by God’s grace.
The Evangelistic Committee will shortly be meeting to fix our brethren’s engagements for next year. Any churches or associations that, wish to secure their services should apply at once, stating the time most convenient for a visit to them. Letters should be directed to Mr. Charles-worth, Stockwell Orphanage, who will be glad to furnish information. This Evangelistic work is doing more for our Lord’s kingdom than it would be possible for us to tell.
Mr. Burnham will shortly be visiting his old friends, the hop-pickers, in Kent. He asks for special prayer for a blessing upon the work. Help in furnishing free teas, etc., can be sent to Pastor J. J. Kendon, Goudhurst, Kent. It is a wonderful opportunity for getting at the real poor, and feeding them with the gospel, while they also get a meal of daily bread, which some of them greatly need. They will go home to London with more knowledge of the gospel than they get for years in our great city, where hundreds of thousands never enter a place of worship.
Mr. Parker seems to have had a remarkable blessing upon his labors with Mr. Mateer at Carrickfergus, Omagh, and Londonderry. Large congregations were gathered in each place, and many professed to find the Savior at the services. There is evidently a great and effectual door for evangelistic work in parts of Ireland, and indeed almost everywhere else if only the men and the means are forthcoming. Prayer should be offered daily for poor Ireland, which is rent and torn with dissension and violence, weakened by want, and ruined by the power of superstition.
ORPHANAGE. — The Girls’ Orphanage Buildings are proceeding most satisfactorily. On October the 4th, at 2.30, we hope to see laid the memorial stones of the two end houses. These are to be called “The Reading House,” and “The Liverpool House,” in remembrance of the noble help received from these two towns, and we are searching for representative men to perform the happy task. Friends will, we hope, remember that about £1,000 are still needed to finish this work. Meanwhile, the boys and girls keep on eating like caterpillars, and we must find them in food; moreover, they do not spin cocoons as silkworms do, but need raiment also. and plenty of it. Boys are rare fellows for clearing up bread and butter, and we trust kind helpers will keep the mill going.
Should any mistake occur in the lists this month, friends will please forgive a man who is moving, and whose secretary is out for the holidays. Many amounts came in just after the lists were closed on Aug. 14, but they will be found in next month’s magazine.
Tuesday, July 27th, was a gala day with our orphan children. By the kind invitation of our friends at Reading they were taken there for the annual excursion. The visit was a long-looked-for event. The orphan boys gave a Service of Song at the town hall some two years ago, when Mr. Martin H. Sutton, who kindly took the chair upon that occasion, promised to defray the railway expenses of an excursion to that neighborhood: this summer saw the fulfillment of his generous promise. The boys and girls were accompanied by Mr. W. C. Murrell and Mr. C. F. Allison (who represented the trustees of the Orphanage). The weather proved most propitious; everyone seemed pleased, and “all went merry as a marriage bell.” The procession from the railway station, headed by the band from the Birley Farm School, and with flags and banners flying, seemed to take the town by storm. The day was spent at Erleigh Court Park, which was kindly lent by Mr. J. F. Hall. The arrangements were in the hands of Rev. W. Anderson, and Messrs. H. Hutt, P. A. Collier, and Moore, to whose exertions the success of the day is entirely due. To these gentlemen, to Mr. G. W. Palmer (who provided the children with a bag of biscuits each on their homeward journey), and to all our good friends, we are most grateful. May the cheers of the orphans ring in their hearts.
COLPORTAGE. — The present number of colporteurs actually at work in the districts supplied by the Association is 70, and intimation has been received that four or five additional ones will shortly be required in as many new districts. It is encouraging to find this steady growth in the extension of the work. For all these new districts £40 a-year has been promised over and above what the society gives, which is the least sum for which we · can undertake to appoint or maintain a colporteur in a district. It is to be feared that some of the districts which do not contribute £40 a year will have to be discontinued, as it is necessary that either we or local friends should find annually from £50 to £60 for each man employed over and above the profit on the sale of books. The association engages to find all beyond the £40, but the limited amount received for the General Fund precludes more extended aid to the districts.
About £150 per month is required to work the association on its present scale without drawing upon the Capital Fund, but, during the last few months, the amount received from subscriptions and donations for the General Fund has not reached this sum by about one-third. Unless a regular income can be maintained the work will have to be curtailed, and some of the most needy districts discontinued, because they cannot furnish the full £40 a-year, and we are unable to help them. In some of these districts this would be a positive calamity, as the colporteur is the only evangelist and sick visitor in the locality, and by his withdrawal many souls would be left destitute of spiritual instruction and consolation. If every reader of The Sword and the Trowel would send a contribution regularly, however small, the difficulty would disappear. Upon the work actually being accomplished much blessing is reported. Sunday newspapers and trashy books are replaced by the Word of God and good moral and religious reading, the sick and dying are visited daily, and the poor have the gospel preached to them in neglected and isolated places, and, above all, sinners are led to Christ.
Those who know the value of colportage always speak highly of it. Will our friends who only hear of the good results help us to maintain the present usefulness of the Association, and if possible to extend it? Contributions can be sent to the Secretary, Mr. W. Corden Jones, Pastors’ College, Temple Street, London, S.E., from whom last year’s Report can be had on application.
PERSONAL NOTES. — A somewhat venerable brother from the North of England called upon us recently, and told us the following pleasing story: — He said that he had a son who had greatly grieved him, and who had been like the prodigal. He derived much comfort from a sermon of ours on the return of the prodigal, in which we spoke of the joy of the prodigal, the joy of the servants, and the joy of the father; and he was stirred up to pray for the return of his boy, and sent a note to ask us to join him in prayer at our Monday evening meeting at the Tabernacle. That young man is a Christian now, and his father is so full of joy at the change that has taken place in him that he gave us a thankoffering of £5 for the College.
The Missionary Herald publishes a note from Pastor W. J. White, of Japan, containing the following interesting item: — “I have just completed a translation of Mr. Spurgeon’s 1,500th sermon, and the Tokio local committee of the Religious Tract Society having accepted it, have it now in the press.”
SERMON TO SAILORS. — Mr. Matthews, of the Sailors’ Institute, Shadwell, finds sailors most eager for our sermon on “The Sea, the Sea, the Wide and Open Sea,” and wants to give away a large quantity while the matter is fresh. He begs us to mention the work urgently, and we do so at his desire. The more sailors will read of the gospel the better for us all, but it is not every book or sermon that they will look at, and when they are in a mind for it they ought to be supplied without delay.
BIBLE DISTRIBUTION. — We are glad to learn that Mr. Hawke, of the Bible Stand, has commenced the free distribution of the Scriptures at the Brussels Exhibition. He sends word that he wants help, and he certainly deserves it. Direct to the Crystal Palace, Sydenham.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle: July 29th, twelve.
Chap 8. OCTOBER, 1880.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
OCTOBER, 1880.
THE THREE THENS OF ISAIAH’S TEMPLE VISION
A PRAYER-MEETING ADDRESS, BY C. H. SPURGEON,
OUR subject calls us to Isaiah 6:1-8, where we find a vision granted to the favored prophet Isaiah — a vision of so grand a character, and exercising so great an influence over its beholder, that he records the exact date of it, — “In the year that king Uzziah died.” Such transcendently glorious manifestations come not every day, and therefore it is well to note their occurrence with a red letter. Perhaps the date was better fixed on his memory by a thought of contrast: Judah’s king was dead, and then the prophet saw the living King sitting upon his throne. That dead king had intruded into the temple; but the eternal King reigns there, and fills the holy place with his train.
Let us read the passage —
“In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory. And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke. THEN said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. THEN flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar: And he laid d upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged. Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? THEN said I, Here am I; send me.”
Our one point just now is to mark the three “THENS.” The prophet commenced his narrative by a note of time, and he makes his time-bell ring again and again — striking then, then, THEN.
The first “THEN” occurs thus: — the prophet was led to feel his own uncleanness, and the uncleanness of those among whom he dwelt. When was that? For it is important for us to feel the same conviction, and we may do so by the same means. Was it when he had been looking into his own heart, and seeing its dire deceitfulness, and the black streams of actual transgression which welled up from that inward fountain of depravity? He might certainly have said “Woe is me” if he had been looking there; but he was not doing so on this occasion. Had he been considering the law of God, had he observed how exceeding broad it is, how it touches the thoughts and intents of the heart, and condemns us because we do not meet its demands of perfect obedience? Assuredly if he had been looking into that pure and holy law he might have well bewailed his guilt, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. Or had he been turning over the pages of memory, and noting his own shortcomings and the sins of his fellows? Had he noted his own failures in prayer, or in service, or in patience? Had he watched himself in private and in public, and did the record of the past bring a consciousness of sin upon him? If so, he might well enough have lamented before the Lord and cried, “Woe is me! for I am undone.” I might even say, had he been carrying out self-examination for a single day of his life, and had that day been the Sabbath, and had he been acting as the preacher, or had he been sitting under the most stirring ministry, and had he been at the holy feasts of the Lord, he might have found reason for confession. I will not judge all of my brethren, but I will make this confession for myself, that if I examine the best day I have ever spent, and the holiest hour I have ever lived, I can see even with my poor, weak eyes enough of sin in my holiest things to make me cry, “Woe is me! for I am undone.” The best sermon I have ever preached is a sure proof to me that my lips are unclean, for when I come to examine it with care I discover a thousand defects.
But none of these things are mentioned here as the occasion for his humbling cry. When was it, then, that he had such an overpowering sense of his own unworthiness, and of the sinfulness of the people among whom he dwelt? It was “THEN,” — when he had seen the Lord. He had been permitted in vision to gaze upon the great King upon his throne, he had seen him in his infinite sovereignty, he had beheld his glory filling the temple, till the house was filled with smoke to veil the matchless splendor; he had heard in vision those sinless beings the seraphim, using their lips to cry in ecstasy, “Holy, holy “; and he had carefully observed that when they drew near to the awful majesty they each one used a fourfold vail with which to cover himself, — “with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet.” Even they did not dare to look upon his glory, or stand before him without a covering. What with their cry of “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory,” and their lowly posture while adoring, the prophet was humbled by their reverence, and wondered how or in what language he should ever speak with God. John in his gospel tells us that Isaiah saw the glory of God in the person of the Lord Jesus. The posts of the door moved and trembled at the presence of the Lord of the whole earth, under the stress of those adoring cries which rose from an innumerable company of angels, of whom the seraphim may be regarded as representatives. It was the sight of the thrice holy God which made the prophet say, “Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips.”
Oh, my dear brethren and sisters, if you have never seen God, if you have never had a faith’s view of him, you have not seen yourselves: you will never know how black you are till you have seen how bright he is; and inasmuch as you will never know all his brightness, so you will never know all your own blackness. Learn, however, this lesson, that for you to turn your face away from God in order to repent is a great mistake; it is a sight of God in Christ Jesus which will breed humiliation and lowly confession of sin. Dream not that you are to stay away from Christ till you sufficiently lament your sin; it is a grave error and a grievous folly, for nothing makes sin to appear so exceeding sinful as a view of the glory of God in Christ Jesus. No, your face must be towards your Father’s house, and you must hopefully resolve to arise and go to your Father, or you will never cry, “Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight.” Yes, and I will venture to say that the nearer the prodigal came to his father the more he repented; and when his face was hidden in his father’s bosom, and kiss after kiss saluted him, then his repentance was deepest of all. O poor hearts, if you cannot come to Christ with repentance, come to him for repentance. If you want to feel “Woe is me,” come and see the glory of Jesus and the holiness of the great God, and then will your knee bow and your heart tremble. There is no road to repentance so short and sure as to remember your God, and enter spiritually into his presence. “I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up,” “THEN said I, Woe is me!”
Now, is there any man here that says, “I bare had intimate communion with God”? Brother, we will listen to your speech and judge of your pretensions. Did I hear you say, “I am a man that lives very near to God. I walk in the light as God is in the light, and enjoy a higher life than other Christians”? Brother, your speech is as sounding brass and as a tinkling cymbal, for no man who has come fresh from God ever speaks in tones of self-congratulation. What said Job? “Behold I am vile; what shall I answer thee? I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes” (Job 42:5, 6). This was the experience of a perfect and an upright man, one that feared God and eschewed evil; and if you have really entered into communion with the Lord the same humble emotions will fill your breast. No man has seen the Lord, high and lifted up, if he exalts himself. When we are favored to know the Lord we are humbled then, and not till then.
You see the man trembling: in himself unclean, and conscious of it, and surrounded by a people as unclean as himself, and it is while he stands in that condition that we meet with our second “THEN.” “Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar: and he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin is purged.” “Then,” that is, not when this man was full of joy and rejoicing, but when he said “Woe is me”; not when he was living in the sublimities of boastful self-consciousness, but when he was crying” I am undone;” “then flew one of the seraphims.” When he was consciously unfit, the Lord commissioned him; when he felt his uncleanness, when he owned the ruin of his nature and the sad estate of his people, then it was that the seraphic messenger touched him with the living altar coal.
Brethren, do you so much feel your sinfulness that you are afraid that the Lord will never use you in the conversion of sinners? I am glad of it. Are you conscious that your lips are not worthy to speak for the holy God? Then I know you feel that if ever God should save a soul by you, he must have all the glory of it; you feel that it is a wonder of grace that you are saved yourself, and if ever others are saved through your means, you confess that it will be a miracle of divine power. In all this I rejoice, for your hour of acceptable service has begun. I have noted in my own experience that whenever I have been most blessed in the winning of souls, it has generally been just after I have endured a thorough stripping in my own heart, or when by soul trouble I have been brayed as in a mortar among wheat with a pestle till I seemed ground into dust. Trial has preceded triumph. A wider field has been opened to me by the breaking down of my hedges. I have shrunk into self-oblivion, and then the Lord has moved me to speak in a burning manner to his glory.
I remember a foolish person coming to me once after I had been preaching, and he said to me, “You said you were a sinner when you were preaching.” I replied, “Yes, I did, and I meant it.” His answer was, “What right had you to preach if you are a sinner?” “Well,” I replied, “my right to preach lies in the Lord’s command, ‘Let him that heareth say, Come,’ but I think little of right, for I preach because I cannot help it, and I preach to sinners because I am a sinner myself, and feel a sympathy with them. If any man needs to be daily saved by Christ, I am that man, and therefore I delight to describe the salvation which is so dear to me. Sometimes, when I have been myself in bondage, I have preached in chains to men in chains, but made music with my fetters, by commending Christ when I could not have said a good word for myself.” Why, methinks that a man who has taken medicine and has recovered is the very man to extol it to others; yea, and if he still feels that in some measure the disease is upon him though its deadly power is taken away, and if he feels that every day be must drink the healing draught and wash in the healing bath, he is the very man continually to tell of the abiding power of that ever-precious heal-all which meets his case. Even when we walk in the light with God, still the precious blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin, and still we declare from our own experience its gracious power.
My dear brethren and sisters, I want this to encourage you, if you feel unhappy in your work for the Lord. If you feel very much cast down, and are crying, “Woe is me!” do not, therefore, cease from your service. If you did not get on last Sunday, when you tried to preach, if you blunder every day with those unclean lips of yours, if you have been unsuccessful in working among the people with whom you dwell, or if you have not succeeded with the children in your class, or with your own children at home, now is the time to seek the blessing, now is the time to pray for it in hope. “Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar.” The seraph does not come with live coals from off the altar to men of pure lips who never were undone, for such are exceedingly satisfied without altar coals; but when the chosen servant of the Lord is deeply conscious of his unworthiness, then shall the Lord inspire him from above. It is his delight to fill empty vessels, and to put his treasure into caskets which contain nothing of their own.
Very briefly let us now speak of the third “THEN.” “Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me.” Hear ye not to-night the voice which never ceases to cry in the church, “Whom shall I send. and who will go for us?” O that we may be ready to respond to it! Alas! we feel reluctant to answer, “Send me,” because we feel that we are undone, and our lips are unclean; but oh, beloved, if while sitting here the angel shall bring the live coal from off the altar, one of those coals wherewith our Great Sacrifice was consumed, and touch each lip with it, and say, “Lo, this hath touched thy lips, and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin is purged,” then we shall leap to our feet and cry, “Here am I.” Knowing that we are now clean in the sight of God, through that altar which sanctifies all that it touches, we shall have all our fears removed, and then will grateful love burst out into the cry of fall surrender and complete consecration. “Here am I; send me.” Here is a man fall of leprosy, and there is a healing bath. Jehovah Rophi cries, “Who will go and publish the news of healing, sure and effectual?” He makes no answer because he is himself still full of disease; but the moment he has stepped in and perceives that he is cleansed, he shouts, “Eureka, I have found it,” and begins at once to publish the joyful tidings. He longs for opportunities to tell his story. He rests not day nor night, but incessantly publishes salvation.
“Then I will teach the world thy ways; Sinners shall learn thy sovereign grace; I’ll lead them to my Savior’s blood, And they shall praise a pardoning God.”
“Here am I; send me.” Who among you will say this in reference to missions abroad, or holy works at home? I expect to hear it come from those who love much because they have had much forgiven. The coal which purges will also fire your lip and burn the bonds which restrain your tongue. The love of Christ constraineth us. How can we be silent? The beam out of the roof and the timber from the wall would cry out against us if we did not witness for our Lord. Others may be able to be silent; as for us, we must cry out, “Here am I; send me.” I could most heartily wish that more of you deeply felt your unworthiness till it filled you with anguish, and that you felt anew the altar’s purifying flame, for then would you be fired with fervor and enthusiasm, and a great work would be done for my Lord. Fresh from a sense of sin, you would pity careless sinners; newly blessed with a sense of sacrificial cleansing, you would earnestly point men to the Savior, and the fire which kindled your life would communicate itself to many hearts.
These are the three “thens”: “then,” when I had seen God, I said, “I am undone”; “then,” when I felt I was undone, the seraph brought the burning coal and touched my lip; and when that lip was touched, and I was purged, “then” I said “Here am I; send me.” May this be a word in season to many, then will they be blessed, then will we rejoice together, and then will God be glorified.
BAPTISMIAL regeneration is one of the most baneful heresies contained within the covers of the Prayer Book. Subtle theological explanations or evasions are sometimes offered by theologians of this doctrine, but they are caviare to the multitude. It is our mournful and settled conviction that millions have been misled into the most fearful and hurtful superstition by the language of the baptismal service. There is no need to introduce the odium theologicum into the discussion of any abstract subject; but none the less do we submit that, in view of the practical heathenism which has resulted from the inculcation of this dogma, moral indignation is emphatically called for. Let any evangelical at least recall the spiritual condition of hundreds of English hamlets; let him ponder over the dim, dark notions of salvation and God which thousands of the peasantry cherish; let him multiply in imagination the picture which Tennyson draws in the “Northern Farmer,” until he has some faint conception of the widespread darkness which this teaching has produced, and if he is not angry with righteous wrath he will have reasonable ground to doubt the depth and sincerity of his own beliefs. This is not a doctrine which may be handed over to the transcendental region of spiritual metaphysics; it is eminently potent and practical, and, as we think, for little but evil. It behoves all lovers of the human race to fight a hocus pocus rite of this kind to the death, for it contains within it the essence of the narrowest sectarianism and schism. Baptismal regeneration tries to determine the eternal and primal fact of man’s divine sonship by what may be an accidental ceremonial; and by implication it leaves millions of the human race, for whom Christ died, starving in the cold of utter estrangement. The very statement of its essence, namely, that a child of God is made by the application of water in a Christian sacrament, is as shocking to the understanding as it is opposed both to the intuitions of the enlightened heart and to the broad purposes of the gospel. The intrinsic superstition of this doctrine is by itself a full justification of the stand made by Nonconformists in repudiating the Book of Common Prayer as an authority for Christian truth and teaching. — From Samuel Pearson’s “Assent and Dissent.”
THE BURIALS BILLS.
AT last Nonconformists have gained the exercise of their right to bury their dead in the national grave-yards. The concession was so long in coming that there remained no room for grace in making it, and no opportunity for thankfulness in receiving it. That has been yielded which could not have been withheld, and this is the sum of the matter. However, the struggle is over, and we are grateful for it: one less cause of stumbling now remains among Christian men.
Our earnest desire is that in no instance may anything be said or done at the grave which would be unworthy of our principles, or contrary to Christian charity. We cannot enter the grave-yard with the tramp of victors, for our dead are with us and must be borne along at a more solemn pace. In the tombs of our brethren let us bury the past; let Englishmen sleep side by side upon the lap of earth, and in their sacred quiet rebuke the foolish fears which have hitherto divided every cemetery into two hostile camps. Controversial subjects are out of place amid the chastening sorrows of bereavement: they may be wisely left for more seemly occasions. It would be wise on the part of every Dissenting minister to officiate in the churchyard exactly as he would have done in the plot of land near the meeting-house. Let him make no allusion to the parliamentary conflict, but act as though he felt himself at home in the enjoyment of what has always been his right. Let him seek the comfort of the mourners, the conversion of the careless, the edification of believers, the glory of God, and nothing else.
Here and there wild spirits will indulge in taunt and sneer, but we feel confident that from our brethren, as a whole, the clergy will receive nothing uncourteous or unkind. We would render this change so little unpleasant that our Episcopal brethren may desire greater ones. We are not Red Indians or Nihilists, and we can lay our deceased relatives in the tomb without wantonly insulting those from whom we differ, ay, and without causing them a single justifiable regret at our presence in their consecrated enclosure. Our hope is that the civilities of the grave-yard may lead on to courtesies, and these to intercourse and knowledge, and these again to esteem and Christian union; and these to happy times in which strifes between Christians shall be impossible. C. H. S.
REVIEW OF OUR WORK
When in the quiet of our sink room we read of such work as this which is recorded above, done in Australia in connection with our son and our students, our courage revives. The splendid generosities of the Gibson family, and others of our helpers in various parts of the world, are cheering evidences that the Lord knows how to provide for his own work. God bless these noble helpers, and make them partakers of our joy! All along the line we see wonderful progress, and work done which fills our soul with holy delight. We have enough success to fill the cup of a hundred servants of God to the brim, and yet we have not a drop which we could waste in self-glorying.
Bearing the banner onward before a great host we find hand, heart, and head all taxed to the utmost; sometimes, indeed, beyond their power of healthy endurance. What is it when the crippled leader lies prone in desperate pain, and absolute mental inability! Then, indeed, we cry out of the depths, and our voice is as of one in great agony.
At such times the shortness of funds and the failures of individuals become sources of worry. Of course, men will disappoint us, but faith in God will prevent our making too much of the occasional calamity. As for lack of money, the enemy hisses in the ear, “What will become of the College and the Colportage? They are not cared for by your friends as once they were, and one of these days you will find students and book-hawkers looking for their weekly moneys and none will be forthcoming!” Such a moment fell on us the other day, and forebodings fashioned themselves in horrible forms; but on a sudden we sat up in bed and laughed — fairly laughed. We saw springs rising in a desert. All around us we marked the smiling water leaping upward, and rippling to the music of silver bells. God’s resources are unfailing. He has never failed a believer, and he never will. How we reveled in the thought of sure supplies, which we knew were on the way! They have not come yet, but they are on the road. Faith sings, “My God shall supply all your need, according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.” Therefore do we bless God for all things, and out of weakness we are made strong.
C. H. S.
STRANGE NOISES IN NEW HOUSES.
In entering a new house of the modern order it takes time to get acquainted with all its pipes for water and gas and sewage, and all its arrangements for working bells and bolts and ventilators. One is apt to be alarmed at the flow of water in a direction which is perfectly correct, and to be in trepidation because gas will not turn off where it was never meant to do so. Many of the fears and tremblings of new beginners in the divine life spring from a similar cause. Everything is new to them; emotions and desires which are perfectly natural to their young life are quite surprising to them, and though calculated to give confidence to the instructed they arouse suspicions in new beginners. They don’t know the working of spiritual apparatus yet, and are confused and confounded by the simplest inward movements. They had better not be in too great a hurry to condemn themselves, but wait till they are more at home in the heavenly life, which is all plain to him that understandeth and safe to him that trusteth in the Lord.
C. H. S.
A JOURNEY TO MENTONE WITH MR. SPURGEON
BY JOSEPH W, HARRALD
(CONCLUDED)
JANUARY 12. — This morning three of our company took advantage of the continued bright weather (our diary notes that we have now had forty fine days in succession) to ascend to Castellare, a little city set on a hill. On our way up we passed Villa Mount Carmel, but saw neither the prophet Elijah nor any cloud even as large as a man’s hand. As we came in sight of the mountains that shut in Mentone on the north, we noticed that wherever there was a little spot unreached by the rays of the sun the snow that fell several weeks ago remained unmelted. So, thought we, is it with hearts unwarmed by the Sun of Righteousness, they continue cold, hard, and dead. — During our climb this morning we saw and heard more birds than we had done before since we left home. The merciless or mercenary sportsmen apparently cannot endure the sight or song of the sweet little creatures that are the charm of our English woodlands and forests. A writer who has spent several winters in the Riviera says: — “The poor little birds have a bad time of it in the South of France. Many a day have I felt grieved, when walking through the market, held until 11 a.m. in the town, at seeing robin-redbreasts, linnets, doves, pigeons, blackbirds, and thrushes all lying mingled with snipes, woodcocks, and pheasants, on the stalls.” The only hope of their being preserved from extermination lies in their withdrawal to higher regions, and more secluded groves than those frequented by the man with the gun. This was the plan that the Lord adopted for himself, and recommended to his disciples when persecutors sought to destroy them. When the people of Nazareth would have cast him down headlong from the hill on which their city was built, he passed through the midst of them and went to Capernaum to do there the mighty works which he could not perform in his own country. Some of the early Christians would have been wiser if they had remembered the words of the Lord Jesus, “When they persecute you in this city, flee ye to another”; for some of them seem to have been so anxious to be enrolled in the noble army of martyrs that they did not exercise common prudence, and in certain instances went out of their way to court persecution. There are times when it is necessary for a Christian to stand like the brave, with his face to the foe, determined to die rather than fly: but it is well for him to recollect that it is one thing for him to be cast into the den of lions as Daniel was, and quite another to hunt up the old roaring lion or one of the lesser beasts of prey, and imitate the performer at the menagerie by putting his head inside the animal’s jaws. Being sent forth as sheep in the midst of wolves we are to be “wise as serpents” as well as “harmless as doves.”
Jan. 13. — The weather to-day was illustrative of a frequent experience of the Lord’s people, for while a hot sun shone brightly overhead a piercingly keen wind was blowing all around us. How often do believers who are basking in the light of God’s countenance feel at the same moment the cutting blast of affliction or adversity, temptation or persecution! — In the afternoon we visited the quaint little town of Roquebrune, which, according to the local legend, was built on the top of the hill which now forms its most efficient rear-guard. but slipped down one night in a huge solid mass, the houses, churches, castle, gardens, and everything on “the brown rock” remaining intact, only some hundreds of feet lower down in the world. Like most other legends this needs to be taken with a good many grains of salt. — Over the door of one of the houses we observed a rough painting of the Virgin Mary with a serpent writhing under her heel, the substitution of the mother of Jesus for her divine Son and Lord being the result of the Romish version of Genesis 3:15, “She shall bruise thy head,” a version which, we are sorry to be informed, has long had the great weight of the British and Foreign Bible Society’s support in many Popish countries. We trust that this venerable society will yet see its way to refuse help to all but the purest versions. Why not?
Jan. 14. — While waiting for friends outside Dr. Bennet’s garden this morning we picked up some crystals of peculiarly fine formation. One of them especially we wished to take home, but feared it would be too heavy; so Mr. Spurgeon suggested that we should weigh it in the scales which we had at the hotel, to see whether such an addition to our luggage would be permitted without extra charge. As these scales were only intended for letters not exceeding an ounce, and the stone weighed several pounds, they were of no use. This simple illustration reminded us that it is impossible to weigh infinity in our tiny thought-scales; it can only be done by him who hath “weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance,” whose “understanding is infinite.”
Jan. 15. — Taking advantage of another “morning without clouds,” we drove to the little principality of Monaco, “the rock of joy,” name sadly suggestive to many of the joy they have lost through visiting the gaming tables, which enable the Grimaldi princeling to take rank side by side with the millionaires and monarchs of Europe. When we reached the plateau before the prince’s palace, we found that the mistral was blowing so fiercely that we were glad at once to return to a calmer and purer region. — On our way back, we noticed some terraces that, through neglect, were falling down, and so not only destroying the vines and fig-trees planted upon them, but also endangering the terraces above, which leaned for support upon them. It is thus, too, in the moral world; the effects of evil are cumulative. He who neglects salvation ruins others as well as himself. Parents often inflict irreparable injury upon their children, as well as upon themselves, by their indifference or opposition to religion. Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, not only did evil in the sight of the Lord, but he also made Israel to sin by the idolatrous example which he set both for his subjects and his successors.
Jan. 17. — Walking through the town this morning, we were deeply affected by the sight of the burden on the head of a poor Mentonese woman. She had been out gathering fuel for her fire, and was returning home bearing a bundle of withered vine branches. As we looked upon them we were reminded of our Savior’s solemn words,” and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned;” and we prayed, “Lord, cause us to abide in thee, and do thou abide in us; so shall we bring forth much fruit, and glorify the Father who is in heaven, and thus shall all men know that we are living branches, vitally united to the true Vine.” Graceless professors, like fruitless vine-branches, are good for nothing but to be burned.
Jan. 19. — Yesterday a fine breeze sprang up, and soon the paths of the sea seemed crowded with ships, though for several days previous not a sail had appeared upon the unruffled waters. This afternoon, however, dark clouds overspread the sky, and the wind became so boisterous that quite a little fleet of vessels ran for shelter to Mentone. Thus do sinners, when conscious of their danger, seek to enter the harbor of refuge for souls in distress. So long as all is fair or calm, they have no thought of fleeing to Christ; and some do not seek a shelter until the storm of divine wrath breaks upon them, and they find that they have waited until it is too late for them to escape. Others beside the Jews have realized the meaning of the Savior’s terrible prophecy, “Ye shall seek me, and shall die in your sins.” It will be in vain to look for a hiding-place when the thunders of the day of judgment burst upon the guilty and unbelieving. — Some days elapsed before the ships above-mentioned were able to put to sea again, and their enforced idleness taught us that sometimes the truest progress will be secured by the observance of needful rest. If the vessels had left the harbor while the wind was unfavorable, they would have test time, and they might have been driven on the rocks, or sunk in the depths of the sea; and Christian workers and warriors will often gain more by standing still to see the salvation of the Lord than by starting on an enterprise when circumstances are inauspicious. When temptation is howling around us, like a raging storm, our safety will consist in lying within the harbor of refuge, trusting to our anchor to preserve us from drifting into danger. Occasionally the sailor must go to sea in the teeth of the tempest; and there are times when the child of God must dash forward in spite of all opposition, or he will be counted unworthy of the name he bears. Doing this, he shall have the special presence of his Lord, and extraordinary grace shall be given to supply his unusual need while he sings —
“Fearless of hell and ghastly death,
I’d break through every foe;
The wings of love, and arms of faith,
Should bear me conqueror through.”
Jan. 21. — To-day our quiet retreat was disturbed by the noise of the young men who had been chosen by the conscription for military service. They marched or drove about the town, beating drums, waving flags, and singing and shouting as though they were returning from victory, forgetting the old soldier’s caution, “Let not him that girdeth on his harness boast himself as he that putteth it off.” After all, they had not much cause for glorying, for they had only attained to the dignity of becoming possible targets for an enemy’s bullets, or of being themselves participators in the wholesale slaughter of their fellow-creatures. Had we been liable to the conscription, we should have rejoiced if the lot had not fallen upon us: our happiness would have consisted in our being preserved from apprenticeship to “the gunpowder and glory business”; but the Mentonese conscripts were of another mind, they were even proud of the bonds with which they were bound, like those who are led captive by the devil at his will, who glory in their shame.
Jan. 27. — The finest day during our stay in the sunny south was spent in driving to Castiglione, the mountain city of which we had a distant view from the top of Castellare. The ascent was so circuitous that at one time we could count no less than eight different roads, over which we had traveled As we saw the zigzag track by which we had reached the far-away town, we had a faint idea of the feeling we shall have when we arrive at the celestial city among the everlasting hills, and, looking back upon the devious windings and twistings of our pilgrim path, exclaim, “He hath led us by the right way to the city of habitation.” — The higher we ascended the purer and stronger did the air become; and, in the same way, the nearer we are to the summit of the mount of communion with God the sweeter and clearer is the atmosphere in which we walk. — From the wall of the old town we had a magnificent view of the snow-clad mountains of the Maritime Alps.
Jan. 30. — This evening a telegram arrived from the deacons asking Mr. Spurgeon to delay his return for another week, as the weather was so dreadfully bad in England. Most providentially the Pastor was induced to consent to this proposal, for the last week in Mentone was a season of unbroken sunshine, while in our island home it proved to be the worst and last of the long winter, so that when we did come back there was little or no risk of another relapse. The change was so remarkable that we could only bless the Lord for so graciously caring for his servant, and bringing him once more to his loved work under such happy auspices.
Jan. 31. — To-day we drove through Ventimiglia, and some distance up the valley of the river Roya, to view the wonderful rocks that rise, like a colossal fortress, some hundreds of feet above the level of the sea. The road had been so much mended that it was exceedingly difficult to travel over it, and reminded us of the way that the “modern thought” gentlemen have cut up the gospel track until it is scarcely possible for any poor sinner to travel over it to reach “the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.” — While walking along the side of a little stream we discovered maiden-hair ferns and violets growing in rich profusion, although it was the last day of January. The violets betrayed their presence by their sweet perfume, just as Christians should make themselves known by the fragrance of their graces, and by their resemblance to the fairest flower in all the universe, the Rose of Sharon, and the Lily of the valleys. — Before we returned we went to inspect the village church. For some time we could not find an entrance, until, passing round to the back of the building, we saw a key hanging upon the door, and thus obtained admittance. We thought at once of Bunyan’s key of promise, which is as effectual for opening the gate of mercy as it was for unlocking the door of Doubting Castle. On coming away we hung up the key, so that those who came after us might find it, and let themselves in as we had done. This little church, so easily accessible to all who wished to enter, seemed to be an emblem of the Savior, and brought to our mind Dr. Bonar’s hymn commencing —
“I heard the voice of Jesus say,
‘Come unto me and rest.’“
Sunday, Feb. 1. — This afternoon Mr. Spurgeon preached in the French Protestant Church to an audience almost as mixed in nationality as that which the apostles addressed on the day of Pentecost. In the evening we had a short service at the hotel, for the purpose of bidding farewell to our friends who had to leave for England on the morrow. We had hoped to have accompanied them, but under all the circumstances we were well content to wait a little longer ere we took our long journey.
Feb. 4. — While we were sweltering in the heat the news came from home that our dear ones there were pinched with frost and enveloped in fog. We could sympathize with them, for in days gone by we had experienced the inconvenience and discomfort; but the Mentonese could understand very little of what our friends were enduring, for their sunny shores are seldom visited by fogs and frosts. Just so, Christians cannot sympathize with their fellow-believers in their trials and temptations unless they have themselves felt the same. This is the glory of our sympathizing Lord that “in all things it be-bored him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people. For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succor them that are tempted.” — We were amused at some of the newspaper notices and letters concerning the fog. One correspondent suggested that people should light their lamps in the day-time, and leave their blinds up, so that the poor wayfarers in the streets might not be altogether lost. This would be a new and very useful way of letting our light shine before men; perhaps some people will try it when the fogs come on again. — Some one described an incident which we commend to the notice of all Christians who think their talents and opportunities are so small that they cannot do anything for Jesus. A gentleman was standing close to Hyde Park afraid to venture across it to his usual place of business, and asked aloud if anyone could lead him to the spot to which he wanted to go. “Oh, yes,” said a blind man, “I can, and I shall be pleased to do it. The fog makes no difference to me, I can see as well to-day as when all is bright and clear; come along with me, and I will take you across in safety.” If a blind man can lead one who can see, surely there is not one child of God too weak to be of service to others who just need the help be can give.
Feb. 5. — Dr. Bennet gave us this morning a good illustration of the need of a pilot to those who are sailing over life’s stormy sea, hoping to reach the port of eternal glory. During the Crimean war a French troop-ship sailed from Toulon with twelve hundred men on board, but without a pilot. In trying to pass through the Straits of Bonifacio the vessel ran aground, but not a life was lost. There are strong currents running in these straits, and at various points the wind at times sweeps down- with great force, and unless the captain knows the track very well, or has a pilot who can tell him where to seek shelter, he is almost certain to get into difficulties. The men who had been wrecked were taken back to Toulon, and a month afterwards another large vessel was fitted out and sailed, this time with fifteen hundred men, but the captain was foolish enough to go again without a pilot; and the result was that just at the spot where the former ship was lest this one struck, and went to pieces, and not a man was saved. — After this recital Mr. Spurgeon, Dr. Hanna (the Scotch Free Church Bishop, whom we were privileged to hear most Sunday mornings during our stay abroad), Dr. Irving (Secretary of the American Presbyterian Board of Missions), and three other friends took a pilot, and went by sea to pay a farewell visit to Mr. Hanbury’s wonderful garden and palace. Two of us preferred to go “afoot,” as Paul went from Troas to Assos. Before we started we were told that if we kept close by the shore we should find the old Roman road very pleasant and comfortable, although some of our informants were a little in doubt as to whether it would take us all the way that we wanted to go. It certainly was a good hard road for a short distance, but soon the track was more fitted for the feet of wild goats than for human beings, however clear their heads or steady their nerves; and further on the only path was up in the air or down the face of a precipice, the first sight of which was quite enough for us. As speedily as possible we retraced our steps, and clambered up over rocks, stones, bushes, and other obstacles until we reached the high road near the cross to which we have several times referred. Our experience taught us that in other things beside religion, “the old Roman road” is a very dangerous one, and that the best path for all to take is the King’s highway, which leads those who tread it past the Cross to the heavenly paradise and palace whither they are bound.
In a company which comprised the son-in-law of Dr. Chalmers, a learned American doctor of divinity, and the Editor of this magazine, it will be readily believed that words of wit and wisdom flowed as freely as water from a mountain spring. As, however, there was no “chiel present taken’ notes,” the record of the day’s proceedings cannot be “prented;” but we must find room for Dr. Hanna’s story of the good old lady who on her death-bed was asked, “What would you say, if after all God has done for you, he should let you drop into hell?” “E’en as he likes,” was the reply, “but if he does, he’ll lose mair than I’ll do,” meaning that he would lose the glory of his name by the failure of his word. — Just outside Mr. Hanbury’s garden we saw some specimens of the Bombyx Processionalis, or processional caterpillar, a most destructive little creature. The moth deposits its eggs on branches of fir, lime, or other trees, and when they are hatched, the caterpillars spin a cobweb nest, in which they can live during the day in safety from their feathered foes. At night they sally forth and attack the defenseless tree which has afforded them shelter, and unless their depredations are discovered in time, soon destroy it. When they have done all the harm they can, or have been disturbed, they move off in procession to another spot, where they repeat the same process of nest-building and tree-devouring. As soon as they are detected, the branch on which they have settled should be cut off and burned, and in doing this care must be taken not to handle the caterpillars, or the fine, sharp hairs which cover their bodies will cause much pain and irritation. The sharp measures necessary for the saving of trees assailed by these insects remind us of the command of our loving Lord to cut off the offending hand or foot lest it should cause the ruin of the whole body and soul for ever.
Feb. 6. — To-day we again visited the Gorbio Valley, but did not repeat our Christmas-day experience, for the day was long as well as bright. Close by where we halted for lunch, a man was ploughing a little plot of ground, a few feet wide and a dozen yards long, with a couple of oxen. As we looked upon the heavy burdens upon their shoulders we felt that their owner could not say as our Master did, “My yoke is easy;” and we realized something of the meaning of the passage, “I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaws, and I laid meat unto them.” We saw also what Paul meant by the expression, “true yoke-fellow,” and the command, “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers.” When oxen are yoke fellows, they must be thoroughly of one mind, they must take equal steps, they must work together and rest together, they must share their burdens, and in all things sympathize with one another. — On our way back we noticed a house that was intended to be painted blue, but the artist evidently had not color enough to complete it as he commenced. At the bottom it was a dark indigo, in the middle it was azure, and the top was like diluted London milk, thus resembling some professors who lay on religious coloring very thickly at first, but gradually weaken it until they appear in their own naked ugliness True Christians “grow in grace”; and “the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day.”
Sunday, Feb. 8. — This afternoon we had some difficulty in finding a convenient resting-place near at hand, although we need not have troubled ourselves at all about the matter, for close by was a beautiful garden, which the kind owner had placed at Mr. Spurgeon’s disposal whenever he chose to make use of it, and nearer still was a pleasant olive-garden belonging to the hotel, where we might have gone every day if we had liked, but which we had never entered until this afternoon, being thus a type of those Christians who do not live up to their full privileges as believers until they are about to depart to their distant home. — Our farewell communion service was attended by twenty-five brethren and sisters in Christ. It was good to be there.
Feb. 9. — A little before noon we started on our long journey home. For several hours we had the pleasure of passing by daylight through the fine country which we had before traversed, much to our regret, in the dark. We now saw what delightful scenery we had missed, and were glad that we had another opportunity of admiring its loveliness. A pleasant ride brought us to Antibes, which we have since learned was the scene of a terrible railway accident eight years ago, because “in the darkness of the evening the danger signals were disregarded by the engine-drover. How many souls are lost through disregard of the danger-signals held forth by the Lord’s servants, and by God himself in his word! — On a hill close by stands the Hermit’s Chapel, which will always be associated in our mind with a saying of Frere Richard, the old monk in charge of the place, — “I would go anywhere to build organs for the glory of God.” What a grand sentiment, if it were always connected with a worthy object! “I would go anywhere to glorify God.” — Near Cannes we had a magnificent view of the islands of Marguerite and Honorat, the latter being named after the holy man who founded a celebrated monastery there. In this school of the priests, St. Patrick, the apostle of Ireland, was trained, and according to tradition the patron saint of the Emerald Isle learned amongst other things from good St. Honorat the art of banishing serpents, vipers, and other noxious reptiles from his adopted country. Would to God that all viperous spirits could be banished from the island which our Hibernian friends still claim to be the
“First flower of the earth,
First gem of the sea”
Two inscriptions in the abbey are worth preserving. In the lavatory, upon a marble slab, in Latin, is the following: — “O Christ, let thy right hand, which cleanses inside and outside, cleanse within what this water cannot cleanse.” In the monks’ refectory is this modern but model motto: —
“Leave all for God,
And you will find all in God.”
At Frejus we were greatly interested in the Roman remains, which carried our thoughts back to the days of the early Christians, some of whom may have been martyred in the amphitheater, of which only the ruins are now to be found, while the faith for which they died is daily winning its way among all nations under heaven. — For a considerable time we rode along through the Esterel mountains, whose red porphyritic rocks and brilliant green pine forests were a charming contrast to the somber silvery olives with which we had become so familiar and friendly. At one time these Esterelles formed an almost impenetrable lurking-place for the escaped convicts from Toulon, and other evil-doers from the neighboring country, but all that has been changed since Stephenson’s iron horse found its way into this region. — While we have been writing our steed has been rushing along, and here we are at the end of the first stage of our journey, Marseilles. Since we were here before we have met with an illustration of the old saying, “‘Tis better to bear the ills we have than fly to others that we know not of.” Here it is — “The unpleasantness of the harbor of Marseilles is well known, but it may not be as well known that this very ill odor of the waters prevents a great danger to the shipping which has escaped the perils of the Mediterranean. Some fifty years ago an effort was made to purify the waters of this port; and the Marseillais delighted in the fragrant sea-odor, so unwonted and strange to them. Alas! ere long swarthy sea-captains began to perceive that the hulls of their ships were being perforated by thousands of sea-worms, whose ravages the foul water had kept at a distance; and the danger to the vessels lying in the port became so great that at last the purification of the harbor had to cease, and the foul waters returned to taint the atmosphere, but to banish the destroying worms.”
Feb. 9 — 11. — Our long story is nearly at an end. When we left Marseilles the last trace of daylight had disappeared, so we had to occupy ourselves as best we could by the light of the carriage lamps until we turned in for the night. The temperature of our sleeping-car taught us another lesson. Our friends who returned a week before we did wrote that, notwithstanding the large fire which was kept up all night, the cold was so intense that ice was formed on the windows. The attendant did not seem at all conscious that a great change had taken place in the weather, and as a consequence he heated the air to such a degree that Mr. Spurgeon was scarcely able to breathe. It is just thus with some who are supposed to minister to our comfort spiritually, they have zeal without discretion, they take no thought of changing circumstances, they pile on their elocutionary fuel until we are almost roasted alive, when we ought to be calmly resting, or else they go to the other extreme, and because somebody wanted a window open on a hot summer’s day, they let out the fires and fling wide the doors in the middle of a winter’s night. “To everything there is a season.” — When we reached Paris at ten the next morning, it was so fine that we did not stay as we had intended, but crossed the city, and pushed on at once to Boulogne. After a good night’s rest there, our usual experience in crossing the channel, and a quick run from Folkestone to London, we arrived at home greatly benefited by our three months’ experience as traveling companion to our beloved Pastor and President.
NOTES
THE Editor has been haunted by the fear that no magazine could be prepared for October, for he has been racked with pain, and mentally unable to attend to any duties requiring thought. Seizing little intervals of comparative ease, page by page the work has been done in a broken sort of way. Friends must be pleased to overlook blunders and shortcomings, having compassion on their willing servant whose utter incapacity has been his deepest grief. Oh, for power to pursue our work: Troops of orphans, students, colporteurs, and evangelists seem to march through our poor brain both sleeping and waking. All must be left with the Lord. Where could they be better?
Heartily do we welcome the Baptist Union to spend its autumnal session in London. May the Lord be in the midst of all its assemblies. The first engagement of the Union is to visit the Stockwell Orphanage. It was most kind of the Committee so to arrange. On Monday afternoon, Oct. 4, at 2:30, Mr. George Palmer, M.P., will lay the memorial stone of the Reading House of the Girls’ Orphan. age. The town of Reading has led the way in constant kindness to the Orphanage. At one time it gets up a bazaar, and year after year it gives the children a fete. The pastor of King’s-Road vies with his leading helpers in aiding us, and the great firms of the town, such as Palmer and Sutton, are equally hearty in the cause of the orphan.
Our beloved brother, Mr. Hugh Stowell Brown, is at the same time to inaugurate the Liverpool House. By his means Liverpool has done grandly for us. We hardly think Mr. Brown would like us to tell what big, brotherly, whole-hearted deeds he has done for us. He has acted magnanimously. God bless him! Bless him in resting as well as in working. It was meet that he should in some way or other be manifestly linked with this work, since in the most quiet, unostentatious manner he has always done more than his share of it.
Now that our Baptist brethren are corning to the Orphanage, will they please note that the money given to the Boys’ Orphanage by the denomination has procured shelter for 21 ministers’ sons, and it may be worth their consideration whether some such interest might not be wisely secured in the Girls’ Orphanage. At any rate, beloved brethren, you are expected at the Orphanage with great delight, and though the sick President may be denied the joy of seeing you, his heart will be crying, “Welcome, welcome!” Oh that the good Physician’s hand may give us back our limbs again, free from anguish and weakness, and then we shall weep for joy at the sight of the rising wails of the Girls’ Orphanage.
All goes well at Stockwell. Never so many children in residence before; never better in health.
THE BOOK FUND. — We hope that the quiet, but eminently useful, work carried on by Mrs. Spurgeon is not forgotten by our friends. The bookneeding minister is always writing, and book-parcels are always going out; but friends have been sea-siding and continental-tripping, or hay-making and harvesting, and so Book-funds and. other good things have not been remembered. When they are all home again friends will say, “Let us see how that admirable Book-fund is getting on.” The needs of ministers in other matters besides books have pressed heavily just lately on our beloved wife, whose personal afflictions have made her tender for the trials of others.
On Friday evening, Sept. 3, the Annual Meeting of THE GREEN WALK MISSION was held in the Tabernacle Lecture-Hall. A letter from the pastor was read regretting that an attack of rheumatism kept him away. Earnest prayer was made for his speedy recovery. In his absence Mr. William Olney presided. A report of the last twelve months’ work was read. The following is a short summary of it: — The year has been one of much spiritual blessing. It has been the exception to hold a service at which some new case of the Spirit’s work has not been discovered. The particulars of from forty to fifty persons, who have seen the president of the mission as inquirers have been recorded. Many other hopeful cases are known to other workers. Most of these persons have joined the church at the Tabernacle. Several of the sons and daughters of the workers have professed faith in Christ. The report recited a week’s work in the mission, consisting of Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday evening services in the Concert Hall, Green Walk; and gave particulars of the Sunday-school, Mothers’ Meeting, Tract Society, Open-air Services, Dorcas and Benevolent Societies, etc. It mentioned the encouraging attendances both indoors and out. The people help in supporting the work, and the weekly offering is well sustained. Our admirable fellow-worker, Mr. W. Olney, jun., conducts this work splendidly. The great want is a fit place to meet in. In Bermondsey there are hundreds of thousands who never enter a place of worship, and are altogether untouched by religious agencies, This brother and his workers can touch them, and could move them if he had a place whereon to plant his lever. Christian merchants of Bermondsey, will you let the people perish in utter heathenism? If you cannot preach, can you not provide a large, plain building for those who can preach?
On Friday evening, September 17, the annual meeting of our home EVANGELIST’ ASSOCIATION was held in the Tabernacle Lecture-hall. We had hoped to have presided, but the return of our illness prevented us, and our place was ably supplied by our good friend and deacon, Mr. Murrell. We are informed that the meeting was the largest the Association has held, and that it was very successful in every respect. Mr. Elvin, the energetic secretary, reported that during the year 1448 services had been conducted by members of the Association on the Lord’s day, and 1135 on weeknights, or a total of 2583, whereas last year the number was 1767, and in 1878 it was 1084. These figures show that the Association is getting a largo share of the confidence of the churches of the metropolis, and supplying a great need. There are 118 speakers and singers, more or less engaged in this work, and they have spoken or sung 3448 times since the last annual meeting. The total cost of all this good work has been £ 141 6s. 2 1/2d., towards which, with the help of various friends, we have contributed £100. As the work continues to grow it is very necessary that the income should increase in the same proportion. Donations may be sent to Mr. G. E. Elvin, 30, Surrey Square, Walworth, S.E. We cannot imagine an agency which does more gospel preaching in proportion to its expenditure, and we are pleased to bear witness that it is no uncertain doctrine which is taught, nor is it proclaimed by cold hearts. We rejoice in this Society, and shall always be glad. to help it personally, and to be the channel for the help of others.
COLLEGE. — During the past month Mr. T. Whiteside has been accepted by the committee of the Home Mission for work in Athlone, and Mr. H. Wallace, for St. Heifer’s, Jersey. Mr. J. Scilley is going to Coleraine; Mr. W. Gillard to Appledore, Devon; Mr. G. H. Kemp to Alford, Lincolnshire; and Mr. W. Thorn to Loose, Maidstone.
Mr. H. E. Stone is removing from Arthur Street, Gray’s Inn Road, to the Nottingham “Tabernacle,” and our earnest prayer is that he may prove a great blessing to that town; Mr. W. Hobbs from Norwood New Town to Hamilton Road, Lower Norwood; Mr. G. D. Cox from Sittingbourne to Melton Mowbray; Mr. R. Herries from Consett to S. Shields; Mr. J. J. Irving, formerly of Swadlincote, has settled at Maidenhead; Mr. J. Foster, late of Wick, at Waterbeach; and Mr. H. W. Taylor, late of Redruth, at St. Alban’s.
Mr. F. A. Holzhausen, of New Basford, has sailed for Canada; and Mr. N. Rogers, late of Stratton, has become pastor at Jamestown, S. Australia.
Mr. A. J. Clarke, of West Melbourne, continues to send us good tidings. He has baptized 69 persons, and has received 87 into the church since he arrived; and his chapel is about to be enlarged so as to seat 950 people. As we should expect with such a pastor, all kinds of evangelistic work are prosecuted with great vigor. He also reports well of Brn. Bunning at Geelong, Marsden at Kew, Clark at Ballarat, and Garrett at Brighton, all of whom are having much success in winning souls. Our son Thomas was at Melbourne on July 18, when the Town Hall was crowded, and Mr. Clarke says, “hundreds could not gain admission.”
Sad news from Jamaica. — Our readers will have seen from the denominational and other papers accounts of the terrible hurricane which recently swept over a great part of Jamaica. Many of the stations of the Baptist Missionary Society have suffered most severely, and amongst others Mount Hermon, where our Bro. J. J. Kendon and his newly-married wife were on the eventful night of Aug. 18. We have received the following letter, which will speak for itself: —
“It was a hurricane of more than usual violence. Our dwelling at Mount Hermen was a part of the chapel partitioned off. I did not for a moment think the storm would last as long or rage as violently as it did; and accordingly went down often into the chapel to fasten up windows, doors, etc. I did not advise Mrs. Kendon to dress (she had gone to bed early, as the day was so dull and gloomy), but she got up and put on a thin dress, thinking all would soon be over. Daring the evening two of our servants were driven into our dwelling. The out-houses were wet through, and had fallen down on one of them. The storm continued to increase, so, not knowing how soon the ceiling would be down, I delayed no longer, but, taking Mrs. K. by the hand, went forth, not knowing whither I went. The wretchedness of that hour pen cannot describer We went through sleet and wind to an under part of the dwelling, between two massive walls. I found there two young men, terror-stricken. They cried, ‘Massa, pity us’. Lord, save us! with such earnestness as they had never manifested before. All round was open, we could see the lightning, and feel the wind. I expected every moment some flying splinter would strike us, and to go out into the open was, I knew, sure destruction. After some time we heard shouts, ‘Minister, minister, where are you?’ and, between the gusts, we went forth through pools of water and long wet grass to a little house four feet square, strong and compact, and into that we gathered for shelter. I was surprised at the calmness I felt then — no fear. We sang, with trembling, quivering voices, ‘Safe in the arms of Jesus.’ That has grown common and stale in English ears, but let them once view a hurricane of that nature, let them sit on a cold, wet bench, with garments dripping wet and feet clad only by thin slippers filled with water, let them hear the snapping of boughs, the roar of thunder, the crash of stones falling and rolling all around, and then the reality of faith will be seen. Old-fashioned hymns will have a fresh halo, and become doubly precious. For five hours we could not move. I was tolerably well protected, but Mrs. K. was badly off. At last daylight came; never more eagerly desired and welcomed. I went round the premises, and found the chapel destroyed, two walls down, the roof shattered, pulpit smashed. A part of the house (a lean-to) was standing, but filled with sand and plaster and water; we cleared these out, lit fires, dried clothes, and thus began as well as we could to throw off the ill effects of such a night. Three of our members were buried in the ruins of their houses and killed, and I hear on every side accounts of houses by scores demolished, and families rendered homeless. All provisions are destroyed, and without immediate help many must starve. England must come to our help. I shall take a list of all our people who have houses down, and I think from report they will number one out of every five or six. To-day our service was exceedingly solemn and impressive, we began and ended with the doxology. The people are ruined. It will be years before they reach the state of comfort of former times. England never knows such scenes. She should show her gratitude by helping those who do suffer thus, and this I trust she will do. Pray for us that we may bear patiently the heated furnace. From yours in gospel bonds,
“J. J. KENDON.”
Our brother, Carey B. Berry, who is over in England for the benefit of his health, also informs us that three of the chapels connected with his station, — Sligo-ville, Passage Fort, and Kitson Town — have been completely destroyed: and Mr. James Tilley, a former member of the Tabernacle church, writes that his chapel and house at Oberlin are in ruins.
We shall be very glad to receive contributions for either of our brethren who have suffered in this terrible time of visitation. The calamity is of sufficient dimensions to call for a national subscription, but meanwhile we ought to be helping at once cases which are so well I known and so closely bound to us as these are.
EVANGELISTS. — Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at Galashiels have been a great success, the whole town seems to have been moved, and many were led to decision. Just in the midst of the meetings unusual solemnity was given to the services by the arrival of tidings of the death of the absent Pastor, Brother Chas. Hill, who had gone to Saltcoats for the benefit of his health, but was suddenly called home to be for ever with the Lord. We are greatly grieved to add that he leaves a widow and five children unprovided for. What is to be done? The Orphanage can no doubt find a home for a boy, but much more is wanted. What painful want comes before us, and when our best is done how much sorrow remains!
Our Evangelists have since visited Sel-kirk, Dunoon, and Wick; and this month they go to Paisley.
Mr. Burnham has been laboring among the hop-pickers in Kent during the past month until summoned to what proved to be the death-bed of his wife. From our inmost heart we sympathize with this beloved and useful brother. May the comforts of the Spirit abound towards him! He asks us to say that he is fully engaged up to June next year.
Mr. Parker has been preaching and singing in Dublin. Thus England, Scotland, and Ireland have been simultaneously visited by members of our College Society of Evangelists.
ORPHANAGE. — The total amount received or promised for the Girls’ Orphanage Building Fund to Sept. 14 is £10,416 3s. 7d.
The quarterly meeting for collectors, which we had intended to incorporate with the stone-laying, will be held a little later in the year. Full particulars shall be duly announced.
We have decided not to hold the proposed bazaar in aid of the furnishing of the new institution until next year. We shall then want it well done, and therefore we announce it now, that the time may be long enough. If we live till Christmas, 1881, we hope to see a great help given to our funds by a Bazaar, and it will be at the tune when we anticipate pressing needs!
COLPORTAGE. — Last month we reported seventy colporteurs actually at work, and we are glad to say that the following additional districts have been added to the list: — Norwich, Islington, Sunderland, and Swaffham (Cambs). Some difficulty is found in getting men qualified for the work. Applicants are numerous, but really suitable men are rare. The tact and ability requisite for gaining access to all classes of the people, and making good sales among them, combined with such experience in Christian work, as will enable a man to utilize every opportunity for acting as an evangelist, are only occasionally met with. Men who fail in other kinds of business, or who look upon colportage as a stepping-stone to some higher post, are unlikely to succeed in this laborious and most difficult work. But a man full of zeal and love to Christ, who sees the evil of the hurtful literature which abounds, and the advantage and importance of trying to substitute that which is good and helpful, and who longs for the opportunities to work for Christ which are presented by colportage, and for which previous experience has qualified him, may apply for appointment as a colporteur, with hope of success. Should there be no vacancy when the application is made, we are glad to have the names of such men recorded against they are needed.
The quarterly reports received from the colporteurs this month are unusually interesting and encouraging, and speak of sinners brought to Christ both by the written and spoken word. Good has been accomplished both by the roadside and in the field; in the cottage, and chapel, and also in the open air. Think of over seventy men at work every day whose sole business it is to scatter the truth and speak to men about the interests of their immortal souls! Pray for them, for they ask your prayers; help us by your gifts, for they are needed, and will encourage us in the work.
The following is a brief extract from the letter of our colporteur in a recently-started district: — “One village where I have been three times only, the people seem almost ready to eat me, pack and all. It is a very poor place indeed, but the last time I was there I sold three Bibles and four Testaments, besides a few other things, and have hymn books and Bibles to take next time. A poor old man told me the other day he was very thankful to God that I had come to visit him. He showed me a tract that I had given him two months before, which had led him to Jesus; he had entirely defaced it with using it so much. I am glad to tell you that our services are well attended, the chapel is almost packed, and men who have never been before are coming regularly to hear God’s word.”
We are at this present moment so ill supplied with funds for the general work that we are slowly but surely eating up the capital, and unless we have increased subscriptions the President will feel burdened in spirit. This lead he desires to cast upon the Lord, whose glory is the one aim of the society. Surely the Lord’s people will be moved to keep this work going; or must we step by step retreat, abandon station after station, and leave many villages with their last light quenched? It must come to this before long if we fall to enlist the sympathy of our brethren in this enterprise. And yet — No, it cannot be.
PERSONAL NOTES. — A missionary to the Karens, who is the editor of a monthly paper circulated in Burmah, is commencing the translation of our sermons for the Karen Christians, of whom he says there are now 20,000 baptized believers. The first to be translated is “The Unknown Ways of Love.” (No. 1293).
A friend who was staying at Buxton recently tells us that two ladies who were there had distributed more than a thousand of our sermons to the visitors, workmen? and servants whom they met. Only one person refused to accept the sermon offered, giving as a reason that his physician would not allow him to read it!
Our son Thomas writes: —
“I received a visit in Geelong from a man who produced from his pocket a torn and discolored copy of the Australasian, dated June, 1868, which contained a sermon by C. H. Spurgeon, entitled, ‘The Approachableness of Jesus’ (No. 809). To this sermon my visitor attributed his conversion. He lived alone about twenty miles from Geelong, and had not entered a place of worship more than four or five times in twenty years, and had taken to drink until delirium tremens seized upon him. When partially recovered, with not a human being near, his eye lighted on the newspaper. Then he read the sermon, which went to his heart, and ‘Sir,’ said. he, ‘I’ve never touched the liquor since. I can’t tell you how grateful I am to your father, but I thought the best way for me to do honor to the father was to tell his son of the blessing the printed word has been to me.’ The good man told us that he had lent the paper a good deal, but it seems almost past it now, its yellow pages hardly hold together. Almost daily am I hearing such happy testimony as this. It did Bro. Bunning and myself so much good that I thought the preacher would like to hear it too, and Sword and Trowel readers can share the joy.”
A brother in Christ in Massachusetts writes to us: — “A gentleman gave three volumes of your sermons to an Irish boy; he gave them to a friend of mine, and this friend was anxious that I should read them. I did not want to read the dry stuff, but she pleaded so hard that I took one to please her. I had only read a few lines when I was convicted of sin, but I was about two years before I received the assurance of forgiveness. One day, as I was reading your sermon on ‘The Blood’ (No. 228), light came, I understood what faith was, and I believed, and was saved. I do all the good I can with your sermons by lending them to others, and praying to the Lord to bless them.”
“A poor hard-worked, underpaid country evangelist” writes: — “I have a wife and four children, and an income of £60 a year. When I received my month’s salary I sat down quite disconsolate, for I had a doctor’s bill to pay, as well as bills for provisions, coals, shoes, etc. I was indeed under the shadow, but I took up your magazine, The Sword and the Trowel, for March, and, in reading your short sermon, ‘Under his Shadow,’ the dark cloud seemed to pass away. My heart was cheered in the fact that he who has been my help will shelter his family beneath his divine wings.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle — August 19th, fifteen; 30th, eighteen; September 3rd, thirteen.
PASTORS’ COLLEGE, METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE.
STATEMENT OF RECEIPTS FROM AUGUST 15TH TO SEPTEMBER 14TH, 1880.
Giver | £ | s. | d |
A friend, per Rev. W. Thorn | 0 | 2 | 0 |
Mr. A. C. Apperly | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs. De K | 0 | 10 | 0 |
A friend, per Rev. G. Wright | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Collection at Rugby Baptist Chapel, per Rev. H. T. Peach | 5 | 12 | 6 |
Mr. T. W. Smith | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Mrs. McIntyre | 0 | 2 | 6 |
A sister, Bankhead | 0 | 2 | 6 |
Stamps, from Glasgow | 0 | 1 | 0 |
Mr. Edward Dyer | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Mr. Charles Ball | 10 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. Henry Speight | 0 | 10 | 6 |
Mr. Johnson, Abingdon, per Mr. A. Wood | 1 | 0 | 0 |
The Misses Dransfield | 2 | 2 | 0 |
Mr. Herbert Trotman . | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Collection at Clarence-street, Landport, per Rev. D. Asquith | 1 | 15 | 0 |
Mr. and Mrs. Penny | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. Charles E. Tidswell | 0 | 15 | 0 |
Mr. A.H. Scard | 0 | 2 | 6 |
Rev. S. N. Honan | 2 | 0 | 0 |
A friend in Scotland | 25 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. F. W. Lloyd | 10 | 10 | 0 |
Mr. Holdron | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Miss E. Antliss | 0 | 6 | 6 |
Mrs. Stone, per Mr. G. H. Carr | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Collected by Rev. J. T. Almy, Ryde | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. F. W. Brackett | 0 | 5 | 0 |
Weekly Offerings at Met. Tab. — August 15 | 35 | 6 | 6 |
August 22 | 40 | 0 | 0 |
August 29 | 45 | 8 | 0 |
September 5 | 30 | 0 | 0 |
September 12 | 30 | 7 | 6 |
— | 181 | 2 | 0 |
| £258 | 11 | 0 |
.
STOCKWELL ORPHANAGE.
STATEMENT OF RECEIPTS FROM AUGUST 15TH TO SEPTEMBER 14TH, 1880.
Giver | £ | s. | d |
Mrs. Mundy, per Mr. G. Cox, Bath | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Collected by Miss Walker from friends at New Cross, per Rev. D. Honour | 1 | 5 | 6 |
Master Frank Oakley | 0 | 2 | 0 |
From friends in Eskdalemuir | 0 | 5 | 0 |
M. Bloxceidge | 0 | 1 | 0 |
Per Rev. W. V. Young, Tring Collected by Miss L. J. Smith | 12 | 2 | 3 |
Collected by Miss Mead … | 7 | 9 | 6 |
Collected by Mrs. Chapman | 1 | 8 | 3 |
Mrs. Lawman | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Miss Lawman | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Mrs. Hayter | 0 | 2 | 6 |
Collected by Mrs. Vernon Peskett | 0 | 16 | 0 |
“Staines” | 0 | 2 | 0 |
Box at Tabernacle Gates, per Mr. Murrell | 2 | 6 | 10 |
“Asympathizer for the orphans” | 0 | 1 | 6 |
“Yorkshire Crown,” per Mr. Hyde Mr. Richey Lundy, per Rev. W. Fearon | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. Thomas Lewis | 2 | 2 | 0 |
E.H.G. | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. A. Thomson | 0 | 5 | 0 |
Mr. P. Bainbridge | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Collected by Mr. G. Anderson | 1 | 3 | 6 |
A Sermon Reader | 0 | 2 | 6 |
Mr. G. Steele | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Chap 9. NOVEMBER, 1880.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
NOVEMBER, 1880.
GATHERED BY C. H. SPURGEON.
SWEET FRUIT FROM A THORNY TREE
WHEN our heavenly Father “puts his hand into the bitter box” and weighs out to us a portion of wormwood and gall in the form of bodily pain, we very naturally ask the reason why. Nature suggests the question at times in petulance and gets no answer; faith only asks it with bated breath and gains a gracious reply. Our Lord has a right to do as he wills with us, and his dispensations are not to be challenged as though he were bound to give an account of his doings at the bar of our bewildered reason. Still, with the full persuasion that the Lord ever acts in love and wisdom, we may inquire into his design, and so far as experience can help us we may see what comes of the suffering which he inflicts. What are the “comfortable fruits of righteousness” which are produced by watering the soul from the bitter lakes? What are the jewels of silver and gold with which we are adorned when we come up from the Egyptian bondage of pain and weariness? I, who have of late been a prisoner of the Lord in the sick chamber, would witness my confession as he enables me.
Pain leaches us our nothingness. Health permits us to swell in self-esteem, and gather much which is unreal; sickness makes our feebleness conspicuous, and at the same time breaks up many of our shams. We need solid grace when we are thrown into the furnace of affliction: gilt and tinsel shrivel up in the fire. The patience in which we somewhat prided ourselves, where is it when sharp pangs succeed each other like poisoned arrows setting the blood on flame? The joyful faith which could do all things, and bear all sufferings, is it always at hand when the time of trial has arrived? The peace which stood aloft on the mountain’s summit and serenely smiled on storms beneath, does it hold its ground quite so easily as we thought it would when at our ease we prophesied our behavior in the day of battle? How have I felt dwarfed and diminished by pain and depression! The preacher to thousands could creep into a nutshell, and feel himself smaller than the worm which bored the tiny round hole by which he entered. I have admired and envied the least of my Lord’s servants, and desired their prayers for me, though I felt unworthy of the kind thoughts of the weakest of them. We are most of us by far too great. A soap bubble has a scant measure of material in it for its size, and most of us are after the same order; it is greatly for our good to be reduced to our true dimensions. It is comfortable to be small, one has more room and needs less, and is better able to hide away. When storms are out a low bush or narrow caves may shelter a sparrow, while a larger bird must bear the beat of the rain and the wind. To be nothing, and to feel less than nothing, is most sweet, for then we cower down under the great wings of God as the little chick beneath the brooding hen, and in utter helplessness we find our strength and solace. Nothing goes but that which ought to go; the flower falls, but the seed ripens; the froth is blown away, but the wines on the lees are perfected. When nought remains but the clinging of a weeping child who grasps his Father’s hand, nought but the smiting on the breast of the publican who cries “God be merciful to me a sinner,” nought but the last resolve, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him,” no real loss has been sustained, say rather, a great gain has come to the humbled heart.
Heavy sickness and crushing pain shut out from us a thousand minor cares. We cannot now be cumbered with much serving, for others must take our place, and play the Martha in our stead; and it is well if then we are enabled to take Mary’s place as nearly as possible and lie at Jesus’ feet if we cannot sit there. With me it has been so. That beloved congregation and church, I could do nothing for them, I must perforce leave them with the great Shepherd and those dear associates whom he has called to share my burden. Those orphans, how could I watch over them? Those students, how could I instruct them? Those colporteurs, how could I provide for them? What if funds run low? They must do so; I could not increase the flow of the brook Cherith, nor even find out a widow of Zarephath, whose barrel of meal and cruse of oil should never waste. The Lord must do all or it must remain undone. The weary head could only exaggerate the need; the sinking spirits could not suggest a supply. All must be left; yes, must be left. The reins drop from the driver’s hands, the ploughman forgets the furrow, the seed-basket hangs no longer on the sower’s arm. Thus is the soul shut in with God as within a wall of fire, and all her thought must be of him, and of his promise and his help; grateful if but such thoughts will come, and forced if they come not just to lie as one dead at the feet of the great Lord and look up and hope. This cutting loose from earthly shores, this rehearsal of what must soon be done once for all in the hour of departure, is a salutary exercise, tending to cut away the hampering besetments of this mortal life, and make us freer for the heavenly race. It is well to have the windows shut which look towards earth and its cares, that we may be driven to that fairer prospect which lies on the other side of Jordan. This is not the natural effect of pain, but when the Spirit of God works by it the help that way is wonderful.
Sickness has caused many workers to become more intense when they have again been favored to return to their place. We lie and bemoan our shortcomings, perceiving fault where it had in healthier hours escaped observation, resolving, in God’s strength, to throw our energies more fully into the weightlest matters and spend less of force on secondary things. How much of lasting good may come of this! The time, apparently wasted, may turn out to be a real economy of life if the worker for years to come shall be more earnest, more careful, more prayerful, more dependent upon God, more passionately set upon doing his Lord’s business thoroughly. O that we could all thus improve our forced retirements! Then should we come forth like the sun from the chambers of the east, all the brighter for the night’s chill darkness, while about us would be the dew of the Spirit, and the freshness of a new dawning. Sickness would be as a going into the desert to rest awhile, or as a bath from which a man arises with shining face. O that it might be so with me! My Lord, vouchsafe it for the sake of the many to whom these hands must yet break the bread of life. They say that pearls are bred in the oyster by disease; may our graces be such pearls. Falling leaves enrich the soil about the forest tree, would God that our weeping autumns would yield as fairer springs, and larger growths. May the divine Spirit cause it so to be! If but one or two of his people shall profit by my keen pains I will thank him heartily.
Pain, if sanctified, creates tenderness towards others. Alone it may harden and shut up the man within himself, a student of his own nerves and ailments, a hater of all who would pretend to rival him in suffering; but, mixed with grace, our aches and pains are an ointment suppling the heart, and causing the milk of human kindness to fill the breast. The poor are tender to the poor, and the sick feel for the sick when their afflictions have wrought after a healthful fashion. One could have wished to give the gruff, unsympathetic boor a twist or two of rheumatism, were it not that our experience would make us for pity’s sake spare even him. Surely they who first founded hospitals were not always well themselves. Grief has been full oft the mother of mercy, and the pangs of sickness have been the birth throes of compassion. If our hearts learn sympathy they have been in a good school, though the master may have used the rod most heavily, and taught us by many a smart. To those who are teachers of others this is of the first importance, for none can bear with the infirmities of others if they have not been made compassionate, and filled with a fellow-feeling for the faint and the trembling. The keys of men’s hearts hang up in the narrow chamber of suffering, and he who has not been there can scarcely know the art of opening the recesses of the soul. Instinctively the believing sufferer turns to the Lord Jesus, because he has been tempted in all points like as we are; and in a lesser degree he naturally looks most hopefully to those of his brethren who have been most compassed with infirmity, and most familiarized with anguish. Happy is the man who has been afflicted if the Holy Spirit shall thereby make him a son of consolation to the mourners in Zion.
I find my scarcely-recovered mind cannot continue this meditation much longer, and therefore, omitting a score of thoughts which would naturally suggest themselves to any devout person, I will only add that pain has a tendency to make us grateful when health returns. We value the powers of locomotion after tossing long upon a bed from which we cannot rise, the open air is sweet after the confinement of the chamber, food is relished when appetite returns, and in all respects the time of recovery is one of marked enjoyment. As birds sing most after their winter’s silence, when the warm spring has newly returned, so should we be most praiseful when our gloomy hours are changed for cheerful restoration. Blessed be the Lord, who healeth all our diseases. JEHOVAH ROPHI is a name much treasured by those who know the Lord that healeth them. Gratitude is a choice spice for heaven’s altar. It burns well in the censer, and sends up a fragrant cloud, acceptable to the great High Priest. Perhaps God would have lost much praise if his servant had not much suffered. Sickness thus yields large tribute to the King’s revenue, and if it be so we may cheerfully endure it. Bow down frail body and faint heart, if in the bowing ye can yield what ye had never produced if ye had stood erect in manly vigor. Bruise, Lord, the spice, which else had kept its sweetness slumbering and useless. This is not a hymn, but yet it has heaven’s poetry within it, even this agonizing cry, “Nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt”; and it is a delicious result of trial if in this hearty utterance we learn to imitate our Lord, and to have fellowship with his sufferings. Here a great ocean opens up before us: pain may aid us in communion with our much suffering Lord. Anything is a boon by which we are made more fully to be partakers with him. But we cannot pursue the theme. As when the mariner in northern seas forces his way through an ice-blocked strait, and sees opening up before him a boundless sea, even so do we perceive great truths to which our subject leads the way; but our vessel has so late been tempest-tossed that we can enter on no venturous voyage, but must cast anchor under the shelter of Gape Fellowship, and leave our readers to push onward into the blessed depths. May the good Spirit fill their sails, and bear them into the expanse of holy fellowship.
“THERE’S SUNLIGHT AT THE CROSS.”
WE toiled up a cold ascent, shivering in the shade, and we were cheered in doing so, for on the summit stood a cross gleaming in the sun. No sooner had we reached that cross than we were in the full warmth of an Italian day. Courage, poor sinner; press forward to the cross of Jesus; sunlight is there, and all the genial summer of God’s love shall smile around you. Believe and live. — From “The Spurgeon Birthday Book and Autograpic Register.”
NOTES
WE spoke in great physical weakness and pain at the meeting of the Baptist Union, and we do not wonder that certain of our remarks were not thoroughly understood. Our desire for the union of all Christians is intense. We have no sympathy with isolation, bigotry, and division; on the contrary it is our joy to have, on every occasion in our power, joined in many united movements for the advance of the Redeemer’s kingdom. No one has been laid under greater obligations to charity than we have been, for the generous courtesies of many denominations have been most heartily accorded us. This was not the point which we were driving at. The unity of Christendom is one thing, but the breaking up of the various religious bodies is quite another. Under the notion of creating union we are urged to be undenominational: that is to say, to complete the walls of Zion we are advised to pull down those lengths of the wall which are already completed. Certain “brethren,” who are of all men the least united and the most sectarian, cry out against “system,” “sects,” “parties,” etc., as if they were not themselves the fiercest of partisans. They do not practice or promote Christian union one hundredth part so much as these whom they stigmatize as denominational. It is a hollow cry intended to subserve the purpose of the sheep-stealers, who can prey best on scattered flocks. Unity is the pretense, but the breaking up of useful organizations is the object aimed at.
Some of our own brethren, who are far from being one with the Plymouths, are, nevertheless, fascinated by them, so far as to unite in their cry, — in their own instance a genuine though a mistaken one. But the idea, come whence it may, is preposterous. We are to become one by being broken into fragments! It seems to us that for believers to unite with each other for practical purposes cannot be an evil thing. If they find that by reason of divergent opinions they cannot work with one body of Christians it must be a wise thing for them to join with those who are of the same mind. Thus various regiments are formed in the one army, and we all pray that Christian love and the teaching of the Holy Spirit may so abound that these regiments will be more and more united and mingled, till even apparent division shall cease. To break up the ranks in order to unite the army would be a foolish procedure. It is true that there are too many denominations, and that it will be a glorious time when all divisions cease. To promote this end let every denomination disband itself when it perceives that it is not faithful to Christ and his commands; but let those who are united in Christ, and in his doctrine and ordinances, never dream of giving up their union with each other, or their defense of every word of their great Leader.
Let each Christian cultivate abounding love to all the saints, even to those whom he judges to be in error upon certain points. Let him work with all believers as far as he can, but let him obey the ordinances of the Lord’s house, and maintain the faith once delivered to the saints. To do this he will find it needful to join to the fullest degree with those like-minded, for he may not for unity’s sake pollute his conscience and be a partaker in superstition or error. Let him pray that the church to which he belongs may be taught the whole truth, and that all other churches may be instructed in the same manner, for this is the way in which all the churches will become openly one. We will do anything for love and peace except sacrifice truth, and disregard the will of the divine Lord.
The day on which the stones of the Reading and Liverpool Houses of the Stockwell Orphanage were laid turned out to be one of the wettest order. No one could attend the ceremony without an umbrella, and even under that protection there was great danger of getting soaked by the drippings of your neighbor’s umbrella, which would persist in running down your back. Mr. Palmer, M.P., and Mr. Hugh Stowell Brown were not to be hindered in their good work by the steady downpour, and we owe them both a great debt of gratitude for the whole-hearted way in which they entered into the matter. Reading has done gloriously, and Liverpool is not behind, for Mr. Brown, for himself and friends, presented a cheque for two hundred and fifty guineas. Unable to be present in the pouring rain, we were delighted to hear of the brave way in which our fellow-helpers stuck to their posts, though some of them wet to the skin; and we were greatly gladdened by the warm manner in which the Orphanage was spoken of by our saturated and satisfied visitors. A brighter day would have seemed better, but no doubt it was best that it should be otherwise. If it pleased the great Patron of orphans it ought to please us: surely the Father of the fatherless would do no hurt to those under his own peculiar care. We think it highly probable that the ministers and delegates will remember the Orphanage all the better, and will take care that the institution is never left high and dry for want of funds.
On the night of Sunday, October 17, thieves entered our study and plundered it. If, therefore, any letters received late on Saturday contained money they may have been stolen. We do not think that there were any such, but as our visitors threw all our papers and documents into indescribable confusion we cannot be certain. Any omission which may occur in our accounts for November or December may possibly be caused by this painful event. Our gratitude to God is great that no violence was permitted, and that no large sum of money was taken.
On Wednesday evening, Sept. 29, about 300 friends gathered in the College Lecture Hall, by invitation of the Tabernacle Sun-day-school Young Christians’ Association, to listen to “Illustrations of Old-fashioned Singing,” by a select choir. Mr. S. Wigney, who had arranged for the evening’s program, made a few explanatory remarks to the young Christians present, referring to the characteristics of the old tunes, and calling attention to the beauty of their harmonies. He expressed his attachment to them, and the hope that a revival of their use both in the home and in the congregation might take place. The illustrations given by the choir consisted of a Lonsdale, Tranquility, Hampshire, Calcutta, Queenborough, Westbury Leigh, Bradley Church, Twyford, Refuge, Bermondsey, Leach, Gabriel, and Poland. The audience seemed much delighted in listening to the tunes of bygone days. For our own part, we like best a mixture of new and old, but certainly the old-fashioned times suited a fervor of devotion which is scarce in these days. Ridicule has been poured upon them, but it is principally by persons with more music than grace.
On Monday evening, Oct. 18, the annual meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE MATERNAL SOCIETY, was held in the Lecture-hall. The Pastor presided, and Messrs. W. Olney, Carl and Moung Edwin, a Karen brother, spoke on behalf of the society. During the year 235 poor women living around the Tabernacle have been supplied with a box of linen, visited, and relieved. What a sphere of service lies open to Christian ladies in connection with their poor sisters! Happy are they who take delight in compassion. Those who for Christ’s sake sow in charity shall reap in mercy. On Tuesday evening, Oct. 19, the annual meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE LOAN TRACT SOCIETY WAS HELD IN THE LECTURE-HALL, UNDER THE ABLE CHAIRMANSHIP OF OUR GOOD deacon, Mr. W. Olney. The number present at the tea was much larger than usual, and the meeting altogether was very successful. Mr. Woods, the energetic secretary, reported that 100 districts are now worked by 98 distributors, who visit 3,640 families every week, and carry to them the pastor’s sermons. He also mentioned many encouraging cases of conversion which had resulted from the efforts of the visitors, and stated that a sick fund amounting to about £12 had. been commenced during the year for the relief of special cases of distress. Mr. Harrald, the treasurer for the past year, presented the balance sheet, which showed that the total receipts had been £55 12s. 4d., and the expenditure £50 16s., leaving a balance of £4, 16s. 4d. in hand. At the last annual meeting, the society was considerably in debt. Addresses were delivered by the chairman, Messrs. Dunn, Tomkine, and Bowker, and some of the distributors. It is no small joy to know that thousands of our neighbors are by this society brought into contact with one or other of the friends of Jesus every week, and have left in their houses an appeal to their hearts. Best of all is the fact that the sermons are read and that men’s minds are, through divine grace, impressed by them.
COLLEGE. — During the past month Mr. L. R. Foskett has settled at Shepton Mallet, and Mr. J. L. Bennett at Wood-green. Mr. A. A. Saville has left us to continue the work commenced by Mr. Osborne at Carlisle. Mr. E. J. Parker has completed his college course, and now intends devoting himself to the work of an evangelist. He has a powerful and melodious voice, and sings the gospel most effectively.
Thanks to a generous friend, we have been able to send £50 each to our brethren in Jamaica, and smaller amounts are coming in. It must need a great deal to rebuild the chapels and houses destroyed, but every little helps. Still, another large sum, or several such, would help very much more.
To our intense regret our brother, Mr. Stubbe, is obliged to leave Allahabad. He is suffering from extreme debility, and must come home. We were rejoicing that so many of our students were prospering in India. and this is a dash of bitter in the cup. When Mr. Stubbs has returned and recovered, any home church will find in him a valuable pastor.
Our brethren in Spain report progress in Vigo, Corunna, Morgadanes, Arteigo, Pontevedra, and Villagarcia, and ask for our prayers.
Mr. Cook, Kingston, Ontaria, sends us good news of his work, and mentions that over 100 of our sermons are being circulated by the young people of his church every week.
Mr. Harry Wood writes that the Lord has greatly blessed his labors at Saddle-worth, S. Australia. The membership has been trebled, and the chapel debt paid off during his first year’s stay, and he is now collecting money for necessary alterations.
By last intelligence our son Thomas was making a tour in Victoria and Queensland, preaching the gospel to large assemblies.
Evangelists. — The Scotch papers which have been sent to us, give good reports of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services in the north. Even the silver cornet seems to have been welcomed. One writer says: “On hearing it the prejudices of a lifetime melted away, and men, and women too, who before the evangelists came would with deep and cherished convictions have resented the introduction of instrumental music, were soon swelling with hearty chorus the grand volume of praise.” The services at Galashiels are described as the most successful evangelistic meetings yet held in that town. At Dunoon large congregations gathered in the Burgh Hall and United Presbyterian churches, and much good was done. While
making up the notes, our brethren write from Paisley that they are having splendid meetings in St. George’s parish church every night. They are this month paying a long-promised visit to Leamington.
Mr. Burnham has been resting during the month, and trying to regain his spirits after his recent sorrowful bereavement. He hopes soon to be in full work again, but he is not strong.
POOR MINISTERS’ CLOTHING SOCIETY — Mrs. Evans asks us to mention that she is very grateful for two parcels of old clothing received from “Readers of The Sword and the Trowel.” They could not be acknowledged by letter, as there was no address sent with them. Suitable material for dresses, and under-clothing, and garments of all kinds, are very gratefully received by poor ministers’ families.
PERSONAL NOTES. — A lady who is engaged in Zenana Mission work in India writes to us: — “One of my outdoor pupils is a Mahometan lady. On my first visit to her house I had a long talk about religion with her husband, who confessed that he was favorably impressed towards Christianity, but not converted. I lent him a volume of your sermons, and on my next visit he said to me, ‘I have read half the book you lent me, and I like it very much. I think it will be the means of my conversion,’ and then he exclaimed, ‘If this preacher would only come to India, everyone would believe and be converted, and I do wish the whole world was converted to Christ.’“ Alas! India needs far mere than any human preaching. May God bless those who are laboring there, and give them abundant fruit.
At the close of a recent service in the Tabernacle two Russian ladies came into our vestry and presented us with one of our sermons in their own language. On the back of it was a list of nine other sermons issued by the same publishers. Thank God for opportunities to preach by the press in Russia.
The Editor of the French monthly, L’Echo de la Verite, writes that the translations of our sermons recently published in France have been much valued. As an instance he mentions that a poor woman having read the sermon on “Lot’s Wife,” (No. 1,491), which had been lent to her, and thinking it was impossible to get another copy, actually copied it with her own hand from beginning to end, in order to be able to read it again and to lend it to friends. M. Andru says that he will print the translation of our sermon on “Salvation by Works, a Criminal Doctrine,” as soon as he has the money. The excellent friends who manage this work have everything requisite except cash to buy paper and pay for press work.
One of our students writes as follows:-”You will be glad to know that one sister here, who is to be baptized shortly, found peace while reading your sermon on ‘Peace: a Fact and a Feeling’ (No. 1,456).”
One of the members of our congregation writes that she was converted under our ministry, and at once commenced to send the sermons to her friends. She sends us the following letter from her cousin: — “My dearest cousin, — I will now answer your very kind letter. You will have some gems in your crown for all the comforting words you have spoken to me. We do not know how deep a word sinks into a heart, therefore we ought always to speak for Jesus, wherever we are. I have written to you to-day on purpose to thank you for your earnest pleadings to God on my behalf, and to tell you he has answered them. Last Sunday evening it was very wet. I wanted to go to chapel; but my parents thought it unwise for me to go, so I stayed at home. Looking into a drawer I saw a lot of Spurgeon’s sermons. I commenced reading one, entitled, ‘Peace: a Fact and a Feeling’ (No. 1,456). As soon as I had finished, the light began to dawn on my soul. I see it all now. Instead of taking God at his word, I was trying in my own strength to become better. After I had read the sermon I went to my room, and poured out my complaint: Jesus listened, and renewed my heart.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle, Sept. 30th, seventeen.
PASTORS’ COLLEGE, METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE.
STATEMENT OF RECEIPTS FROM SEPTEMBER 15TH TO OCTOBER 14TH, 1880.
Giver | £ | s. | d |
Mr. John Nuttall | 1 | 0 | 0 |
G.M.R | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Miss Goff | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Miss Traill | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Pastor B. Smith | 0 | 10 | 0 |
J.B | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Mr. G. E. Ardill, New South Wales … | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. and Miss Bloom, New South Wales | 3 | 0 | 0 |
Rev. G. H. Rouse | 1 | 1 | 0 |
MAN. | 1 | 10 | 0 |
Mr. J. Hassall | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. W. Seth Smith | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Banknotes from Lurgan | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Collection at Kingsgate-street Chapel, Holborn, per Pastor R. F. Jeffrey … | 4 | 14 | 6 |
A member of the Church of England… | 0 | 8 | 0 |
Mr. J. Tritton | 10 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs. Robins | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs. Raybould | 1 | 0 | 0 |
“Emma” | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Mr. Alfred Chamberlain | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Mr. Spriggs | 0 | 5 | 0 |
Collection at Shooter’s-hill Chapel, per Rev. H. Rylands Brown | 0 | 12 | 6 |
Mrs. Alfred Walker, per Rev. G. Duncan | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mr.A.H. Scard | 0 | 2 | 6 |
Mrs. M. J. Horwood | 1 | 4 | 0 |
Mr. J. Seivwright | 1 | 0 | 0 |
A sermon reader, Cookstown | 1 | 0 | 0 |
A Christian lady, “for good works” | 50 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. J. N. Crossland | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs.Meary | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. W. H. Balne | 0 | 14 | 0 |
Mr. W. Rooksby | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs. F. M. Freeman | 0 | 5 | 0 |
Annual Subscriptions:— Mrs. Gardiner | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. J. Pentelow | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Weekly Offerings at Met. Tab.:— September 19 | 34 | 9 | 5 |
September 26 | 11 | 12 | 6 |
October 3 | 29 | 4 | 8 |
October 10 | 27 | 7 | 0 |
— | 102 | 13 | 7 |
STOCKWELL ORPHANAGE.
STATEMENT OF RECEIPTS FROM SEPTEMBER 15TH TO OCTOBER 14TH, 1880.
Giver | £ | s. | d |
Mr. John Nuttall | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs. Traill | 5 | 0 | 0 |
A lover of Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons | 0 | 10 | 0 |
W.S.M. | 0 | 2 | 6 |
G.M.R | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. J. Leeson | 3 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. John Sarjeant | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Mr.G. Milligan | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. John Rennison | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Miss Ann Aldred | 1 | 0 | 0 |
A 1over of Jesus | 0 | 5 | 0 |
R. Joyce and A. W. Bridges | 0 | 2 | 0 |
Friends at Bradninch, per Pastor T. G. Strong | 0 | 5 | 0 |
R.E.M | 0 | 7 | 6 |
Mr. R. Thomson | 2 | 2 | 0 |
Mr. J. Alexander | 0 | 5 | 0 |
Mr. A. Pearson | 0 | 1 | 0 |
Collected by Master W. F. Hinsche | 0 | 16 | 0 |
Mr. and Mrs. Rawlings | 50 | 0 | 0 |
Chap 10. DECEMBER, 1880.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
DECEMBER, 1880.
CLOSING THE YEAR
THE old question, “Watchman, what of the night?” comes to us from many anxious hearts at the close of the year, even as it has done aforetime. The watchman’s reply is given in a hoarse voice, for the fog has damped him, and the cold thank God, the central fire is burning on. He does not place great faith in his own judgment, and answers with trembling accents. Perhaps a younger and nimbler guardian of the night would give a merrier answer, but he who is muffled up to keep a little warmth within him, and feels the frost in every limb, is not likely to exaggerate in the direction of cheerfulness. Those “waits,” across the road, who are being inwardly execrated by sleepy householders, may sing their carols, and blow their curious mixture of brazen nuisances, but the watchman’s tone does not pretend to be musical, its only excellence is that it is gruffly honest. Truth to tell, the watchman is growing weary of the night and of all that comes of it, and is longing for the everlasting morning when he will exchange “watch and pray” for “rest and praise.”
“Still, watchman, what of the night?” Well, the night is a mixture, — stars and clouds, glimpses of the moon and hidings of all light; winds, showers, cold gusts, and interludes of silver shining. It is not all well nor all ill. At best there is nothing to make a man covet the watchman’s place, and at worst there is nothing so terrible as to drive the weather-beaten watcher from his post. Times have been worse, and it were well if they were better.
The happy signs are by no means hard to see, and therefore we leave them to be dwelt upon gratefully by fluent tongues. Our side of the has entered unto the outer coats of his soul, though as yet, task shall be that which is least pleasing, and therefore least likely to. be attended to. It is the watchman’s duty to mention two things which seem to him to bode no good to the church of God. One is the abounding doubt among professing Christians, and mainly among a certain class of ministers who aim at being thought “intellectual.” Young men from college, for lack of whiskers, display their critical ability as an evidence of their manliness, and that ability runs mainly in the line of evaporating the gospel from every text which contains it. Afraid of being unnoticed, they affect disdain of the oldfashioned truths which fed their fathers, and endeavor to win distinction by repeating at third hand the sophisms of skeptics who have been dead and buried for half a century. Older men have in some cases set them an ill example, but the youths have generally outrun their leaders, and having no discernment have leaped into the ditch from which wiser runners have started back.
It is not that there is in the churches an anxious investigation of the meaning of Scripture and a desire to conform all creeds to the Word of God: that were a hopeful sign indeed. But the foundations are assailed, the Bible is itself attacked, and its inspiration more than questioned. Once let this go, all is gone. Our great sheet anchor is the infallibility of divine revelation. Hence the vital importance of certain controversies in the Free Church of Scotland. It is not that a professor has said this or that of Holy Scripture, or that sundry expressions used concerning inspiration are to be deplored; but the weight of the sorrow lies in the spirit which could treat the sacred book irreverently, and lay it down upon the critical block to be chopped up. as though it were a carcase from the shambles. When tutors set before young men the example of judging inspired Scripture as though it were the product of Burns or Byron, there will not come much good to the church of God from the institutions over which they preside. Most of the mischiefs of the churches commence in the colleges. These can be fountains of orthodoxy or sinks of heresy; and much will depend upon those who teach. O that in all denominations this matter were laid to heart!
Bereft of the very basis of truth, stripped of faith, and tormented by’ teachers of doubt, the church will soon be in a sorry plight unless her Lord shall visit her by his Spirit and give back to her the simple confidence in his word which is her strength. May those who know the truth stand fast, and this evil will yet be overcome.
A second and equally serious omen of ill, is the worldly conformity of the present day. We hear of dancing parties in Christian families, and we are told of indulgence in frivolities of the vainest order; it is even darkly whispered that among certain Dissenters the card-table and the theater are no longer judged severely as once they were. If these things be so, the glory has indeed departed. Thank God, there is a remnant whose raiment is clean, but it is to be feared that many have defiled their garments. “Come ye out from among them! Be ye separate,” is an old-fashioned text which some even among Nonconformists do not regard: they act as if they were eager to be conformed to the world, and to taste of as much of its pleasures as possible.
The watchman’s heart is heavy as this last cloud chills him. He more and more abhors the hypocrisy which would serve Christ and Belial. Let men be one thing or the other. If they love the world, let them follow after it, and not pretend to be Christians; and on the other hand, if they serve Christ, let them not put him to an open shame by their inconsistencies. The line of demarcation between the church and the world cannot be too definite, and he who goes about to shift it is doing the devil’s business. Ye pastors, do your duty! Warn the flock, and make it uncomfortable for the wolves! Ye deacons and elders, cease not by your holy conversation to keep the young from dangerous pastures! Ye that love the Lord, see to it that ye grieve not his Spirit.
The watchman ends his husky talk by wishing at the close of 1880 to all who hear him,
PEACE FROM THE GOD OF PEACE!
HYMN OF SPECIAL THANKSGIVING FOR 1880.
O LORD, we glorify thy grace,
So rich, so full, so free:
Who in their trouble seek thy face
Thy power and love shall see.
Wide o’er the land a heavier cloud
Came year by year to lower,
And late our hearts with fear were bowed
Of yet a darker hour.
In opening spring our hope was bright,
‘Twas bright in summer’s bloom;
Then followed storm, and flood, and blight,
And shaded all with gloom
Thy mercy with thy judgment strove,
But mercy won the day:
Against thy wrath rejoiced thy love,
And death for life made way.
Lord, when thy hand is lifted up
The scoffers will not see;
And when thy bounty crowns their cup
They bring no thanks to thee.
But we will bless thy glorious name,
Thy patient care we praise,
And to extol thy matchless fame
Our joyful anthem raise.
Enthroned beyond the starry host,
Amidst thine angels strong,
O Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
Accept our grateful song!.
Hopton Rectory, Thetford, Henry Downton.
4th Sept., 1880.
REMOVING
WE have often been advised to rise from Nightingale Lane to higher ground, to escape a portion of the fogs and damps which hang almost always over our smoky city. In the good providence of God we have been led to do so, and we are now upon the southern heights. We did not seek out the place, but it came into our hands in a very remarkable manner, and we were bound to accept it. We have left the three-windowed room on the right, which has been so long our study, and the delightful garden where we were wont to walk and meditate. Not without many a regret have we transferred our nest from our dear old home to the Hill of Beulah.
What a type of our departure out of this world is a removal from an abode in which we have lived for years! Many thoughts have thronged our mind while we have been on the wing from the spot where we have dwelt for more than twenty years. Our musings have worked out the parallel between our change and “the last remove,” and here are the notes of it. On such a day we must quit. There is no altering it; we mast leave all the dear familiar chambers, and the cozy nooks, and comfortable corners. The matter is settled, and there is no altering it; therefore, take another look round, and prepare to say farewell. Just thus shall it be when the inevitable decree shall go forth, “Arise ye and depart, for this is not your rest.” There will be no evasion of the order, no lingering, even for an hour, beyond the time. We are summoned by an authority which must be obeyed.
The warning being given, the dwelling becomes a mere lodging, a place in which we are no more inhabitants, but transient visitors. The whole character of the house is altered, and we ourselves act a different part; the freeholder becomes a temporary tenant, and the child at home changes into an expectant traveler. Were we fully alive to the fact of our approaching death, our position in this body and this world would be far other than it often is; we should no longer regard ourselves as fixtures, but as strangers and sojourners, soon to be removed.
When the actual flitting is near, the furniture begins to be packed up, stores are arranged in cases, and all things are set in marching order. We have scarce a table to eat at, or a chair to sit upon, for we are on the move. So will our last hours call for a setting of the house in order, and a preparing to depart. Small comfort will earthly gear afford us then; in fact, there will remain nothing which we can rest upon, nothing will abide in one stay. Our hearts must cherish a good hope of a new and better mansion, or they will have a wretched time of it in the hour of departure.
We are going, and we leave the dear old house with keen regrets; it would he a pity if we could do otherwise, for it would appear as if we had been unhappy in our abode. It is natural that the soul should be loth to quit the body in which it has resided so long.
“For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey,
This pleasing, anxious being e’er resigned,
Left the warm precincts of this house of clay,
Nor cast one longing, lingering look behind!”
The joy of the believer is that he will be no loser by his removal; he has elsewhere a house not made with hands, eternal in the heaven,;; he will not be houseless, but will enter into his everlasting habitation. Away there, on the hill-tops of glory, stand the mansions which Christ has prepared for them that love him. Shall we dread the hour when we shall take possession of our palace? Nay, rather let us look forward with joyful expectancy. This, indeed, is a notable par; of removal experience, this looking forward to the new home. Our minds are up and away in the house which we are to occupy for the future, and this takes away regret at leaving the old abode. O to have one’s heart and mind in heaven? Let us already sit in the heavenly places with Christ Jesus, for this he has raised us up together with himself.
Reader, when you have to remove from earth, have you a dwelling place in heaven? You are only a tenant at will to the great Lord of all, and you may have notice to quit at any time; if such notice came to-day, where would you go? Have you ever considered this question? Or will you take a leap in the dark? If you have no mansion above, is it not time you considered your latter end, and the dread alternative of endless joy or misery? A little thought may save a tempest of remorse, therefore sit still a while and consider the world to come. Remember, that both for this world and the next your best friend is Jesus, and that if you trust him he will surely save you. No time can ever be better for the beginning of that trust than this very instant.—From Spurgeon’s Almanac for 1881.
The Gentle Heart: a second series of “Talking to the Children.” By ALEXANDER MACLEOD, D.D. Hodder and Stoughton.
A LIVING and devout spirit breathes in every page of this book, and makes it fragrant with the richest perfume. The sweet odors of the Rose of Sharon float about the atmosphere as soon as you begin to read it. It is no less valuable for its literary merits—it is not only the product of a devout heart, but also of a refined and scholarly mind. We have been fascinated with the originality and beauty of its thought, charmed with the simplicity and elegance of its language, enriched with the store of its illustrations, and blest in spirit through its abundant manifestations of “the truth as it is in Jesus.” It is meant for children, and the good Dr. has caused his doctrine to drop as the rain, and distill as the dew; but others beside children will read it to great profit. There are here topics for teachers, subjects for preachers, and lessons for all.
Doom Eternal: The Bible and Church Doctrine of Everlasting Punishment. By Rev. Junius B. REIMENSNYDER. Philadelphia: Nelson S. Quincy.
AN admirable work. Nothing can. be more orthodox or more convincing. We should like to see the book issued by an English publisher. For clear, solid reasoning we hardly know its equal upon this tremendous theme.
The Popular Commentary on the New Testament. Edited by Dr. PHILIP SCHAFF. VOL. 2:T. and T. Clark, Edinburgh. THE second volume of the “Popular Commentary” is as good as the first. The work promises to be truly useful to the mass of readers who cannot labor through the huge tomes among which some of us live and move and have our being. The illustrations and maps are excellent, and as far as we have been able to judge by reading here and there, the comments are sound and instructive. The best of authors here unite to give information helpful to the general reader. Each volume is 18s., and there will be four to the New Testament. The books are handsomely and strongly bound.
Jenny and the Insects; or, Little Toilers and their Industries. With 26 Illustrations by GIACOMELLI. T. Nelson and Sons.
FINER illustrations could not be produced. The subject is one which needs to be made familiar to children, for they know so little about insects that boys torture them, and girls scream it’ one of them comes within a yard. Anything is good which teaches our savage race to love all things that live. We thank Mr. Nelson for introducing us to bees and beetles, crickets and caterpillars, not as pests to be exterminated, but fellow-creatures to be known and admired. Like all Mr. Nelson’s productions, the book is elegantly got; up and splendidly printed.
NOTES
The Editor has little to record of work done by himself, for he has again had to lie in the trenches instead of going down to the battle. Still, all is well. In answer to prayer health is returning, and his hope is that he shall be able to labor on through the winter wit]sent going abroad.
We cannot help recording our obligations to Mr. Sowter, of the Hydropathic Institution, Beulah Spa. He is our next door neighbor, and we have had his careful attention in the use of Turkish, vapor, and chemico electric baths. Others who are similarly afflicted would find it to their advantage to come under Mr. Sowter’s care.
We may, perhaps, by mentioning this fact, save some of our friends the trouble of writing to us about remedies of all sorts; it is very kind of them, and we are very grateful, but we cannot try a hundred things at once. For the present we give these baths such attendance as we can.
Mrs. SPURGEON’S BOOK FUND is distributing hundreds of volumes of our works among poor ministers of the Church of England, and we are rejoiced greatly to find them so glad to receive them, and so heartily pleased with them. It is no small thing to feed those who have to feed. others.
Our only trouble about this blessed work is the continued slackness of means for making the distribution. Our beloved wife looks up expectantly, but for some few weeks her faith has been tried. Usually with the demand comes the supply; but just now many ministers are craving for books, and the stores are very short. Still, there is no total drying up of the stream, and the distribution does not cease, for which let God be praised. He will doubtless take care of his own work.
On Monday evening, Nov. 15, the annual communion in connection with the London Baptist Association was held at several centers in the metropolis, and one of these was the Tabernacle. Most of the Baptist ministers of the district met for tea before the public gathering, and held a fraternal experience meeting, cheering each other, and entering into most loving fellowship. The attendance at the service was considerably affected by the excessive storminess of the weather, but there was, nevertheless, a large muster. Mr. Spurgeon was able to preside, and to address the assembly upon the subject of the separateness of believers from the world. Many neighboring ministers took part in the proceedings of the evening, of which we have heard believers say, “the Lord was there.” The more of holy, happy, hearty intercourse among the servants of God the better for them all.
COLLEGE,—Mr. W. J. Taylor has been accepted as a preacher in connection with the Evangelization Society; and Mr. C. E. Stone has accepted the pastorate of the church which now worships in the Laminas Hall, Battersea. He hopes soon to build a new chapel, and there is both room for it and need for it, for Battersea increases at a marvelous rate, and is not adequately provided for as to religion.
Mr. W. J. Dyer has removed from High Wycombe to Bridgnorth; Mr. W. H. Smith, of Tenterden, to Beccles, Suffolk; Mr. R. P. Javan, from Warkworth to New Basford, Notts; Mr. D. E. Evans, from Wolverhampton to Lodge-road, Birmingham; Mr. A. H. Collins, from Milton, to Selly Park, Birmingham; and Mr. E. Spanton, from Caxton, Cambs., to Dawley, Salop.
On Friday afternoon, Oct. 29, Mr. J. Gelson Gregson gave an address to the students on his proposal for the evangelization of the English-speaking population of India. Mr. Spurgeon stated his anxious desire to send then to India, and his bitter regret that he had not the means to do so, a legacy which he had hoped to spend in that direction being now a matter of litigation. The English and half-caste people of India present a fine field, full of promise; but without means what can be done? Men, also, fit for this service are scarce.
Our colored brother, Mr. T. L. Johnson, has safely reached America, and commenced work in soliciting help and exciting sympathy for missions in Africa. Mr. and Mrs. Richardson are still plodding on at Bakundu.
Mr. Hamilton is building his new chapel at Cape Town. As he will have to pay the builder £200 per month he writes that he will be glad of the help of English friends. Any amounts entrusted to us will be duly forwarded. The work of God in CapeTown in building up a vigorous Baptist Church in so short a time is marvelous in our eyes, and we cannot but believe that the silver and the gold will follow where the hand of God has led the way.
Mr. S. Fairey, late of Gawler, S. Australia, has removed to Parkside, one of the rapidly growing suburbs of Adelaide, where, inconjunction with Mr. C. H. Geede and other earnest Baptists, he has formed anew church, and erected a chapel to seat 400 persons. He tells us that at the annual meetings of the South Australian Baptist Association, recently held, our brethren W. C. Bunning, of Geelong, and ‘F. Hibberd, of Sydney, attended as delegates from the Victorian Baptist Association and the New South Wales Baptist Union, and Mr. Fairey adds, “right nobly did they acquit themselves. They remained in the colony for two weeks, preaching in our churches, and speaking at our meetings. They have done a good work, and gained the esteem, and confidence, and admiration of all. We are all better for their visit, and they profess to have received flora us like good. . . . There were some nine Pastors’ College men taking part in the meetings, and men of whom, I venture to say, the College need never be ashamed.”
EVANGELISTS. — Messrs. Smith and Fullerton have been at Leamington during the greater part of the past month, and there, as in other places they have visited, the chapels and halls were too small for those who wished to hear them, and many received the truth sung or spoken by our brethren. On the second Sunday of their stay they had 1000 working men at the afternoon service, every one of whom received one of our sermons on leaving. The experiment was so fully appreciated that at the request of the men it; was repeated on the following Lord’s Day. The noon prayer meetings and afternoon Bible-readings have been largely attended, and the spiritual results are expected to be most cheering. Three meetings were held daily, and on. Sunday, 14th ult., no less than nine services were conducted by one or other or both of the Evangelists. They report that they hope to send up a large thank-offering, which will be very acceptable, as the receipts for the Evangelization I work recently have been much below the expenditure. Just as we are making up the notes Pastor S. T. Williams sends us the following telegram:— “Glorious finish here! Nine meetings by Evangelists. Numbers turned away at each service. Many saved. Local expenses all met. A thank offering beside. Praise God!”
Mr. Burnham recommenced work on Oct. 17, by preaching to a crowded congregation at Fivehead, where he was formerly pastor, and where he had baptized his late wife. He believes the service was not in vain. On the following Sunday evening our brother ministered to the church in our house at” Westwood.” From Oct. 25 to 31 he was at Chiswick, where in spite of unfavorable weather many met to hear the word, and some received it with joy. Mr. Burnham conducted a very successful series of services at Thurleigh, Beds., from Nov. 7 to 12. So earnestly had the Christians prayed and worked that the Evangelist found both chapel and schoolroom filled with eager listeners, who had been attracted from no less than seven different villages. Pastor G. Chandler bears testimony to the blessings received by saints and sinners, and adds, “Our dear brother has won all our hearts, and his visit has been greatly blessed to the cider branches of my dear family.”
This month Mr. Burnhan is engaged at Charlton Kings, Highgate, and Winslow.
ORPHANAGE.—The quarterly Collectors’ Meeting was held at the Orphanage on Friday, Nov. 12th. The President had intended to have been present, but found as the time approached that it would not be safe to venture out. We learn that there was a large attendance of collectors and friends, and that a very enjoyable evening was spent in listening to the recitations and singing of the boys and girls, and an address from Mr. Charles-worth, who presided over the evening meeting. The collectors brought in about £150, for which we are very grateful, as our general contributions recently have been small, although our expenses have increased rather than diminished; and when the houses for the girls are completed they will be nearly double what they are now.
Christmas at the Orphanage.—Please, dear friends, do not forget to send special donations for Christmas. We like to break up the monotony of the year by here and there a holiday, and Christmas is the special festival of the twelve months. The expenditure of that day has hitherto been always met by loving gifts from those who like to see children enjoy themselves, and we beg to put them in mind that Christmas is coming on very rapidly now. All sorts of good things will be gratefully received at the Orphanage, or money to buy them can be sent re, Mr. Spurgeon, Beulah Hill, Upper Norwood.
Services of Song by the Orphanage Choir.—On Wednesday evening, Nov. 10, the orphan boys gave a service of song at the Baptist Chapel, Southend-on-Sea, and as the result Pastor J. G. Wilson has sent us a cheque for £18. This is grand help, and we are truly thankful for it. Other congregations might do the same without the slightest loss to themselves.
On Nov. 16 Mr. Charlesworth and his choir started for a fortnight’s tour in Devon and Cornwall. They are to hold meetings in Exeter, Torquay, Plymouth, St. Austell, Truro, Falmouth, Helston, Penzance, Liskeard, and Taunton. On Dec. 14 an evening of song is to be given at Mr. Brock’s chapel, Hampstead. Thus our young friends are doing their best to help themselves.
COLPORTAGE.—The work of the Colportage Association is very encouraging just now. From the commercial point of view the results recorded represent a large amount of plodding hard work by the Colporteurs. During the last three months the value of the sales effected was £1851 18s. The greater part of this was realized by the sale of Bibles and testaments and small periodicals and books, ranging in price from a halfpenny to a shilling. These have often been delivered under very discouraging circumstances—flooded roads, long and wet journeys, and people needing much persuasion to buy, and having little money to spare, are obstacles surmounted which add to the estimate formed of such a fair measure of success achieved. The seed of the gospel has thus been scattered broadcast in 73 different districts in England and Wales, some at once taking root, and some, like the lighter seeds which are borne by the wind to more distant fields, to bear fruit which shall be found after many days. Beside the immense good which the distribution of such numbers of Bibles, books, etc., must accomplish in pro-riding an antidote to the evil literature which abounds, and creating a taste for better reading, there are not wanting instances of direct conversion to God in the several departments of Christian service connected with the valuable work of the Colporteur. “A word spoken in season, how good it is,” and the Colporteur is always ready to speak such words. One writes:—”The word is blessed by the wayside. I always carry tracts with me, and give to the people I meet on the road, and speak a word where I can. A man overtook me the other day with a horse and a wagon. I put my box (knapsack) on, and walked by his side, and read the book by Mr. Spurgeon, called ‘ The Bible and the Newspaper,’ explaining its contents, how it spoke of the terrible sight of seeing souls ushered into eternity without a moment’s warning, and how important that we should believe on Jesus Christ, etc. The man seemed deeply touched, he bought the book and asked me to call at his lodgings at any time, and he would buy others. I asked Lira to give his heart to Jesus Christ.” Another Colporteur writes:—”I am happy to say in my district the circulation of impure literature is decreasing. One woman has given up ____ and _____, and has begun to take the monthlies from me instead. The “Christian Age” is being taken and read by a young man instead of _____. A song book has been given up by a young girl, and a hymn-book used instead. A man to whom I gave a tract has been led to Jesus. Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons have been made a blessing to an aged man who has recently died in my district. I am glad to say that our chapel here (in which the Colporteur preaches) is always nicely filled, and great attention is given to the Word of God.” No agency surpasses Col-portage for meeting the special necessities of a district. The book-selling is an introduction, to the people, and the details of the work can be arranged according to circumstances. But it must ever be borne in mind that it is a missionary enterprise, and while it accomplishes a large amount of work for a small expenditure, cannot be self-supporting. Hence the need of constant and regular subscriptions to the general fired, which will be thankfully received. There are several districts in which a good work is carried on by the Colporteur, but the people are poor, and sufficient local aid cannot be obtained. It will only be by additional help to the general fund that the committee can continue some of these, and they await the assistance of friends of the work, who they feel sure will not allow any restriction in its operations.
METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE UNITED CHRISTIAN BROTHERS’ BENEFIT SOCIETY.—This Society has been for some time duly registered according to the Friendly Societies’ Act, but we did not like to recommend it, as so many similar societies had been broken up after continuing for several years. Having now submitted the rules, terms, etc., to the judgment of a competent actuary, and received from him a very satisfactory report upon them, we are pleased to be able to say on his authority that the Society is based upon sound financial principles, and if carefully managed there is no reason why it should not go on for any number of years. It may be well to state that it is not available for persons in the country; it is only intended for those who live in London. All particulars can be obtained of the Secretary, Mr. B. B. Blake, 76, Queen’s Road, Peckham, S.E.
PERSONAL NOTES.—”A Lay Visitor” has sent to The Montreal Daily Witness the “Touching Story” of a young Scotchman who recently died it. the General Hospital in that city, after suffering from an internal disease which baffled the skill of the doctors. He says it was a delight and a privilege to visit and converse with the sick man, for salvation through faith in the Crucified was the theme he most loved to talk about. The “Visitor” then adds “The one and only matter of his reading, next to the Bible, was Charles H. Spurgeon’s sermons: of these he near tired. Biographies of eminent Scotchmen, like Norman Mac Leod and William Arnot, were taken to him, but as he put them aside he would say, ‘Spurgeon is always the same, but always satisfying, for he makes you forget himself as he holds up Him who is fairer than the children of men.’“
One of our subscribers writes from Essex:—” I cannot help telling you that I have long taken your sermons, and my dear husband, who is now seventy-two years old, has read them, and the Lord has blessed them to him. He is suffering from chronic bronchitis, so that he cannot attend any place of worship. It is his greatest pleasure to read a sermon every Sabbath morning, and I believe he is, through reading them, a new creature in Christ Jesus.”
Last May we inserted eight notes of in. stances of the usefulness of our sermons which had come under the notice of one of our evangelists. He has sent us the following additional items, from which, as before, we omit names and dates:—
(9.) Mr. P—, a farmer, whose guest I was near N—, told me that he had for years been a secret disciple. Twenty years ago he heard Mr. Spurgeon at Cheltenham. During the discourse Mr. S. referred to some Christians who seemed ashamed to come out boldly and own themselves on the Lord’s side; then in pathetic tones Mr. S. looked straight at Mr. P , exclaiming, “Is this thy kindness to thy friend?” This completely broke down friend P , who wept like a child under it; and led him at once to return and confess Christ by baptism, and unite with the church, of which he is now a deacon.
(10.) At M____ I asked an old man if he was on the Lord’s side? “Oh, yes; eighteen years ago I found the Lord through hearing Mr. Spurgeon preach on ‘ Repentance.’“
(11.) At E—, during his address at our service, Bro. B—, of E. instanced the case of a man, who, the week previous, called him in to see his dying wife. The dear old soul was very peacefully passing away. Expressing her joy at seeing Mr. B—, she said, “I am very happy; I have no fear; it is all gone; all is well. A good old man connected with your church used, before he went to heaven, to call weekly, and leave me Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons to read; and through reading these, I was led to feel myself a poor lost sinner, and to trust in Christ as my Savior: and now he is with me, and all is well?”
(12.) When at E—, Bro. H and I were out distributing tracts and handbills in the neighboring village of O . One old lady asked us in, and commenced blessing and praising God for answering her prayers, etc. We wished to know the meaning of her words, and she said, “Oh, sir, I am too old and feeble to get out, and scarcely ever does anybody come to see me. I live hero alone, except for the company of my heavenly Father. Well, this morning I did earnestly ask him to send me some spiritual help by the way to-day, and he has sent you, bless his dear name? And do you get no comfort and no spiritual food now you are debarred the public means of grace? Oh, yes, sir; bless the Lord! I have a feast every week indear Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons. I read them over and over again. I should not know what to do, and should never get a crumb if it were not for these sermons; and they are feasts to my soul.”
(13.) At D____, a Primitive Methodist minister recently said to Brother W___, “If Spurgeon were to die I should suffer a tremendous personal loss, an irreparable loss.” “Indeed; why? Do you know Mr. Spurgeon? Is he a personal friend of yours? …. No, I have never seen him, never written to him; never heard from him; yet I seem to know Mr. Spurgeon, to love him, to hold constant intercourse with him through his weekly sermons. I regularly read Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons the last thing before going to preach on Sunday mornings, I have done so for years; and to lose them would be an irreparable loss.”
(14.) At A____, the church clerk has got tired of hearing the same sermons year after year from the parson, who turns the pile annually, so he takes in Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons regularly, for Sunday afternoon reading: he is the only man in A who takes them in.
(15.) At W— , the most energetic man in Christian work is Mr. A——. He has been the means of doing an immense amount of good. He was brought to a knowledge of the truth through reading Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons, “Heaven and Hell” (Nos. 39—40), twenty years ago, on Hackney Downs. Recently, on his birthday, Mr. Abought one thousand copies of these sermons, and scattered them for miles about here. These have gone into distant parts, and remote corners, that his hardly likely he can ever know here the real good done by them; but he has heard already of two or three conversions through them.
(16.) Here is an extract from a letter from E—:—”Just a line to tell you that I am very happy again. The ‘ plague of my heart’ is gone this very morning. It has been depressing me for weeks, and I had begun to think that there was no hope left for me; but that I should carry it to the grave. The Lord be praised!’ The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin.’ Please excuse this hurried note now, as I want to write out that which has done me so much good, namely, Mr. Spurgeon’s sermon,’ The Plague of the Heart’ (No. 1489). He little thinks what joy it has given one this morning. Oh, how I thank the Lord for putting it into his heart to preach such a sermon? “The writer also enclosed £1 as a thank-offering for the Evangelists’ Fund, ‘, From one recently saved.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle.— October 28th, thirteen; November 1st, twenty-three; November 4th, eleven.
Chap 11. A RECORD, PREFACE, 1881.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL
A RECORD
OF
COMBAT WITH SIN AND OF LABOR FOR THE LORD.
EDITED BY C. H. SPURGEON.
1881.
“They which builded on the wall, and they that bare burdens, with those that laded, every one with one of his hands wrought in the work, and with the other hand held a weapon. For the builders, every one had his sword girded by his side, and so builded. And he that sounded the trumpet was by me.”—Nehemiah 4:17, 18.
.
PREFACE.
KIND READERS,—Throughout another year you have sustained satisfaction, and few, if any, have favored me with a compliant, I feel encouraged to believe that you have been pleased with my monthly issues. It was once observed in my hearing by a friend who wished to account for my fulfillment of numerous duties, that, as for the magazine, it was a merely nominal thing to be the editor, for few editors ever saw their magazines till they were in print, However this may be as a rule, it does not contain a spark of truth in my case, for I have personally superintended every page, and I do not think a single line of the magazine has passed through the press without having been. read by me. Whether I succeed or not, I certainly do not delegate my task to others. If I had more leisure I am sure I could do better, and it is with unfeigned satisfaction that I find my subscribers contented with what I can procure for them.
The SWORD AND TROWEL has been the happy means of uniting in gracious service a band of gracious givers and workers, who now for these 17 years have joined to aid the institutions which, though they locally surround the Tabernacle, are really the offspring of a congregation which is found scattered throughout all lands. By means of this warm-hearted brotherhood the -Pus/ors’ College has been sustained from year to year, until some six hundred ministers have been educated in it, the most of whom are still faithfully preaching the old-fashioned gospel in which they have been trained. In connection with this enterprise three brethren have been supported as evangelists, and their itinerant labors have been signally successful. Testimonies that churches have been aroused, and sinners converted by their means, have been plentifully sent in, and these pages have been increased in interest thereby. Hundreds of thousands have heard the gospel through this instrumentalist..
The Stockwell Orphanage originated through an article in this magazine, and from time to time its support has been mainly supplied by its readers. During the past year the houses for the girls’ side have been completed an, partly furnished; and at the present time the first detachment of little ones has entered into occupation. More remains to be done by way of furniture for other houses, and the further contracts for the infirmary, baths, and outbuildings have to be met, but it is a great comfort to have seen the project so far in progress, and to feel assured that all that is yet required will be forthcoming in its season. The Bazaar which is so soon to be held will, we hope, secure the amount needed to bring the enterprise up to thenext stage, and then we may lay our plan for the final outlay on the chapel of the Orphanage, and a few other necessaries. All that has been done has been accomplished without personal solicitation, or the allotment of votes, or the dissemination of heartrending appeals: it has sufficed the magazine; and as very many of you have expressed your to lay the case before the Lord in prayer, and then to mention it to his people in plain and earnest terms, and the funds have come in with marvelous regularity, the larger amounts having been timed to meet the hour of need as exactly as if the whole went by clockwork. The hand of the Lord is in this thing, and to him be glory. That this institution has brought honor to God is plain enough, for many a time those who would have abused our ministry have admitted that; a good work has been wrought, and have had no heart to revile. There is a something about orphan work which wins the sympathy of the most careless, and none can tell till the last great day how many have been by this means led to think well of the gospel, and next to hear it and experience its power.
The Colportage Association has held on its most useful course. It has been sustained with difficulty, for somehow it does not chime in with the tastes and views of large donors, but its influence for good is second to no existing agency. Where there are not enough Dissenters to support a minister, or where ministers are unable to cover large and scattered districts, the colporteur makes his way with his pack, and speaks word for Jesus at every door, either by personal conversation or by leaving a tract. Besides this, he preaches by the roadside or in village chapels, gets up temperance meetings, visits the sick, and above all sells good books. This society, and several other useful works, report themselves in these pages, and enlist good friends thereby.
Mrs. Spurgeon’s Book Fund quietly pursues its beneficent course. It is putting sound theology just now upon the shelves of many a poor curate and ill-paid minister, and this it does so largely that it would be a miracle of a strange sort if it did not greatly affect the ministry of the day. That the sermons distributed and the “Treasury of David” furnish material for preachers is saying very little: that they hi, ye evangelized the tone of many has been confessed in numerous instances, and is true of far more. Brethren and sisters, you have aided me so far in a benevolent enterprise of no small dimensions, and I hope I have in no degree lost your loving confidence. Continue, then, to bear me up in your prayers, and to sustain me by your contributions. More can be done, and more should be done. Every living work is capable of growth; every work which has God’s blessing upon it is under necessity to advance. Our watchword still is FORWARD. Possibly we cry forward more often than pleases those who lag behind. Some time ago I asked for men and means to send evangelists to India; one man only offered, and that one man was sent. Up till now I have had sufficient money, and I believe that when more men offer I shall have larger funds; but here is room for prayerful up-looking to the Lord. Brethren, pray for us. I would fain live to the utmost of my own life, and I would draw out from all my brethren more and more for God’s glory by the propagation of the gospel, the alleviation of suffering, and the arousing of the church. Thanks to all helpers, and a thousand blessings,
From their hearty friend,
C. H. SPURGEON.
December, 1881.
A DESPAIRING SOUL COMFORTED
THERE lived lately at Tilbury, in Essex, a gentleman who was a long time under such an eminent degree of despair, that he rejected all comfort that was tendered to him by any hand, and would not suffer any to pray with him; nay, he sent to the ministers and Christians that lived near him, and desired them, that as they would not increase his torments in hell, they would cease praying for him. He would not suffer any religious services to be performed in his family, though formerly himself was much in the use of them. Yet, God gave him at last such inward refreshings, and by degrees filled him with such abundance of heavenly comforts, that he told all who came to him that it was impossible for any tongue to utter, or heart to imagine, his joys, unless they had felt them. At last God gave him “the new name, and the white stone, that none knows but he that hath it,” Revelation 2:17. He lived about three-quarters of a year, enjoying heaven upon earth, and then breathed out his last in the bosom of Christ.—THOMAS BROOKS, 1608—1680. [We quote this, not to excuse despair, but in the hope that some one who has long been shut up in the iron cage may take heart and believe that the bars can yet be broken. Jesus can set free the prisoners.—C. H. S.]
YOUNG PREACHERS ENCOURAGED
A SHORT ADDRESS, DELIVERED TO THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE COUNTRY MISSION,
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
A CERTAIN venerable minister once told me that when his young people took to preaching he did his best to choke them off of it. Whether he was right or wrong is not a question which I shall now discuss: I can only say I have acted upon the opposite, principle, and have endeavored not to choke but to cheer those who try to speak for Jesus. I am not old enough to have forgotten the struggles of my own early days, or the influence of a cheering word upon my young heart, and so I take a loving and lively interest in those who sincerely endeavor to do their best for their Master, even though that best be raw and uncouth. “Would God that all the Lord’s servants were prophets,” and that far greater numbers of laborers were sent into the harvest of the great Householder.
Let all who have gifts for the work open their months and preach Jesus, for the gospel cannot have too many faithful heralds. At this time I will only dwell upon one truth, that for men to speak of Christ to others is a great blessing to themselves. Brother workers, the endeavor to win souls by preaching Christ is a grand means of grace to our own hearts. The apostle Paul thought preaching to be a high privilege and a means of good to himself; for he said” Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ.” It is a token for good to us when God employs us, nay more, the holy service is the channel of incalculable benefit to us. So far as I am concerned, I scarcely know how I could keep alive spiritually if I did not refresh my own heart by preaching the gospel to others. So is it with my brethren. Many are warmed by holy exertion who else might have been cold; many are cheered who else would have been despondent; many are instructed who else had been ignorant; many are made to grow who else had been stunted. The first blessing is to be saved yourself, but the next in value is to be the means of saving your neighbors. Salvation from sin includes salvation from selfishness, and this is in a large measure effected by our beginning to care for the souls of others, and showing that care by earnestly speaking to them. The man whose first and last concern is about his own safety is not half saved yet, if saved at all. It is wretched work to be for ever prying into the vault of one’s own inner feelings and spying out in the murky darkness new causes for disquietude; better far to look around on dying men, and spend the divine life within you in trying to glorify God by proclaiming his infinite love. By morbidly brooding over self you will hatch new griefs, but by blessing others you will open fresh sources of rejoicing.
Public speech for Christ helps to develop us. I believe it, is as good for young men to try and preach the gospel as it is for children to attempt to walk. How they tumble about! — I mean both the preachers and the children. As for the children, their battered noses and broken knees are part payment for the privilege of ultimately walking on two legs; and who regrets the bruises in after days when it is his joy to run without weariness? The break-downs of young speakers are much the same, they pain them for the time, and perhaps leave a bruise in the form of a story which makes them wince when it is repeated, but by these things men learn to speak without fear, and the preacher is trained to ready utterance. If there were no miserable defeats there would be no happy successes. Preachers are like the sycamore figs of Amos, they must be bruised by failure before they will ripen and sweeten into great usefulness. I like to hear of men beginning to speak for Jesus; they remind me of young eagles stretching their callow wings and taking their first venturous flight: they will in due time soar into the heavens, none the less surely because now they can scarcely wing their way from one point to another. I recollect my own beginnings, and I know how tremblingly, and yet how trustingly, I took each tottering step. Some of the holiest feelings of our renewed nature are called into action at such a time: I could wish that in after years we were as prayerful and dependent as at that season. The effort arouses the noblest part of us, and gives it a chance to indulge its aspirations, and so far it must be good.
It is an admirable thing for young men to begin early to preach the truth, for it is the best way of learning it. My college course was after this fashion. I was for three years a Cambridge man. though I never entered the university. I could not have obtained a degree because I was a Nonconformist; and, moreover, it was a better thing for me to pursue my studies under an admirable scholar and tender friend, and preach at the same time. I was, by my tutor’s often expressed verdict, considered to be sufficiently proficient in my studies to have taken a good place on the, list had the way been open. “You could win at a canter,” said he to me. I had, however, a better college course, for I studied theology, as much as possible during the day, and then at five in the evening I became a traveling preacher and started into the villages to sell out what I had learned. My quiet meditation during the walk helped me to digest what’—I had read, and the rehearsal of my lesson in public, by preaching it to the people, fixed it on my memory. I do not mean that I ever repeated a single sentence from memory, but I thought my reading over again while on my legs, and thus worked it into my very soul. I must have been a singular-looking youth on wet evenings. During the last year of my stay in Cambridge, when I had given up my office as usher, I was wont to sally forth every night in the week, except on Saturday, and walk three, five, or perhaps eight miles out and back again on my preaching work, and when it rained I encased myself in waterproof leggings and a mackintosh coat, and a hat with a waterproof covering, and I carried a dark lantern to show me the way across the fields. I had many adventures, of which I will not now speak, but the point is, that what I had gathered by my studies during the day I handed out to a company of villagers in the evening, and was greatly profited by the exercise. I always found it good to say my lesson when I had learned it; children do that, you know, and it is equally good for preachers, especially if they say their lesson by heart. No better means of fixing knowledge can be devised. My dear brethren, who are young preachers, will learn their theology while preparing their sermons and while delivering them if the Spirit of God be much sought and depended on. To translate the ideas of your own mind into language which others can understand and receive is a fine lesson both in thinking and in speaking.
I am glad to see the men in our churches attempting to preach, because it is likely to give them a deeper sympathy with their ministers, and we need the sympathy and love of all around us. Some thoughtless persons imagine that the preacher stands up and opens Ms mouth and sermons leap forth; they know nothing of the intense study and wear and tear of mind which are necessary to maintain freshness and vigor from Sabbath to Sabbath. When these young men open their mouths, they find that instructive matter does not flow forth spontaneously; they discover that the same thing is very apt to come .over and over again, or that they are too embarrassed to say anything at all. They are perplexed and worried to know where to find themes, and thus they learn the need of searching the Scriptures, and storing their minds. This is good for them. Better still, they find that they must pray over their subjects, and get their hearts into a right state before God, or else they cannot discourse to profit. They soon perceive that minds are not always fresh and fertile, and they learn to bear with a dull sermon, caused by a headache or a sleepless night. Those who have preached themselves will pray for those of us who have all the year round to instruct huge congregations, and to make the old, old story new and attractive to the same people throughout a lifetime.
I am sure, too, that it keeps men out of mischief to set about spreading the knowledge of Christ. The most useful members of a church, re usually those who would be doing harm if they were not doing good. They cannot be chips in the porridge, they must flavor it one way or another. I know very well if I was not always at work I should be sure either to worry myself or others, for my brains will not imitate the dormouse, and take a long sleep. To have nothing to do would kill some of us outright.. Activeminded idlers are a curse to any community. Lazy members of churches, if they have restless dispositions, become critical hearers, grumblers, gossips, heretics, or schismatics. The}’ find pleasure in giving pain. It is fine to see a sluggard lean over a rail and find fault with those who are hard at work in their shirt-sleeves; he says they are out of order, and ought to wear dress coats. It would be better if they would dress his coat for him. On a very hot day it is very pleasant to sit in a boat and find fault with the two fellows who are rowing so hard that they drip with sweat. I know some who enjoy this delight in a spiritual sense, and also add to it the further joy of criticizing the way in which the rowers feather their oars. If the workers should turn round and say, “Try and do better yourself,” they would be justified in the observation, and I wish the idle gentlemen would accept such a bit of practical wisdom. Now, you with fault-finding tongues, use your mouths for a better purpose, and we shall be less troubled by you. Spare energy soon runs wild if it be not yoked to the gospel plough. Vines which bear little fruit go all to wood, and many of the branches run over the wall.
It is a good thing for our young brethren to begin to preach, because it arouses their natures. They discover points in themselves that they never knew were there; frequently these discoveries are not flattering, but humiliating, and this greatly benefits them, for anything is good which lowers self-conceit. Other discoveries comfort and encourage them, for they find out faculties and talents which were unperceived while they were silent. No one knows what he can do till he has tried, nor even what he cannot do till he has made the attempt. When a man begins to agonize for souls, to persuade, and entreat them to come to Christ, he discovers his own weakness, and his need of the Holy Spirit; while further on, when the Lord blesses him, he gladly perceives what great strength can be put into him, and how much his very infirmities may be overruled to the glory of God.
Though a man cannot preach at all, it may do him great good to make the attempt, if he has any strong impulses in that direction; for if ha be a man of sense the clear evidence of his inability will satisfy his conscience, and enable him quietly to attend to more suitable work. We’ cannot all preach, and there is no need we should, for it cannot be desirable that the church should be all mouth, since that would amount to its being one great vacuum, a sort of cave by the sea, famous for nothing but contending noises. There must be ears to hear the gospel as well as lips to preach it; and it is not an ill thing for a man to have attempted to preach when his failure leads him to become a good hearer, and a diligent laborer in service more suitable to his abilities.
It is good for young men to begin to preach because it is from among their ranks that the ministry must be recruited, and lay-preaching associations are often the means of raising up and qualifying men who become able ministers of the new covenant. Many a small church has been a nursery of preachers. The very need of the people has compelled them to search out and encourage native talent. When a man stands up in the street to preach, or talks to a dozen people in a cottage, he is putting out his pound to interest as his Lord desires, and it grows by being thus employed, till one talent becomes two, and two become five, and five become ten. By exercising his gift the chosen servant of Christ goes from strength to strength. Some of those who now occupy the foremost pulpits, and are doing the greatest good, owe their capacity under God to the constant habit of preaching, which commenced at first in a very small way. How many times I have enjoyed preaching the gospel in a farmer’s kitchen, or in a cottage or in a barn. Perhaps many people came to hear me because I was then a boy; but I owed my earliest opportunities to the Cambridge Lay-preachers’ Association, which placed me upon its plan, and kept me in constant work, till I became a village pastor. I, therefore, advocate such societies, and wish to see one of the like in every town.
In my young days I fear I said many odd things and made many blunders, but my audiences were not hypercritical, and no newspaper writers dogged my heels, and so I had a happy training-school, in which by continual practice I attained such a degree of ready speech as I now possess. There is no way of learning to preach which can be compared with preaching itself, if you want to swim you must get into the water, and if you at the first make a sorry exhibition, never mind, for it is by swimming as you cart that you learn to swim as you should. Hence we ought to be lenient with beginners, for they will do better by-and-by. If young speakers in Cambridge had been discouraged and silenced, I might not have found my way here; and therefore I hope I shall be the last to bring forth a wet blanket for any who sincerely speak of Christ, however humble may be their endeavors. If we slay the striplings, where shall we find our veterans? The fear of there being too many preachers is the last which will occur to me. I rejoice in that passage of the psalm—” The Lord gave the word, great was the company of those that published it.” Go forth, young men, and proclaim among the people of this vast city all the words of this life. Among these millions you will all of you be few enough. The Lord make you to be all good men and true. I pray him to anoint you with his Spirit; fill your baskets with living seed, and in due season bring you back laden, with many sheaves. My heart is with you, my soul rejoices in your successes, and I look to the great Head of the church through your means to gather in his blood-bought ones.
GRATEFUL THOUGH SORROWFUL.
SEEING that all our troubles and afflictions come from God, we ought to humble and submit our hearts and minds unto him, and to suffer him to work in us according to his most holy will and pleasure. If unseasonable weather should hurt the corn and the fruits of the earth, or a wicked man should misreport us or slander us, why should we murmur and grudge against the elements, or seek to revenge us of our enemy? for if we life not up our minds, and consider that it is God that layeth his hands upon us, and that it is he that striketh us, we are even like unto dogs, which, if a man cast a stone at them, will bite the stone, without any respect to who did cast it …. Pliny the Second, an heathen man, when he would comfort a friend of his, whose dear spouse was departed out of this world, wrote after this manner: “This ought to be a singular comfort unto thee that thou hast had and enjoyed such a precious jewel for so long a time: for forty-four years did she live with thee, and there was never any strife, brawling, or contention between you, nor never one of you once displeased the other. ‘ Yea,’ but now thou wilt say, ‘so much the more ]oath and unwilling am I to be without her, seeing I lived so long a time so pleasantly with her. For we forget soon such pleasures and commodities as we have proved and tasted but a little time only.’ But to answer to this, take thou heed that thou be found not unthankful, if thou wilt only weigh and consider what thou hast lost, and not remember how long thou didst have and enjoy it.”
So if we will not set and weigh the one thing against the other, we are like unto children, who, if any man happen to disturb or hinder their game a little, or take any manner of thing from them, will by-and-by cast away all the rest also, and fall to weeping.—Saltmarsh.
NOTES
IT may interest our personal friends to know that on January 8 we shall reach our twenty-fifth wedding-day. We had a figurative silver-wedding with the Church two years ago, and now we have literally reached that event of domestic joy. We unite with our beloved wife in deep gratitude for a quarter of a century of great happiness, and we beg our friends to aid us in praising God’s name. In all probability the Church at the Tabernacle will have a special meeting on Monday, January 10, to congratulate the pastor and his wife.
On Sunday, Dec. 5th, no less than 109 persons were received into church fellowship at the Tabernacle. This is a cheering addition with which to close the year. “The Lord hath been mindful of us, he will bless us.” Abiding in peace, and love, and earnestness, the church is made to rejoice in the presence of the Holy Spirit, giving power to the Word and saving men. We have dismissed a company to form a church in Tooting, and we are organizing a colony in the Old Kent Road, under Mr. Briggs. Thus the vineyard is enriched by offshoots which become vines, and bring forth fruit unto God’s glory. Some of the workers among us are eminently blessed in bringing souls to Christ, and the increase to the church is not alone from the pastor’s labors, but from the efforts of brethren and sisters whose names are written in heaven. The joy of our heart in the success of the Orphanage Cornish tour is very great. It is not only the help received, but the warm affection exhibited in the doing of it, which has cheered us greatly. Baptist friends led the way, but Methodists were thoroughly hearty too; indeed, everybody helped the orphans, and many sent personal words of love to the President. Thank you, warm-hearted friends of Cornwall and Devon: the Lord recompense your kindness a hundredfold.
On Monday evening, Nov. 29th, the Tabernacle prayer-meeting was specially on behalf of the COUNTRY MISSION. Several members of the mission prayed or spoke, and the pastor delivered the address which appears in another part of this magazine. We have often commended this work, and therefore need not say much about it now. It is one of the most useful of our agencies for the spread of the gospel in the heathen districts round the metropolis, and it could be greatly extended if we had the funds with which to hire rooms and pay expenses.
On Wednesday evening, Dec. 1, a meeting was held at the Tabernacle to help Mr. Murrell to secure the usual amount from the WEEKLY OFFERING for the College, which through Mr. Spurgeon’s illness had somewhat suffered, A large number of friends assembled to tea, and afterwards many more came into the meeting. Three of the students, Messrs. Simmons, Harrison and Ward spoke of the benefits derived from the College, and Mr. Chamberlain and Mr. Frisby’s choir sang some of their sweet songs of Zion; but most of the time was occupied by a recital of “Personal Recollections,” by the pastor. It was an enthusiastic meeting, proving the love of the congregation to the College and its conductor. The sum of fifty pounds was by this means added to the offering. We believe that £1880 will be reached, but it will need a special effort during the last few days of the year.
Friends of the College are requested kindly to note that the Annual TEA AND PUBLIC Meeting will be held at the Tabernacle on Wednesday evening, -Dec. 29th. ‘-The President is to take the chair, and “John Ploughman” is to exhibit dissolving views painted from the pictures in his new book, and give readings explanatory of them.
On Friday evening, Dec. loth, it was once more our privilege to attend the annual meeting of the COLLEGE EVENING CLASSES, and in the name of the members to present to Mr. Johnson, one of the tutors, Chambers’ Encyclopedia, in 10 volumes, handsomely bound, as a well-deserved mark of esteem for himself, and appreciation of his labors. Several of Clue students spoke of the advantages which they and others had derived from attending the classes, and Mr. Ferguson and the secretary, Mr. Kirk, both testified that the attendance was never so large as it has been during the present year, and that at no time has the work been more successful than it is now. If any other Christian young men wish to join the classes they can write to Mr. Kirk, 24, Gilbert-road, Hurley-road, Kennington, S.E. We are training in this Working-men’s College some two hundred brethren who pursue their callings all day, and then study in the evening. Of former pupils many now occupy places of responsibility in the church, in the press, or in business houses,—and they are Christian men who would have had no chance to rise had it not been for these classes. Mutual instruction ends in frivolous entertainments, but classes with good tutors. are the most efficient agencies for developing the gifts and fostering the piety of young men.
COLLEGE.—Mr. C. W. Townsend, who was one of our orphan boys, has completed his college course, and settled at Inskip, Lancashire; and Mr. Jno. Doubleday has accepted an invitation to Sittingbourne, Kent. Mr. E. Isaac has sailed for Australia, where he hopes to labor as an evangelist. He is worthy to be received right heartily.
The following brethren have removed during the past mouth:—Mr. R. F. Jeffrey, from Kingsgate-street, Holborn, to Folke-stone; Mr. W. S. Llewellyn, from Bowden to Ogden, near Rochdale; and Sir. J. Hillman, from Hunslet to Hampden Chapel, South Hackney.
EVANGELISTS.—Messrs. Smith and Fullerton have been at Grecnock during the past month, and the services are still being continued while we write. Notwithstanding very unpropitious weather the average week-night attendance has been about one thousand persons, while the noon meetings. have been good, and the Saturday evening “Song Services” very successful. On Sunday evenings it is estimated that the congregations have numbered between three and four thousand, while hundreds have been unable to gain admission. Best of all, many have professed to find the Savior during the meetings. Pastor J. Dann and several other ministers have labored heartily with our brethren.
During the early part of the present year the evangelists are to visit Halifax, Annan, and Sheffield, and later on they are to come to London for a long campaign.
Mr. Burnham, though still far from well, has conducted very successful services at Lincoln, Eelbeach, and Churlton Kings. The pastors in all these places testify to the blessing received through our brother’s visit.
ORPHANGE.—Friends who send presents for our orphan boys or girls will greatly oblige if they will address them to Mr. Charlesworth, Stockwell Orphanage, Clap-ham-road, London. On several occasions recently we have had to pay carriage on parcels sent to our house, and as we live at a considerable distance from the Orphanage additional expense has been incurred in getting the articles to the institution.
After their return from their tour in the West, the Orphanage choir gave a service of song at Mr. Medhurst’s chapel at Land-port. Members and friends of the pastor’s Bible-class had collected £55 8s. 6d. for the institution, and the collection after the concert realized £25 5s. 6d., making a glorious total of £80 14s., which we have received since the lists were closed.
On the morning of Christmas-day a service will be held at Mr. Newman Hall’s church, Westminster-bridge-road, when a collection will be made for the Orphanage. Some of the children will sing at the service.
The following extract from a letter from our son Thomas explains an item of £50 in the accounts, for which we thank the Sydney friends, and bless the beloved preacher:—
“Sydney, Oct. 20, 1880.
“My very dear Father,—Yesterday being my last Sunday in Sydney, I took the opportunity, at the suggestion of some kind friends, and notably of our Brother Hibherd, to make a collection at the Theater Royal on behalf of the Orphanage. I had some handbills printed, giving a concise account of the work, abridged from the annual report. These were given to the folks as they assembled. I preached from ‘In thee the fatherless find mercy,’ and tried to preach the gospel, and at the same time draw a parallel between the orphanage of my heavenly Father and that of my earthly parent. Among other things I endeavored to show that the qualification for admission to each is destitution, that the reception is gracious, that gratitude is the necessary result, ‘ So will we render the calves of our lips.’ I pleaded earnestly that they would remember the good they had received from your preached and printed sermons. I urged a still more potent plea. ‘For Jesus’ sake.’ Then I read that short notice in The Sword and the Trowel for September about the boys eating like caterpillars, and not spinning cocoons. The audience’ responded liberally, contributing £46 17s., and I find that by contributions from friends at Paramatta I am able to remit you a draft for £50. Dear father, I can’t tell you how glad I am to do this. You will be pleased, I know, but not more than I am. Thousands here are deeply interested in you and your glorious work, and would doubtless help it oftener but for the long distance and local claims:. However, they have eagerly seized on this opportunity of manifesting their esteem and love. I am rejoiced to see it. You will be delighted to hear it, and to receive their gifts, and they are pleased enough to help the orphans for the president’s sake. I would have had the collection for the College, but that I felt I could appeal to all for so undenominational a work as the Orphanage. The College must ever hold first place with me, as it does with you, and I think the people would have given to it gladly enough, and perhaps as liberally, but I wanted to make sure, and get a good amount. I had quite set my heart on £50, and prayed the Lord we might realize that amount by one means and another. He has answered prayer. To his name be endless praise.”
COLPORTAGE.—Since last month the Committee have been much cheered by an application for the appointment of a second colporteur in a district in Staffordshire, adjoining one where the present man has so commended himself and his work to the confidence of the friends that they want another just like him. A new and very promising district has also been opened under the superintendence of our friend, C. F. Allison, Esq., at Orpington, in Kent.
A lady generously sends £100, but wishes the acknowledgment to be anonymous. This aid was specially acceptable, as the amount received during the month without it was less than that received for some time, and far below the necessities of the Association. Will other kind friends help by forwarding a subscription for the new year?
The colporteurs themselves keep working away. One man writes:—” I find I have made 2,267 sales during the past three months, for which I have taken £65 15s. 3d. I have also delivered on the Sabbath 2l sermons or addresses. I have also worked 822 hours, not reckoning Sundays.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle.—
November 29th, nine; December 2nd, eighteen.
PASTORS COLLEGE, METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE.
STATEMENT OF RECEIPTS FROM NOVEMBER 14TH TO DECEMBER 14TH, 1880.
Giver | £ | s. | d |
Mr. W. Ladbrooke | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Part of Communion Collection by Church in Plum Tree House | 0 | 15 | 0 |
Mr. E. Isaac | 3 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. J. H. Gould | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Miss M. Neath | 5 | 0 | 0 |
J. W. L., a Thankoffering | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. James Rayne | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Executors of the late Mr. Samuel Willson | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. William Gourlay | 21 | 0 | 0 |
A despairing one | 0 | 10 | 0 |
H.R.W. | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Free-will Offerings at our Mission Hall per Mr. A Ross | 6 | 5 | 0 |
“A Friend in Scotland” | 25 | 0 | 0 |
H.I., Malta | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs. Ellis | 0 | 10 | 0 |
A Student, per J. A. | 2 | 2 | 0 |
Mr. F. W. Brackett | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Miss Bradford | 0 | 2 | 6 |
An aged Christian, per Pastor’ T. D. Cameron | 10 | 0 | 0 |
Dr. MacGill | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Mrs. Kennard | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Pastor George Hearson | 2 | 2 | 0 |
Mercy and Grace | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Mrs. James Smith… | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Part Collection at Penge Tabenacle, after Sermons by Rev. C. H. Thomas | 5 | 0 | 0 |
.
THE INN
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
Of all the images which set forth this mortal life there is perhaps none more apposite or instructive than that of an inn. Our own three months’ sojourn last year at the Hotel de la Paix at Mentone may well represent a somewhat lengthened and peaceful life. Archbishop Leighton thought so much of the image that he desired to die at an ran, and providence answered his desire: we feel no such wish, though we fully agree with the good bishop’s view of the analogy.
We arrived at our inn, where we had for a short time been expected, and were welcomed by those who were already on the spot. So came we into the world to those who received us gladly. Among the very poorest people, the addition of a new member to the family may be a meager joy, because it divides the scanty loaf into smaller rations, and yet there can hardly be a parent who is not glad at the birth of a child. In the great majority of cases, “Welcome, welcome, little stranger,” is no mere empty compliment.
Our own welcome at our inn was a very hearty one: we found all things ready for our lodging, comforts provided by forethought, and promises that whatever else might be wanted should be promptly supplied. Happy those who can look back on their first days in this world, and see that the lines fell to them in pleasant places. Here are our sitting-room and our sleeping-room, arrangements for converse and for refreshment, and much more than the bed and table and candlestick which the Shunammite of old provided for the prophet. So come we into the world, and find loving hands ready to minister unto us, and full many a comfort and necessary provided without our care and forethought. We are too apt to forget the mercies of our early hours in this great caravanserai; but it should not be so.
All the while we tarried, everything in our rooms was our own; we might use chair, and couch, and glass, and table most freely, and yet nothing was indeed our own, but only lent us. Neither the house nor a single article in it was ours: we held nothing in the place, no foot of land was ours. Neither did we in other respects lose the sense that we were sojourners in a strange country, whose citizenship lay elsewhere. Some of those who waited upon us spoke a different language from our own, and could not fully comprehend us, neither could we readily enter into their speech. We confessed that we were strangers and pilgrims, and had no desire to be regarded as natives of the country. We never concealed our nationality, nor wished to change it: France was our lodge, but England was our home. Letters came to us from home, and we were sending perpetual messages back again, and we took more interest in these than in the decrees of the Republic under whose shadow we tarried. We were very comfortable, and yet it was not home; nor did the inn ever rival our own loved home, and thus often we remembered that “this is not our rest,” and that our true abiding-place was on the other side the flood. Besides which, we were often thinking and speaking of the time of going home, and referring to the almanac to see how many days would intervene before the end of our stay. We had dear companions, but the nearest and dearest of all were divided from us by fall a thousand miles, and their absence rendered it impossible to forget that we were exiles in a strange land, fair as that land might be. There is no need to denote the parallel, the simile is clear as crystal. The inmates of the hotel were perpetually changing. We formed friendships, and spent happy evenings, and made excursions together, and then we bade good-bye, never to see those friendly faces any more. The hotel forgot them, and others came to fill their places, and were welcomed in the same manner. The look of the table somewhat changed, seats were empty for a little while, and then were filled up by others: yet there were the same daily meals, and the routine of the hotel went on the same whoever came or went. The most important guest was, after all, nothing in particular. He made a stir at coming or going just for an hour or so, and then all went on as if his name had never been inscribed on the tablets in the hall. The hall-keeper would probably keep up the name for a week or two after he was gone, for certain documents might come when he had departed; but this, like posthumous fame, was soon over, and an old yellow-looking letter inside a glass case was all that remained to show that he had ever climbed the great staircase, or entered the drawing-room.
Among the guests there were little circles of acquaintance, and some show of gradations, though all met at the same table, and dwelt under the same roof. You were drawn to one, and repelled by another. There were warm greetings, and cold nods, for all the world like those one meets with in the greater inn of society. Yet, whoever the guests might be. they were always on the move. A few stayed long and became old inhabitants, but the majority were more distinctly birds of passage, and indeed all were such, for the long stayers talked of “the season,” and when they would be going, and always owned that it was only a matter of a few weeks, and they, too, would be gone. The constant adding of new faces at the end of the table, and the disappearance of others made it appear as if death had taken away some, and birth had brought in fresh ones to supply their places.
The dwellers in the hotel were of all ages. We could hear the merry laugh of Children on the stairs, and see them romping in the passages; and there were old men and elderly women who talked wisely and soberly, and spent their days very carefully, afraid of the wind, the cold, and the draughts. So in the world we see a great mixture, and it is well it should be so. A table at which all are very old is not a pleasing sight: we want buds and blossoms as well as mellow fruits. We saw a variety of dispositions as well as of ages, and these shifted frequently. If one visitor was a little grumpy and unneighborly, he was soon gone; and alas? if another was very cheerful, and shed a light over the whole party, he or she would be gone too, and leave a gap which we all deplored till another filled it.
We saw the omnibus at the door, and waved our handkerchief with farewells to the departing, and anon we heard the bells ring, and saw a rush of servants to the front doors, for there were new comers to occupy the empty rooms. Everything changed, nothing continued in one stay for any length of time.
The luggage, too, is an instructive item. What trunks—we had almost said, what portable warehouses?—some visitors brought with them. We can honestly say that we pitied them heartily. They could not get all their lumber into their rooms, and their huge boxes and portmanteaus half blocked up the corridors. Sensible people rather made fun of them, and wondered why they burdened themselves with such mountains of rattletraps. We think we know other travelers who heap together riches, and load themselves with cares, and make their life-journey a misery. Could they be content with less, their happiness would be far greater. The spiritually wise would smile at the eagerness of many to be rich did they not see stronger cause for weeping over the folly, so injurious in the present, and so ruinous in the future.
At last our own time came to depart, and there were many hand-shakings, and adieus, and “God-bless-you’s,” but the time was up, and we must needs go. Some wished that we would remain longer, but it must not be: the dearest friends must part. Indeed, the friendships of the hotel had never been formed with any idea of continued residence in the same house; we had met casually, and we parted without any violent wrench, for, after all, we were only dwellers in an inn, and were none of us at home, and therefore the partings were not very sorrowful. If we had the same clear view of the temporary character of all earthly relationships we should be spared a thousand sorrows. Our children were not born immortal,—what wonder if they die? Husbands and wives were united only till death should them part,—how can they hope to be together for ever?
Our rooms are not empty now. Perhaps some worthier guest is there, and the hotel may be all the more fall of life because an invalid middle-aged gentleman and his friends have gone to their home across the sea; and so, when we leave this world, we may be missed a little while, but, as the poet said,
“Other bards will walk these dells,
And sing your praise, sweet evening bells;”
so will other voices carry on the solemn worship of God, and other pastors feed the flock redeemed with blood. In reading a book which interested us greatly during our sojourn we stumbled on the following passage:—”
In the anecdote books of our boyhood used to be told the story of an Indian Faquir, who entered an Eastern palace, and spread his bed in one of its ante-chambers, pretending that he had mistaken the building for a caravanserai or inn. The Prince, amused by the oddity of the circumstance, ordered, so can the tale, the man to be brought before him, and asked him how he came to make such a mistake. ‘What is an inn?’ the Faquir asked. ‘A place,’ was the reply, ‘ where travelers rest a little while before proceeding on their journey.’ ‘Who dwelt here before you?’ again asked the Faquir. ‘My father,’ was the Prince’s reply. ‘And did he remain here?’ ‘No,’ was the answer. ‘ He died and went away.’ ‘And who dwelt here before him?’ ‘His ancestors.’ ‘And did they remain here?’ ‘No; they also died and went away.’ ‘Then,’ rejoined the Faquir, ‘I have made no mistake, for your palace is but an inn after all.’”
The Faquir was right. Our houses are but inns, and the whole world a caravanserai. Under what sign are we living? We like our own sign of PEACE. DE LA PAIX has a soft sound to our ear. Others prefer to have their hotels called “the Splendid,” or “the Royal,” or “the Imperial;” let us dwell in PEACE, and we shall be content. It was said of old concerning our Lord and Master that “there was no room for him in the inn:” if it be so in any house, peace will be courted in vain; but make room for Jesus, and all will be well, for “he is our peace.”
LIFE AND LETTERS OF HORACE BUSHNELL
THIS book is an affectionate tribute to the memory of an American clergyman greatly beloved among a wide circle of friends. Lively reminiscences, etched by various contributors, supply us with a series of portraits as he appeared in the successive stages of life — a child in his father’s house; a student at Yale College; a settled minister gradually rising to distinction among his contemporaries as a preacher and an author; and, at length, a venerable sire, whose declining age was radiant with many virtues. The entire story is skillfully woven together with diffuse selections from his correspondence, in which he is allowed to speak for himself, and so to become in a measure his own biographer. We hardly anticipate, however, that this voluminous volume will obtain any wide popularity on this side of the Atlantic. It is too much padded with trivialities. In our busy age, with its accumulation of books, we cannot afford to be bored with long stories about Horace Bushnell’s mother and grandmother, the “homespun” dress he wore in his school-days, the letter he wrote to his wife’s mother, Mrs. Apthorne, when his baby-boy was born, in which he speaks of him as “the little gentleman,” the romps he used to have with his children, and the facetious remarks he made when he was talking to his friends. The shelves of our library are pretty well loaded now, but if such a fashion were imported from the United States to the old country, “I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written” And what was Horace Bushnell? Well, he was a typical thinker of rather a narrow type. The good man had a little genius. His originality consisted in a slight divergence from the school of thought in which he was trained. To the heaven-inspired faith of the old Hebrew prophets he made no pretensions. Of the enthusiastic missionary spirit of the Christian apostles he was not a partaker. His idiosyneracies can all be traced to earthly influences. The soil on which he was planted will account for the stature to which he grew. A thoughtful propensity, a sensitive temperament, and a fertile imagination supplied the raw material of a selfreliant, positive, and withal a persuasive preacher, who would never fail to challenge notice. As for the phases through which his mind passed, they must be interpreted by the shadows that were cast on it. tie appears to have always ranked himself among orthodox believers, though he frequently announced his orthodox convictions in such a manner as would soothe Unitarians and Freethinkers, while it startled the members of his own fraternity. He evidently found agreeable excitement in first alarming his evangelical friends, and then quietly allaying their fears. This kind of sport we look upon as dangerous, if it is not sometimes deadly, to unstable souls. His lectures on “The Divinity of Christ,” and “The Atonement for Sin,” delivered, the one at: Newhaven, the other at Cambridge, U.S., might have been regarded as efforts to conciliate rather than to combat adversaries of the faith. When he combined them in one volume he prefaced it with “a dissertation on language” so ingenious, not to say so sophistical, that it puts his arguments out of the pale of criticism, because, as old words are acquiring in his estimation a fresh meaning, we are not yet educated up to his modes of expression, and cannot, therefore, be sure of what he means. Disciples of modern thought would probably greet this as a fine mist on a fresh morning, which augurs a bright day for this dark world. We are not exactly of their persuasion: they groan over fossilized dogmas, while we grieve over ossified hearts. This nineteenth century is not more notable for the unbelief of its wise men than any other century of the Christian era, although recent science has minted new apologies for skepticism. But the tree of life is no fossil;:it yields leaves and fruits as healing and nutritious as ever it did. The faith of the gospel has not lost its soul-saying power, nor have our creeds and catechisms exhausted their virtue; they still supply wholesome nourishment when properly digested. Absorbed into the system they feed and strengthen the tuner man. Ere long there will arise men who will thunder out the old theology, and cause the world to forget the chirping crickets of heterodoxy, who now believe themselves to be the voices of a perfect age. Schools of philosophy are not exactly a fit soil for the production of stalwart Christians. In vain we look to them for successors of the apostles, or even for Sunday-school teachers. Their learned professors are prone to prefer their own inductions to divine inspiration, and this is their weakness for practical usefulness. Of this we are quite sure, that preaching would be shorn of all its power if it failed to speak ‘with authority. Call those pulpit exercises by some other name than preaching—call them essays, discourses, arguments, orations, or whatever else you like, which aim at shadowing forth suggestions which scarcely assume any definite form. “Thus saith the Lord,” said the ancient seers. “Verily, verily, I say unto you,” said Jesus, and “he spake as one having authority.” “The things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God,” writes the apostle Paul, and then he adds, on behalf of himself and his fellow-laborers in the ministry,” which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth.” How else would you define a sermon but as a discourse founded on some text or passage of Scripture, the absolute truth of which is accepted as an axiom? One of the most friendly and apologetic of Dr. Bushnell’s American critics thus explains his position: Though he had denied none of the cardinal doctrines of Christianity, he had ventured to express his faith in them under formulas and philosophic explanations some-what different from those which were assumed to be canonically settled for all time.” We are very confident ourselves that the simple Scriptures, as they have been handed down to us, will survive all the strictures of scientific minds, and we are equally sure that the philosophizing upon them which did Bushnell no good will do others great harm.
The volume before us will be better liked than any of the books which Horace Bushnell published in his lifetime; for it is obvious enough that those who knew the good man most intimately, the peculiarities of his thought were completely overshadowed by the piety of his heart and the purity of his conversation. He established a reputation among his fellowcitizens, which they appropriately perpetuated by calling a park at Hartford, U.S., after his name. But his admirers expect too much of us if they think that on this side of the Atlantic we can classify him among “first magnitudes.” Jonathan Edwards was a theologian whose treatises stand the test of time. William Ellery Channing was a philanthropist whose moral instincts were so fine and his sense of justice so keen that his words touch the very core of our common humanity. But of Horace Bushnell what can we say except that he started a problem which he seems to have never solved to the satisfaction of himself or of anybody else. He trod on treacherous ground, and he detected his mistake before he ,died. Protestantism always appeals to piety in efforts to reform or to mould back on primitive models: no less surely does it procure the suffrages of profanity when it attempts to pioneer a new path through undiscovered continents. Bushnell’s speculative proclivities appealed to the wrong party: they have won him little confidence from believers, and the questionable honor of being admired by “the advanced school.”
USE YOUR EYES RIGHTLY
AN Italian bishop who had endured much persecution with a calm unruffled temper, was asked how he attained to such a mastery of himself. “By making a right use of my eyes,” said he. “I first look up to heaven as the place whither I am going to live for ever. I next look down upon earth and consider how small a space of it will soon be all that I can occupy or want. I then look round me and think how many are far more wretched than I am.”—From Bishop Horne’s Aphorisms and Opinions.
NOTICES OF BOOKS
We regret that through the great abundance of books sent in at this season of the year we are in arrears with the publishers. This is not due to any neglect on our part, but to the slender space which we can afford for the review department. We always do our best to make these notices interesting, and they always express our frank, unbiased opinion. Publishers may rest assured that we will use our best diligence, so that all their productions shall have some sort of notice, however brief. We will always be as prompt as we can be, but delay is unavoidable where columns are so crowded.
John Ploughman’s Pictures. By C. H. SPURGEON.
Passmore and Alabaster.
Is a few months this work has reached its seventieth thousand. The review of these thousands is far more striking than any review by an individual. This book for the people has evidently become the people’s book.
Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit. Vol. XXVI. Passmore and Alabaster.
Is this volume better or worse than its predecessors? If the reader prefers to .judge for himself, he can purchase the book for seven shillings. To us it is a theme for deep gratitude that all these years we have been able to find readers for our discourses. God bless them to all who study them.
The Sword and the Trowel. Volume for 1880. Passmore and Alabaster.
A BOOKSELLER’S catalogue calls this “a really standard magazine.” We believe that the volume, for five shillings, contains as much interesting and valuable information as can possibly be procured for the money.
Modern Scottish Pulpit: Sermons by Ministers of various Denominations. Vol. II. Edinburgh: James Gemmel. Scotch Sermons are not all bad, though the name has gained an unenviable notoriety, for here are discourses “as sound as a bell.” Sydney Smith called Scotland” the knuckle-end of England;” but, as to gospel preaching, we have always regarded it as the choicest part of the three kingdoms, and so it is, and so it shall be by the grace of God. This is a valuable collection of sermons, containing one discourse from each of such brethren as A. A. Bonar, Moody Stuart, Hugh Martin, David Brown, and the like. We must write to the publishers for Vol. 1.
The Protestant. One penny weekly. East Temple Chambers, fleet-street.
WE wish every success to this and similar endeavors to raise up a barrier against the perpetual inroads of popery.
Noon-Day Meditations; being a Reflection upon a Scripture Text for ever:/ Day in the Year. By the late ELIZABETH SERLE, James Nisbet and Co.
WE do not care to criticize this book, for it is gracious and consolatory, and it will be read with much pleasure by many experienced believers; but yet the style is inaccurate and the matter rambling to the last degree. Those who love the doctrines will readily overlook literary faults; those who do not had better leave these “Meditations” alone. The work is somewhat after the manner of Dr. Hawker’s “Portions,” but it cannot for a moment compete with that famous volume.
Word of Comfort for the Weak in Faith. By M. J.U. W. Mack, 4, Paternoster-row.
Or these poems Horatius Bonar said, “Thank God for your sweet hymns. They are fragrant with the name of the Lord and Master, and will help to refresh and quicken souls.” This witness is true, and this little book requires no eulogy from our pen. The poems have been written by a greatly afflicted sister, and we gladly commend them to the sorrowful Christian as full of gold tried in the fire. The poems, with God’s blessing, will comfort; and enrich those who are in tribulation. The book is neatly got up, and is cheap—Is, and ls. 6d. We wish it a large circulation among those for whom it is especially intended.
Deep unto Deep: an Inquiry into some of the deeper Experiences of the Christian Life. By Sir Emilius Bayley, Bart., B.D. London: Hatchards, Piccadilly.
HERE we have a series of twenty-two sermons, or chapters, of more than average merit, specially adapted to tried believers who are passing through the deep waters of tribulation. The author has not followed the silly fashion of making a motley volume of discourses or poems carry the patronymic of the first paragraph, but he has been true to his title-page all the way through. We cordially recommend this book to young pastors, for we are persuaded that there is far more need to study the pathology of the Christian soul than many of them wot of. The sore straits through which some saints are called to pass, and the depths of anguish that others have to endure, make no small demand upon the sympathy and the knowledge of every faithful minister of the gospel. Physical infirmities and social bereavements, for example, may appear very common afflictions, though they plunge the soul into deep grief, but the influence they produce on sensitive minds is often so peculiar that each case requires specific attention. The tortures that some experience, when old sins haunt their memory, even after they have had a sense of forgiveness; and the horrors that overtake others through the temptations of Satan, are not to be lightly thought of by those to whom Christ has committed the oversight of any church or congregation. Of’ course we have a choice little stock of old authors, whose charts we highly prize: there are Augustine, Luther, Bunyan, Gilpin, Brainerd, Edwards, and, we might say, William Huntingdon. These were men much tossed about on the stormy main: men of God, moreover, who knew how to tend sea-sick souls in every stage of their sad complaints, whether staggering to and fro, or brought to their wits’ end. None the less are we gratified to greet a new book on an old subject. The old books are a wee bit obsolete. The devil may be as personal in our belief, but he is not quite so present to our senses as he was to some of our predecessors. We should not think of throwing an inkstand at his head nowadays. With the same faith we travel on fresh lines.
We are pleased with Sir Emilius Bayley’s parable. He has read Captain Maury’s “Physical Geography of the Sea,” and Professor Wyville Thomson’s “Depths of the Sea,” and the: “Voyage of the Challenger,” and his acquaintance with modern discovery has helped him to find illustrations of a problem that is started and solved in the sacred Scriptures.
This is just the time for New Year’s gifts. You will have to pay a visit to your bookseller: include “Deep unto Deep” among your purchases, and be sure you give a copy to your pastor.
A Catechism of Geology and Sacred History for Young People. By E, A. PEAKOME. Relfe Brothers.
THIS is an attempt to explain the Scripture statements of the creation by the infant science of geology. We reckon it moderately successful, but think that when science has done her utmost, there will still be mysteries in the word of God that must be accepted as revelations rather than understood as the results of reasoning. We are not so afraid of faith as to fear asking for its exercise even in receiving the statements of the Scriptures; what we fear much more is the attempt to reduce everything to the dead level of judgment by carnal reasoning. Christian Rationalism—forgive the contradiction —is very much the fashion just now.
The organization of our Sabbath Schools. By Rev. DAVID MILLER, D.D. Edinburgh and London: William Black-wood and Sons.
This book contains an interesting sketch of the Rev. David Blair, the writer’s predecessor at Brechin, who instituted the first Sabbath-school in Scotland, in the year 1760, and also a review of the rise and progress of the Sunday-school system in England. The writer’s aim is to point out some defects in the present system, and to suggest, in lieu of the usual prizes, certificates of merit ascertained by examination in the subjects taught. A good deal may be said for the scheme proposed, and teachers will do well to give it their consideration.
What Church? And the only Faith and Fold: Romanism and Anglicanism Tested. Correspondence with Archbishop Manning. By Rev. C. BULLOCK, B.D. London: “Hand and Heart” Publishing Office.
IF Romanism were capable of refutation and conviction by argument, this pamphlet would surely reveal to it its errors and follies; but when a system relies; on its traditions and prejudices rather than upon Scripture authority or common-sense arguments for its existence, what can be done to overthrow it? This little book may be of service in extricating those who have not yet been completely entangled in the Anglican or Romanistic web; but those are just the persons who will not be likely to read it. We believe that the best testimony against Romanism and Anglicanism is a sturdy Nonconformity that knows nothing of priests, or liturgies, or saving ceremonies, and believes in deed, and not merely in word, in the headship of Christ over his church.
The Gospel in Leviticus. By JAMES FLEMING, D.D. Morgan and Scott.
WE have inadvertently passed by this last work of our friend, Dr. Fleming. Those who knew this beloved minister while he was laboring in Kentish Town will not need to be told of his earnest, evangelical spirit, and of the savor which rested upon all his teaching. “The Gospel in Leviticus” is all of a piece with the rest of Dr. Fleming’s testimony, and is a most fitting close to a life of holy teaching.
Good Thoughts in Bad Times, and other papers. By THOMAS FULLER, D.D. Hodder and Stoughton.
FULLER’S face would have betrayed his humor even if he had tried to conceal it; wit sparkles on the arches of his eyebrows. The portrait prefixed to this admirable reprint we are sure is a good one; there is a something about it so like the Thomas Fuller of the book that we are quite certain of our man. We feel that we could try a quaint conceit with him on the spot were there any need, but all pretense for such a procedure is taken away by the presence of the work to which his face is the worthy frontispiece. Good gentlemen of 27, Paternoster Row, ye do well thus to give us “olde bookes mayde newe.” Handmade paper and clear old type help us to dainty reading when Fuller finds the sentences, and spices them with his wit. he who loves great thoughts, pressed into quaint expressions, like rare foreign fruit into fine carved boxes, and withal bedight with joyous humor as with Christmas flowers, will thank us for bidding him go get himself these “Good Thoughts in Bad Times.” Years ago we made this the companion of certain leisure days, and were the wiser and the better for it, at least for the time.
The Panoply; or, “The whole armor of God.” By the Rev. F. BOURDILLON, M.A. Hatchards, Piccadilly.
VERY SWEET. Full of experimental and practical teaching. We have found much pleasure in fellowship with Mr. Bourdillon at Mentone, and now in reading this instructive little book happy memories are revived. Our friend here gives twelve most striking lectures on the famous passage in Ephesians 6:10—20. Gurnall did this work is extenso long ago, and no one is likely ever to rival him: but Mr. Bourdillon gives us much in a little, and his lectures will enter where the bulky Puritan would not be admitted.
The Evangelical Revival and other Sermons: with an Address on the Work of the Christian ministry in a period of theological decay and transition. By R. W. DALE. Hodder and Stoughton.
WE cannot bring our mind to review this volume of discourses. It manifests the author’s great ability and honesty, but to our mind it is unsatisfactory, and to our heart it is saddening. Mr. Dale says,” Mr. Spurgeon stands alone among the modern leaders of Evangelical Nonconformists in his fidelity to the older Calvinistic creed.” If it be so, we are sorry to hear it, and we pray God that it may not long be true. There is an indefiniteness and uncertainty about these sermons which distresses us. They are not after our heart, and we are the more disappointed because Mr. Dale is a typical person among Independents, and a fine man in all respects.
Songs for Little Singers in the Sunday-school and Home. Composed by Henry King Lewis. London: Hodder and Stoughton.
As a book for infants, or children of an older growth, this is not at all to our mind. Solos, with difficult accompaniments, and four-part music for soprano, alto, tenor, and bass, can scarcely be said to be suitable for the little ones, although they are “intended to indicate the writer’s idea of the function of song and music in the education of children.” Out of the thirtyeight compositions in the volume there are less than a dozen which we should regard as falling within the range of a child’s capacity. Awkward intervals; and difficult progressions should be absent from “Songs for Little Singers.”
Studies in Worship — Music, chiefly as regards Congregational Singing. By J. Spencer Curwen. London: J. Curwen and Sons, 8, Warwick-lane. The subject of this volume is of considerable interest and importance, and Mr. Spencer Curwen was just the man to deal with it. In treating the subject historically, he has succeeded, after painstaking research, in tracing the progress of congregational music in England, from its introduction by the refugees who returned after the accession of Elizabeth down to the present time. The second part of the book is practical, and contains many valuable facts on the. subject of instruments, congregational harmony, vince-training, and congregational singing. Then follows a seines of descriptive chapters on the musical service in the principal places of worship in London in the present day. Mr. Curwen says, “The beauty of the Tabernacle singing is religious and spiritual”; and when he speaks of the singing at the Presbyterian Church, Regent-square, he says, “i have always been in favor of organs, but a Sunday at Regent-square is enough to shake one’s faith in them. The organ gives a .great deal of pleasure, but, after all, it is a sensuous pleasure. We worship when we send up aspirations and feelings of adoration, prayer, and joy to God.” We are glad to note that Mr. Curwen’s judgment is not overmastered by the modern custom of “syllabic tunes, many of which are utterly without individuality.” He very truly says, “The congregations want more variety, more outlet for the feelings, tunes they can remember and enjoy.” With the great increase of musical capacity it is a disagreeable fact that the singing is less hearty and general than it was thirty years ,ago, and the reason is not difficult to discover. Dreamy, contemplative compositions have pushed out the older hymns of jubilant exultation and praise; and fugal tunes, with a very pronounced melody, have given place to musical combinations of chords. Precentors who were dependent upon a pleasing air for their success in leading the congregation have been sent packing, and organists have been substituted to accompany a choir, with little or no sympathy with the ordinary worshippers. A reaction in favor of the older style is inevitable, and we shall welcome the change when it comes. The service of song in the house of the Lord should be the vehicle of praise, not the stalking-horse of musical composers. We commend Mr. Curwen’s book to all who are interested in the subject of which it treats, and wish for it the large circulation its merits demand.
Poems and Hymns. By JOHN LIVINGSTONE. Johnstone: Alexander Hood, Rankine Street.
PLEASING versification, more suited to the Scotch than the English ear. We should not be surprised if the young songster sings again and again, and each time better, for there is hopefulness in his strain.
The Chain of Life in Geological Time. By J. W. Dawson, LLD., F.R.S., F.S.S., etc. With numerous Illustrations. Religious Tract Society.
GEOLOGY handled by a devout man. Our thoughtful readers who are weary of the countless spawn of religious fiction would find the study of the rocks a delightful exercise for the mind, a change from more direct Biblical learning, and an assistance in controversy with the evil scientists of the day. Ground which Hugh Miller found so fruitful cannot be barren to any right hearted man. Dr. Dawson’s book might serve as an introduction to that wide domain which “coucheth beneath.”
Vignettes of the great Revival of the 18th Century. By EDWIN PAXTON HOOD. Religious Tract Society.
Though this marvelous piece of history has been repeated in many forms, it always thrills the reader. Mr. Hood in his own vivid, dashing ,style rehearses the whole matter from beginning to end; and as his pages are well adorned, and the book is most tastefully bound, we expect to find that the work will become specially popular. Mr. Hood always secures ore’ delighted attention, and we are glad to meet with him in the fertile fields which belong to Whitefield and Wesley.
Heavenly Arithmetic. Addresses by S. A. BLACKWOOD, Esq. Nisbet. THESE addresses are scriptural and sterling. The speaker is forgotten in the subject, and everywhere the authority of the Word of God is assumed or insisted on. The style is vivacious, crisp, and illustrative to a high degree, and we cannot conceive of any man with head and heart reading them in vain. May Mr. Blackwood deliver many such addresses.
Keeping open House. By Mary W. McLain. (Isaiah 6d.) J.F. Shaw & Co.
A STAPLE but pleasing record of the visitors supposed to have come to four little maidens in the course of a year. The story will not be in vain if some who read it take notice of those who seek admittance into their Heart Castles, in order that, like these girls, they may welcome the good, and keep out the evil ones.
The Unseen, and Songs in Trial. By J. M. BAMFORD. London: Wesleyan Conference Office.
THOUGH not of the highest poetic order, these songs are sweet, musical and pious. We have seen much worse jingle called poems.
Ada; or, the Memoir of a Consecrated Young Life. By W. J.M. London: W. Mack.
A SWEET record of a charming young life, which was sanctified by great love and devotion to the Savior. May the history of this lamb lead many others to follow her footsteps.
Missionary Work in connection with the Society of Friends. By STANLEY PUMPHREY. Philadelphia: Office of “Friends’ Review.”
A LITTLE book giving a most succinet account of the missionary work undertaken by the Society of Friends. Full of information, and apostolic in its exhibition of transparent earnestness: it has quickened our soul, and we believe will create new interest in all missionary operations. Talk of romance, missionary work is more romantic than any fiction could be, and this is a worthy record of one section of it.
Christian Manhood: or, Memorials of a Noble Life. Being Biographical Sketches of the Rev. R. S. Blackburn. By T. MITCHELL. London: Bemrose and Son.
APART from the padding which has swollen this book, it is a very interesting record of a devoted life, early cut off in the service of Christ. Primitive Methodism has never wanted fire and zeal, and Mr. Blackburn seems to have been full of flaming earnestness.
With a good deal less moralizing and a simpler way of stating facts this biography might be made a very powerful one. There is a constant effort at “preachment,” which we do not care for in a professedly biographical work.
Miss Margaret’s Stories. By a Clergyman’s Wife. National Temperance Publication Depot, 337, Strand.
VERY pretty little temperance tales that must do good wherever they are read. Miss Margaret’s own story may be a warning to any young lady who is engaged to a man who “drinks.” The cover of the book is embellished with a silver fountain and lake, and a golden swan, symbolical, we suppose, of the purity and beauty of the temperance which the authoress inculcates.
New Map of Palestine, showing the Travels of Jesus in Chronological Order. By Rev. A. P. STOUT, Indianopolis, Indiana, U. S, A.
THIS map seems to have been carefully prepared. It is well executed, and likely to be of much use to Bible students.
Bristles for Brooms. By WALTER J. MATHAMS (“ Blunt Robin “). Haughton and Co.
MR. MATHAMS writes very pleasantly, and always with an admirable aim. He has not, however, quite mastered the Blunt Robin style which he has chosen, but too often mixes with it words and phrases not congruous therewith. Many of the sentences which are meant for aphorisms lack salt and point. After making this abatement there still remains enough of good sense and piquancy in the book before us to make it tasteful to a considerable number, and these as they read will be profited. We are greatly obliged to Mr. Mathams for the following paragraph about the Orphanage, which we quote because it is a good plea and also a fair specimen of his manner
“Then there is Charles Spurgeon’s fold of hungry lambs over at Stockwell. Can’t you give him something in the way of food or clothing, or cash? lie will soon put it into use, and bring down the blessing of the orphan and the orphan’s God upon your head. Anything is grist I’ve heard that comes to his mill. Articles of jewelry and all sorts of queer stuff have been put in and come out in the shape of good wheaten flour. If’ you were to send him a whale he would turn it into food for his bairns, not by cooking it though. So don’t be ashamed to do a good turn to the orphan through him. And, by-the-by, he is just starting an orphanage for girls, and consequently needs more than ever the liberal offerings of his friends. Just give him a lift. in that direction, so that the dear little lasses (God bless ‘era) may have a happy home and plenty to eat.”
Bessie Blach’s Wager. BY CLAIR WILLIAMSON. Glasgow: John S. Marr and Sons.
WE took this book from quite a pile uniform in style and price, its a sample: we hope it is not a fair sample, but the very worst of the lot, by a long way; for it is a “story” we would carefully avoid putting in the way of a child. The scene is laid in an “English Industrial School,” and the actors, or actresses rather—Bessie Black and her companions—a set of coarse, incorrigible girls, who, in the attempt to get free from control, conceive and carry out the diabolical plot of setting fire to the institution. As a setoil’ to this atrocity, or (if the writer prefers to have it put otherwise) as the Christian teaching of the story, we have the pious influence of one good little girl so blessed to the incendiary that almost simultaneously with the crime she repents and confesses, and the next day begins her prison course “with a peaceful heart,” and comes forth to be “the heroine of the village.” Children can learn coarse language and sinful ways without our buying lesson-books for them; and to manufacture such stories, even with the intention of illustrating the mercy of God, is not to glorify God, but to do evil that good may come. These books at sixpence are really so handsome and cheap that, after preparing the above, we thought we would read another in the hope of being able to commend the rest of the series; but, alas, this time we hit on a tale about two little ,girls running away because they did not like their stepmother. The books are intended to do good, but we fear they are more likely to do harm. The idea or’ sixpenny gift-books, nicely bound, with two drawings in each, is a very liberal one, but the tales ought to be much better written.
Three Naturalists. Stories of Linnaeus, Cuvier, Buffon. 66, Paternoster Row.
IT is well for our young folks to know the lives of Linneus and Cuvier and Buffon, but we hope they will never imitate the last, who seems to us; to have been everything that is despicable. This is a tiny book, but interesting. Glenwood: a Story of School Life. By JULIA K. BLOOMFIELD. Wesleyan Conference Office.
A USEFUL book for school-girls who think more of beauty and dress than of brains and grace. No harm would have been done it’ the story had been told in a more lively manner, and we should have liked a little less about certain church ceremonies, and a great deal more of genuine gospel. The religious teaching of the book is good as far as it goes, but it is very imperfect, and is apt to give false notions concerning God’s way of peace.
Caught in the Toils. A Story of a Convent School. By EMMA LESLIE. Sunday School Union.
THIS little story is written with the laudable desire of warning Protestant parents against the dangers and beguilements to which they expose their daughters when, from economical or other reasons, they allow them to finish their education in a Continental school. The subject is one of grave importance, and might worthily employ an abler pen; but even in this simply-told tale we see abundant evidence of the deadly peril with which young and tender minds are surrounded when brought under the subtle and infamous influence of priests and nuns. The inducement of fluently acquiring the French language is a poor excuse for imperiling the soul, and English parents will do well to ponder this solemn question of eternal profit or loss before they send their boys and girls to be “finished” for the Pope and the devil.
Babylonian Caps: or, Behind the Scenes. By a Special Commissioner. With Preface by II. W. WILLIAMS, M.D. E. W. Allen, 11, Ave. Maria-lane.
This is a dreadful book, and, worse still, it is, we fear, no more terrible than true. The “Special Commissioner” was in formed that those who are determined to procure intoxicating drink can obtain it in London at every hour of the twenty-four, week days and Sundays too, all the year round, lie says that the statement is quite true, for he has taken pains, and sometimes run considerable risks in order to prove that the present very imperfect licensing laws are systematically violated or evaded. Ills revelations of ladies’ public-houses, Sabbath desecration on the river, the road, and the rail, and other scenes over which he is obliged to draw a veil, ought to teach Christians, abstainers, and all patriots, that there is no place in all the world which more needs the gospel than the metropolitan city, which is continually growing, and attracting to itself’ the best and the worst of all nations. At any rate, somebody ought to see that the laws which are on our statute-book are not deliberately set aside for the purpose of steeping our countrymen and countrywomen still deeper in vice and sin. The writer of this book evidently does not believe that the police will stop the illegal sale of liquor, for he states that while making his investigations he continually found what he calls “our cerulean, guardians” drinking spirits at the liquorseller’s expense.
The Prophet Jonah. By the Rev. SAMUEL CLIFT BURN. Second Thousand. Hodder and Stoughton.
THESE lectures will not add much to what is already known concerning Jonah, but they will spread among another constituency the facts which are to be found in other works. Mr. Burn has attained a respectable mediocrity as a writer, and the work before us is made up of discourses of fair average merit, not very deep or fresh, but still far too good to be found fault with, except by a critic who has not yet eaten his breakfast. We like this second book better than his first, which was “A Humble Companion to the Pilgrim’s Progress.” In form and general get-up the volume on Jonah does credit to the publishers.
Hours with the Bible; or, the Scriptures in the Light of Modern Discovery and -Knowledge. From Creation to the Patriarchs. By CUNNINGHAM GEIKIE, D.D. S.W. Partridge and Co.
MAY the learned author persevere in the enterprise which he here commences, and give us at least a dozen such instructive books. His plan is similar to that of Kitto’s Daily Bible Readings, but the chapters are more full and detailed. If carried out after the style of this first part, the work will be recognized as a standard piece of Scriptural literature. Dr. Geikie is occupying a minor position in Paris; but if the Church of England knows how to reward a laborious writer, some patron will soon put him in a place where he can have large leisure for his writing, and a sufficient income to enable him to utilize the national stores of learning. We abominate the whole system of patronage:: but as it does exist, we should like to see it used for the aid of one of the best religious writers of the age.
Sunday: its Origin, History, and Present Obligation. The Bampton Lectures for 1860. By JAMES A. HESSEY, D.C.L. Fourth Edition. London: Cassell, Petter, and Galpin.
THIS is a cheap reprint of a well-known book of very loose views on the Sunday question. Surely it is “carrying coals to Newcastle” to advise men to disregard the outward observance of the Sabbath. As we have no desire to return to the “Book” of Sports” of infamous memory, nor to see the infidelity and profligacy of a Continental Sunday introduced into England, we shall be old-fashioned enough to prefer the day as at present we try to keep it. Apart from its opinions, the book is well got up, and is cheap.
Popery and Puseyism, Twin-Demons with one Soul: or, Ritualism Unmasked. By R. M. GURNELL. London: F. Southwell.
THE form which the Papacy assumes in England is of so mild a type compared with the Continental that few Englishmen believe in the venom of which this serpent can be capable: but in this trenchant treatise the author shows the horrors which it perpetrates in the name of religion when uncontrolled. If to be forewarned is to be forearmed, none who read this pamphlet will ever be found tolerating either Roman Catholicism or its twin-sister, Ritualism. Smithfield’s fires would be lighted again to-morrow could our priests have their way. May that day never come.
Sin and its Penalty, Present and -Future. By JOSHUA HAWKINS. London: Elliot Stock.
ANOTHER of the miserably sentimental effusions of the “restoration” school of theologians: who teach that, because they so dream, wish, and hope, the vilest sinner and most hardened unbeliever will, after a term of punishment, ultimately enter heaven. But we believe—notwithstanding this pompous little book —that there is, and ever will be, an eternal difference between washing and whitewashing. We had sooner believe in a God who annihilated the ungodly than in a God who should send us into the world to tell men that, unless they accept the gospel, they will be lost, and all the while had a backstairs to heaven by way of a bastard purgatory. No? no? Mr. Hawkins, your molluscous Deity is not the God of the Bible, if we read it aright, and you may write a library, and then—well—we won’t believe you.
Universal Instructor, or Self-culture for all. Fully illustrated. Parts I and II. Ward, Lock, and Co.
MESSRS. WARD AND LOCK are doing great service to the cause of popular education by preparing this Encyclopedia of Learning. The parts at sixpence each are marvels of cheapness; indeed, it seems to us that the char in No. 1 is worth all the money. The articles are carefully prepared, and the matter is well condensed. The work, so far as we can judge, would seem to be as thorough in execution as it is comprehensive in plan. We seldom give an opinion of a book from seeing small parts of it; but in this instance, as much depends upon the sale in parts, we depart from our usual rule. Should the quality of the articles, illustrations, and materials be kept up, this will be one of the best popular instructors ever prepared. No one can be excused for being ignorant while the means of knowledge are thus brought to his door, and proffered at so small a cost.
The Eastern Archipelago: a description of the Scenery, Animal and Vegetable and Physical Wonders of the Islands in the Eastern Seas. By the author of “The Arctic World,” etc.
The Lake Regious of Central Africa; a Record of Modern Discovery. By JOHN GEDDIE. T. Nelson and Sons. WE put these together because they are of the same type. Here we have excellent writing, full of accurate geographical information, and fascinating in style; first-class illustration and plenty of it, a fortune spent in engravings, and binding congruous with the subject, chosen with admirable taste. Nelson and Sons are never excelled as publishers; they have a masterly method of production, of which we cannot speak too highly. The works before us are of thrilling interest, and should be in every library in the land. to be read alike by young and old.
The Prayer—meeting and its improvement. By Rev. L. O. THOMPSON. Hamilton, Adams, and Co.
WE should not advise anyone to follow Mr. Thompson’s suggestions in all points: his book is American, and across the water many things are done which we hope will never be tried here; our island is not large enough for such big things. But, with all abatements, this is so good a book that we wish we could afford to give a copy of it to every young minister. We love the prayer-meeting dearly. Revive your prayer-meetings, and the churches will be revived. These meetings are the furnace by which the church-engine is supplied with power, and if the motive force fails, work will not be done; hence poor prayer-meetings mean a poor pastorate, a poor deaconship, a poor school,—universal poverty, in fact. Mr. Thompson says some capital things in a telling manner, and as his pages are full of fire and gunpowder we hope certain old, worn-out things among us will be exploded, and good things set on fire. A brother who has this book handy will be helped to lead lively meetings, conducting them in varied ways, and expatiating on different topics, so as to keep up freshness, and avoid monotony and dullness. Four editions have been called for in America, and we have little doubt that a like number will be needed here.
Baptist Doctrines: being an Exposition in a series of Essays by representative Baptist Ministers, of the distinctive points of Baptist faith and practice. Edited by Rev. C. A. JENKINS, of North Carolina. St. Louis: Chancy R. Barns.
A SERIES OF vigorous and talented discourses upon the distinguishing doctrines of Baptists. Coming from our American brethren, we find, as we expected, that close communion is insisted on. In other respects the sermons are greatly to our liking; and we are greatly refreshed by such forcible denominational teaching in these days, when speaking out is hardly allowed unless you utter some sugared platitude from which even the evil spirit could hardly differ. Messrs. Trubner, of Ludgate Hill, would, no doubt, get this book for any who desire it. We are gratified to find that our sermon upon “Baptismal Regeneration” is included in the series: we forgot this when we said that the discourses were talented.
Preaching: its Ideal and Inner Life. By THOMAS ARMITAGE, D.D. Philadelphia: American Baptist Publication Society.
DR. ARMITAGE is a master in Israel among the Baptists in America. It was not possible for him to lecture upon the work of his life without saying some good and wise things; and accordingly he has said them, and here they are alive and vigorous. Some of them are not so big as they look, but others are worthy of their parentage, and likely to instruct those who receive them. The lectures must have been fine hearing, with the living man at their back speaking them to living men. As printed, they only add one more to a heap with which this subject is getting overdone, choked up and buried.
Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. “The Household Library of Exposition” series. By MARCUS DODS, D.D. Edinburgh: Macniven and Wallace.
DR. DODS is learned and instructive, but as to unction or spirituality he is as dry as the bones in the valley of vision. He seems to have a desiccating faculty, for whatever his theme may be his magic pen extracts from it the least trace of savor. In this he resembles many of the Germans, whose powers in this direction are so great that they would turn a cluster of Eshcol into raisins in five minutes, and leave the pomegranates of Syria. dry as the apples of Sodom in half a second. Such scholars have their uses, and, certainly, the writings of Dr. Dods are by no means to be despised, for he presents his readers with much excellent information. Every man cannot be an oil merchant: a dry-salter is a very useful person in his way; and so every man has not evangelical dew and warmth, but he may yield us a dry light in which some things are best seen.
The design of the Household Library of Exposition has our heartiest sympathy. We are glad to see that another work by Dr. Maclaren is in preparation.
Notes and Extracts on Misunderstood Texts. By Mrs. MACLACHLAN, Sen. James Nisbet and Co. Yes, there are, no doubt, many misunderstood texts, and if we do not greatly misunderstand Mrs. Maclachlan, she, also, misunderstands them.
The Letter H; Past, Present, and Future: a Treatise with Rules for the Silent , etc. By ALFRED LEACH. Griffith and Farran.
Those who aspire to understand the aspirate will here find assistance in their aspirations. In a few pages we hear all about that awful letter H, which so cruelly betrays the power of early associations and the deficiencies of cockney education.
A Violet in the Shade. Dolly’s Charge. A Rose without Thorns. Light on the Lily. Our Laddie. Ursula: a Story of the Bohemian Reformation. James Nisbet and Co.
Six pretty little presents for papa to purchase for Philip and Phillis when they deserve a prize for good behavior.
The Preachers’ Monthly (Lobb and Bertram, l, St. Bride-street, Ludgate Circus) is a capital sixpennyworth. Some of the outlines are rather grander in words than in meaning; but, take it as a whole, no magazine for preachers ever opened more hopefully. If it can be kept up to its present point it will be a great boon to weary ministers.
NOTES
VERY PERSONAL. I have been very ill for more than five weeks, and during that time I have been brought into deep waters of mental depression, yet on the whole I have had more quiet of heart than aforetime. I beg specially to acknowledge the tender thoughtfulness of a host of friends. As if they felt it good to send cheer when God was sending chastisement, they have poured in letters of sympathy, backed up with tokens of love in the form of contributions to my various institutions. I have been sustained by overflowing kindness. A growing sense of unworthiness bows me down, and compels me to mingle wonder with my gratitude. Theft this continuous kindness to me should result in benefit to my Orphanage, and the other works for God, is cause for unmingled satisfaction. It is doubly blessed to be beloved when the fruit abounds to the glory of God and the good of men. What thanks I owe to God and to my numerous friends? To HIM my heart can speak in silence, but to men there must be voices, and where shall I find them? I can do no more than say to the long list of donors and comforters,—The Lord recompense into your own bosoms all your loving thoughts and deeds towards his unworthy servant.
Our beloved wife has prepared the Report of her work for ministers during the year 1880. In order that many friends may see it, and become interested in her needful service, she has, desired Mr. Passmore to publish it; and it can be had by order of any bookseller for sixpence. I think it is a very interesting record, and very likely to benefit the whole class of poor ministers in many ways. The work itself, though it costs our beloved all her time and much careful thought, is one of the most blessed which can be imagined, since it puts sound theology where it will not only be studied, but published to congregations. Some people imagine that in a very short time all needy preachers can be supplied with books. Alas, there has not been one helping all round yet, and meanwhile the hunger for thoughtproducing books comes on again, and Oliver “asks for more.” And preachers must have more, or their flocks will look up to them and look in vain for food.
A protest from Christian brethren in Holland in reference to the Transvaal has been forwarded to us, and to other prominent ministers. What reply can we make? We understood that the Transvaal was annexed by the will of its inhabitants; but if it was not so it was a piece of oppression ‘and robbery, against which we heartily protest, and we hope that some means may be found by which the Boers may be allowed to enjoy their liberty and govern themselves according to their own laws. It is said that these good people maintained a kind of slavery within their own borders, and if so their demand for freedom loses much of its force. The religious sentiment of England will ask liberty for the Boer, but it will also demand freedom for the Black.
On Friday, Dec. 17, Mr. and Mrs. Guinness and the tutors and students from Harley House, Bow, returned the visit which we and our students paid them earlier in the year. Our esteemed deacon, Mr. C. F. Allison, presided at the afternoon meeting, at which, after prayer by Professor Ferguson, Mr. Guinness delivered a most earnest address on the need of missionaries to the heathen, showing that the home field is overdone as compared with the foreign, which is grossly neglected. The President of the Pastors’ College followed with a description of the kind of sermons likely to be blessed to the winning of souls. Our communion was intensely hearty, for the Colleges are of kindred spirit, and aim distinctly at evangelistic work and soul-winning. Mr. Murrell provided a substantial repast in his usual excellent style, for which he was thanked by representatives of both Colleges.
The evening was spent by the two Colleges very profitably in a devotional meeting, at which Professor Gracey took the chair, as we had to, leave in order to preside at the public examination of our Day School At this examination we were delighted with the results of the instruction given to the children. We have seldom spent such a happy afternoon and evening; but, alas? our joy was of short duration, for the following night we were suddenly seized with the first indications of the illness from which we have not yet recovered. In consequence of our affliction the College annual meeting, and the Silver Wedding congratulatory gatherings had to be postponed. Both of these we look forward to as pleasures to come. The dreary gap has been filled up by the diligent labors of others, and it will be joy indeed to be to the front again. Will our readers ask for us health, and a continuance of it, if it be the Lord’s will?
Dec. 31.—Messrs. Smith and Fullerton conducted the usual WATCHNIGHT SERVICE. The power of God was present in the vast assembly, and the fruit will be seen for man)’ days to come.
COLLEGE.—Since our last notice Mr. F. E. Blackaby has settled at Stowon-the-Wold, and Mr. E. H. Ellis at Wellington Road, Stoke Newington; Mr. Potter has been accepted by the Baptist Mission for India; and the following brethren have removed:-Mr. H. J. Dyer from Gainsborough to Kilmarnock; Mr. W. Smith from Calling-worth to Arthur-street, Gray’s Inn-road; Mr. A. Harmer from Chatham-road, Wands-worth Common, to Dolton, Devon; Mr. W. Osborne, late of Bristol, to Eastbourne; and Mr. A. Knell, late of Ridgmount, to Walsham, Suffolk. Mr. W. McKinney, late of Port Jervis, has serried at Kingston on the Hudson, New York.
Mr. Kendon writes from Jamaica expressing great gratitude for the £50 which we sent him from a friend, but adding that twenty times that amount will be needed to repair what the hurricane destroyed. He and his people have erected a room for temporary services, and they intend soon to rebuilt the chapel. Amid all his troubles he has much to rejoice over, for during the year he has had 250 additions to the church list of inquirers and members, over forty backsliders have been reclaimed, and a deep work of awakening seems to be going on.
The church at Madras, under the care of Bro. Maplesden, reports steady progress in each department of its work, although the pastor has been absent through sickness part of the year. The Lord bless this beloved brother more and more, and send gracious help to all our brotherhood in India.
Mr. R. Spurgeon writes that, at the request of the Missionary Conference, he has removed from Dacca to Barisaul, “the most important mission-field in Bengal,” where, in connection with Mr. Martin, he is to commence a class for the training of native evangelists to take charge of native churches. After speaking of the success of our brethren, Norris and Hook, at Calcutta, Brother Spurgeon adds:— “It is a joyful thought to me that so many of our brethren are filling the pulpits of our great Indian cities; but why are they not occupying our mission stations also? I cannot understand how it is that I only have this honor of all our brethren. We are in as great need of men now as ever; and I feel sure there are many to cry, ‘Here am I; send me.’”
If there are any of our brethren who are thus ready to respond to the divine call for missionaries, “Who will go for us, and whom shall I send?” we shall be glad to hear from them, for we have been looking about for months for suitable men to Jill important posts in India, but at present without success. Some who would have bean the very men for the work in other respects have not the physical constitution necessary to endure the hot climate; but we hope that in our regiment of more; than five hundred soldiers of the cross there will be found some whom the Lord has ordained and specially qualified for this work.
We greatly rejoice that at last we have been able to secure a brother who will take charge of the work at Darjeeling. Mr. H. Rylands Brown, who has for thirteen years been pastor of the church at Shooter’s Hill-road, Blackheath, and who has long desired to give himself to foreign mission work, has felt called of God to enter this important sphere of labor, and we earnestly pray that he may be made a great blessing both to the residents in the district, and the large numbers of persons who resort to this Indian Mentone in search of health or rest.
We are glad also that there is a slight indication that the Lord approves of our proposed evangelistic mission to the English-speaking populations in .India, for he has begun to move his servants to contribute to this object, though at present the amount received is exceedingly small compared with what will be needed if the scheme is to be carried out. A contribution of £10 for this fund from a friend in Australia. greatly cheered us. The sending out of Mr. H. Brown will cost far more than we have in hand at present.
Our beloved son Thomas sends us a characteristic account of the services at the opening of the Tabernacle at Deloraine, Tasmania, and says that the following week he was to be at; the opening of the Tabernacle at Longford.
Mr. D. M. Logan reports the safe arrival of himself and wife and family at Melbourne, after a somewhat similar experience to that of Brother Mann in going to Cape Town. They were first wrecked in the Hydaspes off Dungeness, when they lost everything but their lives; and the second vessel in which they sailed, the Sorata, ran aground on the Australian coast, and put them to considerable inconvenience for more than “a night and a day.” On the whole, our brother writes cheerfully, although he has not yet found the right sphere in which he can imitate the great apostle, who supported himself by working with his own hands, and at the same time, whenever he had the opportunity, preached among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ.
EVANGELISTS.—On Sunday, Jan. 9, Mr. Smith commenced a series of services at Halifax. As Mr. Fullerton was preaching at the Tabernacle on that day, his place was occupied by Mr. Charlesworth, but on the following day he joined his fellow-worker. Three crowded services were held on the first day in Trinity Road Chapel, and at night a large music-hall was filled long before the hour of commencing the service. So many were unable to gain admittance that it was deemed advisable to secure the Drill Hall, where the meetings are still being held with great success.
Since writing this paragraph we are grieved to hear that, owing to the prevalence of fever, our evangelists have abruptly closed their services at the request of the Mayor. This, too, when crowds were gathering? Truly the way of the Lord is in the sea. From Dec. 13 to 19 Mr. Burnham was at -Highgate. Of the services held there our Bro. Barnard writes, “They have been a great refreshing to us all, and the means of reviving the spiritual life of the church. It is also our joy to know that some unsaved and undecided ones have been awakened and impressed.” At Winslow,
from Dec. 30 to Jan. 7, Mr. Burnham had, as on a previous occasion, a most gracious season of blessing. He specially mentions the usefulness of a short Bible-reading in the vestry at the close of the service each evening, when many anxious ones, who would not have come alone to speak with the Evangelist, accompanied others, and heard words whereby they were saved. Our brother has since conducted services at Cranswick (where a former visit awakened such interest as to necessitate the pulling down of the old chapel and the erection of a larger one), Searborough, and Sheepshed, and this month he commences a visitation of the village churches of York, hire, under the auspices of the Baptist Association of that county, an engagement which, with needful rest, will occupy him until the summer.
Mr. Burnham has hitherto been supported by a single subscriber, for whose help we are most grateful, ‘but that gentleman finds himself giving rather more than he thinks prudent, and, therefore, in future Mr. Burnham must come upon our General Fund unless some other brother should come forward and offer to support him. At any rate, his labors shall not cease from want of support. We trust that for the present our Yorkshire friends who have his services will remember that the laborer is worthy of his hire.
ORPHANAGE.— Christmas Festival. Although the poor President was obliged to be at home and in bed all Christmas day, the orphan boys and girls were as merry as ever. Through the kindness of our ever faithful friends donations in cash and kind were on the most liberal scale, and right heartily did the youngsters enjoy the good things provided for them. Our son Charles once more presided in our absence, and several of the Trustees attended to assist in satisfying the wants of our large family. Mr. Charlesworth reports that everything passed off most satisfactorily, both at the children’s gatherings and the usual supplementary meeting of mothers and the inmates. The surplus of the Christmas Fund runs into the daily expenses, and makes quite an item of importance.
Girls’ Orphanage Buildings. —. In the preface to the volume of The Sword and the Trowel for last year we wrote two months ago that all the money had been promised or given for the first contract, and added” We shall need several other buildings to render the whole of the girls’ houses available as dwellings and schools. Infirmary and dining-hall must be built, and a large building is needed to serve us on our great days of public meetings, and to be on ordinary occasions the chapel for the whole of the children, their teachers, and other friends. It may be that some one friend will give this or that building, and if not, a bazaar, at the end of 1881, will go far towards it.” The words which we have italicized caught the eye of two generous friends who desired to have a hand in this good work, for while we were lying in bed in great pain a lady and gentleman called at our house, and intimated their desire to pay for one of the “other buildings” needed to complete the institution. We have been too ill to ascertain the final decision of these noble souls as to which building they will prefer to erect as a memorial of their love for us and our orphan charge, but we understand that their gift will not be less than £1000. Will other friends begin working for the Bazaar? It will be seen from our cash accounts that we have during the past month received the legacy of which notice reached us on the morning that we paid for “The Hawthorns,” in which our first batch of fatherless girls has been housed. Two other noble donations have also come to hand in redemption of promises made for the building fund; and, as the lists show, the general contributions have been both considerable in number and large in amount. For this we devoutly thank God, who through his steward thus continues to provide for a work which is peculiarly his own; but friends will please note that the large stuns have been already reckoned upon and accounted for, and are not therefore new items to the good; indeed, the legacy comes out of court £250 less than we expected.
COLPORTAGE.—The Secretary writes:—” I have nothing special to report this month. no new districts have been opened except Pembroke Dock, where we have made arrangements with the colporteur engaged, hoping that the friends in the locality, when they see the value and importance of the work, will subscribe the £10 a year required, so that we may employ him permanently in the regular way. I think it should be publicly acknowledged that we are very thankful to Mr. W. H. Stevens, of Brixton Road, for a very handsome stove kindly presented to the Association, to warm our offices.”
The colporteurs will in most cases be snowed up at this time, and the people will have few pence to spare when the thaw comes, but this is an affliction common to us all.
One of the colporteurs says— “I am generally, engaged every Sunday and every evening in the week in preaching. Every time I go to each place, whether on Sundays or week-days, I get the rooms not only filled, but often crowded, and great blessings hay,; attended my humble labors, for at nearly every meeting that I have conducted during the last two months, there have been evident signs of conversion, and I have also got many to sign the temperance pledge. The sale of the books has not been without good results. One woman has been brought to the Savior through reading the book called, ‘The Dying Savior and the Gipsy Girl,’ and a lady friend who buys a great many books to give away has told me of several cases of a decided change through the books read.”
METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE EVANGELISTS’ ASSOCIATION.—Mr. Elvin sends us very cheering reports of services recently held by some of his helpers. We have only space to mention one out of many. During a week of meetings in the new chapel erected on the site of the Tabernacle, Moorfields, twenty-five persons professed conversion; and Mr. Elvin adds, “The minister (Mr. Morgan), deacons, and all friends were highly delighted. They were full of thanks to everybody belonging to the Association, and more than all to you for starting and sustaining such an agency.” As a practical proof of their appreciation of the work they had a collection on behalf of the Association, although none had been announced. This is as it should be, and if all our churches that receive blessing through the visits of these unpaid evangelists will do the same Mr. Elvin will not find so much difficulty as he now does in keeping the expenditure of his society within the limits of its income. The Association aims at the evangelization of London, through existing churches of all denominations, and already many parts of our great city have to bless God for what it has accomplished.
POOR MINISTERS’ CLOTHING SOCIETY.—Y. J. W. is very gratefully informed that the “suits of gentlemen’s clothing, good, and suitable for a poor minister” will be very thankfully received if sent to Mrs. Evans, Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington, London. The donor’s address should accompany the parcel, that it may be plainly acknowledged.
PERSONAL NOTES.—Mr. Chowrryappah, Baptist Missionary at Madras, has just sought and obtained permission to translate some of our sermons, tracts, and “Evening by Evening,” into Tamil. He says that this work will, beyond a doubt, benefit thousands of his countrymen.
The following is an extract from a letter recently received from a ministerial brother: —” Your first sermon in Belfast caused me to decide finally to enter the ministry. Since then I have given ten years to mission work in Damascus, where I built the first church ever erected for the spiritual worship of the true God in that city. I built two churches on Mount Hermon, ‘red in these churches again and again I have preached your sermons in Arabic. I preached one of your sermons on the top of Mount Hermon at a picnic given to our different villagers.
One of our elders writes: “In common with everybody, I am deeply grieved at your illness and pain, and I wish I could alleviate your sufferings in any way. I did suffer vicariously for you the other evening. At a meeting in S— -I was laid hold of by a big, burly fellow, more than six feet high, and broad in proportion, who had a paw in proportion, too. and with this paw he laid hold of my poor hand. He did not get hold of it fiat, but all of a heap and did not he give me a squeeze? I thought I had not deserved such a reception, and was not surprised that I was getting it for year sake. e man who held me told me that seventeen years ago he was one of the worst characters in S——, but out of curiosity he wont to hear you, and you preached from the text ‘ Why sleepest thou?’ You woke him up. He could not rest, and was obliged to come again to hear you. I forget what text you preached from on the second occasion, but he found Christ that day, and since then he has been earnestly working for the Master. He said he had often walked to the Tabernacle and back in clays gone by, and had thought nothing of it, but now his feet would not carry him; neither had he had an opportunity of shaking hands with you, and as he still kept hold of my hand, he gave me another vice-like grip to show how he would shake your hand if he could. My hand did ache. He is a good fellow, though, and I rejoice that the Lord gave him the word of salvation by you.”
Our beloved brother, J. A. S., tells us he was greatly delighted on visiting a sick man lately to hear how he found the Savior. He said that a few days before we preached at the Crystal Palace,, in 18o7, we went down to the building to arrange where the platform should be placed, and while trying various positions we cried aloud, “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.” This man was at the time at work in the Palace, and the text spoken under these unusual circumstances went with power to his heart, convinced him of sin, and led him to the sin-atoning Lamb. How well it is to utter great gospel texts, even when we are not preaching, for they are arrows from the quiver of God, and will not fly abroad in vain.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle.— December 30th, 1880, eleven.
Chap 12. MARCH, 1881.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
MARCH, 1881.
PREACH CHRIST IN A CHRISTLY MANNER.
AN ADDRESS BY C. H. SPURGEON, DELIVERED AT THE PASTORS’ COLLEGE.
THOMAS Aquinas and others wrote commentaries upon the works of Peter the Lombard, who was surnamed Magister Sententiarum, or the Master of the Sentences. I will for a while join these schoolmen, and discourse upon a sentence. I know not whence it came, but it is floating in my brain; here it is: “PREACH CHRIST IN A CHRISTLY MANNER.” It comes to me in association with another, “Preach the cross in a crucified style” an equally weighty word, which we may handle at another time. Ministers of the gospel, let Christ be your subject, and let Christ be your model: find in him not only the truth you utter, but the way and life of your utterance.
As for Christ’s being our subject, I have spoken upon that theme so many times that there is the less need on this occasion to dwell upon it at any length. What other topic can engross a Christian minister’s attention? He is certainly untrue to him who called him if he puts his Master into any but the chief seat, or overshadows him with other themes. Whatever else you leave out, let Christ Jesus never be forgotten. Preach all that you know about Christ—all that you have learned from the Scriptures, all that you have experienced at his hands, all that his Spirit; has enabled you to perceive and enjoy. “:Not a bone of him shall be broken”: set him forth in his entirety. Give each of his doctrines a fair share of your attention, for blessed are they who keep his sayings. Preach all that Christ set forth in his life; all that he commanded, all that he (lid, all that he suffered, and all that he was. Is not this range enough, even for those who, like Solomon, have “largeness of heart even as the sand which is on the sea-shore”? What a work is before you if you preach all that Jesus was as to his person, offices, relationships, works, and triumphs. The central sun of your whole system must be his glorious sacrifice for sin. As the starry cross holds the chief place among the southern constellations, so let it be the main glory of your ministry. Let there be no muddle nor mixture about the doctrine of substitution; say plainly that “he was made a curse for us,” that he bare the iniquities of his people, and died “the just for the unjust to bring us to God.” Set before the; people not only Christ, but Christ crucified, and when you are engaged upon the work, not only preach him in a dull, didactic manner, but, by a lively, spiritual, earnest, hearty mode of address, set him forth “before their eyes evidently crucified among them.” You can never grow weary of this subject; it is an inexhaustible fountain of wonder; angels desire to look into it, and glorified spirits fall down in adoration as they think of it. Like a fair landscape, it will grow upon you; and the more you look into it the more you will see in it. God fed his people for forty years with manna, and it was only their lust which made them long for flesh: their every-day diet was all that they really needed, and all that God ever gave them in love,—the quails were sent in anger. The gospel is manna, human speculations are but flying fowl, and often does it happen to those who feed thereon that, while the meat is yet in their mouths, the wrath of God comes upon them. We are not authorized to hand out anything but the bread which came down from heaven, and the true Israel will never weary of it. If the mixed multitude sigh for the leeks, and garlic, and onions of Egyptian philosophy, let them buy their provender at the stall of the nearest “intellectual preacher,” but as for you, I beseech you, deal in nothing but the bread of life. Nothing else will stand you in such good stead for profitable discourses as the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Nothing else will keep a congregation in a gracious condition. Nothing else will win souls. Nothing else will bring you a soft pillow when you are nearing your last account. Let your motto be, “None but Christ.”
But my sentence bids us preach Christ in a Christly manner. Every piece of music has its own proper key, and the proper pitch for the gospel is to be found in the gospel itself. Every man should speak in his own tongue, and we must let the gospel speak its own language and use its own tone. “Never man spake like this man,” and this is the man whose speech it best becomes us to copy, if we would prove to men that we are his disciples. How, then, did Christ preach? I cannot attempt to describe his style and manner at length; but here are a few hints. Did he not preach most solemnly? There was weight about every word that he said, meaning in every gesture, force in every tone. He was never a trifler, he did not show off his abilities nor aim at winning applause: he was in solemn, self-forgetting earnest. His accents were those of conviction, his voice was as the voice of God, his very attitudes pleaded with men. What shall I say of him? Oh, that we could speak always as in the presence of God as he did? O that we came fresh from prevailing with the Father in prayer, to prevail with men in preaching, then should we work the works of him that sent us.
Although our Lord always spoke solemnly, yet never drearily, there is a pleasant interest about his words, for he preached glad tidings joyfully. It was evidently his meat and his drink to do the will of him: that sent him. He delighted in his ministry, and in it he found refreshment. I cannot imagine our Savior during those three years wearing the aspect of one who was tired of his work, or as speaking merely because he was expected to do so, in a dull, monotonous, lifeless manner. His heart was in his sermons, and parables, and gracious talks; he loved to be God’s ambassador, and would not have exchanged his office to rule empires. He would not be diverted from his life’s great mission, and when other work was set before him, he said, “Who made me a judge or a divider over you?” O men of the world, how could you invite him to such a task? Wist ye not that he must be about his Father’s business? He said, “The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up.” He found a satisfaction in his mission so great that even for the most painful part of it he sighed, saying, “I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!” God forbid, my brethren, that we should ever say of our pulpit or pastoral work, “What a weariness it is?” For in it the joy of the Lord is our strength, and our love to our service will be the life of it by God’s grace. Let us joy in our high vocation, and never follow it as if we had made a mistake, and would be glad to rectify it by getting out of the ministry if we dared. Let your joy in your service impart an interest to your discourses, making them fragrant with the peace which reigns in your own soul. “The fruit of the Spirit is joy:” let your hearers see many a specimen of that fruit in your sermons. Preach Christ from the constraints of love, or not at all. Your Lord was no slavish herald, forced to unwilling labor, and he will not have his gospel of liberty proclaimed by hirelings, who have no delight in their message.
Our Lord Jesus also preached very meekly. Gentleness was an eminent characteristic of his manner, for he was himself meek and lowly in heart, stooping to the lowest of men without appearing to condescend, taking the little children in his arms and blessing them, and doing it so naturally that you might admire but could not wonder. He did not speak to the poor and ignorant like a very great man, who was so very high up that he had to come down a great many. steps to them; but he addressed them as a friend, and entreated them as a brother. “Then drew near unto him all the publicans and sinners for to hear him,” because there was no affectation of superiority about him. He had no need to assume the airs of superior purity, for the superior purity was really there. He lovingly cried, “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” We must try to possess his meek and quiet spirit, for he says to us especially, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart.” We carry his cross, let us copy his lowliness. Of him it was written, “He shall not strive, nor cry; neither shall any man hear his voice in the streets. A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench.” Contention and strife were not for him, he was the Preacher and the Prince of Peace. Scolding in the pulpit, bitterness in conversation, asperity of manner, and domineering over others are not for us, for they are not Christly things.
Yet if we preach Christ in a Christly way we must preach him courageously. There was nothing cowardly about our Lord, no shirking or shrinking, no cultivation of soft speech to win favor from men. He was never anxious to cut the gospel diamond into a shape which should please the taste of the period. He was brave as a lion though gentle as a lamb; keen as the surgeon’s knife, though tender as a mother’s hand. How bravely he rebuked the sins of the Pharisees I He never trembled before any of his hearers, not even when they took up stones again to stone him; nor, what is sometimes harder to avoid, (lid he flinch when he was in the midst of his own acquaintance, and, like every other preacher, was without honor among his own countrymen; for he came unto his own and his own received him not, but took him to the top of the hill on which their city was built that they might cast him down headlong. I never heard anybody say that our Lord was brave, because the remark would be altogether superfluous: there is a cool, calm, self-possession about Jesus which it would be hard to match in the life of any other man. He does not brace and rouse himself up to heroism, he is always a hero; but it is always in a way so natural to him that his grandest actions seem only such as you would expect from so sublime a nature. It is the natural calmness of his heart which makes Christ’s life so serenely brave. Be you like him. Never go into the pulpit timidly, so as to be afraid of men’s faces, lest you be put to shame before them; but, without uttering or feeling defiance, confront the multitude on God’s behalf with the fearlessness which becomes the ambassador of God. If what you say be of God, say it out like a man; nay, rather like “the Son of man.”
Recollect that one point of Christ’s style was his simplicity of language. He used great plainness of speech. Though under one aspect of truth it; may be said that he veiled his meaning under parabolic curtains so that men did not see it, yet the veil was so thin that those who desired to see the light did see it all the better for that veil, which did but make the light more suitable for feeble eyes. If his gospel was hid it was hid to them that were lost, for now that with opened eyes we read the New Testament we see in it most clearly the glorious gospel of the blessed God. Certainly Jesus had no preference for hard words. You do not find him puzzling his hearers with the terms of the schools or the refinings of the scribes; his language was such that the common people heard him gladly. I wonder what our Lord would have done with some of the books translated from the German with which we have been favored in past years. Devour stones and grind granite rocks between your teeth, and then hope to feed upon some of the great thoughts of the learned mystifiers of the age, whose thought-creation is chaos, and whose word-utterance is as darkness itself. “Brethren,” said a negro preacher, “I am going to confound a chapter to you.” Verily, I say unto you, that is what too many critics are doing; their explanations explain away the Scriptures: they hide the wisdom of ,God behind the foolishness of men. Jesus, the light of the world, was most luminous in his style. Had he been an Englishman I am sure that he would have drawn his language from the pure well of English undefiled, sparkling with Saxon idiom, dear to the people. Always preach with clearness of thought and word. If you are learned men, to whom Greek and Latin studies are familiar delights, save your classics for yourselves and your fellow collegians; but give the people, words which can be readily understood: you will do so if sour scholarship has brought you real wisdom. Your shallow scholar’, like a scantily flowing brook, reveals every glittering grain which lies within it; but where we find depth and fullness the pure current of the water of life alone is seen, and even pearls and sands of gold lie undisplayed below. Preachers of the age of Thomas Adams and Lancelot Andrewes bespattered their periods with Latin phrases, till one hardly knows whether they were preaching to Romans or to Britons; and this reprehensible practice is but an exaggeration of a habit which is found among certain divines at this hour, which leads them to quote metaphysical passages from Tennyson and hard sayings from Carlyle, as if they were royal dainties for believing minds. Not that I plead for the rags or nakedness of mental poverty: let goodly truth be arrayed in fit apparel; but I decry the Babylonish garment and the meretricious finery with which some would disguise the virgin daughter of Zion. Aspire to be understood rather than to be admired. Seek not to produce a wondering but an instructed audience. Obscurity more befits the Delphic shrine than the oracles of God. Be as plain as a pikestaff in your doctrine and clear as the sun in the heavens in your gospel. Let there be nothing difficult about what you preach, except that which naturally and inevitably surrounds truths of surpassing sublimity and spirituality.
Yet, while our blessed Lord preached very plainly and simply, you must remember that there was much instruction in every discourse. I have heard the expression “simple gospel” used by persons who seemed themselves to be simple enough by nature, and far beyond the necessity of making violent efforts in that direction. I do not believe in a simple gospel which is suited for simpletons because there is nothing in it. Let your teaching be clear as crystal, but deep as the sea. Our congregations are not to be treated as if they were the infant classes of a Sunday-school. Foundation truths are to be taught frequently; but there must be building up as well. Let there be real teaching in what you have to say, or you will create dissatisfaction among your best hearers. The notion that we have only to cry, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved,” and repeat for ever the same simplicities, will be fatal to a continuous ministry over one people if we attempt to carry it out. The evangelical party in the Church of England was once supreme; but it lost very much power through the weakness of its thought, and its evident belief that pious platitudes could hold the ear of England. If you knew that as much gold as could be purchased for three-halfpence had been beaten out so as to cover a ten-acre field, you would not be surprised if people said that the metal was rather thin; yet such was the quantity of thought to be found in many “evangelical” books and sermons. I have seen enough of the writings of one or two evangelical bishops not long deceased to wonder how they came to be printed, much less sold; for there is really nothing in them. It was, I suppose, the proper thing to purchase such books and set them on the shelf, and therefore they obtained a sale; but what an imposition upon the public! Can anyone tell me why Archbishop Sumner’s comments were ever submitted to the press? Did weakness of thought ever reach a deeper degree of imbecility? I conceive that, by giving the people mere pap and milk-and-water, our brethren lost their vantage ground, and gave the Ritualist and Broad Churchman an opportunity of which they readily availed themselves. Leave off thinking and you may as well leave off preaching. Our Lord Jesus was no repeater of a parrot cry: the poor had the gospel preached to them; but it was not a poor gospel. What condensed thought he uttered? What massive, masterly expressions he used: such as, “I am the way, the truth, and the life”; or that other grand announcement, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” A fullness dwelt in him, and fullness therefore flowed from him. His was no shadow of empty oratory; he gave to men the substance of eternal blessing. In simple language he proclaimed infinite mysteries, and none who heard him could say that he ever wasted time with barren words, or poured forth vain repetitions of worn-out phrases. Do, brethren, be as solid in matter as you are simple in manner; let your apples be apples of gold, and the baskets, baskets of silver; no wild crabs thrown into hampers will suffice for the service of the Great King.
There was also in the Savior’s preaching a wonderful mixture of devotion. He might have prayed his sermons; he did pray in his sermons; his sermons were the result of his prayers, and were followed by his prayers. His public discourses were the children of his midnight devotions; they were born in the morning, but he travailed with them all night, and. agonized until they were brought forth. This is the way to preach. Pray the divine message into yourself, and then preach it out of yourself. Speak with God for men, and then speak with men for God. To turn from prayer to preaching and from preaching again to prayer was most natural with Jesus; when he was alone with God his heart was pleading for men, and when he was in the midst of the throng his soul was pleading for God. He was always with God, and God was always with him. You never find him for a single moment in a condition in which he was not fit to deal with men’s souls, for you never find him out of communion with God.
The only other remark I will now make is that the distinguishing trait in the Savior’s preaching was Ms love. He had an intense affection for his hearers. He had no need to say so, for he looked it, he spoke it, he lived it, he died to prove it. He was incarnate love, and his preaching was his heart set to words. Some men seem to be incarnate dignity. Christ was dignified; yet men saw more of his affection than of his glory. Some men are like embodied tempests. Oh, how they storm? But God is not in the wind, and he is not often in the fire: the still, small voice of tender love is usually the medium of divine communication. I have known brethren who have appeared to take for their example, not Jesus, but the prophet Jonah; and these would seem to care more for their ministerial honor than for the fate of men. They have a sharp, short, spiritual bark about them, as if they suspected everybody, and most of all those who came to confess their faith in Christ. A churlish and cynical manner is by no means uncommon among men; but Jesus was full of love both in heart and manner, and he would have his ministers to be intensely affectionate to their flocks. He desired men to become his followers for their good, and when they rejected him his great grief was because they were losing the blessing which would have come to them if they had received him as their Savior. I do not know that I should point to any one sermon and say, “How loving our Lord was in that”; but I would bid you look at the whole of his ministry, and tell me where was ever such devoted love to men. When he has to speak sternly, as well as at every .other time, his tenderness is apparent. He laments even while he condemns. If Jerusalem must be doomed, its sentence is pronounced by a voice that is choked for utterance. He bathes the furbished sword in a flood of tears. Nay, he went far beyond weeping, for he was ready to die, and did die, to finish the work which he had undertaken for our sakes. In some sense he was dying throughout the whole of t, is career, looking forward to death, shut up for death within his own spirit, dying daily for those whom he loved. In such a spirit let us proclaim the gospel of the loving God.
Thus, my beloved brethren, I hold up to you Jesus Christ as the model preacher. I hold up no man beside, and I earnestly advise you never to become slavish copyists of any living preachers. Do you reply that you need a living teacher? I reply that Jesus is a living model; for, blessed be God, he ever liveth. There is also this choice advantage about him, that he is an accessible model; for at all times we may sit at his feet. What is equally important, he is an inimitable model, and not as certain among us, whom it would be ridiculous to copy. Many good men I despair of imitating; but the character of Jesus can be transcribed upon the pages of our own lives. You may find faults in all other preachers, for the best of men are men at the best; but there are no flaws, eccentricities, or infirmities in him, for he is perfection. You may regard the ablest of preachers as your beacons as well as your guiding-lights; but in Jesus you will find nothing to avoid, and everything to admire. Preach Christ, then, in a Christly way, and you shall enter into your Master’s joy, and share in your Master’s glory at the last.
WHAT AGNOSTICISM LEADS TO
MANY of you have heard that wondrous opening passage of Mendelssohn’s “Elijah,” in which the musician tries to represent the despair of a whole people perishing from thirst, a despair which finds vent for a while in sullen, restless murmuring, until at length, gathering a terrible cumulative strength, it bursts forth almost appallingly in cries of heartrending and importunate agony. So can I imagine the voice of a deceived and terror-stricken humanity, having sought in vain to slake its thirst at the dry wells of modern positivism, sending upward at length to heaven the broken-hearted cry, “Give us back the Christ that we have lost.” Away with the ghastly specter, the hideous phantom, the “It” that has usurped his throne, and let us learn again to love and worship a God who is heart to heart.—Bishop of Neath.
ENCOURAGEMENT TO STREET
AN INCIDENT RELATED BY MR. SPURGEON AT THE TABERNACLE PRAYER-MEETING.
I HEARD just now a little story which may encourage those of you who preach in the street. One of our friends called in upon a tradesman not far from here, bought some goods of him, and seeing in his shop a text, or a temperance motto, he asked him if he was a Christian. The reply was “Yes, blessed be God, I am.” A conversation began at once, in the course of which the tradesman inquired, “Do you know a minister of the name of Medhurst?” The other said he knew him well, for he was the first student in Mr. Spurgeon’s College. “Well, he was once in Glasgow, the minister of North Frederick-street Baptist Church, and he often went out to preach in the open air. Two sisters, in rather humble circumstances, were living together in Glasgow, and neither of them had any concern about religion. One of them was very ill, and near to die. The other having to go out to a shop to get some necessary for her sister, wished her sister, as she lay alone, to be amused, and therefore gave her a novel to read while she was away from her. She herself hurried along, but her curiosity made her stop for a few minutes to listen to a young man preaching out of doors. The Spirit of God blessed the few sentences which she heard, so that she saw her past life in a true light, and was fully and deeply convinced of sin. In a few seconds—perhaps fewer than it takes to tell it—she was in an agony of soul about her condition before God. The congregation moved off into the chapel, and she dearly wished to go in with them; but she recollected her sister whom she had left sick at home, and so she quickened her steps towards the shop. She was, however, so bowed down and wretched that she felt ready to faint, and, pausing a while, she took hold of the rails of an area, and cried, ‘O God, have mercy upon me. I will have it any how? I will have it now.’” Scotch people, you know, even if they are godless, are usually well acquainted with the Bible: precious texts came to her recollection, and in a few moments by faith in Christ Jesus she found peace with God, and went on her way light of foot and joyous of heart. As soon as she reached home she cried to her sister, “My dear sister, I have never spoken to you about your soul; you will soon be with God, and you are not prepared to die any more than I was myself a few minutes ago. That book is no good; I will get you the Bible; and oh that you may feel your state by nature, and seek and find the Savior as I have done!” It is a short story, for the invalid died within a few months, happy in Jesus, saved through the instrumentality of her sister, who had been brought to God in the street by hearing Mr. Medhurst preach in the open air. The survivor became a Biblewoman, and went to work in a town in Scotland where she remained for years a great soul-winner, remarkable for usefulness, considering her station and opportunities. What cannot the Holy Spirit accomplish even by a few words ]heard in the street? One soul can be won, and that soul may win another, and so the light may be passed on for many a mile and through many a year. Do not think when you preach at the street corners that you will at once see the harvest of your seed-sowing, although the Lord may so favor you. If you see no immediate results your’ labor may, nevertheless, have been owned of God. Street hearers perhaps live far away from the preacher’s residence, and they may have no idea of who he is or where he resides, and so they may obtain eternal benefit and yet never speak with the man who was their spiritual father till they meet him in heaven. I am not aware that Mr. Medhurst knows anything at all about this case, though probably he will hear of it now; but whether he is informed of it or not is a small matter, for the deed is done, heaven is enriched, and God is glorified.
MRS. SPURGEON’S BOOK FUND REPORT
WE have watched from day to day for months the agonies of author-ship us this Report has been produced. Our beloved wife has the lowest possible idea of her own powers of composition, and hence every line has been written in grief, criticized in despondency, and condemned without mercy. Not that there was ever the slightest occasion for all this, for in our judgment no language is more pure or pleasant; but so it has been, and therefore “the Report” is a child of sorrow. No one would think it, nor ever dream it; nobody has thought so out of all who have seen it, for the style and manner of the report are every way as good as the subject could possibly require,—as good as any subject could suggest. At any rate, the flower has emerged from the bud, and all who gaze on it can judge of its beauty for themselves. All that now remains is that it be widely scattered and attentively read. The smallness of the price (sixpence) will, we hope, enable all our friends to purchase it, and we want them to make a point of doing so for several reasons.
First, it will do them good to read the narrative. A friend, with tears in his eyes, told us that it had been a sweet means of grace to him. To hear how the Lord answers prayer, comforts his mourners, and glorifies his own name, must be beneficial; and there are plenty of instances in the little book by which faith will be confirmed and hope encouraged.
But, secondly, we want poor ministers to have more sympathizers, and nothing upon earth that has ever issued from the press is more likely to make friends for the Lord’s needy servants. Read, and let your heart break, if you will, for the sorrows of those who feed the flock of God, and are in return but scantily fed themselves.
Our third motive is that other workers may be stimulated to exertion by seeing how a simple effort can be made to grow till it becomes as “streams from Lebanon.” They will see that brethren of all denominations have. drunk at this well in the desert, and that many more are pressing forward to be refreshed, and yet this much-valued fountain was once no more than a trickling drop of crystal, hastening to hide itself from the heat. Where once it trembled as a tiny globe it now flows in floods. The Lord’s way is ever from good to better; he can in this fashion help the weak things of the trembling beginner till they grow into strength and size altogether unexpected.
We should like to give our readers a few extracts to tempt them on, but we do not know how to manage it: we cannot dig out pieces with the trowel, nor cut them out with the sword: we would, if we had the space, transfer all the pages bodily to our own. Here, however, is a little narrative which may come away whole, like a primrose removed with roots and soil:—
“One of ‘ our own’ men, who has long been ailing, has at last been obliged to resign his charge, not alone on account of feeble health, but also because his people are utterly unable to keep their pastor in the common necessaries of life. ‘ You must go to Australia,’ said one doctor after another, ‘ it is your only chance for life?’ But what was to be done with the dear but very sickly wife and the three mites of children? Long they pondered ways and means, and the conclusion they arrived at was a hard one for loving human hearts, and cost them many a struggle,—the poor wife consented to remain in England, working at her needle for a subsistence for herself and babes, while her husband would seek in a far-off land the strength to labor for means which should reunite them.
“At this juncture she wrote to me, acquainting me with the above arrangements, and there were certain facts in her communication which led me to desire intensely to overturn these present plans of theirs, and secure the emigration of the entire family. But how was this to be accomplished? The expense is great to convey so many to the Utopia of feeble folk, and the funds of the ‘ Pastors’ Aid ‘ could not be made available for such heavy and unusual charges. I wrote again, suggesting and inquiring, and, meanwhile, the Lord sent me quite unexpectedly a sum of money which I could do no less than consecrate to him or this matter. With even this, however, there was still a deficit of some sixteen pounds in the amount needed, and now it was that the wonderfully tender dealing of our God became so manifest. The very morning on which I received a rapturous agreement to my proposal that the whole family should go out, and the good news that the passage could be effected under exceptionally cheap rates, my dear husband came joyfully into my room exclaiming ‘ Here’s the rest of the money to take your proteges to Australia!’ and to my amazed delight he explained that on opening his morning’s letters he found £15 as a personal gift to himself from an unknown correspondent, and forthwith felt that it was sent from the Lord for this very purpose about which our minds had been so exercised and anxious. Those notes seemed to come straight from Heaven’s mint into our uplifted hands, and the morning’s hours were hallowed by a sweet sense of the nearness of an invisible and watchful love.
“Nor did the Lord’s thought for these poor exiles exhaust itself in this sole benefit, for I afterwards received a parcel of new clothing from a gentleman, a stranger, containing the very articles which were needed to complete the out, fit of the husband, and I was enabled to obtain all that was requisite for the comfort of mother and children. What joy to see the hand of the Lord sustaining, directing, and providing in so blessed and unmistakable a manner. Can eyes which have seen so clearly the goodness and lovingkindness of our God ever be obscured by the wicked mists of distrust and doubt?”
Many such things are in this record, and others painful or pleasant, as the case may be, but all setting forth the goodness of the Lord, and the way in which his own right hand leads those who put their trust in him. His people are not a regiment of ornamental guards, whose chief delight is to be admired by all the weak minds around them:; “they all hold swords,” and are expert in war of the most trying kind, and yet not one of them is overcome by the enemy. We are more than conquerors, through him that hath loved us. Believers in the living God shall not fail nor be discouraged, but they shall see and admire the wonderful faithfulness of the Lord their God.
COLLEGE AND ORPHANAGE
THIS engraving is intended to remind our readers of the two major works which are supported by their liberality. THE PASTORS’ COLLEGE has about one hundred students in training for the ministry, and more than two hundred men in the evening classes, who spend their evenings in gaining an education by which .they shall be better fitted for out-door preaching, Sunday-school teaching, and other gracious work. Besides this, a large Sunday-school meets in the building, and all sorts of societies for the benefit of the young people of the Tabernacle. Hitherto the expenditure has always been met by the providence of God. We usually spend £1500 per annum more than the income from donations, but this has been specially furnished from time to time by considerable legacies, which have enabled us to go on with the work without hindrance. How our God may deal with us in the future it is not for us to prophesy, but he is sure to do that which is right. More than five hundred ministers of the gospel have been trained in the College, and the work still goes on. Many will give to an orphanage out of natural compassion, who will not contribute to a college out of zeal for the truth; and yet we have never lacked friends who have seen the needs of this work supplied, nor shall we ever find ourselves forsaken, for the work is the Lord’s. While departures from orthodoxy startle us on all sides, it would ill become the lovers of the old-fashioned gospel to withdraw their aid from an institution which keeps to the Puritanic lines of doctrine, and has no ambition to be held in repute for “progressive ideas,” and “advanced thought;.”
THE STOCKWELL ORPHANAGE FOR BOYS AND GIRLS is the second work, and a great one it is. Our bird’s-eye view is nearly all to be seen a; the present moment, but it does not quite show all that must be built before the Institution is complete. The entrance and dining hall for the boys, on the left, are familiar objects to our readers. Something similar will be required on the right hand for the girls, with a chapel or large hall for our great public meetings, to be placed where the artist has sketched a thicket of trees. For this expense we have not even made an estimate at present, but it will be met, we hope, by the Bazaar next Christmas. The left-hand range of houses is all occupied by our two hundred and fifty boys, and the handsomer pile on the right, with covered way in front of the lower windows, contains the houses and schools for two hundred and fifty girls. We do not wish to see the Orphanage increase beyond this size; for this number of children the ground-space is admirably adapted, and we may say of it, “there is room enough and to spare.” The number of children is quite enough for one management, if we only consider the domestic arrangements, while financially the burden is quite sufficient, and we shall need extraordinary help to carry the work to completion. So much, however, has been done that no excuse for unbelief remains, this is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.” Friends will scarcely need to be told that the great square which makes the Orphanage is not surrounded by fields, as our woodcut would imply; that is a freak of the draughtsman’s imagination; yet the site is open, airy, and healthy; and, being’ under the eye of the people and friends at the Tabernacle, it is more likely to be cared for than if it stood shivering alone upon some bleak hillside. The advantages of a country site are very great, but for convenience of oversight, for securing sympathy, and for command of the markets our position could not be excelled. The Stockwell Orphanage can be seen at any time by dropping a note to Mr. Charles-worth, the Head Master.
Our friends have cared for our boys, and we have suffered no lack, or scarcely felt an anxiety; surely the girls will cast around their hearts a second and yet stronger chain, and the family of half a thousand will eat and be filled and gather up of the fragments.
We have sought only the glory of God, whether we have taught men or fed children, and God has been glorified. To him, therefore, be praise that he has permitted us to bring any measure of praise unto his name.
NOTES
THIS month our notes are few, for more wearisome days have been appointed us, but yet the Lord has been very gracious, and we have good hope of permanent recovery when frosts and damps; become fewer. Our ever-careful church officers have urged us to go .away for a month’s rest; but, with overflowing gratitude for their kindness and the greatest deference for their judgment, we mean to try and be at our post as much and as often as strength permits: for where can we go in this land of damp, and what rest is there for us while such a charge is upon us? We should only lose home comforts, and like a snail carry our lead on our back wherever we might crawl. Work gets sadly behind, and while it is undone where could we rest? Even if the Garden of Eden could be found on earth the Serpent would he at us till our arrears are pulled up, and till we see the Lord’s work going on again with its usual vigor.
On Tuesday Evening, Feb. 8, the Annual Church Meeting was held at the Tabernacle. It was a very joyous occasion, though the senior Pastor was disabled in both arms. The warm love of his attached people cheered his heart, and though another season of, suffering awaited him, it was a sunny oasis in the desert of pain. The statistics presented at the meeting were as follows: —Increase, by baptism, 314; by letter, 101; by profession, 38; total, 453. Decrease, by dismission, 147; by dismission to form new church at Tooting, 5; by joining other churches with letters, 50; emigrated, 12; died, 74; excluded for non-attendance, 106; removed for other causes, 5; total, 399—leaving a net increase of 54, and making the number of members on the books 5,284. An error was made in the total announced last year; this has been corrected in the present returns. A happy meeting was held, and the reports showed that the hardness of the times and the illness of the pastor had not materially damaged the finances. As to spiritual progress, it was hoped that, in earnestness, unity, and prayerfulness, the Church was never in a healthier state.
COLLEGE.—Mr. J. C. Brett, late of Wellington, expects shortly to sail for Australia, where he will be glad to hear of a Church needing a pastor. Mr. W. H. Burton, pastor of the church at Daiston Junction, also hopes soon to go to the Antipodes his church having given him a year’s leave of absence in the hope that during that time his health will be sufficiently restored for him to return to his work in England.
Mr. H. Rylands Brown also sails early this month for Darjeeling in company with Mr. J. Gelson Gregson, who is once more returning to India. May this brother be the precursor of many others; but as yet we have no funds forthcoming. To evangelize among the English-speaking population of India seems to us to be a good life-work for any man. If we could send out a few men soon, we should be glad.
Mr. J. Stubbs, whose health gave way in Allahabad, has reached England in safety. He will be glad to get to work again as soon as possible. Mr. D. Lyall has also returned from the Cameroons, invalided. These are sad blows; but men are not made of iron, and the climate is trying.
We learn from Australia that Mr. F. G. Buckingham has settled at Emerald Hill, Melbourne; and that Mr. E.G. Ince has removed from Echuca to Stawell.
Mr. Jas. Smith has removed from York Road, Leeds, to Tunbridge Wells. May he there build up the Church of God?
Another of our brethren, Pastor T. Colville, of Diss, has fallen asleep in Jesus.
The Annual Conference will (D.V.) be held in the week commencing Monday, May 2nd. Dear readers, pray that we may enjoy the Divine presence, and that every minister may return to his people filled anew with the Spirit.
EVANGELISTS. — During the past month Messrs. Smith and Fullerton have been holding a series of services at Annan, in connection with the Young Men’s Christian Association of that town. A local paper states that the services have been well attended.
From Sheepshed we learn that Mr. Burnham’s services have again been highly appreciated. Crowded meetings were held alternately in the two chapels, and on the last evening about 900 persons, or nearly one-:Fourth of the whole population, were present. The spiritual results of the meetings are very encouraging, many having been led to decision, and great numbers to ask what they must do to be saved. On the 13th ult., Mr. Burnham commenced his engagement in Yorkshire, to which we referred last month.
Mr. Welton, of Driffield, asks us to correct the statement that was made in our last number with respect to the new chapel at Cranswick. He says that half the cost of the building had been raised before Mr. Burnham’s previous visit, and that the new chapel is the result of four years’ hard work. The Evangelist’s services helped to secure the desired end, and we meant to say no more than that.
ORPHANAGE.—Another dear lad has “gone home” from the Orphanage during the past month. Mr. Charlesworth has written an account of his life and experience while in the institution, which will probably appear in the next number of the magazine.
A Collectors’ Meeting will be held on March 23rd at the Orphanage, when specially interesting matters will be attended to, and the President hopes to be in the chair. Will all Collectors make a note of this ‘.;
The following note came one morning when the President was very ill, and its contents greatly comforted him:—” Dear Sir,—I have been wishing for some time to send you a donation for the Stockwell Orphanage, and I now ask you to accept the enclosed cheque for £500. Will you kindly enter it ‘ In Memoriam’ without name? I have much pleasure in sending this gift as I believe the dear children are trained in the best possible way for their present and future welfare.
There is no truth in the statement that an anonymous donation of £1,000 has been sent, but we have received (luring the mouth the amount (£1,000) promised by W. R. Rickett, Esq., for “The Limes,” and since the lists were made up the lady and gentleman mentioned in the last magazine have sent us a cheque for £1,000 for the new hall which will be needed for the girls. This is a noble beginning.
COLPORTAGE.—During the past month one of our most devoted and successful Colporteurs has been called from the labors of the field to his eternal rest. A local paper notices his work as follows:—
DEATH OF MR. W. MATTHEWS, THE COLPORTEUR.—-During the week there has passed away from our midst a worker in a humble, but most important department of Christian labor. We allude to Mr. W. Matthews, the local colporteur from Mr. Spurgeon’s Colportage Association. whose death occurred, at the Cottage Hospital, early on Sunday morning. The deceased will be remembered by many persons in the scattered villages and hamlets around Evesham as one who, at times of sickness or sorrow, would be ever ready with a word of religious counsel and Christian sympathy and to many he has been the means of leading them to decide to pursue a new, moral, and spiritual life; while at the side of many a death bed he has been able to offer true comfort to the departing one. His proper work was to sell and give away books and other kinds of literature, selected for him by the society as being of a moral or religious character. In following this employment, Mr. Matthews had to visit 74 villages, lying within a radius of seven miles front Evesham. During the, course of the rather more than six years since his appointment he has sold about £1,000 worth of books, besides distributing to purchasers over 1,000 periodicals monthly, re accomplish this work many long and weary journeys bad to be undertaken; and the deceased cheerfully continued his work with scarcely an intermission from week to week, weather rarely deterring him. He mapped out his district so as to traverse the whole within the mouth; and when sometimes persuaded to give himself a little rest, he would always excuse himself by stating his earnest wish that not one of his rounds should be omitted, even for a month. Besides the houses of the poor, the colporteur with his pack of books was welcomed at some of the country parsonages, the clergy showing thereby their appreciation of the value of his work. The strength and bodily health of Mr. Matthews visibly declined towards the close of the last year, and at the urgent entreaty of his friends, and of Mr. Thomas White, the local superintendent of the Colportage Association, he temporarily gave up his work the week before Christmas, and another agent—who now remains to continue the work—came to relieve him. Mr. Matthews then went to Matlock, hoping by the change and rest, and with skillful medical treatment, to recover his strength. After remaining at Matlock a short time, he found himself worse, and anticipating the event which has taken place, expressed his desire to return to Evesham, where he arrived on Thursday week. The long journey during such inclement weather, it is feared, proved too much for his strength, and he died on Sunday morning.”
The last entry made in the Journal of Mr. Matthews shows his confidence in the good being accomplished by his labors, and his unwavering trust in God amid failing strength. He says:—” The work is doing all classes good? the books sold and tracts given are good seed. It cannot die, for it is God word, and it must and shall prevail. A few here and there express their thanks for my visits; and they miss me very much if I do not go on the expected day. It is with much trouble I have gone about my work this month, but I have found the promises not to fail. ‘As thy day so shall-thy strength be.’ TO GOD BE ALL THE GLORY.”
AS might be expected the severe storms and heavy floods impeded the Colporteurs in their work, and many’ were laid aside; but still on the whole the districts were fairly worked. We have not received any applications recently for opening new districts, and would therefore realm! our readers that the Association is prepared to equip and send a Colporteur to a district for the small sum of £40 a year. There are many districts where a Pastor cannot be sustained, and in which the constant visitations and evangelistic help of the Colporteur would be invaluable. All communications should be addressed to the Secretary, W. Corden Jones, Colportage Association, Pastors’ College, Temple-street, Southwark, S.E.
PERSONAL NOTES.—The New York Examiner and Chronicle, in reporting the ordination of a Baptist minister in Rhode Island, says that he was “formerly a Universalist preacher,” and that he “ascribes his convictions, that led to an evangelical change in him, to his bearing, while in London, a sermon from Mr. Spurgeon, on ‘ The resurrection of life, and the resurrection of damnation. ‘“
A Baptist minister in the West of England sends us the particulars of the conversion of a man who was deeply impressed by reading our sermons, which had been supplied for distribution in the village by the “Spurgeon’s Sermons’ Tract Society.” He seemed to be sinking in despair, when the pastor remembered our address, “Tempted of the Devil,” which he had read in The Sword and the Trowel, sent him. by Mrs. Spurgeon. It just met his case, and prepared the way for the sermon on “Precious Faith” by our sort Thomas in a later number of the magazine. Then our sermon, “A Wilderness Cry” (No. 1,427), was left by the distributor, and by the blessing of the Holy Spirit on the reading of it he was led into true peace, and departed rejoicing in the Lord. Thus does God devise means to fetch home his banished children.
A member of the church at the Tabernacle says:—“Since my removal to— it has been my happiness to become acquainted with the City Missionary in this district. I have been delighted with his expositions of divine truth, and it is my firm opinion that he is destined to be ere long a successful preacher of the gospel, he was brought up as a coalminer, but the sermon you preached from the words—’ Here am I, send me,’ was used as a call from God for him to go and preach the gospel. He felt after reading that sermon (‘ The Divine Can for Missionaries,’ No. 1,351,) that he would go anywhere where the Lord would open a door.”
A Christian farmer, who is now a Wesleyan class-leader, in sending us a donation for the Orphanage, writes:—” I was led to give my heart to God about twenty-four years ago, one evening, while at work in a mill, through reading a sermon preached by you from Psalm 125:2 (‘The Security of the Church,’ No. 161). I mention this as another illustration of the text,’ Cast thy bread upon the waters; for thou shalt find it after many days.’“
Another donor to the Orphanage says:—”My chest seems to be going fast, so that this may be my last opportunity of writing to you. Dear Mr. Spurgeon, I shall never forget you; no, not even in heaven. My eyes fill with tears of gratitude to our loving Father for ever leading me to take your sermons, and for the unspeakable blessings I have received from them these last sixteen years. My friends in New York also write me from time to time expressing their thanks that I was led to send them out to them. The Sword and the Trowel, too, has been a constant source of refreshment.”
SPURGEON’S ILLUSTRATED ALMANAC.—We have been recently trying to complete a set of our small almanacs, but find that we cannot get copies for the years 1857, 1860, 1862, and 1865. If any friends can oblige us with any or all of these we shall be extremely thankful to them.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle.—January 31st, eighteen; February 3rd: nine.
C.H.S. ON “TAKING THE BULL BY THE HORNS”
THERE was a little trouble in the church, and the young minister was sad about it. He sought advice, and one who loved peace begged him to let the matter alone, and in a short time the evil would die of itself, for, as Solomon says, “Where no wood is the fire goeth out.” The brother was of a fretful spirit, and could not take things quite so easily; it worried him that there should be a single weed in his garden, and he felt he would sooner plough it all up than let that weed remain. His friend begged him to do nothing in a hurry, but take counsel of his pillow, and repeat the operation for one calendar month at least. This the young pastor found it as hard to do as it would be to wait quietly while a clog has his teeth in our leg, or a red-hot coal is finding its way down the inside of our waistcoat, tie thought that the church pond was foul, and he longed to stir it to see how it would smell.. This young man’s tastes and mine by no means, agree, for I had rather run a mile any day than quarrel, and that is saying a good deal,:for miles are long to legs which have the rheumatism. This energetic pastor wanted to be setting things to rights, and therefore quiet counsels were not very kindly taken. Young men will have their will, and our friend resolved to have his own way, even if he ran over everybody else.
Off he went to a hot-headed gentleman who was more of his own age, and stated the case to him. His new adviser at once told him never to give in, or consent to be put upon, and closed his oration by telling him to take the bull by the horns at once. This counsel was more to our friend’s liking, and therefore he applauded it as wise and straightforward, and resolved to carry it out. What came of the rash performance we will not stop to relate in so many words, but it may be guessed from the usual result of taking bulls by their horns.
Our woodcut represents Scene I.: the brave man, regardless of consequences, boldly confronting his foe. Hurrahs and cheers from persons on the other side of the hedge! Considerable excitement in the mind of the hero, who believes himself to be infallible and invincible, Hercules and the Pope rolled into one.
Scene II. we have not drawn on the wood because it is easy of imagination: the bold man is off his feet and off the ground, rising in his own consciousness, rising into the air like Sancho Panza from the blanket. Horns are pretty sure elevators when a bull apt)lies his wrathful strength to a transaction of the lifting order. Persons who are violently assailed often become violent assailants. It is very wrong of them, but it is a way they have.
Scene III. would be too painful for a drawing. The rising man has come down again, not in peace, but almost in pieces. He is badly gored, and will probably be crippled for the term of his natural life. He says that he will never take bulls by the horns again.
MORAL.—Avoid strife, especially in a church. It’ the cause cannot prosper in quietude it certainly will not in an uproar. Tares are a trouble, but the rooting of them up may make worse trouble. Courage is a virtue, but a pugilistic tendency is not. It is well to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints; but we must not wrestle with flesh and blood, nor fight the Lord’s battles with the devil’s weapons. “The wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.”
LOVINGKINDNESS OF THE LORD.
IN the first spare corner of the magazine let it stand recorded as my experience that the Lord is exceeding tender in his dealings with his afflicted. During the last six months he has tried me with sharp pains, but during that period he has kindly removed all cause for serious care as to the financial needs of my many institutions. Everything has been healthily sustained, and there have been no pitiful appeals by striking advertisement, or otherwise. I intend no censure of the plans of others, but I cannot help admiring the considerate providence of our gracious Lord that he has kept off the trial of straitened supplies from his suffering servant. “He stayeth Ms rough wind in the day of the east wind.”
Friends have come forth from the most unexpected quarters in the time of need,—nay before the need had actually come. Every fund, except that which supplies the College, is in better condition than before my illness, and even that is hardly an exception, for the outgoing in that direction will no doubt be made good at the Annual Supper. Prayerful trust is a way which the Lord will assuredly honor. I do but feebly trust and pray, but God most richly answers; and when in hours of crushing agony both supplication and confidence seem to need an effort beyond the strength of the tortured mind, the Lord deals with me after his own gracious fashion, “exceeding abundantly above all that we ask, or even think.” C.H. SPURGEON.
THE WORTH OF COLLEGES
The great importance of the work done in our educational institutions for young’ ministers was never more strikingly emphasized than by the Missionary Juddon who said, as he was approaching Madison University, “If I had a thousand dollars, do you know what I would do with it?” The person asked supposed he would invest it in Foreign Missions. “I would put it into such institutions as that,” he said, pointing to the college buildings. “Planting colleges, and filling them with studious young men, is planting seed corn for the world.”
These are our sentiments, and to this end we have labored with all our heart, and soul, and strength to make the Pastors’ College a seed-garden for the church and for the world. In all other institutions doing similar work we take the deepest interest, and shall continue to do so. Whence comes the voice which questions the usefulness of these invaluable institutions? We cannot tell. But this we know, that if it should ever be regarded it will be a dark day for the churches, and for the world. Our word to all our brethren is—Encourage and help the colleges more and more, but see to it that those you aid are seminaries for the growth of unmistakable gospel preachers.
FROM AN UNEXPECTED SOURCE
A NOTE BY C. H. SPURGEON.
THE DETROIT Post says that a circus clown in Virginia took occasion, the other day, at the close of the performance, to speak plain and very searching words, which deserve the sober attention of many more than those who heard them. In his painted face and mottled garments he said: “We have taken six hundred dollars here to-day; more money, I venture to say, than many a minister of the gospel would receive for a whole year’s services. A large portion of this money was given by church members, and a large portion of this audience is made up of members of churches, I wonder what excuse they have for being here? When yore’ preacher asks you to aid him in supporting the gospel, you are too poor to give anything; but you come here and pay your dollars to hear me talk nonsense. I am a fool because I am paid for it; I make my living by it. You profess to be wise, and yet you support me in my folly. But perhaps you say you did not come to see the circus, but; the animals. If you came simply to see the animals, why did you not simply look at them and leave? Now, is not this a pretty place for Christians to be in? Do you not feel ashamed of yourselves? You ought; to blush in such a place as this.”
In addition to the rebuke for being at the circus, the professed Christians had a valuable hint as to their poor ministers, and it is to this that we would call attention. We are sure that the poverty now existing among Baptist pastors is net all inevitable: very much of it might be prevented by those giving who have it to give. In some instances the need only requires to be made known, and the meeting of it would be no difficulty; in many more, the matter wants forcing upon the thoughts of a few kind individuals, and they soon contrive to put an end to the misery, and make i; a pleasure to do so. We glory in our brother ministers for being willing to be poor, but we are vexed with the many of their hearers who thoughtlessly allow valuable servants of God to fret and pine in actual want. Do they really know that their pastor cannot afford to eat meat? Are they aware that he cannot buy clothes for his children? Are they content to live at case, and lay by considerable amounts, while their minister cannot get common necessaries? We wish this clown could go round and talk to those who spend more on ribbons and roses than on the cause of God.
It is a very serious fact that the blessing of God is withheld from churches because of their cruelty to God’s servants. They have no prosperity, no holy joy, no increase;—how can they when those who teach them have scarcely bread to eat or raiment to put on? The people themselves are poor, and seem to grow poorer; and well they may, for God is measuring out to them their portion with their own measure. The tears ,of ministers’ wives are stopping the blessing; the shoeless feet of pastors” children are treading’ down all hope of spiritual prosperity. All this while we have those among us who are professedly too poor to give anything, and yet are actually worth their thousands. In country churches we see continually by the wills of deceased persons that members of churches die worth from three to fifty thousand pounds, and vet their ministers were aided by the charitable funds of the denomination! Oh, when will men be true to Christ, and truly live for him?
After all, what comes of the saving and hoarding which is practiced by so many? They starve themselves and the cause of God to amass a huge sum, and the net result is shown in our drawing below. We have seen the thing done scores of times. Poor old Baptist farmer, honest, laborious, parsimonious, toiling and moiling, scraping and saving; thinking himself quite unable to give to the Lord’s work more than the merest trifle. He dies, and then his son and heir, quite the gentleman, goes to church, and goes further still, making the old man’s money into golden wheels, on which to ride to destruction. Surely it can never be worth a man’s while to be nipping and screwing, and denying that which is due to the cause of God, merely to make it easier for his son to ruin himself.
LOOK WELL TO THE SIGNING
I NEVER give myself any trouble about the hymns,” said a minster. I let the organist take care of them.” It is to be hoped that there are not many pastors who follow the lazy and senseless example of the minister here quoted. Singing is just as much an act of worship and praise as prayer is, and the preacher who does not select his hymns with special reference to their appropriateness to the subject, of his sermon, loses at least half of their effect upon the congregation. Everything that is done in the Lord’s house ought to be done as well as it is possible for it to be (tone, and a careless, shiftless selection of the hymns to be sung is utterly inexcusable in any pastor.
So writes the New York Examiner and Chronicle, and we are glad to quote the passage. The whole spirit of the service may turn upon the reading of a hymn, and therefore it is a matter to be done in the best style. If we cannot control the singers we can at least so choose, and so read the hymns that the people shall be helped to praise God intelligently, and the sacred worship shall not be careless and slovenly. C.H. S,
TO JOHN PLOUGHMAN
MY DEAR FATHER,—I am so glad you have had your likeness take n with your smock on and the big whip in your hand. There are ever so many portraits of you in your Sunday go-to-meeting suit; but this suits you best of all. I wish you could have got Dapper and Violet into the picture. All your friends in this part of the world are glad enough to hear the smack of your whip again. It cracks as many jokes as ever. We rejoice, too, that the sharp share is driven through the monster evil drink, and its attendant vices. “God speed the plough,” we pray, when it roots up such ill weeds.
There is any quantity of snakes in these colonies, and men either avoid or kill them; but this venomous viper they cherish and fondle till “at the last it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder.” It puzzles me why those who know and admit the danger still risk it. “Once bit, twice shy,” doesn’t hold good in such cases. They see the devil’s hook, and yet grab at the bait, and drink like fish Why, the very rooks in the trees might teach them a lesson. Let them but see a gun and off they fly; indeed, conceal the weapon as you may, they spy it out somehow, and take to themselves wings, not waiting to hear the report, or give a chance; but these black birds “tarry long at the wine” and “go to seek mixed wine.” They love to get within range of the Cannon Brewery or the Gunner’s Arms, and are willing targets for a shower of grape shot any hour of the day or night. What wonder that their eyes become blood shot, and that they themselves are “brought down” shattered, and tattered, and torn.
As to public-houses (hotels they call them here), they are as thick as gum trees in the bush, and, though Australia is free from wild beasts, the Red Lion does a roaring trade. And the stuff the topers swallow is, I heat’, abominable, especially up in the bush, where folks are not expected to be over particular. If all the colonial beer and spirits were of the best quality the harm would not be quite so great; but such mess as some of it evidently is must mean “death in the pot.” The best of intoxicants to my mind is bad, what must the worst he? Would to God the cursed traffic could be checked; a host of crimes would then. be stayed. Red rum spelt backward reads “Murder”; gin, the dictionary says, “is a snare,” and every-day facts prove it so to be. I feel sure that “the cold water cure” is the only remedy. Moderation goes half-way, and therefore fails. Thank God, there are thousands of abstainers amongst us, so we will do the best we can, God helping us, to stem the tide.
I hear readers of your second edition comparing your last furrows with your first. Of course the novelty of such Plain Talk is not so keen, but the pictures are deemed a great improvement. Old Humphrey likes pictures as well as little Harry, and these are first-raters too. You remember I did a little ploughing on boxwood once on a time, so I reckon myself a bit of a judge. Here’s my opinion, if it’s worth the having. Your illustrations seem .just to fit the writing: they might have been drawn by your own horses, so handy are they to the plough, and the engravings might be cuts of your own whip.
Many a good laugh I’ve had over some of your quaint sayings and odd rhymes. They seem made to make one smile, and are more powerful than laughing gas. This is the beauty of the book, to my mind. I like a mixture of pleasure and profit, and of wit with wisdom. Just a drop or two of sauce with the cold mutton is a grand improvement. The meat is good enough by itself, you know; but it slips down sweeter somehow with a dash of “relish.” When will people learn the absurdity of fancying that, because we have faith, we mustn’t have any fun? I believe that holiness and humor can be yoked together, and pull finely, too, and I can’t bring myself to believe that it is impossible to love Jesus and have a laugh occasionally into the bargain. What would you have done, dear father, but for a natural merriment, sanctified by grace? It would be dreadful hard labor to be always ploughing without whistling a tune every now and then, and having a hearty laugh when we knock: off, or even during work. The plough doesn’t; go any better for being rusty, and the pilgrim isn’t a whit fitter for heaven because he’s crusty.
If I remember rightly, those two favored evangelists from America were both cheerful, happy men; but I often think it’s a good plan if I feel Moody to sing Sankey, and let solemnity and song blend together. If I should feel a bit down at any time I mean to have another look at your pictures, and if’ the white egg of the black hen, or the fiddle without the stick, or the cart before the horse don’t liven me up—well, I must read some more. Here’s a receipt for melancholy which beats half the tonics and enliveners” all to pieces.”
If you’re down in the dumps, or given to grumble,
If things go awry, or all in a jumble,
If storms should grow thicker, and thunder clouds rumble,
And clown the big drops like cats and dogs tumble,
It’s surely no good to murmur and mumble,
Nor yet to commence to flurry and fumble,
Accept my advice—nor think it too humble—
(I give it to all you good gloomy folks),
Invest in a volume of John Ploughman’s jokes.
I am often asked if you are likely ever to come out here. Your horses say “neigh,” and I feel obliged to return the same answer. How I wish you could though! What rejoicing there would be, and how the people would flock to welcome you! I fancy see even the kangaroos hopping down to town to hear some of your “plain talk.” Will you ever plough the South Atlantic Ocean, think you? We’ve got some good workers here, but we should all be the better for a look at your way of doing it, and a specimen of your straight furrow, just to guide us a bit.
You will be glad to hear we have got our new chapels up and opened. Our minister calls them tabernacles, after yours. Of course they’re not quite so big. A good deal of rough ground has been broken up: now we can go in more readily for sowing and reaping a crop which is already appearing. I think of going to New Zealand shortly to turn up some ground that is new, at least to me.
I need not tell you that my thoughts often fly home. I have put my hand to a colonial plough, but, truth to tell, I constantly “look back,” not from the work, but across the deep blue sea to “Home, sweet home.” “Every bird loves its own nest,” and this “seagull” is no exception.
Give my love to dear mother. She has a work of her own, and a right good one too; I wish all were as well employed in the field. She does her plough share, and no mistake. The Master help her in it! Brother Charles still ploughs at Greenwich, I suppose. There’s plenty of ground to work upon there. God bless him. Remember me to Will Shepherd, and give Dapper and Violet an extra feed on my account.
I fear I’ve kept you too long reading this. It is something like stopping the plough to catch a mouse. I think it’s time I gave over; so God be wi’ ye, and fare thee well, dear father. Your loving son,
Tom (the ploughboy).
Tasmania, December, 1880.
NOTES.
Personal affliction has continued through the month of March, and it has been with difficulty that the weekly sermon and the monthly magazine have been prepared. Intervals of possible effort have been granted, and then all sail has been crowded on, so that we are not compelled to lie high and dry on shore, and tell our readers that there will be no sailing for the next month. O for health and strength? We are apt to think that we could do a great deal if we had these, and yet it may be a greater and a better thing to bow the head in silence and say, “It is the Lord, let him do as seemeth him good.”
We have had many deaths at the Tabernacle. Eleven deceased members were reported at one church meeting. We are .growing older, and our death-rate must increase, for the children must go home sooner or later. We have often wondered at the fewness of our deaths, far below the average of the life-tables, and we have noted that godliness, bringing with it temperance, peace, and purity, has a tendency to produce long life. Among our older friends who have gone home is our aged brother Mr. B. Vickery. Although by no means a man of wealth, he was a man of great liberality, and he liked to give in his own way. He erected a fountain at the Orphanage, of which we give an engraving. Wishing to see the lamps at the Tabenacle improved, he gave all the opal glasses. We confess we like to see persons undertaking to care for some part of their accustomed place of worship. Our meeting-houses should not become gaudy, but they might be kept neat and reputable if God’s servants cared a little more to have his worship conducted without slovenliness. We prefer those donors who quietly give their portion in the way which seems to them the wisest, and make no fuss about it. The good man has gone to his rest, in joyous hope of the resurrection in Christ, and we can but sorrowfully bid him “farewell.”
It was as an obituary notice that we read the words” Final Closing of Surrey Chapel.” There is a sadness about the end of this renowned structure. It is doomed, and must be swept away. To the last it was best known as “Rowland Hill’s Chapel,” and it is in connection with that man of God that; its greatest glories shine; but yet under Messrs. Sherman and Newman Hall its history was no mean one, nor did its leaf wither. Translated to a fine position, and known as Christ Church, Surrey Chapel still flourishes elsewhere, and it is only its outward form that now awaits the stroke of the destroyer; yet what a shame it seems to pull down the old octagon, or round house, the center of so much usefulness, the focus of so much reverent memory. Why would not the owners sell the freehold? Ah, there’s the rub. But they would not, and so there’s an end of it. When first built the chapel was in the fields, but now it is miles away from grass and corn, with two railways running close to it, causing a traffic the noise of which is enough to distract any but the regular hearers. With two sides street, and the other two sides railway, “old Surrey” is not so attractive a place of worship to strangers as to render it a very bitter regret that it should be given over to some other useful purpose. Our Primitive Methodist friends who boldly took the fag-end of the lease will, we hope, succeed better in a building of proportions more suited to their number. Of all possessions one of those most ]hike to a white elephant is a large chapel for a small congregation. Your congregation can grow, and your chapel can grow with it, as a little snail grows, shell and all; but you cannot easily make a little congregation swell out so as to fill a huge chapel, for that is like putting a tiny snail into a big shell, and expecting him to expand according to his habitation. We do not, therefore, very much regret the re moral of our earnest Methodist brethren to another building; but wish them larger success in a smaller room. Farewell, old Surrey: thou hast had a noble career. When we, too, shall come to be taken down, may there be memories about each one of us as fragrant as these which will long linger around the hallowed spot in the Blackfriars Road where thousands have been born to God.
On Monday evening, Feb. 28, the usual prayer-meeting at the Tabernacle partook of a highly missionary character, for on that occasion was inaugurated the effort to send out evangelists to the English-speaking people of India. Being enabled to occupy the chair, we tried to show that a great and effectual door was opened before us. Working in all things heartily with the Missionary Society, we wish to help young brethren to go out for five years, and preach the word. We say “help,” for we hope they will go to places where the laborer will by degrees be welcomed and supported. There are many towns where a church could be formed and a minister supported if there were only some one to begin: we wish to begin. Mr. Gregson, long a worker for our Lord in India, in a full and fervent speech proved the need of such an agency alike for the English, the half castes, and the educated Hindoos, and noted the usefulness of getting preachers to India, who after five years could honorably return and spread the missionary spirit, or could remain as missionaries if they felt a call in that direction, as they probably would. Then followed Mr. H. R. Brown, who is now on his way to Darjeeling, where warm-hearted brethren are waiting to co-operate with him; and the meeting closed with a touching word from Mr. Stubbs, who has returned invalided from Allahabad. Many of our brethren commended this new effort to the Lord in earnest, believing prayer, and now we invite our readers to join their petitions with those of our own church. O or the blessing of the Lord upon the effort. With no desire but our Master’s glory do we enter on this project; it is forced upon us by his voice and his providence, and we cannot keep back.
The sailing of Mr. Henry Rylands Brown for India has been a gleam of sunlight amid the darkness of our sickness, He goes ‘bravely hoping in the Lord, and if he can succeed in rinsing a church, and in finding, to a large extent, his own support, we shall feel that this work is of the Lord, and that; many other brethren must be helped to follow him, as the Lord may raise them up. To keep the English-speaking people in India well supplied with the gospel is surely a grand necessity, and we shall feel our heart dance for joy if, by God’s grace, we may have a humble portion in the service. As vet we have only received the small sum of £34 towards this effort, and to this we have added £50 from our own proper substance; but if this thing be of the Lord, he will send the silver and the gold. We shall far more greatly need men of the right sort. Where are they?
On Monday evening, March 7, the Annual Meeting of the Metropolitan Tabernacle Ladies’ Working Benevolent Society was held in the Lecture Hall. Pastor C. /t. Spurgeon presided, and after tea addresses were delivered by Pastors C. H. and J. A. Spurgeon, and Messrs. B. W. Carr and C. F. Allison. The receipts of the Society during the past year amounted to £93 11s. 8d.. and the payments to ,£91 17s. 2d. It would be well if this could be largely increased, for these benevolent societies are among the best of our gospel agencies, following in their operations the line pointed out by our Lord when he fed the hungry people as well as taught them. To bring our Christian sisterhood into contact with the poor is good for both parties, perhaps best of all for those whose happy portion it is to be the givers. How are we to keep any hold upon the masses of our great cities now that they seem to shun our places of worship? Surely it must largely be through the personal visitations of Christian people; and among the very poor this can only be done when we are prepared to relieve their necessities as well as to speak to them the word of life. Friends who cannot personally be visitors might supply the funds for those who can. Send the shot if you cannot fire the gun.
On Friday evening, March 11, the Annual Meeting of the Tabernacle Sunday-school was held in the Lecture Hall, which was crowded. The meeting throughout was of a stimulating and encouraging character. In the absence through illness of his brother, Pastor J. A. Spurgeon presided, and spoke of the benefits of unity among the teachers, and also between the church and the school. He had always found Sunday-school teachers among the been members of the church; he, supposed the exercise of teaching gave them an appetite for spiritual food. After some further remarks addressed to parents, asking their co-operation in the teachers’ efforts, he called upon Mr. Pearce, as superintendent, to make his report. From this report it appears that there are 109 teachers, all of whom are church members, such only being admitted; 19 have joined during the year and 15 have left, in some cases owing to removal from the neighborhood, in others from marriage. To those teachers about to marry Mr. Pearce’s earnest advice was, “Don’t—leave the school.” There are 1,250 scholars, 254 of whom are over 15 years of age; 96 are church members, 26 having joined during the year. Prayer-meetings, services for the young, preparation class for teachers (conducted by Rev. W. K. Rowe), Young Christians’ Association, Band of Hope, Dorcas Society, and Library and Periodical department were all reported to be in thorough ‘working order, and prospering under the divine blessing. The school had participated in the special meetings held last year in celebration of the centenary of Sunday schools, and had sent a sum of nearly £65 to the Centenary Fund for the extension of Sunday-schools. They had also raised during the year the sum of £175 for missionary objects, £20 of which had been devoted to the Colportage Association, and £20 to Mrs. Spurgeon’s Book Fund. The general finances of the school were in a satisfactory condition. They had started the year with a balance in hand of £8 17s. 3d., which with the grant from Tabernacle of £25, a donation from T. H. Olney, Esq. of £5, and Cash from Library, £1 15s., amounted to £40 12s. 3d. The expenses had been: Printing, etc., £19 16s. 3d.; Hymn Books and Rewards, £9 19s. ld; Subscriptions to Sunday-school Union, £3 12s. 6d.; and Rebinding Books for Library, £9 6s. 10d., showing a deficit of £1 2s. 5d. Mr. Pearce having referred to the regret which all felt at the enforced absence of our beloved Pastor and President, concluded by exhorting all to work for the Lord with ready mind and fervent will. Rev. Dr. Clemance and Pastor W. Stott also spoke, and between the addresses selections of sacred music were rendered by the Sunday-school choir, conducted by Mr. Wigney.
COLLEGE.—-Since our last notice Mr. J. L. Thompson his settled at Esher; and Mr. R. M. Harrison, who came to us from America, having completed his College course. has decided to return to that country, having received warm encouragements from leading brethren in the United States.
Mr. G. J. Knight, of Trinity Road, Tooting, is removing to Girlington, Bradford; Mr. J. Blake from Darwen to Marlboro’ Crescent, Newcastle on-Tyne; Mr. Z. T. Dowen from Beetle to Macclesfield; and Mr. R. T. Sole from Milton Hall to Harrow on-the-hill.
Mr. H. J. Baits has returned to his work in Port Elizabeth, S. Africa. Mr. F. A. Holzhausen, late of New Basford, has settled at Brampton, Ontario; Mr. W. Ostler, formerly of Morrisville, has settled at Woodstock, Illinois; and Mr. A. H. Stote has removed from Joliet to Sterling, Illinois.
Word and Work informs us that Brother White, at Tokio, Japan, has recently received into church fellowship six new converts.
We are greatly grieved to learn that the wife of our brother Norris, of Circular Road Chapel, Calcutta, recently died of typhoid fever. He earnestly asks for the prayers of all his brethren for himself and his motherless children.
EVANGELISTS.— We have received several pleasing testimonies to the usefulness of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at Annan, to which we briefly referred last month. On February 24th they paid a flying visit to Bradford, and on the 27th recommenced at Halifax the work which was abruptly suspended in January through the prevalence of fever in the town. At first the wintry weather somewhat affected the attendance, but before many days the crowd was as great as ever. The noon prayer-meeting was larger than any held by the evangelists for a long time, and the evening services were seasons of great power. Many decided cases of conversion have been witnessed, and others are seeking the Savior. The evangelists gratefully mention the sympathy and help they have received from Pastor J. Parker, M.A., and his church, and they regret that other ministers were not equally ready to co-operate with them. This month they go to Sheffield, where all the Congregational churches are uniting for the special services, and where consequently great blessing is expected.
A correspondent in Halifax writes:—” It is one of the master-strokes of the pastor of the Tabernacle to send out together two such brethren as these to preach, by song and speech, the unsearchable riches of Christ. He has been most happy in the choice of the men. Each of the brethren has his special sphere, and yet both would suffer by the absence of either. They work most thoroughly together, and their combined tact and power over large gatherings are extraordinary. In Halifax, as in other places where; the evangelists have been, the people have come in great numbers to hear the gospel preached by them. The largest meetings have been held in the Drill Hall, the most spacious building in the town, and this has been again and again filled. Of these brethren it may he truly said that they are ‘ always abounding in the work of the Lord,’ bearing the message of salvation from place to place, rousing the churches from spiritual apathy, and winning many souls by their plain, simple, and earnest preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ.”
Cheering reports of Mr. Burnham’s work in the villages of Yorkshire continue to reach us. He has visited Birkby, Staincliffe, and Normanton, and in each place many have been attracted to the meetings, and several led to the Savior, while backsliders have been reclaimed, the people of God edified and encouraged, and many aged and suffering ones cheered in their homes by our brother’s visits. One of the ministers writes: —”He is just the right man to help us poor, toiling pastors, and we are especially grateful to you for sending out such a man amongst our smaller churches.”
Mr. Parker has been holding a series .f very successful services in Waterhouses and Langley Park, Durham, where many young people have professed their faith in Christ. He has since been at Sheerness, and now is again at work in county Durham, where he says there is a. wide field for evangelistic efforts.
ORPHANAGE. — We are very grateful to all friends at Humpsread, Salters’ Hall, and Westbourne Grove Chapels, who contributed to the success of the services of song given by the boys. These services cause great pleasure, and present to our friends a method of serving the Orphanage without drawing upon their own local funds. A visit from the boy-s does good, excites a warm interest, and brings in a stream of help which is not diverted from any other channel.
Mr. Charlesworth has arranged for meetings at Yarmouth, March 31; Norwich, April 1, 2. and 3; Cambridge, April 4 and 5; Bury St. Edmund’s, April 6; and Stow-market:, April 7. We shall be glad if all friends in these places will do what they can to make the visits of the boys remunerative.
COLPORTAGE. — The Secretary, Mr. W. Corden Jones writes as follows:— “Dear Mr. Spurgeon,—I am sorry to report this time that the amount received for General Subscriptions during the last few months has fallen off very seriously. After allowing for the collection in the Tabernacle, and two large donations in the first quarter of 1880, there is still £60 less received this quarter than in the corresponding three months of 1880. Now, as the General Fund is the only source from which we can supple merit the amount received for districts, it is evident that we cannot continue all the 73 Colporteurs now employed unless friends of the good work rally round us, and supply the necessary funds. This they have always done on former occasions when the need has been stated, and we trust they will do so now. Will the readers of The Sword and the Trowel kindly help to make the next three months’ receipts bring the half-year’s total at least up to that of 1880?
“I could occupy more space; than you can spare with interesting facts, but, as we are preparing the Annual Report, forbear for the present. Suffice it to say that our primary object is being achieved, in spreading the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, and that many have cause to bless God for the visits of the Colporteurs.”
POOR MINISTERS’ CLOTHING SOCIETY.— Mrs. Evans desires us to acknowledge with thanks the receipt of a parcel without the donor’s name and address, and another from “a woman who is a great sinner.” We looked in lately at one of the working meetings of this excellent society, and were delighted to see the number of willing helpers present, and the useful parcels about to be despatched to the homes of some of our poor pastors. Donations of money, or clothes, or materials for garments for the ministers, or their wives and children, will always be gratefully received by Mrs. Evans at the Tabernacle.
PERSONAL NOTES.—A French Pasteur writes to tell us that a woman in the village of which he is minister has lately found the peace of God while reading a translation of our sermon, No. 227, “Compel them to come in.” One of our members has recently visited the town where she used to live, and where she commenced the distribution of our sermons, and she now sends us a very cheering account of the blessing which is resting on the labors of those who took up the work when she left. One of the visitors tells of the conversion through the sermons of a poor, sick woman, who used to feel very lonely, but who is so no longer. Another distributor mentions the case of a butcher, who at first repulsed her, but afterwards received her joyfully. He said he had been reading the sermon entitled, “The Man of One Subject,” (No. 1264,) which had been greatly blessed to him. A poor woman, who had been a backslider for many years, for a long time refused the sermons, but they were put under her door, and one of them (“Beware of Unbelief,” No. 1238) was the means of reclaiming her from her sad condition,. Our friend says there are many other instances of blessing which might be mentioned, and concludes her letter thus:—”I wish those who have any of these precious messengers of mercy lying idle in their cupboards would lend them themselves, or give them to those who would circulate them among those who need the glorious truth that they contain.” Will some one take the hint?
Chap 13. MAY, 1881.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
MAY, 1881.
GOOD CHEER FROM PAST AND FUTURE SERVICE.
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
“And when there arose a great dissension, the chief captain, fearing lest Paul should have been pulled in pieces of them, commanded the soldiers to go clown, and to take him by force from among them, and to bring him into the castle. And the night following the Lord stood by him, and said, Be of good cheer, Paul: for as thou hast testified of me in Jerusalem, so must thou bear witness also at Rome. And when it was day, certain of the Jews banded together, and bound themselves under a curse, saying that they would neither eat nor drink till they had killed Paul. And they were more than forty which had made this conspiracy.”—Acts 23:10—13.
From the midnight whisper of the Lord to Paul we may draw forth sweet encouragement. Those of the Lord’s children who have been engaged in his work and are called to suffer in it have here a special word of consolation. Paul had been in a great tumult, and had been roughly rescued from the wrath of the people by the chief captain, who saw that otherwise he would be pulled in pieces. Paul was like the rest of us, made of flesh and blood, and therefore liable to be cast down: he had kept himself calm at first; but, still, the strong excitement of the day had no doubt operated upon his mind, and when he was lying in prison all alone, thinking upon the perils which surrounded him, he needed good cheer, and he received it. The bravest man may find his spirit sinking after the battle, and so perhaps it was with the apostle.
In these words let the reader note the Good Cheer that came to Paul in the dungeon. This consisted, first, in his Master’s presence: “The Lord stood by him.” If all else forsook him, Jesus was company enough; if all despised him, Jesus’ smile was patronage enough; if the good cause seemed in danger, in the presence of his Master victory was sure. The Lord who had stood for him at the cross, now stood by him in prison: the Lord, who had called to him out of heaven, who had washed him in his blood, who had commissioned him to be his servant, who had sustained him in labors and trials oft, now visited him in his solitary cell. It was a dungeon, but the Lord was there; it was dark, but the glory of the Lord lit it up with heaven’s own splendor. Better to be in a gaol with the Lord than to be in heaven without him. The harps above could make no heavenly place without Jesus; and Jesus being there, the clanking fetters and the cold pavement of the stony cell could not suggest a sorrow. “The Lord stood by him.” This shall be said of all who diligently serve God. Dear friend, if you are a worker for the Lord Jesus, depend upon it he will not desert you. If in the course of your endeavors you are brought into sadness and depression, you shall then find it sweetly true that the Lord stands by you. Did you ever forsake a friend who was spending his strength for you? If you have done so, you ought to be ashamed of yourself; but I think I hear you say, indignantly, “No, I have always been faithful to my faithful friend.” Do not, therefore, suspect your Lord of treating you ungenerously, for he is faithful and true. All your former helpers may desert you; Sadducees, Pharisees, and scribes may all set themselves to oppose you; but with the Lord at your right hand you shall not be moved. Cheer up, desponding brother,
“God is near thee, therefore cheer thee,
Sad soul!
He’ll defend thee when around thee
Billows roll.”
The next comfort for Paul was the reflection that the Lord’s standing by him proved that he knew where he was, and was aware of his condition. The Lord had not lost sight of Paul because he was shut up in the common gaol. One is reminded of the Quaker who came to see John Bunyan in prison, and said to him, “Friend, the Lord sent me to thee, and I have been seeking thee in half the prisons in England.” “Nay, verily,” said John, “that cannot be; for if the Lord had sent thee to me, thou wouldst have come here at once, for he knows I have been here for years.” God has not a single jewel laid by and forgotten. “Thou God seest me” is a great consolation to one who delights himself in the Lord. Many and diverse are the prisons of affliction in which the Lord’s servants are shut up: it may be that the reader is lying in the prison of pain, chained by the leg or by the hand, through accident or disease; or perhaps he is shut up in the narrow cell of poverty, or in the dark room of bereavement, or in the dungeon of mental depression; but the Lord knows in what ward his servant is slut up, and he will not leave him to pine away forgotten, “as a dead man out of mind.”
The Lord stood by Paul despite doors and locks: he asked no warder’s leave to enter, nor did he stir bolt or bar; but there he was, the companion of his humble servant. The Lord can visit his chosen when nobody else could be allowed to do so, because of contagion, or from fear of exciting the fevered brain. If we come into such a peculiar position that no friend knows our experience, none having been tempted as we are, yet the Lord Jesus can enter into our special trial and sympathize in our peculiar grief. Jesus can stand side by side with us, for he has been afflicted in all our afflictions.
What is more, that part of our circumstances which we do not know ourselves, Jesus knows, and in these he stands by us; for Paul was not aware of the danger to which he was exposed, he did not know that certain Jews, to the number of forty, had banded together to kill him; but he who was his shield and his exceeding great reward had heard the cruel oath, and arranged to disappoint the bloodthirsty ones. Reader, the Lord knows your troubles before they come to you; he anticipates them by his tender foresight. Before Satan can draw the bow the Preserver of men will put his beloved beyond the reach of the arrow. Before the weapon is forged in the furnace, and fashioned on the anvil, he knows how to provide us with armor of proof which shall turn the edge of the sword and break the point of the spear. Let us therefore sing with holy boldness,—”In the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion: in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me; he shall set me up upon a rock.” How safe we are, for Jehovah hath said, “No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn.” With joy let us draw water out of these two wells of salvation: the Lord is present with us, and he knows us altogether. Putting the two thoughts together, we may hear him say to our inmost souls, —
“I, the Lord, am with thee,
Be thou not afraid!
I will help and strengthen,
Be thou not dismayed!
Yea, I will uphold thee
With my own right hand;
Thou art called and chosen
In my sight to stand.
Onward then, and fear not,
Children of the day!
For his word shall never,
Never pass away.”
When the Lord Jesus came to Paul he gave him a third reason for courage. He said, “Be of good cheer, Paul: for thou hast testified of me in Jerusalem.” There was much comfort in this assurance that his work was accepted of his Master. We dare not look for much joy in any thing that we have done, for our poor works are all imperfect; and yet the Lord sometimes gives his servants honey in the carcasses of lions which they have themselves slain, by pouring into their souls a sweet sense of having walked in integrity before him. Before the great day of reward the Lord whispers into the ear, “Well done, good and faithful servant “; or he says openly before all men, “She hath done what she could.” Herein is good cheer; for if the Lord accepts, it is a small matter if men condemn. The Lord says to Paul,, “Thou hast testified of me in Jerusalem.” The apostle had done so, but he was too humble to console himself with that fact till his Lord gave him leave to do so by acknowledging the brave deed. Perhaps, dear friend, by this little book you shall be made to remember that you have borne witness for Jesus, and that your life has not been altogether in vain. It may be that your conscience makes you more familiar with your faults than with your services, and you rather sigh than sing as you look back upon your Christian career; yet your loving Lord covers all your: failures, and commends you for what his grace has enabled you to do in the way of witness-bearing. It must be sweet to you to hear him say, “I know thy works; for thou hast a little strength, and hast kept; my word, and hast not denied my name.”
Be faithful to your Lord, dear reader, if you are now in prosperity; for thus you will be laying up a store of cheering memories for years to come. To look back upon a well-spent life will not cause an atom of legal boasting to an experienced believer, but it will justly create much holy rejoicing. Paul was able to rejoice that he had not run in vain, neither labored in vain, and happy are we if we can do the same. If it be right for us to chasten our conscience on account of omissions, it must be lawful ground for thankful joy that our heart condemns us not, for then have we confidence towards God. If we fall into straitened circumstances it will be a comfort to be able to say, “When I was rich I freely used my wealth for my Lord.” If we are ill it will be a satisfaction to remember that when we were in health we used our strength for Jesus. These are reflections which give light in the shade, and make music at midnight. It is not out of our own reflections that the joy arises, but out of the witness of the Holy Spirit that the Lord is not unrighteous to forget our work of faith and labor of love.
A fourth comfort remained for Paul in the words, “As thou hast testified of me in Jerusalem, so must thou bear witness also at; Rome.” The Lord would have us take comfort from the prospect of future service and usefulness. We are not done with yet, and thrown aside as vessels in which the Lord hath no more pleasure. This is the chief point; of comfort in our Lord’s word to the apostle. Be of good courage, there is more for you to do, Paul; they cannot kill you at Jerusalem, for you must, bear witness also at Rome.
Brace yourself up, O weary, working brother, for your day’s work is not over yet, and your sun cannot go down till, like Joshua, you have finished your conflict with Amalek. The old saying is trite, “You are immortal till your work is done.” Possibly not one-half of your work is even begun, and therefore you will rise again from sickness, you will soar above depression, and you will do more for the Lord than ever. It will yet be said of you as of the church in Thyatira, “I know thy works, and the last to be more than the first.” Wycliffe could not die though the malicious monks favored him with their best wishes in that direction. ‘: Nay,” said the reformer, “I shall not die, but live, and declare all the evil deeds of the friars.” The sight of rogues to be exposed roused his flickering life, and revived its flame. Disease could not carry off Melancthon because he had eminent service yet to do, side by side with Luther. I have admired the way in which the great Reformer dragged his coadjutor back to life by assuring him that the great work needed him, and he must recover. “He devoutly prayed, ‘ We implore thee, O Lord our God, we cast all cur burdens on thee; and will cry till thou hearest us, pleading all the promises which can be found in the Holy Scriptures respecting thy hearing prayer, so that thou must indeed hear us to preserve at all future periods our entire confidence in thine own promises.’ After this, he seized hold of Melancthon’s hand, and said, ‘ Be of good courage, Philip, YOU SHALL NOT DIE.’“ He prayed his friend back from the mouth of the grave, and sent him on his way comforted with the truthful prediction that he had yet to bear more testimony for the truth. Surely there is no restorative from sickness, and no insurance for continued life, like the confidence that our task is not done, and our race is not ended.
Godly Whitefield, when smitten with a dangerous illness, rose again to renew his seraphic activities after his death had become matter of daily expectation, it is said, in connection with this event, that shortly after his recovery a poor colored woman insisted on having an interview with him. On being admitted, she sat down upon the ground, and, looking earnestly into his face, said to him in broken language, “Massa, you just go to heaven’s gate, but Jesus Christ said, Get you down; you must not come here yet, but go first and call some more poor negroes.” And who would not be willing to tarry here to win more poor negroes for Jesus? Even heaven may be cheerfully postponed for such a gain.
Come, then, ailing and desponding one, there is no use in lying down in despair; for a life of usefulness is still in reserve for you. Up, Elijah, and no more ask to die; for God has further errands for his servant. Neither the lion nor the bear can kill thee, O David, for thou hast yet to fight a giant and cutoff his head! Be not fearful, O Daniel, of the rage of Babylon’s drunken king, for thou art yet to outlive the rage of hungry lions. Courage, O thou mistrustful spirit; thou hast only run with the footmen as yet, thou shalt yet contend with horses and prove more than a match for them, wherefore lift up the hands that hang down. “Thou must stand before Caesar”; a divine decree ordains for thee greater and more trying service than as yet thou hast seen. A future awaits thee, and no power on the earth or under the earth can rob thee of it; therefore BE OF GOOD CHEER.
LOOKING UNTO JESUS
IN every enjoyment, O Christian, look unto Jesus; receive it as proceeding from his love, and purchased by his agonies. In every tribulation look unto Jesus; mark his gracious hand managing the scourge, or mingling the bitter cup; attempering its severity; adjusting the time of its continuance; and making it productive of real good. In every infirmity and failing look unto Jesus, thy merciful High Priest, pleading his atoning blood, and making intercession for transgressors. In every prayer look unto Jesus, thy prevailing Advocate, recommending thy devotions, and “bearing the iniquity of thy holy things.” In every temptation look unto Jesus, the Captain of thy salvation, who alone is able to lift up the hands which hang down, to invigorate the enfeebled knees, and make thee more than conqueror over all thy enemies. Bat especially when the hour of thy departure approaches, when thy flesh and thy heart fail, when all the springs of life are irreparably breaking—then look unto Jesus with a believing eye. Like expiring Stephen, behold him standing at, the right hand of God, on purpose to succor his people in their last extremity. Yes, when thou art launching out into the invisible world, and all before .thee is vast eternity—then, oh then, look unto Jesus, and view him as .the only “way” to the everlasting mansions.—James Hervey.
RELIGIOUS REVOLUTION IN FRANCE
WE are all familiar with the repressive measures adopted recently by the French Government towards the Educational Institutions of the Romish Church in France. It is not surprising that English adverse criticism should have been plentiful. Looking at French action from the English standpoint, we may easily find room for dissent. Liberty in England is the growth of centuries. She has become so strong as to be able to hold her own against all comers. She can afford to give ample room and verge to her enemies. She needs to take no precautionary measures. If her hands were bound with new cords she would burst them asunder as burnt flax. If the iron gates of bondage were shut upon her, she would lift them from their hinges and stride away with them to her own realm. She is the dominant power, and therefore in England we need not suppress institutions that in their spirit are opposed to liberty. We can afford to leave them pretty much to themselves. They grow in an alien soil. The air is too sharp and keen for them to come to their tropical luxuriance, and we are not likely to be overshadowed by them. And though we consider that even in this native home of freedom Romish institutions, like all others, should be subject to the supervision of the State, and be compelled to let in upon their darkness the peering glance of Liberty whenever she pleases, we can afford to leave them unsuppressed. We stand on our white cliffs, therefore, and look across the Channel at the action of our neigh-hours with an unfavorable eye. But this is unjust. The state of things in France is different flora that which prevails in England. The French are beginning to perceive that, with them, freedom is still immature; and, until she arrives at her strength, must be protected against her natural and implacable enemy the Romish Church. Their formula of liberty, equality, and fraternity must not be permitted to delude them into the sophism that liberty, equality, and fraternity must be accorded to Rome. These priceless possessions must be so held as to be secured. The murderess of liberty must not have liberty to accomplish her fell deed. Liberty does not mean the right to destroy liberty. The Romish Church avails herself of the national cry, and claims liberty in France, although if dominant she would not give liberty to France. She employs the watchword of the opposite camp to obtain the key of the position she assails. Liberty! cries she.:But the French are awaking to the conviction that they must not give up common-sense under the magic spell of three syllables. If they would defend the fortress of freedom they must not put the key into the hands of the foe.
This determined attitude of French opinion has been the slow growth of the present century. Amongst its most powerful promoters was Edgar Qainet, a name less known than it deserves to be in England. One of the greatest French thinkers of this century, he devoted his life to the cause of liberty, and to the moral elevation of France. The government recognized his power, and appointed him professor at Lyons, and afterwards in the College of France., His brilliant lectures showed the general decadence and comparative ruin of Southern Europe to be the work of the Jesuits—the direct result of the counter-reformation inaugurated by Loyola. He aroused such enthusiasm on. the one hand, such rage on the other, that the government compelled him to resign; and in 1851 he was one of the’ great champions of freedom exiled from France by the coup d’etat. During this exile of nineteen years he wrote some of his finest works. The little work before us, “The Religious Revolution of the Nineteenth Century,” is the introduction to his life of Marnix de Sainte-Aldegonde, the friend of William of Orange, and one of the founders of the Dutch Republic.
Pointing out that the English Reformation preceded the English Revolution, and was at once its cause and guarantee, Quinet lays his finger on the weak point of the French Revolution. It was not preceded by a religious revolution, and it did not lay its foundation in the religion of the people. It committed the mistake of treating all religions as alike, and as alike opposed to freedom, and herein it was unjust and suicidal. All religions are not alike. There is one that proclaims itself the foe of all the rest, and glories in its incompatibility with modern freedom. Had the French Revolution recognized the freedom-loving churches, and welcomed their aid in its war against the church of despotism, it would have succeeded. But by making war on all religion it raised against itself the spirit of religion, and fell.
To secure enduring freedom in France, she must first be delivered from Rome. While France is Catholic, she cannot be permanently free. But while the Jesuit institutions are permitted to work unhindered, she will remain Catholic. Quinet holds that it is idle to expect that Romanism in France will cease of itself under the spread of education. “The real education of a people is its religion. Good or bad, vigorous or decrepit;, it is religion that penetrates into the depths of the people, bringing them life or death.” It is an illusion to think that this great church will disappear “at the sound of a few wise words and some excellent advice. What are all the systems laid down in books, and scattered here and there by a few hands, compared with the authority able to surround a nation on every side? While this authority is standing, your philosophical treatises, your warnings, your lessons, your pamphlets, welcomed with applause by a few in the upper crust of the nation, remain ignored by the masses, who only see, hear, and respect the church with which day and night they come in contact. It was this thought that destroyed for me all the joy of teaching in the days when I was permitted to live amidst a crowd of friends in the College of France. I never quitted this living atmosphere without saying to myself, ‘Beyond these walls speech, life, is not understood. I have only to cross this threshold, and I shall enter again that opaque, tenebrous mass from which not a single echo of my words will return.’“
A baneful superstition can be rooted up only by removing the superstition itself from the eyes of the people. Men easily detach themselves from that which they no longer see. It was thus the Roman church itself destroyed Paganism. Constantine recognized in the church a new instrument of domination, and grasped it for his own purposes. “A shipwrecked mariner could not have thrown himself with more impetuosity upon a plank in midocean than the despots of the Decline and Fall seized hold of the unity of the church, hoping thereby to save their empire, breaking up in all directions. The imperial soul of the Caesars passed into the church, and it grew old at once by many centuries.” Then was promulgated the decree of extinction against paganism, “LET SUPERSTITION CEASE!” The very temples were razed to the ground. The legions were sent against the stones. “The old religion, until then tranquil and supreme, suddenly found itself surprised, surrounded, struck down, ruined, and utterly crushed out of existence.” Such action, tempered, of course, by the modern spirit of humanity, of justice, of equity, is the action needed, according to Quinet, to overthrow the tyranny of the Romish Church in France. Her own weapons must be turned against herself. “Worn-out religions resemble those old trees that are nothing but bark. They go on vegetating and casting their shadow over the soil until the day comes that a flash or’ lightning, or the axe of the woodcutter, strikes them, and they fall a heap of dust.”
And there is reason for accelerating this fall. The Romish Church is a poisonous upas tree, striking all under its branches with moral and political death. Very vividly our author states this fact: “As far as experience yet goes, there has been no time nor place in which the Catholic Church has been allowed to remain with unfettered hands by the cradle of Liberty, but what in a short time Liberty has been found stifled in its swaddling clothes.” And yet the modern spirit—equal rights to all—a spirit which cannot be too sincerely commended, may betray the unwary into the danger of losing their own while the inveterate robber of human rights exists in the midst of the nation. To quote again from Quinet:— “Wherever, being in authority, Catholicism meets with Liberty, it swears to destroy it, and as a matter of fact it does destroy it. In return, wherever, being in authority, Liberty meets with Catholicism, it swears to respect it. Overthrown Liberty raises Catholicism up again, craves for it quarter. Can this arrangement last for ever? Honest Brutus!” exclaims Quinet, “magnanimous dupe! are you going on for ever raising up your fallen enemy? for it is you who are always reopening the way for Antony. You wish Antony to mount the platform and make his speech, and should anyone better informed oppose it, your voice it is that cries to the crowd, ‘ Silence! listen to the noble Antony!’ But I answer, ‘Take care! Antony will ruin you, if you do not ruin Antony.’“ Yes; popery will ruin liberty if liberty does not ruin popery.
In order, then, to allow liberty breathing space to grow and become powerful, Catholicism must be for a time restrained. Then, when the change is pretty well complete, it will become possible to slacken the rein, to restore the common right, and reopen the door, as in England and America, to the Catholic church without incurring too great a peril. Our author meets the theory of those who persuade themselves that the loss of the temporal power disables the papacy from working more harm:—” There are two men in the pope, the prince and the pontiff; whenever the prince has been driven away the pontiff has always led, him back again by the hand. If the Reformers had been half-hearted, and had contented themselves with merely tearing the temporal power from the Papacy, their work would soon have come to an end. The spiritual would very quickly have got repossession of the temporal. The keys of St. Peter would in a short time have brought back the sword.” Against this spiritual force of the church all the beliefs that have struggled against Rome must be enlisted. “I should appeal,” says Quinet, “to every oppressed belief, every persecuted church, every temple that can show its martyr. It is not only Rousseau, Voltaire, Kant who are with us against the eternal oppressor, but also Luther, Zwingle, Calvin, Marnix, Herder, Channing, and a whole legion of minds who in their day fought the very enemy who now blocks up our road. All these great mental athletes will find a place in cur ranks.’…. No one,” he says elsewhere, “can read Marnix to the end and believe any longer in Catholic dogma. It will become for him as the site of a church that has been demolished and abandoned to the whistling and laughter of the winds; a final form of paganism exposed in all its nakedness; the scattered remains of another Diana of the Ephesians. and above these ruins, the conscience of modern humanity, courageously seeking, examining, and tracing out for itself a return to God and Liberty through the Gospel.”
Quinet draws a terrible picture of what would happen if Catholicism were victorious. His closing appeal to his country is stirring, and should be influential. “What, then, ought to be done? I have told you. I repeat it, since you have not heard me. Come out of the old church, you, your wives, your children. Come out, while there is yet time, before she has herself walled up the gate. Come out by every open way, in order that you may not perish of pauperism, moral or physical. I would that the nations should come out in crowds from the old church by the thousand doors which the modern religious spirit has opened up in the walls of Christendom. The way is open; it is simple, it is wide, it is multiple enough to suit itself to the liberty of everyone. Choose as you will! What do you fear? The obstacles are conquered, the way is sure, it has been proved by thousands of men and many nations before you. There is no need to wait for a prophet, a revealer. The modern ages have broken open the door and made wide the breach. It is only now a question of following in the footsteps of those who have been emancipated before you. Of what are you afraid? You have remained here the last of all. What delays you? What are you. waiting for? Onward, men, advance, and come out!”
God grant that such appeals as these, wrought out by powerful reasoning, enforced by cleat’ historical example, illumined by brilliant illustration and wit, sharpened by cutting sarcasm, driven home by soul-impelling earnestness, may not be lost upon Quinet’s countrymen. Ah! and in these days of insidious popery in the Established Church, there is reason for their being deeply pondered even in free Protestant England.
NOTES.
DURING this month we have issued a little work entitled “Be of Good Cheer,” and no sooner was it out than we received the following memorandum from Edinburgh, headed, “The voice of all the colporteurs of the Religious Tract and Book Society of Scotland, sent with the general secretary’s heartiest concurrence:—
“Good Cheer. By Mr. Spurgeon. 1s.
First Notice.
“Thank you, Mr. Spurgeon. Every one of us colporteurs will gladly be legs to you in going from house to house to get upon the sick couch your kind and wise, ‘ Be of Good Cheer, from the Master himself.’ We have all been much concerned about your protracted illness, and welcome the book all the more that you tell us that it is the fruit of that long illness happily now closed. We gladly’ give a home to your dove coming at last with her olive leaf, and thank God on your behalf.”
We accept this as a happy omen for our little book, and feel deep gratitude to the kind friends who have sent us such cheering words. They will be glad to know that health has returned, and strength is gradually coming back.
In the providence of God several choice spirits have been removed from the circle of our friends. Lady Lush, whom to know was to love, has fallen asleep in Jesus, amid the tears of many. Specially bitter is the grief of the poor, to whom she was a generous friend. Just before her departure she sent a message to us to the effect that “If it had been God’s will to spare her to work a little longer for him, she would have been very willing, but to depart and be with Christ was far better, and she could only look forward with joy to the home she had so nearly reached.” May our gracious God comfort her honored husband and her family, and console her pastor and the church under their serious loss.
Nor can we forget Sir Charles .Reed, from whom we received a note which was not delivered till after his death. We keep it as a mournful proof of the frailty of human life, for in it he proposes to call at Norwood, but ere he could pay the visit he was called home to our heavenly Father. He will be greatly missed from the London School Board, and from many committees where his presence was of the utmost value. In the Christian society of London his decease will make a great breach. He took the chair at the Stockwell Orphanage meeting in June, 1879, and it was a singular circumstance that our portraits appeared together in “Men of Mark” for that month.
Just as we are making up the magazine our friend, the Rev. W. Mortey Punshon, LL.D., is being carried to the grave. Had it not been for a cruel east wind we should have been at the grave; indeed, we were preparing to start when it was urged upon us that i: would be a very sad thing if the funeral of one minister should be the death of another It may serve to show coming generation how Christians, with all their differences. loved one another in the year of grace 1881 if we here print a letter which we received from this man of God. some three months ago. It was never meant for the public eye, but was the genuine outflow of a loving heart. Little did we dream that the hand which penned it was so soon to be still in death.
“Tranby, Brixton Rise, S.W.,
“January, 1881.
“My dear Sir and Brother—The papers tell us that the 10th will be a memorable day to you, and amid hosts of greeting friends my wife and I (than whom you have none truer, though our love can rarely exhibit itself but in wishful thought and prayer) would fain express our good wishes in a line.
“We trust there is good foundation for the rumor which has lately reached us of great and permanent improvement in Mrs. Spurgeon’s health; and we pray that if it be the Lord’s will, you may be continued to each other in happy fellowship until the ‘silvern’ shall have become ‘golden’ by the lapse of years.
“Like most of God’s anointed, it seems as if you are to be made ‘meet by consecrated pain.’ May the Refiner sit always by the furnace! You know that the fire will never be kindled a whit too fiercely, nor burn a moment too long.
“There are many, whom you know not, who thank God, in these times of rebuke, for your fidelity to the old gospel, and who watch you with solicitude and prayer.
“Wishing for Mrs. Spurgeon and yourself happiness, and the blessedness which is better, the Lord’s unutterable peace, long and useful lives, and the ‘abundant entrance’ at last,
“I am, in my wife’s name and my own,
“Yours very affectionately,
W. MORLEY PUNSHON.”
We invite our readers to pray for the bereaved family, and specially for that sorrowing lady whose name is blended with that of the dear departed in the loving letter which we have ventured to print.
Our plan for sending out evangelists to India remains where it was. We hope that it will not end in mere words. Mr. Brown has reached Calcutta, but will there be no others to follow? That must now rest with the Lord’s stewards, and with the men who feel called to go.
We have letters from the Cape of Good Hope. The work needs pecuniary he]p just now. The chapel must be paid for, and a considerable sum is needed for that purpose. Perhaps, also, two masters are more than the people are able to support. We should be right glad to forward speedy help: it would be money profitably laid out.
We have republished the sermon upon “Christian Baptism,” delivered by Mr. Hugh Stowell Brown, at the opening of the Tabernacle. It is a very powerful plea for Believers’ Baptism, and it is issued in a neat form for one penny by our publishers.
MRS. SPURGEON’S BOOK FUND.—Our dear wife’s Report has sold so well that it has been needful to print a second edition. Many have written to say that its perusal has been a means of grace to them; they could not have said anything more cheering. The little book can still be had of our publishers for sixpence.
Her work in helping poor ministers is specially needful at this time, for the depression in the agricultural interest has rendered it very difficult for village churches to support their ministers. Small salaries have to be cut down, and many men of God are left with incomes below starvation point. Let all be doubly generous in this hour of need.
On Tuesday, April 5, the Annual Butchers’ Festival was held at the Tabernacle, and from all we can learn it seems to have been the largest and most successful meeting of the kind that has ever been held. We are informed that there were 2,000 men present, in addition to between 300 and 400 master butchers and their wives; and that the provisions consumed on rue occasion included nearly three-quarters of a ton of meat, seven and a half hundredweights of carrots, eight hundredweights of bread, more than a quarter of a ton of cake, a pailful of mustard, 40 lbs. of tea, 200 lbs. of sugar, 80 lbs. of butter, and 130 quarts of milk. Mr. Murrell, as usual, superintended the work of preparation and distribution.
The chair was occupied by W. S. Caine, Esq., M.P.; addresses were delivered by Mr. Charles Spurgeon, Mr. Henry Varley, Mr. William Olney, Dr. Barnardo, and Ned Wright; and Mr. Frisby’s choir rendered good service by singing at intervals during the evening. We are sure our friend, Mr. Varley, who is the founder of this festival, must be pleased with the large attendance of the men, but he expresses his intense desire to see more fruit from it. Let us pray God to bless the addresses to the conversion of many of the butchers.
Friends in or near London who know of districts needing’ the gospel will oblige by letting us know. The thing to be desired is a hall or large room which we could hire, and a few true-.hearted friends to form a nucleus. Our city grows faster than our churches. Except strenuous efforts are put forth London will become more and more heathen. Baptist friends would find us ready to aid them with preachers, and in
every other way within our power; but we cannot tramp over this vast metropolis and make a personal survey. Our brethren should try to raise churches near their own abodes if there are none, or if those which exist are not really gospel-loving churches.
TO ANONYMOUS DONORS.—Towards the end of January we received from “L. M. N.” the first half of a £5 Bank of England Note, but no indication was given as to the object to which it was to be applied, and the second half has not yet come to hand, although the first was acknowledged as requested in the Christian Hearld.
During the past month we have received through the International Money Order Office an order for £5 from Germany without any intimation as to the sender’s wishes concerning it. Will the donor kindly say how the amount is to be appropriated?
Our best thanks are also given to a lady who has presented £110 to be allotted among our various enterprises, and to another friend who on four succeeding Sabbaths has added altogether £150 to the weekly offering for the College.
COLLEGE.—Mr. J. Kemp is removing from Bares, Suffolk, to Burnley, Lancashire; and Mr. W. W. Haines from Eye, Suffolk, to St. Leonard’s, Sussex.
Another member of our Conference, Mr. Alexander Macfarlane, of Wooster, Ohio, U.S.A., has” gone home.” he had won for himself a high position among his brethren, but ere he had completed his thirty-seventh year he was suddenly removed, another victim to this exacting age. Without meaning to censure any one, or to blame the church over which he presided, one of the ministers who officiated at the funeral exercises said, in effect, “During all these two years since he came among you he should have had only rest. He was given none, and there! (pointing to the noblest form among them all) you have the result!” A local paper says of him, “As a pulpit orator, he was highly gifted; and, as such, was a marked man of the times. It may be truly said that but few men of his age, in the land of his choice, could be ranked as equal to him in this particular …. The love and esteem of his church, and of other churches in our city, and of the citizens generally, were made manifest by the large attendance at his funeral, which took place from the church where his voice while living had so earnestly and eloquently proclaimed the glad tidings of the gospel to his fellow inert.”
We are glad to hear that Mr. H. R. Brown has safely reached Calcutta, on his way to Darjeeling; and that Mr. Lyall is much better, and hopes soon to return to his work in Africa.
Mr. T. A. Carver leaves the College for Widnes, Lancashire, with our earnest prayers for his success. Will all applicants for admission to the College kindly note that we shall not be able to receive any more students during the present year? We greatly regret that we should have had to keep them waiting so long, but it is now clear that there will be no vacancies for months to come. Sometimes students are hastened away from us before their studies are complete, for the churches stand in need of them; but at other times it happens that there is less demand,, and so the men abide longer with us: the last is the case at this present time.
EVANGELISTS.—We have received the following report of the closing services by Messrs. Smith and Fullerton at Halifax:— “These evangelists brought to a close last Monday the series of services they have held in this town, having labored here altogether about six weeks. A farewell tea was provided in the schoolroom of the Trinity-road Chapel, to which about four hundred persons sat down, and most of these had an opportunity to speak with Mr. Fullerton and Mr. Smith. After tea there was a crowded meeting in the chapel to hear farewell addresses from the brethren. Mr. Smith, according to request, gave his experience of how he was led to Christ, which was listened to with lively interest. Mr. Fullerton gave a most appropriate and earnest address on three words—’ One thing I know,’ ‘One thing I do,’ ‘One thing I desire’; each of which was based on a passage of Scripture. An opportunity was given at the meeting for anyone to tell of good received during the special services. Several persons spoke. ]During the meeting the Rev. W. Dyson, of North Parade Baptist Chapel, and the Rev. J. Parker, M.A., of Trinity-road, spoke. Mr. Parker said that all expenses had been met by the free-will offerings of the people, and that, moreover, there would be a sum of not less than £100 to send as a thankoffering to Mr. Spurgeon’s Evangelistic Fund. This elicited loud cheers, and the audience, with much heartiness, joined there and then in singing
‘ Praise God from whom all blessings flow.’
The tone of the meeting was inspiriting, and very encouraging throughout.
“The last preaching service conducted by the Evangelists was held on Sunday night, in the Drill Hall. This spacious room was crowded, and the service was a fit crowning of the work. The sermon was a most impressive one, Mr. Fullerton setting before the people ‘Life’ and ‘Death,’ and with much pathos entreating them to ‘choose Life’ Deuteronomy 30:19.) At the close there were many inquirers, and the hearts of all Christian workers present were made to rejoice, as they had good evidence that many were being ‘ born again.’
“The total number of inquirers who have come forward is about two hundred; but we believe even this only represents a small proportion of the good accomplished. The churches of the town thus cannot fail to be numerically strengthened, and many Christians have been revived.
“The idea of sending out evangelists thus is, to our mind, an excellent way of ‘ Launching out into the deep’ to let down the net for a great draught of fishes. The settled ministry is not in the least interfered with, but is materially helped, and the pastors are quietly left in their own spheres, with nothing to trouble them but an increased flock
The evangelists have during the past month commenced at Sheffield a series of services which promise to be the most successful they have ever held. The town has been divided into five districts, in each of which a fortnight is to be spent, and the closing meetings are to be held in some large central spot. The ministers have heartily welcomed our brethren, who find that their visit has been preceded by a week of prayer all over the town, which has already witnessed the earnest of a great blessing.
Mr. Burnham continues his Yorkshire campaign with many signs of the Lord’s presence. In Horsforth, especially, his visit has produced the most blessed results. This month, from the 8th to the 13th, he is to be at Walthamstow; 17th to 20th, Rushden, Northamptonshire; 22nd to 27th, Bedale and Masham, Yorkshire; and 29th to June 3rd, Salterforth and Earley, Yorkshire.
ORPHANAGE.—Our cash list reveals the fact that the “tour in the east” made by Mr. Charlesworth and the orphan boys during the past mouth has been financially a success, and many kind letters and appreciative newspaper reports assure us that the institution has many faithful friends in the Eastern Counties, and especially in the city and towns just visited. To all sympathizers and helpers we tender our heartfelt thanks.
A friend from Cambridge has written to ask how much it will cost to furnish one of the new houses for the orphan girls. He proposes to undertake this work if we let him know the cost. This is a noble proposal. It comes just as this page is being completed, and we cannot answer the inquiry for the moment; but we will do so next month. Meanwhile, we thank our Cambridge friend, and hope that he has started the fashion. Will not five others compete for the other houses?
We must now beg our friends to begin preparing for a Bazaar at Christmas, to provide funds for completing the Girls’ Orphanage: dining hall, infirmary, etc. All hands to the work. This should be a grand effort of all in every place who love our Orphanage work. PARCELS SHOULD BE SENT TO THE STOCKWELL ORPHANAGE, and not to Westwood, or the Tabernacle.
Annual Fete.—It may be well thus early to notify to all country friends that, as the President’s birthday comes this year on a Sunday, the annual fete will be held on Wednesday, June 22nd, when that portion of the new buildings for girls which will then be complete will be formally opened, and other interesting matters attended to.
COLPORTAGE.—The Annual Meeting of the Colportage Association is fixed for Monday, May 16th, at the Tabernacle, when the President, C. H. Spurgeon, will preside. Revs. R. H. Lovell, of Leytonstone, and H. Sinclair Paterson, M.D., will address the meeting, and several of the colporteurs will give an account of their labors. About twenty of the men will attend a conference preceding the meeting. Will our friends muster strongly at the annual meeting, which will certainly be one of great interest?
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle.— March 25th, sixteen; 28th,:four; 31st, eleven.
INAUGURAL ADDRESS
DELIVERED AT THE SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL CONFERENCE OF
THE PASTORS’ COLLEGE ASSOCIATION,
BY C. H. SPURGEON, PRESIDENT, ON TUESDAY’, MAY 3RD, 1881.
I NEVER needed help more than now, and never felt so utterly unfitted to give the key-note to the Conference. As you grow more numerous, more gifted, and more experienced, I feel more and more my unworthiness to stand foremost and lead your ranks. However, I will trust in God, and believe that he will, by his Holy Spirit, send a word that shall be encouraging and quickening. Years ago an eccentric judge, known as Judge Foster, went upon circuit in extreme old age during a very hot summer, and on one of the most sultry days of that summer he addressed the grand jury at Worcester in some such terms as these,—” Gentlemen of the Jury, it is very hot, and I am very old; you know your duties very well; go and do them.” Following his example, I feel inclined to say to you,— “Gentlemen, here you are assembled, I have many infirmities to bear, and you will have great difficulty in bearing with my talk; you know your duties; go and do them.” Action is better than speech. If I speak for an hour I shall scarcely be able to say anything more practical— you know your duties, go and do them. “England expects every man to do his duty” was the rousing signal of Nelson; need I remind you that our great Lord expects every one of his servants to occupy until he comes, and so to be a good and faithful servant? Go forth and fulfill your Master’s high behest, and may God’s Spirit work in you the good pleasure of your Lord. Those who truly serve God are made to feel more and more forcibly that “life is real, life is earnest,” if it be indeed life in Christ. In times of great pain, and weakness, and depression, it has come over me to hope that if I should again recover I should be more intense than ever; if I could be privileged to climb the pulpit stairs again, I resolved to leave out every bit of flourish from my sermons, preach nothing but present and pressing truth, and hurl it at the people with all my might; myself living at high pressure, and putting forth all the energy that my being is capable of. I suppose you, too, have felt like this when you have been laid aside. You have said to yourselves, “Playtime is over with us, we must get to work. Parade is ended, now comes the tug of war. We must not waste a single moment, but redeem the time, because the days are evil.” When we see the wonderful activity of the servants of Satan, and how much they accomplish, we may well be ashamed of ourselves that we do so little for our Redeemer, and that the little is often done so badly that it takes as long to set it right as we spent in the doing of it. Brethren, let us cease from regrets, and come to actual amendment.
A great German philosopher has asserted that life is all a dream. He says that “it is a dream composed of a dream of itself.” He believes in no actual existence, not even in his own; even that he conceives to be but a thought. Surely some in the ministry must be disciples of that philosophy, for they are half asleep, and their spirit is dreamy. They speak of the eternal truth as though it were a temporary system of belief, passing away like all other visions of earth. They live for Christ in a manner which would never be thought of by a person who meant to make money, or to obtain a degree at the university. “Why,” said one of a certain minister, “if I acted with my business as he does in his ministry I should be in the Gazette within three months.” It is an unhappy thing that there should be men calling themselves ministers of Christ to whom it never seems to occur that they are bound to display the utmost industry and zeal They seem to forget that they are dealing with souls that may be lost for ever or saved for ever, souls that cost the Savior’s heart’s blood. They do not appear to have understood the nature of their calling, or to have grasped the Scriptural idea of an ambassador for Christ. Like drowsy wagoners, they hope to get their team safely home, though they themselves are sound asleep. I have heard of ministers who are most lively when playing croquet or cricket, or getting up an excursion, or making a bargain. It was said of one in my hearing, “What a fine minister he would have been if he had only been converted.” I heard it said of a very clever man, “He would have been a great winner of souls if he had only believed in souls; but he believed in nothing.” It is said of the Russian peasants that when they have done their work they will lie on the stove, or around it, and there sleep hour after hour; and there is a current opinion among them that they are only awake when they are asleep, and that their waking and working hours are nothing but a horrible dream. The moujik hopes that his dreams are facts, and that his waking sufferings are merely nightmares. May not some have fallen into the same notion with regard to the ministry? they are asleep upon realities, and awake about shadows; in earnest about trifles, yet trifling about solemnities. What God will have to say to those servants who do their own work well and his work badly I will not attempt to foreshadow. What shall be done to the man who displayed great capacity in his recreations, but was dull in his devotions? active out of his calling, and languid in it? The day shall declare it. Let us arouse ourselves to the sternest fidelity, laboring to win souls as much as if it all depended wholly upon ourselves, while we fall back in faith upon the glorious fact that everything rests with the eternal God.
I see before me many who are fully aroused, and are eager in seeking the lost; for I speak to some of the most earnest spirits in the Christian church—evangelists and pastors whose meat and drink it is to do the will of their Lord. But even these, who are most awake, will not differ from me when I assert that they could be yet more aroused. My brethren, when you have been at your best you might have been better. Who among us might not have had greater success if he had been ready to obtain it. When Nelson served under Admiral Hotham, and a certain hum her of the enemy’s ships had been captured, the commander said, “We must be contented: we have done very well.” But Nelson did not think so, since a number of the enemy’s vessels had escaped. “Now,” said he, “had we taken ten sail, and allowed the eleventh to escape when it had been possible to have got at her, I could never have called it well done.” If ‘re have brought many to Christ we dare not boast, for we are humbled by the reflection that more might have been done had we been fitter instruments for God. Possibly some brother will say, “I have done all that I could do.” That may be his honest opinion, for he could not have preached more frequently, or held more meetings. Perhaps it is true that he has held enough meetings, and the people have had quite enough sermons; but there might have been an improvement in the spirit of the meetings, and in the sermons too. Some ministers might do more in reality if they did less in appearance. A Bristol Quaker—and Quakers are very shrewd men—years ago stepped into an alehouse and called for a quart of beer. The beer frothed up, and the measure was not well fillet. The Friend said to the landlord, “How much trade art thou doing?” “Oh,” he answered, “I draw ten butts of beer a month.” “Do thee know how thee might draw eleven butts?” “No, sir; I wish I did.” “I will tell thee, friend; thee can do it by filling thy pots.” To any brother who says, “I do not know how I can preach more gospel than I do, for I preach very often,” I would reply, “You need not preach oftener, but fill the sermons fuller of gospel.” The Savior at the marriage feast said, “Fill the water-pots with water.” Let us imitate the servants, of whom we read, “They filled them up to the brim.” Let your discourses be full of matter, sound, gracious, and condensed. Certain speakers suffer from an awful flux of words; you can scarcely spy out the poor little straw of an idea which has been hurried down an awful Ganges or Amazon of words. Give the people plenty of thought, plenty of Scriptural, solid doctrine, and deliver it in a way which is growingly better,—every day better, every year better, that God may be more glorified and sinners may more readily learn the way of salvation.
I shall now commend to you for the perfecting of your ministry five things, which should be in you and abound. You remember the passage which says, “Salt, without prescribing how much.” There is no need for limiting the quantity of any of the matters now commended to you. Here they are— light, fire, fat/h, life, love. Their number is five, you may count them on your fingers; their value is inestimable, grasp them with firm hand, and let them be carried in your hearts.
I. I commend to you most earnestly the acquisition and distribution of LIGHT. To that end we must first get the light. Get light even of the commonest order, for all light is good. Education upon ordinary things is valuable, and I would stir up certain loitering brethren to make advances in that direction. Many among you entered the College with no education whatever; but when you left it you had learned enough to have formed the resolution to study with all your might, and you have carried it out. I wish that all had done so. It is a great; advantage to a minister to commence his public life in a small village where he can have time and quiet for steady reading: that man is wise who avails himself of the golden opportunity. We ought not only to think of what we can now do for God, but of what we may yet be able to do if we improve ourselves. No man should ever dream that his education is complete. I know that my friend Mr. Rogers, though he has passed his eightieth year, is still a student, and perhaps has more of the true student spirit about him now than ever: will any of the younger sort sit down in self-content? We shall continue to learn even in heaven, and shall still be looking deeper and deeper into the abyss of divine love: it were ill to talk of perfect knowledge here below. If a man says, “I am fully equipped for my work, and need learn no more; I have moved here after having been three years in the last place, and I have quite a stock of sermons, so that I am under no necessity to read any more,” I would say to him, “My dear friend, the Lord give you brains, for you talk like one who is deficient in that department.” A brain is a very hungry thing indeed, and he who possesses it must constantly feed it by reading and thinking, or it will shrivel up or fall asleep. It is the child of the horse-leech, and it crieth evermore, “Give, give.” Do not starve it. If such mind-hunger never happens to you, I suspect you have no mind of any consequence.
But, brethren, see to it that you have in a sevenfold degree light of a higher kited. You are to be, above all things, students of the Word of God: this, indeed, is a main point of your avocation. If we do not study Scripture, and those books that will help us to understand theology, we are but wasting time while we pursue other researches. We should judge him to be a foolish fellow who, while preparing to be a physician, spent all his time in studying astronomy. There is a connection of some kind between stars and human bones; but a man could not learn much of surgery from Arcturus or Orion. So there is a connection between every science and religion, and I would advise you to obtain much general knowledge; but universal information will be a poor substitute for a special and prayerful study of the Scriptures, and of the doctrines contained in the revelation of God. We are to study men and our own hearts; we ought to sit as disciples in the schools of providence and experience. Some ministers grow fast because the great Teacher chastens them sorely, and the chastening is sanctified; but others learn nothing by their experience, they blunder out of one ditch into another, and learn nothing by their difficulties but the art of creating fresh ones. I suggest to you all the prayer of a Puritan who, during a debate, was observed to be absorbed in writing. His friends thought he was taking notes of his opponent’s speech, but when they got hold of his paper, they found nothing but these words, “More light, Lord! More light, Lord.” Oh, for more light from the great Father of lights!
Let not this light be only that of knowledge, but seek for the light of joy and cheerfulness. There is power in a happy ministry. A lugubrious face, a mournful voice, a languor of manner,—none of these commend us to our’ hearers; especially do they fail to attract the young. Certain strange minds find their happiness in misery, but they are not numerous. I once had a letter from one who told me that he came to the Tabernacle, but as soon as he entered he felt it could not be the house of God because there were so many present, and “Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way that leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.” When he looked at me he felt sure that I was unsound, for I should not look so cheerful in the face, neither should I be so bulky in person, if I belonged to the tried people of God. Worst. of all, when he looked round upon the congregation, and saw their happy countenances, he said to himself, these people know nothing about the depravity of their hearts or the inward struggles of believers. Then he informed me that he wended his way to a very small chapel where he saw a minister who looked as if he had been in the furnace, and though there were but eight persons present, they all looked so depressed that he felt quite at home. I suppose he sat down and sang—
“My willing soul would stay
In such a frame as this,
And sit and sing herself away
From everything like bliss.”
I felt glad that the good man was enabled to enjoy a little comfortable misery with his brethren. I did not feel at all envious; nor do I think that such a ministry of misery will ever draw to itself a number that no man can number. The children of light prefer the joy of the Lord, for they find it to be their strength.
Get plenty of light, brethren, and when you have obtained it give it out. Never fall into the notion that mere earnestness will suffice without knowledge, and that souls are to be saved simply by our being zealous. I fear that we are more deficient in heat than in light; but at the same time that kind of fire which has no light in it is of a very doubtful nature and cometh not from above. Souls are saved by truth which enters the understanding, and so reaches the conscience. How can the gospel save when it is not understood? The preacher may preach with a great deal of stamping, and hammering, and crying, and entreating, but the Lord is not in the wind, nor in the fire—the still small voice of truth is needed to enter the understanding, and thereby reach the heart. People must be taught. We must “Go, and teach all nations,” making disciples of them; and I know of no way in which you can save men without teaching on your part, and discipleship on theirs. Some preachers, though they know a great deal, do not teach much, because they use such an involved style. Recollect that you are addressing people who need to be taught like children; for, though they are grown up, the major part of our hearers, as to the things of God, are still in a state of childhood; and if they are to receive the truth it must be made very plain, and packed up so as to be carried away and laid up in the memory. Therefore, brethren, give forth much holy instruction.
Some give little instruction because of their involved style; but; many fail for other reasons; mainly because they aim at something else. Talleyrand defines a metaphysician as a man who is very clever in drawing black lines upon a black ground: I should like to draw black lines upon a white ground, or else white lines on a black ground, so that they could be seen: but certain preachers are so profound that no one understands them. On the other hand, have you not heard sermons with great oratorical display about them, and nothing more? You have looked on while the angel wrought wondrously. The preacher has been like Blondin on the tight rope, and as we have looked at hint we have trembled, lest he should never reach the end of his lofty period. Yet he has balanced himself admirably, and moved along in his elevated position in a marvelous manner. When all is over your mind is unsatisfied; for these acrobatic feats of rhetoric do not feast the soul. Brethren, we must not make it our aim to be grand orators. Certain men are eloquent by nature, and it is not possible for them to be otherwise than oratorical, any more than for nightingales to help singing sweetly: these I do not blame, but admire. It is not the duty of the nightingale to bring down its voice to the same tone as that of the sparrow. Let it sing sweetly if it can do so naturally. God deserves the best oratory, the best logic, the best metaphysics, the best of everything; but if ever rhetoric stands in the way of the instruction of the people, a curse on rhetoric; if any educational attainment or natural gift which we possess should make it less easy for the people to understand us, let it perish. May God rend away from our thought and style everything which darkens the light, even though it should be like a costly ‘veil of rarest lace. May we use great plainness of speech that gospel light may shine out clearly.
At this time there is a great necessity for giving much light, for a fierce attempt is being made to quench or dim the light, Many are scattering darkness on all sides. Therefore, brethren, keep the light burning in your churches, keep the light burning in your pulpits, and hold it forth in the face of men who love darkness because it favors their aims. Teach the people all truth, and let not our distinctive opinions be concealed. There are sheep stealers about, who come forth in the night, and run away with our people because they do not know our principles,—the principles of Nonconformists, the principles of Baptists, or even the principles of Christianity. Our hearers have got a general idea of these things, but not enough to protect them from deceivers. We are beset not only by skeptics, but by certain brethren who devour the feeble. Do not leave your children to wander out without the guardianship of holy knowledge, for there are seducers abroad who will mislead them is they can. They will begin by calling them “dear” this, and “dear” that, and end by alienating them from those who brought them to Jesus. If you lose your members, let it be in the -light of day, and not through their ignorance. These kidnappers dazzle weak eyes with flashes of novelty, and turn weak heads with wonderful discoveries and marvelous doctrines, which all tend towards division and bitterness, and the exaltation of their own sect. Keep the light of truth burning, and thieves will not dare to plunder your house.
O for a church of believers in Jesus who know why they believe, in him; persons who believe the Bib]e, and know what it contains; who believe the doctrines of grace, and know the bearings of those truths; who know where they are and what they are, and who therefore dwell in the light, and cannot be deceived by the prince of darkness. Do, dear friends—I speak specially to the younger sort among us —do let there be plenty of teaching in your ministry. I fear that sermons are too often judged by their words rather than by their sense. Let it not be so with you. Feed the people always with knowledge and understanding, and let your preaching be solid, containing food for the hungry, healing for the sick, and light for those who sit in darkness.
(TO BE CONTINUED.)
THE ENORMOUS GOODEBERRY
NOW is the season for paragraphs in the newspapers concerning gooseberries which are twice as large as possible. The wonderful information fills up a corner, and gratifies the lovers of the marvelous, besides illustrating a style of writing which is by no means rare even among religious people.
We have been surprised to hear of” a great work” in a place where many intelligent residents never heard of any “work” whatever. Accompanied by a plea for funds we have seen narratives which have been written by excellent persons in which the descriptive adjectives may have been accurate if judged by the standard of their writers, but were certainly inapplicable to the matter in hand from any ordinary person’s stand-point. We thought when we read the article that a whole neighborhood bad been convulsed if not converted; but on inquiry of City-missionaries and Bible women we found that nothing particular had happened,—at least, nothing so special as to cause excessive transports to the most hopeful.
We wish certain brethren could be taught to speak within bounds. The common slang of the day talks of things as “awful,”” magnificent,” “splendid,” and so forth, and this seems to have been imported into religious reporting. It is mischievous, however, and tends to damage the best of causes. When Christian people find things overstated they lose confidence, and in the case of men of the world it is worse, for they use the exaggeration as material for jests. It is always better to be under the mark than over it when we are describing good works in which we have had a hand. We must not put into print those sanguine ideas of things which our hopeful minds create in our excited brains. The cause of truth can never be aided by a deviation from truth. We may win applause at a public meeting or excite admiration in individuals by highly colored descriptions; but the time comes for investigation, and when. the coloring vanishes we are sure to be held in disrepute by those whom we deceived. The whole business of exaggeration is wrong and must never be tolerated in ourselves or encouraged in others: even the suppression of discouraging facts is a doubtful piece of policy, and policy is always impolitic in Christian work.
Brethren who are rather apt to puff, let us whisper in your ears—leave the monstrous gooseberries to the newspapers, and speak every man truth with his neighbor.
NOTES
CONFERENCE.—THE SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL CONFERENCE of the Pastors’ College Association commenced on Monday afternoon, May 2, when a prayer-meeting was held at the College. A large number of the ministers and students assembled for tea at Salters’ Hall Chapel, Baxter Road, Islington, by invitation of Pastor A. Bax and his friends. They were a happy party, and their hosts made them even more so. In the evening the chapel was well filled for a public meeting, at which the president, C. H. Spurgeon, took the chair. Addresses were delivered by Mr. W. Y. Fullerton, and Pastors W. Pert-man, Herne Bay; C. Spurgeon, Greenwich; and C. A. Davis, Bradford. It was a living meeting with real spirit in it, a happy omen for the rest of the week. Simultaneously with this gatherings, prayer-meeting was held at the Tabernacle, led by the Vice-President, J. A. Spurgeon, when earnest prayers were offered for a blessing upon all the engagements of the week.
On Tuesday morning, May 3, about an hour and a half was spent in praise for past mercies, and prayer for future favors. The fire burned as soon as it was kindled, and within half an hour hearts began to glow, for the heavenly flame was among us. The President appropriately referred to the deaths of Pastors Charles Hill, T. Colville, and A. Macfarlane, and prayer was presented on behalf of their bereaved relatives. Letters were read from brethren still spared, but suffering; and also the communications from Australian and Canadian pastors, which will be found in the report, at the end of the present magazine. Very touching were the prayers for the sick and absent: heart-work was going on. Shortly after noon the President commenced the delivery of his inaugural address, the first part of which appears in another page. At its close, and after a brief recess, the Conference business was transacted. Amongst items of general interest the following only need be mentioned,—the names of thirty-two students who have been in the College for six months were added to the Conference roll; and certain other names, for various reasons, were removed from the list. The report of the Assurance community showed that the receipts had been £58, and the payments £65 17s. 6d.; the deficiency of £7 17s. 6d. being met by the President and the Treasurer, C. F. Allison, Esq., who was heartily thanked for his management of the fund, and requested to continue his services during the ensuing year. It was agreed that Monday, June 20th, in the present year, should be observed as far as possible as a DAY OF UNITED PRAYER by all the churches connected with the Conference. The President earnestly entreats the brethren to take this in hand in downright earnest.
Dinner was provided at the Tabernacle each day under the care of Mr. Murrell and his assistants. All the commissariat arrangements of the week were most satisfactory. On Tuesday, after tea at the Orphanage, the evening was profitably spent in listening to the singing of the orphan boys, and addresses upon the Liberation question by Pastor G. Duncan, Oakes Lindley, Huddersfield; and the Rev. J. Guinness Rogers, B.A. Very hearty and joyous was the spirit which prevailed at every gathering.
On Wednesday morning, May 4, a considerable time was devoted to prayer on behalf of evangelistic effort, in anticipation of the addresses to be delivered upon the subject, “How to win souls, and evangelize England.” Pastors A. G. Brown, East London Tabernacle; C. B. Sawday, Vernon Chapel, Pentonville: H. E. Stone, Nottingham Tabernacle; and W. Y. Fullerton spoke upon the topic selected, as did also the following members of the Baptist Union Evangelistic Committee:—Mr. Win. Olney, Revs. W. Sampson, J. T. Wigner, and W. Penfold Cope; and the Rev. H. L. Wayland, D.D., of Philadelphia. It was a morning well spent. No man could fail to be aroused to more earnest action. Much agony of heart was felt by some of the speakers as they described the sad condition of the masses, and expressed their fears that they were not even now reached in their lowest depths by any known agency. There was much good, practical talk, and we hope that something will come of it to the glory of God and the benefit of the people.
In the afternoon the subscribers and friends met for tea, after which the Annual Meeting was held under the chairmanship, first, of John Houghton, Esq., of Liverpool, and afterwards, of the Rt. Hon. W. McArthur, M.P., the Lord Mayor. Prayer was offered by the Rev. W. Brock. The President summarized the report for the year, and addresses were delivered by the two chairmen, George Palmer, Esq., M.P., Dr. Wayland, Mr. J. Manton Smith, and Pastors T. G. Tarn, Cambridge; J. G. Wilson, Southend; G. Simmons, New Malden; and W. Hobbs, Lower Norwood. At nine o’clock the visitors adjourned to the Tabernacle Lecture Hall, where Mr. Murroll and his co-workers had once more prepared with great taste the supper given by Mr. Spurgeon and two friends. After the collectors had passed round the tables, the President was able to announce as the total of donations and promises, £2,166, a higher amount than had ever been reached before. The doxology was sung as an expression of gratitude for this signal favor, and the large company dispersed, thankful for the share they had been permitted to take in providing for the Tabernacle “school of the prophets” for another year.
On Thursday morning, May 5, after a season of devotion, the Vice President delivered an address founded upon the words, “Daily shall he be praised.” (Psalm 72:15.) Pastor T. Harley, John-street Chapel, Bedford row, then read his carefully-pre-pared paper upon “The witness of the Old Testament to Christ,” which was followed by an interesting discussion upon the position of scientific men toward the Word of God. The President announced that Mrs. Spurgeon had hoped to see the brethren, but not being well enough to do so, she had sent them a book, “In Prospect of Sunday.” The following resolution was carried by acclamation, and the President requested to convey it to his afflicted wife:—” That our sincere, and tender, and hearty thanks be presented to Mrs. Spurgeon for her thoughtfulness of us, and for her wise choice of a book so likely to be useful to us.”
In the afternoon a large number of friends met for tea, and afterwards the Tabernacle was nearly crowded for the annual public meeting. C. H. Spurgeon presided, and reported the progress of the College during the past twelve months. Mr. Frisby’s evangelistic choir led the singing, which consisted of several fine old-fashioned tunes, and addresses were given by the Vice-President, and Pastors H. Bradford, Brixham; J. Wilson, Woolwich; and W. Hailstone, Birmingham. Mr. Bradford’s story of the Lord’s work among the sailors at Brixham ,thrilled the whole audience, many of whom, no doubt, joined in the earnest prayer offered by Pastor W. Anderson, Reading, that a similar blessing might be poured out upon other churches. At the close of the meeting the ministers and students repaired to the lecture-hall, where Mr. Murrell was again prepared to entertain them in the usual sumptuous fashion. The President being too weary to stay, the Vice-President took the chair, and, after prayer, reminded the brethren that in July next the College will have been in existence for a quarter of a century, and that as there had been a pastoral silver-wedding and a domestic silver-wedding celebration, so it had been thought well to take advantage of the absence of the President to consider the desirability of arranging for the commemoration of the College Silver Wedding. It was unanimously resolved, “That we have a memorial of our College Silver Wedding, and that the form the memorial shall take be decided upon by a committee composed of the tutors of the College, Pastors A. G. Brown, Cuff, .W. Anderson, Gange, Geo. Hill, M.A., Medhurst, and Tarn, and any others whom they think it wise to add to their number.”
On Friday morning, May 6, after prayer by several brethren and the President’s father, our venerable but youthful friend, Professor Rogers, delivered a special farewell address upon the words, “Christ also,” founding his remarks upon the passage” Ye believe in God, believe also in me” (John 14:1). Mr. Rogers has prepared for the press all the addresses delivered by him at our annual Conferences, and we have arranged for our publishers to issue them as soon as possible in a neat volume, which will, we hope, secure a wide circulation. After a brief interval the brethren assembled for worship, and the President preached a short sermon from the text, “Casting all your care upon him, for he careth for you” (1 Peter 5:7). Then followed the communion, and our closing psalm sung as usual by the whole assembly standing with hands linked, in token of our holy brotherhood. At the dinner-table, our faithful Remembrancer, Pastor F. H. White, informed us that the contributions to the College funds from the ministers and students had greatly exceeded last year’s amount, 185 pastors having collected or given £561 9s. 11d., to which the students had added £124 17s. 9d., whereas the total sum reported last Conference was only £516 16s. 11d. Thanks were then heartily given to all friends Who had not been previously remembered, and in reply Mr. Murrell and Revs. W. Sampson and John Spurgeon spoke, the doxology was sung, and the benediction pronounced, and so ended what all must have felt was a time of unbounded mercy and blessing.
Mr. Spurgeon was able to be present all the week, but on Saturday he was over-taken by a rheumatic affection of the heel, which prevented his being able to stand, and so for one Sabbath he was debarred the privilege of preaching. The attack, however, passed off in a few days, and he was again upon his feet. The strain of such meetings from morning to night upon one who leads them is no small matter, and it is not wonderful that a frail body should somewhat suffer as the result.
COLLEGE.—Mr. W. W. Blocksidge, having completed his course with us, will shortly settle at New Brompton near Chatham. This district contains 24,000 inhabitants, with church and chapel accommodation for less than 3,000, and no Baptist Chapel at all. The only place that could be obtained for a preaching-room was a hall holding 120 people, and there, in spite of many inconveniences, services have been held for more than two years. A church has been formed, which numbers between i0 and 50 members. A site for a chapel has been purchased, and after paying for the land about £200 in cash and promises remains as the nucleus of a building fund. A schoolroom and vestries will probably be erected first, and we shall be glad to receive contributions in aid of the work. We do not know of a district which offers a more hopeful field. Will not the Lord give the word to certain of his stewards to send on the amount needed for a place of worship for this hopeful band of believers?
Mr. A. McCaig has accepted the pastorate of the church at Streatham. Mr. G. Samuel is removing shortly from Penge to Aston Park, Birmingham; Mr. T. Hagen from Great Yarmouth to Coalville, Staffs; and Mr. S. Skingle from Mossley to Retford, Notts.
We have been very pleased to be able, through the kindness of a friend, to send help to Mr. Hamilton to assist him in his arduous undertaking at Cape Town. He has our entire confidence and affection, and we believe that the Lord by him has done a great work, and will do yet more. It will afford us the utmost delight to send more help to this truly missionary brother.
EVANGELISTS.—Messrs. Smith and Fullerton continue at work in Sheffield. One of the ministers of the town sends us the following report of the services held up to the present time:—
“We are happy to report that the mission of our friends, Messrs. Fullerton and Smith, is most manifestly growing in favor and power, and bids fair both to rouse the churches connected with the movement, and to reach large numbers outside all the religious communities.
“The evangelists came to Sheffield on the 10th April, in response to a cordial invitation from all the Independent, Baptist, and Presbyterian ministers in the town. The first fortnight was devoted to Attercliffe, a densely populated district. Here the members of the churches took up the work with great enthusiasm—early morning meetings at seven o’clock were crowded, and throughout a deep spirit of earnestness and expectancy was maintained. Already there is reason to believe that the results will fully justify the faith that has been in such vigorous exercise.
“From the 24th April to the 12th May the effort has been confined to the center of the town. With the exception of two or three days during which our friends were absent in order that they might attend the College Conference, all the meetings have been well attended: on many occasions the largest chapel in the district, holding about twelve hundred people, has been quite full.
“The Song Services given on Saturday evenings have become great favorites. It is evident that soon none of our chapels will be large enough to hold the crowds that flock from all parts of the town.
“On Sunday, 8th inst., a meeting for men only was held in a chapel seating nearly twelve hundred: a copy of the Postman was promised in exchange for the ticket of admission, as an additional help in getting the place filled. However, when the time came, the stream of men from all directions dispelled all fear—the chapel was crowded—Mr. Smith’s happy face and cheerful address, together with some good-tempered drilling in the singing and chorus, at once won the hearts of all, and admirably prepared the way for the direct appeals of the gospel which came after.
“At the close, when the men were asked about another meeting in that place, voices from the pews immediately responded that they must have a larger place. On Sunday last (15th), the Albert Hall was secured. Tickets were issued for about two thousand seats for men, and about one thousand for women. Long before the time for beginning the meeting the hall was crammed, and hundreds clamored for admission. An overflow meeting had to be improvised in a lower room, into which very quickly over three hundred men and women were packed, so that probably some three thousand five hundred were brought together to listen to the gospel at those meetings. Next Sunday we intend arranging the meeting for men only: there can be no doubt the hall will be crowded. Our friends have already gained a firm grip of the attention and of the hearts of the working men of the town.
“On Sunday evening the work was begun in a suburban district at Glossop road Baptist Church. People began to flock to the service at 5.45. Before 6.30 the church, which is returned to seat eight hundred, by the aid of forms and extra seats, contained about one thousand two hundred: an overflow meeting in the schoolroom had to be begun, into which, however, only about two hundred and fifty could be got: we have reason to believe many must have been turned away. Nearly all the congregation remained to the prayer-meeting at the close, and the attention throughout the whole service was most impressive, while proofs of deep feeling were very often to be seen.
“There are yet four other districts of the town to be visited. We believe the movement is growing in depth as well as in breadth. Already there have been many most marked proofs of the Holy Spirit’s working; but we trust these have only been as the droppings before the shower about to fall.
“The noonday prayer-meetings have been well sustained from the first. Of the special meetings for children and for women, we have not time to write. In them at the peculiarly rich adaptation of our friends to their special work has been shown; and, better than all, the Master’s presence has been felt. May God’s fullest blessing rest upon our town is our united prayer.”
Mr. Burnham has been prosecuting’ his work with his usual zeal and success, and this month, after being with us at the Conference, and holding services in Waltham-stow, returns to carry on his Yorkshire campaign.
Mr. G. W. Linnecar, “: the Sailor Evangelist,” asks us to say that he is willing to give three days each month to evangelistic effort in connection with our brethren’s churches. He would prefer to visit seaside places. His address is—-2, Myrtle Villas, Bellenden-road, Peckham, S.E. He is a rough and ready brother, well fitted, by God’s blessing, to get at the hearts of sailors.
ORPHANAGE.—-Just as we are making up the “Notes” we hear that another little lad has passed away from the infirmary. We have for some time expected this, and can only regard it as a happy release. Mr. Charlesworth and a choir of the boys have been for a brief tour in South Wales, visiting Newport, Cardiff, and Bridgend, and have had a most enthusiastic reception. They are not home at the time we write, and therefore we cannot give details of their visits.
Special Notice.—The Annual Fete will be held on WEDNESDAY, JUNE 22nd, when the girls’ houses will be open for inspection, although we hardly expect that any of them will be quite complete. It would greatly cheer us to see many friends from the country. Refreshments are provided on the ground, so that they can spend a long afternoon and evening at the Orphanage. If the Lord should move some friends to be doubly generous just now, so as to finish off the building of the Girls’ Orphanage, we should indeed be rejoiced.
We have now ascertained that the cost of furnishing the four center houses will be about £250 each, and the two end houses. which are much. larger, £460 each. Samuel Barrow, Esq., who rendered us such admirable service in the building of the Girls’ Orphanage, has now placed us under further obligation by generously promising to furnish his house, “The Olives.” Mr. Rickett has also paid the noble sum of £1,000, which it was estimated that “The Limes” house, without the schoolroom above, would cost furnished; and £2,220 has been either paid or promised by the trustees for the building and furnishing of their house. Then we have the inquiry from Cambridge, to which we alluded last month, which we hope will lead to the furnishing of another house; but to make sure we must now ask for sufficient to furnish the two larger houses and one smaller one—this will certainly require £1,200. Then will follow the dining-hall, girls’ infirmary, and other buildings, towards which we have one donation of £1,000 which was reported before. This is a noble beginning, but a large sum will be needed. The Lord’s arm is not shortened:, and he will surely send the whole amount required.
As soon as possible a meeting of the ladies who are likely to help the Bazaar at Christmas will be held, and in the meantime will all friends work away vigorously, so that the whole affair may be carried through With the same hearty zeal which has been displayed all along/, even to this present time ‘: If all over the country ladies will work for this Bazaar, we shall finish the Orphanage at a stroke, but it must be taken up on all hands or it will not succeed. We shall be glad to hear from ladies who would take stalls.
COLPORTAGE.—The Annual Meeting of the Colportage Association was held at the Tabernacle, in connection with the usual prayer-meeting, on Monday evening May 16. More than thirty of the colporteurs had spent the previous day in prayer and conference with the committee, and on Monday afternoon they were addressed by Mr. Spurgeon upon the requisites to success in the spiritual portion of their work. A large number of friends assembled for the public meeting, at which Mr. Spurgeon presided: addresses were given by the Revs. H. Sinclair Paterson, M.D., and R. H. Lowell, and several of the colporteurs related interesting incidents that had occurred in connection with their work. During 1880 the 79 colporteurs employed by the Association have sold 7,80i Bibles, 10,675 Testaments, 96,073 bound books, 9,041 packets of texts, and 272,698 magazines; and they have also visited 630,993 families, and conducted 6,745 religious services. This is one of the best of our enterprises, and deserves to receive ten times its present support. It is one of the cheapest and best ways of spreading the gospel in the dark parts of our land. What can we say to interest Christian people in it? If it does not from its own intrinsic merit win sympathy no words of ours will do it.
PERSONAL NOTES.—A friend living in Surrey writes as follows:—” We hold meeting for the preaching of the Gospel in our drawing-room every Sabbath evening, as there is no place of worship here but the church, which is Ritualistic. All are made welcome at our service, but it is principally attended by the poor. We sometimes have an evangelist, or other preacher, but when we are unable to secure the services of such I read one of your sermons. Recently I selected No. 1,211, (‘The Hospital of Waiters visited with the Gospel,’) and about the middle of the sermon, as I was reading, I looked up, and caught such a beaming glance from a woman whom we knew to be under conviction of sin that I felt perfectly sure that she had found peace; and on the following Tuesday she wrote and told Mrs. — that it was so, and that it came to her at the time I noticed her looking up.”
Another friend, in Middlesex, writes:— “Last week I was visiting in our village among the poor, and entered the room of poor old needlewoman, a godly soul. As she cannot get out much to the services of the church I advised her to read your sermons as a source of comfort; and joy’ She then told me that for the past twenty years she has earned a bare pittance With her needle, often and often finding herself on the Saturday with only threepence to carry her on until Monday. Feeling the great blessing your sermons were to her she would lay out her store thus—ld, sermon, ld. bread, and ld. tea, ‘ and,’ said the good woman, ‘ I would not have changed places with the Queen when I got into the cream of the sermon, and I often forgot to eat my bread.’ After the sermons have accumulated, although a feeble soul, she has gone about distributing them so that others might share the blessing with her.” The following cheering note comes from the United States:—-” It will refresh your heart to learn that a beloved pastor in this country (whose teaching and preaching are a striking contrast to the vapid utterances of the humanitarians and sentimentalists who abound in all our cities,) received through your ministry some years ago a very great blessing. He visited England, and planned to hear all the men of note in London. On his arrival he happened to learn that you were to speak one afternoon in the neighborhood of his hotel. That sermon did him so much good that he followed you around, and during his six weeks in London heard no other preacher. Your vindication of God’s grace, and advocacy of his sovereignty in salvation, and your clear presentation of faith and assurance so filled him, and confirmed his own views of divine truth that he returned to his own country strong in the Lord and in the power of his might. He often speaks of that visit, and I have heard him frequently thank God/or your ministry. He is truly a witness to the sufficiency of the Atonement, and a noble opposer of that science falsely so-called which belittles the word of Revelation. I refer to Dr.—, of — author of —-., &e. He was too modest to introduce himself.”
A minister in St. Petersburg sends us the following:—” By your sermons, etc., you are having a part in the great work of spreading Christ’s kingdom both in St. Petersburg and in the interior. You are well known among the priests, who seem glad to get hold of your translated sermons, and, strange to say, I know cases in which the Censor has readily given consent for your works to be translated when he has been reluctant respecting many.”
Another friend in the same city, who distributes our sermons, says that he gave one recently to an old Russian pope, or priest, who called upon him one Sunday while engaged at family prayer, and tried to sell him some pork. He says that he will get all the other sermons that are translated, and give them to as many popes as he can find access to.
The Rev. Joseph Cook, the Boston Monday Lecturer, has been at the Tabernacle twice during the past month, and on the 31st of May is to be there again, when he is to deliver his last lecture in London on “Certainties in Religion.” On Sunday afternoon, May 1, Mr. Cook preached the annual sermon at the Tabernacle under the auspices of the National Temperance League; and on Tuesday Evening, May 10, he delivered his popular lecture entitled, “Does death end all?” In the absence, through illness, of his brother, Pastor J. A. Spurgeon took the chair. All bear testimony to the force of Mr. Cook’s testimony to the orthodox faith. He has done good service in the United States in defense of the gospel, and he comes to us with the commendation of ministers concerning whose soundness in the faith no question can be raised. We might not endorse every expression used by Mr. Cook, but of his intense’, earnestness for the old-fashioned gospel we have the fullest evidence, and of his ability to defend it against philosophical skeptics we have abundant proof. From his own lips we have had the clearest testimony, not only to the gospel, but to that form of it which is known as thoroughly Calvinistic.
The style in which meetings are reported in the American press is often of the most telling kind. Often when we have been reading Transatlantic papers our feeble pen would have blushed at its own ineffectual attempts if it had not been too much covered with ink. Here is an extract from the -Examiner and Chronicle which ought not to die: in addition to the local news it contains such rich morsels that it makes good reading for people who do not know Cleveland, or its Baptist Social Union, or the pastor who is so likely to be kidnapped if he be too publicly exhibited.
Rev. W. C. P. Rhodes also pleased eye? one by a thoughtful speech on “The Baptists—one in feeling, and one in work.” As we were, coming out we met one of his parishioners. “That was art excellent address,” said one. “How does that compare with his ordinary work?” “Well,” he answered, “I will tell you a little incident. When the Convention met at Dayton, some time since, our pastor preached the sermon. At the close of the service a gentleman from Cincinnati came up to one of our members, and said, ‘ Can he do like that every time? ‘ ‘Yew,’ was the reply. ‘ Well, you had better not show him around much, or you will lose him.’“ Here are a few of his thoughts—” The city church can well afford to send out aid to these weak country fields, for many of its future deacons are to come from among those country boys. It will only be as when the heart sends forth the blood to all parts of the body, to receive it purified back: from the lungs again.” “We need to stand together. A hundred churches may be working apart, each building its own monument, and they may be only like the isolated stones of a cemetery. But let them all work together, and they will be raising a temple to the great God, complete in all its parts.”
Of course the chief attraction of the day was Rev. Dr. Broadus, of Louisville, Ky., that master of public address, when he feels well. We add this latter clause, because it is true of every master of public address. Beecher says “a man can’t preach with a peg in his boot, whoever he is.” We have heard Beecher himself when he was positively dull. We have read the same testimony concerning Webster; and Paul once put a man to sleep, so that he tumbled out of the window. Some of us can do that now. It is a dangerous experiment, however, as unfortunately we do not possess Paul’s power to bring him back to life again if he gets killed.
Dr. Broadus evidently had on his old shoes, however, yesterday. Not a peg in them. tie could not have done better if he had been positively barefooted. He felt well. So did all the rest of us. His theme was “An investment that pays big dividends.” That is—that was the sign in the shop window intended to call in customers, selected and hung there, not by the Doctor, but by the Committee who invited him. The real stock on hand which he dealt out was “The advantages of college education.” Of course, we can give no just synopsis. The truth is, a really effective speech never can be reported. It is like fireworks on the fifth of July—the powder all out of them. We might as well try to show our country friends what the ocean is by taking spoonful home.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle.— April 25th, nineteen; 28th, fifteen.
ANNUAL REPORT OF THE PASTOR’S COLLEGE
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
1880-81.
ON inquiring ‘the other day for the secretary of one of our largest societies I was informed that he had gone to the ‘sea-side for a month, in order that he might have quiet to prepare the. report. I do not wonder at this if he has aforetime written many descriptions of the same work, for every },ear increases the difficulty unless a man is prepared to say the same thing over and over again. Very few can, like Paganini, perform so admirably on one string that everybody is charmed with the melody. The task grows still harder when the year has been peaceful and successful. It has been truly said, “Happy is the nation which has no history,” because it has been free from changes, wars, convulsions, and revolutions; but I may remark, on the other hand, unhappy is the historian .who has to produce a record of a certain length concerning a period which has been innocent of striking events, making bricks without straw is nothing to it. The Pastors’ College has of late maintained the even tenor of its way, knowing little of external attack and nothing of internal strife. Regular in its work, and fixed in its purpose, its movement has been calm and strong. Hence there are no thrilling incidents, painful circumstances, or striking occurrences with ‘which to fill my page and thrill my reader’s soul. Gratitude writ large is about the only material at hand out of which to fashion my report. ‘“ Bless the Lord, O my soul” is my one song, and I feel as if I could repeat it a thousand times.
The College started with a definite doctrinal basis. I never affected ‘to leave great questions as moot points to be discussed in the Hall, ,and believed or not believed, as might be the fashion of the hour. The creed of the College is well known, and we invite none to enter who do not accept it. The doctrines of grace, coupled with a firm belief in human responsibility, are held with intense conviction, and those who do not receive them would not find themselves at home within our walls. The Lord has sent us tutors who are lovers of sound doctrine, and zealous for the truth. No uncertain sound has been given forth at any time, and we would sooner close the house than have it so. Heresy in colleges means false doctrine throughout: the churches: to defile the fountain is to pollute the streams. Hesitancy which might be tolerated in an ordinary minister would utterly disqualify a teacher of teachers. The experiment of Doddridge ought to satisfy all godly ,men, that colleges without, dogmatic evangelical teaching are more likely to be seminaries of Socinianism than schools of the prophets. Old Puritanic theology has been heartily accepted by those received into our College, and on leaving it they have almost with one consent remained faithful to that which they have received, The men are before the public in every part of the country, and their testimony is well known.
This Institution has now reached its twenty-fifth year, and its object, spirit, and manner of work remain the same. It was intended from the first to receive young men who had been preaching for a sufficient time to test their abilities and their call to the work of the ministry; and such young men have been forthcoming every year in growing numbers. Some bodies of Christians have to lament that their ministry is not’ adequately supplied: I know of one portion of the church which is sending up to heaven bitter lamentations because as the fathers depart to their rest there is scanty hope that their places will be: filled; but among the Baptists the candidates for the ministry are, if possible, too plentiful. This is a new state of things, and is to be interpreted as indicating growth and zeal. Certainly the applicants are not tempted by rich livings, or even by the prospect of competent support; or, if they are, I take abundant pains to set before them the assured truth that they will find our ministry to be a warfare abounding in long marches and stern battles; but equally notable for meager rations. Still they come, and it needs a very hard heart to repel them, and to refuse to eager’ brethren. the drill and equipment which they covet so earnestly. If it were wise to increase the number of students, another hundred of suitable men could at once be added to those who are already under tuition.
From the commencement our main’ object was to help men who from lack of funds could not obtain an education for themselves. These have been supplied, not only with tuition and books, gratis, but with board and lodging, and in some cases with clothes and pocket money. Some very successful brethren needed everything, and if they had been required to pay they must have remained illiterate preachers to this day. Still, year by year the number of men who are ready to .support themselves in whole or in part has increased, and, I believe, that it is increasing and will increase. As a college we have had to struggle with a repute based upon falsehood and created by jealousy; but this has not injured us to any great extent; for men come to us from America, Australia, and the Cape, and applications have frequently been made from foreign countries. German students have attended our classes during their own vacations, and members of other colleges are usually to be seen at our lectures. The Institution never deserved to be charged with giving a mere apology for an education; and if ever that reproach could have been justly cast upon us it is utterly undeserved now that the time of study has become more extended, and a fuller course of training has thus become possible. Scholarship for its own sake was never sought and never will be within the Pastors’ College; but to help men to become efficient preachers has been and ever will be the sole aim of all those concerned in its management. I shall not, in order to increase our prestige, refuse poor men, or zealous young Christians whose early education has been neglected. Pride would suggest that we take “a better class of men,” but experience shows that they are not better, that eminently useful men spring from all ranks, that diamonds may be found in the rough, and that some who need most pains in the polishing reward our labor a thousandfold. My friends will still stand by me in my desire to aid the needy but pious brother. and we shall rejoice together as we continually see the ploughman, the fisherman, and the mechanic taught the way of God more perfectly, and enabled through divine grace to proclaim in the language of the people the salvation of our God.
During the past year about 120 men have been with us; but as some have come and others have gone, the average number in actual residence has averaged one hundred. Of these a few have been with us three years, and more have entered upon the third year. The rule is, that a man’s usual period terminates at the end of two years, and his remaining longer depends upon the judgment formed of him. Certain men will never get beyond an English education, and to detain them from their work is to repress their ardor, without bestowing a compensatory advantage. In other cases, the longer the period of study the better. Probably the third year is to many a student more useful than the other two, and he goes forth to his life-work more thoroughly prepared. I could not lengthen the course in former days, when churches tempted the brethren away before the proper time, as they too often did. They told these raw youths that it was a pity to delay, that if they left their studies souls might be saved, and I know not what besides;; and some were induced to run away, as Rowland Hill would have said, before they had pulled their boots on. If I constrained them to remain, the good deacons of the eager churches thought me a sort of harsh jailer who locked up his prisoners, and would not give them up at the entreaty of their friends. One wrote and bade me loose the brother, for the Lord had need of him, and I would have let the young man go if I had thought that he was one of the donkeys to whom the passage referred. That a number of brethren may have entered upon their ministry prematurely was no fault of mine, but of those who tempted them to quit their classes too soon. However, there have been periods, in which there is a lull in the demand of the churches for ministers, and then we have been able to retain the men for a longer season. Such a time is passing over us just now, and I do not regret it, for I am persuaded it is good to give the brethren a longer space for preparatory study.
A short time ago I was compelled to look up to God for special direction in the matter of tutors. Our honored friend, Rev. George Rogers:, grew old, and the question was how would his place be: supplied. Many years ago I said of him what I could repeat with loving emphasis at this moment: “This gentleman, who has remained during all this period our principal tutor, is a man of Puritanic stamp, deeply learned, orthodox in doctrine, judicious, witty, devout, earnest, liberal in spirit, and withal juvenile in heart to an extent most remarkable in one of his years. My connection with him has been one of uninterrupted comfort and delight. The most sincere affection exists between us, we are of one mind and one heart, and what is equally important,. he has in every case secured not merely the respect but the filial love of every student.” The time came when, at eighty years of age, the veteran saw fit to retire, but he did it with such grace that not a jarring word or thought arose out of it; and then the Lord heard prayer and showed how the work could still be carried on efficiently. Mr. Gracey, a most able classical tutor, became the principal; Mr. Fergusson cultivated other branches of service; and Mr. Marchant, of Hitchin, one of our own home-born men, took the juniors, and has proved himself in all respects fit: for the office. Mr. Rogers comes up once a week to give a cheering word, and the other three tutors work together in happy harmony. The change has been gently made, and the train has almost imperceptibly glided from the old rail to the new: our venerable friend is missed exceedingly in many ways; but still God has wonderfully prepared others to continue Mr. Rogers’ work so much in his own spirit and manner that all of us unite in praising God that the alteration which has taken place has involved so little change.
I have been very ill through the greater part of the past year, and hive therefore been unable to give so much personal service to the College as I have usually done. This has been a sore trial to me; but it has been much alleviated by my beloved brother, J. A. Spurgeon, the vice-president, who has looked after everything with great care; and I have also been greatly comforted by the knowledge that the tutors are as deeply concerned about the holy service as ever I can be. It has been my joy to learn that the College was never in a better state in all respects than now, and that the men under training give promise of becoming useful preachers. I have had very little weeding work to do on my coming back to my place, and those whom I have removed were not chargeable with any fault, but their capacity was questioned by the tutors. All through the year this painful operation has to be carried on, and it always causes me much grief, but it is a necessary part of my official duty as president. Young men who come to us loaded with testimonials, are occasionally found after a while to be lacking in application, or in spiritual power; and after due admonishment and trial they have to be sent back to the place from whence they came; others are as good as gold, but their heads ache, and their health fails under hard study, or from lack of mental capacity they cannot master the subjects placed before them: these must be kindly, but firmly, set aside: but I always dread the task. This thinning-out process is done with conscientiousness under the guidance of the tutors; but this year there has been little need of it, and I have rejoiced in the fact, since frequent depression of spirit has made it undesirable to have much trying work to do. I am glad to say that very rarely have I had to deal with a case of moral failure. Bad young men have crept in among us, and no men are perfect; but I have great comfort in seeing the earnest and prayerful spirit which has prevailed among the brotherhood.
Foremost among our aims is the promotion of a vigorous spiritual life among those who are preparing to be under-shepherds of Christ’s flock. By’ frequent meetings for prayer, and by other means, we labor to maintain a high tone of spirituality. I have endeavored in my lectures and addresses to stir up the holy fire; for well I know that if the heavenly flame burns low nothing else will avail. The earnest action of the College Missionary Society has been a source of great joy to me, for above all things I desire to see many students devoting themselves to foreign work. The Temperance Society also does a good work, and tends to keep alive among the men a burning hatred of England’s direst curse.
We need the daily prayer of God’s people that much grace may be with all concerned in this important business; for what can we do without the Holy Spirit? How few ever pray for students! If ministers do not come up to the desired standard, may not the members of the churches rebuke themselves for having restrained prayer on their account? When does a Christian worker more need prayer than in his early days, when his character is forming and his heart is tenderly susceptible both of good and evil influences? I would beseech all who have power with God to remember our Colleges in their intercessions. The solemn interests involved in the condition of these schools of the prophets compel me to entreat, even unto tears, that the hopeful youth of our ministry may not be forgotten in the supplications of the saints. For us also, who have the responsible duty of guiding the minds of these young men, much prayer is requested, that we may have wisdom, love, gentleness, firmness, and abounding spiritual power. It is not every man who can usefully influence students, nor can the same men have equal power at all times. The divine Spirit is needed, and He is given to them that ask for his sacred teaching.
In Great Britain 355 former students are preaching the word, some in the more prominent pulpits of the denomination and others in positions where their patience and self-denial are severely tested by the present depression in trade, and the consequent inability of rural congregations; to furnish them with adequate support. The College has reason to rejoice not only in the success of her most honored sons, but in the faithfulness and perseverance of the rank and file, whose service, although they are little noticed on earth, will receive the “well done” of the Lord.
This Institution is not alone a College, but a Home and Foreign Missionary Society. Our three Evangelists have traversed the land with great diligence, and the Lord has set his seal to their work. Messrs. Fullerton and Smith work together, and God has given them marvelous success;. Mr. Burnham journeys by himself, singing and preaching with much blessing, while Mr. Parker and others are most usefully occupied in preaching the word from place to place.
It is my greatest pleasure to aid in commencing new churches. The oftener brethren can create their own spheres the more glad shall I be. It is not needful to repeat the details of former reports;, but many churches have been founded through the College, and there are more to follow. I announced at the beginning of this enterprise that it was not alone for the education of ministers, but for the general spread of the gospel, and this has been adhered to, a part of the income being always expended in that direction.
A very considerable number of Pastors’ College men are to be found at the Antipodes. I cannot forget that there I have a beloved son; but next to that in nearness to my heart is the fact that so many of my’ spiritual sons are there, prospering, and bringing glory to God. It was with no little delight that I received the following letter from some of them. Readers must kindly excuse expressions of affection which are so natural from friends; I could not cut them out without destroying the spirit of the letter. I rejoice with all my heart in the abounding success, of Mr. A. J. Clarke, who was for years the companion of Mr. J. Manton Smith as the College Evangelist, nor less in all that has been achieved by many others in the various colonies of the southern world. But- here is the letter.
“Melbourne, Victoria,
“Rev. C. H. Spurgeon, “2nd November, 1880.
“Honored and Beloved President,
“A number of former students of the College being met together at this metropolis of the Antipodes, it was most heartily agreed that we should send you an expression of our warm love. For truly we can say that instead of distance or even time causing any abatement of love towards you personally, or towards the Institution which we may with truth style our alma mater, we find it intensified and hallowed.
“The meetings of the Victorian Baptist Association are now being held in this city, which has brought most of us together; but the Melbourne Exhibition has brought to us brother Harry Woods, from South Australia, and brother Harrison, from Deloraine, Tasmania. Our brother A. J. Clarke’s house is the rendezvous for all the brethren, and the cheery hospitality of himself and wife prove them to be called to the episcopate. Though all the brethren, so far as we know, have had blessing this year, some of them wonderfully so; yet our brother A. J. Clarke, here at West Melbourne, has experienced a year of toil and harvesting, in which we all rejoice, and which exercises a stimulating effect upon all who hail from ‘the College.’
“When a number of us were bowing in prayer together, we felt how thoroughly you would have been with us in spirit, as we prayed that we might oppose, in the might of God, the awful world-spirit of this region, and that our souls might be kept wholly loyal to king Jesus, having no ‘ fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness.’
“Finally, beloved servant of God, we hail you in the name of our Triune Jehovah! No words of ours can express our personal obligation to you. But by fidelity to Christ and to truth, by manifesting that we have caught the spirit of burning love to souls which burns in your own breast, and by serving to our utmost ability, and to the last day of life, in the kingdom and patience of Jesus, we hope to show that all your care and that of the tutors and friends of the Tabernacle has not been ill-bestowed. We remain,
“Yours in the bonds of eternal love,
“WM. CHRISTR. BUNNING, GEELONG; WILLIAM CLARK, BALLARAT; ALFRED J. CLARKE, WEST MELBOURNE; H. H. GARRETT, BRIGHTON; HENRY MARSDEN, KEW; J. S. HARRISON, DELORAINE, TASMANIA; HARRY WOOD, SADDLE-WORTH, S. AUSTRALIA; F.G. BUCKINGHAM, MELBOURNE.”
Similarly in Canada the Lord has been with those who have gone from the College. My dear brother, S. A. Dyke, of Toronto, has been a right valiant leader of the band. Singularly enough, this friend, now called “Endowment Dyke,” has been the means of succoring Woodstock College, raising for it an endowment which will make it a permanent institution, to which the Canadian churches will hopefully look for a supply of educated ministers. My brother, J. A. Spurgeon, during his visit to Canada, formed a branch of our Conference there, and from it the annexed loving epistle has lately come.
“567, York-street, London East, Ontario, Canada,
“April 6th, 1881.
“Beloved President,—We, the members of the Canadian branch of the Pastors’ College Brotherhood, herewith greet you lovingly (and our brethren, through you) on the occasion of your Annual Conference, which we hope may surpass even the best of bygone gatherings, in all holy joy and such spiritual refreshing as may fit all for more abundant service.
“Need we say how deeply we feel for all the sufferings by which our President is made to serve, the while we gratefully recognize ‘ the peaceable fruit’ of those sufferings in such enriched utterances as we have lately read. We love our dear President as of yore, remembering days of prayerful tryst in which we heard him sigh and groan his longings for our course.
“During another year we have been ‘ kept by the power of God,’ and used in service; and although we are in some cases separated even here by many dreary miles of continent, we still hold and are held to and by the old-day kinnedness; and, better still, ‘ the form of sound words.’
“We ‘ shake hands across the vast,’ loved President and brethren, and wish you every joy in Conference.
“For the Canadian Brethren,
“Yours affectionately,
“JOSEPH FORTH,
“President for 1881 of the Canadian Branch of the “Pastors’ College Brotherhood.”
A point of great interest, to which I hope the Lord may turn the attention of many of his servants, is ‘that of English evangelists for India. Mr. Gregson, the well-known missionary, has urged upon me the great utility of sending out young men who should preach the gospel to those in India who understand the English language, whether British:, Eurasian, or educated Hindoo. He advises that the men should be sent out for five years, and therefore be subjected to no remark should they return at the end of that period. He thinks it probable that they would acquire a language and remain abroad as missionaries, but if not, they would be missionary-advocates on their return home, and arouse among our Churches fresh enthusiasm. It is believed that in many cities churches could be gathered which would support these men as their ministers, or that at least a portion of their expenses would be found on the spot. I have determined to enter upon this field as God shall help me; and Mr. H. R. Brown, who has been for years the pastor of the church at Shooter’s-hill, has reached Calcutta, on his way to Darjeeling in the hill country. If the Lord shall prosper him there, I hope he will live long in that salubrious region, build up a church, and become the pioneer of a little band of evangelists. Our native tongue is sure to spread among the educated Hindoos, and hence many a heathen may be brought to Jesus by evangelists who do not understand any of the languages; of the East; and meanwhile our countrymen, too often irreligious, may be met with by divine grace, and find Christ where the most forget him. I hope many friends will take an interest in this effort, and assist me to carry it out.
Funds have come in as they have been needed; but apart from a legacy, now nearly consumed, the ordinary income has not been equal to the expenditure of the year. The balance at the banker’s is gradually disappearing, but I do not mention this with any regret, for He who has sent us supplies hitherto will continue his bounty, and he will move his stewards ‘to see that this work is not allowed to flag from want of the silver and the gold. With a single eye to his glory I have borne this burden hitherto, and found it light; and I am persuaded from past experience that he will continue to keep this work going so long as it is a blessing to his church and to the world. I am greatly indebted to the generous donors at the Annual Supper, and quite as much to the smaller weekly gifts of my own beloved congregation, which in the aggregate, have made up the noble sum of £ 1880. Here I cannot refrain from mentioning the name of Mr. Murrell, who looks after the weekly offering with a zealous care which has much to do with its healthy condition. I am sorry to say that a considerable legacy left to the College will in all probability be lost through the law of mortmain. This is a great disappointment; but if one door is shut another will be opened. Friends who mean to remember the Pastors’ College in their wills are requested to follow the form which we have printed in this Report. Those who become their own executors have the pleasure of making sure that their money is used as they desire, and while the intricacies of law remain-— and there seems little hope of their removal — this is the safest course to follow.
Into the hands of Him who worketh all our works in us we commit the Pastors’ College for another year.
VICE-PRESIDENT’S REPORT.
ONCE more it is a pleasure to report continued stead), work amongst all the classes. No special features of interest can be mentioned, as, now that we are working upon lines matured by past experience, the more regularly and smoothly the whole proceeds the better for future results, but the more difficult it is to make a present report which is not a mere repetition of former ones. At the same time our belief in our plans and aims is intensified by the success which attends them.
We do not believe that the Pulpit has lost its legitimate power, or that the Pastoral Office is beginning to decline in its influence. Mere officialism is dying out in the respect and confidence of the people; but the true preacher is left with his sphere of influence widened rather than diminished; whilst our churches were never more in need of trained leaders than they are today. We address ourselves, therefore, with renewed energy to two distinct branches of preparation; we seek to instruct: as to the delivering of truth in public, and then further to train for future guidance of the church in her more quiet and private fellowship and service. In this latter department of preparation lies the secret of much: power or weakness in the after life of the pastor, as. distinguished from the preacher; we have, therefore, kept ever in mind the strong necessity of our young brethren taking part in all our prayer-meetings, occasionally attending our church-meetings, constantly helping in our varied platform meetings, and watching in general all the departments of work as now existing in the huge agglomeration of services, charities, etc., which encircle the Tabernacle as the center of their influence and the mainspring of their order and power. Our recruits are drilled in the camp itself, and amidst all the exercises of actual and successful spiritual warfare. Special lectures are given on the points of church government and procedure, so that no man need be altogether at: a loss how to act in the emergencies of church discipline and care. Without being ]inked to a church for “apprenticeship,” as some have desired, we think we secure the essential benefit of such a special training in the plan we have such unusual facilities for applying at the Pastors’ College. “Nothing succeeds like success,” and the “successful operations of the Tabernacle church are a magnificent school for all students to work in and acquire the methods and precedents to quote and apply in coming years.” We are not anxious to train “lords over God’s heritage,” but we are more than a little wishful to secure for the flock shepherds well skilled in the conduct of all things affecting her health and progress. A bishop’s true power is to be able to “overlook” with wisdom and discretion his portion of “the fold,” so as to see that all his; followers are well guided, and their necessities duly relieved, and all church affairs “done decently and in order.” Despite all efforts, a growingly larger portion of the members of our churches slips away from our oversight, and we are constrained to think that more care must be given to retain as we’ll as to gain our young converts. Alive to this imperative necessity, we are glad to be able to make a prominent feature of our College work this pastoral training of our students.
The other tutors will report as to their departments of study; but judging from the monthly conference of the Staff, when each individual student’s work for the past month is reported and discussed, the result of the year’s study will be, if anything, beyond the average as to thoroughness and extent. The winter has been a trying one, and the health of our young brethren, despite our extra care and expenditure as to clothing, etc., has suffered, though happily but few have been laid aside for more than a brief space. The spiritual tone 6f the College is good, and the adhesion of the men to the “old doctrine” is as loyal and enthusiastic as ever. We march, but only after “the pillar of cloud and fire,” bearing the old ark of a covenant which needs living men’s shoulders, and not a state chariot, for its progress: men singing “The Lord ,of hosts is with us; Not unto us, not unto us, but unto His name be all the praise.”
JAMES A. SPURGEON.
MR. GRACEY’S REPORT
DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—At the return of another Anniversary it will be cheering to you and to your many friends; to know that the College was never in a more vigorous condition. I use the term “vigorous” not in respect of the physical health of the brethren, for in that particular we have suffered somewhat, as you yourself have suffered much. Some of our most promising students have been laid aside for a time, much to their own and their tutors’ regret. But i use the word “vigorous” in reference to the spirit and diligence with which the brethren have labored to attain the chief end of the Institution. It is a rare thing to have to admonish any man for remissness in his duties, rarer still for neglect, and rarest of all for want of conformity in general behavior with the ministry of the Gospel. The one or two who have been advised to reconsider their choice of a calling have not received the advice on account of defects in morals, or religion, or laboriousness, but: owing to an unsuitableness of gifts for a continuous pastorate. Even these, however, as others in like case have done, may live to show that their tutors did not rate them sufficiently high.
It is a sign of that unfailing Divine favor that has from the beginning rested upon the College that for all who are ready pastorates keep continually opening up. There is no glut of seniors on the top benches who cannot find churches willing to receive them. This fact: is at the present time the more noteworthy for two reasons: First, because of the general depression throughout the country which has in many instances crippled the resources of the churches. The second follows as a consequence: ()wing to narrowed means several settled pastors have been obliged to seek a change; and to such straitened brethren all applications from the churches have been for some time referred in preference to those still in college. To the honor of the latter it must be said that they have not only yielded assent to this arrangement, but have also most generously acquiesced in it. Nor have they suffered by the abnegation, as the result shows.
Such abnegation is but one of the many signs of the devotedness to the service of the Savior, whatever form that service may present, which I believe animates the brethren. They do not ask where they may have the highest salaries, but where they may be most useful. It is the earnest desire of all to keep this spirit uppermost; and all true lovers of the Institution will join their prayers to those of the brethren, that the College may be kept with single eye seeking “the things of Christ.”
In our methods of study little alteration has been required. The chief thing sought has been to give a thorough grounding in the various subjects. Of the men at present in College, some have had a superior education before entrance, the majority have had a fair mercantile training, and the cases are few—every year becoming fewer—where men have had to begin with the mere rudiments. That the different studies are all tending in the right direction we have daily proofs in the trial sermons and in the discussions. And if, perchance, a brother’s efforts may have taken a wrong bent, there is in these open displays abundant opportunity of setting him on the true track.
In my own separate classes there has been most gratifying progress. The seniors have been working very hard at Plato and Homer, Horace and Virgil. Of the three divisions of Hebrew, the first has carefully read through thirteen chapters of Genesis, and from the first to the eighteenth Psalm. In the Greek Testament we have been critically reading the Epistles of Peter, the Epistle to the Romans, and the Acts of the Apostles. In the lectures on Theology which I have been delivering to the whole College, I have been much encouraged by the close attention with which they have been received. And as at the end of each section of the lectures examinations have followed, I have had good evidence that the subjects have been thoughtfully considered. My general plan has been to exhibit, as far as possible, every question under a Biblical light. My effort has been, instead of avoiding difficulties, to render help in overcoming them, and to show that in presence of a skeptical and denying age, we have the very best grounds for maintaining a fearless front. In these respects it is assuredly believed among us that the gospel committed to our charge is the only truth that can give real rest to the heart of the world, that it is supported by the strongest of reasons, and that it supplies the most effectual incentives to Christian life and work.
Believe me, dear Mr. President,
Yours very truly,
D. GRACEY.
The other tutors have sent us reports, but as our space is limited we will only add the following letter from our aged friend, Mr. Rogers, who in a few sentences gives a review of the whole matter.
LETTER FROM REV. GEORGE ROGERS.
DEAR SIR,—You have requested me to send you a review of the College, as I have seen it, for the next Report. The brief notice will compel me to be brief in my reply. It is not needful that I should relate the remarkable series of providences by which, for many years, I was training myself for I knew not what; or the not less remarkable coincidences by which I was brought into connection with your College. A college indeed it could not at that time be called, nor ,could it have been supposed by either of us that it would ever rise to the dignity of that appellation, and much less to its present position amongst the Nonconformist Colleges of the present day. In no college has there been less of man and more of God in its origin and increase, and in the peculiarity of its constitution. All its attending circumstances and its successful results have shown that the Lord had need of it. The health and help given me for a long period in my connection with it, in declining years, and the enjoyment with which my whole work, if work it can be called, has been discharged, has been from the same wonder-working hand. The real and prayerful interest which I have taken in your welfare and your work has not been without its encouraging and salutary influence upon me, and not the less for its being. concealed by me rather than expressed. All the College surroundings: have been pleasant and profitable. It might have appeared to some,. and perhaps justly from their point of view, that there was one serious drawback to my qualifications for the position I was called to occupy,. and I must confess that I have felt some diffidence on that account, and less entitled to the entire confidence of the community to which you belong. I cannot say that I have felt as a fish out of water, though I may have been looked upon as such by others. There may have been’ a good providence even in this. This also cometh from the Lord of hosts, who is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working. If I have been in my own element, and felt more at home than I could have been elsewhere, it is because of my thorough sympathy with the great gospel truths, for the dissemination of which, and, may we not add, preservation of which, this College has been instituted and sustained. For this purpose it was greatly needed beyond all that could have been foreseen by man.. for this end it has been Divinely sanctioned and blest. The many hundreds that have gone from us have borne, and are still bearing, a faithful witness to the truth as it is in Jesus. They are not ashamed, even in the present age, of the old gospel; but still find it to be the “power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.” When the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him. It is on this account that the Pastors’ College has received. unusual sympathy and support; and on this account it still appeals to all who, next to their own salvation, earnestly desire the salvation of their fellow-men, and have confidence in the old gospel as absolutely needful for that end. It has the double claim upon the faithful and true, for ‘what it does not teach and for what it does teach. It has already been blessed to the conversion of thousands; but these, we trust, will prove to be but the dew of its youth. In my occasional visits, I have been pleased to observe that its prosperity, with respect both to students and tutors, is well sustained. It is an honor to have been connected with such an institution. May everyone who shall hereafter be similarly situated feel as I do, that he receives more honor from the Institution than he can possibly confer upon it.
G. R.
FORM OF BEQUEST.
I Give’ and Bequeath the sum of _____ pounds sterling to be paid out of that part of my personal estate which may by law be given with effect for charitable purposes, to be paid to the Treasurer for the time being of the Pastors’ College, Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington, Surrey, and his, receipt shall be a sufficient discharge for the said legacy; and this legacy, when received by such Treasurer; to be applied for the general purposes of the College.
Chap 14. JULY, 1881.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
JULY, 1881.
INAUGURAL ADDRESS
DELIVERED AT THE SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL CONFERENCE
OF THE,
PASTORS’ COLLEGE ASSOCIATION,
BY C. H. SPURGEON, PRESIDENT, ON TUESDAY, MAY 3RD,
1881.
(CONTINUED FROM PAGE 264.)
I HAVE now, in the second place, to plead with you that you gather and use in your ministry much heavenly FIRE. Upon this subject you will perhaps expect me to speak guardedly; for you have seen the mischief of wild fire, and the perils of. strange fire, and perhaps you are anxious to know’ what I think of a certain “army” which abounds in fire, and blazes away most marvelously. I shall express no opinion, except that none of the supposed evils of fire are equal to those of lukewarmness. Even fanaticism is to be preferred to indifference. I had sooner risk the dangers of a tornado of religious excitement than see the air grow stagnant with a dead formality. It is far better for people to be too hot than to be lukewarm. “I would thou went cold or hot” is Christ’s word still, and it applies to preachers as well as to others. When a man is freezingly cold in the things of Christ we know where he is; and if another is red-hot, or even at a white heat, and is thought to be too enthusiastic, we know where he is; but when a minister preaches in such a way that at the close of his sermon you say, “this is neither cold nor hot,” you go away feeling that you have had enough, or even too much of it. There was nothing to excite you; you could almost wish to have been made angry rather than to have been lulled by such discoursing. A lukewarm sermon sickens every healthy mind. Nor is this evil to be found in the pulpit alone. I should gravely question whether if an angel were to take a thermometer and go round the dissenting churches in London he would not find a large proportion of them certainly not cold, most decidedly not hot, but somewhere else. How is it with you, dear brother? Do you say, “Well, I am not the warmest of all, but then I am not the coldest of all?” Then I have a suspicion as to your temperature; but I leave the matter to your own judgment, only remarking that I have never yet met with fire that is moderately hot. Should any of you discover such an article you will be wise to patent the article, for it might be of service in many ways. The fire with which I have been acquainted has been such that I have never given it my hand without remembering its warm embrace. Fire is incorrigible in the matter of carrying matters very far: moderation it will never learn. I am told that it is wrong to go to extremes, and upon that ground fire is certainly guilty; for it is not only intensely hot, but it has a tendency to consume and destroy without limit. When it once commenced with this city in the olden time it left little of it but ashes; there was no keeping it within bounds. May God grant us grace to go to extremes in his service. May we be filled with an unrestrainable zeal for his glory. May the Lord answer us by fire, and may that fire fall on the ministers and then upon the people. We ask for the true Pentecostal flame, and not for sparks kindled by human passion. A live coal from off the altar is our need, and nothing can supply its place; but this we must have, or our ministry will be in vain.
Brethren, we must first of all take care that we have the fire burning in our own souls. I am happy to know that there are very few, if any, among you that are utterly cold; for you go to be warmed into earnestness if we set about it aright. It is very hard to warm a stone. You ]nay clothe a man in blankets until he is fairly warm, because there is life in him, but you cannot heat a stone in that fashion; life always begets a measure of warmth and the possibility of more, and as you have life there are capacities for heat. Some preachers are of such a cold nature that no known means could warm them. The attempt to find heat in some sermons reminds me of Aesop’s fable of the apes and the glowworm. The apes found a glowworm shining on the bank, and straightway gathered round it to warm themselves. They placed sticks over it, and tried to make a fire, but it did not burn. It was a very pretty thing, and looked like flame, but they could not warm their cold hands with its cold light. So have I known ministers, whose light was destitute of heat, and consequently the poor sticks around them have never kindled into a flame, nor have frozen hearts been melted by their influence. It is dreadful work to listen to a sermon, and feel all the while as if you were sitting out in a snow-storm, or dwelling in a house of ice, clear but cold, orderly but killing. You have said to yourself, “That was a well divided and well planned sermon, but I cannot make out what was the matter with it;” the secret being that there was the wood, but no fire to kindle it. A great sermon without heart in it reminds one of those huge furnaces in Wales, which have been permitted to go out; they are a pitiful sight. We prefer a sermon in which there may be no vast talent, and no great depth of thought, but what there is has come fresh from the crucible, and like molten metal burns its way. I once knew a lad who when he used to go home from the smithy where he worked was roughly handled by the boys of the village, till his master suggested to him a plan of defense, which was wonderfully efficacious. He took a rod of iron, and just before he went home he blew up the fire and made the iron hot. When the boys came round him he warned them not to touch his stick, and after one trial of the same they obeyed the admonition, and reverently kept their distance I do not quote the example with any commendation of the actual flint, but with this moral in view—heat your sermon red hot, and it will be likely to be remembered by all who come into contact with it. Everything gives way before fire.
Energy still remains an essential, whatever else in oratory may have changed since the days of old. It is said that the oft-quoted reply of Demosthenes to the question, “What is the first thing in oratory?” was not “action,” but “energy.” What is the second thing? “Energy.” What is the third thing? “Energy.” I will not pretend to decide the classical question, but I am sure that as a matter of fact energy is the main thing in the human side of preaching. Like the priests at the altar, we can do nothing without fire. Brethren, speak because you believe the gospel of Jesus, speak because you feel its power, speak under the influence of the truth which you are delivering, speak with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, and the result will not be doubtful.
Let it be carefully remembered that our flame must be kindled from on high. Nothing is more to be despised than a mere painted fire, the simulation of earnestness. Sooner let us have an honest death than a counterfeit life. The imitation of Baxter is detestable; but to be like Baxter is seraphic. If you would be like Whitefield, I would say be Whitefield. Let the fire be kindled by the Holy Ghost, and not by animal passion, the desire of honor, emulation of others, or the excitement of attending meetings. Let the terrible example of Nadab and Abihu for ever put away strange fire from our censers. Burn because you have been in solemn fellowship with the Lord our God.
Recollect also that the fire which you and I need will consume us if we truly possess it. “Spare yourself,” may be whispered by friend’s; but it will not be heeded when this fire is burning. We have given ourselves up to the work of God, and we cannot go back. We desire to be whole burntofferings and complete sacrifices to God, and we dare not shun the altar. “Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” We can only produce life in others by the wear and tear of our own being. This is a natural and spiritual law,— that fruit can only come of the seed by its spending and being spent even to self-exhaustion. Why are many ministers worn and weary till heart and brain give way? They would be of little use if they did not run such a risk. All men who are eminently useful are made to feel their weakness in a supreme degree. Can the Spirit of God, even the Infinite Deity, ride in such frail chariots as these, without straining the axle and making the whole machine to quiver, as if it would be utterly dissolved beneath its sacred burden? When God visits us with soul-saving power, it is as though devouring flame came forth from heaven and made its abode in our bosoms; and where this is the case there may well be a melting away of all strength. Yet let it be so: we humbly invite the sacred burnings, Herod was eaten of worms, being cursed of God; but to be consumed by God for his own service is to be blessed to the full. We have a choice between these two, to be eaten up by our corruptions, or by the zeal of God’s house. It needs no hesitation, the choice of every man among us is to be wholly the Lord’s—ardently, passionately, vehemently the Lord’s servants, let the divine fervor cost us what it may of brain, and heart, and life. Our only hope of honor, and glory, and immortality lies in the fulfillment of our dedication unto God; as devoted things we must be consumed with fire, or rejected. For us to turn aside from our life-work, and to seek distinction elsewhere, is absolute folly; a blight will be upon us, we shall not succeed in anything but the pursuit of God’s glory through the teaching of the word. “This people have I formed for myself,” saith God, “they shall show forth my praise,” and if we will not do this we shall do less than nothing. For this one thing we are created, and if we miss this we shall live in vain. Good Dr. Wayland, the other day, walking in my garden, saw the swans out of the water, and he remarked that they were the true representation of persons who are out of their proper sphere, and attempt to do what they were never made for. How ungainly the swans are on land, they waddle in a ridiculous manner; but as soon as they are in the water how gracefully they glide along; each one is the model of a ship, the image of beauty; every line about it is perfect. So is it with a man who is content to find in the ministry waters to swim in. As God’s sent servant he is everything that is beautiful; but as soon as he dabbles in trade, or becomes a secular lecturer, or seeks his own aggrandizement, he ceases to be admirable, he often becomes notorious, and is always awkward. Brethren, you are not mean for anything but God, therefore surrender yourselves to God, and find in him your wealth, your honor, and your all. If you do this, you shall be the head, and not the tail; but if you start aside you shall be lightly esteemed. Let the fire of perfect consecration be heaped upon you, for so shall you glow and shine like molten silver, which brightens amid the heat. Let us not subject ourselves to the shame and eternal contempt which will be the portion of those who quit the service of their Redeemer for the bondage of self-seeking. He that sayeth his life loseth it, but he that loseth his life for Christ’s sake shall find it unto life eternal.
III. The next thing necessary to us is FAITH; I might say the first, second, third, and last thing is FAITH. “Without faith it is impossible to please God,” and if we are pleasing God, it is not by our talent, but by our faith. Just now we much need faith in the form of fixity of belief. We know more than we did some time ago; at least I hope we do. I just now heard one of you say to another, “How broad you get!” Well, we do widen out; but not as some men; for we are not of the broad school who believe little or nothing aright because they desire to believe everything. We have cast our anchor, it has taken a firm grip; we have ceased to drift; we remain at rest. Some men have no creed, or, if they have, it is altered so often that it is of no use to them. It must be like the blanket of a gentleman who came from the Emerald Isle, of which he said, “See here! Our skipper has given me a shamefully bad blanket. Just look at it: it is too long at the top and it is too short at the bottom; it gets over my head, and yet my feet are always cold. I cut a whole foot off the top, and I sewed it on to the bottom, but it is not altered a bit; it still comes over my eyes, and is too short to cover my feet.’“ That is what certain “thinkers” do with their creed, they keep cutting it off at one end, and putting it on at the other, but it never gets right—it is always forming, never formed. Modern creeds are like the clothes of Italian peasants, which I have gazed upon with wondering inquiry. It would puzzle the most learned geologist to discover the primary formation of a pair of trousers which have been patched and mended with cloth of all patterns and colors from generation to generation. Such and so varied are some men’s beliefs and unbeliefs; an agglomeration of philosophic rags, metaphysical tatters, theological remnants, and heretical cast-offs. Certain thinkers have reached the blessed ultimatum of believing nothing at all with anything like certainty of belief. When these cultivated persons speak of us they manifest great scorn, and affect to believe that we are natural fools. Ah, dear! People are not always what they are thought to be, and it may happen that a man sees himself as in a glass when he thinks he is looking out of window at a neighbor. It is a sign of great weakness when persons are full of contempt for others. If in any review or pamphlet a writer parades his culture, you may be sure that he has been lying fallow of late, and his affectations are the weeds which have come of it. If it came to a fair contest upon the matter of education and culture, the orthodox would be quite able to hold their own. Boasting is sorry work; but sometimes persons must be answered according to their folly, and I say boldly that in any sort of mental tournament we should not tremble to tilt with the men of “modern thought.” Be it so or not, it is ours to believe.. We believe that when the Lord our God gave forth a revelation he knew his own mind, and that he expressed himself in the best and wisest manner, and in terms that can be understood by those who are teachable and truthful. We therefore believe that no new revelation is needed, and that the idea of other light to come is practically unbelief in the light which now is, seeing the light of truth’ is one. We believe that though the Bible has been twisted and turned about by sacrilegious hands, it is still the infallible revelation of God. It is a main part of our religion humbly to accept what God has revealed. Perhaps the highest form of adoration possible on this side the veil is the bowing of our entire mental and spiritual being before the revealed mind of God; the kneeling of the understanding in that sacred presence whose glory causes angels to veil their faces. Let those who please worship science, reason, and their own clear judgments; it is ours to submit ourselves before the Lord our God, and say, “This God is our God for ever and ever: he shall be our guide even unto death.”
Brethren, rally to the old standard. Fight to the death for the old gospel, for it is your life. Whatever forms of expression you may use as you advance in knowledge, ever keep the cross of Jesus Christ in the forefront, and let all the blessed truths which gather around it be heartily maintained.
We must have faith not only in the form of fixity of creed, but also in the shape of constant dependence upon God. If I wire asked what is the sweetest frame within the whole compass of human feeling, I should not speak of a sense of power in prayer, or abundant; revelation, or rapturous joys, or conquest of evil spirits; but I should mention as the most exquisite delight of my being, a condition of conscious dependence upon God. It has been often associated with great pain and humiliation of spirit, but it is inexpressibly delightful to lie passive in the hand of love, to die into the life of Christ, It is deep jay to feel that you do not know, but your heavenly Father knows; that you: cannot speak, but “we have an Advocate “; that you can scarcely lift a hand, but that he worketh all your works in you. The entire submission of our soul to our Lord, the full content of them hear with God’s will and way, the sure reliance of the mind upon the heavenly presence and power,—this is the nearest approach to heaven that I know; and it is better than. rapture, for one can abide in it without strain or reaction.
“Oh, to be nothing, nothing;
Only to lie at his feet.”
It is not so sublime a feeling as soaring aloft on the wings of eagles; but for sweetness—deep, mysterious, indescribable—it bears the palm. It is a blessedness which can bear to be thought of, a joy which never seems to be a stolen one; for surely a poor, frail child has an unquestioned right to depend upon God, a right to be nothing in the presence of the allsupporting One. I love to preach in such a mood, not as though I was about to preach at all, but hoping that the Holy Spirit would speak in me. Thus to conduct prayer-meetings, and church-meetings, and all sorts of business, will be found to be our wisdom and our joy. We generally make our worst blunders about things that are perfectly easy, when the thing is so plain that we do not ask God to guide us, because we think our own common sense will be sufficient, and so we commit grave errors; but in the difficulties, the extreme difficulties, which we take before God, he gives young men prudence, and teaches youths knowledge and discretion. Dependence upon God is the flowing fountain of success. That true saint of God, George Muller, has always struck me when I have heard him speak as being such a simple, childlike being in his dependence upon God: but, alas, the most of us are far too great for God to use us; we can preach as well as an)body,, make a sermon with anybody—and so we fail. Take care, brethren; for if we think we can do anything of ourselves all we shall get from God will be the opportunity to try. He will thus prove us, and let us see our nothingness. A certain alchemist who waited upon Leo X. declared that he had discovered how to transmute the baser metals into gold. He expected to receive a sum of money for his discovery, but Leo was no such simpleton; he merely gave him a huge purse in which to keep the gold which he would make. There was wisdom as well as sarcasm in the present. That is precisely what God does with proud men, he lets them have the opportunity to do what. they boasted of being able to do. I never heard that so much as a solitary gold piece was dropped into Leo’s purse, and I am sure you will never be spiritually rich by what you can do in your own strength. Be stripped, brother, and then God may be pleased to clothe you with honor, but; not till then.
(TO BE CONTINUED. )
SEASIDE NOTES BY A MINISTER ON FURLOUGH
THALASSE! Thalasse! shouted Xenophon’s little army of heroes as, after innumerable perils and privations, they had made their way to the coast.
“The sea!” “The sea!” shouted the minister, his wife, and boy, as looking from the window of the railway carriage they became assured that the blue at the horizon line was water, not sky. Dissimilar as their circumstances, there was something of the same relief, the same exhilarating sense of freedom, in the modern as in the ancient cry. The weary brain, the strained nerves, the sympathetic heart, all need rest and recreation. These may be found in woodland retreat, in breezy upland, or, best of all, at least for some, by the grand old sea.
We eagerly and kindly greet it as a familiar friend. Gleaming in the morning sunshine, dyed in the rich hues of sunset, gloomy under cloudy, and intensely blue under bright skies, wavelessly smooth, freshened into ripples, or hurrying to the shore in mound-like billows, it possesses for us a fascinating interest. It suggests, as but few material objects can, ideas of abundance, of freedom, and of infinitude. Though its face retains no scar of battle, and it lends itself less easily than the land to historical reminiscence, yet it needs no vivid fancy to dot the Downs with Caesar’s galleys when, on that August afternoon, B.C. 55, he attempted, near where we now write, to force a landing, or at noon of November 29th, 1652, to hear the shock and thunder of conflict between the Dutch under Van Tromp and the English under Admiral Blake. The wild waves might babble out to the instructed ear half the history of this great maritime nation. How strangely novel a minister’s first experience at the seaside is. It is difficult at once to realize the withdrawal of mental burdens, and, as the evening deepens, to believe that no service is to be taken or meeting addressed.
Walking on the beach watching the waves as they uncoil, and listening to the delightfully soft music they make, the minister’s thoughts, like the limbs of the overtaxed traveler,-which move even when he sleeps, go back to work, and the morbid conscience begins to question whether in a perishing world, and with the church’s urgent claims, it is right and Christlike to rest at all. Paul’s utterance of lofty experience comes to one at such a time with a startlingly new application: “I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be content,” It’ we are to be content with the “state” of labor, responsibility, and even of suffering into which Providence brings us, we may well at the beginning of a holiday call a truce to subtle questions of casuistry, and say to our heart, “Learn to be content, to be silent, restful, receptive—open thyself to the unhindered influences of the great, beautiful world.” We are surely most in harmony with the divine will, and best consulting the interest of that church we delight to serve, when we try for a while to shut out or forget the sound of the murmuring wheels of wonted work. He who steeps the wearied senses in kindly sleep will not fail in pity for our need and response to our prayer to hide our work in temporary and partial oblivion. While the minister lay idly resting on the pebbly beach, he saw his little boy with spade and pail busy at work. He asked him, “Harry, what are you doing? Why, father,” he said “gathering shells to take home to my dear little sister.” And the thought came to the minister, Why may not I, too, pick up, in the shape of illustrations, a few mementos of this seaside run? And so, at times, a jotting or two was made. Similes and illustrations are proverbially favored with criticism. Some who can neither make nor use them are highly gifted in pulling them to pieces. I therefore somewhat shrink from putting a few of my hasty jottings into public prominence. Yet I am led to do so from the feeling that prompted the little shell-gatherer. What is in itself valueless may transport in thought, for a moment, the inland reader. Here are a few cullings:—
I was interested in noticing three kinds of sea locomotion, The little boats with difficulty pulled hither and thither by oarsmen, who sweat and finally grow weary at their work; the steamers seen far out at sea by the volumes of smoke emitted; the merchantmen spreading their sails like snowy wings, and beautifully dying out of view in the distance. Fire, wind, and human arm. How much stronger the two first than the last. When we have the fire of God we are steamers unwearied]y ploughing our way through the deep. When we have the freshening gales of the Spirit our sails are filled; but, alas! when we are left to row away with merely human effort, what sorry, painful work it is.
I could not help being struck with the number of little pleasure-boats beached upon the shore. Now and again they dotted the sea for a quarter of a mile, but in an hour or two were back quietly beached again. How like many of our hearers, who are moved a little, and that little only for a while. They venture out on the sea of Christian experience as for a pleasure row.
But yonder, like true Christians, go the great ships, leaving us for strange seas, and bound for other and foreign lands.
Opposite Deal we saw small steamers anchored, and on inquiry found they were waiting on the look-out for merchant ships that needed tugging to their ports. So let the Christian be on the alert, to tug any uncertain or weary soul, first to Christ, and then to the quiet haven of the church’s fellowship.
This is written on the chalk cliffs, in full view of the French coast. For such a sight two things are necessary, a clear day and a sufficient elevation. Both now combine, and between the two countries there is only the gleaming streak of silver. On the low levels of jealousy and prejudice, and when the mist of misunderstanding thickly falls, Christian denominations fail even to recognize each other’s existence. But when enabled to climb the heights of Christian experience, and under the clear and sunny sky of divine approval, differences dwindle, and to the eye of love “there is one flock and one Shepherd.”
Other shells are in the “pail,” but fearing lest the reader should be tired, I forbear.
Not the least benefit of a minister’s outing is that, for a while, it throws him into close contact with nature. ‘It is not enough that we should become acquainted with the thoughts of the mighty dead, or be brought into living contact with the movements of our own time. It will not even suffice to read books that photograph nature. Wordsworth makes mountain, lake, and lamb to live before the eye. Bible psalmist and prophet, with master stroke outline, and ‘with delicate touch fill in, the sketch of starry sky, roaring seas, long rich grass, and billowing hills; but not even these can supply the place of personal and prolonged intercourse with nature. I do not wish to suggest that a holiday should be spent in the study of natural science, that flowers should be pored over, classified, and named, book in hand; that as we say, with the Laureate,
“Break! Break! Break!
On thy cold grey crag, O sea.
I would that my lips could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.”
I would not suggest that by having Hugh Miller and Lyall as our companions they should be entreated to help our “lips to utter” the thoughts stirred by the wave-worn, cold, grey crags. I am somewhat skeptical of the saw that is by many considered as certain as a demonstrated problem in mathematics, that “change of work is rest.” It is one of those half truths to which common sense instinctively assigns limits. Nor would I suggest that, note-book in hand, we should gaze on every scene consciously desiring that it should help us in our after ministry, and light up or point the truth of our sermons. While we lie, or sit,, or saunter on the beach, the incidents that happen around interest and absorb. Sea and sun, ship and cloud, revolving light and gleaming star, ancient castle and modern pier, pebbly beach and chalky cliff—all mirror themselves in the sensitive soul; and in after hours of study will not fail to crystallize around and illustrate our themes. With increased bodily vigor, returning mental tone, and that spiritual sensitiveness which is engendered by quiet communion with the Master, we begin to anticipate a return to our work, and venture to reconsider the methods and motives, the tone and temper of our ministry. Is there to be any modification in our message? This is a lull in life’s battle. We may reconstruct, or modify, or with augmented force proceed upon the old lines. Which shall it be? Shall we strive after culture in our sermons? It is surely not unseemly to see the learned and hoary heads of the Magi bent before the “child that was born kin,-,,” and to find them offering to him the rare products of their own land. Shall we attempt to mould the movements of national life? There is something grand in the battle words of Elijah to Ahab, and in the fearless rebukes administered by John to Herod. I; surely is fitting that the precepts of the inspired Statute Book should be interpreted for the guidance of the nation. Shall we seek the enrichment of experience, the upbuilding of character, the grounding and settling of the church in doctrine? We wistfully regard John as he dwells in the placid deeps of fellowship with his divine Lord. We admire Paul as he leads the saints on to “comprehend” the limitless love of God. We are half repelled, but chastened, into appreciation of the severe and almost dewless moral purity and virtue inculcated by James. As wise master builders we must see that the stones are fitly framed together, growing into a holy temple in the Lord. We are not, however, left to surmise or guess at our duty.
Coming back to our risen Lord, we listen with eager and obedient heart to the commission, the great, unabrogated commission, the commission which has the pathos and power of being among the Master’s last utterances on earth: “Preach the gospel to every creature.” Here then is our message, “The gospel.” We would give no contracted meaning to “the gospel.” Its center is Calvary, but its circumference includes the paradise lost of Genesis, and the paradise regained of Rev.. Its depth, its sweep, its far-off issues no finite mind can comprehend. Yet its salient and saving features stand out cleat’ and simple to the very babe in grace. This, then, is the message of our ministry, Here, too, is an indication of the method of conveying the message—” Preach the gospel.” It is not ours to excogitate or amend, but to preach the gospel.
Steeped in tenderness, ringing with confidence, believing that it will fully meet the world’s need, this is our supreme business—to “preach the gospel.” Paul stirred Europe by “preaching the gospel.” Luther moved Germany by “preaching the gospel.” The Erskines and Chalmers shook Scotland by “preaching the gospel.” Edwards and Payson roused America by “preaching the gospel.” Not to mention men of our own day, Whitefield and Wesley touched the heart of England by “preaching the gospel.” As David said of the sword of Goliath, so does the minister returning to his work say of “preaching the gospel”: “There is none like it; give it me.” On these lines, and on these lines alone, do we wish the ministry of our entire life to move. In the great commission we have, too, the measure or limit of our ministry: “To every creature.” We have sometimes heard it covertly hinted that the gospel may, perhaps, do for the masses; but if we wish to reach the young men of our universities, if we would secure the wealthy, the thoughtful and cultured, we must appeal to the speaking splendors of cathedral windows; we must soften and render idealistic the mind by the cadences and mystic mazes of music; we must play upon the imagination, and draw it into the invisible by the witchery of oratory; or we must grasp and enchain the intellect by the mastery of keen argument and profound thought. We cannot entertain for a moment these suggestions or counsels, as they may be called. He who gave us the conception of beauty, and in the fair earth and spangled heavens created what may satisfy it; he who bestowed the ear and soul for music, and then granted the mellifluous voice, and the skill to unfetter the hidden harmonies of material things; he who formed the human mind, and poured the grace of oratory into favored lips; he has said, “Preach the gospel to every creature “; whether the “creature” be cultured or uncultured, civilized or uncivilized, of patrician or plebeian birth, rich or poor, to him we must “preach the gospel”; and as we obey the command of him who wisely adapts the means to the end, in the bosoms of those apparently so different, the gospel will make
“Cords that were broken
To vibrate once more “;
and the uplifted Christ will still draw “all men” unto him. Before closing I cannot refrain from making an appeal on ‘behalf of those to whom a holiday is a rare experience. Shortly after coming to the seaside, and while enjoying a beautiful walk, my wife said, “How delightful this is! There is but one drawback, that all our friends are nowhere.” This drawback is sadly greater than any of us know. Many are bound to bed and chamber by bands of weakness and pain, and many, alas! of one’s self-sacrificing and hard-working brethren are forced to foot the unpausing treadmill of toil. The Sword and the Trowel for July may possibly fall into the hands of generous deacons, magnanimous members, or helpful hearers in our congregations; some of them preparing for their annual outing, others sitting by the sounding sea enjoying the cool, refreshing breeze,—how quietly kind a thing it would be if they would send to their minister, for a holiday, a five or ten pound note. As he opens it on some Saturday or Monday morning, it would rustle out the echoes of the Master’s own thoughtful words, “Come ye apart, and rest a while.” On some winter Sunday when the skies are leaden, and the trees are bare, illustrations will come from the pulpit as gleams of summer sunshine, or the sound of autumn leaves. Pictures will be drawn in the sanctuary that will revivify fading memories; the sea will sound in the sermon, and the bracing breeze be felt in the prayer, and it may not make your enjoyment of them the less, secretly to know, that but for your help such illustrations had not been culled, nor the strength found to lend them force
SLANDER.
A LADY presented herself to Philip Neri one day accusing herself of being a slanderer. “Do you frequently fall into this fault?” inquired he. “Yes, father, very often,” replied the penitent,. “My dear child,.” said Philip, “your fault is great, but the mercy of God is still greater; for your penance do as follows: Go to the nearest market and purchase a chicken, just killed, and still covered with feathers; you will then walk to a certain distance, plucking the bird as you go along. Your walk finished, you will return to me.” Accordingly, she repaired to the market, bought the fowl, and set out on the journey, plucking it as she went along, as she had been ordered to do. In a short time she returned, anxious to tell of her exactness in accomplishing her penance, and desiring to receive some explanation of one so singular. “Ah,” said Philip,” you have been very faithful to the first part of my orders; now do the second part, and you will be cured. Retrace your steps, pass through all the places you have traversed, and gather up one by one all the feathers that you have scattered.” “But, father,” exclaimed the poor woman, “I east the feathers carelessly on every side; the wind carried them in every direction. How can I recover them?” “Well, my child,” replied he, “so it is with your words of slander: like the feathers which the wind has scattered, they have been wafted in many directions; call them back now if you can. Go, sin no more.”— From G. W. M’Cree’s “Bows and Arrows for Thinkers and Workers.”
NOTES
OUR work has lost one of its oldest, firmest, and most generous friends in the person of Mr. John Edwards, of Hilldrop Crescent, Camden Town. He was our prompter in several enterprises in chapel building, and ready with his own money to aid the work. He had the fire of youth and the stability of age. He was at times brusque in expression, but this arose from the warmth of his temperament and the zeal of his spirit. He denied himself many of the comforts of life that he might give to his Master’s service. He was a strong believer, and if ever we expressed a feeling of discouragement he was sure to drive it away by his courageous assurance that in God’s hands the work must succeed. If we can collect the materials we shall write a short memoir. Mr. Edwards was hardly known so well as he should have been. It would be hard to find a more true-hearted, devoted man of God. He has left a portion of his property to the Orphanage and College, but nothing can compensate us for his loss except it be the remembrance that our old friend has entered into the joy of his Lord.
The past month has been a very busy time for several of the societies which have their headquarters at the Tabernacle, for they have passed in review before the General. We can only briefly mention each meeting, but we can assure our readers that we could easily occupy many pages in recording interesting incidents in connection with each of the beneficent operations carried on by our faithful and earnest “fellow-laborers, whose names are in the Book of Life.”
On Monday evening, May 30, the half-yearly meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE EVANGELISTS’ ASSOCIATION was held in conjunction with the usual prayer-meeting, Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presiding. Mr. Elvin, the secretary, stated that either in their own halls, or in chapels where’ their services were requested, the members of the Association were holding on an average forty services every Sunday, and thirty on week nights, thus conducting about three thousand six hundred and fifty meetings in a year with the direct object of evangelizing some part of London. He said that they still wanted more men and more money. They had been obliged, among other cases, to refuse to take charge of a mission hall which had been started by a beloved brother now in Brompton Hospital, as the funds at their disposal would not warrant them in under taking any fresh responsibilities. Several of the members of the Association offered prayer, or gave short addresses in such an excellent manner that we could see how well fitted they were for the work to which they had given themselves. Mr. Elvin is constantly receiving testimony to the usefulness of the evangelists sent out under his direction. One of these has come under our own notice, and we reproduce part of it. After referring to a week of services which were believed to have been the means of the conversion of some twenty persons, the writer says ·
“Would that other large and influential churches, besides that at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, would organize bands of evangelists to mission our great and sin-stricken cities. Are there not churches with many hundreds of members that are doing scarcely anything in this direction for the godless crowds among whom they are located? And are there not thousands of the Lord’s people in those churches with gifts and leisure who might be induced to enter upon such a mission? We believe there are numbers, not only of young converts with their warm, fresh, yearning first love, but of Christians of matured experience, whose talents now lie buried, who are ready to throw themselves into this work, if only the organizations existed. May God stir up his church to care more for the perishing; and may he lay upon his beloved believing ones the burden of souls so greatly that they shall be led to ‘ travail’ for them.”
We furnish this excellent Evangelists’ Association with about £100 a-year, and it is expended in a way which produces more preaching of the gospel than by any other means. And it is the gospel.’ there’s the joy of it.
On Wednesday evening, June 8, we had the great joy of being present, with several of our deacons and elders, at a thanksgiving meeting held in the chapel of our beloved brother, J. A. Spurgeon, at WEST CROYDON, to celebrate at the same time the pastor’s forty-fourth birthday, and the extinction of the debt on the whole of the property belonging to his church. One of his generous helpers had offered £500 towards the removal of all existing liabilities, another promised £250, and from the richest to the poorest of the flock thankofferings flowed in so freely that there was literally enough and to spare. After paying off the last £1,000 due on the chapel and mission premises, there remained £550 with which to defray the cost of various improvements and extensions, which had in the meantime been ordered to be executed.
It was a happy meeting, and well it might be while so much favor shone upon pastor and people. It would be impossible for C. H.S.. to say how greatly he values J. A. S. To God be praise that for the great work and service of the Tabernacle such a brother-helper has been provided. Long may he be spared in/health and strength to be a master workman in the temple of the Lord. He who has such a brother may well pray for him, and equally praise God for him.
On Friday evening, June 10, a large and representative meeting of the ladies and gentlemen who are likely to take part in the ORPHANAGE BAZAAR AT CHRISTMAS time was held at the College, the Pastor occupying the chair. Several friends stated that they were authorized to promise stalls on behalf of those whom they represented; and others who cannot do much for the Bazaar reported that they had begun to make weekly collections, in order that they may not be behind hand when the time comes. The editor of The Sword and the Trowel undertook to stir up with his sword the readers of the sermons and magazine to give him mortar for his trowel; and he hereby redeems his pledge. Many of his most faithful and constant helpers are found amongst those whom he has never seen, but to whom he speaks week by week and month by month through the printed page. They have helped him to carry on all his institutions up to the present time, and he has no fear that they will desert him now. It is not possible to tell exactly how much will be needed to complete the Girls’ Orphanage, as the plans are not yet fully matured, but Mr. Charlesworth stated at the meeting that from £10,000 to £12,000 would he wanted, and we are hoping that by the beginning of next year, by the Bazaar and other means, a good portion of this sum will be in hand. All goods for the Bazaar should be addressed to Mr. Charlesworth Stock-well Orphanage, Clapham Road, London. From this good hour we hope to hear daily from friends who will help us. It would be well to have immediate information as to what we may expect. Dear friends, write us at once and say that you are going in for this work with all your hearts. You know the Editor’s address, and you may direct your letters to him and gladden his heart.
Our free service at the Tabernacle, on Sunday evening, June 12th, was to our mind the most successful of our efforts in this direction to get at those who are not in the habit of attending any place of worship. On former occasions we have feared that most of those present had only run away From their own churches and chapels for the evening, but this time a large portion evidently belonged to the class that we have been most anxious to reach. The number who did not know the tunes was joyfully great; and the general aspect of the attendants was not of the usual religious order. Oh that God would capture these outsiders, and hold them fast by his grace! Importunate prayer was offered about this, and we expect answers from our God. Unusual heaviness rested on the preacher before entering the pulpit, and the deacons pleaded with God for him before he left the vestry. Utterance was graciously given, and after the service the same brethren lovingly gathered around their pastor and prayed a second time for the blessing. Surrounded by a body-guard of praying men the Lord’s servant cannot fail.
On Monday evening, June 13, the annual meeting of THE MISSIONARY WORKING SOCIETY was held in the Tabernacle Lecture-hall, the Pastor, as usual, presiding in the enforced absence of the President, Mrs. Spurgeon; and addresses were delivered by the chairman, Pastor J. A. Spurgeon, and Messrs. C. F. Allison and B. W. Carr. The report stated that the object of the society was to aid the families of poor ministers and colporteurs by sending them clothing, and contained the following statement and appeal from the pen of Mrs. Spurgeon: —”There is, alas! no improvement in the position of our poor country brethren, poverty and privation seem rather on the increase than otherwise, for the general depression in trade and agriculture tells upon their scanty salaries, and adds bitterly to their heavy burdens. Never were the loving gifts of this society more needed than at the present time, never did its Christlike efforts more deserve or claim the kind and practical help of all those who love the Master’s servants. We used to think, in times gone by, that the stipends of our poor pastors were at their lowest ebb; but, pitiful as they were, they did receive them! Now, we hear of cases where the money is owing quarter after quarter, and the poor man is driven to his wits’ end—and to debt, for the necessaries of life for himself and his children. We know of some servants of God so destitute that they seldom taste meat more than once a week, and there are many families where, but for the nice and suitable clothing given by this excellent society, the children of the minister could not have appeared in the house of God, their garments were so shabby, and an utter want of means prevented any renewal of their scanty wardrobe ….. How gratefully that help has been received Mrs. Evans will joyfully tell, how much more assistance is needed will be a sadder theme, and while we rejoice greatly in the success which God has given to this sweet womanly work, we would earnestly ask for it an increased and extended operation. If our Christian sisters all over the land were but to take to heart the deep needs of Christ’s ministering servants, and help them with resolute purpose and love, they would very soon wipe away this sad blot from the page of our history, and in so doing bring down a rich reward into their own hearts, and an unexpected blessing on their .lives.’
‘ During the year 48 parcels have been sent to ministers and 7 to colporteurs, 202 children have been clothed, 1,901 ready-made garments have been given, and various miscellaneous articles, bringing up the estimated value of the grants to £262 11s. 0d. The expenditure for the year has been £75 ls. 5d., and the balance of £187 9s. 7d. has been received in clothing and materials to be made up at the meetings of the society. All communications and contributions should be addressed to Mrs. Evans, Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington, London.
On Friday evening, June 17, the annual meeting of THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE COUNTRY MISSION, of which Mr. Bowker is the leader, was held in the Lecture-hall, the Pastor presiding. After prayer, and an address by the chairman upon the great need of the pioneer work done by the members of the mission, Mr. Goldston, the secretary, reported the progress of the work at North Cheam, Tiptree, Willesden, Bell Green, Hatton, Little Paris-street, Teddington, Thornton Heath, and Southgate, and referred to the fact that through the agency of the mission churches had been formed and chapels built at Walthamstow and Tooting. Addresses were than delivered by the brethren who are laboring in most of the places mentioned, their earnest speeches being interspersed with selections from the songservice “Homeward bound,” sung by Mr. J. Courtnay and a choir of the Orphanage boys. Mr. Hayward, the treasurer, stated that the total expenditure for the year had been £195 15s. 7d., which had been exactly met by the receipts. The principal items of expense are for traveling, rent of chapels and halls, furnishing, cleaning, printing, etc., and as the preachers not only give their time, but also subscribe to the funds, and as the whole amount is spent directly in evangelistic efforts in the suburbs and country districts near London, we shall be glad to see the income grow far beyond its present limit. This also is a grandly useful and economical society. Churches have sprung up through its operations, and, if supported, it will continue to work up little places till they become important stations, or self-supporting churches. London demands the labors of all who can preach Jesus. Some will do nothing unless they can do great things, but these brethren are content to begin With a dozen, and work on with a score, and so out of this come here and there congregations of hundreds. Oh for more blessing! Blessed be God for so much! Friends may inquire what is the distinction between this Society and the Evangelists’ Association, under Mr. Elvin. We are not very clear about this; except that this Society sends the same meat to fixed stations to raise churches, and the other is more of an evangelistic order, assisting churches already in existence. They are equally excellent, and might wisely be united.
Monday, June 20, was, we believe, generally observed by the churches connected with the Pastors’ College Association as a day of united prayer, in accordance with the resolution gassed at the last Conference. At the Tabernacle we had meetings at seven o’clock in the morning, at noon, at five in the afternoon, and at seven o’clock in the evening our usual prayermeeting was specially devoted to earnest supplication for our whole College brotherhood. Brethren from various churches report to us that they had days of power and joy. We shall do well to have another such day before the year closes. United pleadings must prevail.
COLLEGE.—During the past month Mr. A. Billington, who has long set his heart on going to Africa, has been accepted by Mr. H. Grattan Guinness as one of a party of missionaries who will shortly start for the Congo. Mr. Jesse Gibson, who came to us from Canada, will sail early this month for St. Thomas, to take charge of the church during the pastor’s absence in Europe. He hopes afterwards to settle in the dominion.
Mr. B. Brigg has accepted the pastorate at Drummond Road, Bermondsey; and Mr. F. Tuck has succeeded him at the Providence Gospel Hall, Alvey Street. Mr. C. Ingrem leaves the College to settle at Wimbledon; and Mr. L. Humby at Coseley, Staffs.
The students are now away for their summer vacation, which will end on August 8th. Mr. T. Whiteside has, at the suggestion of the Secretary of the British and Irish Baptist Home Mission, removed from Athlone to Ballymena. Mr. G. W. Pope, late of Nottingham, has settled at Piss; and Mr. A. It. Morgan, late of Dolton, has gone to Fair-ford, Gloucester. Mr. J. C. Thompson, late of Paisley, has accepted the hearty invitation of the church at Brondesbury.
We are glad to learn from the Missionary Herald that Mr. and Airs. Lyall are sufficiently restored to health to return to their work at the Cameroons, West Africa.
Mr. Kendon writes very gratefully from Jamaica, acknowledging the receipt of various sums sent to us to help him in restoring what the hurricane destroyed. He has been holding evangelistic services in different districts in his diocese, which is twenty miles square, and for five weeks took part in an average of three meetings daily. On Good ]Friday he baptized sixty-seven believers at Jericho in the presence of several thousands of people, and on the previous Sunday six others put on Christ at Mount Hermon; and, when he wrote, his list of inquirers on probation contained two hundred and sixty names. Mr. Head, from Mr. Guinness’s College, is at present helping him, although it is not very clear how the support, which is barely sufficient for Mr. and Mrs. Kendon, can be made available for an additional worker. However, the Lord knows what is needed, and will doubtless supply it in his own time and manner.
Mr. Norris sends us word from Calcutta that in answer to prayer the way has been made clear for him to remain at his post. He earnestly prays that we may send out evangelists to the English-speaking people of India, and this will we do if God permit. Funds are slowly but surely coming in for this object, and information of suitable centers for work is also arriving, so that if we could only get the right men, something might soon be done in this direction.
Mr. H. Rylands Brown, the pioneer of this movement, finds plenty to be done at Darjeeling, and we believe he is the man to do it.
Our son Thomas, who is now preaching in New Zealand with great acceptance, its very anxious that we should let ore’ readers know that there has been a glorious revival at the Deloraine Tabernacle, which is one of the chapels built by his friend and ours, Mr. Gibson, of Perth, Tasmania… Mr. Harrison. who has now joined Mr. Isaac, as an evangelist, was greatly cheered during the last few weeks at Deloraine, by seeing converts every Lord’s-day. Mr. Harry Wood, who has left Saddleworth on account of the excessive heat, has had the same joyous experience since he took charge of the work at Deloraine. Our son says, “Mr. Gibson will feel amply rewarded, and ready for more service and sacrifice.”
EVANGELISTS.— “Dear Mr. Spurgeon,—I have been pastor of Townheadstreet Baptist Church, in Sheffield, for nearly ten years. Feeling deep interest in the work of our brethren Fullerton and Smith, now in this town, I have thought you would be pleased to receive the enclosed account of Whit-week.
“It was a week which will, I believe, be memorable in the history of the church of God in this town. Indeed, the whole work of our brethren here has been so manifestly marked by the presence and power of the Holy Spirit that Christians with one accord give God the glory. A spirit of united, fervent, and importunate prayer has been awakened for the quickening of believers and the salvation of the lost, and God has appeared to revive his work in the hearts of his people, while not a few have been truly converted to Christ. Whir-week is in Sheffield, next to Christmas, the great holiday of the year. Most of our foundries and manufactories are closed—especially in these times of trade depression—nearly, or quite, the whole week through. Our brethren, therefore, desired to make special efforts to reach the working men who would then be unemployed, and the crowds of strangers who flock during the holiday into our town. The circus, a large building, was therefore engaged for the whole; week, the congregations were immense, and the exhibitions of truth, presented by our brethren in song and address, were peculiarly owned and blessed. It may interest; you to have a list of the special services held from the Saturday evening preceding Whir-Sunday until the following Thursday night, and I will mention the circus gatherings first:— “Saturday evening—’ Song service.’ “Sunday morning, at seven o’clock, a ‘ meeting for Christians,’ at which each of our brethren gave an address.
“Sunday morning at eleven o’clock, a meeting, the admission to which was by ticket, in order, as far as possible, to exclude regular attendants at the House of God. “Sunday evening, at seven o’clock, a meeting similar to the morning one at eleven.
“On Monday evening—’ Song service.’ “On Tuesday evening—’ Song service.’ “On Wednesday and Thursday evenings the ‘preaching of the word, the singing of the gospel, and prayer.’
“In addition to the gatherings in the circus during the week, there was a crowded meeting for ‘men only,’ on Whir-Sunday afternoon, in the large ‘ Albert Hall;’ and at noon on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, our brethren conducted a special service in Queen-street Chapel; and on Thursday afternoon, at three o’clock, a Bible-reading in the Presbyterian Church. The whole week was a season of peculiar power, and such services as were held, and such addresses as were given, must be made a great blessing. We, as ministers of Christ in this town, hold our brethren in highest .esteem, and we shall ever lovingly remember their visit.
“I am, dear Mr. Spurgeon,
“Yours very sincerely,
“RICHARD GREEN.”
Mr. Burnham’s labors at Rushden, in May, were crowned with great blessing, and once again the house of his host received a large share of the soul-saving power which accompanies our brother wherever he goes. This month he returns to follow up the very remarkable work already accomplished. Continuing his Yorkshire campaign, he visited Bedale and Masham, Salterforth and Earley, Malton, Morley, and Middlesbro’. After he has finished his work at Rushden this month he is going to help our Brother Mather in open-air and tent-work at Hol-beach and the surrounding villages.
We have not received any amounts lately from the places visited by the evangelists, but we are quite sure that the spiritual re-suits of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at Sheffield will be followed by a .corresponding thankoffering; and we are informed that the Committee of the Yorkshire Association are waiting until the close of Mr. Burnham’s engagements to pay over in one sum the amounts received from the .churches which he has helped. Meanwhile, general subscriptions will be heartily welcomed for this work, which the Lord has so signally owned to the salvation of souls, and the edification and comfort of believers.
COLPORTAGE.—The Secretary writes:—”Dear Mr. Spurgeon,—The Colportage Association is about to open several new districts. The friends at Vernon Chapel, King’s Cross, have promised £40 a year for a colporteur to work in that locality. This effort is, I think, to some extent the out-come of the work of the colporteur for whom our friend Pastor F. A. Jones, of Cross Street, Islington, is responsible. Also, through the kindness of Miss Hadfield, of Ryde, arrangements have been made for a third colporteur to labor in the Ventnor district, Isle of Wight. The whole island will thus be fairly worked. Will our friends pray for a blessing upon these new districts, and that we may be specially directed in these lection of suitable men? Why should not this valuable agency be extended all over the land’? If Scotland maintains over two hundred colporteurs, surely England should support at least five hundred. The committee will always be glad to employ a man in a district where £40 a year can be pro-raised. In the meantime, the General Fund is very low, and help has been received to a very limited extent during the past six months. The new districts will need more outlay from the General Fund; we there-fore look prayerfully to the Lord, through his people, to supply our need.”-Friends, please note the words which we have underlined. We shall be glad of immediate help for this object.
PERSONAL NOTES.—A Christian sister in India writes:—” I enclose you a note which I received from a Mussul man to whom I had lent a book of your sermons, and I re-quest your prayers on his behalf that he may have grace given him to profess Christ openly, and to come out from Mahometanism.” Here is the note, “My dear Miss——. Your sermon-book has, indeed, converted me to Christianity. I do believe in Christ our Lord, and so long as my belief in him is firmly rooted, I do not care what I may be called in the outer world. Mr. Spurgeon appears to be an extra ordinary man.” We were very gratified when we received from Germany the following unsolicited testimony to the value of The Treasury of David:—“I mailed one volume of The Treasury to Dr. Zoekler, and requested him to give me his opinion of it. Dr. Zoekler is considered (even among German pastors) a great bookworm, and I was a little curious to see what he would say. He declared the Commentary to be ‘ a museum of spiritual treasures,’ and thought the publication of it would be to most German theologians like the discovery of ancient Troy by Schilemann. My Lutheran neighbors beg me to have the work done, if not for money, still for the good it would do, and they beg for the whine work There is nothing which might benefit Germany more than the publication of this work.” We would gladly aid in the publication, but cannot see our way to do so. Perhaps the German publisher may yet be able to bring it out, and make it pay its own costs.
A friend informs us that in Toulon, the great seaport and naval arsenal in the southeast of France, where there are many artisans, and multitudes of sailors, a work similar to that of Mr. McAll in Paris has been commenced by M. Massis, a Protestant pastor, assisted by his wife and a missionary. Several rooms have been opened for preaching, and converts gathered for worship and work. Recently, when both M. Massis and his helper were compulsorily absent from the service, one of the converts undertook to lead the singing and prayer, but being unable to preach, he read the French translation of our sermon, “Remember Lot’s Wife,” (No. 1,491), and this was the means of the conversion of a ‘whole family.
Another friend, who conducts services in a Hampshire village where a new chapel is being built, tells us that every Sunday evening for the last four years he has preached there, but being engaged in business all the week he cannot give much time to study. He says that he has, therefore, taken our sermons regularly, got all the marrow he could out of them, copied out the leading thoughts, lived in the subject all the week, and then given out to the people the honey he has gathered, tie adds that God has blessed this system of working to the salvation of souls and the edification of believers, and that this way of proclaiming the truth has also interested the congregation.
METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE
COLPORTAGE ASSOCIATION.
THE FOURTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT, 1880.
METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE
COLPORTAGE ASSOCIATION.
PRESIDENT
REV. C. H. SPURGEON.
TREASURER.
ED. BOUSTEAD, ESQ.
HON. SEC.
MR. C. P. CARPENTER.
COMMITTEE.
MR. C. F. ALLISON. Mr. C. MURRELL.
F. D. CARPENTER. J. PASSMORE, Junr.
G. GOLDSTON. W. PAYNE.
G. GREGORY. S. R. PEARCE.
M. LLEWELLYN C. WATERS.
W.J. MILLS. WOOLLARD.
T. MILLS,
SEC.—REV. W. CORDEN JONES.
THE object of this Association is the increased circulation of religious and healthy literature among all classes, in order to counteract the evil of the vicious publications which abound, and lead to much immorality, crime, and neglect of religion.
This; object is carried out in a twofold manner:—
1st.—-By means of Christian Colporteurs, who are paid a fixed salary, and devote all their time to the work, visiting every accessible house with Bibles and good books and periodicals for sale, and performing other missionary services, such as visitation of the sick and dying, and conducting meetings and open-air services as opportunities occur. This is the most important method, enabling the Colporteur to visit every part of the district regularly.
The average total cost of a Colporteur is from £ 75 to £80; but the Committee will appoint a man to any district for which £ 40 a year is subscribed, if the fund of the Association will permit.
2nd.—By means of Book Agents who canvass for orders for periodicals, and supply them month by month; these receive a liberal percentage on the sales to remunerate them for their trouble.
This; second method is admirably adapted to the requirements of districts where the guaranteed subscription for a Colporteur cannot be obtained. Shopkeepers or other persons willing to become Book Agents may communicate with the Secretary.
The Association is unsectarian in its operations, “doing work for the friends of a ,full and free gospel anywhere and everywhere.”
Cheques may be crossed London and County Bank; and Post Office Orders made payable: to W. C. JONES, at the Chief Office, St. Martin’sle-Grand. All communications should be addressed to REV. W. CORDEN JONES, Colportage Association, Pastor.,” College, Temple Street, St. George’s Road, London, S.E.
METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE
COLPORTAGE ASSOCIATION
FOURTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT.
Fourteen years have now elapsed since the formation of this Association, and the Committee desire to record their gratitude to God for enabling them to continue this work until now with almost uninterrupted progress, and followed by moral and spiritual results the importance of which cannot be over-estimated.
On account of the continued trade depression of the last few year it was deemed desirable for the present to direct special attention and effort to the consolidation of the position already attained by the Association, rather than to seek its rapid extension by any extraordinary, methods. 16 new districts, however, were started, and 79 occupied during the past year, but as several have from various causes been discontinued the number of Colporteurs now employed, 73, is nearly the same as reported last year.
The continued and even increased necessity for the work are abundantly confirmed both by the reports from the various districts and from the recent utterances of eminent men in various positions who are well able to judge.
In a recent sermon on “Books:” the following striking passage appears —” The printing press is the mightiest agency on earth for good or evil. The position of a minister of religion standing in his pulpit is a responsible position, but it does not appear so responsible a position as that of the editor and the publisher. Men die, but the literary influences they project go on for ever. I believe that God has made the printing press to be a great agent in the world’s correction and evangelization, and that the great final battle of the world will be fought, not with guns and swords, but with types and presses, a gospelized and purified literature triumphing over and trampling under foot and crushing out a corrupt literature. God speed the cylinders of an honest, intelligent, aggressive, Christian printing press!” To wage this warfare against pernicious literature is the work in which this and kindred Associations engage. The printing press produces the peaceful weapons and ammunition, while the Colporteur is the Christian soldier who carries them into the conflict. He fires not at random, but selecting his ground and opportunity aims at the enemy now a Bible or Testament, then an attractively illustrated periodical or interesting book, or failing to find a purchaser will present a tract with a word in season, accompanied by silent prayer. The accompanying reports speak of many peaceful victories thus won. The circulation of hurtful periodicals and books is immense, but the Association thankfully records that during the past year it has put into circulation a total of 396,291 books and periodicals to the gross value of £7,577 7s. rod., while no less than 630,993 visits to families have been made by the Colporteurs, who have also conducted 6,745 religious services, besides frequently praying with the sick and dying.
The Colporteurs are frequently told that but for their visits a large number of the people upon whom they call would be entirely neglected by any of the ordinary methods or agencies employed. The Committee therefore, while thanking those friends who have helped them in the past, urgently plead for increased support in this good work. The profit upon the sales renders it an economical agency, but as in many of the districts most needing the work of the Association the sales are small, from the poverty of the people, the additional outlay can only be met by Subscriptions to the General Fund, which are very much needed, both to sustain existing efforts and to commence new ones.
The Committee again desire to express their obligations to the Religious Tract Society for liberal assistance in the supply of Books and Tracts on very advantageous terms, also to the British and Foreign Bible Society for similar favors.
REPORTS FROM SUPERINTENDENTS, ETC., IN DISTRICTS.
WOLVERHAMPTON DISTRICT.—The Rev. D. W. Purdon writes: “The colporteur sticks to his work like a limpet to the rock. Patiently, perseveringly, and I believe very prayerfully he goes on, increasingly acceptable among those among whom he labors, and in every way satisfactorily to those whose eyes are interestedly on him and his work:.
“I see that during the past 11 months he has sold Bibles, 94, Testaments, 14O; Books over 6d., 4,011; Books under 6d., 936; Magazines, 2,721; Packets, Cards, etc., 320. Total, 8,222. And he has visited 773 families; held 78 services; and distributed 4,620 tracts.
“Now, considering the character of his sphere, and the times we have been passing through, I consider this a good 11 months’ work, which speaks for itself. I cannot say more.”
FRITHAM NEW FOREST DISTRICT.—R, W. S. Griffith, Esq., of Lyndhurst, who has had some years’ practical experience of the working of Colportage, writes:—I can only say that we have a very active and earnest colporteur—he works hard and finds a great pleasure in his work, carrying a smiling face to al houses he visits, and finding almost without exception a cordial welcome everywhere: he has a very simple but impressive manner of stating gospel troths, and his visits are, I am sure, calculated to awaken a desire for holy things in many hearts; it has been so in several cases that I have heard of, leading through Divine grace to a decided conversion. He is doing a good work, and we all like him.
“The year, too, has been but a poor one in a very poor neighborhood, and those who know’ the district best are most surprised at the fact that (£80) to £100 are spent annually by the people in good literature. Magazines are in greatest request, the attractions of a good. illustrated magazine for 6d. quite overcoming those of the ordinary 6d. book.
“If am more than ever convinced of the immense practical usefulness of the Colportage work, and if I could advise anyone looking’ out for some branch of work for the Lord which he would aid, I would unhesitatingly say—’ Choose a district as yet unoccupied and send your subscription to the Association, so that a colporteur might be sent to work there.’ Mr. Bellamy, the colporteur, visits 700 or 800 families every month, and takes two or three cottage services every week, and while I am writing he has gone in his donkey cart about seven miles to take a service this evening, he will hardly get back till 10 or 11 o’clock. Hoping this year may prove, by God’s blessing, a very encouraging one to all your men.”
The WORCESTERSHIRE COLPORTAGE ASSOCIATION, which employs four Colporteurs. J. s. Hanson, Esq., Treasurer, writes — “ I hope the Association is going on prosperously: if all were as satisfied about the usefulness of the work as we are, they would soon find the means to increase the number, till the land was filled with colporteurs.” We cull the following from the Annual Report of the same Association.
“When it is remembered that our agents are Christian men, who constantly keep distinctly before them the direct personal spiritual welfare of those they visit; losing no opportunity either on roadside or in cottage, of pressing home the great need each soul has of salvation, and pointing to Christ as the only and sufficient Savior; and that with this; object in view they visit I89 villages every month, and are brought into personal contact with from 150 to 200 persons each day; we obtain some idea (though by no means exhaustive) of the almost unlimited opportunity this Society has, through its four colporteurs, of presenting the glad tidings of salvation to the tens of thousands of people who inhabit our villages.”
COATE AND LEAFIELD COLPORTAGE ASSOCIATION, Rev. B. Arthur, Secretary.— “In presenting the fifth report, your Committee are happy to say that the progress of the work during the past year is highly gratifying. The effects of a free and liberal circulation of tracts, with the sale of the word of God and religious books, with periodicals and works of a highly moral character, are very visible. In many cases they have supplanted the pernicious Police News, The Boys of England and many other similar publications. Pleasing inquiry is being made by the people, and many have been induced to attend some place of public worship. The Committee have pleasure in bearing testimony to the earnest and persevering labors of their present colporteur, Mr. J. Hook. During the year the sale of books and periodicals amounted to £ 103 15s. 8d. Many religious services have been held, either in the open air or in cottages, or places of divine worship. The usual visits have been made to the sick and aged, and instruction been given to the young in the Sunday School. The colporteur’s journal furnishes proof that the visits, with conversations by the way-side, are productive of good.”
NORTHAMPTON ASSOCIATION, Secretary, Rev. W. I. Mills. Extract from Report. —” We begin with Bulwick Lodges. Here the work of the Colportage and evangelizing is still combined, and we believe that the dissemination of the word of God and pure literature during the week, and the preaching on the Sunday, mast be attended with great good.
“Mr. Hornsey wrote in December last:— ‘In the Chapel the word preached was much blessed the first summer I was here, the place was crowded— soon, however, the screw was put on, and the second summer the attendance fell off wonderfully. This past summer there was a fair attendance, and lately it has been better, the average being 24 or 26, sometimes over 30 adults in the evening, but the afternoon service is poorly attended. The seals to my ministry are some who have been born again, some quickened in the divine life, and others awakened to a sense of their need of a Savior. And now for those upon whom the screw was put, these I visit in their own homes in my rounds; here is where the work of a colporteur lies, according to my idea, for with my pack on my back, or in my hand, I have an excuse (if one is needed in the 19th century’) to call at all the houses in the villages; and here, I may say, eternity alone can reveal the good done by the tract given, read and blessed! God only knows of the scriptures read to the sick, of prayers offered at the bedside of the afflicted and those appointed to death, of the word spoken to the relations or attendants, of words of cheer and comfort spoken to the brethren and sisters in Christ, who are cast down, phases of whose life none but the colporteur can see! If you ask me, have you been blessed in this work? Have the results justified the outlay? I say yes, yes, yes! But there is what is called the untabulated results, opposite which we will put the Wall done, good and faithful servant, and the heavenly reward.’“
SOUTHERN ASSOCIATION, Secretary, Rev. J. Hasler. Extracts from Report.— “The work of colportage continues to employ the greater part of the funds of the Association, and the area in which this work is carried on has not only been maintained, but extended. Another district has been formed, and is occupied, that of Andover. There are therefore now seven colporteurs engaged, who are working in the following districts— Downton, West Medene, Lymington, Poole, Salisbury, Quarley, and Andover. In some, if not all, of these districts, the universal depression in trade has had an untoward influence upon one part of the work of your agents—their sales—the amount of those sales is not so large as it otherwise would have been. In other respects, however, and to which their sales are intended to be auxiliary, the work of your colporteurs still yields results that afford increased encouragement, and also call for devout thankfulness. In the Downton district there have been four distinct cases of conversion, a mother and her daughter through reading the book entitled “Saving Faith,” and two young men through reading other books. There is also good reason to believe that the reading of books and sermons supplied by the colporteur has had something to do with the change of a clergyman in the district, from decidedly Ritualistic to decidedly Evangelical views. “Sunday newspapers have been given up in some cases, and publications such as Sunday at Home, Weekly Welcome, and the Boy’s Own Paper purchased instead With respect to the sale of Bibles it may be mentioned as an interesting fact that since his residence in this district the colporteur has supplied 150 vols. of Cassell’s Family Bible. He has conducted 139 services on the Lord’s Day, and he himself says that he has never seen so much good resulting from his work as; he has seen this year; it has been the year of his greatest encouragement.”
Other Associations employ the colporteurs with satisfaction and success, but space forbids further extracts from their reports.
Several private and unsolicited letters have been received affording valuable testimony to the value of colportage. In one we read “I have been a Christian worker in this neighborhood for 40 years, and I fearlessly say no money has been better spent than that by your Committee in keeping the colporteur here to labor with us.”
Rev. J. Richards of Winson Green wrote:—” I see the colporteur frequently, and am exceedingly gratified by his devotion to his work, he really works hard and well. He is one of the most acceptable evangelists engaged in preaching in cottages and in the open air in this neighborhood, the people are delighted with his singing the gospel too. He attends the Total Abstinence Meetings to sell his books, and has a table for his use, and in doing so makes himself personally acceptable to the people.”
The following are extracts selected from the Colporteurs’ letters, and will, it is hoped, be read with interest:—
SALE OF BIBLES AND TESTAMENTS.— “My sales in Bibles and Testaments for the last quarter exceeds the sales at the two depots of the Bible Society here for the whole of the last year. I think this comparison shows conclusively that the right way to sell the books is to take them to the homes of the people.”
“During the past twelve months I have sold 239 Bibles, and I229 Testaments. Thank God for past success, but I shall not be satisfied until I can see a portion of the Word of God in every house in my district.”
“I have found out three houses entirely without the Word of God, but I did not let them remain so. One of the women said she could not afford the money for a Testament, but after I talked to her the little daughter said, ‘ Mother, I shall ,>pen my little bank and pay for it,’ so she took it when the little child paid for it. She had been married seven years, and never had God’s Word in her possession all that time.”
“September.—Sold more of God’s Word this month than any month since I have been in the work, thirty Bibles and over forty Testaments. God’s Word must and shall prevail; it cannot return unto him void, because it is a living Word, coining from the ever living Say/our.”
PREVALENCE OF EVIL LITERATURE AND ITS CURE.— “Was told of a young female (a governess) who sat in bed reading by candle-light some of the most filthy, low, vulgar, pernicious papers, so bad indeed that the woman was ashamed to tell me what they were; succeeded in supplying her with a good magazine.”
“My work is still progressing favorably. Several boys at a boarding-school, who used to read bad papers, now take Young England and Excels/or from me. The mistress told me that she was very glad these papers had come out, as her boys used to be so fond of bad ones before.”
“In one village which I visit there are several infidel books, and several persons have turned, infidels through reading them. One is a very intelligent, quiet young man, and two were Methodist local preachers. Packets of infidel tracts are being sent into the villages; this makes me feel more than ever the pressing need of Colportage to counteract this evil work.”
“I am glad to report that through a customer I have succeeded in getting a young woman to take the Girl’s Own Paper, instead of . (a trashy paper). She was so delighted with it that she lent it to another young woman, and I expect more orders.” “The wife of a man who has three children, and only earns 9s. per week, had taken in a weekly penny paper, full of empty stories. She asked me to get a number of them bound, but I told her they were not worth it, and if she loved her children she must not encourage them to read such trash as that. Persuaded her to take in the Sunday at Home.” “A young man upon leaving this district has requested me to post his good books direct to him. This is a case wherein I have succeeded in substituting a religious periodical in place of a pernicious penny novel, and the subscriber expresses pleasure and profit in the change.”
“My word shall not return unto me void.”
CONVERSIONS THROUGH BOOKS, &C., SOLD.—The number of conversions reported by the colporteurs through the books sold is too large to print the cases in detail; the following, however, are a fair sample of others:— “Saying Faith,” R. T. S.—” Two persons have been led to the Savior through reading this book—a mother and daughter. I sold the book to a Christian woman, she read it, and lent it to one of her neighbors who was ill. Through reading it she was led to trust in Jesus as her Savior, as was her daughter, who had left service to nurse her mother.” The book was then sent on to another daughter, hoping that by its perusal she may share the same blessing. The same colporteur speaks of a third case of conversion from reading the same book.”
“The Home Beyond,” HATCHARDS.—” A farmer to whom I had previously sold The Home Beyond, when I called again said, ‘What a beautiful book that Home Beyond is. I read it, and sent it to a relation of mine, who was very ill, first wasting away in consumption, and without having a hope in Christ.. She read the book I had sent, and it was the means of leading her to the Savior of the lost, and by being able to die a peaceful and happy death she testified that she had truly embraced the Savior.’
“ The following books are noticed as having been instrumental in conversion wink, some more and some less:—” Alleine’s Alarm,” “A Savior for You,” “Better than Gold,” “Baxter’s Dying Thoughts,” “Come to Jesus,” “Child of Jesus,” “Grace and Truth,” “God is Love,” “Home Beyond,” “Light for Dark Hours, Morning by Morning,” “Pike’s Persuasives,”” Pardon and Peace,” “Saving Faith.”
GRATUITOUS TRACT DISTRIBUTION AND ITS RESULTS.—Many thousands of evangelical tracts are given away by the Association, and most of the colporteurs report that people receive them readily, and that numerous cases of conversion have resulted from their distribution. Two cases are appended:—
“I was showing my books to a gentleman one day, he had a little tract in his hand entitled ‘ Taken by Surprise.’ I offered this to a lady who was passing by, and she accepted it. Bless the Lord, it was the means of awakening her to a sense of danger, insomuch that she could not find rest until she found it in Jesus. She is now believing and rejoicing in his great salvation.” The Pipe Light —”Some time ago I held an open air meeting at one of our villages during the dinner hour of the workmen, as I was not permitted to enter the mill. After speaking some time, I sold several small books, and gave away about 200 tracts. One of the men screwed the tract up and threw it away, but picked it up again, and put it into his pocket, thinking it might come in to light his pipe. At tea time, however, having nothing else to read, he resorted to the despised tract. It was headed ‘ Stop the Clock.’ Before he had finished reading it, he trembled from head to foot, and pleaded with God for the forgiveness of his sins; from that moment, he tells me, he has felt a changed man.”
Mr. Spurgeon’s Sermons.—As usual, many of the colporteurs have met with instances of the great usefulness of these sermons, both in the comfort and instruction of believers and in the salvation of sinners. A few reports are given:—
“About twelve months ago, a friend of mine leaving for America took a good supply of Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons. I also kept up correspondence, sending other sermons. Having now returned, he speaks of the blessings the sermons were to him and others while there, where the preaching is quite perfection in the flesh. One of these sermons sent was 1507-8-9, and was the means of the conversion of one woman, and of stirring up others to find perfection only in Christ Jesus.”
“In soliciting orders, one woman asked me if I carried any of Mr. Spurgeon’s works, and when told that I did, seemed pleased; bought several of his writings, telling me that although she had been a member of a Christian church for years, she never saw the gospel in its true light until she read one of Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons. It was not until then that she saw Jesus to be her only Savior and could rejoice in Him as such.”
Speaking of a young woman who had been in much darkness and perplexity about spiritual things and seemed to despair of mercy, a Colporteur writes “But when I was there in January I sold her Mr. Spurgeon’s ‘ Loving advice for anxious seekers’; when I called next month I could see by her countenance that there was a change for the better. She then told me that God in His mercy had blessed that sermon to her, that it seemed as though Mr. Spurgeon must have known of one exactly like her, for every word suited her case exactly.” Other cases occur of a similar character, and an instance is reported where the reading of Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons by a Ritualistic clergyman “it is believed had something to do with his change to decidedly Evangelical views.”
VISITATION FROM HOUSE TO HOUSE.—”June 14 passed on to another house, where I had visited a man before, he said, I have to thank God you called to speak to me about my soul. I feel now that I am a changed man, my desire is to live ,::o Jesus whom I have long despised. Prayed with him, leaving him trusting in Jesus.”
The following is extracted from a report from our Bro. Matthews of Eversham, who was a valuable colporteur and was called to his rest beloved and respected by all who knew him. September, 1880.—Another said, “I am very glad you ever came to my house with your visits and books, I feel now that I can fully trust in Jesus as my only Savior. Many are sick and brought low by pain; I advise them all fully to trust in Jesus the great Healer both of body and soul, and I hope through the work clone, a few are resting their all on the rock which is ‘ Christ in you the hope of Glory.’“
Another colporteur writes “One case of conversion I would refer to which has come under my notice. I spoke to a young servant girl about six months ago on the subject of salvation, urging very much the importance of a full and present decision for Jesus, and of not resting upon anything short of a knowledge of sin forgiven. On calling again three months afterwards, I asked her if she was still seeking or whether she had found the Savior. She replied ‘Oh! I have found peace in Him, it was on my birthday in December.’ She is about to join a Christian church.”
VISITATION OF THE AFFLICTED.—”A man who is dying said, ‘ I am so glad to see you again; do pray beside me, for I have found much happiness through your prayers. The “church parson” has been to see me, and gave me a bottle of wine and read some prayers out of a book, but, indeed, I would rather have your prayers than all he did.’“
“After paying several visits to a sick man I found him near to his end. Told him of a Savior, but he did not seem to be able to trust his all upon Him. On going that round next time I found that he had passed away, but was pleased to hear that he had accepted the Savior. He spoke of me and would have liked to have seen me.”
AMONG THE QUARRYMEN — “ On my visit in October I went as usual amongst the working-men in the granite stone quarry, and just where I was standing I heard a bell ring loudly, and all at once I saw about sixty or seventy men running towards where I was standing.—Just what I wanted! I found that the bell signified the firing of a shot in the quarry, hence danger. Now they came around the colporteur—listened eagerly to the gospel and bought freely of my good books, nearly emptied my knapsack and nearly filled my pocket with coppers. Previous to this I was very weary because of my heavy load of books. How good of the Lord to direct me to the right place at the right time! I came away with a light heart and a light load and offered up my little: prayer ‘ Lord, bless those good books and those few words spoken to the good of the men’s precious souls.’“
PRAYER UNDER THE HEDGE. — “The old man was standing up the sunny side of the hedge on the roadside. I went to him; and on offering a tract he said, I cannot read; I then spoke to him of sin and death, of salvation, and the Lord Jesus. I appealed to him as to a dying man, beseeching him to prepare to meet the good God whom he had been living without these upwards of eighty years; he trembled as one shivering on the brink of eternity and fearing to launch away, which according to the nature of things I assured him he must soon expect to do. Down aside the hedge we both got on our knees, and with liberty of soul earnestly besought that the converting grace and power of the Holy Ghost may be poured upon him that he may be enlightened and saved. Knowing now where he lives I shall hope, if God spares him and me, ere long to see him again and to see him saved of the Lord.”
PREACHING THE GOSPEL FROM HOUSE TO HOUSE. — “I have much encourage-merit in the Colportage Work. I find some of the people very willing to hear the word of God. Some days I have had what I should term a Cottage Meeting. Where I have found four and five people in one house, I have read, prayed, and sang for about an half-hour. Passing on to another house, where I have found another group, I spent another half-hour. I have had five, some days six, little Meetings with the people; at such times the Master has been with us, and much good has been. done.”
VISITING IN THE HOSPITAL.—” What changes we have! Several have died just lately, whom I expect to meet on the heavenly shore. Dear W. H., whom I visited in the Hospital, has passed away, leaving his testimony behind him. Mrs. M., too, after a lingering illness, has gone to be with Jesus. Also, Mrs. S., buried this afternoon. How joyful it will be to meet these again to whom God has made me a blessing.”
ADDRESSING THE COLLIERS. — October 2nd.—” Gave a short address to a company of Colliers; was received with welcome and delight. Spoke to them about the leper going to Jesus. Told them that we had hearts diseased by sin and wicked works:, and they needed cleansing. That we could not do anything to merit our salvation, but we could plead the merits of Jesus Christ, and that he was as willing to cleanse them as when he cleansed the leper, if they opened their hearts to receive Him. They expressed gratitude for speaking to them, and thanked me very much; said I had clone them good. Since then two of them have joined the Salvation Army. I believe I have been instrumental in God’s hands of their salvation; they thanked me for going.”
THE COLPORTEUR’S SABBATH.—” Visited about 50 homes with tracts, and spoke a few words where I could. Sunday School, 2.30, gave an address to teachers and scholars. Preached at a Lodging House at 5.30 and at Gospel Hall 6.30 and again in the Market at 8.35; then visited some sick people.”
“On Sundays I always endeavor to get among the groups of men at the corners, and wait on them at closing time, coming out of the public-houses, to present them with a tract, and persuade them to observe the Sabbath; not only have I been successful with individuals, but in two cases, of which I have heard, whole families have been induced to attend regularly the means of grace on the Sabbath ,day. To God be the glory.”
WORK IN LONDON COURTS. — “Thursday, February 17th. Weather, damp, gloomy, and uncomfortable without, and the scenes witnessed within the homes of the people were not any more inviting, for visiting many of the courts in Mount Street I came across many families living in a state of the greatest wretchedness, dirt, and squalor imaginable. The cottages are in a damp, dilapidated, and tumble-down condition. It is indeed wonderful to me how people manage to live under such circumstances. It is of course trot little that I can do in the way of selling in such places. Still my reception is not bad for such a neighborhood: having sold a copy of J. W. Kirton’s interesting little temperance story entitled Buy your own Cherries, in one of these cottages, on my last visit, the purchaser, as I was passing down the adjoining street to-day, sent out to me for another copy—the first having evidently made some impression in that court. In another of these courts I one day read the parable of the prodigal son to two or three apparently eager listeners. In the center of my district are the Columbia Buildings belonging to the Baroness Burdett Coutts. They contain eight blocks of tenements and are occupied by 188 families of the poorer class, which are visited consecutively by me.”
MAKING SALES ON LONDON BRIDGE.—”November 30th. Coming over London Bridge with a load of books from the Tabernacle I happened to be glancing at the new number of the Sword and Trowel for December, I was accosted by a man (a stranger) in a cart, who asked me if I had a copy to dispose of and he would buy i:; I sold him the one I had in my hand, and asked him to become a regular subscriber, to which he consented and gave me his name and address. It is thus possible to make sales in the busy crowded thoroughfare of this great city as well (though by no means as readily or frequently) as in the quiet roads and lanes of a Devonshire district.”
PREACHING SERVICES BY THE COLPORTEUR.—-According to their ability and opportunity many of the colporteurs are regularly engaged preaching the gospel both in the open air and as “supplies” for various denominations. Much blessing rests upon this which may be called the extra work of a colporteur. A few reports are given of this department of service:—
CONVERSION WORK.—” The preaching of the Word has been much blessed this last few months. One poor woman told me in a meeting that the Lord had made her so unhappy about her soul that she could not work. She then went down on her knees, and prayed as best she could, and the Lord had showed her the difference between believing about Christ and believing in Christ, which I had been talking about the last Sunday. She said, ‘I have been trying to get Christ and heaven by doings, but now I see it is a done work, and I can say I am in Christ and Christ in me.’ Two others have just been brought to know the Lord, and several drunkards have become sober men, who a little time ago would curse the name of such a man as myself.”
“There are many things to encourage me. My speaking at the chapel and Sunday-school, and other places, is very acceptable. The congregations have increased, and a greater earnestness is manifested by those who love the Lord, and it has been our joy to hear the cry of the penitent sinner for mercy. One man, in good circumstances, came to me at the close of a Sabbath evening service, and asked to be remembered in prayer. I visited him the next day, and talked and prayed with him, and I believe he is now a saved man. He is very regular at the week-night service, and. it is good to hear him pray. We have three stand proposed for membership, and another was crying for mercy last Thursday night in the meeting, and I believe the Spirit of God is working upon the hearts of several others.”
“In my last report I gave a description of eight villages lying east of my district. There is still a great awakening going on at —, especially among the congregation of the Baptist Chapel. Seven have been baptized and added to the little church there. I preach in this chapel one Sunday per month, and one of the above ‘was brought to a knowledge of his state by nature, and through the goodness of God sought and found peace, and is now rejoicing in Christ, through the blessing of God on my preaching. I have had people attribute their conversion to my prayers before, but this is the first fruit of my preaching.”
Besides these specially religious services, many of the colporteurs give special attention to temperance work, and some have been the means of reclaiming many drunkards.
THE COLPORTEUR AND TEMPERANCE.—”I am pleased to inform you that the book John Ploughman’s Pictures has been the means of leading one man to give up the drink, and since that has joined the Congregationalists, and he wishes me to tell Mr. Spurgeon that he owes his conversion to God through reading that book.”
“When I called there first I found they were a lot of drink-loving beings, but a moral change has been going on among them. One, on reading the book Happy Homes and How to Make Them, gave up smoking at once, and right glad was I to find that two of them had signed the pledge. When I called there, in December, one of them told me he spent on an average 7s per week on liquors. Owing to the snow I could not get there in January, but when I called in February, although they were busy, and could not stop long, they told me with evident pleasure that they still kept their pledge. Will the committee help me to pray for the other, who still holds to the evil? This is manifestly moral reform caused by reading.”
“Through the kind invitations of Capt. Smith I have given three temperance addresses to the’ soldiers at Hurst Castle, when several friends came from the neighboring villages and the Isle of Wight, and each time the large gunroom was so crowded that several had to stand the whole of the time; many have since signed the pledge, and the Captain told me he is sure they have done a deal of good, and hoped he should see me there again. I have also held a Bible class there, at which the Captain and a great number of soldiers and several of the lighthouse men were present. Thus I am led to ‘ Thank God and take courage.’
“On entering a public-house I found several men drinking. I begun to talk to them of the necessity of being decided for Christ. The landlady came and sat down with the men; I then tried to show them what the Savior had done for them and how He loved them; the landlady wept like a child; it seems as if they can stand as many oaths and curses as can be put upon them, but, thank God, they cannot stand to be told of the love of Jesus without feeling uncomfortable, especially the baser sort of people. I find that the name of Jesus has a power when everything else has failed: angels and men before him fall and devils fear and fly.
“Another very interesting case was one day in going to a village. Just as I got to the village there came a dreadful storm of thunder and lightning and rain, and the first house I came to was a public house. I ran into this house for shelter, and found it full of men drinking and gambling, with much swearing. I had not been in many minutes before one asked me what I had to sell; I at once put my pack on the table and showed what I had. They soon gave ,over swearing, and I spoke to them and tried to sell them a book each. I sold one John Ploughman’s Talk and another at a shilling, and a few little books, and a number left the house before I did and went home in the rain; when the rain gave over a bit I started for home without calling at any more houses. I came home with a light heart, though wet through with water.”
Chap 15. AUGUST, 1881.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
AUGUST, 1881.
INAUGURAL ADDRESS
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
IT is essential that we should exhibit faith in the form of confidence in God. Brothers, it would be a great calamity if it could be said of any one of you, “He had an excellent moral character, and remarkable gifts; ‘but he did not trust God.” Faith is a chief necessary. “Above all, taking the shield of faith” was the apostolic injunction. Alas, some men go to the fight, but leave their shield at home. It would be dreadful to think of a sermon as all a sermon ought to be in every respect except that the preacher did not Crust in the Holy Spirit to bless it to the conversion of souls; such a discourse is vain. No sermon is what it ought to be if faith be absent: as well say that a body is in health when life is extinct. It is admirable to see a man humbly conscious of weakness, and yet bravely confident in the Lord’s power to work through his infirmity. We may glory at large when God is our glory. Attempting great things, we shall not overdo ourselves in the attempt, and expecting great things, we shall not be disappointed in our expectation. Nelson was asked whether a certain movement of his ships was not perilous, and he replied, “Perilous it may be, but in naval affairs nothing is impossible, and nothing is improbable.” I make bold to assert that in the service of God nothing is impossible, and nothing is improbable. Go in, in the name of God; risk everything on his promise, and according to your faith shall it be done unto you.
The common policy of our churches is that of great prudence. We do not, as a rule, attempt anything beyond our strength. We measure means, and calculate possibilities with economical accuracy; then we strike off a large discount for contingencies, and a still larger as provision for our ease, and so we accomplish little because we have no idea of doing much. I would to God we had more “pluck.” I know of no fitter word: though the word may better suit the camp than he church, we will for once borrow from the barracks. Bear in mind that there is nothing like courage even in ordinary things. Sir Richard Sutton, when he was ambassador to Prussia, was taken by Frederick the Great to see his regiment of giants, every one of whom stood six feet six in his shoes. The king said to him, “Do you think any regiment in the English army could fight my men, man for man?” Sir Richard answered, “Please your majesty, I do not know whether the same number could beat your giants, but I know that half the number would try at it.” Let us attempt great things, for those who believe in the name of the Lord succeed beyond all expectation. By faith the worker lives. The right noble Earl of Shaftesbury said the other afternoon of Ragged-school teachers and their work,—” It was evident, to all thinking persons that we had a great danger in the ignorance of the children of the loner classes, and so the senators began to think of it, and the philosophers began to think of it, and good men of all sorts began to think of it; but while they were all engaged in thinking, a few plain, humble people opened Ragged-schools, and did it.” This is the kind of faith of which we need more and more: we need so to trust in God as to put our hand to the plough in his name. It is idle to spend time in making and altering plans, and doing nothing else; the best plan for doing God’s work is to do it. Brothers, if you do not believe in anybody else, believe in God without stint. Believe up to the hilt. Bury yourselves, both as to your weakness and your strength, in simple trust in God. “Oh,” said one, “as to that man, there is no telling what mad thing he will start next.” Let the sneer pass;, though it may be as well to say, “I am not mad, most noble Festus; but carry out, works of truth and soberness.” The end of all things will show that faith in God is sanctified common sense, without an atom of folly in it. To believe God’s word is the most reasonable thing we can do, it is the plainest course that we can take, and the safest policy that we can adopt, even as to taking care of ourselves; for Jesus says, “Whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel’s, the same shall save it.” Let us stake all upon the faithfulness of God, and we shall never be ashamed or confounded, world without end.
You must also have faith in God in the form of expectancy. Our brethren Smith and Fullerton would not have a blessing on their work if they did not expect the blessing to come; but expecting the blessing, they provide an inquiry-room, and persons to look after the converts. Shall we commence farming and provide no barn? In many a village the Lord has saved souls under the preaching of the gospel, but the minister has never said, “I shall be in the vestry on such and such an evening to see inquirers,” or, “I shall stop after the sermon to talk with the anxious.” He has never given the people a chance of telling what the Lord has done for them, and if he should hear that a dozen people have been convinced of sin, he would be surprised, and fear that they were hypocrites. We have not so learned Christ. We look to take fish in our nets, and to reap harvests in our fields. Is it so with you, my brethren? Let it be more so. “Open thy mouth wide,” saith the Lord, “and I will fill it.” So pray and so preach that if there are no conversions you will be astonished, amazed, and broken-hearted. Look for the salvation of your hearers as much as the angel who will sound the last trump will look for the waking of the dead. Believe your own doctrine! Believe your own Savior! Believe in the Holy Ghost who dwells in you! For thus shall you see your hearts’ desire, and God shall be glorified.
IV. It is time to talk of the fourth thing, namely, LIFE. The preacher must have life; he must have life in himself. Are you all alive, my brother? Of course you have been quickened as a plain believer; but as a minister are you altogether alive? If there is a bone in a man’s body which is not alive, it becomes the nidus of disease; for instance, a decayed tooth may cause more serious injury than most people imagine. In a living system a dead portion is out of place, and is sure sooner or later to create intense pain. It is a wise arrangement that it should be so, for decay has a tendency to spread, and mischief might; be caused imperceptibly if pain did not sound the alarm bell. I hope that any part of our soul which is not truly alive may pain us till the evil is removed.
Some brethren never seem to be thoroughly alive. Their heads are alive, they are intelligent and studious; but alas! their hearts are inactive, cold, lethargic. Many preachers never spy out opportunities, for death seems to have sealed up their eyes, and their tongue also is not half quickened, so that they mumble and stumble, and all around them sleep rules the hour. I have been told that if certain preachers would only for once stamp a foot, or lift a handkerchief, or <to anything out of their regular way, it would be a relief to their people. I hope none of you have become quite so mechanical; but I know that some are heavy and yet not weighty, solemn and yet not impressive. My brother, I want you to be alive from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head, alive in brain and heart, in tongue and hand, in eye and ear. The living God should be served by living men. Labor to be alive in all your duties. John Bradford, the martyr, used to say, “I never go away from any part of the service of God till I feel thoroughly alive in it, and know that the Lord is with me in it.” Carry out this rule conscientiously. In confessing sin, go on confessing till you feel that your tears have washed the Savior’s feet. In seeking pardon, continue to seek till the Holy Spirit bears witness to your peace with God. In preparing a sermon, wait upon the Lord until you have communion with Christ in it, until the Holy Spirit causes you to feel the power of the truth which you are to deliver. “Son of man, eat this roll.” Before you attempt to give out the word to others get it into yourself. Is there not too much dead praying, and dead preaching, and dead church work of all sorts? Do you not know churches which are like the ghostly ship in the legend: the captain, the mate, and all the crew are dead men?
“The mariners all do work the ropes
As they’ve been wont to do;
They raise their limbs like lifeless tools—
They are a ghastly crew.
The body of my deacon’s self
Stands by me knee to knee:
The body and I pull at one rope,
But nothing of life have we.”
This is a grim business, but I have beheld such a sight, though never have I seen a ghost. I recollect being years ago in a church which was almost defunct externally, and altogether defunct internally, and after sermon, during which I felt a terrible chill of soul, I went into the vestry, and there I saw two important persons leaning heavily against the fire-place. I said to them, “Are you the deacons of the church?” They answered, “Yes, sir.” I replied, “I thought so!” I did not explain further. These pillars of the church evidently needed propping up. Sluggish ease will not do! Brethren, we must have life more abundantly, each one of us, and it must flow out into all the duties of our office: warm spiritual life must be manifest in the prayer, in the singing, in the preaching, and even in the shake of the hand and the good word after service. I delight in these Conferences because they are living assemblies; the room does not feel like a vault, nor do you salute each other like a set of living skeletons without hearts, or a company of respectable mandarins fresh from the tea-shops, who nod and bow mechanically. I cannot endure meetings where the only exhibition of life is seen in heated discussions over points of order, amendments, and movings of the previous question. One marvels at the little things over which an assembly will waste hours of precious time, contending as if the destiny of the whole world and the fate of the starry heavens depended upon the debate. How the mountain heaves, but how small a mouse is born! Brethren, may you be alive, and keep alive, and disseminate your life. We read in Plato that the Egyptian priests and concerning the Greeks, “You Greeks are always youths, there is not an old man among you.” Neither, sirs, is there an old man among us at this hour; we are full of youth even unto this day, and if you want to see one whose vigor and cheerfulness prove that his grey hairs are all external, there sits the man [-pointing to Mr. George Rogers-]. It is a grand thing to be perpetually renewing your youth, never getting into the ruts, but making new tracks with your glowing wheels. Those who are old when they are young, are likely to be young when they are old. I like to see the liveliness of the child associated with the gravity of the father; but especially do I rejoice to see a godly man keep up the vivacity, the joy, the earnestness of his first love. It is a crime to permit our fires to burn low while experience yields us more and more abundant fuel. Be it ours to go from strength to strength:, from life to more abundant life.
Be full of life at all times, and let that life be seen in your ordinary conversation. It is a shocking state of things when good people say, “Our minister undoes in the parlor what he has done,, in the pulpit; he preaches very well, but his life does not agree with his sermons.” Our Lord Jesus would have us perfect even as our Father who is in heaven is perfect. Every Christian should be holy; but we are laid under a sevenfold obligation to it. God help us so to live that we may be safe examples to our flocks: how can we expect the divine blessing if it be not so? In such a case life will go out of us to others. The man whom God uses for quickening is the man who is himself quickened. May we and our people become like those ornamental waters which we have seen while traveling in foreign parts; the water leaps up as a fountain, and descends into a basin; when that basin is full the crystal runs over the brink in a sparkling sheet and rolls into another basin, and the process is repeated again and again till the result charms the eye. At our Conference, my brethren, may the living waters flow into us, and then flow from us till thousands shall receive a blessing, and communicate it to others “He that believeth in him, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” God fill you to the brim, and cause you to overflow. This is essential: life we must have. If among us there is a slumbering brother, who does everything in a slow way, let him wake up. If anyone among us performs his duty in a lifeless manner, as if lie were paid by the pound, and would not give half an ounce over, let him also wake up. Our work requires that we serve the Lord with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our mind, and with all our strength. Ours is no place for half-heartedness. Go, ye dead ones, take a chaplain’s place at the cemetery and bury your dead; but work among living men needs life—vigorous, intense life. A corpse among angelic choirs would not be more out of place than a lifeless man in the gospel ministry: God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.
V. The last thing, but not the least important, is LOVE. Assuredly we must abound in love. It is a hard thing for some preachers to saturate and perfume their sermons with love; for their natures are hard, or cold, or coarse, or selfish. We are none of us all that we ought to be, but some are specially poverty-stricken in point of love. They do not “naturally care” for the souls of men, as Paul puts it. To all, but especially to the harder sort, we would say, be doubly earnest as to holy charity, for without this you will be no more than sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. Love is power. The Holy Spirit for the most part works by our affection. Love men to Christ; faith accomplishes much, but love is the actual instrument by which faith works out its desires in the name of the Lord of love.
Brethren, love your work. You will never preach well unless you are enamored of it: you will never do well in any particular charge unless you love the people, and I would almost say the village and the meeting-house. I would have you believe that Slocum-in-the-Marsh is a gem among villages. Think that London may be all very well as a city, but as a village Slocum bears the palm. Even your chapel, with all its plainness, should have charms for you: be of opinion that the Tabernacle is very well in its way, but that it has great deficiencies about it; that it is too big for one thing—at ]east, too big for you. Your meeting-house holds only three hundred and twenty; but in your judgment that is quite as large a number as one man can see after with any hope of success; at least, it involves a responsibility quite as large as you desire to bear. When a mother’s love to her children leads her to believe that they are the sweetest in the parish, she takes more care in their washing and their dressing; if she thought them ugly, troublesome beings, she would neglect them; and I am sure that until ‘we heartily love our work, and love the people with whom we are working, we shall not accomplish much. I can truly say that I do riot know anybody in all the world that I would like to change places with. “Ah,” say you, “that is very likely, for you have a fine position.” I am quite of that opinion; but I thought just the same of my little pastorate at Waterbeach, and it was with the utmost reluctance that I removed from the first to the second. I still retain the belief that there were people in my first congregation whose like I shall never see again, and that as a position of usefulness there are great attractions about that Cambridgeshire village. It is a rule to which I know of no exception, that to prosper in any work you must have an enthusiasm for it.
You must have also intense love to the souls of men, if you are to influence them for good. Nothing can compensate for the absence of this. Soulwinning must be your passion, you must be born to it; it must be the very breath of your nostrils, the only thing for which you count life worth the having. We must hunt after souls, even as the Swiss hunter pursues the chamois because the spirit of the chase has mastered him. Above all, we must feel an intense love to God. Our dear brother who led us in prayer this morning rightly spoke of the power which girds us when we burn with love to God. Why is it we tell children and young people, “You must love Jesus in order to be saved “? This is not the gospel. The gospel is, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” We are careful to state the matter correctly to the grown people; why give it inaccurately to the young? If we make a difference at all it will be wiser to tell the children to believe, and the old people to love: the error will be less injurious, for love is the great lack of most men. The holy grace of love needs to be more preached among us, and more felt by us. “Oh,” said a woman when she was speaking of the Lord to her minister, “He has heard my prayer many a time, and I can have ‘what I want or’ him, for by his grace I am very thick with him.” She meant that communion had wrought sweet fellowship, and so her prayers were heard. O that we lived on familiar terms with the Wellbeloved, and felt his love within our bosoms always. Love to God will help a man to persevere in service when otherwise he would have given up his work. “The love of Christ constraineth us,” said one whose heart was all his Master’s. I heard one say the other day that the “love of Christ ought to constrain us.” This is true, but Paul did not so much speak of a duty as of a fact; he said “the love of Christ constraineth us.”
Beloved brethren, if you are filled with love to your work, and love to souls, and love to God, you will gladly endure many self-denials, which else would be unbearable. The poverty of our country brethren is very trying, and ought by all means to be relieved; but we may well feel proud that so many men are forthcoming who, for the sake of preaching the gospel of Christ, are willing to leave remunerative callings and endure hardness. Other denominations might pay theta better, but they spurn the golden bribe, and remain faithful to Christ and to the ordinances as they were delivered. All honor to those lifelong martyrs who put up with sore privations for the sake of Christ and his church. The devil once met a Christian man, so I have heard, and said to him, “You call yourself a servant of God. What do you do more than I do? You boast that, you fast, so do I; for I neither eat nor drink. You do not commit adultery; neither do I.” The fiend mentioned a long list of sins of which he is incapable, from which he could therefore claim exemption. The saint at last said to him, “I do one thing which thou never didst; I deny myself.” That; is the point in which the Christian comes out: he denies himself for Christ’s sake; believing in Jesus, he counts all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, his Lord. Brethren, do not leave your charges because the stipend is small. Your poor people must: be looked after by somebody. Do not despair when times are hard, for they will be better byand by; and meanwhile your heavenly Father knows your needs. We have heard of men who have remained in plague-stricken cities when others fled, because they could be of service to the sick. Abide, then, with your people when work fails them; be as faithful to your God as many a man has been faithful to his philanthropy. If’ you can anyhow manage to tide over the present distress, stick to the people. God will help you, and reward you, if you have faith in him. May the Lord confirm your confidence, and comfort you in your tribulation.
Go on, brethren, go on preaching the same gospel; but preach it with more faith, and preach it better every day. Do not draw back: your place is to the front. Qualify yourselves for larger spheres, you that are in little places; but do not neglect your studies to look after better positions. Be prepared for an opening when it comes, and rest assured that the office will come to the man who is fit for the office. We are not so cheap that we need go hawking ourselves in every market; the churches are always on the look-out for really efficient preachers. Men whose fitness for the ministry is doubtful are at a great discount nowadays; but for men of ability and usefulness there is great demand.
You cannot hide a candle under a bushel, and you cannot keep a really able man in an insignificant position. Patronage is of the smallest importance; fitness for the work, grace, ability, earnestness, and a loving disposition soon push the man into his place. God will bring his servant into his true position, if he has but faith to trust in him. I put this word at the tail-end of my address, because I know the discouragements under which you labor. Do not be afraid of hard work for Christ; a terrible reckoning awaits those who have an easy time in the ministry, but a great reward is in reserve for those who endure all things for the elect’s sake. You will not regret your poverty when Christ cometh, and calleth his own servants to him. It will be a sweet thing to have died at your post, not turning aside for wealth, or running from Dan to Beersheba to obtain a better salary, but stopping where your Lord bade you hold the fort.
Brethren, consecrate yourselves to God afresh. Bring hither new cords. Bind the sacrifice again to the altar! Struggle as it may, anxious to escape the knife, fearful of the fire, yet bind it with cords, even with cords, to the horns of the altar; for until death, and in death, we are the Lord’s. Entire surrender of everything to Jesus is our watchword this day. Only may the Lord accept the living sacrifice, for Jesus Christ’s sake. Amen.
NOTES
We have lately felt more than ever the burden of souls, and a strong desire for a special visitation of grace to our churches. Our heart wanted vent. Hence we begged those of our friends who could snare the time to come together an hour before the week-night services to pray for a blessing. Before the lecture on Thursday we have had some of the most real and intense prayer that we have ever known. Perhaps some brother minister may take the Lint, and see whether his people would not assemble with much enthusiasm to pray for a blessing upon their pastor and the service about to be held. Where regular prayer-meetings flag it is well to hold others, at different hours. Better get the people together a; dead of night than let them fall into a dead condition.
In answer to many inquiries, we are glad to speak of improved health. No summer holiday will be taken, for the many Sundays spent in the sick-room forbid any further absence from home. Neither can we travel far afield, for home work is so pressing. What with managing everything, preparing the weekly sermon, editing the magazine, and writing books, we are not doing badly when we fill up our weeks as we do. Here is a specimen week in which we did no more than ordinarily, but a little more than usual was visible to the common observer:—Five sermons, three prayer-meetings, chair at two public meetings, speech at a third, one communion, one College afternoon of two hours’ lecturing. Some of these occupied far more time in preparation than in the actual doing of them. We are thankful to be able to work. Oh that we could accomplish far more. We need the prayers of all loving friends that God would give us more of his divine blessing. What is all that we can do without his Spirit?
With regard to the Revised New Testament, in answer to many inquiries we are only able to go thus far. It is a valuable addition to our versions, but it will need much revision before it will be fit for public use. To translate well, the knowledge of two languages is needed: the men of the New Testament company are strong in Greek, but weak in English. Comparing the two, in our judgment the old version is the better.
On Monday afternoon July 4, between one and two hundred of the Baptist pastors, church officers, and members in the South of London accepted an invitation, issued at the suggestion of Mr. Baynes, the secretary of the Baptist Missionary Society, to a tea and conference at the Tabernacle. The special object of the meeting was to consider the desirability of appointing some brother or sister in each church whose duty it should be to keep the members well supplied with the latest information concerning foreign missions, to endeavor to increase the number of both large and small subscriptions, and in general to act as the connecting link between the Society and the church. Our beloved friend and senior deacon, Mr. William Olney, will represent us at the Tabernacle, and he will doubtless take every opportunity of fulfilling his office of Missionary Remembrancer. Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presided, addresses were delivered by Mr. Baynes and the Rev. G. H. Rouse, and the following brethren took part either in the conference or the prayer-meeting which followed;—Pastors W. Alderson, W. P. Cope, W. Howieson, and J. A. Spurgeon, and Mr. W. Olney. Many churches are no doubt collecting for missions in a business-like way, but to those who are not doing so we would earnestly suggest the immediate setting apart of a brother, and perhaps a sister also, for the special work of ingathering the offerings made to this portion of the Lord’s work. Very much is lost for want of baskets in which to gather up the fragments. ‘We are not doing all we ought to be doing for the perishing millions of heathen. Stall we always murder their souls by letting them die through our negligence? The very least thing we can do is to make arrangements for the flow of the stream of liberality in the right direction, We know a church which two years ago had only one or two subscribers to the Mission, which now by a single effort sends in some £200 of private donations, because a brother takes the pains to gather them in.
COLLEGE.—Mr. J. G. Williams, having completed his College course, has joined the Evangelization Society; and Mr. F. Potter has gone for three months to Nash’s-street, Frome, to endeavor to re-establish the church, which has fallen to the lowest ebb. The following brethren have removed:— Mr. J. Kitchener, from Liskeard to York-road, Leeds: Mr. B. Speed, from Milns-bridge, to Lindsay-road, Sunderland; Mr. It. Charmer, from Sarratt, to Sutton-on-Trent: Mr. G. Pring, from Southbank, to Wolsingham, Durham; Mr. J. Ney, from Amersham, to Church, Lancashire: and Mr. G. Monk, from Thetford, to Bures St. Mary, Suffolk. We believe that in each case the change is one for which there are excellent reasons, and that the kingdom of Christ will be advantaged thereby.
The students of the College will re-. assemble on Tuesday, August 9th. We beg for much prayer, that holiness and sound doctrine may abound, and that by all their studies the men may be made abler minis-tots of the New Covenant. Oh for more soul-winning preachers of the Word! We beseech our beloved friends not to forget this College work, which is fraught with eternal results to the church and the world.
EVANGELISTS.—In another part o:! the magazine we have given an account of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s work at Sheffield. After a month’s rest they intend invading London, going around the suburbs, and closing up at the Tabernacle. Those churches which desire a visit from them should write speedily to Mr. Charlesworth, for the arrangements will soon be made. How we wish that the ministers of London would combine like those of Sheffield, and so secure a grand universal movement of the church: then might a great blessing be expected from the Lord himself.
The following letter is a specimen of what we receive from many places visited by Mr. Burnham:—
“Morley, Leeds,
“June 23, 1881.
“My dear Mr. Spurgeon,—You will be pleased to hear that the visit of Mr. Burnham to Morley has been accompanied with most blessed results.
“He has been staying at our home, as we have no one who could entertain him, and – the Lord has so graciously blessed his words that both my daughters, aged respectively twelve and fourteen, with the servant, have been led to decide for Christ, with a great many more from Mrs. Davis’s Bible-class and the congregation. Our hearts are too full for utterance when we think of our own being led so early to be Christ’s disciples. God bless you, dear sir, is our prayer for sending out such men.
“With very kind regards,
“I am, yours very truly,
“R. DAVIS.
“Rev. C. H. Spurgeon.”
ORPHANAGE. — The Annual Fete, in celebration of the President’s fortyseventh birthday, was held on Wednesday, June 22, and proved in every respect a great success, for which we are devoutly thankful, first to our loving Lord., and next to the thousands of faithful friends who once again came to encourage and help us in our work of caring for the widow and the fatherless. Our long columns of receipts testify to the unflagging interest in the institution, and the kind wishes that accompanied the gifts, whether presented in person or through the post, expressed the same delightful feeling. Altogether the proceeds of the day amounted to between £1,400 and £1,500, most of which, as the figures will show, was wisely given to help the general fund for maintaining both boys and girls. We are glad our subscribers did not rob Jack and Tom to help Mary and Maggie; but we should like all friends to remember that a considerable sum is still needed Before the houses, which are approaching completion, can be fully furnished. The President had great pleasure in announcing that, with the help of a legacy left by the late Mr. Vickery, he would be enabled to furnish all the fittings for the school-rooms at a cost of about £300.
In the evening two large public meetings were held in the open-air, the principal one Being under the presidency of Hugh Mason, Esq., M.P., who not only spoke most lovingly of the President, and enthusiastically of the Orphanage, but gave the noble donation of a hundred guineas as a practical proof of his sympathy. The other speakers were the President, and his brother J. A. Spurgeon, and son, C. Spurgeon, and the Revs. A. G. Brown, W. Cuff, Arthur Hall, Newman Hall, LL.B., Hugh Price Hughes, M.A., E. Maclean, and T. V. Tymms, most of whom rendered us a double service by speaking at both gatherings. The afternoon’s proceedings were greatly enlivened by the excellent performance of the band from Dr. Barnardo’s Home; and after the meetings were over the members of the Southwark Choral Society, under the efficient leadership of Mr. Courtnay, discoursed sweet music to a large, audience. The commissariat was, as usual, managed in first-rate style by Mr. Murrell and his little army of helpers, to all of whom we again present our hear(test thanks. The day will come when it will be seen to be a greater honor to have had a share in blessing the fatherless than in winning victories over vanquished nations.
A Word to Collectors. — We still find some difficulty in getting in tell collecting boxes and books, and therefore we very kindly remind all collectors that we shall be glad if they will at once forward the amounts they have received, whether they are large or small, and get fresh boxes and books, as the old ones are not available after the annual meeting, and should not ‘be used for collecting unless they have been returned and reissued.
How about the Bazaar? Christmas is coming, and will be here before we are ready for it unless we make the most of the sunny hours while they last. Oar friends at Mansfield-street Sunday-school write that they are determined to make their stall one of the best in the Bazaar. Two generous helpers have agreed to send about £60 worth of goods from their stock, and the teachers and scholars hope to collect an equal amount. Their representative says, “There is very little difficulty in collecting articles for fife Bazaar, as the work of helping the fatherless and widow commands the sympathy of all. Unsold goods will remain the properly of the Orphanage.”
Mr. Pearce reports that the Tabernacle Sunday-school teachers have set apart Tuesday evenings for work, and that they and their scholars will do their utmost to make the Bazaar a success. Many other helpers are, doubtless, equally in earnest, but they have not yet sent us word what they are doing.
Please pay special attention to the advertisement on the last page of the Orphanage report.
One of our “old boys” writes us from New Zealand a very cheering let(or. Our readers may be glad to see what he says of the Orphanage after seven years absence:—”I should like to know how the Orphanage is going on now. I expect there are none of the boys whom I knew so well now left there. I often think of the time when I was there too, and feel grateful to God for the way he has led me, for it was owing to the religious instruction I got there that I was led to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. We have no Baptist church here yet, but steps are being taken now to form one, and I intend joining it as soon as it is formed. I am now connected with the Wesleyan church rind Sunday-school, and have a class of little boys of whom I am very fond.” The writer is just out of his apprenticeship to the painting and sign-writing business, and sends £1 for the institution which in his hour of need befriended him.
COLPORTAGE. — Mr. W. Cordon Jones, the General Secretary, writes:— “Dear Mr. Spurgeon,—The direct results of Colportage as an evangelizing agency are not often so forcibly illustrated as I have seen them during the present month in the district of Malden, Essex, where our colporteur, Mr. J. Keddie, has labored with much blessing for about five years. Besides regularly visiting a wide district, and making a fail’ sale of books, etc., many open-air services have been held, and cottage-meetings conducted. A former colporteur, Mr. Pearce, opened a cottage for preaching, and I had personal conversation with some who attributed their conversion to his labors there. After Mr. Keddie took up the work, the place soon became too small, and the people had to go away for want of room. This led to their making an effort to build a mission chapel on a piece of land let to them at a peppercorn rent. By the assistance of friends, a beautiful and convenient place has been erected, and on Thursday, 7th July, I had the privilege of preaching at the opening service, when the chapel was quite full. In the evening, the mayor of Malden presided at a meeting in a large barn, and stated that the building, which cost about £130, was practically free from debt.”
This case is a confirmation of a part of the report of the Southern Association, just issued, which says: —
“There is one distinct characteristic of this colportage work upon which your committee lay especial stress, and because of which they would urge the importance of maintaining and even extending it. It is its home-mission and evangelistic character. It is not’ merely the selling of literature of a healthy moral tone, or of copies of God’s word; there is also the utterance by the living voice of the words of eternal life, in the visits to the homes of the people, and by the bedside of the sick and dying; there is the teaching in the Sabbath-school and in Bible-classes for adults; and there is, further, the public preaching of the gospel; for everyone of your colporteurs engages in this work, and most of them every Sabbath day. Besides these, there is the employment of other means, the influence of which is favorable to the interests of true religion. Your committee are the more concerned to emphasize this feature of colportage, because of the readiness in some quarters to regard it exclusively as a book-hawking agency, altogether ignoring, if not denying, its missionary and evangelistic character.”
The Lancashire Association has just taken a colporteur on in the Accrington district, and we hope that other friends will avail themselves of this very efficient agency, and apply for a colporteur. The committee are still able to appoint men to a district where £ 40 a year is guaranteed. If any friends wish for further information he annual re-pert can still be had on application to the Secretary. The work is prospering, but we need funds to maintain it and extend its blessings.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle:—June 2nd, thirteen: 27th, nineteen; 30th, ten.
ANNUAL REPORT
OF THE
STOCKWELL ORPHANAGE
1880-81.
TRUSTEES: WHO ARE ALSO MANAGERS.
C. H. SPURGEON, PRESIDENT.
J.A. SPURGEON, VICE-PRESIDENT.
WILLIAM HIGGS, TREASURER.
WILLIAM P. OLNEY. THOMAS H. OLNEY.
JOSEPH PASSMORE. B. WILDON CARR.
WILLIAM C. MURRELL HENRY SMITH.’
WILLIAM MILLS CHARLES F. ALLISON.
HON. CONSULTING PHYSICIAN.
HENRY GERVIS, ESQ., M.D.
HON. CONSULTING SURGEON.
J. COOPER FORSTER, ESQ, F.R.C.S.
HON. CONSULTING OPHTHALMIC SURGEON.
J. C. WORDSWORTH, ESQ., F.R.C.S.
HON. DENTIST.
W. O. HINCHLIFF, ESQ.
MEDICAL OFFICER.
WILLLAM SOPER, ESQ., M.R.C.S.E., L.S.A.
SOLICITOR.
THOMAS C. PAGE.
HEAD MASTER SECRETARY.
VERNON J. CHARLESWORTH, FREDERICK G. LADDS.
THE STOCKWELL ORPHANAGE FOR
BOYS AND GIRLS.
Application for the admission of destitute Fatherless Children, between the ages of six and ten, should be addressed in writing to the Secretary, and full particulars given. As the number of candidates is largely in excess of the accommodation, the Trustees may decline to issue a form; for if; would be useless to cause trouble when there is no prospect of success. If a form be granted, it must not be regarded as any indication that the application will succeed. The questions upon the form must be fully and frankly answered by the applicant, and the form returned as soon as possible. The slightest untruthfulness will necessitate the immediate rejection of the ease. Unhealthy, deformed, and imbecile children are not eligible. Only children born in wedlock can be received. Under no possible circumstances can exceptions be made to this rule, as the trust is definite and unalterable.
If the case is entered on the list of candidates, the Trustees appoint a visitor to make personal inquiries. Should these be satisfactory, the child will appear before the Committee in due course, and if among the most needy and deserving at the time, it will probably be recommended for admission to the Institution, as soon as there is room. Friends who are only acquainted with the case in which they are specially interested must not be surprised at its rejection by the Trustees at, any stage if it is proved by them to be less necessitous than others; nor must they wonder if the child is declined because of unsuitability, for the Institution is not a Hospital, or a Reformatory, or an Idiot Asylum. The election of children not being determined by subscribers’ votes, the Trustees maintain the strictest impartiality while considering the claims of the various applicants, and the greatest need always has the loudest voice with them.
Applicants are requested not to call upon the Trustees privately, as they are bound not to attend to them otherwise than officially. Cases will be considered on their own merits, and they will derive no advantage from personal solicitation. Mr. Spurgeon cannot personally see any applicants, and should not be written to. All letters on this business must be addressed to the Secretary, Stockwell Orphanage, London, S.W.
The Institution is mainly supported by spontaneous gifts, a number of donors sending as regularly, year by year, as if they were pledged to do so. An increase to the number of subscribers would greatly cheer the President’s heart. Now that girls are coming in the income needs to be doubled. Will not the reader of this Report become a helper? Subscriptions, large or small, will be gratefully received by C. H. SPURGEON, Westwood, Beulah Hill, Upper Norwood, S.E. Gifts of Food, Stores, Clothes, Books, Toys, and useful articles are always welcome, and should be directed to
VERNON J. CHARLESWORTH, Head Master,
The Orphanage, Stockwell, London, S.W.
NOTE.—Letters requiring an answer should contain a stamped, directed envelope
REPORT 1880-81.
With profound gratitude to our heavenly Father we issue the Twelfth Report, of the Stockwell Orphanage, and our gratitude will be shared, we doubt not, by all who have given of their substance towards the maintenance and development of the Institution. We, therefore, invite all our readers to “Rejoice with us,” in the tokens of the divine favor which have crowned our labors during another year. “The Lord hath been mindful of us: He will bless us.”
When we remember how this gracious work began by the consecrated thought of a holy woman, and then grew into an actual gift from her hand, and further developed, by the large help of others, into houses, and schools, infirmary, and dining-hall, and all manner of provision for destitute children, we feel bound to cry, “What hath God wrought!” Our God has supplied all our need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. The story of the Stockwell Orphanage will be worth telling in heaven when the angels shall learn from the church the manifold wisdom and goodness of the Lord. Incidents which could not be published on earth will be made known in the heavenly city, where every secret thing shall be revealed, How every need has been supplied before it has become a want, how guidance has been given before questions have become anxieties, how friends have been raised up in unbroken succession, and how the One Great Friend has been ever present, no single pen can ever record. To care for the fatherless has been a work of joyful faith all along, and in waiting’ upon God for .supplies we have experienced great delight. The way of faith in God is the best possible. We could not have carried on the work by a method more pleasant, more certain, more enduring. If we had depended upon annual subscribers, we should have had to hunt them up, and pay a heavy poundage, or perhaps fail to keep up the roll; if we had advertised continually for funds, our outlay might have brought in a scanty return: but dependence upon God has been attended with no such hazards. We have done our best as men of business to keep the Orphanage before the public, but we have desired in all things to exercise faith as servants of God. Whatever weakness we have personally to confess and deplore, there is no weakness in the plan of faith in God. Our experience compels us to declare that he is the living God, the God that heareth prayer, the God who will never permit those who trust in him to be confounded. The business world has passed through trying times during the last few years, but the Orphanage has not been tried; men of great enterprise have failed, but the home for the fatherless has not failed, for this enterprise is in the divine hand; an eye watches over it which neither slumbers nor sleeps.
Let the people of God be encouraged by the fact of the existence and prosperity of the Stockwell Orphanage. Miracles have come to an end, but God goes on to work great wonders: the rod of Moses is laid aside, but the rod and staff of the Great Shepherd still compass us.
The son of an old Puritan rode some twenty miles to meet his father who came a similar distance to the half-way house. “Father,” said the son, “I have met with a special providence, for my horse stumbled at least a dozen times, and yet it did not fall.” “Ah,” replied the father, “I have had a providence quite as remarkable, for my horse did not stumble once all the way.” This last is the happy picture of the Orphanage for some time past, and indeed throughout its whole career: we have never had to issue mournful appeals because of exhausted resources, and in this we must see and admire the good hand of the Lord.
We now enter more fully upon a fresh stage of our existence; we shall need to double the amount of our present income, and we shall have it from the ever opened hand of the Lord our God. Friends will be moved to think of our great family, for our great Remembrancer will stir them up. The duty of each Christian to the mass of destitute orphanhood is clear enough, and if pure minds are stirred up by way of remembrance there will be no lack in the larder, no want in the wardrobe, no failing in the funds of our Orphan House.
We labor under one great difficulty: many people say, “Mr. Spurgeon will be sure to get the money, and there is no need for us to send.” It is clear that if everybody talked so, our President’s name would be a hindrance instead of a help. He will be the means of finding money for our Institution, for the Lord will honor his faith and hear his prayers, and be glorified in him; but there will be no thanks due to those who fabricate an excuse for. themselves out of the faithfulness of God. This difficulty, however, does not distress us: we go forward believing that when we have twice our present number of children the Lord will send us double supplies; we cannot entertain the suspicion that the girls will be left without their portion, for we, being evil, care as much for our daughters as for our sons, and our heavenly Father will do the same. It is well, however, to remind our friends of this, that each helper of the Orphanage may try to interest another generous heart, and so enlarge the circle of our friends. It may be that by such means the Great Provider will supply us; for we know that when our Lord fed the multitude he first said to his disciples, “Give ye them to eat.”
After having made these observations, we will allow our report to pursue the usual tenor of its way. The reader will be interested by it if he is already interested in it.
The growth of the Institution will be seen in the following table of figures:—
1 | From Aug., 1867, to March, 1870 | 154 | 154 | 6 | 6 | 143 |
2 | From April, 1870, to March,1871 | 42 | 196 | 7 | 13 | 183 |
3 | From April, 1871, to March, 1872 | 38 | 234 | 9 | 22 | 212 |
4 | From April, 1872, to March, 1873 | 21 | 255 | 15 | 37 | 218 |
5 | From April, 1873, to March, 1874 | 36 | 391 | 38 | 75 | 216 |
6 | From April, 1874. to March, 1875 | 63 | 354 | 42 | 117 | 237 |
7 | From April, 1875, to March, 1876 | 28 | 382 | 29 | 146 | 236 |
8 | From April, 1876, to March, 1877 | 46 | 428 | 52 | 198 | 230 |
9 | From April, 1877, to March, 1878 | 51 | 479 | 47 | 245 | 234 |
10 | From April, 1878 , to March, 1897 | 48 | 527 | 38 | 283 | 244 |
11 | From April 1879, to March, 1880 | 41 | 568 | 41 | 324 | 244 |
12 | From April, 1880, to March, 1881 | 42 | 610 | 44 | 368 | 242 |
Number of Girls received—36. Left—2. In residence—31.
Total number of Children received—646. Number in residence, April, 1881—276.
Of the 44 boys who left during the year, 32 were sent to situations, 8 were returned to their friends; 3 were dismissed on the re-marriage of their mothers, and 1 was removed by death. The story of the little boy who died forms No. 6 of the Stockwell Orphanage Tracts, price one halfpenny, or 3s. per 100, which are useful/’or insertion in letters.*
No difficulty is experienced in finding situations for the boys as soon as they are ready to leave the Institution, merchants and tradesmen accounting it a privilege to assist us in this important branch of our undertaking. In several instances the relatives of the boys have been able to procure situations for them in their own locality, and have very properly assumed parental oversight and control.
The sanitary condition of the Orphanage has been all that we could desire. Considering that so large a proportion of the children come to us in a delicate condition, and some with the taint, of hereditary disease, it is a matter for devout thankfulness that their general health is so good, and that so few deaths have occurred. Oat of the entire number who haw left, only one boy was unable to enter upon a situation, in consequence of an enfeebled constitution. ‘We owe it to an ever-watchful Providence that, during the prevailing epidemic, not a single case of fever or small-pox has occurred in the Institution.
The Institution being open to ALL CLASSES of the community,
the following table shows the wide range of its operations as to the parentage of the children, to the end of March, 1881:—
Mechanics 133
Laborers and others 110
Shopkeepers and Salesmen 112
Manufacturers and Tradesmen 25
Clerks 65
Ministers and Missionaries 24
Mariners and Watermen 18
Commercial Travelers 13
Schoolmasters and Teachers 13
Railway Employees 9
Policemen 7
Accountants 6
Merchants and Commission Agents 6
Cab Proprietors and Coachmen 5
Farmers 4
Postmen 4
Surgeons and Dentists 4
Solicitors 3
Journalists 2
Fireman 1
Soldier 1
Gentleman 1
TOTAL 646.
Poverty is a relative term, and it often happens that the severest pinch of it is felt by those children who, during the lifetime of the father, were in circumstances of comparative affluence. In many cases the savings of years have been exhausted during a protracted illness, and the life insurance has been eaten up before it was due to keep the wolf from the door. It will be observed that we have received a large proportion of the children of the more necessitous classes of the community with hour, however, excluding those of other grades
All class distinctions are ignored in the arrangements of the Institution, and the children are dressed in a manner to avoid the monotony of a uniform badge of charity.
The following table illustrates the catholicity of the Institution as to the parentage of the children admitted to its advantages:—
Church of England 230
Roman Catholic 3
Baptist 145
Brethren 1
Congregational 72
Moravian l
Wesleyan 68
Bible Christian l
Presbyterian 15
Not specified 110TOTAL 646.
All sections of the Church are thus laid under obligation, and we record with thankfulness the fact that members of every communion contribute to the funds of the Institution. This is as it should be, for it would be a calamity to be deplored were theological differences allowed to mar so beneficent a work as that of assisting the widow and the fatherless. Our supreme aim is not to advance the interests of a sect, but to minister to those who are consigned to the care of the Church by Him who said, “Leave thy fatherless children unto me,” and we desire to realize, in all our arrangements, that we are called upon to act “in God’s stead!”
Family worship is conducted twice daily, before the morning and evening meals, by the Head Master or his assistants, the service being taken occasionally by the President, or a Member of the Committee, or a visitor to the Institution who may happen to be present. The Word of God is read and expounded, hymns sung, and prayer offered, and the whole of the boys repeat a text selected for the day. A service is conducted for the elder boys every Wednesday evening, by Mr. W. J. Evans, when addresses are given by ministers and other friends.
On the Lord’s-day morning the elder boys attend the service at the Tabernacle; a second detachment is accommodated at the Wynne Road Chapel; a third attends the Stockwell Chapel, South Lambeth; and. a suitable service is conducted for the rest at the Orphanage by Messrs. Bartlett and Daniels. Mr. W. J. Evans still superintends the Sunday School in the afternoon, assisted by a staff of 25 earnest teachers, when the international lessons arranged by the Sunday School Union are studied, and Mr. C. Carpenter presides over the Evening Service. All these good friends, who labor with commendable zeal to win the children to Christ, have been connected with the Institution from its commencement. By these arrangements the members of the staff, who are with the boys all the week, find a welcome relief, while the influence of our earnest voluntary helpers is of the most salutary kind. Those boys who give evidence of a change of heart are formed into a “Young Christians’ Band,” and meet twice a month.
During their term of residence in the Institution all the boys are total abstainers, no alcoholic liquors being allowed except by order of the doctor, but most or’ them are pledged abstainers, with the approval of their friends. Band of Hope meetings are held every month, when the children receive instruction from competent speakers; and lectures are given at intervals during the winter months.
In July the whole of the children and the staff enjoyed an excursion to Erleigh Park, Reading, by permission of Mr. J. F. Hall, the railway expenses being defrayed by Mr. Martin J. Sutton, and other friends providing the necessary refreshments for the day. As “it is more blessed to give than to receive,” the kind donors must have been enriched with a holy joy, for the delight of the children was beyond their power: to express. All honor to the many generous friends in Reading who have so warmly espoused the cause of the Orphanage!
The operations of the Institution reveal to the managers the widespread necessity which exists. The cry of the orphan comes from every part of our beloved land, and the plea of the widow for Christian sympathy and help is restricted to no one class of the community. Faces once radiant with smiles are saddened with grief, for the dark shadow, which death casts, falls everywhere. How true are the lines of the poet There is no fireside, howsoe’er defended, But has one vacant chair!”
It is a constant joy to the president and the committee that they are able to mitigate, to such a large extent, the misery and need which are brought under their notice; and it must be an equal joy to the subscribers to know that their loving contributions furnish the sinews for this holy war.
Children are received from all parts of the United Kingdom, no patronage being necessary to secure their admission.
TABLE OF TOWNS AND COUNTIES
From which children have been received.
LONDON.
Balham | 5 | Humpstead | 2 | Paddington | 3 |
Barnsbury | 2 | Hayerstock Hill | 1 | Peckham | 15 |
Battersea | 6 | Holborn | 7 | Pentonville | 2 |
Bayswater | 5 | Holloway | 5 | Pimlico | 2 |
Bermondsey | 52 | Homerton | 2 | Poplar | 4 |
Betlanal Green | 4 | Hornsey | 1 | Shadwell | 1 |
Bloomsbury | 2 | Horselydown | 4 | Shoreditch | 2 |
Borough | 7 | Hoxton | 8 | Soho | 1 |
Bow | 13 | Islington | 18 | Southwark | 17 |
Brixton | 18 | Kennington | 4 | Spitalfields | 1 |
Camberwell | 22 | Kensington | 2 | Stepney | 5 |
Camden Town | 2 | Kentigh Town | 6 | Strand | 12 |
Chelsea | 6 | Kilburn | 6 | Streatham | 3 |
Clapham | 5 | Kingsland | 2 | Stockwell | 2 |
Clapton | 2 | Lambeth | 50 | Stoke Newington | 1 |
Clerkenwell | 6 | Lewisham | 3 | St. John’s Wood… | 1 |
Dalston | 1 | Limehouse | 3 | St. Luke’s | 2 |
Deptford | 4 | Marylebone | 12 | St. Pancreas | 3 |
Dulwich | 2 | Mile End | 5 | Sydenham | 1 |
Finsbury | 2 | Newington | 10 | Walworth | 32 |
Hackney | 11 | New Cross | 51 | Wandswor th. | 11 |
Haggerston | 1 | Norwood | 4 | Westminst er | 8 |
Hammersmith | 3 | Netting Hill | 5 | Whitechap el | 3 |
Total 468
It is worthy of note that of the children received from London, the poorer districts furnished the larger proportion during the earlier period of our history. The metropolis absorbed the main part of the benefit, but now that the Institution is more widely known, candidates from the country are more numerous, and they are not crowded out by Londoners. Of recent admissions about one half were country cases.
It will be seen that 117 provincial towns, representing 32 counties, have participated in the benefits of the Institution by sending 170 children. Distance is a matter which has to be considered, for rite coming of children from afar is a great expense, and frequently becomes a practical prohibition through the poverty of the friends. It is natural and right that orphans should be taken into institutions as near home as possible; still we, as an Institution, know no boundary, but are willing to receive orphans from any and every place stay long as we have room.
SUMMARY OF ADMISSIONS.
London 468
Country 170
Scotland 1
Wales 5
Ireland 2
646
As Candidates are selected by a Committee who are pledged to accept only the most needy and deserving, children are admitted only upon full consideration of their relative need. Applicants who are unsuccessful have, at least, the satisfaction of not having been put to any trouble or expense in canvassing for subscribers’ votes, and of knowing that others more necessitous have secured the advantages offered by the Institution. In some instances, when a number of Candidates have come before the Committee, poor widows have requested to be allowed to withdraw their claims in favor of others whom they themselves deemed more necessitous from what they heard in the waiting room. With only a limited number of vacancies to fill every year it is impossible to admit all who apply, but the Committee have the satisfaction that, as far as they are able to judge, none but cases of urgent necessity succeed in gaining admission.
The Educational arrangements are the same as in former years, the object being to impart a sound English education and a religious training. In addition to the ordinary subjects the children are instructed in Shorthand, Drawing, and Elementary Science, and they are examined in the two last named subjects by the examiners appointed by the Science and Art Department, South Kensington. The returns of the last examination are as follows:—
SCIENCE AND ART CLASSES.
DRAWING
FREEHAND, GEOMETRY, AND MODEL.
Presented for Examination, March, 1880 ……… 199
Number of failures ………………… 10
Passed 189
Of these there were passed with satisfaction to the Examiners.. 50
Number who obtained Certificates 115
Prizes and Certificates 24
Total 189
The amount, granted by the Department for examination in aid of the Classes was £15 5s. 2d.
MAGNETISM AND ELECTRICITY.
At the first examination in May, 1880, 50 boys passed successfully two of whom gained Queen Prizes.”
This rear an additional class has been formed for the study of Physiography, and the boys give promise of more than average success in all subjects.
The amount gained by the examination is granted to the teacher for his valuable services.
SCRIPTURE EXAMINATION.
As our Sunday School is affiliated to the Sunday School Unions. we allow the boys who desire to do so to sit for examination. Or the Candidates who were successful at the last examination, 3 gained prizes, 12 First Class Certificates, and 38 Second Class Certificates.
During the year the boys took part in the Crystal Palace Musical Festivals arranged by the Band of Hope Union and the Tonic-Solfa Association.
In order to make the character and claims of the Institution more widely known, the Head Master and the Secretary have held meetings in London and the Provinces, and the success which has crowned their efforts is. of a very gratifying character. The boys who accompany them to sing and to recite furnish a powerful appeal by their appearance and conduct, and commend the Institution to which they owe so much. The local papers speak in terms of the highest praise of their services, and thus a most effective advertisement is secured without any cost to, the Institution. So far as the boys are concerned these trips have an educational value, fin’ they get to know a great deal of the products and industries of different parts of the country, besides securing the advantage of being brought into contact with Christian families where they reside during their visit.
During the year Services of Song have been held as under:—
METROPOLIS.
Acton; Bermondsey (Green Walk Mission); Camberwell (Masonic Hall, Denmark Place Chapel, and Camberwell New Road Congregational Church); Hampstead; Ross’s Mission (Old Kent Road); Islington (Salter’s Hall Chapel); Victoria Park (Tabernacle and Grove Road. Chapel); and Westbourne Grove Chapel, Bayswater.
PROVINCES.
Cambridge, Dunstable, Exeter, Falmouth, Helston, Liskeard, Penzance, Plymouth, Portsmouth, Southend, St. Austell, Taunton, Torquay, Truro, Willingham, and Woburn.
The amount realized during the year, after defraying all expenses, is £ 644: 10s. 2d., and our thanks are hereby tendered to all who assisted in any way to secure such a splendid result. Friends in other places, willing to assist the Orphanage by arranging for a visit from the Choir, should apply to Mr. Charlesworth. Our funds might be helped in a pleasant and efficient manner if’ friends would invite the choir to their localities.
The Committee record witch thankfulness that there has been no lack in the funds contributed for the efficient maintenance of the Institution. friends prefer to give donations rather than pledge themselves to send annual subscriptions, and the benevolence thus manifested is purely; spontaneous. The admirable custom of making shirts for the boys is still continued by the young ladies of an educational establishment, who send in a supply of 200 shirts every year. Their efforts are supplemented by several working Associations, but the supply is not yet equal to the demand, and we cordially invite the co-operation of others, to whom we shall be glad to send samples and patterns.
The Orphanage Acre at Waterbeach produces more than the average yield of flour and potatoes, under the skillful farming of our friend, Mr. Toiler. Another farmer in Kent has sent us a portion of his potato crop, and several millers have forwarded a sack of flour occasionally. Puddings and potatoes form such important articles of ,diet, that we shall be glad if other Christian farmers will remember our Orphan children from time to time. A good friend at Reading has dedicated a pear tree to the Orphanage, and sends either the fruit or the money realized by its sale.
It would be impossible to enumerate all the presents sent by generous friends, but they have been duly acknowledged every month in The Sword and the Trowel. They are all received with gratitude, and we take this opportunity of repeating our thanks. It is a cause of grief, to us when friends do not receive a prompt acknowledgment of their gifts, but in almost all instances where this has occurred, the donor has failed to send name and address with the parcel. We are too grateful for any help, however small, to risk giving pain or offense to those who remember us, and we respectfully request to be informed of the transmission of presents at the time, and their receipt shall be duly acknowledged.
The work of caring for the widow and the fatherless is specially mentioned by the Holy Spirit as one of the most acceptable modes of giving outward expression to pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father, and therefore the Lord’s people will not question that they should help in carrying it out. Will it need much pleading? If so, we cannot use it, as we shrink from marring the willinghood which is the charm of such a service. The work is carried on in dependence upon God, and as His blessing evidently rests upon it, we are confident the means will be forthcoming as the need arises. While commending the work to our heavenly Father in prayer, we deem it right to lay before the stewards of His bounty the necessities and claims of the Institution.
The year 1880 will be a memorable one in the history of the Institution, and we record with gratitude the fact that the foundation stones of the first four houses for the Girls’ Orphanage were laid on the 22nd of June, when the President’s birthday was celebrated. It was a joy to all present that Mrs. Spurgeon was able to lay the memorial stone of “THE SERMON HOUSE, the gift of C. H. Spurgeon and his esteemed publishers, Messrs. Passmore and Alabaster.” The memorial stone of another house, the gift of Mr. W. R. Rickett, and called “The Limes, in tender memory of five beloved children,” was laid by C. H. Spurgeon, who made a touching allusion to the sad event thus commemorated. Mrs. Samuel Barrow laid the memorial stone of the house called “The Olives,” the amount for its erection having been given and collected by her beloved husband. The Trustees of the Institution having subscribed the funds for the erection of a house, the Treasurer, Mr. William Higgs, laid, in their name, the memorial stone which bears the inscription, “Erected by the Trustees of the Orphanage to express their joy in this service of love.” Several friends have rendered substantial help in kind. Mr. G. F. Dean and Messrs. Wills and Packham, of Sittingbourne, each sent a freight of bricks, and Mr. Arnold, of Woolwich, a quantity of flooring. The late Mr. R. May provided the slating of two houses, and Mr. G. M. Hammer has offered to furnish one of the schools with desks.
The plans of the Orphanage were drawn for six houses, but it was not deemed expedient to proceed with them all until the necessary funds were forthcoming. “H. E. S.” generously gave a thousand pounds, and other amounts being subscribed, we were able to lay the memorial stones of the two remaining houses on the 4th of October. The President felt that, as the friends in Reading and Liverpool had rendered substantial help to the Institution from time to time, it was most appropriate to record the fact on the memorial stones, which were duly laid by George Palmer, Esq., M.P. for Reading, and the Rev. Hugh Stowell Brown, of Liverpool.
At the present moment the buildings of the Orphanage form a great square, enclosing a fine space for air and exercise. Visitors generally express great surprise at the beauty and openness of the whole establishment. Much remains to be done before the Institution is completely accommodated; there is needed an infirmary for the girls, and till that is built one of the houses will have to be used for that purpose, thus occupying the space which would otherwise be filled by thirty or forty children: this should be attended to at an early date. Baths and washhouses will be urgently required for the girls, and we propose to make them sufficiently commodious for the girls to do the washing for the entire community of 500 children, thus instructing them in household duties, and saving a considerable expense. We have not yet settled upon the working plans, but they must either include a place in which all our great family can worship at one time, or else a new hall in which they can assemble at meals: our moot question is whether we shall turn our present dining-hall into a chapel and build a new hall, or leave matters as they now are, and erect a new place for divine service. In either case the cost will be very considerable, and we shall again have to call for the stream of liberality to flow towards Stockwell. Two esteemed friends, husband and wife, have already given £1,000 towards the needful outlay, and we doubt not that other friends, hitherto unknown, will be called out by the great Father of the fatherless to aid us in putting the topstone to this great work. We would not spend a sixpence needlessly. No money has been wasted in lavish ornament, or in hideous ugliness. The buildings are not a workhouse or a county-jail, but a pleasant residence for those children of whom God declares himself to be the Father. The additional buildings which we contemplate are not for luxury, but for necessary uses; and as we endeavor to lay out money with judicious economy we feel sure that we shall be trusted in the future as in the past.
Are there not friends waiting to take a share in the Stockwell Orphanage Building? They cannot better commemorate personal blessings, her can they find a more suitable memorial for departed friends. No storied urn or animated bust can half so well record the memory of beloved cues as a stone in an Orphan House. Most of the buildings are already appropriated as memorials in some form or other, and only a few more will be needed. Very soon all building operations will be complete, and those who have lost the opportunity of becoming shareholders in the Home of Mercy may regret their delay. At any rate, none who place a stone in the walls of the Stockwell Orphanage will ever lament that they did this deed of love to the little cues for whom Jesus cares. Honored names are with us already engraven upon the stones of this great Hostelry of the All-merciful; and many others are our co-workers whose record is on high, though unknown among men. Who will be the next to join us in this happy labor?
We hope to have the houses furnished and ready for occupation in the autumn of the present year. As funds come in we shall erect the dining hall, gymnasium, and swimming-bath, and a house for the head master. When the u hole of the buildings are complete, the Institution will afford accommodation for 500 children, and prove a memorial of Christian generosity and of the loving-kindness of the Lord.
As it is most, important to comply with legal conditions in order to secure the validity of a legacy, we append-the necessary form. Very serious risks are run by persons deviating from such form. It cannot be too clearly understood that bequests of land or houses for charitable purposes are null and void. Those are wisest who are their own executors and distribute their money in their own life-time, but if this cannot be, they should at least make their wills and see that they are properly worded.
FORM OF BEQUEST.
I Give and Bequeath the sum of_____ pounds sterling, to be paid out of that part of my personal estate which may by law be given with effect for charitable purposes, to be paid to the Treasurer for the time being of the Stockwell Orphanage, Clapham Road, Surrey, and his receipt shall be a sufficient discharge for the said legacy; and this legacy, when received by such Treasurer, to be applied for the general purposes of the Orphanage.
A SERMON TO MINISTERS AND OTHER TRIED BELIEVERS
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
“Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.”—1 Peter 5:7.
THIS season of depression in trade has brought great care to many a house and heart, especially to village pastors and their flocks. Their troubles have been heavy, and I am afraid their cares have not been light. Few have escaped the pinch of these hard times: the most prosperous have to catch the ebbing tide, and ask—How long shall these things be? The subject will be seasonable to us all.
A very good preface to any sermon is the connection; let us look at the passage before us. The verse preceding it is, “Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time.” If we are truly humble we shall cast our care upon God, and by that process our joy will be exalted. We are slow to submit to the hand of God, and oftentimes our care is fretful rebellion against our heavenly Father’s will. We determine to carve for ourselves, and so we cut our fingers. I saw upon a cart only yesterday the name of a tradesman who calls himself” Universal Provider”: do we not aspire to some such office? There is a Universal Provider, and if we are humble under his hand we shall leave our matters in his hands. Oh for more humility, for then shall we have more tranquillity. Pride begets anxiety; true humility gives birth to patience.
The verse which follows our text is this—”Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.” Cast your care upon God, because you need all your powers of thought to battle with the great enemy. He hopes to devour you by care. Cast all your care upon God, for if you are worried you cannot be sober or watchful. Satan rides on the back of carnal care, and so obtains entrance into the soul. If he can distract our minds from the peace of faith by temporal cares he will get an advantage over us.
The preface allowed of expansion, but I have compressed it with stern economy of time. I must condense with equal rigor all through my discourse. We will first expound the text, and then enforce it.
I. First, let us EXPOUND the text —” Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.” It is noteworthy that in the Greek the two words for “care” are different: hence the Revised Version reads, “Casting all your anxiety upon him; because he careth for you.” The care which you are to cast upon God, is wearing you out, and you are to cast it upon God because, in quite another sense, “he careth for you.” The word used in reference to God is applied to caring for the poor, and in another place to the watchfulness of a shepherd. Our anxiety and God’s care are two very different things. His care, though tender and comprehensive, causes no anxiety to him, for his great mind is more than equal to the task; but our care ferments within us and threatens the destruction of our narrow souls. You are to cast your care, which is folly, upon the Lord, for he exercises a care which is wisdom. Care to us is exhausting, but God is all-sufficient. Care to us is sinful, but God’s care of us is holy. Care distracts us from service, but the divine mind does not forget one thing while remembering another.
If our care is to be cast upon God we are hereby led to make a distinction; for there is a care which we could not dare to cast upon God, it would be blasphemy to attempt it. Anxiety to grow rich; can we impart, that to God? Anxiety to be famous, to live in luxury, to avenge an injury, to magnify myself; can I ask the Most High to bear such an anxiety for me? If any of you are vexed with such care, I charge you to fling it off, for it is like the poisoned tunic of Hercules, and unless you can tear it away it will burn into your very soul. All cares of covetousness, anger, pride, ambition, and willfulness must be cast to the winds, it would be criminal to dream of casting them upon God. Do not pray about them, except that God will redeem you from them. Let your desires be kept within a narrow circle, and your anxieties will be lessened at a stroke.
“Casting,” says the apostle. He does not say “laying all your care upon him,” but he uses a much more energetic word. You have to cast the load upon the Lord; the act will require effort. It is no child’s play to cast all our care upon our Lord when there are six little children, shoes worn out, cupboard empty, purse bare, and the deacons talking of reducing the scanty salary. Here is a work: worthy of faith. You will have to lift with all your soul before the burden can be shifted, and the anxiety cast upon the Lord: that effort, however, will not be half so exhausting as the effort of carrying your load yourself. Oh, the burden of watching and waiting for help which never comes; depending on the help of man, who is altogether vanity. Oh, the weariness of carrying a heart-breaking anxiety, and yet standing up to preach. We have all seen statues of Atlas bearing the world on his shoulders, but we can hardly conceive of his preaching in that attitude. It would be better to make one tremendous effort and have done with it, rather than groan under a perpetual weight. If the fox is eating into our bowels, let us pluck it from our bosom and kill it at once.
Note the next words: “Upon him.” You may tell your griefs to others to gain their sympathy, for we are bidden to bear one another’s burdens; you may ask friends to help you, and so exercise your humility; but let your requests to man be ever in subordination to your waiting upon God. Some have obtained their full share of human help by much begging from their fellow Christians; but it is a nobler thing to make known your requests unto God; and somehow those who beg only of God are wondrously sustained where others fail. What a pleasant story is that in which we recount the lovingkindnesses of the Lord, and tell how “this poor man cried, and the Lord heard him.” Quiet, patient believers have come under my notice who have carried their cross in silence, waiting upon the Lord alone. How they endured their trial I cannot tell, save that “they endured as seeing him who is invisible”; but their necessity became known, it leaked out they knew not how, and they were helped, and helped better than they would have been if their appeal had been to man. I am condemning no appeal to our fellow believers; many are willing to help, and they cannot do so if the need is unknown; but do not place anyone in the office and throne of the great God, who alone is the Care-taker and Burden-bearer of his people. I am afraid that sometimes in our care not to alienate this great man who does so much for the cause, or that excellent lady who takes halfa-dozen sittings in the chapel, we may grieve the Lord and lose our true Helper. Cease, then, from man; cast all your care upon God, and upon him only. Certain courses of action are the very reverse of casting all your care upon God, and one is indifference. Whatever virtue there may be in stoicism:, it is unknown to the true child of God. “I don’t care” may be an excellent thing for an atheist, but it is not suitable for a Christian: it may sound well, and the man who utters the defiant word may think himself some great one, but it is an evil word for all that. I am afraid some brethren’s “don’t care” is very sinful, for they get into debt, and don’t care; they break their promises and engagements, and don’t care. Brethren, such men ought to care. Every man is bound to care about his life-duties, and the claims of his family. He that careth not for his own household is worse than a heathen man. Casting: care upon God is the very reverse of recklessness and inconsiderateness.
It is not casting care upon God when a man does that which is wrong in order to clear himself; yet this is too often tried. Under pressure some men do very unjustifiable things. We ought to be slow to condemn, since we ourselves also may yet be tempted in the same way and may err in like manner; still, faith ought to be able to win every battle. He who compromises truth to avoid pecuniary loss is hewing out a broken cistern for himself. He who borrows when he knows he cannot pay, he who enters into wild speculations to increase his income, he who does aught that is ungodly in order to turn a penny is not casting his care upon God. An act of disobedience is a rejection of God’s help, that we may help ourselves. He who does the right thing at all hazards practically casts his care upon the Lord. Acts are with us, but their consequences are with God: our care should be to please God, and all other care we may safely leave to him.
How, then, are we to cast all our care upon God? Two things need to be done. It is a heavy load that is to be cast upon God, and it requires the hand of prayer and the hand of faith to make the transfer. Prayer tells God what the care is, and asks God to help, while faith believes that God can and will do it.. Prayer spreads the letter of trouble and grief before the Lord, and opens all its budget, and then faith cries, “I believe that God cares, and cares for me, I believe that he will bring me out of my distress, and make it promote his own glory.”
When you have thus lifted your care into its true position and cast it upon God, take heed that you do not pick it up again. Many a time have I gone to God and have relieved my care by believing prayer, but, I am ashamed to confess that after a little time I have found myself burdened again with those very anxieties which I thought I had given up. Is it, wise to put our feet into fetters which have once been broken off? My brethren, there is a more excellent way, a way which I have tried and proved. I have at times been perplexed with difficulties; I have tried my best with them and I have utterly failed, and then I have gone with the perplexity to the throne of God, and placed the whole case in the Lord’s hands, solemnly resolving never to trouble myself about the aforesaid matters any more, whatever might happen. I was quite incapable of further action in the matter, and so I washed my hands of the whole concern, and left it with God. Some of these cares I have never seen again, they melted like hoar frost in the morning sun, and in their place I have found a blessing lying on the ground Other troubles have remained in fact but not in effect, for I have consented to the yoke, and it has never galled my shoulder again. Brethren, let the dead bury their dead, and let us follow Jesus. Henceforth let us leave worldlings to fret and fume over the cares of this life; as for us, let our conversation be in heaven, and let us carefully abstain from carefulness, being anxious only to end anxiety by a childlike confidence in God.
II. Accept this little contribution towards an exposition, and let us now proceed to ENFORCE the text. I will give you certain reasons, and then the reason why you should cast all your care upon God.
First, the ever blessed One commands you to do it. We need no other reason. The precept is akin to the gospel command, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.” It is a blessed privilege, and it is also a command. He who bids us cease from idolatry, also bids us cease from care. The law of Sabbath-keeping is not more divine than that of resting in the Lord. He whom we call Master and Lord bids us take no anxious thought; his bidding has all the authority of law. Say to yourself, my anxious brother, “I may roll my burden upon the Lord, for he bids me do so.” If you do not trust in God you will be distinctly sinful; you are as much commanded to trust as to love.
Next, cast all your cares on God, because you will have matters enough to think of even then. There are sacred cares which the Lord will lay upon you, because you have cast your care upon him. When he has broken your painful yoke you will have his easy yoke to bear. There is the care to love and serve him better; the care to understand his word; the care to preach it to his people; the care to experience his fellowship; the care so to walk that you shall not vex the Holy Spirit. Such hallowed cares will always be with you, and will increase as you grow in grace. In a sense we may cast even these upon God, looking for his Holy Spirit to help us, for it is he that worketh in us to will and to do of his own good pleasure; yet not without our care and zeal doth he operate upon us, and this is one reason why you are not to allow lower ends and designs to inundate your mind. Your spirit has another vineyard to keep, another capital to put out to interest, another master to please, and it cannot afford to yield its thought to meaner pursuits Ministers are shepherds, and must care for the sheep. “The hireling fleeth, because he is a hireling, and careth not for the sheep “; but you have the care of churches laid upon you daily, and it is peculiarly needful that you be not occupied with carnal care.
And, next, you must east your care upon God, because you have God’s business to do. It is a dangerous thing for a merchant to employ a man who has a business of his own, because sooner or later the master’s business will suffer, or else the man’s own concern will die out. “No man that warreth,” saith Paul, “entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier.” There is sure to be a clashing of interests when a brother goes into business, unless he does it as Paul did, that he may not be chargeable to the church; for then he attains to double honor. Paul carried his needle and thread with him wherever he went, for everybody had a tent in those days, and he was ready for work at any moment either upon small family tents, or tents to cover a great assembly. When he had finished preaching, he could turn to tent-mending, and so earn his own living, and preach the gospel freely. Paul did not make his preaching a stalking-horse to his trade, but he made his handicraft a pack-horse to his ministry, so that he could say,” These hands have ministered unto my necessities, and to them that were with me.” That is a very different thing from a minister deserting his charge to make a larger income by some other calling. The less we have to do with other business the better, for all our care is needed by the church. Queen Elizabeth bade a notable merchant in the city of London go to the Continent on royal business. “Please your majesty,” said he, “who will attend to my business while I am away?” The queen replied, “If you will go abroad, and see to my business, I will see to your business.” I will be bound to say it would not suffer if such a queen took it in hand. Just so the Lord says to us, “You attend to my work, and I will take care of you and your wife and children.” The Lord pledges himself to do it; bread shall be given us, our water shall be sure. The testimony of many among you will bear me out in this! I come of a line of preachers, and though some of them have had to endure straitened circumstances, yet none of them were forsaken, nor have their seed been seen begging bread. The Lord has cared for us, and we have lacked nothing.
You ought to do it not only for this reason, but because it is such a great privilege to be able to cast your care upon God. If I am plunged in a lawsuit, and some eminent law officer would offer to undertake it all, out of love to me, how glad I should be! I should worry no longer. I should say to all who troubled me on the matter, “You must go to my solicitor; I know nothing about the matter.” Do this to your cunning enemy, the devil, who is always glad to see you anxious and fretful. Let us say to him, “The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan; even the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem, rebuke thee.” What a the that is for the old viper to break his teeth upon! Chosen! chosen! And if chosen shall we not be cared for?
Let me add, that you ministers ought to cast all your care upon God, because it will be such a good example for your hearers. Our people learn much from our conduct, and if they see us fretting, they will be certain to do the same. You preach faith, do you not? How. sad it will be for you to be convicted of unbelief! Our own words may condemn us if we are anxious. Once when I was unduly depressed, my good wife said to me, “I have a book here which I should like to read to you.”:It did me good to hear her read, but I felt myself rebuked by every word. I half suspected what was coming when she said, “That is your own, recollect.” She had been giving the doctor some of his own medicine. What a many things you have said, my brethren, that will condemn you if you do not trust God! Is it, after all, mere talk? Did you mean what said, and is it true? Or have you merely been repeating official dogmas in which you have no personal confidence? Is the providence of God a myth, or a living, bright reality? “Here,” said a quack in the market-place, “is a medicine that will cure coughs, colds, consumptions the fellow coughed horribly at this point]. It is of such efficacy that it would almost restore the dead. [Here he coughed again.] Nobody need remain a sufferer—he has only to buy a box of these pills”—[here the quack’s own cough prevented him from speaking]. Ah! laugh on, laugh on, brethren, only mind that nobody laughs at you fordoubting while you extol faith. We must show in ourselves that faith in our God is a healing medicine, or men will not believe us; we shall make Christ himself seem to be a pretender, unless we practically prove that we have been healed by him. Let your people see in you what comes of trusting Christ; let them see what cheerfulness, what hopefulness, what buoyancy of heart come to those who trust Christ, and cast all their care upon him.
But the reason of reasons is that contained in our text—” He careth for you.” After all, what a small matter it must be to God to care for us, since he provides for the commissariat of the universe; the feeding of the cattle on a thousand hills, and the wild beasts of the plains. Think of those myriads of fish, those armies of birds, those enormous multitudes of insects! What a God must he be who cares for all. Compared with the demands of all these our little wants are soon supplied. We want but little, and that little is scarce a crumb from the table of the Lord our God. Surely if God says, “I will care for you,” we need not give another thought except to sing, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” It does not need two of us for this small matter, and certainly not two when one is infinite in wisdom and power. Even if we were wise the Lord would not need our help. With whom took he counsel, and who instructed him, when he built the earth, and piled the mountains, and spanned the sky? Let us, therefore, stand still and see the salvation of God. The Lord thinks about us, plans for us,. arranges for us, studies to make things right for us,—these are poor words with which to describe his care, for he does more than that, he loves us. That great, boundless, mighty heart loves us. This is fit matter for a heavenly song I Because he hath set his love upon us we can surely cast our care upon him. He has given us Christ, will he not give us bread? See, he has called us to be his sons, will he starve his children? See what he is preparing for you in heaven, will he not enable you to bear the burdens of this present life? We dishonor God when we suspect his tenderness and generosity. We can only magnify him by a calm faith which leans upon his word.
There, dear brothers, there is my word from the Master for you. I should like to have hammered out that little grain of gold so that you might have gilded your lives with it; but, please do it for yourselves. Now will you carry your cares away, or will you bow your heads in silent prayer, and throw them all off? Holy Spirit, the Comforter, lighten our darkness, we beseech thee.
NOTES
THE special prayer-meetings before our week-evening lecture have not only been well sustained all through the past month, but have increased in number and grown in fervency, and we are already reaping the firstfruits of what will, we trust, prove a good harvest of souls. The Monday evening prayer-meetings have been seasons of unusual power; and this fact makes us quite sure that a blessing of an unusual extent is on the wing. Requests for prayer have continued to come in large numbers from almost all parts of the globe, and not a few requests for praise because former supplications have been answered. These have tended to keep the meetings real and earnest, for there has been actual business to do with the Lord that heareth us. Each meeting differs from every other, but all are remarkable seasons of fervent devotion. Frequently there are fifteen hundred persons present. On August 1 a missionary address was delivered by Mr. Gogon Chunder Dutt, of Bengal, and by the evangelists who had just come home; on August 8 our three newly-elected elders, Messrs. Johnson, Bantick, and Copsan were introduced to the members present, and commended to the Lord in prayer; and on August 15 the Pastor gave an address upon the words, “Ye have not because ye ask not.” Have we not here the key to the non-success of churches, and the small progress of individuals? It is a pity to be deprived of a blessing because we are too idle to ask for it.
On Wednesday August 10, it was our privilege to preach an open-air sermon in connection with the opening of a new chapel at North Cheam. Some members of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE COUNTRY MISSION have held services in the neighbor-hood for a year or two, and their labors have been so greatly blessed by God that it has been necessary to erect an iron building, which has been purchased at a greatly reduced price. About £250 will be needed to pay for this building, of which up to the present about £60 has been contributed, in addition to £50 which we have promised. We shall be grateful to any friends who feel moved to help this work, and the erection of three other chapels which are now fix hand. Our suburban districts, and our growing towns, must be occupied speedily for Christ, unless they are to be left as strongholds of priestcraft or indifference. The people on the spot are frequently careless about the work, and we have to arouse them to care about their souls. Those who love the truth are at the first few and feeble, and unless helped from the outside they cannot get a building to meet in. We are at this moment treasurer for four rising places. The first is this little place at Cheam, for which we. need at least £150: could not some friends see to it that we are not burdened by this? By a little effort Tabernacle friends could clear this place. Then comes New Brompton, near Chatham, where the chapel is just commenced. Some £700 or more will be wanted before we have ‘finished, and we only see our way to half of it. Thirdly, Gipsy Road, Lower Norwood. We have £1,000 in hand or promised, but the friends have entered upon some £4,000 expense. Mr. Hobbs, the minister, will carry it through; but meanwhile we feel anxious about it. Fourthly, the village of Horn-church, Essex: a friend has given ground, and we have some £150 in hand, but the friends are hard pressed for a place to meet in, and want to build before winter. No one knows be many cares which come upon us in connection with the work of extending our churches in needy districts. Large sums could be advantageously used, but they do not come. Our own purse is not spared, but the work is great and the demands large, and yet not so large but that a few wealthy persons could make it easy. We sometimes sink in spirit as we see how little the souls of men are cared for by those who call themselves the Lord’s. If growing London is not provided with the means of grace coming generations will blame us. As the Lord enables us our utmost shall be done. May HE provide for his own work in his own way.
On Wednesday evening, August 17, the eleventh annual meeting of THE SPURGEON’S SERMONS TRACT SOCIETY was held in the Tabernacle lecturehall. The chair was occupied by C. F. Allison, Esq., prayer was offered by Mr. Harrald, and addresses were delivered by Messrs. Murrell, Dunn, Penstone, Perkins, and Pullen. The report, read by the honorary secretary, *r. C. Cornell, stated that the object of the Society is to make known the way of salvation by means of the distribution of the pastor’s printed sermons as loan tracts. During the past year 23,000 have been circulated in fifty-two towns and villages in the United Kingdom, making a total of 140,000 since the work was commenced. Great blessing has resulted from this method of sowing the seed. The Society’s income for the year has been £81 16s. 5d., and the expenditure for sermons, covers, printing, carriage, etc., £78 Os. 10d., leaving a balance of £3 15s. 7d. in hand. All information about the work of the Society can be obtained of Mr. Cornell, 60, Hamilton-square, Borough, S.E., who will be happy to receive contributions towards the extension of its operations. To get the sermons lent round in districts which are devoid of spiritual teaching is a soul-saying work. These discourses are attended with a blessing when heard in the Tabernacle, but their beneficial influence when printed is vastly greater, as abundant facts are daily proving. As tracts, it is found that persons will read them even when they will throw aside other religious literature. Hence this Society, by providing a stock of the sermons for friends to start loan societies with, is doing a missionary work, which supplies a weekly ministration of the gospel to thousands.
COLLEGE.—Mr. J. A. Ward settles at Clay Cross; Mr. T. Armstrong has accepted the pastorate of the Lower Baptist Church, Chesham; and Mr. J. T. Mateer has left us to continue his work in Ireland as an evangelist.
Mr. J. Stubbs, who was obliged on account of ill-health to return from India, has accepted the pastorate of the Church at Brannoxtown, Ireland. Mr. W. Ewens has removed from Uley, to Liskeard; and. Mr. G. H. Kemp from Alford, to Langham, Essex. Mr. A. Bird, late of Penzance, is seeking to raise a new church at Sundown, Isle of Wight. Will friends there take this notice, and rally to the standard? Mr. J. H. Dean, one of our medical missionary students, has gone to Blantyre, Central Africa.
Mr. J. Wilkins, late of Maidenhead, has settled at Charlestown; and Mr. G. H. Trapp, late of Mundesley, has safely reached the United States, where he hopes to find a suitable sphere of labor. Sir. Trapp is a worthy man: a treasure to any godly people. We are glad also to learn that Mr. Burton arrived at Melbourne in May, and that the doctor says there is no reason why It,’, should not be permanently cured. He desires to be remembered in prayer by all his brethren. Australian papers just to hand give most cheering reports of the evangelistic services held at Geelong and West Melbourne by our brethren Harrison and Isaac. Our soil Thomas has had a happy season in Dunedin, and has gone on to Auckland.
On Tuesday, August 9th, the students reassembled after ‘the vacation, by kind permission of Joseph Tritton, Esq., at “Bloomfield,” Upper Norwood. The proceedings of the day commenced with a short devotional service, during which the wind blew threateningly. The new students were introduced by the President, and then the brethren dispersed over the grounds. The usual outdoor amusements were heartily enjoyed, and Mr. Murrell superintended the commissariat department to everybody’s satisfaction. In responding to a very cordial vote of thanks, Mr. Tritton expressed the pleasure he had felt in placing his grounds at the disposal of the brethren. May this session be rich with benediction, and the College do the best work it has ever yet accomplished.
EVANGELISTS— We have received the following resume Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s mission in Sheffield:—The mission in Sheffield was brought to a close on July 26th. The work has surpassed the most sanguine expectations of those who commenced it. A powerful stimulus has been given to the spiritual life of the churches which took part in the movement; large numbers of Christians belonging to various denominations have been most hearty in their co-operation and goodwill; friends have come forward at every demand, spontaneously offering to provide whatever seemed helpful to success; and hundreds of those formerly attending no place of worship have been induced to attach themselves to some congregation, many of them giving evidence that they have been won for Christ. A valuable contribution has thus been made to the solution of the important question, How can we evangelize our great towns and centers of population? Many points connected with this question have been seen in a new and clear light by those who have been privileged to watch over and take part in the work as it has progressed. It may be well to place on record some of the peculiar features of the work, as carried through in Sheffield, for the consideration or guidance of workers who may be contemplating a similar mission in ,other towns.
(1.) The evangelists came at the unanimous invitation of all the Independent and Baptist ministers in the town; and worked throughout under the direction of a central committee, composed of representatives of the churches concerned. The ministers as a whole took part in the work, many of them identifying themselves by their presence on special occasions, and some of them throwing all their strength .and influence into the movement from the first. A few who were a little disposed, at the outset, to hold the movement at arm’s length, because of former experiences with evangelists, became the most demonstrative and earnest in clasping it to their hearts, when they came to know our brethren personally, and when the meetings were being held in their own neighborhood.
(2.) The meetings were held in chapels, and every effort was made to keep the whole movement in close union with existing churches. The town at the outset was divided into six districts, on an average two weeks being given to each. The meetings were held in the largest and most convenient chapel of each district. Christian workers were, therefore, always at hand belonging to the neighborhood where the meetings were held, to see inquirers, to follow up good impressions in the hearts of friends, and to visit at their own homes those who had been brought to spiritual concern. For special meetings it became necessary to go elsewhere. The Albert Hall was used every Sunday afternoon for a meeting of men only; the Circus became the headquarters during Whitsun-week, and the last fortnight of the Mission. The Albert Hall was the only building large enough for the allday meeting and the united communion service. But, as a rule, the chapels were found convenient, and sufficed for the work.
(3.) There have been no collections, but boxes have been held at the doors to receive thankofferings after every service. Both the evangelists have always brought this matter before the people in the most frank and independent way, and those who were able and glad to give, have been asked to do so; and as the financial result, after all expenses are paid, at the close of a mission extending over nearly four months, we expect to have the pleasure of sending up to Mr. Spurgeon, towards the maintenance of the Evangelists’ Society, a balance of £300, which, indeed, by the generosity ,of a friend, we hope to make 300 guineas. This has been accomplished with perfect ease, without anyone being pressed. Indeed, the cheerful way in which “the common people” have given of their means has been, perhaps, the most reliable proof of the healthy and sterling nature of the work. The heap of copper after some of the largest meetings was a sight to see, and a lead to carry!
(4.) As to the spiritual results of the Mission, unquestionably that which can be tabulated is in some measure always unreliable, that which cannot be shown in any statistics is the most precious. Great care has been taken to avoid setting any seal or imprimatur, in the name of the evangelists or the committee, on the religious experiences of those who have been impressed. The word “convert” has been as little used as possible, for fear of misunderstanding or misuse. It was resolved that the last meeting of all should be for those who had received special spiritual benefit in the services, admission to be by ticket, only, for which personal application had to be made during the last two days. Every applicant was seen by one of the ministers, and briefly questioned, and the name and address was taken of each to whom a ticket was given. In this way we gained a list of more than six hundred men, women, and children from all parts of the town, who not only rejoiced to testify to the good they )tad received, but were so much in earnest that they were willing to take this trouble, and bear this personal test. We are well aware that some of these names may prove worthless, but against this we have to set the fact that very many who received lasting blessing were, for some reason or other, not able to comply with these conditions. Those who attended the final meeting were urged to connect themselves with some congregation at once, and were asked to fill in a form stating what place of worship each wished to attend. These papers have been conveyed to the clergymen and ministers concerned.
(5.) Much attention has been drawn to the private study of God’s word. Mr. Fullerton’s Bible-readings have been throughout well attended. The Berean Bible Union has gained already eight hundred and thirty members, and in several of the churches special meetings are arranged, which will practically be public or private Bible-readings.
(6.) The prolonged stay of the evangelists in the town has been a very great advantage to the work. The first meeting was on April 10th; the last on July 26th; and the movement has gained momentum continually as it has gone round the districts in order. Our brethren came altogether unknown; now their names have become household words in the thickest parts of the population, and have been even made the occasion of good-tempered remarks in the local papers. The meetings during the last week at the Circus were crowded every night; and on the Sunday so intense and widespread was the desire to gain admittance that every inch of standingroom was packed an hour before the time announced for the beginning of the service; and an hour and a half after the doors had been closed the crowd outside reached across the street. All the Christian workers taking part in the Mission felt that the spiritual power realized in these closing meetings was far greater than in any that had gone before. The intense interest and overwhelming solemnity of the last evangelistic service will never be forgotten. We have reason to believe very many that night gave their hearts to Christ. The last public meeting was a united communion service at the Albert Hall, when nearly two thousand members of the various churches united to “show forth the Lord’s death”; the remaining space (a top gallery holding five hundred) being filled with spectators. The whole service was singularly impressive. Mr. Fullerton’s address on Cant. 1:4, “The King hath brought me into his chambers,” and Mr. Smith’s singing of “Rock of Ages,” were especially touching, winning the hearts of all. Many striking instances of direct personal blessing might be given if time allowed. Take one as a sample of scores. A man was seen leaving the Circus one night in great haste and under deep emotion. A good brother on the watch overtook him, and asked him if he would not stay to the end of the service. “No, I’ve had enough, I can stand it no longer,” was the answer. On further conversation our friend got a promise that the stranger would go with him to chapel the next Sunday morning if he called for him. On Sunday morning the call was made, but the man was unwashed and unshaven at the appointed time, and had made up his mind not to go. “Never mind,” said our friend, “I’ll wait until you are ready.” No finally induced the man to go with him, and both arrived, of course, somewhat late. That man had not been to a place of worship for more than twenty years; but already he has taken a sitting, and has not missed a service. Such is the work as it has been carried on here. It will be cherished in the grateful memories of all who have taken part in it, and will remain a “savor of life unto life” in the experience of hundreds of backsliders who have been reclaimed, of careless who have been brought to conversion, and of penitents who have been led to Christ. Those who have seen and known most of what has been accomplished join most heartily in thanking God. that ever our brethren came to Sheffield, and in praying that such proofs of divine power may attend their ministrations wherever they may labor.
The cheque for £315 has since arrived. Our brethren’s arrangements for the opening of their London campaign are as follows: — Early this month they commence work at Mr. Cuff’s Tabernacle, at Shore-ditch; next they go to Mr. Sawday, at Pentonville, then to Mr. Stott, at St. John’s Wood, Mr. Charrington, at Mile End-road, Mr. Edgley, at Bow, and early next year they hope to visit our son at South-street, Greenwich, and then to come to us at the Tabernacle.
Mr. Burnham wishes us to say that he hopes to spend the whole of this month, as usual, among the hop-pickers. He specially asks all readers of the Magazine to look up “Brother Mayo’s excellent paper on the work in The Sword and the Trowel of last December by way of refreshing their memories with regard to the special claims of this work on their practical sympathy and prayers.” Mr. Burnham adds—” May I particularly call attention to Brother Mayo’s closing appeal for the loan of a horse and van for the mouth’? They would be well cared for and not over-worked, and would be a wonderful help to us in our open-air services in the surrounding villages. Some earnest Christian who has successfully garnered a good harvest may feel it on his heart to return his thankoffering in this practical way, and lend us his horse and van to assist in the grander spiritual harvest ‘“
ORPHANAGE.—Various friends, who have not gone into the country or to the sea-side, have sent us word that they are working for the Bazaar for the Girls’ Orphanage. We suppose others are doing the same, and that; when the summer holidays are over all our friends will set to work in real earnest, At present we have not received such assurances of help as we looked for. Friends, will you let this flag? Shall anything be allowed to drag heavily? This work for orphan girls must be a labor of love, and be accomplished to a joyous song. Suffer it not to become a burden. For the sake of the orphans’ Father help us through with this.
The next quarterly collectors’ meeting will be held at the Orphanage, on Friday, September 30, when we shall be glad to receive all collecting boxes and books. Mr. Spurgeon hopes to be present; and to do his best to make an interesting and.’ happy meeting.
COLPORTAGE.—The work of the association is being carried on as usual, but there are no new features of special interest, excepting that arrangements are pending for the appointment of a new colporteur in a fresh district, under the superintendence of Rev. J. E. Cracknell, of York Town, Surrey. Being holiday-time our funds come in slowly, and we need £250 to make the amount given to the General Fund equal to that of the same period in last year. As decrease in the General Fund means a contracting of the sinews of war, we trust our friends will rally to the help of the work once more, that at least the present amount of work may be continued, and if possible more new ground be broken up. The work is so good that we sigh over the indifference of so many to it. If it were a questionable experiment we should not marvel, but that its excellence should be admitted and yet that it should not be efficiently supported is a matter of lamentation to our heart. Surely the Lord will appear for his own work.
PERSONAL NOTES.—A fisherman in Scotland sends us the following pleasing account of his conversion:—” I remember a colporteur coming to my mother’s house, and he asked me if I would buy a book. ‘ Yes,’ says I, ‘ if you have got any ballads,’ that is, Scotch songs. So he says to me, ‘If you give me a piece of fish I will give you something that will do you more good than ballads.’ I saw he desired my good, so I gave him half a codfish, and he gave me one of your sermons. The text was, ‘ Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.’ (‘Sovereignty and Salvation,’ No. 60.) While reading that sermon the blessed Spirit of God enlightened my understanding, and I saw Jesus set before me as my Savior. Blessed hour! Happy day! Jesus washed my sins away.”
The Secretary of the China Inland Mission writes:— “This morning I received from one of our missionaries in China, a letter, from which the following is an extract: ‘ I just want to tell you one thing, which is the principal object I had in writing you this time. In China’s Millions, of December,
I think it is, you mentioned at one of the farewell meetings held on behalf of Messrs. Cooper, Protheroe, and Thompson, that besides Cooper there was another in China (Hunnex, I presume,) who had been led to offer himself for the work through Mr. Spurgeon’s sermon, “The Divine Call for Missionaries” (No. 1,351). It was that “call” that led me to offer myself to the C. I. M.; previous to that I had thought(D.V.) of applying to the London Missionary Society; but that call gave me no rest nor peace of mind, till I had applied to the C. I. M., till I had read the Millions sent down for my perusal, till I had again applied, filled up the form, and gone to London. So there are three working in connection with the C. I. M. who were led to give themselves for work in China through Mr. Spurgeon’s sermon.’ “A minister from Tennessee recently bore the following personal testimony: Nine years ago I was a wild young man, but I was converted through reading one of Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons, and I am now the minister of a large and influential church. The Lord’s name be magnified.” One of our students recently received an application for baptism from a young Swiss lady, who gave this testimony: My parents were members of the Protestant Established Church in Switzerland; but though I attended the ordinances, and observed the ceremonies. I always felt that I was a hypocrite, for I never believed in them, but desired some-thing which I could not get in the church. When I came to England I read a sermon by Mr. Spurgeon, which did me good. John Ploughman’s Talk, though funny, was made a great blessing to me. I then bought his sermons, and read them, and I am now happy to say that I am trusting in Jesus. When I return home I shall distribute these sermons which have been so blessed to me.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle — July 21st, sixteen; August 1st, twenty-one; 4th, eighteen.
PASTORS COLLEGE, METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE
STATEMENT OF RECEIPTS FROM JULY 15TH TO AUGUST 14TH, 1881.
Giver | £ | s. | d |
C. S. Gzowski | 0 | 8 | 0 |
Mr. P. VanAlstuie | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. Meggat | 1 | 10 | 0 |
Mrs. Watson | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. R. Wilkinson | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Miss Spliedt | 2 | 0 | 0 |
A Friend, Belfast | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Mr. S. Ormrod | 0 | 12 | 6 |
Mr. Pratt | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs. De Kavanagh | 0 | 2 | 6 |
Mr. A. H. Seard | 0 | 5 | 0 |
Mr. A. Hall | 0 | 5 | 0 |
A Thankoffering From the sea-side | 0 | 10 | 0 |
W. Hill | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Dr. Beilby | 3 | 0 | 0 |
Miss Bailey | 0 | 5 | 0 |
“A Friend in Scotland” | 2 | 50 | 0 |
Mrs. E. Raybould | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Collected by Miss Jephs | 1 | 5 | 0 |
Lizzie | 1 | 0 | 0 |
A Friend | 10 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. and Mrs. Sutcliffe | 1 | 0 | 0 |
TOTAL— | 156 | 9 | 4 |
Weekly Offerings at Met. Tab:— July 17 | 16 | 14 | 2 |
July 24 | 34 | 2 | 4 |
July 31. | 35 | 6 | 6 |
August 7 | 30 | 6 | 1 |
August 14 | 40 | 0 | 3 |
TOTAL — | 217 | 3 | 4 |
Chap 16. OCTOBER, 1881.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
OCTOBER, 1881.
WHY WE HAVE NOT
A PRAYER-MEETING ADDRESS: BY C. H. SPURGEON.
The Holy Ghost, by the mouth of his servant James, has said, “Ye have not because ye ask not.” I would not willingly be censorious, but crying evils demand open rebuke. Do you not think that this text applies to the case of many of our churches? They have no prosperity, their numbers do not increase, and the congregations are small; and, as the main cause of it all, they have scarcely a prayer-meeting. I hear perpetually of prayer-meetings abandoned, or, what is much the same thing, blended with the weekly lecture. From various sources I gather that in many instances the meeting for prayer is so small that it is difficult to spin out the hour, and as the same few persons come from time to time, variety is out of the question: indeed, in some places the prayer-meeting only exists to reveal the nakedness of the land. Now, if there be no conversions, and no additions to such churches, what is the reason? Is it not found here—” Ye have not because ye ask not”
A lack of interest exists in many places, so that the assembly for prayer is despised, and put down as a second-rate affair: “only a prayer-meeting.” Is this a right vie v of the throne of grace? Will this bring blessing? In certain churches there is no union, and consequently no agreement in prayer: “their heart is divided; now shall they be found wanting;” and wanting they are in their assemblies for prayer. In such a case a feeble prayer-meeting is an effect as well as a cause of disunion, and till this is altered we may expect to see more and more of “the divisions of Reuben.” Prayer is a grand cement; and lack of prayer is like withdrawing the force of gravitation from a mass of matter, and scattering it into so many separate atoms. Some churches are feeble all round; the members are a race of invalids, a body of infirm pensioners who can hardly hobble about in the ways of godliness. They have no life, or energy, or enterprise for Christ; and do you wonder at it when their meetings for prayer are so scantily attended? In some places where there are good, praying people the prayer-meetings are badly attended, because certain long-winded brethren spoil them. I know a church which is endowed with an excellent deacon, a real godly man, but he will pray without ceasing at every meeting, and I fear he will pray the prayer-meeting down to nothing unless he is soon taken home. The other night when he had talked for full twenty minutes he intimated both to heaven and earth that all he had said was merely a preface, a drawing near as he called it, and that he was then going to begin. None of his friends were pleased to receive that information, for they had begun to cherish the hope that he would soon have done. They were all too sadly aware that now he would pray for “our own beloved country,” “from the queen upon the throne to the peasant in the cottage,” then for Australia and all the colonies, and then for China and India, starting off afresh with kindly expressions for the young and for the old, for the sick, for sailors, and for the Jews. As a rule, nothing was really asked for by this most estimable brother, but he uttered several pious remarks on all these subjects, and many more. It is a great pity when highly esteemed brethren fall into the notion that they must deliver themselves of long harangues: the better the men the worse the evil, for then we are forced to tolerate them. I am sorry when a good man gets the idea that praying means telling out his experience, or giving his theological opinions. I am told that our Salvation Army friends strike up a tune whenever a friend becomes long and prosy, and I have great sympathy with the practice. It removes the responsibility of stopping the man from the minister to the people, and by dividing the action among many it operates like a round robin for the screening of any one. When prayer is an earnest asking it may occasionally be lengthened to advantage; but the less of mere holy gossip the better. If prayer-meetings degenerate into gospel gossip we cannot wonder if no blessing comes. In such cases the word is true, — “Ye have not because ye ask not.”
If any believer should chance to live where the prayer-meeting is neglected, let him now resolve to revive it. Let us make a solemn league and covenant that the churches shall pray, or that it shall not be our fault if they do not. To strengthen a prayer-meeting is as good a work as to preach a sermon. I would have you vow that the prayer-meeting shall never be given up while you live. Be like the good woman who, when it was decided to close the prayer-meeting in a certain village, declared that it should not be, for she would be there if no one else was. She was true to her word, and when the next morning some one said to her rather jestingly, “Did you have a prayermeeting last night?” “Ah, that we did,” she replied. “How many were present?” “Four,” she said. “Why,” said he, “I heard that you were there all alone.” “No,” she said, “I was the only one visible, but the Father was there, and the Son was there, and the Holy Spirit was there, and we were agreed in prayer.” Before long others took shame to themselves at the earnest perseverance of a poor old woman, and soon there was a revived prayer-meeting and a prospering church. I have heard of a negro who was found sitting out the time of service all alone when his colored brethren had grown cold and prayerless; in his case also the rest were shamed into fresh energy. I beg you, then, to maintain this holy ordinance even if the attendance should have dwindled down to two or three. Surely a church, if it be a church of Christ at all, must feel the rebuke which would be given by your perseverance. Oh, never let us leave off praying unitedly for a blessing! Solemnly settle it in your hearts that the fire upon the altar shall never go out. As for me and my church, we will serve the Lord by maintaining this sacred exercise in full vigor; and I beseech all other believers to come to the same resolve, or, if not, there will be dreary days for the church of Christ.
But now let us apply this to ourselves as individuals. “Ye have not because ye ask not.” I wonder whether there is a brother here who has been tugging, and toiling, and struggling for years after a certain thing which seems further off than ever; and does the reason of his failure lie in the fact that he has never prayed about it? Do you wonder, dear brother, that you have not when you do not ask? With one hundredth part of your present trouble you may obtain the desired boon if you seek it at the Lord’s hands. I mean even as to temporal things;:it is our duty to work for our daily bread, and to earn what is necessary for this life; but do recollect that everything about a Christian should be a matter of prayer, because everything about a child that ought to be {:.he child’s business is his Father’s business. If a child should have a perfect father, that father would be interested to hear about the child’s play as well as about the child’s suffering. He would take an interest in his boy’s lesson-books at school, and cheer him in reference to the little trials of his play-hours, for that which may be very little to a stranger, may be great to a father who measures things by his love to his child. Though a matter might be little to the father, considering him as a man alone, yet since it is great to the child, and the father puts himself into the child’s place, his sympathy makes insignificance important. I have heard of a great king who was one day waited upon by an ambassador, who found him upon all-fours upon the floor, making himself into a horse for his little son. He said to the ambassador,” Sir, are you a father?” “Yes, your majesty, I am.” “Then,” said he, ‘: I will finish my game with my boy, for you will understand me.” So he went on round and round the room till the little one had enjoyed his full share of romp, and then his majesty turned to the ambassador, and said, “Now I am ready to attend to the affairs of state.” I honor the king for thus showing that he was a man who had a father’s heart. So our heavenly Father takes an interest in the trifles which concern his children, if they are such as ought to concern them; and therefore you need never fear to tell everything to your God. Little things are often more troublesome than great things. If a tiny splinter of wood gets into your finger, it may be more serious than a heavy blow, and even so a minor sorrow may work us grievous ill.
Take your daily troubles, wants, longings, aspirations, and endeavors to the Lord; for if they are such as are right and true, they should be laid at his feet. “In everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.” Do you not think that many desires of your heart and many domestic troubles may continue—the desires to be unfulfilled and the troubles to be un-removed—because they have not been made the subject of prayer? “Ye have not because ye ask not.” May not that be the case with many a merchant, student, mother, or worker? Success in life, comfort, employment, health, friends may in some cases be found by asking, and missed by neglect of prayer.
Certainly, with regard to spiritual things, this must often be so. A brother has heard of the high joys of God’s saints, and of the lofty places to which they have attained, so that they pass through life as if their feet trod lightly on the mountain tops. He sighs, “I wish I had their faith.” How many times has that brother said the same! Let me speak to him. Have you ever sought this faith of the Lord? If you had once prayed for it, it might have been better than wishing for it a thousand times: peradventure strength of faith and elasticity of step have been denied you because you have not yet asked for them. May there not be a hundred other boons, which you have missed because you have never asked for them? You have envied others who had them, you have picked holes in their characters in consequence, and you have complained of the Lord for withholding them, and all the while the secret; of your spiritual poverty has been this fact,—” Ye have not because ye ask not.”
Sometimes you will not ask because the thing is too little, sometimes because it is too great, and oftener still because it does not occur to you to ask for it. Is there anything about which a Christian ought not to pray? Then be sure of this, it is a matter with which he should have nothing to do. Mr. Rowland Hill, in his Village Dialogues, proposes the composition of a form of prayer to be offered by a young lady before going to the theater, and another to be said when she returns from a dance. “There,” cries one, “I call that mere hypocrisy. Who ever heard of praying in connection with such matters? It is preposterous.” Just so, and thus it is dear that these things are not for Christians, for they must do nothing which they cannot pray about, and it was to exhibit the incongruity of such actions that Mr. Hill wrote as he did. A beloved brother said the other night, and I heartily agree with him, that we ought not to pray anything that we could not suppose our Lord Jesus Christ praying. He allows us to ask in his name, and thus to use his authority in prayer. Now, what right has anybody to use my name in favor of that which he knows I should not approve of? This may test your prayers. If there is anything that Jesus would not pray for, do not dream of praying for it; but humble yourself for being guilty of a desire which would be contrary to his pure and holy mind. This rule will be an excellent guide to you, for as you may only ask for that which Jesus would endorse, so you may only seek in your daily life that which Jesus would support you in seeking. Pray over everything, and that which you dare not pray over do not touch. You are proposing a new course in business: well, go and pray over it. Are you going to issue bills announcing “an alarming sacrifice” of your goods? Can you pray over them? You say that you will sell off “under cost price” is it true that you hope to get a profit on all that you sell? Then how can you ask the God of truth to prosper your sales? This simple rule, if fully followed, would work a revolution in trade; and truly it should be followed by all who call themselves Christians. Even in commerce men have not because they ask not: they think cheating to be a surer way of profit than praying. Hence evil practices arise, and at length become so usual that they lose their efficacy, and everybody allows discount for them. Should not godly men in every case set their faces against dishonest customs? “Yes,” says one, “but they would be great losers.” That might be, and yet the Lord is able to make it up to them in a thousand ways if they tried the power of prayer. In questions of business complication, where there is-a will to do right there is sure to be a way, and if you have not found out such a way I must again quote the text, “Ye have not because ye ask not.”
It may be that many a spiritual thing for which you may pray without doubt has never become yours simply because you have never asked for it. Is not that a pity? What! Nothing to pay; the priceless treasure a free grant, and yet I have it not because I do not ask for it I This is such a folly as we do not see in common life. Few people miss an alms for want of asking. Our poor neighbors are generally fast enough in begging. Poor frozen-out gardeners are out in the streets pouring out their complaint long before the ponds will bear a mouse. Few need to be encouraged to apply for charity, and yet while spiritual gifts are to be had for the asking many have not because they ask not. Open your mouth wide, brother, and ask for a great deal. Begin asking in real earnest, and never let it be said that your spiritual poverty is your own fault.
If it is ever true of us, “ye have not because ye ask not/” what does it mean? It means that there are needful spiritual blessings which you do not desire with all your heart. In what a wrong condition your heart must be! When a person has no appetite for wholesome food it is a sign of disease, and if you have no appetite for divine grace you must be sick in soul. Healthy children have large appetites, and God’s children when they are healthy hunger and thirst after righteousness. Why is it we do not desire these precious things? Very often it is because we do not feel our need of them; and what a proud ignorance that is which does not know its need! If you were to look at yourself, brother, though you think yourself rich and increased with goods, and needing nothing, you would see that you are naked, and poor, and miserable. What a sad thing it is that you should miss priceless blessings because you fondly fancy that you already possess them! Or, perhaps, you know your need, and are anxious to be supplied, and yet you do not ask because you have no faith in God upon the matter. How long have you known the Lord? Have you known him a year? Is not this long enough to have gained confidence? There are many persons whom you would rely upon at once, and hundreds whom you could trust with untold gold after having known them for a few hours. Cannot you thus trust God? How is it that you dare to doubt him? What a sin it must be to distrust one so faithful and true!
Or else it may be that you do not doubt either God’s ability or willingness to help you, but you have grown rusty in the knee; I mean out of order as to prayer. It is a very great evil when this is the case. When I have pains in my wrist, or in my foot, I have some hope of speedy recovery, but I am always despondent when the weakness is in the knee; then it is a very serious business. O brethren, well doth the Scripture say, “Confirm the feeble knees.” If we are not at home in prayer everything is out of order. He who goes often to a room knows how to gain admittance, but a stranger loses himself in the passages. Familiarity with the mercy-seat is a great point in the education of a child of God; be sure that you gain it.
There are two or three matters for which I desire to ask your earnest prayers just now. Do pray for a very large blessing on the congregation here. In the early summer weeks I thought that this house was not so full as usual, and I was greatly troubled about it; but the fact was that the major part of our friends had taken their holidays early. Of late the crowds have exceeded those of past years, and we are all amazed at the attendance at the prayer-meeting and the lecture. The sickness of the minister, no doubt, tended to make the public fearful of not hearing him, and his continued health has reassured them, so that now our great building will not hold all who come. We have the people to our heart’s content; do you wonder that I tremble lest the opportunity should be lost in any measure? Do pray that I may preach with power. Plead with the Holy Ghost to convert these eager thousands. Persons of all nations, ranks, ages, and religious come hither. I beseech you, agonize in prayer that they may be saved. Let it not be true, in their case, that we have not because we ask not.
Again, all through the summer weather, when friends go out into the country, and to the seaside, they generally forget to send any subscriptions for the Orphanage, College, and other enterprises. This is often a trial of my faith. I see the waters ebbing out, and at times the tops of the rocks are left bare, and I can see the weeds and the mud, and I do not enjoy the sight at all; I had rather see a good depth of sailing water for the fleet of charity. I bless God we have never come into actual debt, but I have wished that there was a little more regularity in the giving. Soon we shall have as many girls as boys in the Orphanage, and I say to myself, “I do not see any more people taking a share in the work,” and the question arises, “However will you keep them?” I do not know, but God does, and there I leave it, ‘believing that he will find the means. It is not like him to cast away any good work that is undertaken for his sake; but still I beg you to pray about it, lest it should be true that we have not because we ask not. I do not speak thus because I have any unbelieving anxiety, but because the Lord has said, “For this will i be inquired of by the house of Israel to do it for them.” The College and the Colportage are as much in need of help as the Orphanage, and they are equally useful agencies: I beg you to commend them all to the Most High, for whose glory they exist. By one or by another, by the living or by the dead, by the rich or by the poor, the Lord will provide; but I beg you to join with me in my prayer for these institutions—” Give us this day our daily bread.”
Greatly do I need your prayer for the work and ministry of this huge church. What a load rests upon me! Here are about 5,500 of you, and with all the help I have I find I have enough upon me to crush me unless heaven sustains me. My brother and the elders do for me what the elders in the wilderness church did for Moses, else should I utterly faint; but the more difficult cases, and the general leadership, make up a burden which none can carry unless the Lord gives strength. I loathe to speak thus about myself, and yet I must, for there is need. Beside all this, there cometh upon me the care of many another church, and of all sorts of works for our Lord. There, you do not know all, but you may guess; if you love me, if you love my Master, I implore you pray for me. A good old man prayed before I carne to London that I might always be delivered from the bleating of the sheep. I did not understand what he meant; but I know now when hour by hour all sorts of petitions, complaints, bemoanings, and hard questions come to me. The bleating of the sheep is not the most helpful sound in the world, especially when I am trying to get the food ready for the thousands here, there, and everywhere, who look for it to come to them regularly, week by week. Sometimes I become so perplexed that I sink in heart, and dream that it were better for me never to have been born than to have been called to bear all this multitude upon my heart. Especially do I feel this when I cannot help the people who come to me, and yet they look that I should do impossibilities. Moreover, it is not easy to give wise advice in such complicated affairs as those which came before me, and I hope I shall never be content without using my best judgment at all times. Frequently I can do nothing but bring the eases before God in prayer, and bear them as a burden on my heart. These burdens are apt to press very hard on a sympathizing heart, and cause a wear and tear which tell upon a man. I only say this because I want more and more the sympathy of God’s people, and perhaps I may not have even this if I ask not for it.
If you put me in so difficult a position you must uphold me by your prayers. If I have been useful to you in any measure, pray for me; it is the greatest kindness you can do me. If the word as spoken by these lips has been a means of grace to your children, plead for me that others of the young may be brought to Jesus by my teaching. If you would find my ministry more profitable to your souls, pray for me still more, and let it not be said of your minister that you do not profit by his preaching, and that you have not because you ask not. Beloved, let us wrestle in prayer; for untold blessings are to be had for the asking. As a church we have been specially favored; but we have not exhausted the possibilities of prosperity, or the resources of heavenly power. There is a future for us if we pray. Greater things than these lie behind that curtain: no hand can unveil them but the hand of prayer. The singular blessings which have rested upon us in the past call upon us to pray; the marked prosperity and unity of the present invite us to pray; and the hopes of the future encourage us to pray. Behold, the Lord says to you, “Ask, and ye shall receive.” Brothers, sisters, slack not your asking; but for the love of souls multiply your petitions, and increase your importunity.
LONDON ADVANCING
THIS is a picture of the garden of our house in Nightingale-lane. It was truly quiet and rustic, but the enemy of all beautiful things was near at hand. Notice the heads of the advancing columns visible over the tops of the trees. London pushes the country further and further away. To cover scores of acres with streets is the work of a few weeks. Where do the people spring from? Assuredly they have come in armies hitherto, and still they come! They swarm like birds of the air.
As these thousands and thousands descend upon us, it would be a grand thing if we could have places of worship ready to welcome them. Whoever is first in the field secures most of them. Alas, it seems impossible for the lovers of the gospel to overtake so large a demand, and the birds as soon as they alight are captured by Ritualistic fowlers, or else they are left to wander into utter heathenism. What is to be done? What ought to be done? What shall be done? Too many rich professors are engrossed with the silly ambition to be richer still, though they have already more than they can possibly need. The paramount claims of the Lord Jesus and the needs of dying souls are forgotten, and for lack of means the cause of God and truth is crippled. O Lord, how long!
The fervent prayers of believers everywhere are entreated for London, that the Lord may give the means for erecting houses of prayer, and may also raise up powerful ministries, and give the people a willingness to hear them. Hundreds of thousands of Londoners have practically turned their backs on the Sabbath, and on all hearing of the word, and many find a ready excuse for doing the same thing because the gospel is not preached in their neighborhood. By means of our College we have the men at hand, and now we lack the power to form churches because we cannot provide them with meeting-places. Halls for hire are seldom to be had, and the police will not let us worship in the street: what, then, is to be done? Must we see men perish for lack of means to reach them with the gospel?
To those who have riches, and do not come to the help of the Lord’s cause, we commend the word of the Lord in Haggai 1:4, “Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your cieled houses, and this house lie waste?” It is not wrong for you to enjoy the comforts and even the luxuries of life if God has given you the means to do so; but these must. not be purchased at the expense of the cause of God: your giving to the Lord must bear a due proportion to your personal expenditure. To spend on self, and not upon the Lord’s work, is to subject our religion to question, and our conduct to condemnation.
SUCH BEAUTIFUL LANGUAGE
IT is not unusual to hear persons express their estimate of a preacher in words something like these: “But he uses such beautiful language!” His “beautiful language” or “elegant diction” forms the basis of their approval or condemnation. But what does he say? Nobody seems to remember or tell much about that; but his “language” is “beautiful.” It is a beautiful cup, but it contains no water; the plate is beautiful, but there is little food; instead of good seed, he sows beautiful beads and buttons; but what shall the harvest be? He applies a beautiful plaster, but there is no balm of Gilead about it, and it possesses no healing power; he is a beautiful physician, but his patients die. He gives medicines in beautiful vials, but they are deadly poisons. Think of a man crying “Fire!” in the most chaste and elegant forms of expression, and so softly, too, that the slumberers sleep on, and those who are awake are persuaded that there is no danger.
In a world like this there is something beside sweetness and beauty. There are awful facts of sin and wrath and judgment which concern mankind; and we have something to do beside listening to quaint conceits, polished expressions, and smoothly-drawn sentences which have no grip on the conscience, and which allow men to sleep quietly while judgment and damnation are hastening on their track. There is sin, there is sorrow, there is danger, there is death on every hand, and shall we be lulled to rest with” beautiful language,” and neglect the warnings which God has given and the judgments which he has pronounced against sin and iniquity? Oh, better far to listen to a voice of one crying in the wilderness, that warns and wakes and rouses slumbering souls, and bids us flee from the wrath to come, ere it shall burst in thunder on an unsuspecting world.—From The Boston Armory.
NOTES.
On Wednesday morning, September 7, at nine o’clock, the long-afflicted wife of J. A. Spurgeon, our beloved brother, entered into rest. It is very singular that exactly eleven years before, on the same day of the week and month and year her brother, Captain Burgoyne, was drowned in the ironclad ship Captain in the Bay of Biscay. She was the daughter of General Sir John Burgoyne. She united with the church at the Metropolitan Tabernacle at the same time with her esteemed mother, and bore her witness for Christ with a courage characteristic of the family. Her attainments were great alike in languages, in music, and in general information: she was a living Concordance of the Bible, and could find any text; in her own Bible at once. Her husband found in her a true helpmeet so long as strength sufficed, and to the last she did her utmost, selecting the hymns and tunes for the services up to the last Sabbath of her life. She has marked her copy of “Morning by Morning,” August 29, page 242, at the passage referring to Carey’s choice of an epitaph:-
“A guilty, weak, and helpless worm,
On Christ’s kind arms I fall;
He is my strength and righteousness,
My Jesus, and my all.”
She doubtless felt that this was her own condition in reference to her salvation. She died aged 44, having been married for twenty-one years. Her husband greatly feels his heavy loss, but recognizes also the great goodness of God in sustaining the patience of the sufferer and in lifting her higher in his own good time. She died in her bed, and not in her hath, as has been strangely stated in the papers. She passed away quoting the lines—
“Lift me higher! Higher!”
Another death which has touched us closely is that of Dr. Manning, of the Religious Tract: Society. He has long been our most hearty friend and helper. His speech upon Colportage will not soon be forgot, ten; we published it in. these pages under the heading of “The well-aimed Inkpot.” His preaching during our late illness was greatly appreciated by Tabernacle friends. He was one of the most genial, lively, generous men we have met with. In him deep earnestness never soured into sternness, neither (lid liberality degenerate into laxity. Like his predecessor in office, Dr. Davis, he began life as a Baptist minister, but we rejoice to add that he remained to the close faithful to his convictions. Those who knew him will miss his beaming face, and radiant smile, and hearty grip. We feel that we have lost a true friend, and what is more, the church has lost a valuable worker. “Be ye also ready.”
The death of President Garfield creates among Christian people a feeling far deeper than that which arises from the decease of an ordinary ruler. He was a member of a section of the Baptist church, and the representative of that party in the United States which is the friend of the freedman. His fall is a serious blow to those in the States whose principles are on the side of righteousness. We believe that it will be overruled for the highest ends, but as it stands his murder is a great calamity. May his widow find a measure of consolation in the sympathy of all civilized nations, and comfort without measure in the tender mercy of her husband’s God. England and America have been drawn together as by a common grief; may a feeling of concord thus sown in tears be reaped in joy. Some hundreds of Americans are to be found at the Tabernacle all through the summer, and thus the Pastor is drawn into close, fellowship with believers on the other side of the ocean.
On Friday evening. Sept. 9, Charles Spurgeon, Pastor of the church at South-street, Greenwich, gave his popular lecture on “Hoarding Information; or, Lessons from Advertisements,” in the Tabernacle in aid of the funds of the College. There was a large audience, who frequently applauded the good points of the lecture, which were very many. The subject was illustrated, by a large number of beautifully executed dissolving views, reproducing very faithfully many of the striking advertising notices which meet us whenever we take our walks abroad. It is well thus to find thoughts, on bill-stickers’ hoardings, wisdom on walls, and sense in everything. The lecturer’s address is 32, Devonshire-road, Green-with.
On Sunday evening, Sept. 11, rite Tabernacle was again thrown open to all comers, when not only was the building crowded to its utmost capacity, but we are assured that thousands were unable to enter, though anxious to gain admission. We know already that the word preached on that occasion was blessed to several persons, and we expect to hear that it was God’s set time to favor many more. The sermon preached that evening is published under the title of, “Is it nothing to you?” Oh that the Holy Spirit would send a still more abundant blessing upon the preaching of the word! On Friday evening Sept. 16, another meeting of the managers and workers for the ORPHANAGE BAZAAR. was held at the Tabernacle, under the presidency of the Pastor, C. H. Spurgeon. Reports were presented of the efforts that are being put forth in various parts of the country to secure the success of the enterprise, and hopes were confidently expressed that as large a sum would be realized as on the occasion of the Silver Wedding Testimonial Bazaar. Tuesday, Jan. 3, 1882, was fixed for the opening day, and the sale will be continued during the three following days. It will require a vigorous effort to achieve success, but the object is so deserving that we hope helpers will come forward in every town. A lady friend taking it up in each congregation would help marvelously, and our Orphanage would soon be finished.
It will he seen from the acknowledgments on another page, that some friends have already begun to send contributions for the stalls, and an anonymous donor in Iquique, Peru, has forwarded £1 for the Bazaar Fund. We have also received intimations that friends are at work for us in Beverley, Halse, Hampstead, Haverfordwest, and Reading, but these we are sure do not represent a tithe, nor perhaps a hundredth part of the places from which we shall receive help for this object. It would be a great comfort to us to have just a line assuring us that our confidence is well-founded. The fogs are coming over us, and the Pastor stands in daily fear of a return of rheumatism; in which case he will have to leave this land of damps at once. It would tend to health to see the good work going on with vigor.
The Sunday-school teachers at the Orphanage have written to inform us officially that they have agreed to furnish a stall. Mr. Dunn’s helpers at Richmond-street Mission Hall have promised a stall. They are meeting weekly to work, and will be glad to receive remnants or material that can be made up for sale. We have many willing workers at the Tabernacle whose needles would soon be in full action if they had materials. All contributions for this purpose should be addressed to the Metropolitan Tabernacle; and all parcels for the Bazaar should be sent to Mr. Charlesworth, Stockwell Orphanage, Clapham-road, London.
COLLEGE.—Mr. J. E. Jasper leaves us to settle at Carshulton, and Mr. D. Macmillan becomes pastor of Hunton Bridge and King’s Langley. Mr. R. M. Harrison, who recently returned to the United States after completing his course with us, has settled at New Durham, New Jersey; and Mr. Jesse Gibson has accepted an invitation to Plattsville, Canada.
Mr. W. Coombs has removed from King Stanley, to Princes Risborough; and Mr. W. Hollinshead, from Rattlesden to Eye.
Mr. E. H. Edwards. B.M., who has been working during the past year in connection with the London Medical Mission, has recently been appointed Resident Physician to the Hospital for Women, Soho-square: where he hopes to become still more full3 qualified for the medical mission work abroad.
Mr. H. R. Brown writes more hopefully than he did a month ago about his work at Darjeeling, but it is evident that he will not be able to hold the fort for Christ there without even more heroism than was needed in leaving his church in England for the foreign mission field. Our confidence is in God that he will be upheld and prospered. Are there no others like-minded who will volunteer for work in India? We have another request for a pastor to go out, but know not where to find the man.
The missionary zeal of the students of the College has been fanned more than usual during the past month. At the Tabernacle missionary prayermeeting on Monday, Sept. 5, Mr. A. Haegert gave us a most interesting account of his medical missionary labors in Santhalistan. One of the students has already applied To him for permission to return with him, and to assist him in his work. Then, on Friday afternoon Sept. 9, by request of the College Missionary Association, Dr. Landels addressed the students on the claims of foreign missions, and the President, who occupied the chair, earnestly emphasized the doctor’s appeals for more men for the lands that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death. Again, on Sept. 16, Bishop McTyeire, from Tennessee, and Dr. Andrews, President of the College in Louisiana, delegates to the Methodist (Ecumenical Conference, delivered short addresses, and Mr. W. M. Webb, a colored pastor from Jamaica, spoke of the need of evangelistic work in connection with the Baptist churches in that island.
We have received from the deacons and other friends forty pounds, as promised at the meeting at Mr. Tritton’s, for the purchase of a new tent to be used for evangelistic services in connection with the College. The former tent was worn out in affording shelter for congregations, and in traveling to and fro. We shall be prepared with a new tabernacle in the wilderness next spring.
College Stall at the Bazaar.—We hope our brethren who have gone out from the College will be able to render much help in furnishing the College Stall at the Orphanage Bazaar. There are many from whom we cannot expect much, as in consequence of the agricultural depression they can barely live, but there are others who may he able to assist us without in any way injuring other useful objects. Brethren, do not forget that the children o£ some who were once of your number, have found a happy home at Stockwell, some are there now, and in all probability when the new houses are filled, some will be found there whose fathers in days gone by were trained in the College. All parcels and communications for this stall should be addressed to the Secretary, Pastors’ College, Temple-street, Newington.
EVANGELISTS.—Messrs. Smith and Fullerton have commenced their London campaign during the past month by holding services at Mr. Cuff’s Tabernacle at Shore-ditch. From the very first meeting great crowds have been attracted to hear our brethren preach and sing the gospel, and already many signs of spiritual blessings are apparent. On Sunday afternoons the build-rag, which holds nearly three thousand, has been filled with men only, to each of whom one of our sermons was presented as they left the Tabernacle. Mr. Cuff says, “It is a splendid sight to see so many skilled mechanics together.” Night after night during the week every seat has been occupied, and large numbers have remained after the services for prayer and conversation about their souls. On Wednesday afternoon, 14th ult., a service was held for women only, when there were between 1,500 and 1,600 present, beside babies. On Saturday night, 17th, a Song Service was held ill accordance with the evangelists’ usual practice; and on Sunday morning, 18th, a service for Christian workers was held at seven o’clock, in addition to the regular morning and evening services, and the meeting for men only in the afternoon. Mr. Cuff thus describes these gatherings: his letter was not intended for publication, and. we hope he will forgive our taking the liberty; it is so warm, so fresh, so kind that it ought not to be lost.
“Shoreditch Tabernacle,
Sunday, Sept. 18, 10 a.m. “My dear Mr. Spurgeon,—The ‘Song Service’ last night was an unbounded success. The place was suffocatingly full, and there were literally hundreds who strove about the doors, and then at the gates, pleading in vain to get in. Our two beloved brethren were both at their very best, and did exceedingly well, the Lord being with them. These Song Services of Mr. Charlesworth are unique in interest and power. They add vastly to the rest of the work. There is so much gospel in them, put in a novel, taking, yet proper manner. They must do good. Fancy four thousand people of all sorts moved by them on a Saturday night in a district so busy as this! Let the fact tell their power. Skeptics and Christians alike came last night. We know the people, and therefore write with certainty. Mr. Passmore and Mr. Charles-worth were here last night; and they can testify to what I tell you. In the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall be established.
“We had a service this morning at seven o’clock. There was a very large gathering, and the two dear fellows were here in good time. They were again at their best, and it was the best service we have yet held. The Tabernacle seemed full of holy power.
The Lord was here. I hope these things will cheer your heart in the midst; of all you have to try your faith and hope. It was something for you to take me into the College, and fit me for the ministry. It was no small matter for the Lord to move his people to give money to build this house but now he has given to you to set in motion such a work as Fullerton and Smith are doing, not only here, but everywhere they go. I am glad they come from the dear old College. May the good Lord send more men to the College who will step out of old ruts, and be men of originality and real power!
“2.30 p.m.—A crowded house at 11, and a word of much power from Mr. Fullerton. The men are now crowding in. for their service. Oh, for power! I am now stopped by a man who enters to tell me an infidel was here at 7 this morning, and so touched was he that he has just come into the Tabernacle, and vows to a friend that by God’s help he will seek Christ. We are going specially to pray for him. What wonders does the old gospel achieve! I will continue by-and-by. These are scraps ….
Afternoon service for men just now over. If it be possible the place was more crammed than last Sunday afternoon, and there was £1 13s. more in the offering. Last Sunday they ‘gave £7. Mr. Smith preached, Mr. Fullerton read, and I prayed. What a sight! This huge place crowded with men of every class and condition! I am contented to leave all results with God, for I know he will save many through his word.”
The meetings are still continuing while we write. On Sunday, October 2, our brethren go to Mr. Sawday’s Chapel, at Pentonville.
During the whole of the past mouth Mr. Burnham has been working in conjunction with Messrs. Kendon, Kipling, and Mayo, among the hop-pickers in Kent. Up to the time of writing, the services appear to have been very encouraging. Readers of the magazine are familiar with the plan of operations, and therefore it is not necessary to give details here, but only to say that each night in the week a service has been held either at Staplehurst, Horsmon den, Lamber Hurst, Kiln down, Marden, or God-hurst, and that on Sundays special efforts have been made to get at the hop-pickers by visiting them in their camps, inviting them to free teas, and in all other possible ways trying to bring them under the sound of the gospel. It will prove a lasting blessing to London if her poor children shall return from the hop-gardens made into children of the living God.
This month Mr. Burnham is to visit Leighton Buzzard and Malton.
METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE EVANGELISTIC CHORAL SOCIETY.— The honorary secretary, Mr. R. Bailey, asks us to inform our readers that this society recommences practice on Thursday evening, Oct. 6, at 8:30, in the College buildings. They will be pleased to welcome any who can sing, and are capable of reading music at sight fairly. Further particulars can be obtained of the secretary, 145, Tottenham-court-road, W. We shall need a good choir to support the efforts of Messrs. Fullerton and Smith, when they commence work in the Tabernacle.
ORPHANAGE.—A special word of thanks is clue to Mr. Geo. Hammer for his generous gift of thirty-two desks to accommodate sixty-four children in school, and to Mr. Walker, of Dunfermline, for sufficient tablecloths for the entire Girls’ Orphanage. Mr. James Teller, of Waterbeach, has also sent one hundred and twenty bushels of potatoes and three sacks of flour, the produce of “The Orphanage acre.”
PERSONAL NOTES.—A friend in Scotland sends us the following extract from a letter · received by him from a nephew in London: —”I went to hear Spurgeon last night. Our free service, Sept. 11.] He was preaching on, ‘Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow.’ His last head was—What have you to do with him? He urged us to consider and to decide either that we had or had not an interest in Christ’s work; if we had an interest in it to accept it; and if not to say so at once. This led me seriously to consider what I was going to do with the salvation bought at the cost of such terrible sorrow and agony. When I had got safe to my room at night, I began to think it over. There was a Daily Text-book on the table, so I just took it up, thinking I might get some help there. The very first page I opened, began with, ‘ I have seen his way, and will heal him.’ ‘I am the Lord that healeth thee.’ I saw at once that the One who knows all my transgressions is the Lord that healeth me, and so I was able simply to trust in him without waiting for a better state of feelings, or anything else. · . . I know you have prayed for me. God has answered your prayers; may you have the joy of continuing to see them answered in a life spent in serving him.”
One of our church-members writes:—”Dear Pastor,—I have often noticed in The Sword and the Trowel the personal notes of good done by your printed sermons in this and other countries, and since my wife (a member with you from the time of New Park-street) and I have rejoiced over these notes very much, I feel it has been wrong of me not to send you this line before. You were preaching about nine years ago upon the subject of the man who was brought to Jesus on his bed, and let down through the roof, and I remember very distinctly how you pleaded with us that bands of four should bring unconverted relations to Jesus. The idea seized other two as well as ourselves, our then school superintendent, and a lady friend, and we pledged our word outside the Tabernacle that we would not cease to pray for our superintendent’s daughter, and my wife’s father; that the four of us would bring them to Jesus
whenever we came to him in prayer. We did so. Our superintendent’s daughter;;-as brought to the Lord six months afterwards, and joined the church meeting at York-road Chapel, Lambeth, lived another twelve months, and (tied of rapid consumption, nay, sweetly fell asleep, rejoicing in the Lord. Our father was taken ill with consumption of the bowels, and laid on a sick bed for thirteen weeks, and then passed away to be with Jesus. His testimony was in these words, the last of any import that he said: ‘I know you have been deeply anxious on my account, but you need not be, for I have laid my sins on Jesus, and he has forgiven them all. I know he has done it, and they are all gone.’ After this he could never bear his daughter and myself to be absent from his side for a moment, and never was he so glad as when one of us breathed a word of prayer for him. To show his sincerity he spoke to every one who came to see him, exhorting them to live differently in their lives, to attend the means of grace, and so on. You ‘will see how much room we have to feel grateful that ever your sermon stirred us up in this way when I add that our father was at one time an infidel.”
One of our workers writes:—”My Dear Pastor,—On a Sunday evening, about two years since, one of the constables told me that a great invalid was very desirous of hearing you preach. She was in a ,’hair at the door, and was brought; in by her husband and Ben. She looked the picture of health. I offered her several seats, but she chose to occupy the very back one. I could not understand her helplessness until she told me she had no particle of leg, and that for two years she had been praying to God and begging of her husband to bring her to London, that she might hear you preach. I asked how far she had come, and she replied, ‘ From near Colchester.’ I said, ‘You pray and beg for two years, and come that distance to hear a man, how far would you go to hear Jesus? Mr. Spurgeon would not thank you to come to hear him unless through him you hoped to hear his dear Master Jesus.’ I implored her to pray God that she might see Jesus. She burst into tears and replied, ‘ I will try, sir.’ I told her husband I would see them again after the service. I did so, and oh! what a face. I saw in a moment Jesus was with her. I asked, ‘Have you seen Jesus?’ She said, ‘ Yes.’ I asked what he was like. She replied, ‘So glorious.’ I said, ‘Yes, he is glorious, and so good. He specially calls the halt, the lame, and the blind to trust him, and rejoice in his salvation.’ Turning to her husband, I remarked, ‘ You cannot be indifferent, can you? ‘ He said, ‘ I believe Jesus Christ was the Son of God, but I don’t know about salvation.’ We were among the hast to leave the Tabernacle, and I trust we shall meet in heaven.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle:—August 25, sixteen; September 1, seventeen.
NOTES
C. H. Spurgeon purposes to leave England for the South of France after the first week in November. The supplies for the Tabernacle Pulpit on Lord’s-days will probably be as follows:-
Nov. 13, Mr. R. H. Lovell; Nov. 20, Mr. I). L. Moody; Nov. 27 (morning), Mr. A. G. Brown; evening, Mr. W. Y. Fullerton; Dec. 4 (morning), .Mr. C. Spurgeon; evening, Mr. J. A. Spurgeon; Dec. 11, Mr. R. H. Lovell; Dec. 18 (morning), Mr. J. Jackson Wray; evening, Mr. W. Y. Fullerton.
Friends from a distance had better not attempt to get in when Mr. Moody preaches, as there is sure to be a dense crowd, and the ordinary congregation will be first admitted, so that the place will be full. We hope that on some future occasion both Mr. Moody and Mr. Sankey will conduct a series of services at the Tabernacle; at any rate, the building will be at their disposal.
Friends who take an interest in our work will greatly ease our mind if they will send in specially abundant help for all the institutions while we are away. We once had watchful friends who promptly sent in generous aid whenever they saw that the pastor was ill, for they thought it would be ministering to his health if they kept every work in going order. Some of these friends still survive, and the Lord is preparing more, for his work must not falter.
Let the BAZAAR preparations go on actively during our absence. Will not every member of the church, every sermon-reader, and every magazine subscriber send in something? it is for orphan girls that the buildings are needed. The poor little ones plead for themselves. Once let their faces be seen, and their wants will be the best argument for generosity. We have hitherto seen the bountiful hand of the Lord stretched out in the hour of our need, and we feel confident that he will not fail us now.
We commend to the kindly notice of all wealthy believers the case of our country ministers. The depression in the farming interest is depriving our village churches of the power to support their pastors. Our Baptist causes must many of them die out unless timely help is given. We are daily receiving appeals for the means of buying bread to eat and raiment to put on. A fund of £5,000 to meet this emergency would save many a village church. Men who were getting only £80 a-year cannot now expect half that amount, and they cry out in utter dismay, “What shall we do?” They are anxious to stay with their people, but how can they keep body and soul together, and find bare bread for their children? Where the deacons are farmers the best subscribers are crippled, and so the sources of supply are cut off. Should not the Lord’s stewards in the towns think of this condition of affairs, and come to the rescue? The system which makes each church independent and self-governing has many excellences, but we are not so enamored of it as to be blind to its defects. Something must be done speedily to aid the smaller churches, or they will die of their independency. All funds at present in existence are strained to their utmost; now is the time for a special effort to meet a difficulty, which we hope will not occur again should next year be favorable to agriculture.
On Friday evening, Sept. 23, the annual meeting of THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE EVANGELISTS’ ASSOCIATION Was held in the Lecture-had, under the presidency of Pastor C. H. Spurgeon. There was a large and enthusiastic muster of the workers and friends of the Association, and the proceedings throughout were of the most encouraging description. We beg our readers to observe the vast amount of work done by this Society. Mr. Elvin presented the report, from which we learn that, during the year, the following services have been held:—On Sundays, at the stations belonging to the Association, 603; at other mission stations, 728; in the open-air, 131; in connection with special services, 63; children’s services and supplies, 376; on week-nights, in various chapels and halls, 1,508; in the open-air, 76; or a total of 3,485 meetings at which the gospel has been preached in some part of London. As the evangelists usually adopt the Scriptural plan of going two by two, the number of addresses given is still larger, amounting to no less than 4,948. To accomplish this work 124 brethren and sisters have been more or less occupied as opportunities presented themselves. The cost of carrying on this effort has been exactly £200, a very small sum when we think how much has been accomplished by this agency towards the actual evangelization of this vast city. The addresses actually cost under 10d. each. We have been glad to meet rather more than half the expenses by sums left to our discretion, the churches visited have contributed £53 1s. 6d., donations from various friends, collections, teameetings, etc., have realized about £43, leaving a balance of £2 10s. *d. in hand with which to commence the work of another year. As fresh openings are constantly occurring, it is necessary that the funds should increase in like proportion, and the Society will also be glad of more voluntary preachers of the right sort. The honorary secretary is Mr. G. E. Elvin, 30, Surrey-square, Walworth, S.E.
On Monday evening, Oct. 17, the annual meeting of the LADIES’ MATERNAL SOCIETY was held in the Tabernacle Lecture-hall. Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presided. Pastor J. A. Spurgeon referred to the satisfactory state of the Society’s funds, the total receipts for the year having exceeded £110, and the balance to be handed over to the new Treasurer being about £25. Boxes of linen had been lent to 232 poor women, and relief administered in each instance. The Chairman stated that Mrs. Pike desired to resign her office as Treasurer on account of her advancing age, and her inability to attend. Thanks are due to her for long and hearty service. Mrs. J. T. Olney has consented to take her place. Mr. J. M. Smith sang and spoke, Mr. W. Olney pleaded for the employment of an additional visitor to the poor women assisted by the Society, and the Pastor promised £20 towards her support. Mrs. Graney, the Bible-woman already employed, described some of the scenes she had witnessed while visiting, and the meeting was closed with prayer. It was stated by one who knew that the poor mothers of London are often obliged to wash and attend to housework within a few hours of their confinement, having frequently no nurse, and no help of any kind. All hearts were saddened by the stories told. and all felt that nurses are as much needed as evangelists. Wanted, holy, patient, self-denying women who would give themselves to such work! We do not mean this as an advertisement for a paid nurse, but as an application for voluntary workers.
The first hour of the prayer-meeting the same evening was specially on behalf of Sunday-school work. Reports of some of the twenty-eight schools directly or indirectly connected with the Tabernacle church were presented by the superintendents or managers, and prayer was offered by several of the teachers and other friends. ‘ Great blessing has been experienced, but there is a general outcry for more teachers. In the more populous parts of London children abound, but teachers are few. The richer classes live out of town, and the poor are left to workers from among themselves. Schools are suffering sadly from this cause. However, the Lord will appear in this thing also.
The after part of the meeting was devoted to taking farewell of Mr. J. G. Potter, of the Pastors’ College, who has been accepted by the Baptist Missionary Society for work in India. He is going in the first instance to Calcutta, and hopes ultimately to be stationed with our friend Mr. R. Spurgeon, in Bengal. Earnest prayer was offered for him by the whole church. His missionary ardor and his steady perseverance lead us to expect great things of him.
Every Thursday evening the friends at the Tabernacle meet for an hour’s prayer before the Pastor preaches. The benefit of this season of supplication is felt all round. It is a fine preparation both for hearing and preaching.
COLLEGE.—Mr. G. J. Dann has accepted an invitation from the church at James’ Grove, Peckham, and several of the students will in all probability leave us for pastorates.
Mr. C. J. Padley has started for Australia, where he hopes to find a suitable sphere. We commend him to the kindness of friends at the Antipodes.
Mr. H. Winsor, late of Beeston Hill, Leeds, has become pastor of the newly-formed church at South Stockton.
We greatly fear that another member of our Conference has been called suddenly home. A telegram in the papers announces a railway accident near Melbourne, and states that “the Rev. Mr. Garrett; ‘red others were killed.” As our brother H. H. Garrett lived at Brighton, near Melbourne, it seem:; probable that his career has terminated thus painfully, though we hope it is not so.
In Memoriam.—On Tuesday, Sept. 27, the beloved wife of our venerable friend and father in Christ, Professor Rogers, passed away, after a happy married life of fifty-eight years, and, as the husband says, at the close of” a long illness endured with much patience and even cheerfulness.” Our dear friend is comforted and sustained.
Did our friends observe that we have published Mr. Rogers’ Conference Addresses at half-a-crown the volume? These are addresses indeed, full of holy wisdom and rare wit. If there is any difficulty about getting the hook, a note to Mr. Thomas, Secretary, Metropolitan Tabernacle, enclosing twoand-sixpence, will secure the volume, postage free. It will hardly be necessary to mention this matter twice to the members of the College Conference, but other ministers will find their money well laid out if they make the purchase.
College Stall at the Bazaar.—-We have received from Pastor C. Bloy, Aslacton, a parcel of goods for sale; from Mr. Padley, a valuable patchwork quilt; from Mr. Armstrong, Warrambeen, Australia, a box of goods; and from brethren at Melton Mowbray, Shoreham (Sussex), Waterbeach, and Wingrave, promises of help for the College Stall. This branch of the Orphanage Bazaar is sure to be fruitful. Surely no minister trained in the College will be one penny the poorer for mentioning this matter to his friends, and procuring a little help for the orphan girls. Some who did not help on a former occasion will, we trust, come forward this time. Children of ministers who were once students are now in the Orphanage; had their fathers foreseen this fact with what an interest would they have looked towards Stockwell! One who prayed at the founding of the Institution remarked that perhaps his children might one day be there. He was well and hearty then, and yet among our boys we have numbered two of his sons. It is a mercy to have such an institution for the boys: now for the girls.
EVANGELISTS.—Messrs. Smith and Fullerton have been at Vernon Chapel, Pentonville, during the greater Dart of the past month. Our brother Sawday, himself an evangelist of the very first rank, thus writes of their visit, up to the time of making up the “Notes “:—
“Vernon Chapel,
“King’s Cross Road, W.C.,
“October 18, 1881. “Dear Mr. Spurgeon,—How can I thank you, as I want; to, for sending brethren Smith and Fullerton to labor in this neighborhood? They have been here now just over a fortnight, and the work of God is progressing gloriously.
“Though our chapel is in a most un-favorable place for reaching the masses, we have had splendid audiences from the very first. A great many who seldom, or never, attend a religious service are now with us night after night. Such gatherings, both for numbers and interest, I have never been privileged to see in this house before, all these eighteen years. The cornet is a great attraction, so is Mr. Smith’s singing, so is the preaching of both our dear brethren. The people go away, and make others long to come, by telling them of the attractive services. Brother Fullerton’s preaching is weighty, rousing, and clear. Surely the gospel cannot be put more lovingly and simply than by these two evangelists.
“The children come in crowds to hear Mr. Smith on Saturday afternoons. The men’s meeting on Sunday afternoons, too, is a marvel both for numbers and interest. On Sunday nights Mr. Chamberlain kindly comes over from the Tabernacle, and sings at Vernon. We have a capital audience, although so many’ of our people are away with brethren Smith and Fullerton at St. Mary’s Hall, Agricultural Hall, which, although it is much larger than the chapel, is crowded to excess long before the time for commencing the service. As for the results, they are most varied and cheering. The old, old story, as told by our brethren, has done our own people a world of good, and they have been greatly blessed in preparing for the visit. They have distributed about thirty thousand invitations from house to house, and as many more in the streets, and in factories, etc. They have prayed much, and prayer is being answered, for souls have been saved, I believe, in every meeting. We are busy until a late hour every night leading the anxious to Christ. Some who have heard me for sixteen years are saved at last. I cannot give special cases now, but there is great joy here at Vernon over prodigals returning home. We hope for larger ingatherings this week and next, and after our brethren are gone.
“I am afraid I shall be presumptuous if I add my testimony as to the fitness of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton for the work of evangelization. They are grand fellows, they work splendidly together, and the hand of the Lord is mightily with them. These are red-letter days at Vernon. How one wishes our churches could all be visited by such men! For just twenty years’ unceasing kindness, I remain, dear sir,
“Yours gratefully,
“C. B. SAWDAY.” Early this month the evangelists are to go to Mr. Stott’s chapel, St. John’s Wood, and on Monday, Nov. 21, the day after Mr. Moody preaches for us, they are to commence at the Tabernacle a series of services which will probably last three weeks or a month. Let all our friends in the south of London come forward, and use their utmost endeavors to make these services a powerful means of grace; and let friends far and near implore a blessing upon the meetings. Members of the church, while your Pastor is away, be doubly active. Bring strangers to the meetings, and watch for their souls. Oh, that the Spirit of God may send us a great addition to the church of such as are saved! Our dear brother and co-pastor will feel much encouraged if all our workers will put their shoulders to the wheel in this good work.
Mr. Burnham reports that he spent a very enjoyable time among the hoppickers, tie asks us to unite with him in praising God for answering prayer, and sending fine weather for the open-air meetings. During the month that the services were held in the hop-gardens, there was much rain day after day, and yet he and his co-workers were only prevented from holding their meetings on two evenings.
On returning from Kent, our brother went to Leighton Buzzard. The pastor of the church there thus writes of the blessing resulting from his visit:—
“My dear sir,—You will be glad to hear of the very successful series of services conducted here by Mr. Burnham during the past week. The services had been preceded by special prayer, and the spirit and tone of those preparatory meetings led us to expect a great blessing: nor have we been disappointed. A feeling of interest was generally awakened from the first, and manifest signs of the divine presence were given. As the services proceeded the number of inquirers increased, and the divine blessing was so manifest and abundant that our brother was induced to prolong his stay with us. Last evening, a meeting was held for praise and testimony; that these who had been brought to the Savior might have the opportunity to tell of the blessing they had received, and that those who were still seeking might be encouraged. This was a most cheering and heart-stirring gathering. A goodly number of friends assembled; most of whom had been either led to Christ, or deeply impressed by the services; and, as testimony after testimony was given, it was found that a longing for fuller consecration to Christ had been awakened in the hearts of some of our church-members; while in one case, at least, a backslider had been restored. One special feature of the work here has been the holding of meetings in the afternoon for the study of the Scriptures. I must not forget to mention that Mr. Burnham has been greatly aided in his work here by our Brethren Walker, of Houghton Regis, Feltham, of Winslow, and Tomkins, of Ridgmount.
Our hearts have been greatly cheered. There are many, especially among the young folk, who will have reason to bless God throughout eternity that the steps of our Brother Burnham were directed to Leighton. Souls have been saved, many have been led to seek the Savior, backsliders have been restored, and the spiritual life of believers has been revived, and, while we rejoice over the results which are already apparent, we are confident that some good has been done of which the fruits are yet to be made manifest.
“Yours very truly,
GEORGE DURRELL.” Mr. Burnham’s engagements for this month are, November 1 to 7, Walton,:Norfolk; 8 to 13, Southwell, Notts; 21 to 27, Mirfield, Yorks; and 28 to December 4, Birkley, Yorks. He asks us to say that he is fully engaged until the Conference, so that those who desire his services must fix some date after May, 1882.
ORPHANAGE. On -Friday evening, September 30, the quarterly collectors’ meeting was held at the Orphanage. After tea, the boys’ dining-hall was quite crowded by an interested audience, who listened with apparent delight to “John Plough. man’s” description of the “Pictures” in his last new book. Mr. Carlin, of the Cow-cross Mission, who has obtained permission to reproduce the pictures for dissolving-view slides, exhibited them by the oxy-hydrogen lime-light. Two of the little girls recited in firstrate style, the boys and girls sang a few of their favorite pieces, and a pleasant evening was happily closed by the presentation of the prizes awarded to the children by the Committee of Council on Education, Science and Art Department. The collectors brought in about £120, in addition to which friends, who could not be present, sent about £30 before or after the meeting. To all our helpers we again say, “God bless you for what yea have done, but please do not forget that our family will soon be nearly double its present size, and therefore will want twice as much support.” We suffer greatly from the remark, “Oh, M,. Spurgeon can get plenty of money!” Alas! we should get none if all were as miserly as those who make this an excuse for refusing to help the orphans. How are we to get money except as the Lord moves his. people to give? We are not surrounded by an army of rich folks who have nothing to do with their wealth. Far otherwise. Our funds come from helpers who are many of them generous to the full extent of their means. The Lord will always supply the needs of the poor orphans, and the students; but when people see a man bearing such a lead of responsibility it is bad enough to refuse to help, and worse still coolly to say, “Oh, he’ll manage it’ He has plenty of friends.”
Orphanage Bazaar.—-The advertisement at the end of the magazine will show all our friends that we have had several additional promises of stalls since last month. The task is first to lead them up, and then to unload them when the sale comes on. The time is drawing near. Dear Mrs. Dilatory, do look alive!
Mr. Bartlett reports that friends in Africa, America, Japan, and Jamaica are working for his stall. Messrs. Ward, Lock, and Co. have promised to send some books for sale; and in addition to the places mentioned under the head of “College,” we have received promises of parcels from Blaenavon, Coalbrookdale, Gnosall, Lakenheath, Kennington Park, and Reigate. We should be specially delighted if some American friends would take u2 this work at once. There is very little time: but among the hundreds of thousands of our sermon-readers in the States surely something might be done …..
SONG SERVICES.—These may be n Lade a special means of grace. Let a choir of believers take either of Mr. Charlesworth’s. Song Services, and sing them through with pious feeling, and good must ‘be the result. The seven “Services” are to be had of our publishers at 3d each, or in one volume, paper covers, ls.; cloth, extra gilt, 2s. 6d.; words of entire series, one penny. Mr. Burnham has also brought out, at 4d., a capital “Service,” entitled “The Waldensian Exiles.” Of course, if these are, used as a mere concert for amusement, no good will come of them, but sung as unto the Lord, experience proves their value.
COLPORTAGE — The General Secretary writes—” The only note of importance this month is that some friends, anxious for the extension of the work, lucre made us some liberal offers, which, however, are conditional upon friends in the districts raising £40 a year. Thus, a gentleman, who will not allow his name to transpire, promises £50 if ten new districts are started in six months, while another offers to assist very generously to support a traveling agent, if a suitable man can be obtained, to visit districts and give information concerning the work, and secure subscriptions towards supporting additional colporteurs.
“We are thankful for that whereunto we have attained:, but for some time past have remained nearly stationary as top aggressive movements. We have 70 districts occupied, but what are these compared with the largo number which need the work? Being un-sectarian in its nature and operations, all Christians may unite in supporting a colporteur, and as the Association always helps the districts beyond the £40 subscribed by paying all expenses incurred beyond that sum, it is an economical form of Home Mission work which should be more widely adopted. It utilizes the press, the pulpit, and personal appeal, to make known the gospel. We shall be glad to receive new applications for the appointment of Colporteurs to districts where £40 a year can be raised. Subscriptions to our general fund are also always needed.”
Mr. D. M. Logan, who for a while attended some of the College classes, sends us the following interesting note concerning-
Colportage in the Australian Colonies.—”Dear Mr. Spurgeon,—A year ago to-day, I was in London, the center of civilization, of usefulness, and of religious effort. To-day I am in an out-of-the-way place in New South Wales, Australia, far from church or chapel, store, telegraph-office, or railway line. I live, with my family, amongst rocky hills, and can only be reached by rugged and difficult tracks. We see but few travelers, for we are some distance from a main road, and yet in this remote situation we have been visited by a colporteur! Indefatigable man! he wasn’t to be stopped by rocky creeks, nasty sidings, or up-hill roads. He had a mission to fulfill, lie carried God’s word and good books to dispose of, he had to speak of the love of God, and to tell of Jesus the Savior, and the power of the Holy Spirit, and he was undeterred by any difficulty, and found his way here as he does to many other such wild retreats. We were astonished to see the colporteur’s wagon approaching. We were delighted to see it well filled with a goodly stock neatly arranged in covered trays, so packed as to stand all the jolting and rough treatment of long and tedious journeys. We gave him a hearty reception, and bought some of his books. We purchased some copies of our old friend, ‘ The British Workman,’ in one of which I found a sketch of the Bible-carriage in the Mile End-road. It was very correctly drawn, and reminded me of old times, for I had had the privilege of selling Testaments, and preaching from it to the crowds that passed by m, that great thoroughfare. When I tell you that the colporteur sold me a volume of ‘The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit,’ and ‘Laws from Heaven for Life on Earth,’ by Arnot, you may guess I was truly delighted, for I had lost every book that I possessed by being shipwrecked on my voyage to this colony. We spent a profitable evening with him, and he left next day cheered and refreshed, I believe, as we also were by his visit. he is one of several missionary colporteurs connected with the New South Wales Bush Mission, which is doing a good work in the interior of this large and lovely Island-Continent.
“D. M. LOGAN.
“Moura, Bumbury,
“via Melongo, N.S.W.
“22nd July, 1881.”
Mr. Logan himself holds a service every Sunday for the men on his farm, and gives them a “Reading” on Monday evenings from “John Ploughman’s Pictures,” and other “sound, improving, healthy, and amusing” literature. As he took his place almost in its natural condition, and now has about 4,503 sheep, beside cattle, to care for, he employs many laborers, and is glad to. do all he can for their spiritual as well as temporal welfare.
PERSONAL NOTES.—A friend writes:—-”I was last week attending the meetings of the Hants Congregational Union at Bournemouth, when a deacon of a neighboring church related the following cheering story:—’ About seven years since a poor woman had saved up a few pounds of money, and was going into the town of Christchurch to purchase some things. By some means she lost her purse, which contained a £5 note, £i in gold, and some 14s. in silver. She was much distressed at her loss, and had some hand-bills circulated offering a reward for the restoration of her property. A person found the purse, and appropriated the whole of its contents, and nothing has been heard of the affair until a fortnight since, when a gentleman went to the printer of the handbill, and asked if he could remember the incident. On looking over his the he saw the bill, and the whole of the circumstances came to his mind. The gentleman then said, ‘ You must ask me no questions, but the purse will be restored.’ A few days afterwards the identical purse, with the amount of money lost, and £3 for interest, was sent to the rightful owner. The cause which brought this about was reading Spurgeon’s Sermons.”
A brother in the Lord, who is also a colonel in the army, told us the other day that although he had Christian parents, and many religious privileges, he never knew the way of salvation until he read our sermon entitled, “The Way of Salvation,” (No. 209.) in the little book form. He has since distributed hundreds of them to others. This is a hint to sowers as to what kind of seed they should sow.
During the past month we received an interesting letter from a German Baptist Colporteur, in which he says that he has sold many of our books, which have been a blessing to him, and to many who have bought them. He also mentions that the Empress of Germany has bought from him;’ Dew Pearls,” and” Gold Beams,” i.e., “Morning by Morning” and “Evening by Evening,” and “John Ploughman’s Talk,” in the German translation.
Just after making up the “Notes” for last month’s magazine we received the following touching letters:—
“Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — the enclosed letter, which I write verbatim, and the cheque for £40, are from my dear boy, who appears to be on the eve of departure to a better world. He has been greatly interested in making up all his little money matters to send you the proceeds. As you will suppose, he has been for some time taking an interest in your work for Christ, and one of the greatest enjoyments of his life was the hearing you preach one Sunday last spring. He has read your sermons, etc., for a long time, and distributed them among our poor neighbors. His life has been one of much suffering, chiefly from asthma; but now consumption is carrying him off, and he is lying in the most peaceful, tranquil slate, waiting the Master’s call.
“If you will kindly acknowledge his letter yourself I should be so much obliged, as I know he is hoping for that pleasure.
“I am, dear sir,
“Yours very truly,
“Sept. 19th, 1881. “My dear Mr. Spurgeon,—I am very ill indeed, and my days are few, so I thought I should like to send you my little savings before I go, for you to use in what way you think best for Christ’s work. I should very much like a few lines from you, with a few words of comfort to cheer me at the last. I am rejoiced to tell you that I know Christ has forgiven my sins, and. I am longing to depart and be with him.
“I cannot say that i have ever felt overwhelmed with sin. I have always been an invalid, and my feeling is that Christ sought me out, and has been gently leading me along a quiet path out of the way of many of the sins and temptations of youth; therefore, all thanks be to him, I can claim no merit. He has so hedged in my way, that I have been kept from the desire after worldly things, and my heart is full of gratitude to him for all the way he has led me, and I bless him for the life of sickness which I feel now has been my safeguard.
“With my best love to you and Sirs. Spurgeon,
“I am, yours affectionately,
We divided the amount as requested, and wrote by return of post to thank the suffering donor, but before he could receive our reply he had entered into the presence of his Lord, and heard from his loving lips the gracious words, “Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as you have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle.—Sept. 22, ten; Sept. 29, twenty-three.
IN SUNSHINE SHADOW
IF domestic happiness be the only mortal bliss which has survived the Fall, those, surely, enjoy it to the full whose home is a Bethel where all the members dwell in God, and love is lord of all. Home is the center and the sphere of the affections, and not a mere contrivance of the architect and the upholsterer; it is a sanctuary rather than a shelter, a temple and not a mere tenement. A residence is not of necessity a home; love must be the basis and the bond of family union, and out of this union the home must grow. In the rudest huts of the Western settler, the affections of the inmates may consecrate every log, and raise the hovel to the glory of a home, while in the luxurious mansion of a West-End square mutual hatred or mistrust may degrade the palace to the level of a prison.
“Are you not: surprised,” demands the sainted James Hamilton, “how much happiness can be condensed into the humblest home? A cottage will not hold the bulky furniture and sumptuous accommodations of a mansion; but if God be there, a cottage will hold as much happiness as might stock a palace.” Ah I there’s the secret of a home which prolongs the memory of Eden and heralds the day of Paradise regained. The Lord is there!
We have gained much, doubtless, by our ecclesiastical buildings, which we are wont to call “the house of God,” but where is the warrant or the wisdom of localizing God by consecrated walls, when he claims the renewed heart for his temple? Important as it is to assemble for worship with the children of God, we must never overlook or underrate the fact that the abode of his people is the sanctuary of God. That the early Christians realized this is evident from the frequent reference to “the church in the house.” A Christian home, rightly constituted and administered, should compel the grateful exclamation, “This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”
Home, viewed thus, is not a selfish retreat from the battle or business of life, it is a hospice from which the inmates sally forth to the rescue or the succor of the homeless wanderer. The ministry of home should operate over a wider range than its own circle of relationship. Afar it should east its beams like the cheering rays of a lighthouse which are seen many a mile by the mariner when he is tossed on the billows.
When home is regarded as bearing the Royal Arms, how loyally shall we try to make it a fit lodging for King Jesus I When we view it as a temple, with what care will its members guard against the entrance of everything which will defile it! There will be a religious atmosphere, if we may so express it, pervading kitchen and parlor and bedchamber. Peace will there wait on piety, happiness will encircle it, and in after days those who emigrate from it will look back upon it, even as pilgrims looked back upon Jerusalem, with loving awe.
Not to own the home-spell is to violate the truest instincts of our humanity and to resist the loving purpose of a Father’s heart, and yet how many there are who play truant from home and yield an easy compliance to the more than doubtful attractions of the club or the public-house. It is to be feared that the expedients promoted of ]:ate, with the best of intentions, to keep the working classes from the public-house may prove in the end to be even more potent rivals to home. A man’s best club is his own family. The multiplication of meetings, even of religious kind, may have the same effect, and we are afraid of anything which keeps a man habitually from home. “Set thy house in order,’“ is a precept to be obeyed literally and at once.
Young has wisely said-
“The first sure symptom of a mind in health
Is rest of heart, and pleasure felt at home.”
Can the reader look upon the happy group in our first; picture, and not be., touched with a feeling of admiring gratitude that husband, wife, and children can find such solace and delight at home? The husband is a true houseband, and the wife evidently secures the strength and beauty of the social fabric by proving herself to be the weft of the home. How happy the children seem. How happy the father, too, as he looks into the face of the youngest-born, and hears the mingled Babel of the rest,. A husband as willing to be pleased at home, and as anxious to please as in a neighbor’s house; and a wife as intent in making things comfortable every day to her family as on set days to her guests, cannot fail to make home happy. Look on the well-drawn picture, and wish that it were everywhere and always so; but, alas, we must look on another picture.
Claiming a poet’s license, Longfellow has sung with all the pathos of a plaintive minor—
“There is no flock, however watched and tended,
But one dead lamb is there;
There is no fireside, howsoe’er defended,
But has one vacant chair.”
The hyperbole comes so near to the expression of literal fact, that we do not care to challenge its strict accuracy. From the moment sin entered and blighted this fair world, the pathway of life has conducted pilgrims through “the Valley of the Shadow of Death.” Few, indeed, are the hearts which have not been rent by the pangs of a bitter bereavement, and it would be difficult, if not impossible, to find the person who, at some period or another, has not suffered an irretrievable loss.
“The air is full of farewells of the dying
And mournings for the dead.”
The echoes of Rachel’s lamentations will never be silenced so long as women are mothers and little mounds in the cemetery cover the offspring of their love. To everyone there are moments when the emotion of the heart demands an expression which it cannot provide.
“O for the touch of a vanished hand,
And the sound of a voice that is still!”
It is some mitigation of the grief we experience when the character and deeds of the departed leave no room for regret, and there is the inspiration of a sacred joy in the conviction that the loved one is “at home with the Lord.”
Heaven becomes more real to those who can localize the dwelling-place of the departed; and so their hearts are drawn to the home beyond. Such a bond with the spirit-world has its value, and is a part of our Father’s grand design. “The Lord is good, and doeth good.” A true faith does not doubt the fact, though its utterance may be choked with grief.
The changes which are wrought in happy families by the removal of the father are terrible to think upon. When the bread-winner is taken away none can fully sympathize with the struggling widow except those who have passed through the like experience. Compassion may do much, but it always indulges a larger hope than it can fulfill. It may brush away a falling tear, but it cannot quench the sorrow of the heart; it rosy silence for awhile the language of grief, but it cannot quell the inward moaning; it may provide for a physical necessity, but it leaves unsatisfied the deep craving of the soul. Thank God, there is One who has undertaken to be THE COMFORTER, and well does he fulfill his office.
If sympathy cannot do all it would, it should not stop short of attempting everything which comes within its range. The sight of sorrow should call forth all that is best and noblest in Christian character, and this is one of its ordained ministries. True religion has no grander environment than the benevolence which “visits the widow and fatherless in their affliction.” Piety has no richer adorning than the beneficence which translates the impulse of the heart into the language of a generous deed. Good advice only aggravates the misery it would mitigate unless it tenders help as the token of its own sincerity. “Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ,” is a precept by which the duties of believers are defined and enforced, and of all the burdens which press upon the human heart, perhaps none weigh with such crushing effect as those which fall upon the widow and the fatherless.
When the head and hand which provided for daily needs is gone, and she is left with a family of little ones demanding all her care, and taxing all her energies, what can a poor lone widow do to keep her home together? In giving her husband a decent funeral, and in providing a little mourning for herself and children, the scanty savings of years; will be exhausted, and the possible earnings of the future will often be anticipated by a loan. It is unwise, but is it unnatural? Who can blame in the presence of so deep a grief? The outlook from father’s empty chair is dismal indeed to the poor, sickly woman, around whom many little ones are crying for bread. She has scarce leisure to weep, for her babes are sickening from lack of proper nourishment. Few are able, either physically or mentally, to cope with the difficulties of the situation, and many a woman will succumb to the demoralizing effects of poverty, unless something be done to lighten her burden and to set her hands free for honest industry. To assist such without defiling them with the taint of pauperism is a painfully difficult and yet graciously pleasant task. No better help can be afforded than to find a Christian home and training for some of the children, and thus render it easier for her to provide for the rest by such labor as women can undertake. How glad a thing it would be if such labor were more abundant and better paid.
In the; Stockwell Orphanage no less than 617 fatherless children have found shelter and support, and their widowed mothers have been helped over an otherwise insuperable barrier. They can work for the remainder now that some are taken. The extension of the Institution to accommodate 250 fatherless girls, in addition to the 250 boys already on its foundation, lends a weighty emphasis to the appeal for their support, and furnishes the coveted opportunity of making many more widows’ hearts glad. It is Christmas, and the season for charitable action; let not this Orphanage be forgotten when the portion for the poor is divided by the generous hand.
PUT MORE, CHRIST INTO THE SERMONS.
MINISTERS should study, most of all, to preach Christ. The most successful preachers have always been pre-eminently preachers of Christ. This is reasonable, because Christ is, above everything else in the universe, what all men most need. There comes a period in the history of every man when he realizes this fact. A clergyman was one day visiting a dying man. He read a chapter to him about heaven, and then sang two verses of the hymn commencing,
“There is a land of pure delight,”
when he was interrupted by the sick man, with the request that he would sing the hymn beginning with,
“There is a fountain filled with blood.”
He who knows Christ, knows everything else. It is Christ, and not heaven, the dying need. He who receives Christ gets heaven. He who has no Christ would be miserable in paradise. The blood of Christ cleanses from all sin. It is the preacher’s great and chief duty to preach that truth in every sermon, lie is to make known, in every possible manner, the great and the only remedy found for man’s sin. If we fail, as preachers, in this one particular, no matter in how many others we succeed, our ministry will be a miserable failure.—The Preacher and Homiletic Monthly.
NOTES
The Editor writes—I have reached the Grand Hotel, Mentone, and find great comfort in the warmth of the air, the brilliance of the light, and the dryness of everything. If rheumatism does not depart in such balmy weather it must indeed be hard to dislodge. Coming here with bad lumbago pains, I found them gone in a night. Friends who are not tied to the land of fog and frost could not: do better than try the hospitality of mine host, M. Georgi, who has for years laid himself out; to make me comfortable. At Hotel de la Paix he was an admirable landlord, and he has not changed his manners taking a new hotel. I hope friends will not write me many letters, but if they do write, let them address Grand Hotel.
At Portsmouth, Oct. 26, the vast audience had a remarkable escape from an imminent peril. One of the papers seams to wonder that Mr. Spurgeon was nervous! Who could avoid it amid that dense throng, in a frail building, with constant interruptions? The horror of great darkness which passed over the preacher’s soul, few can understand but those who have once seen a multitude flying in panic, and people trodden to death in the crush. We should be able to preach abroad far oftener if we could secure moderate audiences, in places full to safety, but not crowded to murder-point. However, the occasion ended well; and to God be praise! The efforts of all friends at forts-mouth to entertain the Baptist Union were most praiseworthy.
For an opportunity of preaching, Southampton, on Oct. 27, bears the palm; for there we had order and quiet throughout, and we trust the divine presence was there. It was a singular sight to see at these services men of all grades and creeds, and even more remarkable to observe with what kindliness they received the preacher of the Word. Surely there is some softening process at work, some coming together of divergent creeds, some candor towards long-despised truth. In the house of Canon Wilberforce, in concert with Lord Radstock and other friends, we had much friendly discussion, but far more spiritual communion both in. conversation and prayer. The life of God in the souls of believers triumphs over even important differences of ceremonial and doctrine. In honestly dealing with each other in the spirit of love to Christ we ‘shall, by the Holy Ghost’s guidance, find the way to mutual edification and enlighten-merit, and so to real unity. If congresses, and conferences, and meetings, by bringing Christians together, shall continue to increase their knowledge of each other, and their common regard for one another, they will do more towards the unity of Christendom than all the plans and societies which have this for their design, but know not how to compass it.
Altogether, Southampton friends deserve the highest commendation,—we were delighted to find three of our College men at Southampton and two at Portsmouth, all favored with the divine blessing, and heartily working together to give entertainment to the denomination which met in such force in the two towns. Others of our own men were to the front, holding their own among the best of their brethren. We are greatly rejoiced when we see a man raised up in the ranks of the church to serve the Lord valiantly, and there is just a drop of special zest to our joy when it happens to be one of the sons of the Pastors’ College.
On Friday evening, Oct. 21, the eleventh annual meeting of the GREEN WALK MISSION, conducted by Mr. Wm. Olney, inn., was held in the tabernacle Lecture-hall, when there was a large attendance of the workers and friends of the Mission. Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presided. Mr. Bennett read the report, which commenced with a grateful reference to the spirit of prayer which had prevailed among the workers, and a recognition of the Lord’s loving care of them at the time when the tempest blew down the tent in August last. It then proceeded to specify the various special and ordinary means which had been used for the purpose of bringing the people of Bermondsey to the feet of Jesus. These include Sunday and Thursday evening services; five prayer-meetings during the week; magic-lantern lectures illustrating the Scriptures; five open-air services weekly; a Tract Society, for the distribution of the Pastor’s sermons by twenty-one friends, who go from house to house on Sunday afternoons; a Sunday-school, with an average attendance in the afternoon of 386 scholars and 25 teachers, more of whom, especially for the girls’ classes, are greatly needed; an infant class of about 150 children; a Mothers’ Meeting, on Wednesday afternoons; a Dorcas Society; Song-services; missionary meetings, and other agencies which could not be mentioned in the “short report.” The spiritual results seen since the last annual meeting have been most cheering, over fifty persons having testified to Mr. Olney that they have been led to the Savior, and many of them having united with the churches at the Tabernacle, Greenwich, Pentonville, and Rye-lane.
It was a good meeting, and greatly cheered the Pastor’s heart as he saw with what vigor the various branches of Tabernacle work are being carried on. Here was a work large enough for a separate church, and yet only one of many boughs of the old tree.
On Tuesday evening, Oct. 25, the annum meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE LOAN TRACT SOCIETY was held in the Lecture-hall, under the presidency of pastor J. A. Spurgeon. Mr. Woods, the secretary, read the report, which stated that the Pastor’s sermons had been lent from house to house in 103 districts, and that thus the gospel had been taken weekly to about 4,000 families. Several instances of blessing re-suiting from the reading of the sermons were mentioned, and Mr. Woods said that 22 cases of conversion had been recorded, although only 45 of the 103 distributors had furnished him with reports. The Sick Fund, started last year for the purpose of giving relief to the suffering poor in the districts visited, has been the means of bringing a double blessing to many a home; while the Maternal Society and Mothers’ Meeting, which have also Become necessary adjuncts of the Tract work, have each comforted and helped many poor women both temporally and spiritually. The report closed with a reference to the Mission, which some of the members of the society have started in Bermondsey for the preaching of the gospel, and which has been already instrumental in the conversion of many souls. Mr. Harrald, the treasurer, in presenting the balance-sheets of the various branches of the work, said that when he was appointed to his present office, eighteen months ago, there was only 3s. 8d. in hand, but now there was a balance of £21 19s 5d. in hand on the Tract account, after paying £30 12s. for sermons and covers during the past year. The proceedings throughout were of a most enthusiastic character, and all who were present must have felt that they had come into contact with Christian workers who were all alive, and seeking by every means within their reach to bring others to the Savior. This is another hive of Tabernacle bees, and we bless the Lord that they work together without using their stings, and the result brings glory to God and benefit to all concerned. When will all churches be alive. and work, not by some stereotyped rule, but just as the free Spirit prompts one and another to engage in this service or that? Our army forms itself into regiments by a natural process, and these attack the enemy with weapons of all kinds, advancing to the war from all points of the compass.
On Friday evening, Nov. 4, the Annual Meeting of the PASTORS’ COLLEGE was held. Several hundreds of friends had previously taken tea together in the Lecture-hall and School-room. The meeting commenced with singing by the, Orphanage boys, who, together with a detachment of little girls from the “Hawthorns,” sang at intervals. Mr. Spurgeon,:first, as President of the College, made a statement with regard to the progress of that Institution, especially calling attention to the fact that since the Conference in May last twenty-one students had become pastors, fourteen of whom had gone to churches raised by brethren from the College, ant four or five to places where other men had not succeeded. Next, as Pastor of the Tabernacle church, he bade his friends “good-bye” for a few weeks; and then, in the character of “John Ploughman,” proceeded to give a reading, with running comments, upon his “Pictures,” the views of which were again exhibited by Mr. Catlin. Pastor J. A. Spurgeon expressed the wish of all present, and many who were absent, that his brother might be greatly benefited by his holiday; and Messrs. R. Wood and Longhurst, two of the students, thanked the President and supporters of the College for enabling them to enjoy its advantages. It was a fin,’., hearty meeting, and went to supply fresh proof that the College lives in the hearts of the brotherhood at the Tabernacle: nay, it went further than that, for kind friends were /)resent from a distance who newer neglect an opportunity of showing their deep love to one who never fails to be touched with such tokens of undeserved affection. God bless all our host in town or country, in England, Scotland, Ireland, the Continent, America, and all the world over!
COLLEGE.—During the past month the following students have accepted pastorates in the places mentioned:—Mr. E. Ashton, Gorsley, near Ross: Mr. M. Baskerville, Caxton, Cambs.; and Mr. W J. Juniper, Histon, Cambs. Mr. H. J. Weeks has been accepted by the Baptist Missionary Society for work on the Congo. Mr. A G. Everett is seeking to raise the churches at Appleby, Leicestershire, and has met with marked success: another of our brethren is trying to do a similar work at Midhurst. Sussex: Mr. H. J. Martin is commencing a new cause at Bracknell, Berks; and two of the students are supplying at the iron chapel erected as a mission-station by our brother, J. A. Spurgeon’s church at West Croydon.
Mr. W. Goacher, late of Hatherleigh. has .gone to Milton, Oxon.; Mr. C. A. Ingram is removing from Roade to Upton-on-Severn; and Mr. W. Mummery from Eynsford to Chatham Road, Wandsworth Common. Mr. G. H. Trapp, who recently went to America, has settled at West Chester, Pennsylvania.
Mr. R. Maplesden has resigned the pastorate of the Madras Baptist Church, and accepted an appointment from the American Baptist Missionary Union for mission work among the Teloogoos.
Our fears concerning our late student, Mr. H. H. Garrett, of Brighton, Australia, proved only too well-founded. He was killed in a railway accident, and leaves a widow and two children to mourn his loss. The colonial papers to hand speak very highly of our brother and his work.
EVANGELISTS.—During the first half of November Messrs. Smith and Fullerton have been working at Mr. Stott’s chapel, Abbey Road, St. John’s Wood. The Pastor thus writes of “the work of grace,” as he rightly terms it:—
“Dear Sir,—Our honored brethren, Smith and Fullerton, commenced their labors at St. John’s Wood with great expectations of blessing. The week of preaching had been preceded by a week of prayer, in which the neighboring ministers of all denominations heartily joined; and the attendance was remarkably good.
“So Sunday, October the 30th, dawned upon us with sunshine upon the earth, and still brighter sunshine in the soul; yea, many saints prophesied a day of power from on high. Ten thousand small bills announcing the services on one side, and a letter from Mr. Spurgeon on the other, were circulated in the district. These won for our brethren a cordial welcome on all sides. The morning congregation was about as usual, the evening witnessed a crowded house, and on both occasions the word was with power, and much assurance; and in at least three cases it proved the power of God unto salvation. On no evening in the week did God leave us without a seal upon the ministry of both song and sermon, yet were the assemblies of people below our expectations; but prayer was offered daily, and the first service of song, given on Saturday night, was a decided success, and a time of refreshing to all.
“On Sunday, November 6th, the people at Abbey Road Chapel, not unaccustomed to see gladdening sights in God’s work, yet had never seen anything so surprising before. In the morning the chapel was well filled, yea crowded; and Brother Fullerton evinced both freedom and freshness. In the afternoon fifteen hundred Sunday-scholars, from six schools, were just held in silken cords of delight by an address from Brother Smith, who is not only a master of music and song, but also in the art of addressing children. The chapel was almost full long before 6.30, and still the people pressed in at every door until aisles, pulpit-stairs, and choir-gallery were packed, and for very safety we had to lock the gates. Once more the singer and the preacher were up to their work; the latter with power and skill wielding the two-edged sword of the truth right and left, unfalteringly and without pause, until women wept and strong men seemed spell-bound, and beyond a doubt the slain of the Lord were many; but as the Lord’s supper, followed the sermon, the full result could not be known.
“We have reason to believe that, while the audiences are by no means so large as were drawn together at Shoreditch, the locality being totally different, nevertheless, a great, deep, and genuine work is being done. The people are in real earnest, and little knots of Christians are meeting daily for social prayer in private dwellings. Bible-readings, conducted by the Pastor at three o’clock, are well attended; and each day from 7.30 till 8 p.m. the time is passed in almost agonizing prayer under the chapel, specially by those who have relations unsaved. One principal feature of this visitation of grace is that several houses of business in the West lend are feeling its effects, and among our young men conversions are taking place daily. The congregations are increasing every night, and both the evangelists and the Christian workers with them are ready to sing—
‘ Lo, the promise of a shower
Drops already from above;
And the Lord will shortly pour
All the fullness of his, love.’
“Hoping to communicate a few more notes about these services after the brethren have left us, I remain,
“Yours in the best of bonds,
“WM. STOTT.”
The Evangelists commence their campaign at the Tabernacle just as these “Notes” are being printed, so that we must reserve all particulars of their services for our next month’s number.
Friends who read carefully what one of ore’ deacons calls the leading articles in the magazine, i.e., the lists of contributions, will notice that Mr. Cuff’s good people have sent us £100 for the Evangelists’ Fund, as a thankoffering for Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at the Shoreditch Tabernacle.
Mr. Burnham continues to peg away with his usual success. Nov. 29 to Dec. 5, he is to be at Birkby, and Dec. 6 to 12 at Staincliffe.
ORPHANAGE. — Christmas Festivities — Will all our readers kindly remember the Orphans’ Christmas treat? The President hopes to be back in time to join the merry party at Stockwell; but whether he is present or not, the boys and girls will try to keep Christmas in the good old-fashioned way, and to do this they will need the help of friends both far and near. Nothing will make a Christmas dinner go down more pleasantly than the reflection that a portion has been sent to the orphans All sorts of toys for girls and boys, with all good cheer to the young so dear, apples and cakes, and pears, such as seldom fall to their shares, so that once in a way they may hold holiday, and enjoy themselves to the highest degree. Presents in kind should be sent to the Orphanage, and contributions to C. H. Spurgeon, “Westwood,” Beulah Hill, Upper Norwood, S.E. Though far away across the sea, his hands will reach to Norwood, and receive all that comes.
We trust the Bazaar preparations are going on grandly in our absence, and that the first week in the new year will see the united efforts of a multitude of lovers of orphans crowned with surprising success. We have signed the first: contract for the additional buildings.
Will all friends please note that parcels for the Bazaar should be sent either to the stall-keepers or to the Orphanage, and NOT TO “WESTWOOD” We are constantly having to pay extra carriage through the neglect of this notice.
Contributions for the College Stall have been received or promised from Aylesbury, Balham, Belfast, Brighton, Bury St. Edmund’s, Chepstow, Forres, Halstead, Highgate, Jersey, Laudport, Langham, and Sheerness.
Mr. Bartlett asks us to mention that he has received for his stall, from Mr. Cowey, Durban, South Africa, a case of goods valued at ten guineas, comprising Zulu shields, assegais, walking-sticks, spoons, etc.
The Rev. Chas. Bullock, B.D., has promised us a parcel from the “Hand and Heart” office, and the workers at Green Walk Mission intend to have a good many fingers in the good work. A friend in Crediton promises a parcel of boots for the Bazaar, and another parcel for poor ministers.
COLPORTAGE.—The Colportage Association is still making strenuous efforts to extend its useful work, and during the past month has added two new districts to the number already worked. One of these is in connection with the Rev. George Brooks, of the Congregational Church, Robertstreet, Grosvenor-square, and the other is at Manorbier, in South Wales, supported by the Rev. J. Thomas and his friends. In each case there is great need for the colporteur, and ample scope for his work, and it is hoped that much success will attend these new efforts. Through the kindness of an old and generous friend of the Association, the committee have been enabled to secure the services of Mr. R.E. Mackenzie as traveling secretary, which appointment they trust will lead to a large and permanent extension of the work already carried on with success and blessing in the present districts. As Mr. Mackenzie calls upon friends throughout the country, we hope that he will find many ready to help him, by affording’ opportunities to give information about Colportage, and by subscribing to the funds of the Association.
TESTIMONIAL TO MR. W. P. LOCKHART.—The Liverpool Mercury, in announcing the presentation of £1,200 to Mr. Lockhart, thus joins our name with that of the honored pastor of the church at Toxteth Tabernacle:— “The story of Mr. Lockhart’s work reads like a romance, and has the additional advantage of being true. On the occasion of the laying of the foundation stone of the Tabernacle by Mr. Spurgeon, Mr. Lockhart told how one evening he was standing in a crowded chapel in London, listening to Mr. Spurgeon about the outset of his ministry. ‘ Can none of you young men do something for religion in the places where you live? ‘ was the arrow shot from his bow at a venture. It lodged deep in the heart of at least one young man. He returned to Liverpool, began the work in Hope Hall and Hengler’s Circus, with which his name was so long associated, and which has now developed into the church in Park-road, with its mission-stations, Sunday-schools, and astonishingly complete apparatus for overtaking the religious wants of an important, and, till recently, most necessitous district in Liverpool.” “We remember,” says the writer, “as if it were yesterday, the tears pouring down Mr. Spurgeon’s cheeks as the young and earnest Liverpool merchant—chiefly known up to that date as one of the best athletes and cricketers in the town—told the story of the sermon he had heard in London, and the results to which it had led.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle.—Oct. 20, eighteen; Oct. 27, twenty-three; Nov. 3, twenty-one; Nov; 4, three.
PASTORS’ COLLEGE, METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE.
STATEMENT OF RECEIPTS FROM OCTOBER 15TH TO NOVEMBER 14TH, 1881.
Giver | £ | s. | d |
Mr. Geo. Kingerlee. | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Communion collections by Church in Plum Tree House | 0 | 15 | 0 |
Executor of late Miss Margraret Eyre | 19 | 19 | 0 |
A Friend, per Mr. E. C. Williams | 0 | 2 | 0 |
Mr. R Purser | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Mr. S. W. Smith | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Mr. Morpeth | 2 | 1 | 1 |
A Widow, Reading. | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs. H. Elias | 10 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. J. Pentelow | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Miss Turnbull | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Mr. J. Scrivener, per Pastor E. Osborne | 0 | 3 | 0 |
Collection at Catford Hill Baptist Chapel, per Pastor T. Greenwood | 2 | 10 | 0 |
Mr. Spriggs | 0 | 5 | 0 |
Mr. J. G. Hall, per J. T. D. (quarterly) | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Mr. John Seivwright | 3 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs. L. Howell | 1 | 10 | 0 |
Mr. A. H. Scarel. | 0 | 5 | 0 |
Mr. William Higgs, Jun. | 40 | 0 | 0 |
Mrs. H. Keevil | 10 | 0 | 0 |
Miss Hadfield | 10 | 0 | 0 |
A Friend, per Miss Pinnel, Wetton under-Edge | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. and Mrs. P Ellis | 1 | 0 | 0 |
A Friend, per Pastor B. Brigg. | 0 | 5 | 0 |
C. R | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Mr. W. Rooksby | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Mrs. Evan Davies | 20 | 0 | 0 |
A Friend in Scotland | 25 | 0 | 0 |
Thankoffering, Alcester | 1 | 0 | 0 |
George Seivwright | 0 | 10 | 0 |
“A Friend” | 5 | 0 | 0 |
Miss E. Hurrell | 2 | 2 | 0 |
SUBTOTAL — | 168 | 18 | 5 |
Weekly Offerings at Met. Tab.:—” October 16 | 40 | 14 | 6 |
October 23 | 20 | 0 | 0 |
October 30 | 34 | 16 | 0 |
November 6 | 40 | 0 | 3 |
November 13 | 33 | 18 | 8 |
TOTAL — | 333 | 18 | 6 |
Chap 17. A RECORD, PREFACE., 1882
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL;
A RECORD
OF
COMBAT WITH SIN AND OF LABOR FOR THE LORD
.
EDITED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
1882
“They which builded on the wall, and they that hare burdens, with those that laded, every one with one of his hands wrought in the work, and with the other hand held a weapon. For the builders, every one had his sword girded by his side, and so builded. And he that sounded the trumpet was by me.”—Nehemiah 4:17, 18.
.
.
PREFACE.
THROUGHOUT another year of grace I have enjoyed monthly communion with my readers, and I hope the fellowship has been as pleasant to them as to myself. Eighteen years have now seen me engaged in the happy service of preparing the magazine. It does not seem to be so long. It would not be easy for me to estimate how much of gratitude I owe for so great a privilege. This last twelve month has slipped away as silently as a ghost: it
“Seems but a score of days, all told,
Or but a week or two at most,
Since our last New Year’s song we trolled,
And lo! that New Year now is Old.”
The comfort is that the flying months have not gone by unimproved; they have had wings, but they have had hands too. We have co-operated in holy service, — we, editor, writers, and readers; and the results are such as are tangible to all; works which will survive both the workers and the age in which they lived. Around the editor has gathered a church of actual hearers, and then a far greater church of readers, and the gathering has been, not an assembly of idlers, but a convocation of workers for the Lord. The preface, then, for the volume of 1882 must be a recapitulation of the labors of the year.
The College has been so well sustained that its income will fully meet its expenses, which is an improvement upon the former year. Many brethren have gone forth from it, both to home and foreign fields, new churches have been formed, and new chapels erected for their housing, and the year has shown distinct and solid progress. At the present moment this Institution is supporting, in whole or in part, several brethren who are gathering congregations, and thus it continues to be what it was designed for at the beginning, — a home mission, attending to the necessities of the people to the utmost of its power. If more openings occur the College men are ready to enter in, and do the work of the Lord. Never was the institution so well furnished with men for pioneer work, — men of whom, under God, we expect great things.
The Evangelists are doing splendid service: the Lord has been with them in every place to which they have gone. Able and venerable ministers who have attended their meetings bear joyful testimony to the power which attends their addresses; and hundreds of professed converts remain in their wake, witnessing to the power of the gospel which was preached by them. It is on my heart to add to their number one, if not two more. The evangelist in India, Mr. Harry Brown, is doing well; and of the two brethren in Spain the same is true.
The Colportage work does not grow as to the number of laborers, but increasing evidence is forthcoming that, as far as it goes, it fills up an important vacuum in small villages and hamlets. It is to the country what the City Mission is to the town, and the fruits which are known unto the Lord are a rich reward for all the effort and cost expended. I groan to think we cannot do at least twice as much in this direction. It is an enterprise which so commends itself to my judgment that I marvel that it is not one of the favorite objects of beneficence; a live man going from door to door, selling good books, and praying with the sick, and anon preaching on the green, or in the schoolroom, gathering up hearers for the chapels, and forming temperance societies — why, it is the surest, cheapest, and most varied form of ministry!
The Orphanage has seen more of its buildings opened, and more girls received, and meanwhile health has been sustained among the children, and a fine moral and religious tone has been kept up. Funds have come in as needed: there has always been a shot in the locker, and a happy freedom from care has blessed the President and Trustees.
The Book Fund pursues its quiet holy work under Mrs. Spurgeon’s daily care, feeding those who feed others, putting, at least, a few books on hundreds of pastors’ shelves. Some eight thousand ministers of various denominations have thus been aided.
Our Unpaid Evangelists and Country Mission have kept up to the mark, and preached the gospel of Jesus in all sorts of places: some of my readers helping to pay the expenses which even unpaid service necessarily involves. The Tabernacle Loan Tract Society, and the Spurgeon’s Sermons’ Tract Society are both doing nobly, the latter giving out supplies to societies which are formed all over England for circulating the sermons from house to house. Conversions are abundantly recorded to God be glory.
During the year I have issued a volume entitled Farm Sermons’, which has obtained much favor in the eyes of my country friends, and I have had the joy of completing Vol. VI. of the “Treasury of David.” This work has been reprinted in America, and has there met with a large demand, as it deserves, for it is brought out in admirable style. I have almost finished Vol. XXVIII. of the Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit sermons, which will then number 1,696. What a privilege to have issued week by week such a lengthened series of discourses! I know not how to express my gratitude.
Dear friends, I thank you all for your generous help. To many of you I am personally indebted, and have had opportunities of expressing my obligations by letters. Others I shall never know on earth, but I hope to meet you in heaven, and joy with you in the triumph of truth, and the victory of love. Let us go on anew with growing zeal and confidence. The old gospel is not dead, neither does it sleep. The doctrines of grace are not extinct, as some say they are: they will yet come more clearly to the front, and have the sway. God grant it speedily.
Two favors I would beg: the first is, that you will all daily pray for me; and the second, that you will increase the number of subscribers to this magazine, which I heartily endeavor to make worthy of a large and appreciative constituency.
Yours very heartily,
C. H. SPURGEON.
Chap 18. JANUARY, 1882.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
JANUARY, 1882.
UNTO THE END
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
FINAL perseverance may well be regarded, as . one of the crowning gifts of divine love. It is the Kohinoor among the jewels of mercy. It is an attainment which will test to utmost the noblest graces, and display the grandest attributes of God. Perseverance in itself is admirable, but carried on to the last hour it will be glorious. Happy and honored will he be who endures till the end.
Men in middle life are best able to judge of the strain involved in being “steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord.” To mount up with wings as eagles, and even to run without weariness, are by no means such attainments as to “walk without fainting” from year to year. It may be true that “it is the pace that kills,” but for our part we find it no small test of life to continue in the race from youth to age. “Having done all, to stand” is such a thing as God alone can work in us, even the God who for ages has sustained the heavens and the earth.
The element of “stay” is a fine one, and if it be altogether lacking in a man’s character its absence is fatal. Often have we seen the best intentions, the most earnest resolves, and the most sensible schemes dissolve into thin air because patient endurance was not called into action. The new minister, when he took the pastorate, projected a grand enterprise, started a journal, opened new rooms, delivered courses of lectures, gathered various classes, commenced a crusade, inaugurated several societies, and did, — well, everything possible and impossible — upon paper. Where are his projects now? Where the societies, the classes, the journal, the aggressive movements? They suture in the radiant memories of those who live on the past because the present affords them little or no provender. A boy’s crackers on a bonfire night are the fit emblems of many “a great work,” which in our time has been for a moment “seen of angels,” and then buried, man knows not where. Yet, is not permanency in religion the test of sincerity and reality? and may we not judge that things which have a speedy and untimely end cannot be of God? In this light the flashes of the moment and the coruscations of the hour are not so much things to smile at as to mourn over. Have not many things which seemed to be of the Lord proved to be poor human notions, since they have consumed away like smoke, and passed from us as the morning cloud? Alas for the faded hopes and withered projects which strew the ground thick as leaves in autumn!
Surveying the wrecks of others, the cautious sailor thinks of his own vessel, and prudently considers whether his barque may not one day be added to the register of ruin. God grant that it be not so. Yet it would be no small wonder if such were to be the case, for who shall for ever swim where so many drown? Certainly, it will need all the strength that can be had to keep the head above water year after year. It is easy enough to stand fast for a while, but to remain as a pillar i, the house of the Lord, — this is the work, this is the difficulty. A man might not find it easy to burn at the stake in a sharp fire, and yet that would be a small feat as contrasted with standing hour alter hour amid the smoking faggots, and having limb by limb consumed by the gnawing fires of green wood. One might joyfully lay down his head on the block, to offer up his life by one stroke of the axe; but how different it would be to die a piecemeal death of long-drawn agony, a week of torment apparently never to end!
A great statesman, the other day, celebrated his seventieth birthday by a retrospect of his life; it is meet that old age should look back. To us, however, in the middle of the stream, it seems more natural to look around on present circumstances. Years ago, at a younger age, our tendency was to look ahead, and long for a great future; nor would we forego the habit, but still the pressure of long years, and growing burdens, and a sense of diminishing strength unite to keep the eyes occupied with the things of today, and the connection of the present with the infinite and eternal. It appeared to us when looking forward that the Christian life-work would require a power far beyond our own, but now we more intensely feel the certainty of that fact, and were it not for divine help we should give up in despair. If still sustained, after all these years of conflict, grace must indeed have the glory of it, and here upon the altar of the present we would offer the calves of our lips, giving glory to the Lord, the God of our salvation. Doubtless divine love will be glorified in the closing hours of the mature Christian, but it is emphatically magnified in the stern period when the burden and heat of the day are on the laborer, when the novelty and romance of youth are over, and the nearness of the reward is not yet vividly certified by old age. Of all parts of the stream, the hardest to ford is the middle: there the water is deepest, the current swiftest, and the footing least secure. Lord, hold thou me up, and I shall be safe. This is the prayer which oftenest leaps from our lips.
“Thus saith the preacher, vanity of vanities, all is vanity.” We have lived long enough to experience the hollowness of earth, and the rottenness of all carnal promises. Our work, though it be holy, presses heavily upon the shoulder, and we see not all the fruit of it which we expected in earlier days. Many strong helpers have been taken away by death, and the enthusiasm which made our earlier friends leap forward with their aid is not repeated to the full at a second sound of the clarion. The decline is only apparent to fear; but apprehension has the eyes of a hawk, and spies out the smallest discouragement. The world grows better very slowly: we sometimes fear that it grows worse. The church relapses to her former sloth; the good are weary, and the wicked wax impudent; the times are out of joint, and evil days are threatening. What can happen better to a man than to go home? Happy is he who is taken from the evil to come, or hears the sound of his descending Master’s coming ere yet the shadows of the day are lengthened to the utmost.
Thus does middle age prose when it is under the influence of its most somber hour. The ink grows thick, and the pen is clogged, and makes black strokes and heavy. The subject should be treated in a more believing manner, and written of, not according to the flesh, but after the spirit. Doubtless length of days tries our graces, but what length of days have we to speak of? We who are sighting fifty, or passing beyond it? Half a century is a trifle in the life of God. True, there is a flagging of human energy, and the warm blood of youth cools down; but our Christian life never stood in the strength of the creature, and hence it cannot flag, since the Creator grows not old, nor is his arm waxed short. The same power which begat will preserve. Omnipotence first made the believer rise into newness of life, and until it fails his life will continue ever fresh and young. Well said the Psalmist, “All my fresh springs are in thee.” What if others suffer shipwreck, yet none that sail with Jesus have ever been stranded yet. Purposes, plans, and achievements of men may all disappear like you cloud upon the mountain’s summit, but, like the mountain itself, the things which are of God shall stand fast for ever and ever. Now is the time, in the lull of natural energy, to prove the power of the Holy Ghost. The trees of earth as they pass their prime decrease the quantity and quality of their fruit: it is a mark of the trees of grace that they still bring forth fruit in old age to show that the Lord is upright. The faithfulness of God may be relied upon to work a growing faithfulness in his people. Never so conscious of dependence as in this middle passage, never so certain of the all-sufficiency of God as in this noontide of the day, we joy in the Lord and look for even richer mercies than ever.
Young men trust God, and make the future bright with blessing. Old men trust God, and magnify him for all the mercies of the past. As for us, we mingle gratitude and expectation in equal portions, and pray to stand in this present hour, faithful to the Master in whose grace we trust.
NOTES
So far as these notes are personal to the Editor they must needs be brief. Little can be said of a good night’s rest; when you can talk about sleep it must have been un-refreshing, and in our experience the most complete restfulness is that in which there are no incidents worthy of record. We have been in a land where the sun’s first beams call you to open the window and let in the balmy air; where in midwinter the flowers which exist in our conservatories are flourishing and flowering in the open garden, — this alone is a joy. Added to this the people speak no English, and do not know us by repute, so that when we walk the streets we are not questioned or begged of by every third person. Quite enough of callers are on hand to keep the day from stagnation, but one is sometimes left alone, and this is no mean blessing. Besides, there are the olive gardens and the woods, and here one can be lost to every human eye. As far as perfect repose can be had on earth we have had five weeks of it, and we are thankful. On returning to London we look up with deep anxiety and fervent hope, longing for, and expecting, a blessing.
Mr. Moody’s Sabbath at the Tabernacle must be recorded, for we are greatly obliged to him for undertaking the service in the midst of his pressing engagements. The enormous crowds that gathered created a great and serious danger which would have driven most men to despair, but our deacon, Mr. Murrell, faced the difficulty and pushed through it. Extraordinary precautions had to be taken to preserve life and limb. If you have twelve thousand people all eager to get into a building which cannot hold more than six thousand, what can you do? Our seat-holders in the evening most commendably lent their tickets to others, and thus gave a second set of people the opportunity of hearing the great evangelist; but this, of course, did not lessen the heavy pressure of the eager multitude. We see clear evidence that if Messrs. Moody and Sankey again visit London no building will be sufficiently capacious to hold the crowds who will gather to hear them. Their hold upon the multitude has by no means diminished. May the Lord send a great blessing upon their efforts, and may London, on this occasion, have a double portion of the resulting benefit.
While lingering at Cannes upon our way to Mentone, we heard of the lamented death of John Best, and we exclaimed at once, “What will the epileptics do now?” Three years ago he was in Mentone with us, and we wrote of him as one of the three mighties who visited us in our cave: and now he is with God! Who would have said that he would go first? Yet we are spared, and this riper brother has been taken. The Lord grant that it may be for the benefit of his church and the glory of his name. We hear that Mr. Best was taken home by a stroke, the second which had befallen him.
COLLEGE. — During the past month the following students have become pastors:-Mr. P. Blaikie, at Newcastle-under-Lyme; Mr. W. Bonser, at Burslem, Staffordshire; Mr. J. G. Gibson, at St. Andrew’s, N. B.; and Mr. W. Smolden, at Lochee, N. B., in place of our Brother Cameron, who has been obliged to resign in consequence of prolonged illness. Mr. Yeatman has gone to superintend for a time the mission carried on by Mrs. Robert Gladstone, near Liverpool.
The President has also peculiar pleasure in announcing that another Pastors’ College student, his son, Thomas Spurgeon, has accepted the pastorate of the church at Auckland, New Zealand, lately raider the care of Pastor A. W. Webb.
Mr. S. H. Akehurst has removed from Harston to Arthur-street, Camberwell. May he enjoy a divine anointing for this most important sphere. Mr. C. Chambers moves from Stoke-on-Trent to Perth, N. B.; Mr. T. G. Gathercole, from Martham to East-street, St. Neot’s; and Mr. J. Spanswick, from Northampton to Long Buckby. We are glad to learn from Mrs. Grattan Guinness’ magazine, The Regions Beyond, that when the last news arrived our late student, Mr. Billington, was in charge of the Banana station on the Congo.
Another of our brethren, Mr. D. Lyall, of the Cameroons Mission, has fallen a victim to the terrible climate of Africa. Very earnestly do we pray that his young widow may be divinely sustained under this sore trial. In this African Mission the world may clearly see the patience of the saints, and the unconquerable heroism which will die to will Africa for Christ.
The Missionary Herald for last month contained the joyful news that Brother W. J. White had baptized another Japanese convert. This fruit of his labors greatly cheered him when he was in deep waters through the death of his wife.
The students re-assemble after the Christmas holidays on Monday, Jan. 16. Several have settled lately, and others are preaching with a view to the pastorate, but we have not judged it wise to receive any fresh men with the exception of a few whom we have long promised to admit when we could find room for them. The funds of the College have not been augmented much during the President’s absence, although the outgoings have been as heavy as usual; but he supposes the donors have been waiting for his return, and that there will now be a golden ram upon this portion of the Lord’s vineyard committed to his care. Even his love to the Orphanage cannot make him place the College in the second rank. No amount of sympathy for the widow and the fatherless will ever make him forget the important work of training men to preach “the glorious gospel of the blessed God.”
Our esteemed friend, Professor Selway, who has for twenty years delivered courses of scientific lectures to the students of the College, now finds that his other work takes up all his time; therefore he has asked us to find a substitute, and we have secured the services of Mr. Frank R. Cheshire. We cannot allow Mr. Selway to retire without expressing our profound regard for him, and our sincere gratitude for his faithful and zealous services.
The students’ secretary reports that he has received for the College stall at the Bazaar a box of articles from Mrs. Sims, Nottingham; a contribution from “an old student and his wife”; parcels from Miss Coope, Somerton; Pastors M. Mather, Holbeach; E. Morley, Halstead; H. A. Fletcher, Aylesbury; and G. D. Cox and friends, Melton Mowbray; and promises of help from Brethren Mackey, Southampton; Marshall, Birmingham; Rankine, Guildford; Sharp, Twerton-on-Avon; Kemp, Langham; Anderson, Dalton-in-Furness; Wilson, Iredcar; and Jeffery, Folkestone. We feel sure that the College will in this case, as in all past instances, occupy a first-class position in the common effort for the orphans.
EVANGELISTS. — One of our helpers, who has attended almost all Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at the Tabernacle, has sent us an interesting summary of the meetings; but as Tabernacle friends have been upon the spot we will only say in print that we rejoice in the evident blessing which has rested upon the labors of these two admirable servants of God. The attendance upon the services has not been all that the brethren looked for, but the eases of blessing are many. In all places to which they have gone these brethren have won the confidence and love of those with whom they have labored, and none have spoken against them but those who know nothing of them.
It is with regret that we have seen in a Baptist newspaper certain criticisms upon our Evangelists. We cannot conceive that any useful purpose can be served by such strictures except that they will be overruled to drawing greater attention to these useful workers. We expect men of the world to find fault with well-intended endeavors to draw the masses to hear the gospel, but we hardly looked for it from brethren in Christ. When an assault comes from them, it is peculiarly trying, for one is apt to say, “It was not an enemy; then I could have borne it.” Yet, as the motive and intent of the criticisms were, no doubt, excellent, the best way is to learn all we can from them, and think no more of them. It will be long before all good men will be agreed upon modes of operation; almost as long, we fear, before all earnest men will cease from hard speeches; we must, therefore, gel; on as well as we can with our brethren, and love them none the less for being a little acid now and then. The extraordinary liberties which some are taking with all the proprieties may well drive our older friends into their growleries: we feel half inclined to go into our own when the wind is in the east, and when we have just read something specially outrageous.
One thing we have fished out of the sea of words which has lately surged around us, and this has been considerably to our comfort our brethren appear to, have been censured all the more heartily because their preaching has a decidedly Calvinistic tone. This reconciles us to all the censorious remarks. Evidently theft doctrine is the head and front of theft offending, and we hope they will always remain liable to the like condemnation. We might have found fault with zealous brethren for their Arminianism; but we have not done so, because we regarded it as a frequent infirmity of noble minds; we will not exact the like generosity from all upon the other side, but we wish they could manifest it spontaneously. Thank God, the bulk of them do so.
We have received, with many thanks, £50 for the Evangelists’ Fund from our Brother Sawday’s friends, as a thankoffering for Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at Vernon Chapel; and a similar sum from Mr. Stott’s good people at Abbey-road.
Encouraging reports of Mr. Burnham’s visits have been received from Winslow, Bucks; Southwell, Notts; and Mirfield, Birkby, and Staincliffe, Yorkshire. It is very remarkable that for a long time nearly every account of our brother’s work has closed with the expression of regrets that, just when the greatest success and blessing have been attending his labors, he has been obliged to move on to fulfill his next engagement. This may suggest to brethren who are arranging services that, in most instances, even in villages or small towns, it will be wise to secure the evangelist’s help for a fortnight at least, as experience has proved that a week’s meetings, as a rule, bring the preacher and the people into full sympathy with one another and with the work, and prepare them for a greater measure of blessing than is generally realized at the beginning of the services.
ORPHANAGE.—Before this number of the magazine can be in the hands of most of our readers, the Christmas festivities will be all over, though not forgotten by the boys and girls at Stockwell. At the time when these “Notes” were made up the contributions for this object were coming in, and doubtless all that will be needed will be forthcoming from one source or another. In the name of the lads and lasses we make a profound bow to all our kind friends, and say, “THANK YOU.” Then we wave our hat, and hundreds of voices shout out three hearty cheers for one and all who remembered the orphans.
Early in December Mr. Charlesworth and his choir visited Southampton and Portsmouth. They have always had a warm reception when they have gone to these places before, but Mr. Charlesworth says they never had such large and enthusiastic meetings as they have had on this occasion. Very heartily do we thank our Southern friends for again helping the Orphanage so soon after having given us collections at the Baptist Union services. We are also very grateful to all at Southend and Maidenhead who contributed to the success of the orphans’ visits to those towns.
Just as we were threatened with another illness, the cheering news reached us that under the will of the late Robert Nicholson, Esq., of Dumfries, the Orphanage will receive from £1,500 to £2,000, as a thankoffering for the comfort derived by the testator from reading our sermons. We are very thankful for such generous remembrance of our work, but beg to inform our readers that the bequest only takes effect twelve months hence, and meanwhile our large family must still depend upon the constant care of numerous helpers who regularly send to us as the orphans’ Father prompts them. We are grateful to say that we have no cause for immediate anxiety, and all we desire is that as we increase the number of girls under our care our income should grow in like proportion.
The great event this month is, of course, the grand BAZAAR in aid of the fund for the completion of the Girls’ Orphanage. This is to be held in the Lecture-hall and Schoolrooms, which occupy the entire area under the Metropolitan Tabernacle, on Tuesday, Jan. 3rd, and three following days. Mr. Murrell and his army of assistants are working hard to prepare the rooms for the reception of the goods, the stall-keepers are all vieing with one another to see which can render most help to the orphan girls, and we do not know anything that is needed now except a host of purchasers to come and clear the stalls of the useful and ornamental articles that will be on sale, In addition to the contributions in cash and goods, acknowledged on other pages, we have received some choice Indian work from our good friend, Mr. J. Gelson Gregson, and another parcel is on its way from Constantinople. Several of the American denominational papers; have asked their readers to send help for he Bazaar Fund, and we expect many will respond to the appeal, for we have large numbers of friends on the other side of the Atlantic. While distant lands are thus remembering our work it is not likely that sympathy will be lacking at home, and we now give the heartiest possible invitation to all in town or country, who love the widow and fatherless, to come to the Bazaar, or to send us a brick, or a plank, or a window, or a door, or a room, that the whole block of buildings needed for the proper accommodation of two hundred and fifty girls may speedily be completed.
COLPORTAGE.—At the beginning of another year we call attention again to the immense good which is being done by the Colportage Association. Could the readers of The Sword and the Trowel visit the depot at magazine-time, when the monthly periodicals are ready to be despatched to the colporteurs, it would help them to realize more vividly how widespread is the extent of this work. Here are huge piles of all the best periodicals published, from the halfpenny monthly for the children to the sedate and erudite sixpenny and sevenpenny magazine for the more advanced. Many thousands of these, besides Bibles and other good books, are carried by our agents every mouth, some of them into remote country villages, and others into busy manufacturing towns; and God is blessing the reading of these silent messengers. Will our readers pray for the colporteurs, as they go on their ofttimes lonely rounds, now selling a book or giving a tract, then conversing with the laborer at work or the wife busy at home, about the welfare of the soul; now addressing a band of cottagers in some villagekitchen, then whispering words of comfort into the ear of the suffering or dying? Here is an evangelist and a bookseller in one person. We want to have at least one hundred colporteurs at work forthwith. Seventy-two are already employed; but what are these compared with the need existing? Thousands of souls are perishing in our rural districts for want of a knowledge of the gospel. Ignorance and vice abound, while Ritualism and infidelity are busy trying to deepen the darkness already existing. The colporteur does not supplant, but helps all other Christian workers of whatever denomination.
Mr. R. E. Mackenzie, our recently-appointed traveling secretary, reports that he has received guarantees for a new colporteur in Tewkesbury and Cheltenham districts. Our general fund needs increased help to keep pace with the extra cost of opening new districts, consequently contributions, large or small, will be at all times thankfully received.
PERSONAL NOTE. — Our son Tom, in a letter recently written to his mother from Auckland, enclosed a portion torn off an old Australian paper, concerning which he sends the following interesting particulars: — “This scrap of newspaper has been given to me by a town-missionary here, who regards it as a very precious relic. It came to him from a man who died in the hospital, and bequeathed it to his visitor as a great treasure. It is a portion of the Melbourne Argus. and of father’s sermon (‘ Loving Advice for Anxious Seekers,’ No. 735). The man found it on the floor of a hut in Australia, and was brought by its perusal to a knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus. He kept it carefully while he lived (for it was discolored and torn when he found it), and on his death-bed he gave it to the missionary as the only treasure he had to leave behind him. I thought dear father might like to have it in his book; if not, send it back to me that I may return it to its owner, who says he often feels encouraged by glancing at it. It was his desire, however, that I should send it home, that the dear preacher might be encouraged.”
The following paragraph may be of use to those of our readers who distribute books and tracts. The parcels are marvelous, both for quantity, quality, and price.
Very great has been the desire on the part of clergymen and missionworkers to avail themselves of the liberal offer made by the “British Gospel Book Association.” Far more than the 20,000 volumes of Miss Hayer-gaps book will be needed to supply the requests for it, and therefore the same donor has not only decided to double the grant, and send out another 20,000 volumes, but also to pay the cost of distributing £2.000 worth of halfpenny and penny books at the same rate, viz., QUARTER PRICE. Many of these books are by Miss Havergal, and some by Mrs. Pennefather and Mr. Haslam, and they are among the most attractively got-up books that we have seen. Distributors can get a £2 parcel for 10s., or a £4 parcel for 20s. Applications for these books must be sent direct to the “Secretary,” British Gospel Book Association, 3, Hackins Hey (Exchange), Liverpool.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle. — Dec. 1st, seventeen. Pastors College, Metropolitan Tabernacle Statement of Receipts from November 15th to December 14th, 1881
Chap 19. FEBRUARY, 1882.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
FEBRUARY, 1882.
“EVER THIS OUR WAR CRY! VICTORY! VICTORY!”
“Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors: and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.” — Isaiah 53:12.
OUR great concern is concerning Christ. “For him shall constant prayer be made.” It does not much matter what becomes of us, the common soldiers, so long, as our great Guard could defy death for themselves, but were over anxious about the emperor, so every loyal soldier of Christ feels that the one question in the present conflict is, “How goes it with the King?” Is he crowned? Is he exalted? Is he winning his way among the sons of men? Brothers, it may be that our star is waning. Does it matter, if his sun is reaching its noon? It may happen that the company with which we are associated is not so much to the front as it used to be, and the regimental flag is in the rear, but what of that? Let us do the best we can to retrieve its honor; but, after all, the main consideration is the royal standard. Where is that? “Let my name perish,” said Whitefield, “but let Christ’s name last for ever.” Such a feeling should actuate us all. What are we, my brethren, and what is our father’s house? What if ten thousand of us should fall merely to fill a ditch for him to march over? What if he took the whole of us and crushed us to the dust, if he were lifted an inch the higher, it were none too costly sacrifice for such a One as he is, who has redeemed us unto God by his precious blood.
Our first and last concern is about the result of our great warfare in regard to Christ; and my text will be consoling to your hearts in proportion as you are consecrated to Christ. If you are a worker for Jesus, and your heart is tremulous for the cause of God, — if you feel dismayed at times, and often anxious about the progress of the kingdom, — such an assurance as this will be like a voice from the Comforter himself. It is the Father who speaks, and he says concerning the Well-beloved, “Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong.”
I. The first truth taught us here is that THE VICTORY OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST IS SURE.
Sure, first, because these words are a diving promise; and every word of promise that comes from God is established. “Hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?” If God has said, “I will divide him a portion,” that portion shall be divided. If the Lord has declared that he shall divide the spoil with the strong, who is he that shalt keep him back from the prey? We might have doubted if this word had been a prediction as to the probabilities of the life of this religion or of that; we might have supposed that the religion of Christ would be crushed out by rougher faiths that could use the carnal weapon, or that its exceeding spirituality might cause it to wither away in an atmosphere so uncongenial. We might, I say, have had seine trembling before of the ark of the Lord if this had been a mere inference or opinion; but we have none now; for as surely as this book is the infallible Word of God, so surely must Christ win the day. As surely as God cannot lie, so surely must he upon whom the Lord laid the iniquity of men, rise from all his sorrows to a glorious victory.
The text is a promise placed very singularly in connection with facts which have been accomplished. We are told that Christ shall divide the spoil with the strong, but that promise is set side by side with the declaration that he is “brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.” Just as surely, then, as that part of the prophecy is fulfilled in which Christ suffers, so surely shall that be fulfilled in which he triumphs. You have no doubt whatever about his being taken from prison and from judgment, about his making his grave with the wicked and with the rich in iris death. Well, the same book and the same chapter which contains the prophecy of those sorrowful facts contains this prophecy that he shall divide the spoil with the strong. Therefore the ultimate victory of Christ is made sure by a divine promise.
Notice, moreover, that it is the Father himself who here puts forth his hand to guarantee the victory. He writes, “Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great.” “I will do it; I will see that he conquers; I will see that he has the reward of his labor. My own right hand and my holy arm shall so be with him that he shall tread down his enemies, and he shall take from them mountains of prey.” Who is this that saith “I will divide him a portion?” It is he at whose voice the earth trembles.
“The pillars of heaven’s starry roof
Tremble and start at his reproof.”
When he says “I will do it,” who shall stay his hand or resist his will? God, the everlasting Father, has staked his honor and his glory upon the success of Christ. I make bold to say that if Christ win not the world, and if he be not crowned King of kings and Lord of lords, it is not Jesus that is dishonored so much as the Great Father by whom he was ordained, sent, and anointed. The stain would not only be upon the manhood but upon the Godhead too; for God himself appointed the Lord Jesus, and said of him — “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” He must see the Messiah through with it. It; is the pleasure of the Lord that is in his hand, and that pleasure must prosper there, or else God’s name would be dishonored. How sure I am that; Jesus will win the victory.
I am delighted to notice a change of expression in the next sentence. The Son of God himself also puts hand to the work of ultimate victory. Read the text again. “Therefore will I divide him a portion,” “and he shall divide.” God gives him the victory, and he takes it himself. The Father grants it, and the Son grasps it by his own right hand. The glorious Jehovah cries, “He shall divide,” and the ever-blessed Son of the Highest as a conqueror comes forth actually to divide the spoil. Oh, my brethren, Jesus is as gentle as a lamb; but I might say of him as they of the Red Sea said of Jehovah, “The Lord is a man of war: tits Lord is his name.” This Lamb is the Lion of the tribe of Judah, and who shall stand before him when he goes forth to war? Who shall rouse him up? They that came against him to take him in the days of his humiliation stumbled and fell when he uttered the words, “I AM”; and if the fall power of that “I AM” had been let loose upon them they had not merely staggered to their falling, but each man among them had stumbled into his grave. It is he that stilled the waves upon Genessaret: it is he that ruled the powers of the deep, and made the devils fly at his bidding: if he putteth his hand to the battle, woe to those that strive against him! The defeat of Christ! Laugh the idea to scorn. Nay, the thorn-crowned Prince is victorious. Well spake the apostate Julian in his dying moments, “Nazarene, thou hast conquered.” All his foes will have to own it. In the day of judgment trembling, and in the lowest pit of hell despairing, they shall acknowledge his supremacy. The despised and rejected of men with rod of iron shall break his enemies in pieces; yea, he shall break them in pieces like potters’ vessels. “Be wise now, therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, O ye judges of the earth: kiss the Son, lest he be angry and ye perish from the way when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him.”
That is the first thing, then; the Christ will conquer. It is a divine promise; its fulfillment is guaranteed by the Father, it will certainly be achieved by the Son.
II. Secondly, THE VICTORY IS AS GLORIOUS AS IT IS SUITE: “Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great.”
The great King rewards our Champion. You have heard of great champions who have been knighted on the battle-field by their sovereigns: deeds of special prowess have been thus rewarded. Others, amid the acclamations of their troops and while yet their hands were unwashed from gore, have been crowned on the field only because or their superior valor and the decisive nature of the battle. Now, what is it to be knighted or crowned by kings or nations? It is as nothing. But to be crowned of God! For God himself to give the reward in the light of eternity! What must such a victory be? I trow that many an act which man applauds is despised by the Most High, and many a fierce fight that has stirred the heart of nations, and made the poets ring out their hymns for centuries, has been not only despicable but abominable in the sight of the Most High. But when God rewards, what must be the glory of the achievement! And here we have it: God, even the Father, the selfsame one whom it pleased to bruise his Son, when he made the iniquity of us all to meet upon him — that selfsame God who knows all things, and weighs all things aright, and is the very source and soul of honor, he shall crown our Lord Jesus. Must it not be a glorious victory? He has crowned him; he is crowning him; he shall continue to crown him; for thus it is written, “Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great.”
The glory of this victory may be seen, next, not only in the reward coming from so high a source, but from its being manifestly a great reward in the esteem of men, since our Lord is to have “a portion with the great.” It is difficult to say what makes a great man. When I look over the lists of great men some of them seem to me to be very little; but still men have among themselves a sort of standard by which to measure, and they say of such and such persons that they are “great.” From different points of view they are so. Now, Christ is to have a portion with the great. Perhaps you have been grieved to see how certain ungodly men in these times make nothing of Christ; like Herod, they set him at nought; but these people are mostly very second-rate individuals, of small account even among their own order. Almost all intelligent men, even if they do not accept all that Christ says, agree that he is a great man, and many confess that there never was such another man as he. There have been skeptics whose admiration of Christ has been extreme. I, for one, cannot understand how any honest mind can do other than reverence his marvelous character and the grandeur of the truths which he has revealed. He is great, inexpressibly great, and the day will come, must come, is every day coming nearer, when Christ will be seen even by his enemies to be supremely great. His cross to-day towers o’er the wrecks of time, and he himself rises before my faith’s vision so much above all the sons of men, that; I see all philosophies, theories, and human dogmas crouching at his feet. His victories are not victories among pigmies, but victories among the great, such as shall make all men see that he himself is the greatest of the great My brethren, think for a minute what a battle Christ has waged with all the powers of evil; with all the wit, and craft, and unbelief, and pride, and lust of man; with all the foul devices, and cruelties, and wickednesses of the devil, and all the principalities and powers that obey his bidding; and with death and all that goes with it, and shall come of it. Against all these he has set the battle in array, and over all these he has triumphed, so that he divides the spoil with the great. Thy adversaries, O Prince Emmanuel, are not such as a common warrior might rout; they are foemen worthy of thy steel. What desperate tugs they gave thee when they forced the bloody sweat from out thee in the moment of thy sternest wrestling; but thou hast flung them to the ground, and trodden down strength.
Of course this language can only be used as speaking part of the truth, because the portion which God has given to his dear Son indisputably greater than the greatest things that earth can hold. I take it that the question that Christ has come to answer is the greatest question that ever moved eternity. The work that Christ has come to do is the grandest work that ever stirred the ages. It is God’s work and God’s question. How shall evil be driven out of the world? How shall justice, without a stain, smile on a sinner? How shall God be seen as the holy One with all the glory of his character manifested, receiving to his bosom the guilty sons of men? The grandest work that e’er was done of God himself Christ has come to perform, and not only has he his portion with the great, but of all the great he is the greatest, and his portion is above their portion. They are not to be mentioned in the selfsame day.
Notice, too, that a part of the description of this victory represents the Lord as himself dividing the spoil “with the strong.” Not merely with great enemies did Christ wrestle, but with strong powers. I might give you a hundred illustrations of this, but I prefer to give you one. When the Lord Jesus Christ came into my heart — came to battle there — he did, indeed, divide the spoil with the strong, for I was strong-willed, and desperately set on mischief, and for a while I was in the hand of a strong despair, out of which it seemed impossible that I should escape. The bands which held me were of iron, tough as steel, hardened in the fires of hell; and yet this day I am his, for he has won me, and taken the prey from the mighty. I have been just now to see. our venerable Elder White. He is dying. I looked at his venerable beard as he sat up in the bed, and I looked at the bright face that shone above. it, and I was charmed at the joyful sight. He said, “I have no trouble; I have not a troubled thought; I am the happiest man in the world; I am going home, and I rejoice in it; though I am perfectly satisfied to wait.” Death is just nothing at all to him. Just like a dear sister who went from us some time ago: when I went to see her, you might have thought she was going to be married, she was so happy in prospect of departing. Charles Wesley once said, “They may say what they will about Methodism, but our people die well.” That is my comfort: our people die well, they die gloriously triumphant in the Lord. When I think of it I can see how my Lord divides the spoil with the strong. Death comes and he says, “That is mine.” He has taken the poor, wrinkled body; and Christ smiles, and lets him have it; for he takes for his share the soul, the life, and as he bears him off he takes the best part of the spoil. He has left death the husk, but he has himself’ secured the kernel. Yea, the day will come when he will take the body, too, out of the custody of death; for not a wreck or a rag of all his saints shall remain in the domains of death. There is a resurrection of dead bodies as well as an immortality of spirits. Glory be to Christ. In this way, here and hereafter, he divides the spoil with the strong. Strong is death, but stronger still the omnipotent Son of God.
There is another aspect under which we may speak of the glory of Christ’s victory; he will share it with his people. The second paragraph of the text is, “he shall divide the spoil with the strong.” That is, he will divide it out, and allot portions to all those who came to the help of the Lord against the mighty. Just as David after Ziklag when he had taken the prey from the Amalekites, sent portions all round to his friends in Judah, so when the King Eternal takes the spoil, he will give a share to you and to me, if we have been faithful to him. There shall be a portion e’en for us whom the Lord made strong for himself in the day of battle. Does it not make your heart laugh to think of it? Jesus wins the victory, but he will not enjoy it alone; he will glorify his people. Even the sick folk that go not down to the battle shall have their share of the spoil; for this is David’s law, and the law of the Son of David, that they that abide with the stuff shall share with those that go down to the fight. He will give to each faithful sufferer or worker a portion of the prey. Make haste, O champion, make haste to give to everyone of us a prey of divers colors, meet for the necks of them that take the spoil!
III. Thus we have seen that Christ will win the victory, and the victory will be glorious. Now let us declare, thirdly, that THE RESULTS OF THIS VICTORY WILL BE VERY SUBSTANTIAL
Let me remind you that, in consequence of what our Lord has done, myriads of souls will be redeemed. How many will escape from sin and death and hell to live for ever is not revealed. We have every reason to believe that a number that no man can number, out of every nation, and people, and kindred, and tongue, shall praise their redeeming,; Lord. Christ’s death will not spend its force in the conversion of here and there one, but he will see of the travail of his soul and’ will be satisfied; and we are convinced that no little thing’ will satisfy him. The great result of our Lord’s death will be the eternal salvation of myriads untold.
Next to that will be the overthrow of every form of evil which now reigns in the world, and the extermination of religious falsehood, vice, drunkenness, war, and every horrible mischief born of the fall and of human depravity. Christ will conquer these, and there shall be new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. For ever and ever boundless honors shall be given to Christ for his victory over every force of evil. The seed of the woman shall trample on the serpent.
As the result of Christ’s death Satan’s power will be broken. He will no longer go forth to rule among the nations.
Death also will hate lost its dominion over the sons of men. The Son of David shall restore that which he took not away. More than our first father lost shall Christ bring back. There shall be glory substantial to himself in the lives of his people on earth, in their deaths, and in their lives for ever. Glory shall be brought to God of a new and unusual kind. A light will be shed upon the character of God which, so far as we know, could not have come to us by any other means except by the death of the Only-begotten. Hallelujahs louder than before shall rise up before the throne. Praises shall ascend unto God such as creation never produced, “for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed as unto God by thy blood, and we shall reign for ever and ever.”
Now, my brethren, do not get into a state of fright and fear about the Christian religion. Do not go to your chambers and sigh, “Everything is going to the bad, and we shall be all eaten up by the devil.” Nonsense! There is a stronger arm yet than that black arm of Satan. In God’s eternal goodness resides a power and majesty that cannot be found in the infernal malevolence of the devil. I know which is the winning side, — I am sure of it. Though we may drearily imagine that things go amiss, and fancy that the vessel is ready to break up and become a wreck, she will enter the harbor yet with all her cargo safe, and from every wave that tossed her and every wind that beat upon her she shall derive eternal advantage. Courage, brethren, we are not beaten, and we are not going to be beaten. We are succeeding all along the line. Shout victory, universal victory, from stem to stern of the good old ship. Not a foe has been able to live upon her deck. Give the enemy’s black hull another broadside. When you think that the crew of the Black Prince are about to board us, grasp your pikes and give them a warm reception. This good ship bears the red cross at her masthead, and shall never be taken, but shall win the victory as surely as God lives, and his Sort lives who has risen from the dead.
IV. So I Close with this last remark: THE WHOLE OF THIS VICTORY RESULTS FROM CHRIST’S OWN WORK.
Lend me your best attention for two or three minutes, because this is the pith and marrow of it all: “Therefore will I divide him a portion” — that is logic. Why this “therefore”? What is the argument? Christ shall divide with the strong because —. How does it run? “Because his doctrinal teaching is singularly in keeping with the progress of the age”? I have heard that observation, and smiled at it. “Because his gospel is preached with such remarkable eloquence and singular clearness”? Indeed, No. Why, then, will Christ win the victory? The answer is — “Because he hath, poured out his soul unto, death.” If God himself deigns to take upon himself our nature, and in that nature pours out his life like a libation even unto death — if, I say, he thus pours out his life, it is impossible to conceive that he will be defeated. Blasphemy may imagine it, profanity may speak it, but truth abhors the idea that Jesus can be baffled. A dying God! it is an in. accurate expression, yet I know of no expression that is so accurate — God putting himself into human form, so as to be capable of suffering and death, cannot suffer and die in vain. He must, he shall, he will win that for which he died. He must reign, because he has poured out his soul unto death.
Listen again, here is the second reason: “He was numbered with the transgressors;” this is mentioned secondly, as if there was something even more in that than in the first. To die is wonderful condescension; but for the pure and holy One to deign to be numbered with the transgressors, and stand as if he had transgressed himself, though transgress he never did, nor could — I say this is more wonderful. If .Jesus did that, then he must win the victory. When I am dispirited, where do I find encouragement? Where the stars of Bethlehem burn, and where men make merry on their Christmas days? Nay, their mirth is weariness to a heavy heart. I will tell you where I go for comfort — to Gethsemane, to Golgotha, to the garden, and to the tomb. Christ cannot have suffered there in vain: Christ cannot have been despised, slandered, and actually numbered with transgressors, and all for nothing. It cannot be: it cannot be. Death and hell, ye can defeat armies of men, but the Crucified treads you down. When our Champion of the pierced hand comes to the front the battle no longer wavers. We glory in his death and in his making common cause with transgressors. But this is not all; it is added, “And he bare the sin of many.” This denotes his actual and literal substitution — his acting as the sin-bearer. This is something more than being numbered with the transgressors; he actually takes the sin of the transgressors, and bears their burden upon his own shoulders by a wondrous system of substitution which is easier to be believed than to be explained. Because he did this he must conquer. He must conquer. Sin cannot be victorious if Jesus has carried it on his shoulders and hurled it into his sepulcher. If the darkest days were to come, and all the churches of Christ were to be extinguished, if there were left only one Christian, and he as good as dead by reason of weakness, yet might he believe that God from the dead would raise up seed unto his Son, and fulfill his covenant and keep his word. It must be so. The offering of Christ’s soul for sin secures to him a seed for ever.
And lastly, there is this fourth reason given — “He made intercession for the transgressors.” I can conceive you praying, my dear friend, and God’s not hearing you; but if the man who was despised and rejected should say, “Rise, poor suppliant, rise and I will take thy place;” and if the Blessed and Beloved of the Father, whose eyes are as the eyes of the morning, and whose lips are as lilies dropping sweet-smelling myrrh, kneels down and prays, “My Father, by my blood, and wounds, and agony, save this sinner;” why, it must be done! And if he says, “Father, give me those whom I have redeemed,” it must be done, And if he pleads, “Father, keep them by thy word,” it must be done. And if he prays, “Father, make them one as we are,” it must be done. And when he shall ask, “Father, give them power and victory,” it must be done. And when he shall ask, “Father, let my servants all become champions, and send them forth, east, west, north, and south, against idolatry, and infidelity, and popery, and clothe them with the Holy Ghost,” why then it must be done! The power of Christ’s intercession is irresistible. Queen Mary reckoned the prayers of John Knox to be worth many regiments; but what shall I say of the prayers of Jesus, the Son of God? They are with us to-day. While we are sitting here, and troubling our minds about the Lord’s work, and saying, “What shall we do?” and, “What will come of it?” and all that — Jesus is pleading. Hush, till your hearts leave off beating — till not a thought is heard! You may hear him saying, “Father, I will.” Here is the power of the church. The plea of Christ with authority before the throne is the majestic force upon which the church depends. “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.” Wherefore pluck up courage. Jesus will yet win. You weak, faint-hearted ones, rejoice. The victory is sure, not because of anything you are, or of anything you can do, but for Jesus’s sake. In the name of the Lord we set up our banners. Hallelujah!
NOTES
WE have devoted so much space to the Report of the Bazaar and Orphanage that our other notes this month must be very brief. The daily and weekly papers have kept our readers and the general public so well informed of our movements that there is little left for us to mention. Only again we bless the Lord, and thank our friends for all the generous help received for the Orphanage.
MRS. SPURGEON’S BOOK FUND.—The Report of Mrs. Spurgeon’s Book Fund for the past year is now ready, and can be obtained through any bookseller. The price is the same as last year, 6d., or post free 7d. What shall we say of this gracious narrative? With sweet simplicity it tells a story of divine love: showing how the weak one has been made strong, and the sufferer useful. Surely it will encourage many a sad heart, and rouse many a joyous one to greater care for the Lord’s servants. We may give extracts next month, but, meanwhile, we should much prefer that friends should get the Report for themselves. It is well written, and we highly commend it. What! a husband recommend his wife’s works? Yes, and it is Scriptural to do so. Is it not written, “Her husband also, and he praiseth her”?
OUTRAGES ON THE JEWS. — All our sympathies are aroused for the Jews who are being brutally treated in Russia. One is made to blush for the name of Christian when we see it mixed up with murder, plunder, and ravishment. The long catalogue of Russian atrocities is enough to move a heart of stone. That followers of the Lord Jesus should hound to the death the nation from which he sprang, according to the flesh is a strange perversity of ignorant zeal, which all true believers should deplore day and night. Let the house of Israel know assuredly that all real followers of Jesus of Nazareth desire the good of their nation, and lament their persecutions. We pray that Israel may accept the Messiah whom we reverence, but we cannot hope that this will be the case while so much wrong-doing is perpetrated against them.
On Christmas-day, 1881, the Pastor again occupied his pulpit after an absence of six weeks. The following day he had the great pleasure of once more presiding at the Orphanage Christmas festivities, when, thanks to the generosity of friends from far and near, all went merry as a marriage-bell. On Wednesday evening, December 28, a large and enthusiastic audience welcomed the Pastor home to the Tabernacle after his holiday. Addresses were delivered by Pastors C. It. Spurgeon, J. A. Spurgeon, C. Spurgeon, R. H. Lovell, W. Cuff, H. Varley, and W. William’s; and Messrs. J. M. Smith, W. C. Murrell, and W. Olney. One result of the meeting was that the Weekly Offering for the College was made up to £1,881 for the year 188l. This constant giving is a perpetual pledge of affection. What would the College do without it? for most people forget the old love — the College, to help the new one. — namely, the Orphanage. This thing ought ye to have done, but not to leave the other undone. Is it not as good a work to train a minister as to educate an orphan?
On Monday evening, January 2, 1882, the Prayer-meeting at the Tabernacle was made an occasion for inviting neighboring ministers to unite in thanksgiving and supplication, in accordance with the arrangements made by the Evangelical Alliance. Pastor C.H. Spurgeon presided, and there were also present Pastors J. A. Spurgeon, S. H. Akehurst, J. E. Crackmell (who gave an account of his visit to the United States and Canada), J. A. Griffin, D. A. Hersehell, J. Locke, J. Maxchant, and G. M. Murphy.
COLLEGE. — Mr. C. G. Croome has settled at Nelson, Lancashire; and Mr. W. A. Wicks, at Moulton, Northamptonshire, the church of which Dr. Career used to be the pastor. Mr. B. Brigg also leaves us to devote himself entirely to his important charge at Drummond-road, Bermondsey. Mr. J. E. Moyle, who came to us from Canada, has returned to the Dominion, where he hopes soon to find a suitable sphere.
Mr. C. Hood has removed from Nuneaton to Gosford-street, Coventry; and Mr. E. Small, from Markyate-street, to Birchington. Mr. W. Stokes, who came home some tune since from Port Elizabeth, has become pastor of the church at Winchester. Mr. H. F. Adams, whom the Canadian ministers have been unable to “ordain” on account of his open-communion principles, has left Lewis-street, Toronto, and accepted the co-pastorate of the church at Quebec City, under the care of the Rev. D. Marsh.
Mr. J. G. Potter sends us an interesting account of his arrival at Calcutta, and his interviews with the whole of our College men in India. He has been appointed to the mission-station at; Agra, under the superintendence of Mr. Jones.
We have also received a cheering letter from Mr. H. Rylands Brown, which we hope to publish in full next month, as it contains an account of his recent evangelistic tour among the tea-planters of the Darjeeling district.
Our brethren in the country may be glad to be informed that the conference this year will probably be held in the week commencing April 17, i.e., the week preceding the Baptist Union meetings.
The Evening Classes in connection with the College recommenced on the 17th ult. After twenty-one years of service in this useful field, Mr. Fergusson has asked us to allow him to retire from the work, which will in future he under the superintendence of Mr. S. Johnson, who will be assisted by Mr. Bowers.
EVANGELISTS. — Messrs. Smith and Fullerton commenced a series of services at South-street Chapel, Greenwich, on Sunday, the 15th ult. Our son Charles sends us the following note of the opening meetings: —
“Dearest Father, — It is with great joy I send you a word about the dear brethren, Fullerton and Smith. They commenced work at Greenwich on Sunday, 15th Jan. Good preparation had been made, for we had a week of prayer-meetings before they came, when several of the neighboring ministers gave addresses. Each time from seventy to two hundred persons attended, and on Thursday quite five hundred gathered. The workers had been busy circulating handbills from house to house, and as many as 15,000 were thus disposed of. On the Sabbath the congregations were, as they are wont to be, praise the Lord, food, the only difference being an afternoon service for children. Brother Smith, with his usual tact, held over 1,500 little ones, collected from four Sunday-schools, spell-bound by song and speech. This service did some of the old boys and girls good as well as the youngsters, and already conversions have taken place. During the week each evening there has been an increasing attendance, and the work is growing in interest and blessing. Personally I thank God for the arrival of these two brethren in Greenwich, and especially as they are laboring at South-street as their head-quarters. I will report further later on.
“With love,
“Your son,
“CHARLIE.”
After they have finished at Greenwich the evangelists will go to Mr. Knee’s church at Peekham-park-road, afterwards to Chelsea, and then to Mr. Charrington’s, Dr. Barnardo’s, and Mr. Fellowes’.”
Mr. Burnham is engaged this month for Gamlingay, Morley, and Ossett.
ORPHANAGE—Collectors’ Meeting. — Will all our collectors kindly note that the next meeting for bringing in their boxes and books will be held at the Orphanage on Friday evening, March 3, when the President hopes to be present.
PERSONAL NOTES. — Our honored friend, Dr. Culross, of Glasgow, sent us the following cheering note just as we were returning from Mentone: —
“My dear Mr. Spurgeon, — In connection with Adelaide Place Church there is a ‘Domestic Mission,’ which, among its various operations, distributes a thousand of your sermons every week to a thousand families in some of the poorer districts of the town. There are seventy persons, chiefly young people, though there is a sprinkling of grey hair among them, who take part in this work. They have found it a good plan to leave the sermon one week and to call for it the week following. By this means a thousand sermons per month, by division into four, get distributed to a thousand families per week. I need not say that they are welcomed very much by the various receivers. It is difficult to trace results, but judging from what is said to the distributors God’s cause is being effectually served. We are going to have a social meeting of those among whom the sermons are distributed, and expect about a thousand to attend. We have not room for more. The date is fixed for 17th January, 1882. We shall remember you gratefully that evening. I thought I would say all this to you instead of sending a Christmas card. Wishing you and yours the blessings of eternal goodness,
“Yours faithfully,
“JAIKES CULROSS.”
The following is an extract from a letter which has come to hand from Mr. Wm. Tolmie just as the “Notes” are being made up:—
“My dear Mr. Spurgeon, — Dr. Culross insists that I shall write you this time, which I have very much pleasure in doing. The Soiree (to which he referred in his recent letter to you) of the readers of your sermons, and others connected with the Brown Street Mission of Adelaide Place Church, was held on Thursday last, and was attended by from six to seven hundred. Testimony was borne to the pleasure and benefit derived from the sermons; and the meeting enthusiastically authorized the sending of a letter to you expressive of gratitude therefor, and of the hope that you may be long continued in health and strength to carry on the various departments of your noble work.” A correspondent has forwarded the subjoined letter:—
“Sir, — Having yesterday traveled from the North in company with a clergyman who labored for many years in the South of France, and who is now residing here, our conversation turned to the relating of anecdotes about ministers. I mentioned that I had heard you in Exeter Hall in 1854 or 1855, when he told me the following, and, as I thought it would interest; you, I now give it as he related it. He said —
“‘In 1866, Mr. S. came to Paris, and, as he could not preach in French, many of my friends, who had gone long distances to hear him, were disappointed. At the request of a good many of my own congregation and other friends, I went to Paris, and took copious notes of the different sermons. When I returned I was pressed to give these sermons in French. When it became known that I was to do so, great crowds came to hear me. By way of introduction I just asked them for the time to fancy I was Mr. Spurgeon, as I wished to try and deliver them with the same effect as he had done.
“‘A few years after that a lady called on me, and wished to be admitted as a member of the Protestant Church of which I was the pastor. I asked her what had led her to think of this. She replied that a few years ago she, along with other Roman Catholics, had gone to hear a man who had been in Paris, and was to give a translation of “Spurgeon’s sermons.” She followed closely the sermon from the text, “I am the good Shepherd,” and had thus been awakened. She added also that she had never again seen this man, nor had she been able to hear of him.’
“I may add that, of course, the clergyman soon informed her that he was that person.”
A constant subscriber in Edinburgh supplies us with another testimony to the usefulness of our sermons when issued as advertisements in the Australian newspapers: —
“About seven years since an Australian clergyman was about to preach at the morning service on a gold-field. He found waiting outside the-door ,of the wooden church a man who spoke to him: saying he wanted work for Christ. His story was simply this:—He had been a shepherd, and, whilst minding his sheep in the bush, had taken out a newspaper to read whilst they were feeding. A sermon by Mr. Spurgeon happened to have been inserted, but which had to be paid for as an advertisement by some Christian brother. The man, who had been careless and indifferent regarding his soul, read the sermon over, and then again and again. The result was that he surrendered his soul to the Savior, and was soon rejoicing over sins forgiven, He then wanted work for his Lord and Master. The clergyman took him into the Sunday-school held before the morning service, and gave him a class. The man’s zeal was soon conspicuous, and ere long he became the superintendent. He was clear-headed and hardworking, and latterly on another gold-field has preached the gospel as a catechist in the Church of England.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle. — December 29, eleven.
A MEDITATION IN THE LONGEST PSALM
EXPOSITION OF VERSES 89 TO 96.
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
FOR EVER, O LORD, thy word is settled in heaven.
90 Thy faithfulness is unto all generations: thou hast established the earth, and it abideth.
91 They continue this day according to thine ordinances: for all are thy servants.
92 Unless thy law had been my delights, I should then have perished in mine affliction.
93 I will never’ forget thy precepts: for with them thou hurst quickened me.
94 I am thine, save me; for I have sought thy precepts.
95 The wicked have waited for me to destroy me: but I will consider thy testimonies.
96 I have seen an end of all perfection: but thy commandment is exceeding broad.
89. “For ever, O Lord, thy word is settled in heaven.” The strain is more joyful, for experience has given the sweet singer a comfortable knowledge of the word of the Lord, and this makes a glad theme. After tossing about on a sea of trouble the Psalmist here leaps to shore and stands upon a rock. Jehovah’s word is not fickle, or uncertain; it is settled, determined, fixed, sure, immovable. Man’s teachings change so often that there is never time for them to be settled; but the Lord’s word is from of old the same, and will remain unchanged eternally. Some men are never happier than when they are unsettling everything and everybody; but God’s mind is not with them. The power and glory of heaven have confirmed each sentence which the mouth of the Lord has spoken, and so confirmed it that to all eternity it must stand the same, — settled in heaven, where nothing can reach it. In the former section David’s soul fainted, but here the good. man looks out of self and perceives that the Lord fainteth not, neither is weary, neither is there any failure in his word. The verse takes the form of an ascription of praise: the faithfulness and immutability of God are fit themes for holy song, and when we are tired upon this shifting scene the thought of the immutable promise fills our mouth with singing. God’s purposes, promises, and precepts are all settled in his own mind, and none of them shall be disturbed. Covenant settlements will not be removed, however unsettled the thoughts of men may become; let us therefore settle it in our minds that we abide in the faith of our Jehovah as long as we have any being.
90. “Thy faithfulness is unto all generations.” This is an additional glory: God is not affected by the lapse of ages; he is not only faithful to one man throughout his lifetime, but to his children’s children after him, yea, and to all generations so long as they keep his covenant and remember his commandments to do them. The promises are ancient things, yet they are not worn out by centuries of use, for faithfulness endureth for ever. He who succored his servants thousands of years ago still shows himself strong on the behalf of all them that trust in him. “Thou, hast established the earth, and it abideth.” Nature is governed by fixed laws; the round globe abides in its course by the divine command and displays no erratic movements: the seasons keep their predestined order, the sea obeys the rule of ebb and flow, and all things else are marshaled in their appointed order. There is an analogy between the word of God and the works of God, and specially in this that they are both of them constant, fixed, and unchangeable. God’s word which established the world is the same as that which he has embodied in the Scriptures; by the word of the Lord were the heavens made, and specially by him who is emphatically THE WORD. When we see the globe keeping its place and all its laws abiding the same, we have herein assurance that the Lord will be faithful to his covenant, and will not allow the faith of his people to be put to shame. If the earth abide; if the spiritual creation will abide; if God’s word suffices to establish the world surely it is enough for the establishment of the individual believer.
91. “They continue this day according to thine ordinances.” Because the Lord has bid the universe abide, therefore it stands, and all its laws continue to operate with precision and power. Because the might of God is ever present to maintain them, therefore do all things continue. The word which spake all things into existence has supported them till now, and still supports them both in being and in well-being. God’s ordinance is the reason for the continued existence of creation. What important forces these ordinances are! “For all are thy servants.” Created by thy word they obey that word, thus answering the purpose of their existence, and working out the design of their Creator. Both great things and small pay homage to the Lord. No atom escapes his rule, no world avoids his government. Shall we wish to be free of the Lord’s sway and become lords unto ourselves? If we were so, we should be dreadful exceptions 1o a law which secures the well-being of the universe. Rather while we read concerning all things else — they continue and they serve, let us continue to serve, and to serve more perfectly as our lives are continued. By that word which is settled may we be settled; by that voice which establishes the earth may we be established; and by that command which all created things obey may we be made the servants of the Lord God Almighty.
92. “Unless thy law had been my delights, I should then have perished in miter affliction.” That word which has preserved the heavens and the earth also preserves the people of God in their time of trial. With that word we are charmed; it is a mine of delight to us. We take a double and treble delight in it, and derive a multiplied delight from it, and this stands us in good stead when all other delights are taken front us. We should have felt ready to lie down and die of our griefs if the spiritual comforts of God’s word had not uplifted us; but by their sustaining influence we have been borne above all the depressions and despairs which naturally grow out of severe affliction. Some of us can set our seal to this statement. Our affliction, if it had not been for divine grace, would Lave crushed us out of existence, so that we should have perished. In our darkest seasons nothing has kept us from desperation but the promise of the Lord: yea, at times nothing has stood between us and self-destruction save faith in the eternal word of God. When worn with pain until the brain has become dazed and the reason well-nigh extinguished, a sweet text has whispered to us its heart-cheering assurance, and our poor struggling mind has reposed upon the bosom of God. That which was our delight in prosperity has been our light in adversity; that which in the day kept us from presuming has in the night kept us from perishing. This verse contains a mournful supposition — “ unless,” describes a horrible condition — “ perished in mine; afflictions,” and implies a glorious deliverance, for he did not die, but live to proclaim the honors of the word of God.
93. “I will never forget thy precepts: for with them thou hast quickened me.” When we have felt the quickening power of a precept we never can forget it. We may read it, learn it, repeat it, and think we have it, and yet it may slip out of our minds; but if it has once given us life or renewed than; life, there is no fear of its falling from our recollection. Experience teaches, and teaches effectually. How blessed a thing it is to have the precepts written on the heart with the golden pen of experience, and graven on the memory with the divine stylus of grace. Forgetfulness is a great evil in holy things; we see here the man of God fighting against it, and feeling sure of victory because he knew the life-giving energy of the word in his own soul. That which quickens the heart is sure to quicken the memory. It seems singular that he should ascribe quickening to the precepts, and yet it lies in them and in all the words of the Lord alike. It is to be noted that when the Lord raised the dead he addressed to them the word of command. He said, “Lazarus, come forth,” or, “Maid, arise.” We need not fear to address gospel precepts to dead sinners, since by them the Spirit gives them life. Remark that the Psalmist does not say that the precepts quickened him, but that the Lord quickened him by their means: thus he traces the life from the channel to the source, and places the glory where it is due. Yet at the same time he prized the instruments of the blessing, and resolved never to forget them. He had already remembered them when he likened himself to a bottle in the smoke, and now he feels that whether in the smoke or in the fire the memory of the Lord’s precepts shall never depart from him.
94. “I am, thine, save me.” A comprehensive prayer with a prevailing argument. Consecration is a good plea for preservation. If we are conscious that we are the Lord’s we may be confident that he will save us’., We are the Lord’s by creation, election, redemption, surrender, and acceptance; and hence our firm hope and assured belief that he will save us. A man will surely save his own child: Lord, save me. The need of salvation is better seen by the Lord’s people than by any others, and hence their prayer — “save me”; they know that only God can save them, and hence they cry to him alone; and they know that no merit can be found in themselves, and hence they urge a reason fetched from the grace of God, — “ I am thine.” “For I have sought thy precepts.” Thus had he proved that he was the Lord’s. He might not have attained to that which he desired, but he had through life studiously aimed to be obedient to the Lord, and hence he begged to be saved even to the end. A man may be seeking the doctrines and the promises, and yet be unrenewed in heart; but to seek the precepts is a sure sign of grace; no one ever heard of a rebel or a hypocrite seeking the precepts. The Lord had evidently wrought a Treat work upon him, and he besought him to carry it on to completion. Saving is linked with seeking, “save me, for I have sought”; and when the Lord sets us socking he will not refuse us the saving, lie who seeks holiness is already saved: if we have sought the Lord we may be sure that the Lord has sought us, and will certainly save us.
95. “The wicked have waited for me to destroy me: but I will consider thy testimonies.” They were like wild beasts crouching by the way, or highwaymen waylaying a defenseless traveler; but the Psalmist went on his way without considering them, for he was considering something better, namely, the witness or testimony which God has borne to the sons of men. He did not allow the malice of the wicked to take him off from his holy study of the divine word. He was so calm that he could “consider”; so holy that he loved to consider the Lord’s “testimonies “; so victorious over all their plots that he did not allow them to drive him front his pious contemplations. If the enemy cannot cause us to withdraw our thoughts from holy study, or our feet from holy walking, or our hearts from holy aspirations, he has met with poor success in his assaults. The wicked are the natural enemies of holy men and holy thoughts; if they could they would not only damage us but destroy us, and if they cannot do this to-day they will wait for further opportunities, ever hoping that their evil designs may be compassed. They have waited hitherto in vain, and they will have to wait much longer yet; for if we are so unmoved that we do not even give them a thought their hope of destroying us must be a very poor one. Note the double waiting, — the patience of the wicked who watch long and carefully for an opportunity to destroy the godly, and then the patience of the saint who will not quit his meditations, even to quiet his foes. See how the serpent seed lie in wait as an adder that biteth at the horse’s heels; but see how the chosen of the Lord live above their venom, and take no more notice of them than if they had no existence.
96. “I have seen an end of all perfection.” He had seen its limit, for it went but a little way; he had seen its evaporation under the trials of life, its detection under the searching glance of truth, its exposure by the confession of the penitent. There is no perfection beneath the moon. Perfect men, in the absolute sense of the word, live only in a perfect world. Some men see no end to their own perfection, but this is because they are perfectly blind. The experienced believer has seen an end of all perfection in himself, in his brethren, in the best man’s best works. It would be well if some who profess to be perfect could even see the beginning of perfection, for we fear they cannot have begun aright’ or they would not talk so exceeding proudly. Is it not the beginning of perfection to lament your imperfection? There is no such thing as perfection in anything which is the work of man. “But thy commandment is exceeding broad.” When the breadth of the law is known the notion of perfection in the flesh vanishes’ that law touches every act, word, and thought, and is of such a spiritual nature that it judges the motives, desires, and emotions of the soul. It, is far too broad for us to hope to cover all its demands, and yet it is no broader than it ought to be. Who would wish to have an imperfect law? Nay, its perfection is its glory; but it is the death of all glorying in our own perfection. There is a breadth about the commandment which has never been met to the full by a corresponding breadth of holiness in any mere man while here below. The law is in all respects a perfect code, and each separate precept of it is far-reaching in its hallowed meaning. We may well adore the infinity of divine holiness, and then measure ourselves by its standard, and bow before the Lord in all lowliness, acknowledging how far we fail short of it.
THE HARBOR OF REFUGE.
SINCE I have been watching the sea a wind has sprung up, and suddenly the ocean is dotted with ships. This little town has a harbor, and trading vessels of small tonnage evidently expect a storm, for here they come. Like sea- fowl borne on white wings they are flying for the harbor. Differing in their tacking, yet it is evident that they are all making for one spot. How beautiful it is to see them enter the haven, cast anchor, and rest! O that our fellow men were equally wise as to spiritual things! A thousand signs betoken the approaching tempest; they know there is a place of refuge, will they not hasten to it? They will suffer loss, nay, they will be wrecked totally, if they try to weather the last dread storm; the harbor is free, there is time to reach it, there is ample room within its shelter; why will they refuse the safety? Ah me; this is cause for tears. Are my fellow-creatures mad? Do they despise Jesus, the appointed haven of souls? Do they so despise him as to perish to show their contempt? My God, help me to mourn for them, if I cannot persuade them, and do thou give them understanding enough to accept their own lives.
NOTES
WE give notes of even the smaller meetings at the Tabernacle, because many friends like to know everything about the work, and also because hints may then be thrown out as to church work, — hints which may be useful to young ministers.
On Thursday evening, Feb. 2, the members of the Youths’ Bible-class at the Tabernacle were invited to a tea at the College by Mr. Pearce, the superintendent of the Sunday-school. At the close of the meeting the Pastor arrived, and in the name of the class presented to the leader, Mr. Thomas Heyland, a morocco leather writing-desk and a lamp. Under this brother a large class of youths has been gathered, and many of them have been led to decide for the Lord Jesus. In our school are several teachers, both male and female, out of whose classes scores have been called by divine grace into the liberty of the gospel.
On Friday evening, Feb. 3, the annual meeting of the Tabernacle Church was held, when the senior Pastor was glad to be well enough to preside. There was a thick fog outside, and some of it penetrated into the interior of the building; but the warmth of Christian affection and enthusiasm which prevailed throughout the whole meeting prevented anyone from feeling much of its influence. It was a huge, happy family gathering of brethren and sisters in Christ, who had met to hear and tell what the Lord had done for them and by them during another year. Both the pastors, and several of the deacons and elders spoke, the annual balance-sheets of the Church and College were presented and approved, and the following statistics: — Increase, by baptism, 279; by letter, 68; by profession (i.e., those who have been previously baptized), 35; total, 382. Decrease by dismission, 144; by joining other churches without letters, 34; by emigration, 7; by removal for non-attendance, 56; exclusions, 3; withdrawal, 1; deaths, 70; total, 315- leaving a net increase of 67, and making the number of members on the books 5,310. Special gratitude was expressed that, notwithstanding the general depression, and the pastor’s long illness last year, the finances of the church had been well maintained, and that in addition so large a sum had been raised for the Girls’ Orphanage. The happy burden of the church lies in the great number of its poor. Although about £1,000 had been distributed among the poor members, yet more could have been usefully employed upon cases of deep distress. Any friends who wish to be sure that their money would go really to the Lord’s poor might aid this fund. We have more than our fair share of poverty, and this is a blessed charge, but it would be painful if means were not forthcoming for its relief. There is still a considerable draw upon the church funds for the alms-women, for we have not found that the amount provided by the Pastor’s endowment is sufficient for the old ladies to live upon. A few more hundreds would put this institution beyond want. Thus it is clear that good investments for the Lord’s money are still to be had.
On Monday evening, Feb. 6, the monthly missionary prayer-meeting was held at the Tabernacle, under the presidency of Pastor J.A. Spurgeon. Several representatives of the China Inland Mission were present, including three sisters and one brother who were about to sail for China. Prayers were offered by several brethren for mission work in general, and specially for those who were leaving for the foreign field, and addresses were delivered by Messrs. Baller, McCarthy, and Macgregor. We cannot withhold our tribute of admiration for the work of Mr. Hudson Taylor and his brethren in China. The work is so great that it needs a hundred times the number of missionaries now employed; but still, much has been done, and hopeful beginnings have been made in many cities in the interior. Oh that God’s people would lay the work to heart!
On Monday evening, February 13, the annual prayer and communion service in connection with the Lambeth Auxiliary Sunday School Union was held at the Tabernacle, in conjunction with the usual prayer-meeting. The chair was occupied by the Pastor, who has been the President of the Auxiliary for the past year. Prayer was offered by representatives of various schools, and the President delivered an address upon Jesus — the teacher’s subject, model, helper, and reward. At its close the communion was enjoyed by several hundreds of teachers and friends. It was a holy convocation, and the Lord was in the midst of us. The leaflet issued by Mr. Spurgeon to the teachers is reprinted in this month’s magazine; a copy was given to every teacher connected with the Lambeth Auxiliary.
At various Monday evening meetings public thanks have been rendered for answers to prayer notified by persons for whom petitions had been presented. This is a great stimulus to prayer.
COLLEGE. — Mr. G. Simmons, who has retained the pastorate at New Malden while attending the College classes, leaves us at the close of the present session, to devote himself entirely to his pastoral work.
During the past month, Mr. M. Mitchell has sailed for Calcutta, en route for Mr. Haegert’s medical mission among the Santhais. We have paid for his outfit from our fund for Indian evangelists. May the Lord make this brother a blessing among the heathen.
Mr. H. Charlton, formerly of Malden, is going shortly to Queensland, where he hopes to find a church to which his ministry will be acceptable and useful. Mr. T. Hatrington has removed from Oxford, New Zealand, to Invercargill.
Writing to us on January 16, our Bro. Hamilton, of Capetown, says: — “ In a month’s time I hope our new chapel will be open. What a glorious day that will be to me after having striven for over five years for the result!” We trust, therefore, that by this time the labors of this honored brother are rewarded, although a considerable sum will still be needed before the building will be out of debt.
The following letter from our late student, Mr. John Downing, is so full of good cheer that we must print it here, in order that those who have helped us to train pastors and evangelists may share our joy, as they deserve to do:—
“Brisbane, Queensland,
“5th Dec, 1881.“Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — I feel impelled to let you know how the Lord has been working in Brisbane of late. In March last I had a run down to Tasmania, and came back to Victoria with Harrison, who was in College at the same time as myself, and who was then on the way to join Isaac for Evangelistic work. I asked Harrison to come on up to Queensland, and after working down south, i.e., in Victoria and N.S. Wales, he and Isaac arrived here in August. The first meetings were under severe disadvantage; the evangelists were unknown It was the annual exhibition week, and people were mad after the young princes just arrived in the “Racchante,” but souls were saved, and the news spread so that at the next place between one hundred and fifty and two hundred went forward for personal conversation, and, as a consequence, the Christian enthusiasm steadily rose. The third church could not hold the throngs, and when anxious souls were asked to come into the vestries, they did at such a rate as to fill them to overflowing, and this continued for nearly three mouths. Harrison’s last meeting in any church was held in mine, and never before has such a crowd gathered there; every seat was more than full, every available inch of standing-room was occupied, and the overflow contented themselves with listening outside the open windows. When the preaching was over we could not get the people away, they wanted eternal life, and would not go without it. To my knowledge, there are scores upon scores professedly saved. Many have received assurance of faith; churches have been roused; pastors and other workers have been cheered, and the whole tone of religious life heightened. Harrison’s Sunday afternoon meetings in the Theater Royal, too, were, numerically, a big success, though, through the lack of accommodation for personal dealing, very many slipped through our fingers. Except when your son Thomas was here, I have never seen such packed meetings. I might say that when he was here, fifteen months ago, we took advantage of his presence and preaching to begin theatermeetings in the only place we then could get, a little pokey, cockroachy hole, holding about four hundred. Through his instrumentality, and in the teeth of much prejudice, the place was filled, and from that has sprung a regular Sunday-evening theater service in a new theater, holding over fifteen hundred, and which, when Harrison preached there last, was so packed that hundreds could not get in. Jesus of Nazareth has been passing by, and eyes once blind now see him, while the communion of soul granted to his people has been blessedly close and choice. The manifestations of the Spirit’s power which have come under my own notice have been remarkable, this is one — We had finished a meeting, and the inquirers had gone into the vestries. I felt very happy, and commenced to sing while the people were going away. Many stopped, and joined in the verse, ‘Glory, honor, etc.’ One frae looking young fellow stood laughing while we were singing, .but, before we had finished, his stiff neck bent, and he broke down, fairly making a dash for the vestry in which were the anxious souls. At another meeting, several young Christians were in the church, praying for the anxious, who had filled the vestry. An ungodly young man did not want to leave his companion, and remained. While someone was praying, suddenly there burst over the solemnity of the meeting great sobs as if one were dying of grief. The Holy Spirit had come in convicting energy upon him; he has since shown by his consistent life that he is a new creature. He has applied for baptism; and there have been many cases somewhat similar. The work is still going on, and fresh cases of conversion are coming to light.
“I am anxiously expecting Thomas Went from the Tabernacle, and purpose having more special meetings when he arrives. Harrison is a grand fellow; everyone regretted his leaving us. He is a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost; may he long be spared for the Lord’s service on earth.
“I do not know how any of the other men are getting on save by far-off report. I am five hundred miles from the nearest, eleven hundred from any of the others. Wherever your son Thomas goes he carries a blessing, and is received very heartily, first for his father’s sake, and the next time none the less so for his own. I wish he might be the flying angel of the everlasting gospel for the Colonies. Whichever way his Master will use him will be wisest and best.
“Praying day and night for blessings upon yourself and kind Mrs. Spurgeon,
“I remain,
“Ever gratefully, yours,
“JOHN DOWNING.”“P.S. — From what I can glean I believe the churches will be increased through Harrison’s visit by upwards of two hundred who have been savingly converted.”
Mr. K. McCullough also sends us a cheering report of his work at Longford, Tasmania, where he ministers in one of the “Tabernacles” built by our generous friend, Mr. Gibson. A year ago a church was formed of twenty-seven members, and since then twenty-six have been added, in spite of opposition.
Just as the “Notes” are being made up, tidings have reached us of the death, at Ventnor, of our Brother D. Morgan, formerly pastor of the church at Luton.
On Thursday, Feb. 9, the Vice-President presided at the formation of a new church, consisting of twenty members, at Sundown, Isle of Wight. The room in which the services have been held up to the present time is quite inadequate to the needs of the work, so that a building of some kind must speedily be erected, A few friends have promised liberal help, and doubtless other amounts will be forthcoming as the scheme is unfolded. We hope many who know Sundown will be willing to assist this effort to provide a place in which evangelical truth may be preached and the ordinances practiced as they were delivered. The building of a Baptist chapel for Sundown is now an object near our heart, and we hope to see it carried out. Several other places are rising, and among the rest Mr. Hobb’s chapel, in Gipsy-road, Norwood, deserves immediate assistance. We take special interest in the building, as it is somewhat in our own region.
On Friday afternoon, Feb. 10, the, half-yearly meeting of the Students’ Missionary Association was held at the College. The President occupied the chair, and. after the report had been read, and the officers elected, Mr. Matthews, who was on his way to America to join the Teloogoo Mission, gave an interesting account of his call to the work. He was followed by the Rev. Burman Cassin, M.A., Rector of St. George the Martyr, Southwark, who delivered an excellent address upon mission work. The students had at tea the company of our London brethren, who had met to make the necessary arrangements for the Conference and afterwards held a meeting under the able chairmanship of W. Haig Miller, Esq., the author of “The Culture of Pleasure,” etc. The speakers were Revs. W. William’s, (Upton Chapel), Anderson (Allahabad), J. McCarthy (China Inland Mission), and A. Haegert (Bethel Santhal Mission), all of whom spoke with considerable power and unction.
EVANGELISTS. — The following letter further describes Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at Greenwich: —
“Dear Father, — I send with the greatest pleasure this condensed report of the special services. The meetings have been well attended throughout, and often the place has been too small. Grouping the different classes together, I must mention the children first. Every Saturday afternoon, at three o’clock, the chapel has been packed with little ones, all eager to hear their friend Mr. Smith. Even on that dreadful foggy day over five hundred found their way to the meeting. In all, five services for the boys and girls have been held, and on one occasion sixty received book pries for having written out one of Mr. Smith’s addresses. Next came the special meetings for men only and women only. Three of each of these have been conducted by the brethren, and if preference is to be shown to either it must .be to the men’s meeting, on account of their numbers being larger, though if the babies had been reckoned up with their mothers the gatherings might have been about equal. It was good to be at all these, for the Master was there. The ‘ Song Services’ have proved wonderfully attractive, overflowing congregations gathering each Saturday, and good as come through the singing of the gospel. Many that never go to any religious service have been constrained to come to these. But the best is to come last. On Sundays we have hardly known what to do with the ,crowds of people. Chapel and schoolroom have both been crammed, until we have had no more room. It does not end here, though. God has been moving in our midst, and by his Spirit converting many. Some most interesting cases have been met with, and there are more to follow. I am rejoiced to say that the prayer-meetings are -full of power. Before I forget it, let me mention that we had a seven o’clock gathering on Feb. 2, when about four hundred came together. Areal work has been done, and I cannot tell you how grateful I am that two such workmen as these brethren have been to Greenwich. ‘God bless them both ‘ is my hearty prayer. I must tell you a good deal more than I can write.
“With filial love,
“I am, your Boy,
“Charlie.“P.S. — The last meetings were the best, and as the result of all I send a bona fide thankoffering of £55.”
On Sunday Feb. 12, the evangelists commenced a month’s services at Peckham Park Road.
Mr. Burnham has recently paid his third ,visit to Sheepshed, where his labors have been once more highly appreciated and richly blessed. A cheering report of his services at Gamlingay has also reached us. Wherever he goes the churches are revived, back-sliders are reclaimed, the careless are aroused, and souls are saved. This month he goes to Shoreham, Sussex; and Watton, Norfolk.
ORPHANAGE. — We trust all our collectors will make an effort to bring in the contents of their boxes and books on Friday evening, .March 3. After tea the President hopes to take the chair, and Mr. J. William’s Benn, of the Royal Polytechnic, will give his popular sketching entertainment, entitled, “Notes on Noses, and those who wear them.” Now that we are increasing the number of girls, we shall be glad to secure the help of many fresh collectors.
Mr. J. T. Dunn furnished us with a list of several hundreds of persons who contributed goods for the Richmond-street Mission stall at the Bazaar; but, as we explained last month, we were unable to publish it. He wishes us, however, specially to mention that parcels were received from the Cape of Good Hope, the Rescue Society’s Home, Bethlehem Hospital, Guy’s Hospital, the Hospital for Incurables, and last, but not least, Balmoral Castle. He has also paid in £15 10s. 6d. for additional contributions, making the total receipts from the stall under his charge £443 9s. 6d.
The following letter came safely to hand with 25s. for the Girls’ Orphanage Building Fund:—
“Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — My heart is filled with joy as I read of the success of the Bazaar, and I bless the name of the Lord who moves the hearts of his people to will and to do of his good pleasure. I have read the account with tears of joy, and am ashamed of having done so little, although that little has been done with self-sacrifice; but I have read of the one who gave the tenth part of her savings in the bank, and you said, ‘ Oh, that others would do the same! ‘That prayer is answered; I have done so; and pray that God may lead many to follow who have their thousands.
“I have sent you an order for £1 5s., that is, the tenth part of what I have in the bank. I have through grace saved it; or it might have gone in drink.
“I have given God more than a tenth part, and do every week; but what is that when I think what it cost my Master to save my soul? My all is nothing worth.
“Dear sir, if you should use this with the hope of others following, please not to let my name go with it: I want no man’s praise.
“I have sent you 10s. annually; but with God’s help I will send double for the time to come.
“Yours in the Lord,
“A POOR GARDENER
“With 16s. 6d. a week.”
Such instances of consecration are too touching to be allowed to pass without notice.
After we had printed this month’s cash-lists we received the following letter, which speaks for itself: —
“Cardiff, Feb. 16, 1882.
“Pastor C. H. Spurgeon,“Dear Friend, — Desirous of sharing in the Christ-like work which you have so lovingly undertaken for poor orphan girls, I have decided to enclose you a cheque for £250 for their and our adorable Master’s sake, and towards the several thousands you still, I understand, need to pay for their Orphanages. Now, upon condition that you can get nine other friends to give, in the course of this year, £500, I will increase my £250 to the same amount. With cordial Christian regards and best wishes,
“Yours very truly,
“R. CORY, Jun.”
Since the accounts were closed Mr. Samuel Barrow has sent us his promised contribution of £250 for furnishing “The Olives,” the house erected and paid for through the generosity of himself and his friends.
We have received and perused with much gratitude the first annual report of the Reading Young Ladies’ Working Party for the Stockwell Orphanage. This new device of our ever-generous Reading friends has been adopted in consequence of our naming one of the houses for girls “The Reading House,” and as the result of one year’s work they have already dispatched to the Orphanage two parcels containing 118 garments for the children, two Scripture quilts, 34 sheets and pillow cases, and 24 scrapbooks. The working meetings are held monthly at the residence of our constant helper, Mrs. James Withers, whose daughter is the secretary of the society.
COLPORTAGE. — During the past month new districts have been commenced at Tewkesbury and Thornbury, in Gloucestershire, where we trust that the newly-appointed colporteurs will prove useful and successful in their important work. Other openings, too, are in prospect, which will make an increased demand upon the general fund of the association. This is already nearly £300 in arrear as compared with the previous year. As it is from this fund that all deficiencies in working the districts are made good, the power of the association for maintaining and extending this useful agency is entirely dependent upon the success or failure of the general fund, and we, therefore, earnestly appeal for the needed help. It should be remembered that some districts which most need the work spiritually cost the Association more to work than others where the receipts are larger. Is there not some wealthy friend who will send a special gift to supplement the small amount yielded n the poorer districts? Without entering into details of circumstances, reports are in possession of the Association which will testify of numerous people and places visited who are not reached by any other agency, of souls won for Christ, both by the books read and the services conducted by the Colporteurs. The annual report is in preparation, and will give full particulars. In the meantime, will friends specially’ remember and supply the lack of funds? — W. CORDEN JONES, Secretary.
RICHMOND-STREET MISSION, WALWORTH. — The annual meeting of teachers and workers was held at the Mission-rooms on Wednesday evening, Feb. 15th. About seventy sat down to tea, and at the meeting afterwards about one hundred workers were present. Mr. J. T. Dunn presided. Fifteen reports were read from the secretaries and others engaged in the different works carried on at the Mission. Almost every department of Christian labor is represented here, including a Sunday-school, Ragged school, Children’s – services, Mothers’ – meetings, Young-men’s Bible class, Band of Hope, Pure Literature Society, Tract Society, Penny Bank, Evangelists’ Association, Mutual Improvement Society, etc.: etc. The amount of work done for the Lord at this Christian beehive is really astonishing, and the Master is honoring the faithfulness of his servants in an especial manner. They all seek as the supreme object of their endeavors the glory of God and the salvation of souls. In most of the reports individual instances were mentioned of God’s favor being shown. The Mission has already done a noble service in the neighborhood where it is situated, and knowing him. on whom they depend, the teachers and workers engaged in this work are expecting greater things than these, and a more extended sphere of usefulness in the future. They have indeed much cause for thankfulness.
GREEN WALK MISSION. — The death of our brother, Mr. Bennett, is a great and grievous loss to this most useful work. Prayer is desired that others may be raised. up that this blessed service for teeming Bermondsey may not flag.
PERSONAL NOTES. — A correspondent in Yorkshire sends us the following characteristic note: — “A young man in this neighborhood, who had been brought up as a Congregationalist, was got hold of by the Ritualistic party, and made into a Churchman, and induced even to go to confession to one of the vicars in —. He fell ill, and consumption set in. When death stared him in the face he found no comfort from his church creeds and practices, and at last turned with disgust from his spiritual advisers. Having heard much of you, and. no doubt at times seen your works, he told his father he should like to read some of them. His father was only too glad to hear this, and at once procured a copy of your “Morning by Morning.” He found here just what he wanted, and through the reading of this book, and the conversation he had with a Christian friend, he was able to say with confidence, ‘I know whom I have believed,’ and he died in a sure hope. He said to his father once or twice that he got more good from your books than from aught else he read.”
We are glad to find that the letter of Dr. Culross, in last month’s Magazine, referring to the distribution of our sermons, has already suggested to others the desirability of commencing similar work. Any friends who wish to circulate the sermons as loan tracts, can obtain a regular supply of them, in return for a small subscription, by applying to the Secretary of the Spurgeon’s Sermons’ Tract Society, Mr. C. Cornell, 60, Hamilton Square, Borough, London, S.E., who will be glad to receive contributions to assist in defraying the cost of the sermons. At the present time he has more applications for grants than the funds in hand will enable him to meet.
We were very delighted recently to hear of a singular case of conversion through one of our sermons. Last “Derby day” we were preaching in Essex, and a gentleman, who was on his way to Epsom to attend the races, seeing the announcement of the service, determined to be present, lie came, the word was blessed to the salvation of his soul, and not long ago he fell asleep in Jesus.
One of our church-members writes as follows: — “ Dear Pastor, — I thought it would gladden your heart to hear of another soul brought to Jesus through reading your sermons. A tract distributor from Chelsea Chapel, some two or three years ago, called at the house of an invalid, but was constantly told not to leave her tracts, for the man would neither read them nor allow anyone to come in to see him. She, however, persevered, and one day left one of your sermons, which he read, and told his wife to tell the woman that, if she had got any more of that sort, she might leave them, which of course she was pleased to do. He has continued reading them, and now is rejoicing in Jesus. He tells the distributor that it is all through those sermons.”
A liberal helper of our work, in sending contributions, says: — “You may remember the initials. My husband has sent pieces of calico to the Orphanage, also when at — he gave you three five-pound notes. He would say I ought net to tell you this, but I have often thought I should like to write to you, knowing that it gives you great pleasure to hear you have been the means of blessing to any soul. My husband lived in London for fourteen years as a draper’s assistant, and when he went was a gay, worldly young man. He was sent for to come home to see his sister, who was very ill, and died. Her death made a great impression upon him, and on his return to London he thought he must attend some place of worship. the first Sunday he started, not knowing where to go, but seeing a number of people going into a large building, thought he would go in. Need I say it was the Tabernacle, and that he was ever after a regular attendant. The word that seemed most blessed to him was preached by you front the text, ‘Wilt thou break a leaf driven to and fro?’ He was baptized by Mr. J. A. Spurgeon, and I am thankful to say is a very consistent Christian. He has been in business here more than ten years now, and the Lord has indeed blessed him in basket and in store, and I am also pleased to add that he has given him a liberal heart. Of course he takes a great interest in your great work.”
A Middlesex policeman writes: — “Before going on duty one evening last November, as I sat talking with my wife respecting a sergeant, who was sick at the police-station, with no one to tell him of Jesus. I felt condemned that I had not spoken to him. The Lord told me to take him some of your sermons, which had been preached about sixteen years ago. One of them was blessed to him; he was led to pray, and after seeking about ten days he found Jesus, to the joy of his soul. He has been baptized by our pastor, and is now very busy telling his friends what the Lord has done for him. One woman who lives at the police-station has found the Savior, and her husband is anxiously seeking the Lord.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle:—February 2nd, twenty-one.
Chap 20. APRIL, 1882.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
APRIL, 1882.
EDITORIAL APOLOGY.
THE magazine is demanded, and the Editor can scarcely think two consecutive thoughts. He has an idea, and then a pang, a sigh, and the idea has flown out of reach, like the boy’s butterfly. Or if he gets the pretty thing, he beats it to pieces in his eager effort, and it is no kroger worth the having. A sword and a trowel are poor things to work with when one tosses to and fro in bed. Will not our kind readers first excuse us if the number should be dull, and next prevent the consequences of such dulness by setting more than usual store by such things as we have, considering what they cost us? We could not postpone the affliction, or we would have had the magazine first, and the gout afterwards; but the sickness waylaid us, and stopped us just when the hour for labor had arrived. If it were only a matter of legs and arms we would manfully bear the pain at the extremities, and carry on our work; but the essence of our mischief is the brain, and, with the foe penetrating our head-quarters, it; is not easy to carry on the war. Our comfort is that our Lord and Master will not expect more of us than we can render, and we may surely hope that his children will be moved by the same compassion. Friends of many years’ standing, you will sympathize with one whom you have so often cheered; and if he be weak, your love will be all the stronger. When he was a lad, it was from his little wallet that the Lord and Master fed you with loaves and fishes marvelously multiplied; and now that he is older, and can hardly lift even the little. breakfast-basket of his younger days, you will pray that the. Master will not stint the feast because he weakens the servitor. If we were; dead God could glorify himself by us, and so he will now that we can say no more than — “ To will is present with me; but how to perform that which I would I find not.” — C. H. S.
ESSENCE OF A BIBLE SOCIETY SPEECH
BY. C.H. SPURGEON.
SCATTER the Bible without stint, strew the sacred pages “thick as leaves in Vallambrosa. Put it into the hand of prince and peasant, leave it in the waiting-room and the car, give it to the skeptical philosopher and the unsophisticated child.;’ In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thy hand.” Spread the Scriptures till they are as universal as the light, as all-pervading as the air, as all-refreshing as the dew.
To that end I commend the British and Foreign Bible Society as a great means of disseminating the word of God in all quarters of the globe. We have our own conscientious difference with this Society on a certain point; but that can never prevent our co-operating with it to the utmost of our power where the one object is to keep the Holy Scriptures before the public eye, and within the reach of all mankind.
Of course, we are not so superstitious as to believe that the mere dispersion of Bibles must do good, whether they are read or not. Our hope is that they will be read, and that the Holy Spirit will lead many to study them to their souls’ eternal benefit. Apart from this, there is no special benefit in putting a Bible to sleep in every bedroom, and a well-dressed copy to be on parade in the drawing-room; neither is there any great; thing done when you can sell a Bible for sixpence;, and a Testament for twopence. But we look for this, and have no reason to reckon upon disappointment — place the Bible within every man’s reach, and see what will come of it.
What is the Bible to us that we should wish to spread it throughout the habitable earth? The answer is a large one. First, it is to us the umpire of truth. Let the umpire be where he can be heard. The Scripture is our court of appeal; let it be open to all comers. Every man must have an anchorage for his faith; even for his unbelief he needs some form of hold-fast. The disputer of this world believes in himself, and so he ends the matter. The Roman Catholic finds his anchorage in the infallibility of the Pope, and submits his reason to the traditions of his church. You and I find our anchorage in the infallibility of Scripture. The Holy Ghost moved holy men of old to write this Book, and we believe that every word of it is inspired, and that if we could get absolutely the exact words in which it was written at the first, we should have a book as perfect, certain, and immutable as God himself. We know that in any one version of it there may be minor errors of copyists, which could not have been avoided unless a miracle had been wrought every day for thousands of years; but, allowing for that, we hold that the volume containing the Old and New Testaments is God’s revelation of himself to us in words, — a revelation positive and clear. Hence it is that we desire every living man to read it. We desire to see truth triumphant, and error defeated; and therefore we scatter the Bible. We would see the divided church once more purged of heresics, and united in one Lord, one faith, and one baptism; and therefore we scatter the Bible. If this book be the test of truth, those who are the children of truth are the most deeply concerned to see it brought to the front.
“This is the judge that ends the strife,
Where wit and reason fail.”
Let us proclaim the judgments of this judge in all places. To me one text of Scripture is worth seven years of argument. Fathers, schoolmen, reformers, Puritans, bishops, and even ecclesiastical courts are nothing in comparison with this oracle of God.
The test-book should be accessible to every man. No one should be allowed to go abroad into an atmosphere loaded with superstition and skepticism without bearing the antidote with him. We Should not merely provide it for him when he seeks it, but we should suggest his use of it by’ furnishing an abundant supply. Every man should be able to judge of the truth and value of the teaching of the pulpit and the press by having in his hand the law and the testimony by which all must be judged.
Brethren, the Bible is to us, next, the storehouse of truth. It not only helps us to judge what is truth, but it tells us what truth is. Shall we not wish that all our neighbors should possess such a treasure? Will we allow one poor wandering gipsy or street-beggar to be without the book which makes wise the simple? The marvelous fullness of Holy Scripture reminds me of certain of our coal-mines. Coal is found upon the surface, and it gladdens the cottager’s hearth, without costing him labor in coming at it. Even thus there are truths in the Bible which are conspicuous to every reader, and are learned without study or research. When the surface-coal is gone, the miners dig down till they come to another seam, and the same thing is done many’ times: they go further into the bowels of the earth, and they find still more treasure. In such mines there is no exhaustion; so long as the expense of the descent can be borne, the enterprising digger may go far down under the bottom of the mighty sea, and still find full veins to reward him. Men exhaust a coal-mine, but; they will never work: out the Biblical mine, nor come to the end of the truth that is in God’s word. I do not know what truth is not in the Bible. A band of eminent men once taught that all science is to be found in the Bible: they conceived it to be a thesaurus of philosophical and physical truth, as well as of theological truth, and they said that all discoveries which are made externally by science might have been made within the inspired volume if we had looked for them. They asked if the circulation of the blood was not taught by Solomon long before Harvey’s day, and if the rotundity of the earth and its position in space were not clearly indicated? All things were and are known to that great Author who inspired the writers of this book, and it is small wonder if his omniscience betrays itself. When our very wise men have discovered all they can, it may be that their wisdom will become sufficiently prudent to look up to the foolishness of God; but as yet the foolishness of God is wiser than men — the book in which God conceals the secrets of nature is yet too bright for mortal eye.
Every stray hint in the Bible is of value, but evidently it was written chiefly to teach us moral and spiritual truth, to teach us the truths that concern our relation to one another, and to God. Upon those subjects it gives us everything we require. There is no subject upon which it does not treat, or if there be a subject upon which it is silent, it teaches us that God having nothing to say upon it, we ought to have nothing to ask. This marvelous book says all we want to know, and ought to know, in every case.
What a storehouse it is, since a man may continue to preach from it for five-and-twenty years, and still find that there is more to preach from than when he began to discourse upon it! What pyramids of books have been written upon the Bible, and yet we who are students find no portion overexpounded, but large parts which are scarcely touched. If you take Darling’s Cyclopaedia, and look at a text which one divine has preached upon, you will see that dozens have done the same; but there are hundreds of texts which remain like virgin summits, whereon the foot of preacher has never stood. I might almost say that the major part of the word of God is in that condition; it is still an Eldorado unexplored, a land whose dust is gold.
This is a tempting subject. The word of God is the great Popular Educator, the treasure-house of wisdom and knowledge, and surely, we, who desire to see around us a holy, happy, instructed people, must most anxiously desire that all men should read and believe, and understand the message of the Lord.
Next, far and wide disperse the Holy Word, because it is the great exemplar of morals. To whom shall we go for help in this matter, if we forget this thrice-holy Book? The common novels of the day are sorry teachers of morality; they teach a great deal more of immorality. The religious fiction of the day is little better: it is either goody-goody, teaching men and women how to be babies, or else it is suggest-ire of doubts which minister weakness to the soul. And what are all the essays and the theories of reviewers? What are all the tomes of the sages, and the gatherings up of centuries? London would become a field of blood if its only force for the maintenance of law, order, and right were found in the current literature of the period apart from the Bible and religion. The Scriptures give us a perfect law, and fix its commands upon the firm foundation of God’s claim to man’s obedience. It reveals to us the perfect example of our Lord Jesus Christ, and gives us the most powerful motives for copying that example, by attracting our love to him on account of his life and death on our behalf. It supplies virtue with courage, and gives zeal to justice. If we would create a thoroughly moral people, it can only be done in connection with the diffusion, belief, and practice of the Scriptures. The spread of sound morals is an absolute necessity of good government, especially in our great cities. Sin is a political danger. But; the people’s morals cannot he cared for except upon the basis of religion, and there is no religion but that of the cross. Banish religion,, and you destroy virtue. We will not say that no infidels have been moral, but we do say this, that unknown to themselves they were: under influences which sprang out of religion and its outgrowths, and so they were not fair specimens of what atheism alone would produce. Go to France in 1797, and see what happens to a nation when the sacred volume is removed and its teachings are derided: there the gospel of Pandemonium brought forth its Millennium, and anarchy’ created upon earth the express likeness of hell. If you would settle the pillars of order upon the basis of liberty, let the word of God be in the hands of all your citizens; and if you would go on to build an enduring empire, which shall be a temple of blessings to all mankind, let the sacred page be every day more studied, better understood, and more heartily practiced.
Holy Scripture is not only the teacher of morals, but it is the great enforcer of truth. Other books tell us the truth, but this puts us in love with it: they instruct us, but this converts us. That is a fine instance which is told of Junins, who had been for years an infidel. His father persuaded him to come home, and, being grieved at his opinions, begged him, for the love of his father, to read the New Testament. He said he would read it once; and here is his testimony concerning it: “When I opened the New Testament I first fixed my eyes on that august chapter with which St. John begins his Gospel: ‘ In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.’ I read part of the chapter, and was soon convinced that the divinity of the argument, and the majesty and authority of the style, did far excel all the eloquence and art of human writings; my whole body trembled, my mind was astonished, and I was so affected all that day that I knew not where or what I was. O my God, thou wast mindful of me, according to the multitude of thy mercies; and in pity broughtest home thy lost sheep into thy fold.”
The word not only contains the truth, but it distills a certain secret unction by which that truth penetrates the heart. The Spirit of God is usually pleased to bless the word of God to the conversion of men. It is a selfevidencing book, proving its own inspiration by its effect on the soul. I find when I question people about their conversion that it is almost always a text of Scripture that God has blessed to that end. I may have expatiated on the text in my sermon, but the main instrument which the Lord has employed has been the passage itself. It is God’s word, and not our comments upon it, which he usually blesses to the conversion of men. Have you not all felt, who know the Lord, that a wondrous charm is in the word of God, by which men are gently led to the Savior? Was it not by one touch of Scripture that the scales were made to fall from your eyes, and you saw the light? Lex lux: the law is light. The Bible itself is a preacher, yea, an army of preachers in one; its silent tongue has more eloquence in it than all the tongues of all God’s ministers; and often those who have not been led to faith by human voices have heard in the Bible the “still, small voice” of God himself, and bowed before the throne of the Most High. If you want sinners converted and souls saved, spread the sacred Scriptures. You cannot tell where God will bless them; sow them beside all waters.
Let us spread the Holy Scriptures also, and perhaps chiefly, because they are the very throne of Christ. I hate to hear Scripture and Scriptural doctrine made into a great stone to roll at the door of the sepulcher of a dead Christ. This may be done by teaching a creed, and forgetting the living personality of our Lord. I have heard of Christians whose principal talk is about “the church.” God bless the church! But it is not the chief object of our affection. Christ — Christ crucified — ,must ever stand first. I have joined the society of “know-nothings “; not the American “knownothings,” but the old Pauline know- nothings; for I determined to know nothing among you save Jesus Christ and him crucified. Those who are of that persuasion will be sure to love the word of God, for it is full of Jesus. “The Scriptures are the swaddling-bands of the child Christ Jesus;” so St. Augustine used to say. The Scriptures are those beds of choicest flowers where he, is ever present: — “He feedeth among the lilies.” This is the garden where he delighteth to walk. In the Scriptures, as in the Temple, everyone speaks of his glory. All the prophets and apostles point to him, and with one voice cry, “Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world.” The ivory palaces of inspiration are fragrant with cassia and myrrh, and all that myrrh and holy perfume; come from the presence of Christ in the midst of them. Oh! you who love the Incarnate Word, spread the inspired word which does him honor. Oh! you that feel that he loved you and gave himself for you, if you desire to bring him an acceptable sacrifice, spread the word of God all over the world, till every creature shall read the glowing page.
Last of all, let us spread the Bible, for we have no idea how greatly it is the consolation of the afflicted, and the comforter of the poor and troubled. It nourishes the souls of the famished ones. I know many persons who cannot get out to a place of worship, for they have been bedridden for many years; but the Psalms of David, and the blessed words of the Savior, such as, “Let not your heart be troubled: ye, believe in God, believe also in me,” have been their daily food.
I have heard it whispered by some of God’s people sometimes, “We know not where to get the gospel. We have a preacher, but he is a dry bone; there is no marrow in him, for there is no Christ in his preaching.” When you hear a sermon that has no Christ in it, you are to by pitied: if you hear that man again it is your own fault, and you will deserve to be blamed. I would not give a man a second chance to preach me a Christless sermon. “That is hard,” say you. If a man were to advertise that he could make bread without flour he might add? “but I will never do it.” It may be so, but let us judge by an analogy. When I get the idea theft a gentleman believes in a gospel in which Christ is not first and last I leave him alone in his glory. Christ must be all in all, or the gospel is not preached. When people live in a region where an adulterated gospel is served out, what a blessing it is that they can go and get the bread of life at first hand from their Bibles! If you live in a region where the milk is watered down, the best thing is to keep a cow of your own: to have your own Bible is like keeping your own cow; from it you get “the sincere milk of the word.” And what a blessing it is to be able to have God’s word at so small a cost! Time was when your forefathers would have given all they were worth if they could have had such a treasure. You have it in all your houses; therefore take care that you have it in your hearts.
When we think of the many, many poor people in this great city of ours that suffer very much, and yet are happy because they live on the word of God as their daily manna; when we think of the many who are full of diseases, whose very bones decay, and yet are joyful and sing all day long because the holy promises are their comforters; when we think of the many that are almost homeless, scarcely knowing where to lay their heads, and are, nevertheless, supremely blessed through the grace of God, we cannot but adore the sacred Scripture, which is the meat and drink of their souls. Take the Bible away! You might as well strike the sun from the firmament, or dry up all the rivers and springs.
I was sitting under a beech-tree in the New Forest some time ago, thinking and meditating on that tree. The beech is a very wonderful tree, exhibiting many curious habits and growths. If any tree has intellect it is the beech tree. I was meditating upon my friend the beech, and looking up through the interlaced branches and enjoying the shade, when I saw a squirrel up in the tree, and I said to myself, “Ah, I do not value this tree as the squirrel does. He knows the trunk avenue, and calls it his High Street, and then he knows all the branch streets, all the little thoroughfares, and the nooks where he can hide himself away. This tree is his town, and he almost counts the leaves as he runs about it. Moreover, he has a little store of nuts somewhere in his own private bank, and this tree is a sort of mother and father and general provider for him. He can tell me what sounds it makes at midnight, and what creaking of the branches he hears when the storm is out; for this tree is his world, it is everything to him.”
Now, we ministers go to the Bible for our texts, and value it for that purpose; and ordinary readers go there, and see much of poetry, and much that is interesting and instructive in it; but the poor sinner, heavy-laden with his sins, how precious it is to him when first it reveals his Savior, and afterwards, when he is worn and weary with the cares of life, how precious is the Word to the believer when it assures him that his bread shall be given him and his water shall be sure. We do not know the value that one line of Scripture has in the eye of one of God’s saints whom that Scripture has sustained. Whenever you give a Bible, you bestow a priceless treasure upon the man who receives it; therefore, go on with your contributions, and do all that you can to spread the word of God. The Bible is not Christ, but it points to him: you may not rest in your Bibles as though they could save you, but you must go to Christ himself for salvation; but still, when you have once believed in the Lord Jesus, set about leading others to him, and how can you do this more surely than by seeing to it that the Scriptures are scattered everywhere? Farewell.
NOTES
SPECIAL. — We have been obliged to cancel all our engagements to preach or speak for various friends and societies, as we find that we cannot hope to fulfill them, and to accomplish our ever-increasing church and homework, without running the risk of being frequently laid aside altogether. It would be a great comfort to us if we could be spared from extra public service until we have the necessary strength for it. The work that we rarest do grows so rapidly that we are unable to undertake anything additional without either neglecting that which has the first claim upon us, or else, by attempting too much, being compelled to do nothing but lie and suffer excessive pain, with its consequent weakness of body and depression of spirit. For some time before we were taken ill, it was a daily burden to refuse all sorts of applications, presented either in writing, or by deputations. Those who could not possibly write their business, and therefore forced an interview, those who waylaid us at odd corners and inconvenient times, those who bored us with twenty requests to do the same thing, when we told them that it was not possible, have our richest blessing for the chastisement which they alone have brought upon us.
On Monday evening, March 6, the annual meeting of the LADIES’ BENEVOLENT SOCIETY was held in the Tabernacle Lecture-hall, Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presiding. Addresses were delivered by the chairman. Pastor J. A. Spurgeon, and Messrs. W. Olney, B. W. Carr, M. Llewellyn, J. T. Dunn, and J. W. Harrald. The report, in addition to detailing the work of the past year, contained special references to the many workers of the Society who had been called home since the last anniversary, and alluded to the pressing need of new friends to fill their places. The poor are still with us in great numbers, but those who are able and willing to help this and other kindred societies for their relief are not so plentiful. It may be that there are some ladies who would be glad to be employed in this Christlike mission of benevolence. If so, we can promise them a hearty welcome at the working-meeting which is held on the Thursday after the first Sunday in each month in the Ladies’ Room at the Tabernacle.
On Wednesday evening, March 8, the members of the ADULT MALE BIBLECLASS held their annual tea and public meeting in the Tabernacle Lecturehall. Much sympathy was manifested when it was announced that our beloved pastor was unable to take the chair. A kind note from him to the president, Elder Perkins, expressed his own disappointment that a sudden attack of his old enemy made bed his only resort. Mr. W. Olney kindly volunteered to preside. The gathering, both at the tea and public meeting, was much larger than on any former occasion, and the interest was well sustained throughout. The chairman spoke of his deep sympathy with such classes, and the secretary described the work: of the class during the last twelve months; also its present state, and its hopes for the future. The subjects discussed had been very varied in character, practical rather than speculative, and had been well taken up by the class, showing generally diligent study of the word. The attendance had been good, the largest number present being one hundred and forty-eight, the average one hundred and six each Sabbath. The weekly prayer-meeting, though not always large in numbers, has been ever characterized by a devout and earnest spirit. The president with gratitude referred to his twelve years’ connection with the class, during which the spirit of love and unity that had prevailed had been a bond of strength, while many backsliders had been restored, seekers directed, and a full and free salvation through a living Savior proclaimed to all. Two recent and interesting eases of the conversion of casual visitors were also mentioned, and several members of the class spoke of the benefit they had received. Many others had been fitted for more extended Christian work by increased acquaintance with the word, deepened piety, and the opportunity given them of using and improving their gifts. A sum of £23 in aid of the Pastors’ College, together with £25 in addition to £27 already given to our dear Pastor, to help him in spreading the gospel in India, is ready to be presented to the Pastor personally when our heavenly Father in his goodness restores him again to us.
During the evening a token of continued love and esteem for the; President was shown by the gift of a pair of pretty ornaments matching a timepiece previously given, and also a handsome black’ marble timepiece to our beloved Brother W. Geen, the secre-taw, who has rendered loving and valued service to the class, bat who, to the regret of all, is about to leave us, hoping to renew his health in his native air.
The meeting was closed with an earnest prayer by our venerable Brother Bowker.
On Wednesday evening, March 15, the inaugural meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE TOTAL ABSTINENCE SOCIETY was held in the Lecture-hall, which was crowded to its utmost capacity by an enthusiastic audience. Pastor C. H Spurgeon, who has accepted the office of President of the Society, had promised to preside, but being too ill to leave his bed, he had to content himself by writing the following letter:—
“Dear Friends,—I am exceedingly sorry to be absent from this first meeting to form the Tabernacle Total Abstinence Society. The worst of it is that my head is so out of order that I cannot even dictate a proper letter. I can only say, ‘Try and do all the better because I am away.’ If the leader is shot down, and his legs are broken, the soldiers must give an extra hurrah, and rush on the enemy. I sincerely believe that, next to the preaching of the gospel, the most necessary thing to be done in England is to induce our people to become total abstainers. I hope this society will do something when it is started. I don’t want you to wear a lot of peacocks’ feathers and putty medals, nor to be always trying to convert the moderate drinkers, but to go in for winning the real drunkards, and bringing the poor enslaved creatures to the feet of Jesus, who can give them liberty. I wish I could say ever so many good things, but I cannot, and so will remain, yours teetotally,
“C. H. SPURGEON.”
The duties of the Chairman were very efficiently performed by Pastor J. Clifford, M.A., LL.B., and addresses were delivered by Messrs. A. E. Smithers (the secretary of the Society), J. W. Herreld, J. T. Dunn, W. Stubbs, W. Hill, J. W. Goodwyn, J. McAuslane (of the Pastors’ College), and John Taylor (Chairman of the National Temperance League). A recitation, entitled,’ “The Drunkard’s Fire-escape,” was ably rendered by Mr. John Ripley; solos were sung by the Misses Price and Stubbs, and a choir of girls from the Tabernacle Band of Hope, and of boys from the Orphanage, sang at intervals during the evening. At the close of the meeting, upwards of one hundred persons signed their names in the pledge-book.
The explanatory statement, read by the secretary, informed the audience that the work had been established upon a distinctly religious basis, and that it would be carried on as a Gospel Temperance Mission. A committee has been formed, with representatives from most branches of the church, and meetings are to be held, for the present at least, every Wednesday evening, at eight o’clock, in the glass-room under the Tabernacle. Further particulars can be obtained of the secretary, Mr. A. E. Smithers, 120, Newington Butts, S.E.
COLLEGE. — Our esteemed friend, Professor Gracey, has been obliged, in consequence of ill-health, to rest from his College duties during the whole of the past month, and several of the students have been more or less unwell, so we have judged it expedient to have a longer Easter vacation than usual. The students reassemble on Monday, April 17, the day on which the Annual Conference commences. Will all our friends pray that the meetings of the week may be full of spiritual life and power, and productive of great blessings to both pastors and people? Yet another name has been removed by death from our Conference-roll. Our former student, Mr. R. Makin, who has been ]aid aside from pastoral work for the last three years, was recently stricken ,flown by typhoid fever, and suddenly called to his rest and reward, leaving a widow and six children to mourn his loss. “Who’ll be the next?”
EVANGELISTS. — Our Bro. H. Knee sends us the following cheering report of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at Peckham Park Road:—
“It is with unfeigned gratitude to our gracious God that we record the manliest blessing which has attended the labors of our brethren, Fullerton and Smith, at Park-road Chapel, Peckham. From many overflowing hearts rise the ancient words, ‘ The Lord hath done great things for us, whereof we are glad.’
“For a considerable season prior to the commencement of the Mission earnest prayer was offered, with the distinct view of seeking from the Lord a preparation for the work, and the expected blessing. Had we nothing but the experience of the past few weeks to convince us of the fact, it would be no problem with us as to whether prayer is heard; we know it, and have seen it. Constantly of late have we heard from parents, teachers, and others, such words as these — ‘ I prayed for the salvation of my dear ones, and now, thanks be to God, they are rejoicing in Christ Jesus.’ Others, with tears in their eyes, testify of their own souls’ salvation, and many who have long known the Lord are conscious of a marked quickening of their spiritual life. ‘ Thou, O God, didst send a plentiful rain, whereby thou didst confirm thine inheritance when it was weary.’
“The services were commenced on Sunday morning, February 12th, by the usual service in the Chapel, and continued until the evening of March 5th. From the first the attendance was good, and the expectation evident; and as the meetings progressed both numbers and interest increased, until the crowd and the desire to hear the word were without a parallel in the history of the church.
“On Saturday afternoons, meetings for children were conducted by Mr. Smith, and certainly we have never seen children listen more attentively than they did at each service. Although the chapel was packed, and many of the audience very young, Mr. Smith, by his inimitable way of telling well-known and well-worn Bible stories, succeeded in holding them all spellbound until the close of the service. The lessons and spiritual suggestions were not forgotten, the gospel was simply and earnestly enforced, and we expect fruits from these meetings in days to come.
“The Song-services on Saturday evenings were most extraordinarily successful; the chapel was crowded to its utmost capacity, and many were unable to obtain admission. The brief, bright addresses of Mr. Fullerton, and the hearty singing of Mr. Smith, aided by a large and efficient choir, made the meetings immensely popular.
“On Sunday afternoons meeting were held for men only, and the chapel was again well filled in every part. We shall not quickly forget the sight, nor will any of those present be likely to forget the earliest words addressed to them by the evangelists.
“Meetings for women only were held on Wednesday afternoons, and these were quite equal to the other meetings in numbers and in interest.
“Of course the Sunday evening services have been the largest, the commodious lecture-hall close by has been crowded, as well as the chapel, the pastor taking the overflow meeting, and Mr. Smith singing in both places. On the last Sunday, in addition to the other three meetings, a service was held at seven a.m., and the chapel was well filled, whilst the occasion proved a precious prelude to the after engagements of the day.
“After each evening meeting a prayer-meeting was held, the greater part of the congregation remaining, and much power being manifested.
“It is early yet to speak much of results, but we have already witnessed many cases of real conversion. Like Barnabas, we have ,seen the grace of God, and are glad, and we expect there is much more to follow.
“No words of ours are needful concerning the fitness of our two dear brethren for their special work, their ability is pre-eminently conspicuous. That they have the ear of the masses, concerning the irreligiousness of whom we hearse much, and that the power of the Holy Spirit crowns their labors with true success, are two facts which, without further comment, we commend to the earnest consideration of those older brethren who are angry, and will not go in for such a mission as that which it has been our privilege to take part in, and our delight to describe. Most earnestly do we at Park Road continue to pray that a similar blessing may attend our brethren’s labors wherever they may go.”
On Sunday, March 12, the evangelists commenced a series of services at Chelsea, in connection with our Brother Page’s church. The report of the first week’s meetings gives promise of great blessing.
Mr. Burnham asks us to mention that he has removed to 24, Keston-road, East Dulwich, S.E., and to intimate that he is fully engaged for September, October, and November; but that he has a few weeks vacant in June and July if brethren are desiring his services.
ORPHANAGE. — The collectors’ meeting, on Friday evening, March 3, was a great success. After presenting the contents of their boxes or books to the gentlemen who sat at the receiving-office, and making an inspection of the new buildings, the collectors partook of tea in the dining-hall. At the meeting afterwards, in the same place, the President occupied the chair, and thanked all who had helped in any way in the work of caring for the widow and fatherless. A choir of girls then sang one of their school pieces very sweetly, and at its close Mr. Charlesworth introduced the Stockwell Orphanage Hand-belt Ringers. He explained that less than a fortnight before that evening he had purchased a peal of bells, for which he hoped to make an appeal to those present, and a friend had kindly taught four of the boys a little of the art of campanology. The young performers then stepped forward, and rendered two selections of music in a style that promises well for the future if they continue to learn as rapidly as they have done during their first week’s tuition; and, as a consequence of their excellent playing, several contributions were given at once to defray the cost of the bells. The principal item in the program, however, was the sketching entertainment by Mr. J. William’s Benn, entitled “Notes on Noses, and those who wear them.” This gentleman has a marvelous facility for almost instantaneous drawing, and very wonderful ace the effects produced by his dexterous fingers. With a few rapid strokes he depicts upon paper representations of most of the prominent types of noses, and in humorous, but always wise and sensible, language keeps his audience interested in the science which he has studied so well. Mr. Benn is a public benefactor, for he has struck out a line of amusement for the people in which there is nothing that can possibly do harm, while there is a great deal that will benefit those who go to hear what he has to say upon the noses that he sketches in their presence. Personally we are very grateful to him, for his services were voluntarily and gladly given to the Orphanage. Before closing the meeting the President announced that the contents of the boxes and hooks brought in during the afternoon had amounted to £130, in addition to which many friends had forwarded by post the sums they had collected. if there are, either in London or in the country, any ladies or gentlemen who would like to become collectors, a box or book will be at once forwarded on receipt of a postcard announcing their wishes, addressed to the Secretary, Stockwell Orphanage, Clap-ham Road, S.W.
COLPORTAGE. — The following extracts from Colporteurs’ Reports give some idea of what a valuable agency Colportage is to reach individuals with the gospel: —
(1) “A whole family has been blessed through my instrumentality. A young man who was very reckless and wicked was brought to Christ at my Bible class. He went home and confessed it to his father and mother. His mother and one sister have given their hearts to the Lord, and another sister, upon 643 whom I called the other day, told me how anxious she was to find Christ. I prayed with her, and I feel sure that she is now a Christian, and all in the family, if not yet saved, are now seeking after salvation.”
(2) “One place to which I go is a laundry where there are several women, besides the family, which is a large one. They always ask me for a little service of singing, reading, speaking, and prayer. Two have given their hearts to the Lord, and I have good hope of the others. I sell a good number of books and monthly magazines here.”
(3.) “I cannot record any direct conversion arising from books, etc. sold, but am persuaded that the many books and magazines sold by your Colporteur have tended, during a long period of spiritual dearth, in some measure to keep alive the grace in the hearts of many, and ofttimes to produce deep impressions and convictions of sin in others, and I feel that the improved condition of many has been largely caused by their reading of good books. I find I have sold during the year 118 Bibles, 192 Testaments, 2,644 books of various prices, 12,784 monthly magazines, 623 packets of books and cards, and 715 almanacs. All this good reading will and must have a great influence on the minds and hearts of the people.”
(4) “The Lord has blessed my services to two poor souls this quarter, and I hear that others are seeking the Savior of winners. I have conducted about 26 services this quarter, some of which have been in the open-air, which have resulted in some going to the house of prayer who used to loiter in the street.”
The General Secretary adds that similar cheering reports have been received from most of our 72 Colporteurs, and addresses to us the following note: —
“Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — Can anything be done to increase our General Fund? So far this month the amount received is only £7 16s. We slowly, but surely, spend our capital in the working of the Districts unless the General Fund keeps up. Our home expenses were about £20 less last year than the previous one. If you will kindly apportion to us as much help as possible, when you have the opportunity, we shall feel very grateful. We are not run aground yet, but shall soon drift that way unless the tide comes to our rescue. We must either have increased funds, or give up some of the districts. — Yours very sincerely,
“W. CORDEN JONES.”
“March 13th, 1882.”
PERSONAL NOTES.—We continue to receive tidings of souls saved through our sermon preached last “Derby day.” Here is an extract from one of the letters bringing us the good news:—
“Mr. Spurgeon, dear Sir:, — I have much pleasure in telling you that my niece (nineteen years of age) heard you preach here last June, and through that message was led to Christ. She is now with him.. I only knew of this a week or two ago, when waiting upon her in the night. We had sweet talk together of Jesus and his love, and she then told me how it was she came to him just as she was. I am very glad to tell you she came when there was a prospect of her getting better.”
One of our former students, in sending a contribution for one of our institutions, says: —
“My next item is to inform you that your Sermon, No. 1609 (‘Faith: What is it? How can it be obtained?’), has been blessed in setting a soul at liberty. The person is a married woman of good character. Prior to her marriage she was servant in a Popish family, where all manner of expedients were resorted to to make her enter their community. Amongst other things they took her Bible from her, made her attend mass, etc., and, when they found they could not: prevail, treated her so unkindly that she left her situation and came home. The loss of her Bible first caused her to prize it, and led her to realize somewhat of its ‘value, a feeling she has never lost, though that is years ago. Three years since a serious illness made her thoughtful and uneasy about her state before God. Then, a year ago a sermon of Mr. Talmage’s, in The Christian -Herald, broke her down, and made her completely wretched. All she read, heard, and did only made her burden, the heavier. One day, however, I put your sermon, No. 1609, into the hands of her mother, who found it to be marrow and fatness to her soul. She read it once, twice, thrice, and found it improve on closer acquaintance, so that on my next visit, a fortnight after, she begged it, and has it still, and prizes it highly, I can assure you. Having drunk a good draught of its sweet contents herself, she passed it on to her daughter, who also read it, and was greatly struck therewith, but could not understand it the first time, so she read it again, and again, and then came the ‘Jubilate Dee’, for the night of weeping had given place to the morning of joy, and this poor, sorrowing, burdened one found the Savior. Her testimony did me good to hear. It was so clear, joyous, and unassuming. Now this friend is before the Church as a candidate for baptism. Though personally I had no hand in this work, save as I delivered the sermon that God blessed, my heart is as glad as if the Lord had given me the honor; and you, dear sir, I know will be only too glad to put the crown on the Savior’s brow. You preach to a large congregation about here. It is my privilege to visit some two hundred homes every fortnight with your sermons. One of our members has a few also for a district I cannot very well take, as the other occupies much time. Most people gladly receive them, and only a few refuse them. After we have done with them they go to the Baptist minister at B____, who distributes them amongst his people. We do not forget you in prayer; remember us sometimes.”
A friend in Dorset, who reads our sermons at the village services which he conducts, writes that recently the Lord was pleased to bless the word to a young man, who is now rejoicing in his Savior. The sermon read on that occasion was, “Vanities and Verities,” No. 1379. He also adds: — “ Last Sunday evening I was in another village, and two of God’s children came to me, after the service, to say how much the word was blessed to their souls. One old saint especially remarked that she did not know when she had been so lifted up. The subject was, ‘For whom is the gospel meant?’ (No. 1,345). So you see, my dear sir, that God is pleased to bless the word, not only as it falls from your lips, but years after, when it is read by other people.”
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle. — Feb. 23, twenty-one; Feb. 27, eleven; March 2, eighteen.
SPURGEON’S BOOK FUND
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
A FRIEND sent us a book entitled “Witty Inventions.” There is genius in the title: it excites curiosity, and sets one’s mouth watering. We opened the book, and were at once taken with one of its sententious utterances. It contented, satisfied, satiated, nauseated us. We had enough and more than enough in a single line. Henceforth these “witty inventions” are cast to the moles and to the bats. The author obtained our attention under false pretences. Here is the sentence, “The best sermon is that which is least studied.” This is an invention certainly, but not a witty one. It is as false a statement as was ever coined. Sermons which have been studied with some degree of care are often the cause of torture to their hearers; but to suppose that the case would be altered if our ministers diverted us with impromptu harangues is absurdity itself. The harvest may be small with all our ploughing, but it would be nothing at all if the feet of the ox quite forsook the field. As well might we say that the best dinner is that which is least cooked, or that the best room is that which is least furnished, as that the best sermon is that which is least studied.
Let every preacher give diligent attention to reading and meditation; let him become wise that he may teach the people knowledge. Let him be much in his library and his closet. Let him use all the help he can. But how is the preacher to prepare his discourse without aid? Keep the man without books, and what is he to do? Happily, few of us have long labored at making bricks without straw; but there are such bondsmen among us, and for these we would arouse sympathy. Alas, the little library, which was the preacher’s pride in his unmarried days, has been gradually dissolved into bread and house-rent, he scarcely knows how. Ask the good man, and he will tell you how small was the market-value of “The Saint’s Rest,” and how little he raised upon “The Rise and Progress.” Yes, Matthew Henry went too, and with it the last chance of his sermons being worth hearing. In one case we heard of a minister’s family, in which a twopenny homiletical magazine, which had been taken to help “father” in getting his sermons, was given up because the few coppers could not be spared, for the famine was sore in the land. We are sore pained for the lack of food and raiment for the sake of the good man and his household; but our grief for the scarcity of books arises out of a wider sympathy, for we think of his congregation. It is pitiable to think of the poor preacher, bowed down with cares, cudgelling his brains (none too many to start with), and finding nothing as the result. Had he been born to lead cattle to the pasture his lot had been enviable, for now he has to lead his flock to a desert, and as they gather about him they look up and are not fed.
It is not everybody who sympathizes with a minister in this need, and yet it is one of the keenest forms of poverty. We feel a kinship with any man who shares our concern for those afflicted in this direction, and we feel personally grateful to anybody and everybody who puts a good book on a minister’s shell It is therefore one of the delights of our life that our beloved wife has made ministers’ libraries her great concern. The dear soul gives herself wholly to it. You should see her stores, her book-room, her busy helpers on the parcel-day, and the wagon-load of books each fortnight. The Book Fund at certain hours is the ruling idea of our house. Every day it occupies the hand and heart of its manager. The reader has scant idea of the book-keeping involved in the book-giving; but this may be said,—the loving manager has more than six thousand names on her lists, and yet she knows every volume that each man has received from the first day until now. The work is not muddled, but done as if by clockwork, yet it is performed with a hearty desire to give pleasure to all receivers, and to trouble no applicant with needless inquiries.
It is no small satisfaction to us to know from countless testimonies that the seven-and-twenty volumes of our sermons are a quarry, out of which are digged or hewn discourses for pulpits of every denomination. These tomes placed in manse libraries will do more for the spread of the gospel than any other agency known to us. Where could books be placed to such advantage? Those who desire to see the orthodox faith maintained in the land can hardly employ a better agency. The blessing is that the volumes are eagerly sought and joyfully received.
The Report of the Book Fund, which has been lately issued, is as good as any of its predecessors. It is a good sixpennyworth for size, and worth far more if judged of by its contents. Few will read it through with dry eyes. We were going to quote largely from it, but upon second thoughts we think we will not, but will urge our readers to buy the neat little book for themselves. Oar publishers will be happy to send it post free for seven stamps. The Report is full of precious pieces which deserve quotation, but we will only transfer a single passage in which the continued need of the work is earnestly stated. We let it tell its own tale, and pray our readers to heed it. “A lady, writing to me the other day, said she ‘supposed the ministers were nearly all supplied now’! Never was surmise more unwarranted and incorrect. The work is as urgent and important as ever, and the necessity for it as great and pressing. Did anybody ever hear of a preacher possessing as many books as his heart craved for? I never did; and I think such a state of contentment must be well-nigh impossible; for the more a man studies and enlarges his mind the more he hungers and thirsts for knowledge, and seeks to add to his stores; and the intense delight he takes in his few precious volumes is a constant incentive to add to their number. I am daily receiving letters from pastors to whom I made grants three or four years ago, whose mental craving, more stimulated than satisfied by the books previously given, is now urging them to seek further appliances for the development of thought and intellect. These good men might truly say —
‘My hunger brings a plenteous store,
My plenty makes me hunger more.’
They tell me with pleasing emphasis of the exceeding value and blessing of my former gifts, and they draw thence a plea for a renewed consideration of their needs. It would be, indeed, a hard heart which would refuse them, and with the coveted treasures at command send them empty away. Help in pulpit preparation, refreshment of spirit in times of deep depression, stimulus to private devotion, assistance in pastoral duties, — all these blessings, and many more, are enfolded in the precious pages bestowed by the Book Fund, which as truly bless a minister’s soul as they enrich his library. But although so many of God’s poor servants have had reason to thank him for the help afforded them in this important matter through the agency of the Fund, my ambition is by no means satisfied with the present attainments of my work. There are still hundreds of men in the ministry whose stock of books is totally inadequate to their needs, and who, though painfully conscious of their famishing condition, are unable to procure the ailment which would nourish their souls, and promote their spiritual and mental growth. If the Book Fund only ministered to the necessities of these long-settled pastors, its work would be useful and important; but there is the fact to be considered that our colleges of all denominations are constantly sending forth their young recruits to the battle of the Lord; and these are seldom, if ever. “thoroughly furnished” for the warfare which they seek to accomplish. To aid all these needy ones, to supply all these longing souls, would without doubt require both more means and more management than this quiet little service and its happy servant; can ever hope to command; but with this high aim in view, according as God prospers us, so do we deal forth our treasures lovingly and gladly till they be exhausted.”
THE THREE “THENS” OF LEVITICUS 26
BEING A PRAYER-MEETING ADDRESS
BY C. H. SPURGEON
IN the twenty-sixth chapter of the Book of Leviticus there are three “THENS,” which will afford us instruction if the Spirit of God will shine upon them. Turn to the passage and read for yourselves. We have first the THEN of promise and threatening repeated several times. The children of Israel were not to make an), graven images, nor to set up any images made by others, nor to bow to those already set up, but to keep clear of idolatry in every shape, and worship only their great invisible God, Jehovah, whose Sabbaths they were to keep and whose precepts they were to obey; and then the Lord says, “Then I will give you rain in due season, and the land shall yield her increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit. And I will give peace in the land, and ye shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid: and I will rid evil beasts out of the land, neither shall the sword go through your land. And I will walk among you, and will be your God, and ye shall be my people.” Very rich are the blessings which the Lord lavishes upon an obedient people; peace and plenty, conquest and communion, are the portion of believers whose hearts are chaste towards the Lord.
But should Israel refuse to hearken to the Lord, the chastening would be terrible indeed.
Listen to these verses from the fifteenth to the eighteenth. “And if ye shall despise my statutes, or if your soul abhor my judgments, so that ye will not do all my commandments, but that ye break my covenant: I also will do this unto you; I will even appoint over you terror, consumption, and the burning ague, that shall consume the eyes, and cause sorrow of heart: and ye shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it. And I will set my face against you, and ye shall he slain before your enemies: they that hate you shall reign over you; and ye shall flee when none pursueth you. And if ye will not yet for all this hearken unto me, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins.”
Is not this first “then” a very terrible one? But this is not all; more sorrows are added if their sins be multiplied. Read verses 23 and 24: “And if ye will not be reformed by me by these things, but will walk contrary unto me; then will I also walk contrary unto you, and will punish you yet seven times for your sins.” Here we have stroke upon stroke to break a hard heart. Nor even there does the judgment rest. Hear again the word of the Lord — “And it’ ye will not for all this hearken unto me, but walk contrary unto me; then I will walk contrary unto you also in fury; and I, even I, will chastise you seven times for your sins.” Brethren, read these words with holy trembling: they are written not for strangers but for the seed of Israel, and for us also who are grafted in unto the true olive. Those who are written in the eternal covenant will find it a hard thing to sin against the Lord their God. The utterly ungodly often go unpunished in this life, for their punishment is reserved for the world to come, where the due reward of their deeds shall be meted out to them for ever and ever; but the Lord dealeth far otherwise with his own, whose transgressions he hath blotted out. These are absolved in their relation to him as a Judge, but as children they come under his fatherly discipline, and out of love to them he causes them in this life to smart for their sins if they break the law of his house. As our covenant God the Lord is jealous. He is no Eli who ruins his sons by indulgence, but he scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. Very heavily has the Lord chastised some of his children. I ask you not to judge of one case by another, nor suppose that all the family must needs be scourged in the same measure. The Lord speaks of the Church as having compassion and making a difference, and he in mercy makes differences in discipline, because real differences of character exist. Certain of the Lord’s beloved ones were happily led to Christ in their early days, and therefore know nothing of those sins which are the torment of others; when these are kept by divine grace from all inconsistency the rod is little needed, and few clouds darken their path; but there are others of rougher mould and sadder experience, who smarted much at their first conversion, and having wandered again are brought back with heavy chastisements, and waters of a full cup are wrung out to them. The Lord may be dealing in discipline with some among you, and if so, you will smart indeed, for the heavenly Father never plays with the rod, but uses it in real earnest. It may be that sorrow of heart consumes your eyes, and your strength is spent in vain: a blight from the Lord seems to have fallen upon you both in temporal and in spiritual things; you sow, but you do not reap; you labor and obtain not. A faintness is in your head, so that the sound of a shaken leaf doth chase you, and you have no power to stand before your enemies: Sin and Satan, doubt and desolation triumph over you, and you flee when none pursueth. To you it has happened as in the nineteenth verse, “I will break the pride of your power,” for now you find no spiritual power within you, even power in prayer is gone, and all around you is barren; God hath made your heaven as iron, and your earth as brass. Ah me! you are in a woeful plight, for your strength is spent in vain, and your plagues are multiplied according to your sins.
It comes to this, my dear brother, that you are to be driven from your sins. God is “avenging the quarrel of his covenant,” as he solemnly says in verse twenty-five. Read that word and mark it. It is an awful thing to have God walking contrary to you; and yet he told you that he would do so if you walked contrary to him. What else could you expect? If you are his dear child he will be much grieved if he sees you act like a traitor; if you have leaned upon his bosom as a favored friend, he has a greater interest in you; and he cannot therefore endure to see you polluted. The dearer you are to God, the more angry will he be with you when you sin. The more he loves you, the more determined will he be to drive out the evil, and rid you of the abominable thing which his soul hateth. A judge when he is sitting upon the bench may feel a great indignation against a robber, or a murderer, yet he does not show it, but calmly condemns him to suffer the penalty of the law. See that judge without his robes, acting as a father at home: his child has transgressed, and now he is really angry, and shows far more sharpness towards his child than towards the offender. He who spoke in cold measured tones to the gross criminal now speaks severely, and with heat of spirit to his own offending boy. You all understand it; his wrath is of that kind which grows out of the truest love, a love which cannot suffer evil in its darling object. The child does not think his father loves him much when he makes him tingle and smart beneath his strokes, but we who are wiser understand that “herein is love.”
When God chastens you, my brother, yield at once, and yield completely. If you do not, you may take warning from this chapter, for the Lord puts his threatening before you three times over, “And if ye will not be reformed by me by these things, but will walk contrary unto me; then will I also walk contrary unto you, and will punish you yet seven times for your sins.” The old Roman judges when they passed along the streets were attended by lictors, and these lictors carried an axe bound up in a bundle of rods, to signify this, that offenders should first be beaten with rods, but if these rods were of no use they should be slain with the axe. I beseech every soul that is under the striving influences of the Spirit, or suffering from the trials of Providence, to hear at once the warning voice of the rod; for those who will not hear the rod must feel the axe. The Lord useth great discretion and deliberation, for he doth not afflict willingly: when little will suffice he will smite but little. If men humble themselves under his mighty hand he will exalt them in due time; but, if they refuse and rebel, he will smite them more and more, till he has chastened them seven times for their sins. “Then I will walk contrary unto you also in fury; and I, even I, will chastise you seven times for your sins.” We have known some men lose all their goods before they have turned to their God. Diseases, accidents, sicknesses have followed each other in quick succession, and hardly would they repent when they were all wounds and bruises and putrefying sores. Death has rent away their darlings; lovely children have been followed to the grave by their yet more precious mother; and hardly’ then has the proud spirit broken down. It has seemed as if Pharaoh was alive again, and the plagues were being repeated. Alas, in some cases there has even been a hardening as the result of affliction; the man has accused God of harshness, and has refused to turn to the chastening hand. Ah, me! what sorrows such are preparing for themselves. Those whom the Lord means to bless he will go on smiting till they bow before him, and make a full surrender. THEN, when they continue to rebel, then when they still harden their neck, then when they will not hear the rod, then when they cleave to their idols and depart from the Most High, then he will make them to pine away in their iniquity and will set his face against them.
We are glad to come to the second THEN of wise and penitent action. In the fortieth verse of this chapter we read, “If they shall confess their iniquity, and the iniquity of their fathers, with their trespass which they trespassed against me, and that also they have walked contrary unto me; and that I also have walked contrary unto them, and have brought them into the land of their enemies; if then their un-. circumcised hearts be humbled, and they then accept of the punishment of their iniquity. Then will I remember my covenant with Jacob, and also my covenant with Isaac, and also my covenant with Abraham will. I remember; and I will remember the land.” They were brought very low: they were even driven out of their land to perish among the heathen; and God seemed utterly to have cast them of, but he declares that even then he would remember his covenant and restore them, if they would turn from their iniquities, — their turning from iniquity would be the turning-point of their affairs; the end of woe, and the dawn of hope.
I beg you to look at the call of mercy, and see when judgment will stay its hand. They were first to “confess their iniquity,” and then would come the mercy, but not till then. O you chastened ones, are you prepared to acknowledge your transgressions, and your doings which are not good? They were to confess their trespass, their own peculiar trespass, whatever that might be; their hearts were to search out sin, confess it and mourn over it; then would forgiveness come, — -there can be no pardon till this is done. We must take sin to ourselves before God can put it away from us. Next, their heart was to be humbled: see the forty-first verse — “ If their uncircumcised hearts be humbled.” Proud sinners cannot be pardoned sinners. If we are not submissive there are more plagues in store. They were to be lowly, and then they would be cleansed from sin. Humility dates the hour of comfort. Observe, also, the peculiar point, that they were to accept the punishment of their iniquity, by which, I suppose, is meant that they must see their sorrow to be the result of their sin, and must own that it was a just infliction, a natural fruit of their own conduct. We are to have no quarrel with God, but to own that we deserve all that he has put upon us, and that if he should cast us into hell itself he would be just then, may we look for grace. If a child should say, “Father, you do well to punish me, for I deserve it,” the father would put up the rod, for it would have wrought its cud; and when a soul has been sore broken, till it sobs out in its agony, I deserve thy rod; “I deserve thy eternal wrath, O God,” then, then, then it is that the Lord accepts the repentance, and looks with an eye of mercy upon the contrite one.
The third THEN will be observed in the forty-second verse. “Then will I remember my covenant” — “Then will I remember my covenant with Jacob, and also my covenant with Isaac, and also my covenant with Abraham will I remember; and I will remember the land. The land also shall be left of them, and shall enjoy her sabbaths, while she lieth desolate without them: and they shall accept of the punishment of their iniquity: because, even because they despised my judgments, and because their soul abhorred my statutes.” “Yet for all that,” he mentions all their sins, and he says in the forty-fourth verse, “Yet for all that, when they be in the land of their enemies, I will not cast them away, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly, and to break my covenant with them: for I am the Lord their God. But I will for their sakes remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the heathen, that I might be their God: I am the Lord.” Now, fellow-sinner, when the Lord has brought you down to accept the punishment which he has laid upon you, then will he remember his covenant, that old and glorious covenant of grace which was made with faithful Abraham, which, better still, is made with every believer in the person of the Lord Jesus Abraham was the father of the faithful, and the covenant is made with all the faithful, with all the trusters, and God will remember it towards them. What is the tenor of it? “I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more.’: “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you.” This is the covenant of grace, and oh! it is a blessed thing when God remembers it on our behalf, for then he remembers no more the iniquities of his people. Poor sinner, though he has hunted you down and pursued you in his fierce anger, though conviction has broken you as a lion tears its prey, though you fear that the Lord has cast you away from all hope of grace, and outlawed you from all hope, yet if you accept your punishment, then you, even you, shall sing of pardon fought with blood.
“Then” when you are proud he will smite you; “then,” when he has smitten you, you are to accept your punishment; “then,” ‘when you have accepted your punishment and confessed your sin, the Lord will remember his covenant, and forgive all your iniquity. Observe well the three steps: chastisement when you are wrapped up in your iniquities; genuine submission when you feel the chastisement; and full covenant blessing when your submission is fully made. If any of us are now smarting, may we hasten there and then to full confession, and may we then receive restoration and comfort. God is very punctual, may he never find us procrastinating.
God grant that we may be kept from sin, or if we fall into it, may he deliver us from its power; and if one of these thens happens to us, may the others follow in merciful succession.
NOTES
Facts and Theories as to a Future State. By F. W. GRANT, New York. Cathcart, 20, Fourth Avenue.
OF all the books written in defense of the Scriptural doctrine of future punishment as against current theories this is the most complete, exhaustive, and conclusive yet to hand. Every new view is examined and then demolished: universalizm and annihilation are both proved to be unscriptural: whilst the propounders of them, from Farrar to Dobney, from Edward White to Samuel Cox, are subjected to a logic scrutiny, such as makes them destroy one another. It is essentially a student’s book, and we trust is the last word in this almost interminable controversy: it is time we taught the Scriptures rather than the brainspinning of men.
Green Pastures and Still Waters. Psalm 23. By J. DENHAM SMITHS. J. E. Hawkins.
THE literature of the 23rd Psalm would make a library of its own: and yet here is another book on the same theme, and no unworthy one. Mr. Smith has his own way of looking at truth, with which we do not always agree, and yet there is in him so much of loyalty to Jesus, and sweetness of speech about him, that we forget the man in the master, and revel instead of reviewing. There is unction, beauty, mellowness, and freshness of treatment here that fairly wins us, and the little volume must go on to our shelves. It has our best commendation.
Counsels and Thoughts for the Spiritual Life of Believers. Nisbet and Co.
THESE are no ordinary religious “snatches,” in the form of daily portions, for believers. The author’s vessel does not hug the coast of ordinary experience, but launches out into the deep waters of confident trust, assured faith, and intense consecration. Every paragraph tells of an experimental fellowship with Jesus and a closeness of intercourse which fit it for becoming the guide and adviser of others. Certainly there is here no milk for babes, but strong meat for those who are of full age.
Pulpit Talent, etc. Literary Varieties by HORACE BUSHNELL, D.D. R.D. Dickinson.
WHILST in some of these papers, especially the one on “Christian comprehensiveness,” there is much of teaching with which we cannot agree, yet in others there is a fund of fresh, bright, powerful truth that compels our admiration and assent. The two papers on the preacher’s qualifications and work are about as fresh and suggestive as anything that could be said on such a well-worn theme; and the student or preacher would be dull indeed who is not quickened thereby. With careful and discriminating reading these papers cannot but do good.
NOTES.
Many times we meet in American newspapers with our own name adorned or disfigured with a doctor’s degree. In a periodical we see month after month an extract from
THE. Rev. C. H. SPURGEON, D.D.
We like the prefix quite as well as the affix, that is to say, we detest them equally. Robert Robinson wrote in his journal “wondered how any man could be so silly as to call me reverend.” Shall we not all wonder in some more rational condition of our brains at a great many things which we now admire?
The Treasury of David is now being reprinted in New York by Messrs. Funk. It is a great venture for a publisher, but the enterprise of this pushing house has in this ease been abundantly rewarded. May a blessing rest on our work, as it Will now be read by thousands of American pastors. We are making rapid progress with volume 6.
A firm is advertising certain pictures with a recommendation from Mr. Spurgeon, but Mr. Spurgeon has never seen the aforesaid pictures: the articles of which he spoke so highly were a number of very handsomely illuminated texts, and his words ought not to be applied to other articles.
On Friday evening, March 17, the annual meeting of the Tabernacle Sunday-school was held in the Lecture Hall. owing to the absence, through illness, of the President, Pastor C. H. Spurgeon, the chair was taken by the Right Hon. the Earl of Shaftesbury, K.G., who referred, in his address, to the priceless value of Sunday-schools, giving instances of the benefits to the young.
Mr. Pearce, superintendent, reported that there are now in the school 1330 scholars; of whom 299 are over 15 years of age, 108 are church members, 36 having joined during the past year. There are also 109 teachers, including officers, all of whom are church members: such only being admissible according to the rules of the school. The sum of £136 6s. has been raised for missionary purposes, in addition to £50, collected in Mr. Wigney’s Bible-class, for Chinese missions, and £184 hs. ld. realized by the Sunday-school stall at the bazaar for the Girls’ Orphanage. The Prayermeetings, Preparation-class, Children’s Services, Library and Magazine Department, Young Christians’ Association, Dorcas Society, and Band of Hope are all in a prosperous condition, and, above all, there have been evident signs of the presence and blessing of God. One of the scholars, a little girl of seven summers, was seized in the early part of the year with inflammation of the heart. On her dying bed, she said, “Father, I want to sing you ‘There is a green hill far away!’“ He was a stranger to the love of Jesus, but from that time a change began in him, and two months ago he came before the church for membership. Another friend, who has attended the school for seventeen years, has just found the Savior. We bless God for the early and latter rain.
Addresses were given by Pastors J. A. Spurgeon, and W. William’s, of Upton Chapel, and Mr. T. Brain, of the Sunday School Union.
The Sunday-school Choir, conducted by Mr. Wighey, gave a selection of pieces during the evening from the service of song entitled “Under the Palms.”
These paragraphs refer to the one school in the Tabernacle; we are happy to say that there are several other schools belonging to our church, and that altogether they contain more than 6000 scholars.
On Sunday afternoon, April 16, under the auspices of our newly-formed Total Abstinence Society, Mr. R. T. Booth delivered a Gospel Temperance address in the Tabernacle. The building was nearly crowded, and the immense audience listened to the appeals of this earnest evangelist with great attention, many being moved to tears by the pathetic story of his own reclamation, and the thrilling narrative of his efforts to rescue others. He has not by any means labored in vain, for since last September, when separate registers for new abstainers, and for old teetotallers who have donned the blue ribbon, were commenced, 150,000 fresh pledges have been obtained at his meetings. His motto is truly “Jesus only.” He implores Christians to become abstainers for Christ’s sake, he entreats abstainers not to rest satisfied without faith in the Savior, and he pleads with drunkards to sign the total abstinence pledge, and at the same time to trust for salvation, to the blood of the Lamb.
This work, so far as we have been able to judge of it by the reports in various papers, and the testimony of friends who have taken part in the meetings, has our full sympathy. The only hope of permanently reclaiming drunkards, and saving the church and the nation from the evils of intemperance lies in the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. This fact is fully recognized by the leaders of this movement, and the enforcement of it in all their addresses goes far to account for the marvelous success which has crowned their labors. When we hear of tens of thousands in one town signing the pledge, and taking the blue ribbon, and learn that scores of public-houses, and even breweries, have been closed for want of customers, we thank God that at last the victory is being won, and we pray that the complete overthrow of the evil traffic may be speedily accomplished.
Our Tabernacle Society continues steadily to prosecute the work for which it was organized. The weekly meetings have been so well attended that they have had to be transferred to the large Lecture-hall, and the number of pledges has been constantly increasing. On the Tuesday evening following Mr. Booth’s address, Mr. W. Noble, of the Hoxton Town Hall, paid a visit to the Society, and as the result of his earnest advocacy of Gospel Temperance eighty person, signed the pledge, and one hundred put on the blue ribbon, in addition to one hundred and sixty who had signed the pledge at the close of Mr. Booth’s address on the Sunday afternoon.
COLLEGE. — Since our last notice Mr. J. W. Campbell has settled at Arbroath, N.B., and the following brethren have removed:– Mr. H. Bradford, from Brixham, to Princes-street, Northampton; and Mr. W, Hillier, Mus. Doc., from Wingrave, to Bartholomew-street, Exeter; and Mr. W. Compton. late of Brighton, has accepted the pastorate of the Union Church, Cosport.
CONFERENCE. — Of course, the great College event of the past month has been the EIGHTEENTH ANNUAL CONFERENCE OF THE PASTORS’ COLLEGE ASSOCIATION — a matter which, now that all is over, demands a jubilant song of praise. The meetings were commenced, as usual, by a gathering for prayer at the College, on Monday afternoon, April 17, after which about two hundred of the pastors and students partook of tea together at Southstreet Chapel, Greenwich, by the kind invitation of Pastor C. Spurgeon and his friends, who gave the brethren a most hearty reception. All must have felt at home among such warm-hearted hosts. In the evening the spacious chapel was crowded for the public meeting, at which the President of the College, C. It. Spurgeon took the chair. Addresses were delivered by the Chairman, Pastors R. F. Jeffrey (Folkestone), F. J. Feltham (Winslow), S. H. Akehurst (Arthur-street, Camberwell), and N. Dobson (Deal), Mr. A. G. Everett, a student still in the College, and Pastor C. Spurgeon, who presided when his father had to leave the meeting in order to husband his strength for the following day. The collection for the College funds realized £15. At the same hour the Vice-President, J. A. Spurgeon, conducted the usual prayer-meeting at the Tabernacle, at which prayer was presented by several of the brethren, and addresses were delivered by Pastors T. W. Medhurst (Lake-road, Landport), and W. F. Stead (Worthing). Altogether, the meetings of Monday augured well for the success of the week; and, looking back upon the whole Conference, we eau distinctly trace a constant widening of the stream of blessing right to the close, when it had become a mighty spiritual torrent, which fairly carried us away, until many of us could scarcely tell whether we were in the body or out of it.
On Tuesday morning, April 18, the first hour was occupied with grateful thanksgiving to the Lord for past mercies, and earnest wrestling for fresh favors at his hands. The President then delivered his inaugural address, founded upon the text, ,’When I am weak, then am I strong.” (2 Corinthians 12:10). As we hope to publish the address in the Magazine it is only necessary to say here that it was said by many that the speaker was an illustration of his own subject, for in his weakness he was made strong for the important task upon which he was engaged. After a brief recess the brethren reassembled, and transacted the business of the Conference. The principal items of public interest are the following:-The President appropriately referred to the deaths of Brethren H. H. Garrett, D. Lyall, R. Makin, H. Marsden, and D. Morgan; the names of eighteen students who have been for more than six months in the College were added to the Conference-roll, and certain other names were, for various reasons, removed. Mrs. Spurgeon, though unable to be present, gave to each minister a book which she hoped would be useful in suggesting thoughts and subjects for sermons, and a hearty vote of thanks was unanimously accorded for her kindness. C.F. Allison, Esq., reported the last year’s receipts from the College Mutual Assurance Community. Each man pays 5s., and then at the death of a wife receives £10, and £5 at the death of a child, and this to poor men is a great help in the time of sorrow and of necessary expense. Through the goodness of God the deaths had been so few this year that a surplus remained. Mr. Allison was very cordially thanked for his management of the fund, and asked to continue his services during the present year, and the balance in hand was carried forward to meet possible claims in the future.
MONDAY, JUNE, 19, the President’s birthday, was fixed as the day to be set apart for special united prayer by all the churches connected with the Conference. It is much wished that this would be more generally noted when the time comes. A letter, which is printed in full in the report at the end of the present Magazine, was read from the Canadian branch of the Pastors’ College Association, and also a communication concerning the work of the brethren in Australia, from Pastor A. J. Clarke, West Melbourne, in response to which the President was desired to send a hearty message of loving greeting, not only to the brethren in the Dominion and at the Antipodes, but to all the members of our holy brotherhood throughout the world. In fulfillment of this desire, and dropping for the moment the editorial “we,” I, C. H. Spurgeon, hereby, “with mine own hand,” carry out the wish of the assembled brethren.
On Tuesday evening, instead of the usual soirie, Mr. Charlesworth’s Songservice entitled “Valor and Victory” was given at Stockwell Baptist Chapel, by the kind permission of Mr. Maclean and his friends. Addresses were delivered by the President, and Pastors E. J. Edwards (Dover), and W. J. Mayers (Bristol), and the musical portion of the service was ably rendered by Messrs. Chamberlain, Mayers, Parker, and J. M. Smith, the orphanage choir, and the Southwark Choral Society, under the efficient leadership of Mr. John Courtnay. During an interval between some of the pieces the Stockwell Orphanage Campanologists delighted the audience with an exhibition of their powers of manipulating their peal of handbells. It was a soul-stirring evening. These Song-services are a charming means of grace, and are adapted greatly to bless both believers and such as are out of the way.
On Wednesday morning, April 19, after a short season spent in prayer, Pastor A. Bax, of Salters’ Hall Chapel, Islington, read a paper on “Expectation in our work.” This led to an interesting and profitable discussion, which was followed by another paper on “The element of personal character in ministerial work,” read by Pastor George Hill, M.A., of Leeds. As we hope, month by month, to place before our readers all the papers read at the recent Conference we will not refer to them at length here, but it is our firm conviction that we have never had a better quartette of essays, and that the men who can write such productions are quite able to hold their own against an equal number of representatives of any other school of the prophets. We do not boast of them, but we do magnify the grace which has enabled so many of our brethren to occupy important posts in the field of Christian service, and to fill their positions with everincreasing credit to their alma mater.
In the afternoon, the subscribers and friends of the College met for tea, and afterwards assembled in the lecture-hall for the annual meeting. George William’s, Esq., nobly fulfilled the duties of chairman; prayer was offered by Mr. S. Thompson; the President and Vice-President described the work of the College during the past year; Pastors F. H. White (Talbot-road Tabernacle), and C. B. Sawday (Vernon Chapel, Pentonville), referred to the connection between the College and the Young Men’s Christian Association; Mr. J. M. Smith and Pastor C. Spurgeon spoke of the blessing that had rested upon the labors of the evangelists; and Mr. Harry Wood gave a thrilling and touching account of the work of various brethren in Australia, where he hopes after a little while again to preach with the same success which has attended his efforts hitherto. At 8:45 the large company adjourned to the Tabernacle lecture-hall, to partake of the supper given By the President and two friends, and provided by Mr. Murrell and his coworkers. Mr. Spurgeon stated that there would be no drinking of toasts, but he expressed his heartiest thanks to the chairman for presiding, and in the name of the whole assembly wished him long life, prosperity, happiness, and all other good things. The total amount promised or contributed -it the supper-table, together with the donations of friends unable to be present, was £2,150. This amount would not have been reached had not the chairman been generous in the highest degree; finding that the amount was for the moment below £2,000, he volunteered a, second hundred guineas, and this awakened the zeal of others, and carried us up to this large amount.
Thursday, April 20, was another season of high spiritual enjoyment. First came, as usual, a short devotional service: next the Vice-President delivered his address founded upon the words, “He which stablisheth us with you in Christ, is God.” (2 Corinthians 1:21) Then Pastor C. A. Davis, of Bradford, read the paper entitled, “How Jesus trained his preachers,” which is printed at the beginning of this magazine; and after a brief but useful discussion, Pastor W. B. Haynes, of Stafford, read his wonderful paper on “The essential nobility of our ministry.” We think all our brethren will agree with us, especially when they remember that this paper had to be written under sore domestic affliction and expected bereavement, that while every brother has done gloriously, Bro. Haynes has a special claim upon our gratitude. In the evening, after a large number of friends had taken tea with the ministers in the schoolroom, the annual public meeting was held in the Tabernacle, which was almost crowded. Several of our sweet singers charmed us with their melodious music; the President and Vice-President again shared the pleasant duty of presiding, and presenting the report for the year; and addresses were given by Mr. Harry Wood and Pastors A. Bird (Sandown) and C. T. .Johnson (Longton, Staffs.). Each brother had a tale to tell that brought tears of joy to our eyes, and feelings of thankfulness to our hearts, as they proclaimed what the Lord had done by them and by others through the preaching of the gospel. At the close of the meeting the ministers and students were entertained to supper in the lecture-hall, when again all toast-drinking was omitted, and sentiments of gratitude to the tutors of the College and the deacons of the Tabernacle church were expressed by chosen speakers and acknowledged by the Vice-President and Mr. B. W. Carr.
The Friday in Conference week is always the great day of our Feast of Tabernacles, and this year has been no exception to the rule. At the suggestion of the London committee, Pastor E.G. Clange, of Broad-mead Chapel, Bristol, was asked to relieve the President by preaching to the brethren, and most heartily did he accept the responsibility, and right nobly did he justify his brethren’s choice. He took for his text the oft-quoted words, “He that winneth souls is wise” (Proverbs. 11:30), and preached from them a sermon that none could hear without devout thankfulness and solemn heart-searching, and that all who heard will remember with delight and profit for many a day to come.
At the communion-table the President gave a short address, founded upon the words, “And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not: I am the first and the last: I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am ,’dive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.” At the close of the sacred service the whole assembly stood, as usual, with hands linked in one unbroken chain, in token of the bond that binds us together, and sang Psalm 122.
During the farewell dinner the President called Mr. Murrell to the front of the platform, and after referring to his great services to the College, read the following address, which the brethren desired unanimously to present to him, appropriately illuminated and framed, together with some suitable memento of their hearty appreciation of his devotion to their interests: —
“Pastors’ College Eighteenth Annual Conference, April, 1882.
“It was unanimously agreed ‘that the warmest thanks of the assembled brethren be given to our ever-zealous and indefatigable friend, William C. Murrell, Esq., deacon of the church at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, for his most efficient and oft-repeated services for the College, not only in connection with the care of the weekly offering every Lord’s-day, but especially during the period of our Annual Conference. For many years our comfort has been secured and our enjoyment promoted by’ the arduous labor and admirable skill of our good brother in providing for our personal refreshment, as also in carrying out the arrangements for the annual supper to the subscribers of the College. We gratefully recognize and appreciate our friend’s unique powers, which are so freely and continuously consecrated in a sphere so peculiarly his own. We wonder at and admire the successful manner in which he has uniformly secured the material comfort of our meetings, and we thank hint with all our hearts. 5fay the great Provider of all good, who ‘will not allow even a cup of cold water to be bestowed in vain, refresh our esteemed brother in all spiritual things as richly as, like a good deacon, he has helped to serve ore’ table. To .’him and his family we wish health and all needed good for many years, that he may still minister to the necessities of the saints, and himself enjoy that meat which endureth, to everlasting life. — Signed for the Conference.”
Mr. Murrell feelingly acknowledged the gift, and expressed the great delight he had in serving the brethren, and in helping the President in any way. Our faithful Remembrancer, Pastor F. H. White, then reported first 178 pastors had collected or contributed, during the past year, £499 1s. 6d. for the College funds. A few earnest closing speeches were made expressive of esteem and affection for the President and Mrs. Spurgeon, the Vice-president, the tutors, the deacons, and- all helpers, and the Eighteenth Annual Conference was fittingly closed with the doxology and the benediction.
The President feels that he cannot close these Notes without a personal acknowledgment of his deep gratitude to the Lord, who so graciously heard the many prayers presented on his behalf, and who not; only enabled him to occupy his post right through the Conference, but made the excitement and enthusiasm of the holy gathering minister to his more speedy recovery, so that instead of being, as he feared, exhausted by the week’s engagements, he was even stronger at the cud than he had been at the beginning of the meetings. Nor can he forget the loving words and affectionate bearing of all the brotherhood, nor the generous hospitality of those who entertained the ministers, nor the liberality of the liberal donors, nor any of the kindnesses innumerable which have been showered upon him. Of all men he is the most in debt to his brethren, and to his God.
EVANGELISTS.—Pastor W. H. J. Page sends us the following report of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at Chelsea: —
“A series of meetings, unexampled in the history of Chelsea Chapel, has been conducted here from March 12th to April 2nd, by our beloved brethren, Messrs. Fullerton and Smith. Mr. Fullerton was no stranger at Chelsea, and memories of his former visit awakened great expectations for the present one; and we now thankfully record that, notwithstanding special difficulties and unexpected hindrances, the success of the effort has been very great. Our chapel is large, and by no means easy to fill, but to our great joy it has been filled again and again during these services. We have also, abundant testimony that the gospel preached and sung has been blessed to many. Christians have been revived and cheered; backsliders have been restored; and others have been aroused and saved. A special blessing has rested upon some of our senior classes, and many of their members have, we trust, been brought to decision.
“Possibly we should have still greater results to speak of but for what has seemed to us a succession of adverse providences, which have certainly affected the work. It was with great regret that on the first Sunday we heard of Mr. Spurgeon’s illness, and that Mr. Fullerton would take his place at the Tabernacle in the evening; and our regret was deepened when the continuance of that illness deprived us of our brother’s presence on the following Sunday. We could not refuse to spare him to serve one whom we so much love, however great the loss might be to us. Then on the Wednesday of the see(red week, just after a most delightful and profitable meeting for women only, our dear friend was suddenly summoned to Ireland by the death of his mother. The announcement of his departure at the evening meeting was a great shock to all, and much sympathy was expressed. The necessary result, too, was that on the third Sunday he was again away from us. During his absence Mr. Smith carried on the meet tugs, with the kind and valued help .of Mr. Charlesworth and Mr. Chamberlain, and we rejoice to know that the labors of each were made useful..
“It was originally intended to close the mission on Saturday, April 1st, but in consideration of the disappointment which marty had experienced in failing to hear Mr. Fullerton, arrangements were made with Mr. Charrington for our brethren to stay the, following Sunday at Chelsea. On this day rite chapel was thrice tilled with people, and it was a day of much power and blessing:; though to many of us it was clouded by the illness of our beloved deacon, Mr. S. Edwards, who died the same night. Thus, all through, our joy has been tinged with sorrow, and we have had to exercise faith in the wisdom of the overruling hand which has arranged events so contrary to our wishes. Notwithstanding all, we review the services with joyful gratitude, and anticipate permanent fruits from them.”
COLPORTAGE. — The Secretary asks us to mention that the annual meeting will be held at the Tabernacle on Monday evening May 8, when Mr. Spurgeon hopes to preside, and to distribute the prizes promised to the Colportents last year. Dr. Donald Fraser has kindly promised to address the meeting, and about twenty of the Colporteurs will be present, several of whom will give accounts of their work.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle: — March, 30, nineteen.
REPORT OF THE PASTORS’ COLLEGE.
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
1881-82
THE Pastors’ College completed its twenty-fifth year at the end of last July,. That quarter of a century of College: history has not been without its trials of faith and labors of love, but it has been specially notable for the goodness and lovingkindness of the Lord, to whom be glory for his faithfulness and grace. Those who saw the commencement of the institution will not be without wonder that it has survived so long, and those who befriended it in those early clays will not be without gratitude that it has remained true to its holy purpose, and has been so greatly prospered in accomplishing it. late sought to promote the earnest preaching of the gospel of our fathers, and we have not failed. Its beginning, however, was small, and open to severe criticism, and few spared it; yet it had its ardent friends. Dr. Campbell, who attended one of the earliest annual meetings of the College, thus wrote of it: — “This College, in all points, is an exceedingly interesting affair. It is a thing by itself; there is nothing to be compared with it in these islands. It shows its founder to be the very incarnation of the spirit of ecclesiastical revolution; perhaps we should rather say, it shows him to be a singular ecclesiastical originality. Not satisfied with things as now existing in colleges, and guided by his strong instincts, he determined, in a happy hour, to create something for himself. His habit has been, from the first, to do things in a new way. Heedless alike of novelty and antiquity, he desires the useful, and is never satisfied till he has found it. In nothing has he studied singularity for its own sake. He has simply given himself up to the inspiration of his own genius, which has led him, here,, and there, and yonder, to do this, and that, and he has always been successful. He acts in everything as if he had been the first actor, and as if this were the first age of Christian society, with neither ancestry nor precedent. What is good? What is better? What is best? This point settled, to work he goes, and he rests not till the object has been accomplished.”
The worthy doctor has long since gone to his rest, but had it been possible for him to have remained among us he would have seen something much more extraordinary in the continuance of the institution than in the commencement of it. It is very easy to plan and project, very easy to inaugurate with a flourish of trumpets, and very easy to push forward for a few years in a novel track; but to plod on through half a lifetime in the selfsame form of effort — this is the work, this is the difficulty. To God’s grace alone we give honor as we see the work of our hands established upon us, and behold our College happy and prosperous after all these years. Old friends have fallen asleep, tutors have retired through very age, youths whom we called students are now in the prime of life as ministers, and the founder himself is weakened by repeated sickness till he feels but half his former self; but as the days of a tree are the days of this College, and the church shall long enjoy the fruit thereof. Dwelling in its own freehold building, gathering hundreds to its Annual Conferences, and having brave sons in all quarters of the globe, the College can say, “The Lord hath been mindful of us, he will bless us.”
There is little need to enlist the sympathy of our readers for our object, for all are now agreed that preachers of the gospel are all the better for being men of education. Time was when an educated ministry was looked upon by certain of our brethren as a questionable blessing, indeed it was thought that the less a minister knew the better, for there was then the more room for him to be taught of God. From the fact that God does not need man’s wisdom it was inferred that he does need man’s ignorance; indeed, some seemed to be leaning to the opinion of the Mohammedans, who have long considered idiots to be inspired. Many devout persons doubted whether the preacher should study at all; they looked upon books as “dead men’s brains,” and conceived of all knowledge as of a thing which necessarily puffeth up. The venerable Daniel Jackson, a Baptist minister of Indiana, said, at the Conference of churches held in 1880, that “he had a lively recollection of the obstacles placed in the way of study and mental improvement in connection with his first pastorate. He had no books, and no money wherewith to buy them, and there was a strong prejudice among his parishioners against human learning; but he saved twenty dollars out of wedding-fees and the like, went fifteen miles to purchase a Commentary on the Bible, came home with his treasure at night, when it was dark, that it might not be seen, kept it secreted in a private apartment, and never ventured to bring it out and read it without setting his wife to watch at the door, as a sentinel, to give the alarm when anyone came. A visitor, alas! of the gentler sex, at last discovered the poor offending book, and reported that the minister studied out his text! The news flew like lightning. If he had had the small-pox packed away in his bookcase the consternation could not have been greater; the whole parish, with one of the deacons at the head, was up in arms. His ministry, it was felt, could no longer be a ‘ Holy Ghost Ministry.’ He had to leave, and seek a new sphere of toil; but he did not abandon his Commentary. Now, thank God,” said the minister, “young men may read Commentaries, and get a College training, for the sunlight of knowledge has risen with effulgent beams upon the denomination.”
This depreciation of learning was a natural recoil from the folly which magnified education into a kind of deity; as though it could take the place of the Spirit and power of God. It was supposed that none but doctors who had passed through the schools could possibly proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ; and yet these were the very last persons to undertake the blessed service,—they were too much engrossed with their own disputations and imaginings. The result of such idolatry of human scholarship was injurious to the last degree; the free utterance of the word was hampered, and the dead letter of pretended learning crushed out the life and energy of Christian zeal. Greater folly has been found in the schools than out of it. Unlearned men may have injured religion by the wild-fire of their injudicious zeal; but pedantic and pretentious scholars have far more seriously imperilled it by the lukewarnmess of their latitudinarianism, and the chill of their doubt. Human learning is, after all, only another form of human ignorance, touched up with an extra coat of the varnish of conceit; for what does mart know when he knows all that he can himself discover? What does he know that is worth knowing unless he be taught of God? Above all, what can he know of eternal truth unless the eternal Spirit shall instruct him? Yet, for all this, the inference that ignorance is better than knowledge is a false one. Neither untutored confidence, nor learned diffidence (:an take the place of the Spirit; but when a man has once submitted held and heart and tongue to the supremacy of the Holy Ghost, all other things may be added unto him without fear of injury, yea, with the hope of great advantage to himself and others; and the more he knows, especially of matters which concern the Scriptures, the better will he be able to bring forth things new and old out of his treasures.
We believe that the Holy Spirit has greatly used the preaching of unlearned men; but, as a rule, it ‘has been mainly among their own class, for whose position and modes of thought their own mental! condition gave them special adaptation. The Lord selects means suitable to the end which he has in view, and it is tolerably clear that to reach a generation in which education is becoming general, his wisdom will probably select men who will not drive away their hearers by glaring ignorance of the simplest rules of correct speech. The Lord in sovereignty speaks by whomsoever be pleases, be he polished or rude; but we perceive that, as of old the nations heard the gospel in their own tongue, so now ranks and classes of men hear it best from those of their own standing, and the age of Board Schools will not be likely to listen to the preacher whose lack of knowledge even the boys and girls discover in an hour. Our beloved Charles Stanford, in a recent address, put this matter in an exceedingly plain and practical light. He says:—”When God gives you a rare plant, you cultivate it, and thus show your sense of its value. Creation is not in your power, but culture is; and it is not his way to do for man what man , — an do for himself. So, as to the gift of ministers. When, in answer to our fervent cries, the right men are given, and, in the days of their youthful promise, ‘discerners of spirits’ point them out to us, of course we show our thankfulness by caring for their education. It would be a bad policy and a burning shame, after the Lord of the harvest has sent forth laborers into the harvest, if, owing to any thrift or indolence of ours, they go to work with blunt sickles and broken scythes. Ministers, like other workers, must have the needful training and development; the same kind is not wanted for all.; but each one should have what is wanted for the particular time he has to live in and the particular post he has to fill Directive hints are given to us in the Acts of the Apostles. Paul, not Peter, was sent to Athens, to Corinth, to Rome, and to the ancient centers of intellectual intensity, — that is, an educated man to an educated people. Let us respect the Divine order, and act on the old lines. These considerations have growing force. You fathers have already sent your sons and daughters to the best schools, because you know that, in the technical sense of the phrase, they have been born into an educated world, and you would have them fitted to fill their own fair place in it. It would break your hearts to see them forsake you on Sundays. Having been educated, you are surely glad for them to have pastors who are naturally likely to gain their ear and win their confidence, before the), are decided for Christ, that they may continue under their ministry until, by the grace of God, they are first converted and then confirmed. For their sakes, even more than for your own, you will glorify God for pastors who, in the quaint, fine phrase of Puritan antiquity, are ‘the poor gentlemen and scholars of Jesus Christ.’“
When we: think of the value of a well-instructed minister of the gospel, and of all the beneficent institutions which are sure to spring up around him, we sometimes think the work of training ministers to be superior to all other services done to the Lord and his church. We wonder not that Colleges should be liberally supported, but the rather we marvel that more lovers of the Lord do not devote their substance to this superior purpose, in which the deed is done more fully unto the Lord himself than in almost any other fom of good doing. Orphanages are excellent, but nature itself teaches us to care for the fatherless, and even the profane will unite in such a work; but to educate a man, who shall thereby become the fitter preacher of the word of God, is a service in which only the nobler spirits will take an interest, and that interest will hinge upon the glory of the Redeemer and the salvation of immortal souls. To build a meeting-house, to found a school, to commence a village-mission, to scatter pure literature — all these are admirable; but in equipping a pastor you have set in its place the motive power which will effect all these and a thousand other grand designs. Those who helped the poor boy Luther to pay for his learning made a grand investment of their monies. The possibilities which lie around one single preaching man of God are such as may make the College Lecture-hall one of the most solemn spots beneath God’s heaven.
In our Institution for these twenty-six years men have gathered around their tutors to learn further the meaning of the Scriptures, and the art of imparting that meaning to others. All sorts of studies have been pursued with the one design of helping the men to speak plainly the word of salvation. Great attention has been paid to the art of speaking. There have been frequent discussions, impromptu speakings, and sermonizings in class. Care has been taken to inculcate proper pronunciation, delivery, and action. These matters are, as a rule, neglected, and many who were intended to be speakers are taught a little of everything except the art of elocution. Indeed the removal of personal, oratorical defects has been passed over by our Universities as though it were beneath notice, and that, too, in the case of men whose profession demands the perfection of ability in speech. In our case mutual criticism has produced a friction, which has been found of great value in wearing off rough edges which else would have been in future years injurious to the preacher. At the same time we have ever endeavored to cultivate the devotional spirit, without which the fluent speaker is but as sounding brass. Many a time have we heard the student say at the close of his term that he was as thankful for spiritual improvement as for mental growth. It has been a mingled anxiety and delight to all concerned to keep the School of the prophets in such a condition that the Lord of the prophets might never be absent, and the Spirit of the prophets might never be grieved. We have had many a hallowed season in fellowship as fellow-workers in this grand enterprise, and these have been auguries to us of blessings to be given when we should be separated far and wide, by mount, and stream, and sea, occupying each one his station among the heralds of the Cross. One in heart within the College, we look to be one in the truth which we shall deliver; knit to each other by sacred ties, we expect to labor in life-long unity; and fired by the celestial flame of the Spirit, we hope to be consumed in the common service.
During all these years we have been greatly encouraged by seeing the large number of men who come forward eager to become more efficient preachers of the gospel. They are informed that poverty will, in all likelihood, be their portion; but this they make no account of so long as they may preach Christ to their fellow-men. It may be supposed by some that the College unduly tempts men into the ministry, and is likely, therefore, to bring out a swarm of preachers of doubtful value; but it does nothing of the kind. Its first demand — that a mart should already have preached the word for two years with a measure of success,-shuts the door in the face of large numbers who thought that a College would make them preachers, and they are surprised to find that they must be made by another hand before we can have anything to say to them. The difficulties encountered by those who apply turn off man}, more; for the delays are often long and the inquiries many, and the halfhearted grow weary, and accept more lucrative employment, or resolve to abide as they are. We refuse numbers of men for different reasons, and among them are not a few who nevertheless enter our ministry, thus showing that they will become ministers one way or another, whether we will help them or not. Either our judgment is greatly at .fault, or else churches have keener eyes for discovering ability than we have been favored with, for we are often surprised to see men chosen as pastors whose replies to our questions indicate powers of the slenderest kind. This will ever be in the Baptist denomination a fact which has its dark and also its bright side: the liberty of prophesying is evidently well maintained, and we are glad it is so. After students are admitted to the College we occasionally have doubts of their fitness, and upon the unanimous judgment of the tutors, we feel bound to dismiss them; and here again we note with some concern that a considerable proportion find pulpits, and so occupy the post of teachers with a training of the poorest kind. We do not say that the churches are wise to choose these brethren, neither may we say that they are unwise, for it is not our duty to judge them, and they have a right to select their own pastors, and probably know best who will suit them; yet this goes to show that it is not the College that is responsible for these men becoming preachers, for they do it in the teeth of our opposition and protest. It would be a great pity if we had the power to stop them, for why should the judgment of any one man, or any set of men, be supreme? As the matter is thus left to forces beyond our control, what is to be done? The simplest way is to give education as widely as we can, use our best judgment in selection, and leave the result with the great Head of the Church.
NUMBER OF BRETHREN | 620 |
Number now in our ranks as Pastors, Missionaries and Evangelists | 464 |
Number without Pastorates, but regularly engaged in the work of the Lord | 28 |
Number not now engaged in the work (in secular callings) | 13 |
Number Medical Missionaries and Students | 7 |
Number Educated for other Denominations | 2 |
Number Dead — (Pastors, 36; Students, 5) | 41 |
Number Permanently Invalided | 5 |
Number Names removed from the List for various reasons, such as joining other Denominations, etc. | 60 |
These last are not: removed from our list in all cases from causes which imply any dishonor, for many of them are doing good service to the common Lord under some other banner. We are sorry for their leaving us, and astounded that they should change their views upon Baptism; but this also is one of those mysteries of human life which are beyond our control.
Among the many good men and true, there are certain names which are known throughout our whole denomination as men of power and influence. It is invidious to make a selection, but we cannot refrain from blessing God for men who hold leading positions, and hold them well. London will not soon forget Archibald Brown, Cuff, Sawday, Bax, William’s, Frank White, and others. Bristol rejoices in our Brother Gange, Reading in Anderson, Cambridge in Tarn, Bradford in Davis, Leeds in Hill; and many another town can tell of its successful pastor who hails from the Metropolitan Tabernacle College, and is a power for good in all the district round about. Boasting be far from us; but we may rejoice in God, who has bestowed gifts and graces upon men for the accomplishment of his own designs, and we will not therefore refrain from saying that among the successful workers of our day our College men have held their own, and stand second to none. Many could we mention who have done splendid service in founding, reviving, enlarging, and establishing churches; but time would fail us to make a record of individual successes. Among the many of our brethren unknown to fame there are apostolic men who, for Christ’s sake and the love of his church, bear the thousand ills of penury without a murmur, and labor on in the midst of their poor congregations, having no reward but the smile of the Great Father in heaven. Of such men ,,re would glory. It is a sad pit)’ that any servant of the Lord should be in want; but it is to the honor of the church that, if men are wanted for positions where want is inevitable, hundreds are ready to leap into the gulf.
All this while the funds for educating and maintaining the men have always been forthcoming, — the free-will offerings of the Lord’s people. The income has never caused us any great anxiety. From an accountant’s point of view the ordinary income is at least £ 1,000 bellow the expenditure; but usually a large legacy falls in just when the exchequer runs low, and this makes up for deficiencies till the time comes round for another special amount. If this is the Lord’s way of sending supplies, it is sure to be the very best, and we most thankfully accept it. At the present moment our stock is short; but a considerable legacy is due under the will of the late Mr. John Edwards, and a portion of the amount will be spent in this direction. No other part of the Lord’s work is drained to keep the College going; its sources are fresh springs, and its streams are a clear gain to Christian philanthropy. Most of the men need to be lodged and boarded as well as instructed, and in many cases even clothes, washing, and other personal expenses have to be found. A growing number are able to bear their own charges; but we shall never forget that a main object of the College is to help poor men, rich in gifts, but unable to pay for an education. Are there not many brethren and sisters who will count it an honor to join us in this blessed work? There have always been “partners with Simon,” and the firm is capable at this time of great enlargement, for many old partners have lately gone home. The Lord will surely find us other helpers; possibly the reading of these pages may work in that direction.
During the year we have considerably diminished the number of our students, because there is a general impression that the Baptist churches at home are not, just now, in need of more fresh men. We have therefore lengthened the average period of study, and also refused many whom we would otherwise have taken, while of those accel)ted a number are under bonds to enter upon foreign service. At this moment churches find it difficult to obtain thoroughly able and efficient pastors, and yet if it is known that a pulpit is vacant a hundred candidates apply for a hearing, — – the same hundred with slight variation applying in every case year after year. Hence an outcry is raised that the ministry is overstocked, whereas it might better be said to be encumbered with unsuitable men. When men find that their gifts are not suitable for any one business they usually turn their hands to something else; but, alas, it often happens that when a man has failed in the ministry in more places than one, he does not lay the blame on his own unfitness, but upon the place, or the people, or the deacons, and he perseveres with the heroism of a martyr, or, as some say, with the obstinacy of a mule, in attempting to fulfill in some other quarter an office for which he has not the capacity. Such men block up the passages of the ministry, bring the work into difficulties, and the office into contempt. You may track their movements by the devastation they have made. Where their foot has stood the cause has never prospered. They are now without pulpits, and the calamity has its consolations. How far these me.n are to be considered we will not judge; but we heartily wish they would consider the matter themselves, and resolutely turn to secular callings in which they might be useful to their fellow-men. Meanwhile we will endoavour to avoid making a hard case any harder. We rejoice to take into the College brethren already in the ministry, who feel their need of more study; by this means we have helped a poor church to keep its minister, the preacher has obtained an education, and the number of men to be supported in the ministry has not been increased. We have also been glad to receive brethren who resolve to build on new foundations, and to create spheres for themselves. This is being attempted successfully by our men at this time in several instances. These two points we have so largely attended to that any surplusage of would-be pastors does not largely lie at our door; indeed, we look upon the fact that some are out of harness as one of those inevitable evils which come out of the stern law of the survival of the fittest, —a law which all the compassion in the world can never alter. Men who undertake what they can only inefficiently perform are sure to suffer, and the only remedy for their distress is the correction of their primary mistake. We are among the first to compassionate all such; but we can do little to amend an ill which in the nature of things requires a more radical cure.
Our great longing is for the College to be growingly helpful to the glorious work of Missions. The great field of the world is still uncultivated, and the Master bids us pray the Lord of the harvest to send forth laborers into his harvest. Oh that they might be sent forth in bands! We have made some progress in this direction since, our last Conference, and we are right glad of it. The Missionary fire burns steadily on our altar; many students are dedicating themselves, and we are full of hope as to the future.
Here are a few notes as to INDIA, where the Baptist Missionary Society has long spent the great part of its strength:
Just previously to the meeting of the Conference last year, Mr. H. RYLANDS BROWN left our shores for Darjeeling, to labor among the English-speaking residents and visitors at that health-resort. He has been doing real missionary work by visiting the houses of the tea-planters and others scattered over the district. What his ultimate destination may be does not appear; but he is in God’s hands, to be guided as the Lord sees well.
Mr. J. G. POTTER, having been accepted by our Missionary Society for work in India, left us at the close of last year. He is now stationed at Agra under the superintendence of Mr. Jones. This beloved brother diffused such a missionary spirit throughout the College while he was resident with us that we have large expectations of what the Lord will do by him on the field of service.
Mr. W. MITCHELL, having heard our esteemed brother, Mr. A. Haegert, give an account of his labors among the Santhals, and plead for help, offered to cast in his lot with our friend, and left us in February to join the little band in Santhalism. May the best of blessings rest on that hopeful enterprise.
At our last Conference we were somewhat saddened, as we thought of our dear friend, Mr. Stubbs, being forced to retire from the field; now we rejoice that three have gone to that land, while our brethren, R. SPURGEON, W. NORRIS, and G. H. HOOK have been preserved it,: health, and enabled to do good service for the Master.
Here, perhaps, is the place to notice that our brother R. MAPLESDEN, who left us to take the oversight of the Baptist Church at Madras, has accepted from the American Baptist Missionary Union a call to work among the Teloogoos.
As to AFRICA, which has set before the churches an almost illimitable field, we have a little to report:–
In the early part of last year our devoted brother Mr. D. Lyall was obliged to leave the Cameroons, West Africa, his health having become seriously affected in that terrible climate. After a short stay in England he believed his health was sufficiently restored to permit of his resuming the work so dear to his heart. Though warned that such a course would cost him his life, his ardent spirit could not be restrained, and he went back, and in a few short months was called from his labor in the “dark continent” to his rest in the presence of the King. He has left a widow who is anxious to go back to the work. Our dear sister is a splendid Christian woman, and we hope the Society will enable her to return.
Mr. J. H. Dean, who went from the College to the University of Edinburgh to study medicine, in order the more fully to equip himself for missionary work, went last year to Blantyre, in Central Africa, where the Established Church of Scotland has a mission-station. We have several other brethren studying as medical missionaries, but the difficulty is to get them out into the field.
Mr. J. H. WEEKS has recently gone, under the auspices of our Baptist Missionary Society, to join the brethren on the Congo River.
Mr. A. BILLINGTON, having been accepted by our dear friend Mr. H. G. Guinness for service in the Livingstone Inland Mission, is now at the Banana Station, at the mouth of the Congo River.
We hear that Mr. and Mrs. RICHARDSON, of Bakundu, are compelled to seek change of climate and rest: we hope and pray that they may soon be able to go back to their poor Africans. We cannot detain the reader by surveying every part of the world in detail, nor can we give an account of all our brethren who are laboring from Britain to Japan; but it is certainly a great delight to see them in increasing numbers toiling on in every land for the advancement of the kingdom of our Lord. Do not all our helpers share the joy? May the Lord grant them their portion of it.
From the CANDIAS branch of the Conference we have received the following communication: —
“The Canadian Branch of the Pastors’ College Conference,
“To the Pastors’ College Conference, London, England.“Beloved President and Brethren,
“We greet you in the name of our common Lord. We rejoice in the opportunity afforded you of meeting together to revive former memories, to hold sweet fellowship with each other, and to discuss themes of importance touching the work of our Lord and Savior in the world.“At our annual meeting, held in the City of Toronto in October last, we freely discussed the advisability of sending one of our number to represent us at the Annual Meeting at the College. Concerning the desirability of such a course there was perfect unanimity, and, but for two principal difficulties, probably a brother would have been with you this year. But, in the first place, the time at which the Conference is held is peculiarly unfavorable for crossing the Atlantic, and, secondly, the expense is more than most brethren could well afford.
“We felt disposed, unitedly, to undertake to bear half the expense of our deputation, but even then some brethren could barely undertake the other half.
“We would rejoice exceedingly if it were possible for you to appoint the meetings for some time after the middle of May — indeed, any time during the summer. If that can be done, we are hopeful that an arrangement may be made whereby we could have the privilege of meeting with you, from year to year, in our regular turns, a privilege we greatly long for, and would exceedingly enjoy.
“On the whole, all the brethren in Canada are comfortable and useful, and, we need scarcely add, feel deeply interested in the welfare of our beloved President, the Tabernacle, the College, and the brethren of the Conference.
“May the Master’s presence be in your gatherings, and his choicest benedictions rest upon your proceedings, and when it is well with you, remember us in this far-off land.
“By order and on behalf of the Canadian Branch,
“ROBERT LENNIE, President.
“JAMES GRANT, Secretary.”“Dundas, Ontario, Canada, March, 1882.”
We would assure our brethren that we received their letter with great delight, and that in return we wish them the richest prosperity. We quite agree with them that it will be a grand day when their numbers will be so increased that a delegate can be sent over without any burdensome expense. We should indeed welcome such a representative, not only from the Canadian brethren, but from each little group of scattered ones over the whole earth. Meanwhile the Conference at home will welcome the Canadian epistle with the utmost enthusiasm.
From AUSTRALIA we have most cheering communications from Mr. Clarke, of West Melbourne. The brethren seem to be upon the whole exceedingly prosperous; but we greatly regret the unexpected loss of the two valued brethren, H. H. Garrett and H. Marsden: the first fell as the victim of a railway accident, but the second bowed before that fell disease, consumption. For a while he gathered strength, and we hoped that he would master the disease; but even the fine climate of Australia could not save him. These brethren have not, however, been called home without having left behind them sufficient evidence that they were called of God to their work, for they had been greatly blessed by him in the doing of it.
We cannot forbear to mention the princely liberality of Mr. and Mrs. Gibson, of Perth, Tasmania, who have built two Tabernacles at Longford and Deloraine, and are generously fostering two churches in them. In every way these dear friends have showed exceeding kindness to our son, Thomas Spurgeon, and to all our sons of the College. May they see Tasmania covered with Baptist churches, all flourishing as a garden of the Lord.
Mr. A. J. Clarke, at West Melbourne, has continued to enjoy a rich. blessing, to see a large increase to his church, and to be the means of great blessing to his brethren. Messrs. Harrison and Isaac have been visiting many of the churches on an evangelistic tour, and our Australian letters speak of great numbers of conversions. Our son Thomas, in. Auckland, New Zealand, has not only entered upon a happy pastorate, but also upon the labor and care of erecting a new chapel, the old one being a wooden erection, and all but ruinous. It is a matter of necessity to build, and the friends will be glad of such help as the generous may feel disposed to render.
CAPE OF GOOD HOPE. — The work commenced in Cape Town by our highly esteemed brother W. HAMILTON, like the most of such enterprises, has had its time of trouble, but now that the new chapel has been opened, we hope that brighter days await it. If only Mr. Hamilton’s energies are continued we have no fear. He has accomplished marvels, and has often made our heart to sing for joy. We wish it were in our power to send him larger help, especially at this moment when the new chapel calls for funds. Mr. MANN, WHO went out to relieve Mr. Hamilton, will remain till he sees him restored to health, and will, then, in all probability, return to us.
During the past year Mr. W. HOBBS has, with great energy, conducted the enterprise of building a new chapel at Gipsy Road, Norwood. It will cost with the ground about £,4,500, and our right worthy brother has obtained from many friends a large part of the cost.
Messrs. BLACKABY & BLOCKSIDGE commenced a work at New-Brompton, near Chatham, and gathered together a persevering, faithful people. Mr. Blocksidge has lately had the sole charge of the church, and has displayed most praiseworthy diligence. By hard struggling, and much help, they have erected a chapel-schoolroom upon which only a small debt remains. Land is secured in front for building a larger chapel when the church becomes sufficiently strong. By means of this and other efforts a large population has been supplied with the means of grace.
At Mitcham, Mr. A. E. CARTER has, together with his brother, built a small chapel, and commenced a hopeful work.
At Sandown, during the last few months, Mr. A. Brad has gathered the nucleus of a Baptist church, and is now proceeding to erect a suitable building. We were not represented in the town, and many friends who love the pure and simple gospel found that it was more accessible in the Church of England than among certain Nonconformists, and wished therefore to see a church of our faith and order, to which they could resort for spiritual food. Will friends who visit Sandown encourage this growing interest?
Mr. H. J. MARTIN is endeavoring to raise a church at Bracknell, Berks, and Mr. W. WELBY PRYER, is working under the superintendence of Pastor J. A. SPURGEON in the hope of forming a branch church in Croydon.
At Hornchurch, Essex, a new chapel will soon be built for the people who have been collected by Mr. E. DYER. For this the working plans are prepared, and we hope soon to receive estimates.
Thus good steady advance is being made. Had we more means, we could found many new churches, for London grows at such a rate that new neighborhoods spring up on a sudden, and in each of these we find a few friends ready to unite for the Lord’s work, and where we find none there is all the more need to begin preaching the word. All that can be spared of the College income will go to the work of extension, but there is need of enlarged liberality. It will be a dreadful calamity if future ages should curse the present generation for allowing all the land to be built over, and reserving no spaces for places of worship. It looks like dooming a region to hopeless heathenism if we allow every foot of soil to be covered with houses, and reserve no site for a meeting-place for the hearing of the gospel. To pull down houses to create sites is a work so costly that the idea is seldom entertained, the only chance seems to be to buy the land while yet it is bare, and even then it is a hard struggle to put up the meanest structure for divine service. We often think that, if the Lord’s people were but half sincere in their professions of love to his cause, we should never have to plead for a penny for London, for the necessities of this great city would stare men in the face, and force them to supply the awful want of the growing population.
EVANGELISTIC WORK among the Churches has been carried on diligently and successfully during the past year. Our two brethren, FULLERTON and SMITH, are singularly adapted for this useful work; in fact, their power and adaptation seem to increase from year to year. It would be impossible to give even an outline of their year’s services. Letters appear in The Sword and the Trowel monthly testifying to the fact that wherever they go a cloud of blessing seems to hover over them, and showers of mercy descend upon the places which they visit. They have during the past year been at Sheffield and neighborhood; Shoreditch Tabernacle; Vernon Chapel, Pentonville; St. John’s Wood Chapel; Metropolitan Tabernacle; South Street Chapel, Greenwich; Peckham Park Road Chapel; and Lower Sloane Street Chapel, Chelsea. This work has become almost entirely self-supporting, for the friends at each place send up a freewill offering sufficient to cover expenses. If at any of the places the contribution should happen to be very small the deficiency has been made up by the extra gifts from more favorable spheres of action. How many souls have been converted and added to the church by this agency during the year we will not venture to guess, for we feel a fear of attempting to number the people; but the day of judgment will reveal that this has been one of the most useful agencies employed in modern times.
During a great part of last year Mr. BURNHAM was occupied, under the auspices of the County Association, in visiting a considerable number of the smaller towns and villages of Yorkshire; and since the last Conference he has also conducted evangelistic services in Waltham-stow, Rushden, Holbeach, Leighton Buzzard, Watton, Southwell, Win-slow, Gamlingay, Sheepshed, New Shoreham, and Burnley, in addition to spending the whole of the month of September in earnestly laboring amongst the hop-pickers in Kent. We continue to receive the most cheering reports of this good brother’s work. Almost all the churches visited tell of saints cheered, sinners saved, the careless aroused, and backsliders reclaimed; and wherever it is possible the), arrange for a second and third visit from the evangelist.
Mr. PARKER also has gone to many places, preaching and singing the gospel, and many profess to have received the saving word from his lips.
We hope to enlarge this part of our operations, and take on more evangelists, but we must only move as God moves. We doubt not that if the men are forthcoming means will be found for their support.
To God be all the glory of a great work thus roughly sketched by one to whom each line has been a labor by reason of weakness, who therefore claims pardon for the broken and abrupt style. — C. H. S.
VICE-PRESIDENT’S REPORT
THE usual course of study has been steadily pursued for the past year with quite average results. Some slight alteration in our staff has been made, and we shall miss for the future our long-tried coadjutor, Mr. Selway, who has given for many years his able lectures on the applied sciences. His post is taken by the Rev. F. R. Cheshire, who bears a high reputation for his Lectures under the Government at South Kensington. Mr. Fergusson having retired from the Evening Classes, we are glad to fill up his place with the efficient labors of Mr. S. Johnson, and his helper, Mr. Bowers, who, we trust, will enable many young men to lay the foundations of a solid education. Our number is not quite equal to former years, and perhaps this will enable some of the brethren already in the field to exchange their spheres of labor with more facility, or to find new positions if they no longer occupy their former ones. Our efforts are directed to a yet more prolonged and complete course of study, and, we think, with encouraging success. The spirit of prayer and earnestness in College work continues unabated, while the missionary zeal of the brethren is, we rejoice to say, augmenting. Happily we see no signs of any abatement in the love of our young brethren to the old doctrines and principles of our denomination. We desire to train up no band of bigots; but we urge a definite creed and a rigid discipline for our churches, and first of all in our church-leaders. We tolerate no vacillation, and desire to rear no disciples of mist and fog. “We believe, and therefore we speak.” The hearty cooperation of our brethren in the ministry, our former students, warrants us, we think, in the belief that our system commends itself to their judgment after testing it in the field of active service, while their acknowledged success is a surest proof and highest reward. We still need picked men, and only those who are such as candidates, for our School of the Prophets. May the Lord of the harvest continue to thrust many such into His vineyard, and to him shall be all the praise.JAMES A. SPURGEON.
MR. GRACEY’S REPORT.
IN rendering an account of the past year, I have to make the happy confession that there is no one feature demanding special attention, so uniform and steady has been the diligence in every department of study. The demeanor of the students has been such as befits those who have “given themselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word.” For the tone of earnestness, intelligence, and spirituality pervading the College there is much reason for gratitude. Through the continuous favor of the Head of the Church, zeal for conversions has suffered no abatement amongst us, whilst every endeavor has been made honestly to meet the large and varied requirements of the pastoral office. Of these things the sermons read weekly for criticism, and the evangelistic efforts put forth, afford substantial proofs. The General Classes for test sermons and for discussions, at which all the tutors are present, have been well sustained. I have continued my course of Lectures on Theology, and kept up the study of Hodge’s “Outlines,” “Homiletics,” and “Church History.” The Seniors have been engaged in the exegetical and grammatical study of the Greek text of the Acts, the Epistle to the Ephesians, and the Epistle to the Hebrews; and have read in connection herewith Trench’s “Synonyms of the Greek Testament.” In Hebrew the Seniors have been reading in the Psalms and in the Book of Genesis, the latter of which the Juniors are beginning. In the Senior Classics the subjects have been Lucian’s “Dialogue” and the “Oedipus Rex” of Sophocles; the 6th Book of Virgil’s “AEneid,” and “Cicero De Senectute.” D. GRACEY.
MR. FURGUSSON’S REPORT
DEAR MR. SPURGEON, — At your request I forward to you a few facts connected with that department of College work you have placed under my care. My work falls naturally under the following heads — Biblical Studies, Ethics and Philosophy, and English. BIBLICAL STUDIES. — The nature of our work in this department will at once appear when I mention its two branches and their respective text-books — Blackie’s “Bible Geography” and Angus’s “Bible Handbook.” By means of the first we travel (availing ourselves of the most recent researches in Asia of travelers and scholars), especially over the ground made sacred by the grace of God, the deeds of Christ and the work of Patriarch, Prophet and Apostle. Here the men are trained form for themselves, to the mind’s eye, a map which, without book or sheet, they can carry to the pulpit, prayer-meeting, or platform; and on this mental map they are soon able to set down in a certain place and give a local habitation to the momentous transactions of that Book in the exposition of which their lives are to be laid out, spent, and exhausted. By means of the Handbook to the Bible they are introduced, through a style at once crisp, rigid and graphic, to the great themes of their life-work, — exposition and Biblical criticism Judging from the amount of work done this year, the sustained application required in doing it, and the verve and energy revealed in the discussion of the subjects suggested, they have left me little to desire. Should our men carry into their ministry the same hunger for Bible knowledge, the same energy in turning it to account, and still keep unspoiled the same sensitiveness of soul in appreciating the fine touches of the Spirit in His delineation of truth, they must and they will excel in the great business of soul-winning. I ,:an safely assert that, if they are determined — and I know they are—to carry the same enthusiasm into their life-work, their people will not be found among those who, to escape the monotony of the modern pulpit, are now clamoring around the doors of museums, art galleries, and Sunday leagues.
ETHICS AND PHILOSOPHY. — In this department our great aim has been in as clear and as simple manner as possible to acquaint the men with a common-sense view of the phenomena of the human mind. Our whole teaching here has been in complete subordination to the grand principle of all our College work — the divine art of winning lost souls to the Lord Jesus Christ. Our every effort here has been to avoid making the men gaunt moralists on the one hand and philosophic somnambulists on the other. The entire drift of our labors has been to bring the men face to face with that stern and real person — the hun-ran soul; that poor fallen majestic creature, the soul of man; and to deepen their sympathies with its sorrows, struggles, hopes, and fears; and to strengthen by all that is strong in the gospel of God its resistance to being snuffed out by the apostles of the materialism of modern science; to help it in every way to maintain its protest against being considered a blood relation of the ape or the oyster; and to increase its loathing towards the last and vilest insult offered to it when it is asserted that its life and potency may be found amid the simmering stews of modern chemistry. As soul-winners our men enter the College; as soul winners they study; and as soul-winners they go forth to their work, therefore, as far as in us lies, our efforts in this department have been directed — if you will allow the figure — -to acquainting our men with the anatomy of the suffering soul. Yes, Sir, to cleave to the soul, to feel for the soul, and to ease the soul is a noble work, a Godlike work, and we all believe that is our work — our only work. Judging from the souls already saved through the agency of the: men from our College in the field, we have our reward in so teaching and studying the phenomena of the human heart and mind.
ENGLISH STUDIES —A mere enumeration of the class-books used in this department of our work will so far explain its nature as to render detail unnecessary. They are these:—Fleming’s “Analysis of the English Language;” for practice in analysis, “Paradise Lost;” Angus’s “Handbook of English Literature;” “Reid on the English Poets;” “English History;” and the preparation of monthly papers on given themes. Our great aim in this part of our work is to help those of our men who, though possessed of plenty of brain and plenty of soul, are suffering from the calamity of a neglected education, or of none at all. They are not allowed to leave this part of their studies until we are satisfied they have secured a common-sense grasp of the principles and capabilities of their mother-tongue. And here also we have our reward in beholding many of our men triumph over all the evils of a neglected education, and succeed in clearly translating into a sound and brawny Saxon style the story of Jesus crucified, the wisdom of God and the mind of Christ, a style which the Holy Ghost, through them, has, deigned to use in bringing many sinners to the feet of Christ. A. FERGUSSON.
MERCHANT’S REPORT.
DEAR MR. SPURGEON, — Your request for a short account of my Classes during the past year reaches me while away from home. I am, consequently, unable to avail myself of some references which would have helped me to speak more particularly of work done immediately after last Conference. The Middle Classes left me shortly after the commencement of the year, and have since been reading with Mr. GRACEY. The Second Juniors, after finishing both the Latin and Greek Delectuses, have for some months past been reading Cornelius Nepos in the former language, and Xenophon’s “Anabasis” in the latter. Good progress has been made by almost all the brethren in these classes, and the more difficult constructions have been overcome with more than usual readiness. Careful attention has been given to the grammar of both languages, and especially to parsing. We have gone through nearly two books of Euclid, and though this is generally regarded as “a dry subject,” the interest in it has grown from the first, and the work has been well done. The First Junior Class is getting on well with Latin, but has not yet advanced far in Greek. On two afternoons of the week, throughout the year, I have taken an Elementary Class for students newly entered, in order that beginners might be helped over their early difficulties in the dead languages, with as little hindrance as possible to their studies in English subjects. The conscientious character of the work done during the year has been very gratifying, and, above all, the earnest tone of piety pervading the prayers in our various meetings encourages us to believe assuredly that the good hand of our God is still with us. May the dear College prosper more than ever.
Yours very sincerely,
F. G. MARCHANT.
DISPENSING WITH THE GOSPEL
MRS. PARTINGTON uttered more of the truth than she thought when she said: — “ Dear me, nothing don’t do me so much good as to go to church Sunday morning, and hear a precious minister dispense with the gospel!” Yes, dear soul, that is exactly what some of them do: they give us anything and everything but ,the glad tidings of salvation, and then they wonder that their chapels become empty. Yet it does not do to say as much, or you will have a hornet nest about your ears. Of course they preach gospel, that is to say a gospel, if not the gospel. What is the difference? Only the indefinite for the definite article, only sand instead of rock, only opinion in the place of truth.
The worst of it is that hearers now-a-days put up with it. There seems to be little left in the land of the discriminating spirit. Mien tolerate error in their ministers, grumbling at first and consenting to it afterwards. Many do not know chalk from cheese in these times, and so long as the language is musical and the ideas are pretty, their preacher may teach anything short of atheism and they will drink it in. What a clapping a man gets at a public meeting if he will only harp on the string of liberality and say that we are all alike, and that our views are only different aspects of the same truth: black is a shade of white, and white a milder tone of black! In times gone by a few sermons without the gospel in them would have brought down a storm about his reverence’s head; but now he is admired as a man of fresh thought, and takes leave to make up his theology as he goes along. No one challenges him, or if a bold brother does so he is called a bigot, and snuffed out.
Surely this state of things cannot last. Someone will bear his protest and ere ate a stir, or else the whole thing will rot into contempt. If there be a gospel let us have it and nothing else. There are not two gospels: which is the genuine article? This we demand. This we would have not now and then, but always as the standing dish, the daily provision of the House of the Lord. If any man shall withhold the truth, or give us the counterfeit of it, he shall answer for it with his head; for by trifling in this matter the souls of men are placed in jeopardy, and the Kingdom of Christ is hindered.
Blessed is he who dispenses the gospel, but cursed is he that dispenses with it. C.H.S.
HOW TO KEEP ABREAST OF TIMES.
“YOU haven’t time to read much, but want to keep up with the At times in religious matters,” says the Congregationalist, and adds, “well, there is no; a religious book in the world so closely up to the times as the Bible is; nor one so well adapted to the wants of a man pressed for time. You can read a verse in a minute that will feed your soul for a day.” Try it, and see what a blessed truth that is. None are so truly learned, so fresh in utterance, so rich in teaching as those who draw from the pure well of Scripture, and present the waters to mankind just as they draw them. God’s own mind is ever far ahead of all mental science, and his thoughts high above our noblest thoughts.
NOTES
IT was resolved by the Pastors’ College Conference that Monday, June 19, should be observed as a special day of prayer by our churches. Will it not be well to make this something more than a form? Why not unite in earnest, wrestling prayer? There are urgent topics. Think of poor Ireland, of persecuted Israel, of our crowds of drunkards, infidels, and backsliders. We cannot do without the Divine blessing. What might we not do with it? If all the churches are like that at the Tabernacle, they are certainly in daily, pressing need of help from on high.
On Lord’s Day evening, May 14, after the usual services, a special meeting was convened for prayer for Ireland. The Lecture Hall was filled, and the cries were fervent. What is to be done for this country but to seek the help of God? Oh, that the gospel had sway among her people! This, and this only, can cure her ills.
On Thursday, May 4, Mr. Spurgeon was able again to occupy his pulpit at the regular lecture. The attendance on Thursday evenings is remarkably large; but there is room for more. If our friends knew that they could readily obtain seats, would they not speedily make the Thursday congregations as large as those on the Sabbath? Service begins at 7 o’clock, and all who come will be heartily welcomed.
COLLEGE. — Since our last notice, Mr. A. G. Everett, who has been greatly blessed in reviving the church at Dorking, Surrey, has accepted the pastorate there. Mr. F. G. Kemp leaves the College shortly to settle at Boringdon, Herts; and Mr. Robert Wood takes charge of the church meeting in St. George’s Hall, Ramsgate. Mr. J. Bateman has removed from Leicester, to Harston, Cambs; and Mr. J. W. Nichol, from Gos-berton, to West Park Street, Chatteris. Mr. John Clarke has completed his course of study at Glasgow University, and obtained the degree of M.A. He is now anxious to be engaged in pastoral work.
In response to a request from the church at Toowoomba, Queensland, for a pastor, we have selected Mr. W. Higlett, who has just completed his College course with us, and he has arranged to sail in the Orient steamer Potosi, which leaves London on June 1st. Mr. J. Blaikie, who was obliged to resign his charge at Irvine, North Britain, through all-health, has secured berths for himself and his family in the same vessel. We trust that he will soon find a suitable sphere in Australia, and that both our brethren will be very useful at the Antipodes.
Tidings of several of our brethren abroad have reached us during the past month. Mr. W. Mitchell has arrived at his destination in Santhalistan: and Mr. S. H. Weeks has reached his station at San Salvador, on the river Congo, Africa. He has already had several fevers, but he hopes soon to become accustomed to the climate, and to be able to prosecute his work without further hindrance from that cause.
The following letter, intended for the Conference, arrived about a week too late, but we insert it here that all our brethren may see it, and remember in prayer their comrades who are battling bravely against the idolatry and superstition of India: —
“East Indies, March 20, 1882.
“Beloved President, Vice – President, Tutors, and Brethren, — From this distant part of our Master’s vineyard we send our united love and greeting, praying also that your gatherings in Conference may be seasons of ‘refreshing from the presence of the Lord.’ Scattered over this vast continent of India, and engaged in work as varied as the language we have to employ, we still feel united to each. other, and to you, by the blessed associations and memories of our beloved College. Three of us have to labor in English, one in Telugu, one in Hindee and Hind stani, and one in Bengalee and Mussulmani-Bengalee; and yet we have but ‘one Lord, one faith, and one baptism’ to declare to these different races. Our spheres of labor are very far apart. One of us is in Madras, one in Agra, two in Calcutta, one in Bachergunge, and one in Darjeeling. In each of these places idolaters, or followers of the false prophet, abound. ‘At Athens, Paul’s spirit was stirred in him when he saw the city wholly given to idolatry; ‘ and we often feel the same; yet we desire to be stirred up to far greater devotion in our work and zeal for our Master. Everything here tends to deaden, and depress, unless we are constantly conscious of our Savior’s presence and help. Could we meet with you in Conference we feel it would be the means of arousing and quickening us; but it will help to cheer us greatly to know that these few words will reach you, and that we have your sympathy and love.
“Finally, brethren, pray for us, that the Word of the Lord may run, and be glorified (in India) even as also it is’ with you: and that we may be delivered from unreasonable and evil men, for all have not faith. But the Lord is faithful. In Him is our trust, for ‘ Pie must reign,’ and every form of idolatry and error must ultimately perish. “With intense love to you all, and especially to our revered President, we remain, faithfully yours in Christ,
“Robert SPURGEON, Barisaul.
“William NORRIS, Calcutta.
“G. H. HooK, Lall Bazar, Calcutta.
“R.W. MAPLESDEN, Ongole, Madres Presidency.
“JAMES G. POTTER, Agra, N’.W.t’.
“H. RYLANDS BROWN,Darjeeling, Himalayas.”
EVANGELISTS. — Since the Conference Messrs. Smith and Fullerton have been holding services at Mr. Charrington’s large Assembly Hall in Mile End Road, and at the Edinboro’ Castle. Of the meetings ion the latter place, Dr. Bernardo writes the following cheering account: —
“Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — The visit of our dear friends, Messrs. Fullerton and Smith, to the Edinboro’ Castle has indeed been a season of unmistakable and wonderful refreshment from the presence of the Lord. I think I may say without doubt that Christ-inns have been quite as much refreshed by their ministry of word and song as have the unconverted been awakened and led to decision. Of course in a Mission like ours, differing in some points from ordinary chapel services, Evangelists have to work in a harder field. We have practically after-meetings, inquiry meetings, and the like, at every service. The chief aim of all our services is directly evangelistic; the nets are always being let down to enclose the fish for whose capture we labor. So, when your dear friends carne to us, their efforts were necessarily without that item of novelty which in many ordinary places of worship they would possess. Notwithstanding this, however, the meetings have been well filled from the first, and on Sundays we have been crowded beyond anything we have ever known from the beginning of our mission at the Edinboro’ Castle until this day. It was a delightful sight, and one which I am sure you would have rejoiced in, had you seen it, to behold that old music-hall at the back of the once-celebrated gin-palace — a hall at one time desecrated by every device the devil could conceive to allure and retain his votaries, verily a citadel of Satan, — thronged in every part, packed so that outside every door and window the huge crowd of faces, still in the distance, could be seen all eagerly listening to the gracious words which the Lord had given his dear servants to utter in their hearing. ‘ Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift.’ The message of salvation has, indeed, won its way to many hearts. Men and women, and even children, for whom we have hoped and prayed for years without seeing hitherto any results to our prayers and labors, have been led to decision. The outside working class, the lower laboring population, have also been attracted in large numbers, and of these many have been savingly impressed, and led to the Savior’s feet. To him we ascribe all the glory and the praise!
“But what cheers me, perhaps, more even than this, is the tidings that reach me from one of our institutions, recently opened for the benefit of a muchneglected and needy class.
“Youths and young men, between 17 and 21 years of age, crowd our common lodging-houses, and, because of their age, are disqualified for admission to any existing institution. Many of these poor fellows are honest and industrious, and would gladly do anything to get occupation; but the fact that they live in a lodging-house, and have no other home or friends, and no proper clothing to make them look respectable, is all against them in the struggle for employment which takes place daily in this great city. At that period in life when our young men are looking forward to the future with the brightest prospects, these poor fellows stand with life behind them, already a lost battle. To give them a helping hand is all I could do, and that I resolved to do, and so a great house was opened for their reception in the Commercial Road, where we call give them labor, and test them for three or six months, to ascertain their capacity, their character, their willingness, and the like. A little while ago, after much prayer, we opened this house, admitting about 30 lads of the ages I have mentioned, the majority of whom were the roughest and the most desperate-looking fellows I have ever tried to assist; all of them absolutely coming from the common lodging-houses. You may imagine my fears lest an outbreak might take place among them, lest a quarrel would lead to blows, which would eventuate in some riot threatening a loss of reputation. We entered the work with much prayer and much trembling, and God has mercifully given us answers such as we never expected. Our dear brethren, Messrs. Fullerton and Smith, have been permitted to reap among them, all unconsciously to themselves, a wonderful harvest. These young men attended many of the services, and, in addressing the common crowd, words were uttered which entered their hearts as arrows. The King’s enemies were wounded, some of them unto death, only to be healed by the message of the gospel, which kills, and makes alive. A prayerful spirit has broken out all over the house, deeply-revived spiritual life is enjoyed by all of my helpers in the home; prayer, reading the Word of God, and an earnest desire to do their duty thoroughly and conscientiously, are the chief features of almost all the lads, and we are now in hopes that every one will be brought to a definite decision ere we send them forth upon their life’s work. For this blessing we have mainly to thank dear Fullerton and Manton Smith. Others, of course, have perhaps sown, but they have been permitted to reap. Again I write, to God be all the glory and all the praise!
“I send this account to you, not merely because I hope it will interest and cheer you, if you have time to read it, but also because I felt it would be ungrateful in the highest extent if I received so much good through the means of your evangelists, and did not at least return to you, as the human agent that meed of thanks which must encourage you amid some of the burdens you have to bear. ‘ The Lord bless dear Mr. Spurgeon ‘ will, I am sure, be a prayer which will often ascend from my people who, have been blessed under the labors of your evangelists.
“There is one matter, however, which troubles me. We are not rich nor can we impose collections upon our people. A few collections in the ordinary course have to be taken up, but the proceeds are absolutely needful for the work at the Castle. I cannot, therefore, do as some have done, send you largely from our stores towards the maintenance of these and others whom you are sending forth in the gospel, but I ask you to accept the enclosed very small cheque as some proof of the desire I have to thank you in a more practical manner if I had trot the means. — Gratefully and faithfully yours in the gospel, THOS. J. BARNARDO.”
This letter was accompanied by a cheque for thirty guineas for the funds of the Society of Evangelists, for which we are extremely grateful.
On Sunday, the 21st ult., Messrs. Smith and Fullerton commenced a series of services at Trinity Chapel, John Street, Edgware Road; and on the 11th inst. they go to the help of our brother Bax, at Salters’ Hall Chapel, Baxter Road, Islington.
During the past month Mr. Burnham has held services at Burnham, Essex; and Trowbridge; and this month he is to visit Charlton Kings (for the fourth, time); Ash Yale, Aldershot; Sandy, Beds.; and Walton, Norfolk. These are all places where our brother has previously been so much blessed that the friends desire his services again. Pastor J. Kemp sends an interesting report of Mr. Burnham’s visit to Burnley just before the Conference.
ORPHANAGE. — Annual Fete. Will all our collectors, and other friends, in town and. country, kindly take notice that the annual fete will be held at the Orphanage on Wednesday, June 21st i/ We hope large numbers. of our ever-generous supporters will come and see for themselves the progress that has. been made with the additional buildings for the use of the girls, and help us to celebrate our forty-eighth birthday by liberal contributions for the maintenance of this holy work of caring for the widow and the fatherless. Full particulars of the day’s proceedings will be duly announced in the usual. way.
Several friends have recently helped the Orphanage in a manner that calls or special notice, and we mention the matter here in the hope that others may be moved to follow the noble examples which have been set by these liberal souls, who have devised liberal things. The following letter was only intended for the President’s eye, but the spirit of loving consecration that breathes in it is so rare and precious that he must put it on record to the praise of the God who has moved the donors to plan and carry out such a deed of whole-hearted generosity: —
“Rev. C. H. Spurgeon:—My dear Sir, Through the loving-kindness and tender mercy of our heavenly Father, in graciously enabling us to carry out our purpose, my wife and myself have the joy of asking your acceptance of the enclosed £350 for the orphans.
“For a long time it has been my desire to devote (D. V.) to the Lord’s work the whole of the salary I might receive in my fiftieth year. The amount enclosed is therefore my year’s wages as a commercial traveler, with something in addition lest we have been slack in giving in the past.
“Left fatherless and motherless myself when only about two years old, and brought up out of compassion by my nurse, the Lord has indeed been my helper and friend. For all his ceaseless mercies, and especially that we and our daughter have been brought to know something of the riches of his love in the Lord Jesus Christ, we offer him in the persons of the little ones of his family this token of our grateful love.
“Please do not publish our names. The Lord knows them, and that is enough. ‘Simply say ‘A year’s salary from a Commercial Traveler,’ and it may be that some one else may do the same.
“The Lord bless you more and more, and speedily restore you to health. With our warm Christian love, believe me,
“Yours very sincerely,
“______”
The Orphanage has been benefited under the will of the late Mr. John Edwards to the amount of £900 during the past month. We have received from another donor a box full of silver plate, which he hopes will bring £30 to £40 to the Orphanage funds; and a gentleman who read the article on the Orphanage in the May number of the “Sunday at Home,” sent a donation of £100.
While Mr. Duncan S. Miller and the Royal Poland Street Hand-bell Ringers were in Philadelphia, they gave an entertainment to the Bethany Schools and Mr. Wanamaker’s employees on condition that a contribution should be sent to our Orphanage. The meetings were very successful, and in fulfillment of the contract we have received from Mr. Wanamaker a draft for £20, for which we heartily thank him and the scholars at Bethany, and our good friends the ringers.
Three youths in Scotland have found out a novel way of helping us. With their father’s permission they collected all the suitable books in their home, and formed them into a circulating library, for the use of which each member of the family paid a small weekly sum. They then secured fresh subscribers and additional books, and now, as the result of less than six months’ efforts, they lave sent us twenty-five shillings for the Orphanage, with the promise of a larger amount next time.
COLPORTAGE. — The Annual Conference and Meeting of the Colporteurs was held on Sunday and Monday, May 7th and 8th. Meetings for prayer were held on Sunday morning and afternoon, during which the men related their experiences in the, work, which were very cheering, one of them alone reporting that one hundred had professed conversion during the year in connection with his labors. On. Monday afternoon, in the absence of the President, the Vice-President, J. A. Spurgeon, gave an encouraging address to the colporteurs.
The public meeting: in the Tabernacle was the best ever held. Dr. Bernardo and Dr. Donald Fraser delivered very powerful addresses, and several colporteurs also interested the people by their simple statements of work accomplished for Jesus.
A new feature in the proceedings was the distribution of prizes given by Mr. Spurgeon for the largest sales during the year, which were awarded to the following colporteurs:
Class I., for the largest sales during the past year: —:Mr. J. Smith, Nottingham, £5; Mr. E. Garrett, Uxbridge, £3; Mr. J. Taylor, Ross, £2.
Class II., for the greatest increase on the previous year: — Mr. Robert Hall, Ilkeston, £5;:Mr. L. Eyres, Cambridge, £3; Mr. C. Morgan, Castleton, £2.
Reports, collecting cards, or boxes, and all information may be had on application to the Secretary, Mr. W. Corden Jones, Temple Street, St. George’s Road, Southwark, to whom also subscriptions may be sent.
We invite special attention to the annual report of this useful agency, which is printed at the end of the present magazine.
PERSONAL NOTES. — We have received from Golcar the following pleasing testimony to the usefulness of our sermons: —
“Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — You may perhaps remember me waiting upon you in December last, to inform you that in connection with our church we had five hundred of your sermons in circulation in the village, and that some cases of conversion had resulted therefrom. Since then we have increased the circulation to upwards of one thousand, which seventeen or eighteen of our female friends circulate weekly or fortnightly, and several other cases of conversion have been reported, besides great help and encouragement to inquirers, especially from your sermon ‘Only trust Him, only trust Him’ (No. 1635). We have not had a church meeting without candidates since last November, and at every one of them lately your sermons have been mentioned as having been greatly blessed to them. I recently visited a good churchman in the village, who was on his dying bed, and he expressed his joy at reading one of them which was left by one of the distributors, and begged me to get him a copy to preserve, as it had been so blessed to him. Since then, however, his happy spirit has gone to its reward. Scarcely any in the village now refuse them, though some did at first, and some who attended no place of worship accept them, and express their gratification to the distributors for the loan of them.
“I would, from experience, strongly’ recommend all our churches to adopt the use of them in this manner, as they have indeed proved to be most useful and blessed in our history.
“Your very truly,
“WILLIAM HIRST.”
Our late student, Mr. Harry Wood, who has been for some time in Australia, has written the subjoined interesting account of the reception of the sermons in that region: —
“During my visit to the different colonies it was very cheering to hear the people speak of our beloved President, and the blessing that had followed the reading of his sermons by saint and sinner alike.
“There are one or two instances which I cannot forbear to relate. When visiting the Thames Gold-field, in New Zealand, a dear friend acquainted me with the following story, which will not only cheer the Pastor’s heart, but will encourage all who are engaged in distributing his sermons. There were three young men who were working at the diggings. They were living together in a tent. One Sunday morning it was raining very hard, and they could not get out; the hours were long, and they knew not what to do to kill time. One of them asked if he should read one of Spurgeon’s sermons, as he had several in his box, perhaps put there by a godly mother, lie made no pretense to be religious or serious any more than his companions, but they agreed that he should read it to pass the time. Before they got through the sermon the Spirit of God convinced them of sin, and it was ultimately the means of leading all three of them to the Lord Jesus Christ.
“When in South Australia I met a well-to-do farmer, who, on hearing that I had come from the Pastors’ College, informed me that a sermon by our President from the text ‘ He that believeth on him is not condemned,’ (John 3:18,)was blessed to the salvation of his soul. He is now one of the most energetic Christians I have met with, and is doing good service in one of the Baptist churches. Many such instances could be given. The sermons are also a great blessing to small churches that are without pastors. In my travels I have met with many little flocks without an under-shepherd. The question has been asked, ‘ How do you keep together?’ The answer has been to this effect, ‘ One of the deacons reads Mr. Spurgeon’s sermons morning and evening,’ and in this way they have been sustained till God has sent them a man. We do well to praise God for giving our Pastor a voice to reach the ends of the earth, and for the great blessing God continues to give both to the preached and printed word. This should stir us up, not only to more earnest prayer, but to more earnest effort in the distribution of these messengers of mercy all over the world.
“I hope I shall see the day when colporteurs from the Metropolitan Tabernacle will be seen to carry the word of God to the settlers in the Bush of the Australian Colonies as they do to-day in the country villages of England.”
A friend in Minnesota, writing to Mrs. Spurgeon, says, “You will be pleased to. hear that out in this Western country, and. in this village of six hundred inhabitants, Mr. Spurgeon’s books are much valued. I have seen them in several houses here. In the Wesleyan minister’s a volume or two of sermons,’ and ‘John Ploughman’s’ productions. In another house ‘Morning by Morning.’ In another, that of an old saint, aged seventy-five, ‘ The Saint and His Savior,’ which he esteems as very precious, saying, with emphatic tone, when he speaks of it, ‘This is Mr. Spurgeon’s first book, and he has written many since, but never one to surpass this,’ though the dear old man has not read a tithe of Mr. Spurgeon’s publications.”
Mr. Chowrryappah sends us from Madras a copy of our “Evening by Evening,” which he has translated into Tamil, and is selling to native Christians under cost price at twelve annas (ls. 4d). He has also translated some extracts from our works, and issued them as tracts. He says that kind friends in England enabled him to accomplish this work, and he is now anxious to procure additional funds so that he may translate and publish “Morning by Morning” also. This is a good work. Though five hundred copies may appear to be a small issue, it is a great thing to get the book translated, for it will then be ready for use when in happier times thousands will need a Christian literature. We are thrice happy in seeing our works thus scattered among many nations. May the Lord send the increase.
SPURGEON’S SERMONS’ TRACT SOCIETY: — Since we inserted a note in reference to this Society in a recent number of the magazine, the secretary has received several applications for grants of sermons, but no contributions to pay for them. He is continually hearing of eases of conversion resulting from the distribution of the sermons as loan tracts, and if he only had increased funds, could largely extend the Society’s operations. Friends who are looking for a good investment of their Lord’s money might do worse than send a donation to Mr. C. Cornell, 60, Hamiltom-square, Borough, S.E.
Chap 21. JULY 1882
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL
JULY 1882
MEALTIME IN THE CORNFIELDS.
SERMON NO. 522 BY C. H. SPURGEON
ALSO FROM THE “FARM SERMONS”
“And Boaz said unto her, At mealtime come thou hither, and eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar. And she sat beside the reapers: and he reached her parched corn, and she did eat, and was sufficed, and left.” — Ruth 2:14.
WE are going to the cornfields, as we did last year, not however, so much to glean, as to rest with the reapers and the gleaners, when under some wide-spreading oak, they sit down to take refreshment. We hope there will be found some timid gleaner here, who will accept our invitation to come and eat with us, and who will find confidence enough to dip her morsel in the vinegar. May they have courage to feast to the full on their own account, and then to carry home a portion to their needy friends at home.
I. Our first point this morning is this — THAT GOD’S REAPERS HAVE THEIR MEALTIMES.
Those who work for God will find him a good master. He cares for oxen, and has commanded his Israel, “Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn.” Much more doth he care for his servants who serve him. “He hath given meat unto them that fear him: he will ever be mindful of his covenant.” The reapers in Jesus’ fields shall not only receive a blessed reward at the last, but they shall have plenteous comforts by the way. He is pleased to pay his servants twice: first in the labor itself, and a second time in the labor’s sweet results. He gives them such joy and consolation in the service of their Master, that it is a sweet employ, and they cry, “We delight to do thy will, O Lord.” As heaven is made up of serving God day and night, so to true workers, their constantly serving God on earth brings with it a rich foretaste of heaven.
God has ordained certain mealtimes for his reapers; and he has appointed that one of these shall be when they come together to listen to the Word preached. If God be with our ministers, they act as the disciples did of old, for they received the barley loaves and fishes from Christ as he multiplied them, and handed them to the people. We, of ourselves, cannot feed one soul, much less thousands; but when the Lord is with us, we can keep as good a table as Solomon himself, with all his fine flour, and fat oxen, and roebucks, and fallow-deer. When the Lord blesses the provisions of his House, no matter how many thousands there may be, all his poor shall be filled with bread. I hope, beloved, you know what it is to sit under the shadow of the Word with great delight, and find the fruit thereof sweet unto your taste. Where the doctrines of grace are boldly and plainly delivered to you in connection with the other truths of revelation; where Jesus Christ upon his cross is ever lifted up; where the work of the Spirit is not forgotten; where the glorious purpose of the Father is never despised, there is sure to be food for the children of God. We have learned not to feed upon oratorical flourishes, or philosophical refinings; we leave these fine things, these twelfth-cake ornaments, to be eaten by those little children who can find delight in such unhealthy dainties: we prefer to hear truth, even when roughly spoken, to the fine garnishings of eloquence without the truth. We care little about how the table is served, or of what ware the dishes are made, so long as the covenant bread and water, and the promised oil and wine, are given us. Certain grumblers among the Lord’s reapers do not feed under the preached Word, because they do not intend to feed; they come to the House of Bread on purpose to find fault, and therefore they go away empty. My verdict is, “It serves them right.” Little care I to please such hearers. I would as soon feed bears and jackals, as attempt to supply the wants of grumbling professors. How much mischief is done by observations made upon the preacher! How often do we censure where our God approves. We have heard of a high doctrinal deacon, who said to a young minister who was supplying the pulpit on probation, “I should have enjoyed your sermon very much, sir, if it had not been for that last appeal to the sinner. I do not think that dead sinners should be exhorted to believe in Jesus.” When that deacon reached home, he found his own daughter in tears. She became converted to God, and united with the Church of which that young man ultimately became the minister. How was she converted, think you? By that address at the close of the sermon, which her father did not like. Take heed of railing at that by which the Holy Ghost saves souls. There may be much in the sermon which may not suit you or me, but then we are not the only persons to be considered. There is a wide variety of characters, and all our hearers must have “their portion of meat in due season.” Is it not a selfishness very unlike the spirit of a Christian, which would make me find fault with the provisions, because I cannot eat them all? There should be the unadulterated milk for the babe in grace, as well as the strong substantial meat for the full-grown believer. Beloved, I know that however murmurers may call our manna “light bread,” yet our gracious God does “in this mountain make unto all people a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined.”
Often, too, our gracious Lord appoints us mealtimes in our private readings and meditations. Here it is that his “paths drop fatness.” Nothing can be more fattening to the soul of the believer than feeding upon the Word, and digesting it by frequent meditations. No wonder that some grow so little, when they meditate so little. Cattle must chew the cud; it is not what they crop with their teeth, but that which is masticated, and afterwards digested by rumination, that nourishes them. We must take the truth, and roll it over and over again in the inward parts of our spirit, and so we shall extract divine nourishment therefrom. Have you not, my brethren, frequently found a Benjamin’s mess prepared for you in a choice promise of your God? Is not meditation the land of Goshen to you? If men once said, “There is corn in Egypt,” may they not always say, that the finest of the wheat is to be found in secret prayer? Private devotion is a land which floweth with milk and honey; a paradise yielding all manner of fruits; a banqueting house of choice wines. Ahasuerus might make a great feast, but all his hundred and twenty provinces could not furnish such dainties as the closet offers to the spiritual mind. Where can we feed and lie down in green pastures in so sweet a sense as we do in our musings on the Word? Meditation distills the quintessence from the Scriptures, and gladdens our mouth with a sweetness which exceeds the virgin honey dropping from the honeycomb. Your retired seasons and occasions of prayer, should be to you regal entertainments, or at least refreshing seasons, in which, like the reapers at noonday, you sit with Boaz and eat of your Master’s generous provisions. “The Shepherd of Salisirury Plain” — you who have read that excellent book will remember — was wont to say, “That when he was lonely, and when his wallet was empty, his Bible was to him meat, and drink, and company too.” He is not the only man who has found a fullness in the Word when there is want without. During the battle of Waterloo, a godly soldier mortally wounded, was carried by his comrade into the rear, and being placed with his back propped up against a tree, he besought his friend to open his knapsack, and take out the Bible which he had carried in it. “Read to me,” he said, “one verse, before I close my eyes in death.” His comrade read him that verse: “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth give I unto you;” and there, fresh from the whistling of the bullets, and the roll of the drum, and the tempest of human conflict, that believing spirit enjoyed such holy calm, that ere he fell asleep in the arms of Jesus, he said, “Yes, I have a peace with God which passeth all understanding, which keeps my heart and mind through Jesus Christ.” Saints most surely have their mealtimes when they are alone in meditation.
Let us not forget, that there is one specially ordained mealtime which ought to occur oftener, but which, even monthly, is very refreshing to us, I mean the Supper of the Lord. There you have literally, as well as spiritually, a meal. The table is richly spread; it has upon it both meat and drink; there is the bread and the wine, and looking at what these symbolize, we have before us a table richer than that which kings could furnish. There we have the flesh and the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, whereof if a man eat, he shall never hunger and never thirst, for that bread shall be undo him everlasting life. Oh! the sweet seasons we have known at the Lord’s Supper. If some of you really did understand the enjoyment of feeding upon Christ in that ordinance, you would chide yourselves for not having united with the Church in fellowship. In keeping the Master’s commandments there is a “great reward,” and consequently in neglecting them there is a great loss of reward. Christ is not so tied to the Sacramental table as to be always found of those who partake thereat, but still it is in the way that we may expect the Lord to meet with us. “If ye love me, keep my commandments;” is a sentence of touching power. “And his commandments are not grievous,” is the confession of all obedient sons. Sitting at this table, our soul has mounted up from the emblem to the reality; we have eaten bread in the kingdom of God, and have leaned our head upon Jesus’ bosom. “He brought me to the banqueting-house, and his banner over me was love.” On these occasions we may compare ourselves to poor Mephibosheth, who though lame and despicable in his own esteem, yet was made to sit at King David’s table; or we may liken ourselves to the little ewe lamb in the parable, which did eat of its Master’s bread, and drink from his cup, and slept in his bosom. The prodigal, who once fed upon husks, sits down to eat the bread of children. We, who were worthy to be esteemed as dogs, are here permitted to take the place of adopted sons and daughters.
Besides these regular mealtimes, there are others which God gives us, at seasons when perhaps we little expect them. You have been walking the street, and suddenly you have felt a holy flowing out of your soul toward God; or, in the middle of business your heart has been melted with love and made to leap for joy even as the brooks which have been bound with winter’s ice leap to feel the touch of spring. You have been groaning, dull and earth-bound; but the sweet love of Jesus has embraced you when you scarce thought of it, and your spirit, all free, and all on fire, has rejoiced to dance before the Lord with tabrets and high-sounding cymbals, like Miriam of old. I have had times occasionally in preaching, when I would fain have kept on far beyond the appointed hour, for my happy soul was like a vessel wanting vent. Seasons too you have had on your sick-beds, when you would have been content to be sick always, if you could have your bed so well made, and your head so softly pillowed.
“These are the joys he lets us know
In fields and villages below:
Gives us a relish of his love,
But keeps his noblest feast above.”
Our blessed Redeemer comes to us in the morning, and wakes us up with such sweet thoughts upon our soul, we know not how they came; as if, when the dew was visiting the flowers, a few drops of heaven’s dew had fallen upon us. In the cool eventide, too, as we have gone to our beds, our meditation of him has been sweet. Nay, in the night watches, when we tossed to and fro, and could not sleep, he has been pleased to become our song in the night.
“He is the spring of all my joys,
The life of my delights;
The glory of my brightest days,
And comfort of my nights.”
God’s reapers find it hard work to reap; but they find a blessed solace when they sit down and eat of their Master’s rich provisions; then, with renewed strength, they go with sharpened sickle, to reap again in the noontide heat.
Let me observe, that while these mealtimes come, we know not exactly when, there are certain seasons when we may expect them. The Eastern reapers generally sit down under the shelter of a tree, or a booth, to take refreshment during the heat of the day. And certain I am, that when trouble, affliction, persecution, and bereavement, become the most painful to us, it is then that the Lord hands out to us the sweetest comforts. As we said last Thursday night, some promises are written in sympathetic ink, and can only have their meaning brought out by holding them before the fire of affliction. Some verses of Scripture must be held to the fire till they are scorched, before the glorious meaning will stand forth in clear letters before our eyes. We must work till the hot sun forces the sweat from our face; we must bear the burden and heat of the day before we can expect to be invited to those choice meals which the Lord prepares for those who are diligent in his work. When thy day of trouble is the hottest, then the love of Jesus shall be sweetest; when thy night of trial is the darkest, then will his candle shine most brightly about thee; when thy head aches most heavily — when thy heart palpitates most terribly — when heart and flesh fail thee, then he will be the strength of thy life, and thy portion for ever.
Again, these mealtimes frequently occur before a trial. Elijah must be entertained beneath a juniper tree, for he is to go a forty-days’ journey in the strength of that meat. You may suspect some danger nigh when your delights are overflowing. If you see a ship taking in great quantities of provision, it is bound for a distant port. And when God gives you extraordinary seasons of communion with Jesus, you may look for long leagues of tempestuous sea. Sweet cordials prepare for stern conflicts. Times of refreshing also occur after trouble or arduous service. Christ was tempted of the devil, and afterwards angels came and ministered unto him. Jacob wrestled with God, and then afterwards, at Mahanaim, hosts of angels met him. Abraham wars with the kings, and returns from their slaughter; then is it that Melchisedec refreshes him with bread and wine. After conflict, content; after battle, banquet. When thou hast waited on thy Lord, then thou shalt sit down, and thy Master will gird himself and wait upon thee. Yes, let the worldling say what he will about the hardness of religion, we do not find it so. We do confess that reaping is no child’s play; that toiling for Christ has its difficulties and its troubles; but still the bread which we eat is very sweet, and the wine which we drink is crushed from celestial clusters —
“I would not change my bless’d estate
For all the world calls good or great
And while my faith can keep her hold,
I envy not the sinner’s gold.”
II. Follow me while we turn to a second point. To THESE MEALS THE GLEANER IS AFFECTIONATELY INVITED. That is to say, the poor, trembling stranger who has not strength enough to reap; who has no right to be in the field, except the right of charity — the poor, trembling sinner, conscious of his own demerit, and feeling but little hope and little joy. To the meals of the strong-handed, fully-assured reaper, the gleaner is invited.
The gleaner is invited, in the text, to come. “At mealtime, come thou hither.” We have known some who felt ashamed to come to the House of God; but we trust you will none of you be kept away from the place of feasting by any shame on account of your dress, or your personal character, or your poverty; nay, nor even on account of your physical infirmities. “At mealtime come thou hither.” I have heard of a deaf woman who could never hear a sound, and yet she was always in the House of God, and when asked why, her reply was, “Because a friend found her the text, and then God was pleased to give her many a sweet thought upon the text while she sat in his House; besides,” she said, “she felt that as a believer, she ought to honor God by her presence in his courts, and recognizing her union with his people; and, better still, she always liked to be in the best of company, and as the presence of God was there, and the holy angels, and the saints of the Most High, whether she could hear or no, she would go.” There is a brother whose face I seldom miss from this house, who, I believe, has never in his life heard a sound, and cannot make an articulate utterance, yet he is a joyful believer, and loves the place where God’s honor dwelleth. Well, now, I think if such persons find pleasure in coming, we who can hear, though we feel our unworthiness, though we are conscious that we are not fit to come, should be desirous to be laid in the House of God, as the sick were at the pool of Bethesda, hoping that the waters may be stirred, and that we may step in and be healed. Trembling soul, never let the temptations of the devil keep thee from God’s House. “At mealtime come thou hither.”
Moreover, she was bidden not only to come, but to eat. Now, whatever there is sweet and comfortable in the Word of God, ye that are of a broken and contrite spirit, are invited to partake of it. “Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners” — sinners such as you are. “In due time Christ died for the ungodly” — for such ungodly ones as you feel yourselves to be. You are desiring this morning to be Christ’s. Well, you may be Christ’s. You are saying in your heart, “O that I could eat the children’s bread! “You may eat it. You say, “I have no right.” But he gives you the invitation! Come without any other right than the right of his invitation. I know you will say how unworthy you are.
“Let not conscience make you linger,
Nor of fitness fondly dream.”
But since he bids you “come,” take him at his word; and if there be a promise, believe it; if there be rich consolation, drink it; if there be an encouraging word, accept it, and let the sweetness of it be yours.
Note further, that she was not only invited to eat the bread, but to dip her morsel in the vinegar. We must not look upon this as being some sour stuff. No doubt there are crabbed souls in the Church, who always dip their morsel in the sourest imaginable vinegar, and with a grim liberality invite others to share a little comfortable misery with them; but the vinegar in my text is altogether another thing. This was either a compound of various sweets expressed from fruits, or else it was that weak kind of wine mingled with water which is still commonly used in the harvest-fields of Italy, and the warmer parts of the world — a drink not exceedingly strong, but excellently cooling, and good enough to impart a relish to the reapers’ food. It was, to use the only word which will give the meaning, a sauce, which the Orientals used with their bread. As we use butter, or as they on other occasions used oil, so in the harvest-field, believing it to have cooling properties they used what is here called vinegar. Beloved, the Lord’s reapers have sauce with their bread; they have sweet consolations; they have not merely doctrines, but the holy unction which is the essence of doctrines; they have not merely truths, but a hallowed and ravishing delight accompanies the truths. Take, for instance, the doctrine of election, which is like the bread; there is a sauce to dip that in. When I can say, “He loved me before the foundations of the world,” the personal application, the personal enjoyment of my interest in the truth becomes a sauce into which I dip my morsel. And you, poor gleaner, are invited to dip your morsel in it too. I used to hear people sing that hymn of Toplady’s, which begins —
“A debtor to mercy alone,
Of covenant mercy I sing;
Nor fear with thy righteousness on,
My person and offerings to bring.”
And rises to its climax —
“Yes, I to the end shall endure,
As sure as the earnest is given;
More happy, but not more secure,
The glorified spirits in heaven.”
And I used to think I could never sing that hymn. It was the sauce, you know. I might manage to eat some of the plain bread, but I could not dip it in that sauce. It was too high doctrine, too sweet, too consoling. But I thank God I have since ventured to dip my morsel in it, and now I hardly like my bread without it. I would have every trembling sinner be prepared to take the comfortable parts of God’s Word, even those called “HIGH.” I hope, brethren, you will never grow as some Christians do, who like all sauce, and no bread. There are some high-flying brethren, who must have nothing but the vinegar; and very sour it turns upon their stomachs too. I hope you will love the bread. A little of the vinegar, a little of the spice, and much savor; but let us keep to the bread as well; let us love all revealed truth; and if there be a trembling gleaner here, let me invite and persuade her to come hither, to eat the bread, and to dip her morsel in the sauce.
Now I think I see her, and she is half prepared to come, for she is very hungry, and she has brought nothing with her this morning; but she begins to say. “I have no right to come, for I am not a reaper; I do nothing for Christ; I did not even come here this morning to honor him; I came here, as gleaners go into a cornfield, from a selfish motive, to pick up what I could for myself; and all the religion that I have lies in this — the hope that I may be saved; I do not glorify God; I do no good to other people; I am only a selfish gleaner; I am not a reaper.” Ah! but thou art invited to come. Make no questions about it. Boaz bids thee. Take thou his invitation, and enter at once. But, you say, “I am such a poor gleaner; though it is all for myself, yet it is little I get at it; I get a few thoughts while the sermon is being preached, but I lose them before I reach home.” I know you do, poor weak-handed woman. But still, Jesus invites thee. Come! Take thou the sweet promise as he presents it to thee, and let no bashfulness of thine send thee home hungry. “But,” you say, “I am a stranger; you do not know my sins, my sinfulness, and the waywardness of my heart.” But Jesus does; and yet Jesus invites you! He knows you are but a Moabitess, a stranger from the commonwealth of Israel; but he bids you. Is not that enough? “Eat the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar.” “But,” you say, “I owe so much to him already; it is so good of him to spare my forfeited life, and so tender of him to let me hear the gospel preached at all; I cannot have the presumption to be an intruder, and sit with the reapers.” Oh! but he bids you. There is more presumption in your doubting than there could be in your believing. HE bids you. Will you refuse Boaz? Shall Jesus’ lips give the invitation, and will you say me nay? Come, now, come. Remember that the little which Ruth could eat did not make Boaz any the poorer; and all that thou wantest will make Christ none the less glorious, or full of grace. What! are thy necessities large? Yes, but his supplies are larger. Dost thou require great mercy? He is a great Savior. I tell thee, that his mercy is no more to be exhausted than the sea is to be drained; or than the sun is to be rendered dim by the excess of the light which he pours forth to day. Come, thou. There is enough for thee, and Boaz will not be hurt thereby. Moreover, let me tell thee a secret — Jesus loves thee; therefore it is that he would have thee feed at his table. If thou art now a longing, trembling sinner, willing to be saved, but conscious that thou deservest it not, Jesus loves thee, sinner, and he will take more delight in seeing thee eat than thou wilt take in the eating. Let the sweet love he feels in his soul toward thee draw thee to him. And what is more — but this is a great secret, and must only be whispered in your ear — he intends to be married to you; and when you are married to him, why, the fields will be yours; for, of course, if you are the spouse, you are joint-proprietor with him. Is it not so? Doth not the wife share with the husband? All those promises which are “yea and Amen in Christ” shall be yours; nay, they all are yours now, for “the man is next of kin unto you,” and ere long he will spread his skirt over you, and take you unto himself for ever, espousing you in faithfulness, and truth, and righteousness. Will you not eat of your own? “Oh! but,” says one, “how can it be? I am a stranger.” Yes, a stranger: but Jesus Christ loves the stranger. “A publican, a sinner;” but he is “the friend of publicans and sinners.” “An outcast;” but he “gathereth together the outcasts of Israel.” “A stray sheep;” but the shepherd “leaves the ninety and nine,” to seek it. “A lost piece of money;” but he “sweeps the house” to find thee. “A prodigal son;” but he sets the bells a ringing when he knows that thou wilt return. Come, Ruth! Come, trembling gleaner! Jesus invites thee: accept the invitation. “At mealtime come thou hither, and eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar.”
III. Now, thirdly — and here is a very sweet point in the narrative. BOAZ REACHED HER THE PARCHED CORN. “She did come and eat.” Where did she sit? You notice, she “sat beside the reapers.” She did not feel that she was one of them — she “sat beside” them. Just as some of you do, who do not come down here this evening to the Lord’s Supper, but sit in the gallery. You are sitting “beside the reapers.” You are sitting this morning as if you were not one of us — had no right to be among the people of God; still you will sit beside us. If there is a good thing to be had, and you cannot get it, you will get as near as you can to those who do; you think there is some comfort even in looking on at the gracious feast.” “She sat beside the reapers.”
And while she was sitting there, what happened? Did she stretch forth her hand and get the food herself? No, it is written, “HE reached her the parched corn.” Ah! that is it. I give the invitation, brother, to-day; give it earnestly, affectionately, sincerely; but I know very well, that while I give it, no trembling heart will accept it, unless the King himself comes near, and feasts his saints to-day. He must reach the parched corn; he must give you to drink of “the juice of the spiced wine of his pomegranate.” How does he do this? By his gracious spirit, he first of all inspires your faith. You are afraid to think it can be true, that such a sinner as you are accepted in the beloved; he breathes upon you, and your faint hope becomes an expectancy, and that expectation buds and blossoms into an appropriating faith, which says, “Yes, my beloved is mine, and his desire is toward me.”
Having done this, the Savior does more; he sheds abroad the love of God in your heart. The love of Christ is like sweet perfume in a box. Now, he who put the perfume in the box is the only person that knows how to take the lid off. He, with his own skillful hand, takes the lid from the box; then it is “shed abroad” like “ointment poured forth.” You know it may be there, and yet not be shed abroad. As you walk in a wood, there may be a have or a partridge there, and yet you may never see it; but when you startle it, and it flies or runs before you, then you perceive it. And there may be the love of God in your heart, not in exercise, but still there; and at last you may have the privilege of seeing it — seeing your love mount with wings to heaven, and your faith running without weariness. Christ must shed abroad that love; his spirit must put your graces into exercise.
But Jesus does more than this; he reaches the parched corn with his own hand, when he gives us close communion with him. Do not think that this is a dream; I tell you there is such a thing as talking with Christ to-day. As certainly as I can talk with my dearest friend, or find solace in the company of my beloved wife, so surely may I speak with Jesus, and find intense delight in the company of Immanuel. It is not a fiction. We do not worship a far-off Savior; he is a God nigh at hand. We do not adore him as one who is gone away to heaven, and who never can be approached; but he is nigh us, in our mouth and in our heart, and we do to-day walk with him as the elect did of old, and commune with him as his apostles did on earth; not after the flesh, it is true, but after a real and spiritual fashion.
Yet once more let me add, the Lord Jesus is pleased to reach the parched corn, in the best sense, when the Spirit gives us the infallible witness within, that we are “born of God.” A man may know that he is a Christian infallibly. Philip de Morny, who lived in the time of Prince Henry of Navarre, was wont to say that the Holy Spirit had made his own salvation to him as clear a point as ever a problem proved to a demonstration in Euclid could be. You know with what mathematical precision the scholar of Euclid solves a problem or proves a proposition, and just the same, with as absolute a precision, as certainly as twice two are four, we may “know that we have passed from death unto life.” The sun in the heavens is not more clear to the eye than his own salvation to an assured believer; such a man would as soon doubt his own existence, as suspect his interest in eternal life.
Now let the prayer be breathed by poor Ruth, who is trembling yonder. Lord, reach me the parched corn! “Draw me, we will run after thee.” Lord, send thy love into my heart!
“Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove,
With all thy quickening powers,
Come, shed abroad a Savior’s love,
And that shall kindle ours.”
There is no getting at Christ, except by Christ revealing himself to us.
IV. And now the last point. After Boaz had reached the parched corn, we are told that “SHE DID EAT, AND WAS SUFFICED, AND LEFT.” So shall it be with every Ruth. Sooner or later every penitent shall become a believer. There may be a space of deep conviction, and a period of much hesitation; but there shall come a season, when the soul decides for the Lord. If I perish, I perish. I will go as I am to Jesus. I will not play the fool any longer with my buts and ifs, but since he bids me believe that he died for me, I will believe it, and will trust his cross for my salvation. And oh! whenever you shall be privileged to do this, you shall be “satisfied.” “She did eat, and was satisfied.” Your head shall be satisfied with the precious truth which Christ reveals; your heart shall be content with Jesus, as the altogether lovely object of affection; your hope shall be satisfied, for whom have you in heaven but Christ? your desire shall be satiated, for what can even the hunger of your desire wish for more than “to know Christ, and to be found in him.” You shall find Jesus fill your conscience, till it is at perfect peace; he shall fill your judgment, till you know the certainty of his teachings; he shall fill your memory with recollections of what he did, and fill your imagination with the prospects of what he is yet to do.
“She was satisfied, and she left.” Some of us have had deep draughts; we have thought that we could take in all of Christ; but when we have done our best, we have had to leave a vast remainder. We have sat down with a ravenous appetite at the table of the Lord’s love, and said, “Now, nothing but the infinite can ever satisfy me; I am such a great sinner that I must have infinite merit to wash my sin away;” but we have had our sin removed, and found that there was merit to spare; we have had our hunger relieved, and found that there was a redundance for others who were in a similar case. There are certain sweet things in the Word of God which you and I have not enjoyed yet, and which we cannot enjoy yet; we are obliged to leave them for a while. “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.” There is a knowledge to which we have not attained — a place of fellowship nearer yet to Christ. There are heights of communion which as yet our feet have not climbed — virgin snows upon the mountain untrodden by the foot of man. There is a yet beyond, and there will be for ever.
A verse or two further on we are told what Ruth did with her leavings. It is a very bad habit. I believe, at feasts, to carry anything home with you; but she did, for that which was left she took home; and when she reached Naomi, and showed her the quantity of wheat in her apron, after she had asked “Where hast thou gleaned to-day?” and had received the answer, she gave to Naomi a portion of that which she had reserved after she was sufficed. So it shall be even with you, poor tremblers, who think you have no right to any for yourselves; you shall be able to eat and be quite satisfied, and what is more, you shall have a morsel to carry to others in a like condition. I am always pleased to find the young believer beginning to pocket something for other people. When you hear a sermon, you think, “Well, poor mother cannot get out to-day, I will tell her something about it. There now, that point will just suit her; I will take that, if I forget anything else; I will tell her that by the bedside. There is my brother William, who will not come with me to chapel; I wish he would; but, now, there was something which struck me in the sermon, and when I get close to him, I will tell him that, and I will say, ‘Will you not come this evening?’ I will tell him those portions which interested me; perhaps they will interest him.” There are your children in the Sunday-school class. You say, “That illustration will do for them.” I think sometimes, when I see you putting down my metaphors on little scraps of paper, that you may recollect to tell somebody else; I would fain give more where they are so well used; I would let fall an extra handful, on purpose that there may be enough for you, and for your friends. There is an abominable spirit of self among some professors, prompting them to eat their morsel alone. They get the honey; it is a wood full of honey, like Jonathan’s wood; and yet they are afraid — afraid, lest they should eat it all up; so they try to maintain a monopoly. I do know some congregations which seem to me to be a sort of spiritual protectionists; they are afraid heaven will be too full, that there will not be room enough for them. When an invitation is given to a sinner, they do not like it — it is too open, too general; and when there is a melting heart and a tearful eye for the conversion of other people, they feel quite out of their element; they never know what it is to take home that which is left, and give to others. Cultivate an unselfish spirit. Seek to love as you have been loved. Remember that “the law and the prophets” lie in this, to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and your neighbor as yourself.” How can you love him as yourself, if you do not love his soul? You have loved your own soul; through grace you have been led to lay hold on Jesus. Love your neighbor’s soul and never be satisfied till you see him in the enjoyment of those things which are the charm of your life and the joy of your spirit. I do not know how to give my invitation in a more comfortable way; but as we are sitting down to feed at his table in the evening of this day, I pray the Master to reach a large handful of parched corn to some trembling sinner, and enable him to eat and be satisfied.
A GOOD STAYER
HERE is an account of a pretty little fix for a cargo of passengers by a mail coach. The anecdote may be found in Anthony Trollope’s “Editor Notes,” in the chapter devoted to the literary adventure of “Mrs. Brumby”: — “There is, however, nothing more difficult to achieve than the expulsion of a woman who is unwilling to quit the place she occupies. We remember to have seen a lady take possession of a seat in a mail-coach to which she was not entitled, and which had been booked and paid for by another person. The agent for the coaching business desired her with many threats to descend, but she simply replied that the journey to her was a matter of such moment that she felt herself called upon to keep her place. The agent sent the coachman to pull her out. The coachman threatened with his hands as well as with his words, and then set the guard at her. The guard attacked her with inflamed visage and fearful words about Her Majesty’s mails, and then he set the ostlers at her. We thought the ostlers were going to handle her roughly, but it ended by their scratching their heads, and by a declaration on the part of one of them that she was ‘the rummest go he’d ever seen.’ She was a woman, and they couldn’t touch her. A policeman was called upon for assistance, who offered to lock her up, but he could only do so if allowed to lock up the whole coach as well. It was ended by the production of another coach, by the exchange of the luggage and passengers, by a delay of two hours, and an embarrassing possession of the original vehicle by the lady.” We give the above because it has its parallel in certain ministers who cannot be induced to move although everybody is eager to see them gone. One by one, deacons, subscribers, and friends withdraw, but the ministerial old ladies stick to the empty coach, as if it were part and parcel of themselves, as much as its shell is an integral portion of the snail Hence the new chapel, which springs up, and makes two churches where one would have been quite enough if it had not been for the adhesiveness of an individual. It is a great sorrow that churches should be ruined because worthy men cannot see that the time is come for a change. But what is the use of our writing this? We shall only put removing into the head of some brother who ought to stay where he is, while those whom it behoves to move will stick like limpets. — C. H. S.
NOTES
MR. EDWARD WHITE, the earnest and able advocate of the doctrine of Conditional Immortality, says: — “ No one yields to me in hearty admiration and affection for the Rev. Chas. Spurgeon. But his refusal to listen to the doctrine of Life in Christ has formed a more serious obstacle to its popular diffusion than that of any other living man during the last twenty years.” We are fully prepared to take all the responsibility of the conduct ascribed to us, and only trust that we may have power to be a more serious obstacle still. With the most profound regard for Mr. White, and something more tender than regard, we cannot help mingling our regret that he should be teaching such mischievous doctrine, an that so many should follow him in it.
On Monday evening, May 22, the half-yearly meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE EVANGELISTS’ ASSOCIATION was held in conjunction with the usual prayer-meeting. Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presided, and commended the work to the sympathy and support of all present. Mr. Elvin, the indefatigable secretary of the Association, gave a brief description of the work carried on by his earnest band of unpaid evangelists, two of whom, Messrs. Pullen and Shurmer, also spoke. Mr. Elvin expressed the fear that the services held by the Association this year will not exceed the number reported at the last annual meeting — i. e., 3,380; but even if his anticipations are realized — what a grand work will be accomplished! This is one of the most useful and economical agencies for the spread of the gospel in the metropolis, and deserves the help of all Christians who desire to see the millions of London converted to Christ. More young preachers are needed by the society, and more funds with which to hire halls and pay traveling expenses: all the rest is gratis work. The Society’s design is to work with the churches, and for them, and not to be an outside agency to draw men away from their regular places of worship. Ministers in or near London wishing for a week of special services can apply to Mr. Elvin, 30, Surrey-square, S.E., who will send suitable evangelists.
On Friday erecting, June 9, the annual meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE COUNTRY MISSION was held in the Lecture Hall, under the presidency of Pastor C. H. Spurgeon. The stormy weather that prevailed during the afternoon and evening reduced the attendance somewhat, but did not lessen the enthusiasm that is usually manifested at this meeting. Mr. G. Goldston, the secretary of the Mission, presented the annual report, and Mr. R. Hayward, the treasurer, read the balance-sheet. There are twentyone members, and services are being held in North Cheam; Bell Green, Sydenham; Thornton Heath; Shoreham, and Halstead, Kent; Teddington; South-gate; Stratford; and Bedport and Hatton; while in the following places the work is being caddied on without the assistance of the Mission, in most cases churches having been formed, and in some instances chapels built: — Tiptree Heath, Putney, Carshalton, Walthamstow, St. Mary Cray, Lower Tooting, Little Paris-street, Pope-street, and Willesden. The total expenditure of the Mission for the year has been £168 12s., the principal items being traveling expenses of the preachers, who give their services freely; and the rent, furniture, and fittings of chapels and halls. To meet this amount the Pastor has been pleased to find £48 10s.; subscriptions and donations have realized £31 13s. 8d.; offerings and collections at the stations, £64 16s.; and at the date of the meeting a small balance was due to the treasurer. Addresses were delivered by the chairman, and Messrs. Millidge, Durbin, Greenstreet, Chalmers, Crathern, McLauchlan, and Clark; Mr. Chamberlain sang a sacred solo; and Mr. Keys was presented with a gold pencil as a token of gratitude for his services at Teddington. This Country Mission is a sort of twin-sister to the Evangelists’ Association, and is doing a most useful work in the villages around London. It merits far more help than it receives. It is also an excellent training-school for earnest Christian young men who desire opportunities for exercising their gifts as preachers of the gospel. Friends in destitute localities in the suburbs would do well to communicate with this Society.
Stranges’ Sunday Evening, June 11. — This service was crowded. All sorts and conditions of men were there; but we judge from the universality of the singing that the bulk of the attendants were such as usually attend places of worship. Before the multitude had dispersed our scouts had pleasing proof that when Christ is lifted up men are drawn to him. Certain brethren scattered over the Tabernacle are ever on the watch for those who ax wounded, and many a case is thus speedily cared for, which otherwise might have been left to suffer in secret.
On Monday evening, June 12, the annual meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE HOME AND FOREIGN MISSIONARY WORKING SOCIETY Was held in the lecture-hall. Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presided, and spoke of the continued need of the society’s work in sending parcels of clothing to poor ministers and their families, many of whom, especially in the country districts, are in more straitened circumstances than ever, as the consequence of agricultural depression. Addresses were also delivered by Pastor J. A. Spurgeon, Mr. Harrald, who read the report, and Mrs. Evans, the esteemed treasurer and manager of the society. She asked very earnestly for additional subscribers, and expressed the wish that every member of the church would give at least one garment during the year. (This is a capital practical hint. From a coat to a pinafore there is a wide range of articles, suited to all pockets.) The report referred to the loss the committee had sustained by the death of Mrs. Scott, an invaluable friend, and included a short letter from Mrs. Spurgeon, the beloved President of the Society, and also copies of the grateful epistles that had been received from several of the applicants who had been relieved during the year. Mention was made of the kind help of the Shooter’s Hill Baptist Chapel Auxiliary, which has contributed 269 articles of clothing since the last anniversary. Forty-seven parcels have been sent to ministers, and nine to colporteurs, the total value of the gifts amounting to £298 9s. 1d., about 230 children have been clothed, and 1707 ready-made garments have been sent, 580 yards of dress material, besides sheets, blankets, and other useful articles. The total expenditure for the year was about £110, and there was a balance of £10 18s. 8d. due to the treasurer, but this was more than. cleared off by a donation of £20 from the chairman. Contributions of money, or garments, or materials to be made up, will be gratefully received by- Mrs. Evans, Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington. Drapers could help us much by giving remnants, Half-worn garments are also acceptable.
The Tabernacle prayer-meeting held on the same evening was dedicated to missionary subjects. Our own work abroad constantly furnishes interesting topics. Two brethren were present who had given themselves to missionwork, and Mr. Harry Wood, having returned from Australia, gave some interesting details. We are greatly gratified to find that under the leadership of Mrs. Allison a society has been formed to support a sister in the Zenana work in India. We glorify God as we see how in every form our beloved friends lengthen the cords and strengthen the stakes of our Tabernacle work.
On Monday evening, June 19, at the Tabernacle prayer-meeting, the following resolution from the elders of the church was read by Mr. J. T. Dunn, and adopted by the whole assembly, who manifested their sympathy with its spirit by rising and singing the doxology: — “We, the elders of the church, in meeting assembled, on this nineteenth day of June, 1882, desire to present to Almighty God our heartfelt thanks for the continued preservation of our Pastor to the church and his much-loved work; and on this, his forty-eighth anniversary, we earnestly and heartily pray that his valued life may still · be preserved to labor in our midst, that with his ever-increasing consecration, he may enjoy renewed health and spiritual power, and that yet larger success may attend his ministry than it has hitherto been his joy to experience.”
From the 19th and onward we have received so many letters containing sums large and small, that we have scarcely known how to acknowledge all the messages of love. Writing as we now do, on the early morning of the 21st, we find that we have received, almost entirely in small sums, the large amount of £380 as birthday presents for the Orphanage. Much more will be put into our own hand to-day if the weather keeps fine. Perchance we can stop the press, and insert a brief paragraph this evening. We are very grateful to all these thoughtful friends; some of them live hundreds of miles away, and yet never forget the Pastor’s birthday. If this money were given to the Pastor for his own use he would feel humiliated by it; but now it comes with the blessing which maketh rich, and addeth no sorrow therewith. Poor orphans are thus helped, and we have the joy of it. Two friends send £48 each to mark our age; one of them says wittily that we grow dearer every year. On closing up the, accounts for the day we find that the Orphanage will be benefited to the extent of at least £1000. The fete was a grand success in every respect. Between seven and eight thousand persons were present, and everything passed off most happily. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
COLLEGE. — Mr. C. Pearce, who has continued to be pastor of the church at Frogmore-street, Tring, while studying at the College, has now completed his course with us, and remains with the people of his charge; and Mr. A. H. Smith has settled at Coningsby, Lincolnshire. Mr. G. Simmons is removing from New Malden to Feet’s Cray.
Mr. A. W. Wood has been accepted by the Baptist Missionary Society for the pastorate of the church at Agra; and Mr. A. Fairbrother is going out to New Zealand as soon as possible, in response to a request from our son Thomas for a student who would devote himself to mission-work among the Maories. We should be glad of help towards the expense of sendingout this brother.
Mr. W. Mann, who has been for the past two years co-pastor with Mr. Hamilton at Cape Town, has returned to England. His voyage home was a pleasant contrast to his double shipwreck on the passage out. We hope he will soon find a suitable sphere in which he can turn to good account the experience he has gained in the colony. A letter will find him at the Tabernacle. Mr. J. S. Harrison, who has been greatly blessed as an evangelist in the Australian colonies, has come home, and is engaging in evangelistic work in the provinces. Mr. Harry Wood also is occupying himself in a similar manner until the way is made clear for his return to the Antipodes.
Mr. Kendon sends us a very cheering account of the progress of his work in Jamaica. In January he baptized twenty-five persons, and in April thirtythree more, and his church now numbers eight hundred and fifty members, about one-fourth of whom, however, are too old and feeble to get out to the services often. Financially, also, there is a great improvement in his position and prospects, and he hopes by the end of the year three of his mission-stations will be able to unite in forming a church, which will support another pastor. How great is our joy as we see our brethren thus blessed of the Lord!
On -Friday afternoon, May 26, Dr. Weymouth, the head master of Mill Hill School, delivered an admirable lecture to the students on “Reading aloud.” On the same day the London ministers connected with the Conference spent the afternoon and evening with the President at “Westwood,” and on the following Friday the students had a similar treat. On -Friday afternoon, June 16, Mr. Spurgeon presided at the Communion service of the students of Regent’s-park College, and had happy intercourse with Dr. Angus and the brethren.
Monday, June 19, was generally observed throughout our Conference brotherhood as a day of special united prayer. We have heard from several brethren who experienced very gracious manifestations of the Holy Spirit’s influence in their meetings, and we look for corresponding results.
The College midsummer vacation ends on Monday, August 7. We have received only a few students since the summer session last year, and as many have gone out to the work since that time, our numbers have been decreased below our usual average. We have, however, accepted about twenty candidates out of the long list of applicants, and with this addition we do not expect to have any more vacancies during the present year. Our men are moved with missionary impulses, and with desires to open new churches, so that we hope we shall not in a single case increase the number of unemployed preachers. There is room in this guilty world for all the heralds of mercy that can be sent forth. We may not yet cease from crying to the Lord to send forth laborers into his harvest.
EVANGELISTS. — The following letter from Mr. Fullerton so well explains the matters he wishes us to communicate to our readers, that we cannot do better than print it just as it is. We shall be happy to receive contributions towards the purchase of the sermons mentioned in the letter: —
“45, Doddington-grove,
“Kennington-park, S.E.
“5th June, 1882.“Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — You will be pleased to know that the services at Trinity Chapel, Edgware-road, have been blessed remarkably to the salvation of souls, and that, notwithstanding the Whitsuntide holidays, most of the meetings have been well attended. To our Master be all the praise, as his is all the power.
“Some interesting cases of conversion have come under our notice, one of which I must tell you. When at Abbey-road, St. John’s wood, some months ago, we had several meetings for men only. As is our custom, we gave each man one of your sermons at the close of the service, in the hope that if the spoken sermon did not reach their heart through the ear, the printed one might through the eye. One afternoon a man, who had not been to a place of worship for years before, took home a sermon, and his wife, who was very ill, read it eagerly, while he, interested in the first service, went again in the evening. At the end of the sermon were the lines —
‘I’m a poor sinner, and nothing at all,
But Jesus Christ is my all in all.’“As the woman read, feeling the first line was true of her, she longed to experience likewise the truth of the second. When her husband returned, this time bringing with him one. of the little hymn-books used at our services, she was thoroughly aroused. On opening the book she noticed the words of an anthem, ‘I will arise,’ which being repeated when sung, are printed twice, thus: — ‘I will arise, -I will arise’; the italics lending a seeming emphasis to them the second time. This struck her, and she determined to say them the third time, which she did on her knees, until — her soul filled with the peace of God — she was able to add —
‘Jesus Christ is my all in all.’
This account I had from her own lips, as she felt she must come and confess what the Lord had done for her.
“Thus the meetings are blessed of God far beyond the radius known to us at the time, and the sermons are once more made the instrument of leading souls to Christ. Seeing this, we are determined to continue. to scatter them more than ever, and have arranged with your publishers to have one hundred thousand laid aside for our use. This number will probably be sufficient for two years. They have kindly promised to supply them, bound in book form, for £250, of which amount they, with their usual liberality, will contribute £50. This leaves a balance of £200, towards which we should be very grateful to receive the offerings of those interested in the spread of gospel literature and the furtherance of evangelistic work.
“Will you, dear Mr. Spurgeon, kindly bring the matter before your readers, and be so good as to receive any sums they may forward? Messrs. Passmore and Alabaster, 4, Paternoster-buildings, E.C., inform us that they will be pleased to place any amount forwarded to them to the credit of this account. Surely some loyal hearts, in view of the great blessing resting upon these sermons, and the eagerness with which they are received — of which the above is only one instance out of many — will be led to assist. No surer way could be conceived of sending a clear statement of the gospel into thousands of homes where it would otherwise be unknown.
“On June 11 we leave our present work with good Mr. Fellowes to begin with Brother Bax at Salters’ Hall, whence we proceed on July 2 to friend Wilson, at Woolwich, where, in conjunction witch nearly all the churches, we hope to carry on a mission for three weeks. We shall then practically have completed a year’s work in London, and from the almost uniform success resting upon it, have disproved; in great measure, the idea that it is harder to labor in the metropolis than elsewhere, provided the same effort is put forth. For all the blessing vouchsafed we adore the Giver of every good gift, and thank the beloved brethren who have received us so heartily in the name of the Lord.
“After the summer interval, which Mr. Smith and myself alike require for rest after the continued strain, and preparation for future service, we propose to visit Bath, Gloucester, etc., in the autumn, and remain some months in that district. We hope still to make some further arrangements with places in the neighborhood, so as to concentrate the influence of the work; perhaps you will, therefore, let friends know that you will give the preference during the coming season to invitations from the southwest of England.
“With hearty and affectionate greeting,
“Believe me, dear President,
“Very sincerely yours,“W. Y. FULLERTON.’’
Mr. Fellowes has also written as follows: —
“My dear Mr. Spurgeon, — Knowing how much it delights your heart to hear of any good work done for the Lord, especially when the workers are those whom you have sent forth, I write to tell you how marvelously God has blessed the earnest labors of your beloved evangelists, Messrs. Fuller-ton and Smith, at Trinity Chapel. They were here three weeks, from the 21st May until the 10th June, and being at liberty — if conducting three large services on the same day before coming admits of the use of the word — they generously returned last night (June 18th), when the chapel was again filled to overflowing, and better still, many precious souls were led into the light, the liberty., and the love of God. Hallelujah!
“We have good cause for thanksgiving and praise, for a full month of the choicest mercies has been graciously granted to this church and neighborhood. The first week was spent in humbling ourselves before God, confessing our shortcomings, beseeching him to put away the iniquities of our holy things, to consecrate us afresh for his service, and to abundantly bless the labors of the two devoted men we were expecting in our midst.
“Ere the week had gone, we began to see and feel that the Lord is indeed very merciful, we experienced a return of first-love, a renewal of spiritual strength, and a holy, expectant joy which the wealth of worlds could not purchase, nor the choicest words describe.
“Our beloved brethren came, and of the forty-seven services held during their stay you will be delighted, but scarcely surprised to hear, that not one was barren of remarkable blessing, or wanting in much, and we verily believe, lasting good. It is always too early to boast of results, but never too soon to praise God for them, so we had a praise-meeting on the Monday after the departure of the two faithful and true witnesses for God. Meanwhile each worker’s list had been collected and corrected, and it was found that we had the names and addresses of more than two hundred persons, the major part of whom profess to have been savingly converted, and the remainder to have been restored from a state of backsliding. Oh, sir, it is a time of blessing at ‘Trinity.’ We have seen the strong man, when smitten by the sword of the Spirit, in a perfect agony of soul, we have witnessed his great frame convulsed while in the throes of the new birth, and heard him crying most piteously for pardon and deliverance from the bondage of sin. We nave seen well-nigh twenty children leap into spiritual liberty, and listened to testimonies from their lips that none but the cynical believer or the captious unbeliever could gainsay or resist. Nor is this all, during this happy harvest-time of the church we have beheld in many, many cases the long-sealed fount of tears in the aged burst forth at the remembrance of a lifetime of sin, and been moved to tears ourselves as we heard their prayer offered in broken, but touching accents for a full forgiveness. Yes, and we have seen several such pass from spiritual death to everlasting life, and go on their way with a new song in their mouth, even praise unto our God. Nor can we ever forget the melting sight of poor drunkards in distress of soul, as on their bended knees, with pen in hand, ready to sign a pledge to abstain, by the help of God, from the drink that has wrought their social ruin — pausing in the act to pray for the pardon of sins committed against their wives and children, and then beseeching Christ to help them by his grace to keep the pledge till death. These, and a hundred other sacred scenes, have been witnessed by us. Husbands and wives have within one and the same hour believed on Christ, and gone home rejoicing; backsliders have left their broken cisterns of earthly pleasure, asked for the old ways, and returned to God as the eternal spring of all their joys; while in other instances, friends and neighbors have been blessed in answer to believing prayer. I am happy to say the good work is still going on, and sincerely do I pray that it may continue to do so, until it is possible for your two unwearying workers to pay us another visit. Hoping in a few days to forward cheque for £25 or £30 — I hope the latter — and with every best wish, believe me,
“Your comrade in arms for King Jesus,
“J. O. FELLOWES.”
We hear from Mr. Bax that the services at Salters’ Hall have commenced most hopefully.
COLPORTAGE. — During the past month the work of the Colportage Association has been vigorously carried on, and we note with gratitude that our friends have begun to respond more liberally to the appeal for aid for this deserving and increasing work. The Metropolitan Tabernacle Sunday-school has guaranteed £40 a year towards the support of another colporteur, who will reside at Tring, in Hertfordshire, and work the surrounding district. Another will shortly be sent to labor in the neighborhood of Tittleshall, in Norfolk, in connection with the Norfolk Association, which guarantees £40 a year towards the expenses. Arrangements are also pending for other new districts. The last Annual Report, which contains much interesting information, can be had on application to the Secretary, Mr. W. Corden Jones, Temple-street, St. George’s-road, S.E., who will be happy to give any information about the Association, or receive subscriptions or donations in aid of its operations.
Mr. R. E. Mackenzie has resigned the post of Traveling Secretary, having accepted a commercial appointment in India.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle: — May 29th, thirteen; June 1st, twelve.
Chap 22. AUGUST, 1882.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
AUGUST, 1882.
INAUGURAL ADDRESS
AT THE EIGHTEENTH ANNUAL CONFERENCE OF THE PASTORS’
COLLEGE ASSOCIATION, APRIL 18, 1882.
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
MY dear Brethren, — I greatly value your prayers, and I feel intensely grateful for that Benjamin’s share in them which is ever my portion. I never consciously needed your intercessions more than I do just now, for I may say with the Psalmist, “He weakeneth my strength in the way.” After my severe illness I am trembling like a child who is only commencing to use his feet; it is with difficulty that I keep myself up; what can you expect from one who can scarcely stand? During the last six weeks I have considered from day to day what to say to you, but nothing has come of my consideration. My mind is out of gear, my memory is like the leaking buckets of the daughters of Danaus, and consequently my meditations have been as great a failure as the labors of Sisyphus, when the stone which he rolled up hill rolled back again into its place. I have gone to the pits and found no water, and returned with my vessel empty. My brain has been so occupied with sympathy for the poor body that it has not been able to mount aloft with the eagle, nor even to plume its wines for the lower flight which I must needs attempt this morning. One thing, however, is clear, — I am in special communion with my subject, and can speak, as the good old people used to say, “experimentally.” I cannot, however, draw much aid from that fact, but I cast myself upon the power divine, which has so many times been displayed in weakness. “The Lord hath been mindful of us: he will bless us.”
I draw my subject from the words of Paul in 2 Corinthians 12:10: “When I am weak, then am I strong.” I shall not be guilty of uttering anything fresh upon my theme, neither shall I be able to say anything forcible upon it. The weak side of the experience will come out most observably: I can only pray that the strong side may not be hidden. My own feelings supply me with a commentary upon the text, and that is all the exposition I shall aim at. Our text is not only written in the Bible, but it is inscribed upon the lives of the saints. Though we are not apostles, and shall never be able to claim the inspiration of Paul, yet in this one particular we are as instructed as he was, for we have learned by experience, “When I am weak, then am I strong.” This sentence has passed into a Christian proverb: it is a paradox which has ceased to perplex any child of God: it is at once a warning and a consolation, bidding the strong behold the weakness of power, and setting before the feeble the strength of weakness.
Let it be understood at the commencement that OUR TEXT IS NOT TRUE IN EVERY SENSE in which it might be read. Some brethren are weak with an emphasis, and always so; but I have never yet discovered that they are strong, except in the sense of being headstrong and willful If obstinacy be strength, they are champions; and if conceit be strength, they are gigantic; but in no other respect are they strong. Many are weak, and yet not strong: we must alter the text concerning them, and say, “When they are weak, they are weakness itself.” There is a kind of weakness which we may well dread, it may steal over us insensibly; but it brings no strength, no honor, no virtue with it; it is evil, only evil, and that continually. With it come unfitness for holy service and want of success, and unless infinite grace avert the calamity there will arise out of it failure of character and defeat in life. May we never know the weakness which befell Samson after he had told his secret, and had lost his locks. He could not say, “When I am weak, then am I strong,” but rather, “When I am shorn I am weak as other men.” See what befalls him! “The Philistines be upon thee, Samson!” He cannot now smite them; he cannot protect his own limbs; he cannot guard his own eyes; he cannot obtain his own liberty. Blinded, he toils at the mill; the hero of Israel is become a slave to the uncircumcised! Alas, that such weakness should be possible to a man who had slain his thousands, and laid them heaps upon heaps I Oh that such weakness should be possible to a man who had carried the gates of Gaza away on his shoulders, posts, and bars, and all! And yet it is so, and may be so with us. “Howl, fir-tree; for the cedar is fallen!” Brethren, we must strive against all weakness which leads to sin, lest to us also some Delilah should bring destruction. Samson’s unshorn locks denoted his Nazarite consecration, and if we ever become weak through failure of consecration, such weakness will be fatal to true usefulness. If the man who had “none of self and all of God” grows downward till he craves for “some of self and some of God” he is in a sad condition. If he who once lived to win souls now lives to win silver and gold, his money shall perish with him; if he that once was famous for his Master becomes his own master, he shall be infamous; for I trow that, even if we do nothing wrong in the eyes of man, it is wrong enough to have declined from the whole-hearted service of God. It is this that demons laugh at and that angels marvel at; a man of God living like a man of the world! Even the Lord himself stays a while to ask, “What doest thou here, Elijah?” The holy and the zealous grieve if they see a minister of Christ ministering to his own ambition. We are only strong as our consecration is perfect. Unless we live wholly for God our strength will suffer serious leakage, and our weakness will be of that kind which degrades the believer till the ungodly scornfully inquire, “Art thou also become weak as we? Art thou become like unto us?”
We must, dear friends, never become weak in another sense, namely, in our communion with God. David slackened his fellowship with God, and Satan vanquished him through Bathsheba; Peter followed afar off, and soon denied his Lord. Communion with God is the right arm of our strength, and if this be broken we are weak as water. Without God we can do nothing, and in proportion as we attempt to live without him we ruin ourselves. Alas! that the man who has seen the face of the Strong One, and has been made mighty, should forget where his great strength lieth, and so become sick and enfeebled! He who has suspended his visits to the banqueting-house of hallowed fellowship will be ill-fed, and cry out “My leanness! My leanness! Woe unto me!” He that walks not with the Beloved will soon be a Mephibosheth in the feet, and a Bartimeus in the eyes; timorous in heart, and trembling on the knee. If we are weak in communion with God, we are weak everywhere. If a man can be strong without God, such dangerous strength may fall to the lot of the man who is out of communion; but if it be true that only as we hang upon the Lord we are strong, then broken fellowship will soon bring broken strength.
And, dear friends, there is a kind of weakness which I hope none of you will ever cultivate, though it seems greatly in favor at the present day, namely, weakness of faith; for when I am weak in faith, then I am not strong in the Lord. When a man doubts his God, he weakens himself. A little time ago persons who were full of distrust and unbelief were regarded as the possessors of a deep experience; but I hope the age has for ever gone by in which unbelief shall be regarded as a qualification for eminent saintship. If the gospel message were, “He that doubteth, and is not baptized, shall be saved;” there are many who have made their calling and election sure; but while ours is a gospel of faith, unbelief can never be regarded with complacency. Faith is our battle-ax and weapons of war; woe to the warrior who forgets it. Therefore, brethren, let us separate between weakness and weakness — the weakness which is the token of strength, and weakness in faith which is the indication of spiritual decay.
I pray that we may never be weak in love, but that we may become like Basil, “pillars of fire.” Love is the greatest of all the powers which can possess the human breast. I must not compare love with other graces so as to depreciate any virtue; yet of all active powers love is the most forceful; for even faith worketh by love. Faith does not overcome men’s hearts for Jesus until it takes to itself this wondrous weapon, and then believingly loves them to Christ. Oh, for a passionate love, a love which shall be a pure flame, burning to a white heat, and consuming us. May this flame burn in the very center of our being. May we love our God intensely, and love the people for his sake. Brethren, be strong there! Depend upon it, if you leave off loving the people to whom you preach, and the truth you are ordained to proclaim, the state of the church will be as when a standard-bearer fainteth. There may remain to you strength of passionate temper, strength to offend, and strength to scatter; but the power of God will be withdrawn. You will, like Phaeton, bind the horses to the chariot of the sun, but they shall only hurry you to swift destruction.
We want, brethren — oh how we would pine for it to be delivered from all weakness of the spiritual life. We want to outgrow the weakness natural to us as babes in Christ, so that we may become young men who are strong; yes, we need to go beyond this, and to become fully developed men in Christ Jesus, “strong in the Lord and in the power of his might.” If we are weak in that respect we are strong nowhere. As ministers we ought to covet all the spiritual strength which God is ready to bestow. Would to God that the Holy Ghost who dwelleth in us found nothing within to impede him, and nothing to restrain his influences! O that the full Godhead of the blessed Spirit might as much manifest itself in these mortal bodies of ours as once the Godhead of the second Person manifested itself in the person of Christ Jesus, the Son of man. I mean not, of course, miraculously, nor in any way to make us rival the incommunicable glories of our divine Master; but even to its fullness I would that our nature, like the bush in Horeb, were aglow with the indwelling Deity. Never mind though the bush should be consumed; it were well to be consumed so long as the Spirit of God would dwell in us and manifest his power.
Thus, you see, there are senses in which we contradict the text flatly, and thereby establish its true meaning. If it were true that all who are weak are strong, we might straightway find a vigorous ministry by ransacking our hospitals, enlisting a troop from our idiot asylums, and calling together all of weak brain and garrulous tongue. No, no, it is not given to the fearful and unbelieving, the foolish and the frivolous to claim that their mental, moral, and spiritual weaknesses are a fit platform for the revelation of the divine strength.
A second observation must be brought before you before I actually come to the text. THERE IS ANOTHER FORM OF IT WHICH IS CLEARLY TRUE. “When I am strong, then am I weak.” That is true, almost as true as, “When I am weak, then am I strong”; of course, not true in all senses, but so nearly correct that I would recommend its acceptation as a proverb worthy to be quoted with the text itself. Look at the tyro who has just commenced preaching in a village chapel or in a mission-room, and admire his boundless confidence in his own strength. He has collected certain anecdotes and telling metaphors, and he propounds these as if they were the Summa Theologica, the very flower and essence of wisdom. He is voluble and energetic, though there is nothing in it. See him stamp his feet and clench his fists! He is a wonder unto many, for they see no sufficient cause for his powerful self-assurance. Possibly he comes to College; he enters the class-room feeling that for once a man treads the College floor. The inhabitants of London shall know that verily there is a prophet among them. We hear about this gentleman very soon, for he is not appreciated; his brethren are not willing for a season to rejoice in his light; they even show a disposition to snuff him out. Yet how perfectly self-satisfied he is! I have heard such a brother deliver himself of nothing at all at extreme length, and sit down full to the brim with satisfaction. I have almost envied and altogether regretted him! Many an abler man is weeping over his shortcomings, while this poor soul is wondering at his own triumphs. Like Cowper’s poor believer,
“Pillow and bobbins all her little store,”
he knows this much, and nothing more — his abilities transcendant and his knowledge vast. How self-content he is. But he is not strong for all that. Did you fear him when you first came into contact with him? Did you look upon him as an ironclad, utterly impregnable? The delusion did not last long. “Man being in honor abideth not.” If I remember rightly, you in the College room began to try your prows upon this man-of-war. You found that it was only a wooden ship after all. There is a grim pleasure in seeing the mighty collapse; and that fell to your share. We felt a degree of happiness in seeing the great man lose ounce by ounce his boasted strength, till he died outright. We never buried the body of vainglory, for we never knew precisely what became of it; but we were glad to find in its place a diffident youth who needed cheering lest he should too much depreciate himself, — a lowly spirit whom in due time the Lord exalted. As he grew consciously weak he became strong, and discovered that when he was strong in his own opinion he was in many ways weak.
Since we left the College benches we have seen many strong men. I think I see one sitting down in his study. He has been reading the reviews and quarterlies, and a little of the latest modern thought: now he is looking out for a text. He perfectly understands it, whatever it may be. At any rate, if he does not understand it, who does? When he falls upon his text he interprets it, not at all desiring to know what the men of God who lived before him have said upon it, for they were of a darker age, and he lives in the nineteenth century, that world of wonders, that region of wisdom, that flower and glory of all time. Now you shall see what you shall see when this cultured divine comes forth from his chamber as a giant refreshed with new wine. No dew of the Spirit of God is upon him, he does not require it; he drinks from other fountains. He speaks with astounding power, his diction is superb, his thought prodigious! But he is as weak as he is polished, as cold as he is pretentious: saints and sinners alike perceive his weakness, and by degrees the empty pews confirm it. He is too strong to be strengthened of the Lord, and therein too weak to bless a congregation. He seeks another sphere, and another, and yet another, but in no position is he powerful, for he is too strong in self. His preaching is like a painted fire, no one is either cheered or alarmed by it. We have known other men that were not so strong, who felt that they could not even understand the word of God without divine illumination, and who went to the great Father of lights for that illumination: trembling and afraid they have asked to be helped to speak the mind of God, and not their own mind, and God has spoken through them; and they have been strong. They were weak, for they were afraid lest their thoughts should stand in the way of God’s thoughts, fearful lest their mind should darken the word of God; and yet they have been truly strong, and humble people have listened to them and said that God spake through them; and sinners have listened, and though they have become angry, they have come again, and at last have yielded themselves to Christ. Verily God spoke through that man; he had neither hurricane, nor earthquake, nor fire, but he was a still small voice, and the Lord was in it.
I have known preachers who have been very weak, and yet they have been used of the Lord. For many, many years my own preaching was exceedingly painful because of the fears which beset me before entering the pulpit. Often my dread of facing the people has been overwhelming. Even the physical feeling which came of the mental emotion has been painful; but this weakness has been an education for me. I wrote many years ago to my venerable grandfather, and told him of many things that happened to me before preaching, sickness of body and terrible fears which often made me really ill. The old gentleman wrote back and said, “I have been preaching for sixty years, and I feel still many tremblings. Be content to have it so; for when your emotion goes away your strength will be gone.” When we preach and think nothing of it, the people thing nothing of it, and God does nothing by it. An overwhelming sense of weakness should not be regarded as an evil, but should be accepted as helpful to the true minister of Christ.
Look at the preacher who has no burdens. His sermon is in his pocket; there cannot happen any mischief to it unless a thief should steal it; he has rehearsed all his action, he is as safe as an automaton. He does need to pray for the Spirit of God to help him in his preaching, and though he uses the form one wonders what the prayer can mean. He surveys the congregation with the complacency of a gardener looking at a bed of flowers. He has something to say, and he knows what it is going to be, every word of it, and therefore he says it with ease, and comes down the stairs as pleased with himself as heart could desire: the notion of trembling is far from him, he is not so weak. Yonder is a poor brother who has been tugging away with his brains, wrestling on his knees, and bleeding at heart; he is half-afraid that he may break down in the sermon, and he is fearful that he will not reach the hearts of the people; but he means to try what can be done by the help of God. Be you sure that he will get at the people, and God will give him converts. He is looking up to God, for he feels so feeble in himself. You know which of the two preachers you would sooner hear, and you know who is the really strong man of the two; the weak man is strong and the strong man is weak. An American divine, who says a great many things that are wise, and a few which are otherwise, says that the best preparation for preaching is to get a good night’s rest, and to eat a good breakfast. According to his opinion, a fine constitution is a most efficient help to preaching the gospel. If you know nothing of the headache, and nothing of the heartache, and never allow anything to disturb the equilibrium of your mind, you may expect to be a very successful minister. It may be so. I would not depreciate health, appetite, a bounding spirit, and a good Saturday night’s sleep; but these things are not all, nor much. Mens sana in corpore sano, by all means; but where that has been a good deal relied upon it has displayed itself in fine sensational sermons; but, brethren, I question whether the next generation will say that it has proved itself fruitful in spiritual teaching which will feed the soul or move the conscience. Many of the noblest specimens of our sermonic literature have come from men who were patient sufferers. Men who have had the most touching pathos, the deepest spirituality, the most marvelous insight into the deep things of God, have often known little of bodily health. Calvin labored under many fierce disorders. Shall we ever see his like? Robert Hall was rarely free from pain. Who ever spoke more gloriously? And here I would mention one whom all of us love, Charles Stanford, who grows sweeter and sweeter as he grows weaker and weaker, and who sees all the more clearly now that his eyes grow dim. My brethren, physical force is not our strength, it may be our weakness. Health is to be desired, and carefully preserved where we have it; but if we lose it, we may count it all joy, and look forward to be able to exclaim with Paul, “When I am weak, then am I strong.” In some form or other we must be tried. A preacher who has no cross to carry, a prophet of the Lord without a burden, is an unprofitable servant and a burden to the church.
It would be a dreadful thing to be a pastor without cares; I do not address any such, I am happy to believe; but I do address some who, as pastors, are overloaded with cares, and overweighted with sorrows. Perhaps the largeness of your church, or more likely the smallness of it, may be to you a daily trouble. Do not ask to be otherwise than troubled. The shepherd who can always go to bed regularly at night, and who is able to say, “I do not have much trouble with my flock,” is not the man to be envied. He coolly says, “A few lambs died last winter; we must expect that kind of thing. It is true that some sheep died of starvation; but if the meadows failed, I could not help that.” That is the kind of shepherd who deserves to be eaten by the next wolf; but the man who is able to say with Jacob, “By night the frost devoured me, and by day the heat,” is the true shepherd. He is most irregular as to his rest; the only thing regular about him is his labor and his disappointment, and yet faith makes him a happy man. When you grow very weak as a pastor, and your charge utterly overcomes you, do not repine at such weakness, for then you will be at your full strength; but when you are strong as a pastor, and say, “I think that to be a minister is an easy matter,” you may depend upon it that you are weak.
Permit me here to say that whenever a brother gets to be so strong as to talk much of his own holiness then also he is weak. I have not observed yet that anybody who has had grace to make into flags has won the more victories in consequence. I have required, as far as I am concerned, all my grace to make into a sword; I have wanted all my power for real fighting; but as to making a single banner out of it to display before men, I have not yet attained unto it, and must take a very lowly position among the servants of God. Coleridge was once asked whether he believed in ghosts, and he said no, he did not, for he had seen too many of them. If anyone asked me if I believed in perfect men I should have to say that I have seen too many of them to believe in them. A ghost is a wonderful affair, and when you see it at first it makes each particular hair of your head “to stand on end, like quills upon the fretful porcupine” But this does not occur a second time, for a suspicion of hollow turnip and candle steals over you. We heard of one the other day who even dared to squirt carmine over a spirit which had been conjured from the vasty deep at a seance. I have sometimes ventured to oppose a perfect man, and the warmth of his temper has been evidence to me that while he may have been upon the verge of perfection among his own friends, he had not absolutely reached that consummation when exposed to the colder judgment of strangers. The pretender to perfection has usually avoided me from a distaste to my protestantism against his holiness; and I have not bewailed my loss. I am not in love with that perfection which talks about itself. There is little virtue in the beauty which calls attention to itself: modest beauty is the last to extol its own charms. A number of persons in company were boasting of their graces and attainments, and only one brother sat silent. At last one said to him,” Have you no holiness?” “Yes,” he said, “but I never had any to boast of.” All the holiness that can be had let us have, and let us press towards perfection; but let us still recollect the fact that when we are strong then we are weak, that when we think we have reached perfection the blue mould of pride is coming over us. We have not afforded ourselves a complete inspection, or we should have found some fault to repent of, some evil yet to struggle against.
(To be continued.)
LARGE MEN WANTED FOR SMALL CHURCHES
WE have heard of a race-boat made so narrow and so easy to overset that the oarsmen had to part their hair in the middle before they took their seats in it, so as to keep it in trim. Even so there are some churches, some little churches, in which the pastor needs to walk very circumspectly, so as not to put more weight on one side than the other. It is a very great mistake to suppose that it takes more grace and skill to manage a large church than a small one. Far otherwise. Christopher Columbus had far more trouble with his three little galleys than Horatio Nelson had with his ships of the line. But the discovery of America was something grander than the victory of the Nile or Trafalgar. A man who can be pastor of a small church, and do his work well, has skill enough for any employment under heaven. Any land-lubber can haul away at a rope’s end, especially if there be a crowd to haul with him; but it is only the “able-bodied seaman” who is able to stand at the wheel, or furl the main-royals in a gale. The largest man is needed for the smallest place. And God can raise up just the kind of men that are needed, men of faith and of the Holy Spirit. If the weak churches would pray to God more earnestly, he would send that kind of men as pastors. All the gifts needed by any church are in the hand of Christ, and can be had for the asking. — Examiner and Chronicle.
UNPROFITABLE LITERARY WARES.
THE late James T. Fields, while an active partner in the firm of Ticknor and Fields, was waited upon by a young sugar merchant who had poetic aspirations. The mercantile man complained that his manuscript poems had been rejected by the firm, and he wanted to know the reason why, inasmuch as all of his friends had heard the verses read, and unanimously declared them to be accessions to American literature. “Our reader decides that,” said Mr. Fields, in his blandest tones. “Then I would like to see the reader.” Always the personification of amiability himself, the publisher took the merchant upstairs to the reader. That mighty personage sat at a desk heaped high with manuscripts; he carefully read a few pages of each package, then dropped it into a basket at his side. Occasionally he became more than ordinarily interested; in that case he placed the package inside his desk. “Why, he goes through ‘em just as I sample sugar!” exclaimed the would-be poet in amazement. “That’s because he’s familiar with literary wares as you are with sugar,” rejoined Mr. Fields. “I’m satisfied, let us go,” said the merchant. They went, and the disappointed bard gave up verse-making, but he made a large fortune in sugar.
We cut this from the Chicago Standard. It is a revelation of the horrors of our own editorial chamber, our waste-paper basket is always in full use, and it has a singular tendency to devour rhymes which writers call “stanzas.” Poetical effusions are for the most part prosy delusions. Good poetry charms us, but limping verses worry us, and we are often worried. Let true poets sing all day and all night, but let pretenders hush. How glad we should be if this paragraph would wean some minor poet from rhyming, and inspire him with love to his drapery, grocery, carpentry, or bakery! The retail trade is far more useful than wholesale poetizing. Guessing at the dates of prophecy, and making poor verses, are two of those unprofitable devices which we rank with getting blood out of gate-posts and extracting sugar from bitter aloes. We mean this scrap to act as a warning. TRESPASSERS BEWARE! A WASTE BASKET IS KEPT ON THESE PREMISES.
C. H. S.
INTERRUPTIONS
TURNER, the artist, said to one who interrupted him with a question, “There! you have made me lose fifty guineas!” Sir Walter Scott says in his diary: “Various visitors began to drop in. was sick of these interruptions. God send me more leisure, and fewer friends to peck it away by teaspoonfuls.” Others besides Sir Walter have had to breathe this prayer. People call on a well-known minister out of the idlest curiosity, and invent the most perverse excuses for dragging him away from his work. One would think we were wild beasts to be stared at. Just as a sermon is shaping itself, in comes a pasteboard from an old lady who has nothing on earth to do but to call round on everybody she knows, and rob them of their time, — wretched thief that she is. We have seen her, and lo! another knock; no message can be sent in, the party must see the minister himself, as his business is strictly private: that means begging. Here’s another, whose pretended errand is to ask if we knew the Rev. Mr. Jones, of Llwwffi, for he was her mother’s uncle’s cousin by marriage. Why should we be thus at every mortal’s beck and call, and have neither space for meditation, nor time for devotion? People do not call on doctors or lawyers at this rate, and our time is quite as precious as theirs. We cannot protect ourselves by fees, and yet if we do not see every one, there will be such an outcry. All we can say is — they must cry, for we cannot neglect our Master’s business to play lackey to everybody who is moved by the powers of darkness to call us away from the word of God and prayer.
C. H. S.
NOTES
FRIENDS will please to notice that we have eight pages extra this month for accounts. When we occupy so much space with the record of donations, we do not deprive our subscribers of their reading-matter. Our aim is to keep the Magazine thoroughly interesting. Will those who think we succeed give us a little help by obtaining new subscribers for us?
We thought that friends might like to see the pattern of the keys which were presented at the opening of the Infirmary and the Play-hall of the Girls’ Orphanage. Silver trowels have been given in hundreds of cases, and this is a little variation upon a well-worn custom.
The prayer-meeting held before the Lecture on Thursdays to pray for the Pastor evidently grows in favor with the people. It is a season of refreshing both to preacher and hearers. Would it not be well for other churches to try this method, and spend an hour before service in praying for the divine blessing to rest upon the preaching of the word? Anything which tends to increase the prayerfulness of the church should be regarded with favor.
On Sunday, June 18, the beloved president of one of the Metropolitan Tabernacle Adult Male Bible-classes, Elder W. Perkins, fell asleep in Jesus. Although called away from the work he so much loved, his influence will long be felt by those whom he either led to the Savior, or helped onwards in their Christian life. His life and death preach a powerful sermon to us all.
We saw him covered from head to foot sore boils, and exhibiting in his own both the patience and the suffering He lived well, and died well. Such he are few, and their deaths are precious. By the unanimous vote of the members, and with the Pastor’s hearty acquiescence, Elder J. T. Dunn has accepted the post of leader of the class, and under his able management we anticipate a new career of usefulness for the earnest body of young men who are here banded together for mutual edification. During the past month we have received from the class £23 for the College, and £30 for our Indian Evangelists’ Fund.
On Monday evening, June 26, at the Tabernacle prayer-meeting, Mr. J. S. Harrison, one of the two students who went out to Australia with our son Thomas, gave an account of his work as the first pastor of the church at Deloraine, Tasmania, and afterwards as an evangelist in the colonies. His report of the various College brethren whom he had visited was very cheering, but he most of all delighted us with his recital of the success of Mr. A. J. Clarke at West Melbourne, and our son Thomas at Auckland. He was able to bear personal testimony to the urgent need of a new chapel for the, large congregation already gathered in Auckland.
This is perhaps the best place in which to insert an extract from a recent letter from our son to his mother. Writing concerning the Bazaar, which is to be held at Christmas time, in aid of the building fund of the new Auckland Tabernacle, he says: — “ We shall have a struggle to make the sale much of a success; but a success it must be, so now for the struggle. I am going in for the Young Men’s Stall, and wonder if any of my eager Sword and Trowel readers will find it in their hearts to help me. A case from the home Tabernacle would be welcome for the new Tabernacle. If you should hear of any such desires, give my address. I will gladly pay carriage and duty for such good goods. When I write this, mind you, hardly expect anything of the sort, but there is no harm in suggesting possibilities, is there?”
A case will be sent from the Tabernacle, so that any friends who wish to help will have an opportunity of doing so. Parcels should be sent on as speedily as possible, and addressed to Mrs. Evans, Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington, London, for Mr. Thomas Spurgeon’s Bazaar. Moreover, it would be peculiarly pleasant to the father if many friends would rally to the help of the son. Our readers must have been interested by the papers which have been contributed by Thomas Spurgeon, and as he has now a needful but heavy work in hand, we should be glad to see him largely helped. He has taken up his position in a most important part of New Zealand: it is important that a good church should be built up there, and to that end the people must have a house to meet in. Help our son for his own sake, for he is worthy, and for our sake, if that argument will weigh with you. A bazaar in Auckland is all very well, but it would be far better to send money than goods. Combine the two, and the best thing is attained.
On Monday evening, July 3, a meeting of the ladies of the church and congregation was held in the Lecture Hall, for the purpose of forming a Tabernacle Auxiliary for Zenana Mission Work. Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presided at the meeting, and after a brief address, called upon Mrs. Rouse, of Calcutta, who described the condition of the women of India, and gave many interesting and encouraging details of her own work, and the labors of other lady missionaries among the women and children in the Zenanas and schools. Mrs. Rouse pleaded with great pathos and earnestness the claims of the work. Mrs. Allison responded to the pastor’s request to state the steps which had led to the present movement. It was proposed that the sum of at least £120 should be raised annually at the Tabernacle for the support of a Female Missionary, who should give all her time to the work. Mr. W. Olney and Mr. Allison also explained the plans of the friends who had interested themselves in the matter, and a list of subscriptions was read, which was considerably extended at the close of the meeting. Mrs. C. H. Spurgeon has consented to act as President, Mrs. Allison as Treasurer, and Mrs. Charles Murrell as Secretary, to the committee about to be formed. The Pastor is delighted to see this new vessel launched under such favorable circumstances.
At the prayer-meeting in the Tabernacle, the same evening, a party of missionaries from the China Inland Mission attended, and asked for the prayers of the church on their work. Among them was one of our former students, Dr. E. H. Edwards, who has been trained at the Edinburgh Medical Mission.
COLLEGE. — Mr. T. I. Stockley has accepted the pastorate of the church at Port Mahon, Sheffield, and the following brethren have removed: — Mr. W. Bonser, from Burslem, to Fenton, Staffs., where we hope to build up a Baptist cause; Mr. W. Glanville, from Egremont, to Newport, Isle of Wight; Mr. C. Gomm, from Kilburn, to Soham, Cambs.; Mr. G. B. Richardson, from Charlbury, to Eynsford; and Mr. Albert Smith, late of Esher, to West Drayton.
Mr. S. A. Dyke has resigned his pastorate in Toronto, in order to become Business Manager of the Canadian Baptist and book-room.
One of our medical missionary students, Mr. E. H. Edwards, B.M., has been accepted by the China Inland Mission, and has sailed for China.
On Tuesday, July 18, the President preached an open-air sermon in connection with the laying of the foundation stone of a new chapel at Hornchurch, where Mr. E. Dyer is laboring with much success. About half the amount needed for the building is already in hand, and £100 more is promised, leaving about £270 still to be raised. Mr. Abraham, who laid the stone, has been the means of the formation of a Baptist church in Hornchurch.
EVANGELISTS. — Mr. Bax has written the following appreciative report of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at Salters’ Hall Chapel: —
“Dear Mr. Spurgeon, — It is with very great thankfulness I write to inform you of the great blessing we have received at Salters’ Hall through the visit of our beloved brethren, Messrs. Fullerton and Smith. Our dear brethren were with us for three weeks, and the services seemed to increase in interest and power to the very last; and it was with the most sincere regret that we bade our friends farewell. Mr. Fullerton’s preaching is altogether remarkable. It is very pointed and illustrative, and appeals much more to the reason and conscience than to the emotions. To this fact probably is to be attributed the entire absence of anything like undue excitement. People feel they are being addressed by an earnest, true-hearted man, who entirely forgets himself in his work. Mr. Smith’s singing adds greatly to the interest of the services, which are singularly bright and happy. The special services for children, conducted by Mr. Smith, are not likely soon to be forgotten by the little ones. They abound in anecdote, and always have a good application. Some of the meetings deserve especial notice, e. g., the early Sunday-morning service for workers, the meetings for men only, and women only, and the excellent song-services on Saturday evenings, which I may say, in passing, are no mere entertainments, but full of the gospel, both spoken and sung. The results have been very blessed. Many persons have been pressed into active service for Christ, Christians have experienced a great revival in their spiritual life, and have been roused to deep concern for the salvation of their fellows, while a very large number profess to have found rest and peace in Christ. God is with our dear friends, of a truth, and the crowds which nightly filled our spacious chapel prove triumphantly that it is not at all necessary to resort to all sorts of vulgar and senseless expedients to gain the ear of the multitude. Our treasurer will forward you in a few days a cheque as a thankoffering, and I only wish it were double the amount.
“With very best love,
“I remain,
“Faithfully yours,
“ALFRED BAX.”
Since the accounts were closed we have received a cheque for £46 as a thankoffering for the blessing received through our brethren’s visit.
During the past month the evangelists have been conducting very successful services in connection with nearly all the churches in Woolwich. After a season of rest, which they both greatly need, they will again, visit the south-west of England, in which they can still arrange for a few more engagements. In response to Mr. Fullerton’s letter in last month’s Magazine he has received from “A Friend” £5 for the distribution of sermons, and a lady at Salters’ Hall Chapel gave Mr. Smith £5 for the same object. These are the only donations to hand at present towards the £200 that will be required for the proposed 100,000 sermons to be given away at the evangelists’ services.
ORPHANAGE. — We have decided to proceed at once with the erection of the next portion of the Girls’ Orphanage buildings. We reported at the fete on June 21st that we had at that time a balance of £3,000 in hand on the building fund account, and during the past month we have received £1,000 from “A Friend,” who does not wish his name to be known. This enables us to go forward with confidence, assured that the rest of the money will be forthcoming as it is required. The plans for the laundry have been prepared, and the building will be commenced as soon as possible; the dining-hall, kitchen, and master’s house being left for the present. We can the more readily continue our building operations without anxiety as we have recently received for the general purposes of the institution two legacies amounting together to nearly £3,000. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
On Thursday afternoon, June 29, Mr. W. Ross entertained the whole of the Orphanage boys and girls at a strawberry-tea at the Horse-shoe Ironwharf, Old Kent-road; for which the President very heartily thanked him. A considerable number of visitors also partook of Mr. and Mrs. Ross’s kind hospitality, and then showed their interest in the orphans by making a generous collection in aid of the institution. Thus one friend after another helps us to make the little ones happy.
A country donor writes: — “Whenever I buy or sell a horse, or have one born or die, I always make a tithe of £1 for something which seems to claim it most (your institutions principally). I was very much tempted on one occasion not to do so; circumstances seemed to forbid, when one of my horses died; but a few days after I had an account sent to me which I never expected to get, showing me plainly that the old promise is as sure now as ever. Since the enclosed P.O.O. was obtained, the colt has died, so that is the reason you get the sovereign extra.”
We have experienced a great sorrow. Miss Hannah Moore, an invaluable worker, has for years served faithfully at the Orphanage, but having been for some time unwell it was the unanimous opinion of doctors and friends that a change and a sea-voyage would be of great benefit to her. Our kind friend, Miss Annie Macpherson, generously made an opening for Miss Moore, and she left us, as we all hoped, to return in a year or two, refreshed and well. She felt it to be a great sorrow, though the holy happiness of the home at Gait, Ontario, and the general kindness of Miss Macpherson and friends helped her to tide over the change; but alas! while she was speaking of her grief at leaving us, she died, in a moment, of heartdisease. We never had a better sister among us, and her death is to us as sad as it is sudden; only when we look beyond this present scene we almost envy such a translation. We shall not soon see another like her, for in all respects, except health, she was exactly suited to her post, — kind, gentle, faithful, Christ-like, she was our ideal of a Christian worker; but for that very reason she was ready to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better. There is a voice in this to all of us who are banded together at the Orphanage — “Be ye also ready.”
COLPORTAGE. — The reports of work from the colporteurs continue to arrive, and many of them tell of the conversion of sinners through their labors. Some of them appear specially useful in the cause of Temperance. The following letter will be read with interest. It is from a colporteur who has charge of a Sunday-school, and who also conducts the services in the village chapel: —
“At the end of another quarter I submit a brief report of past labors. I have very much to be thankful for, although I cannot exceed the amount previously realized by the sale of books. When I consider that many of the families have been out of employment, and others do not care about purchasing books, I can still thank God, and take courage, and my daily prayer is that God may abundantly bless his word, and the different periodicals which I have been enabled to dispose of; also that I still may have an increased demand for the good and useful literature.
“Upon the whole, I continue to be well received; there are a few exceptions, and some are as happy to see me as though I were one of their own family. In some of the villages we are having glorious times, and several, I feel sure, are under serious impressions.
“God is also blessing our labors in the Gospel Temperance Movement, and in one of the darkest villages through which I travel glorious have been the results. One hundred have signed the pledge, and donned the blue ribbon. Praise the Lord! All these are new recruits brought in during the last five months, and I am happy and thankful to God that nearly all of them are staunch and true; and, more than that, some of them are anxious about their souls’ salvation, and now instead of being found in the alehouse singing the devil’s songs, they are to be heard singing the songs of Zion.
“Among those that we have been led by God to rescue is one of the greatest drunkards in the place, and another who, in a drunken spree, was stabbed, and nearly lost his life. But now they are respectably clothed, and in their right mind, and as the result we have been enabled to sell books to them, and others who before spent the greater part of their wages in strong drink and tobacco.
“One man in particular deserves mention. He had been a regular attendant at the house of God for years, but the drink was a snare to him, also the pipe; but now as the result of talking to him he has thrown his pipe, etc., into the canal, given up his beer, and signed the pledge. Instead of spending his money as before, he has ordered from me “The Life of Christ,” and bought other books as well. On the whole, we have very much to be thankful for.”
The efforts of over seventy Christian men, engaged in various parts of the country, doing similar work to that described above, cannot but result in a mighty blessing, and when it is remembered that each man is a distributor of thousands of volumes and parts of religious and moral books, the influence for good of the Association can hardly be over-estimated. The committee will be glad to hear from friends in any districts willing to contribute £40 a-year towards the support of a man. This is one of the cheapest forms of Evangelistic work known.
Regular contributions are also needed for the General Fund, to continue the work already in hand. They may be sent to W. Corden Jones, Secretary, Colportage Association, Temple-street, London, S.E.
METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE TOTAL ABSTINENCE SOCIETY. — The regular meetings of this society, which are held in the Tabernacle Lecture – hall, every Wednesday evening, continue to be well sustained, and in every way successful. During the four months since the movement was started nearly 900 pledges have been taken, the signers being nearly all those who were not previously total abstainers; and, better still, many cases of conversion have resulted from the work. It has been carried on from the commencement on the principles of the Gospel Temperance Union, as advocated by Messrs. R. T. Booth, W. Noble, and F. Murphy, although the wearing of the blue ribbon badge is quite optional.
Arrangements have been made with Mr. Richard T. Booth to hold a series of Gospel Temperance Services in the Tabernacle, commencing on Sunday afternoon, September 3, and closing on Tuesday evening, September 12. On the Monday and Thursday evenings the meetings will be held at the close of the usual prayer-meetings and service; and on Sunday evening, September 10, which will be the strangers’ quarterly free service, Mr. Booth will hold a special meeting at eight o’clock. Lord Mount Temple, Canon Wilberforce, Pastors W. J. Mayers (Bristol), and C. Leach, F.G.S. (Birmingham), and other able temperance advocates, have, we understand, promised to help Mr. Booth. Will all who desire to see the spread of the gospel and temperance pray that a rich and lasting blessing may rest upon the mission?
PERSONAL NOTES. — Some time ago we published sixteen cases of usefulness of our sermons, which had come under the notice of one of our evangelists. The same brother has sent us the following additional incidents: —
(17.) During my Yorkshire campaign, I met with an earnest worker who has been engaged in the Sabbath School for many years. In conversation it transpired that she was brought to Christ twenty-five years ago through reading your sermon on “India’s Ills and England’s Sorrows” (No. 150). Until then thoughtless and unconcerned, the whole current of her life was changed by reading that sermon: and she was led to devote herself and her energies to the Savior’s service.
(18.) In Northamptonshire, far removed from any place of worship, I have during the past year, repeatedly visited a poor old lady, who is nearly ninety years of age. Each visit has been a season of blessing to my soul; for the good woman is one of the happiest Christians I know. It is years since she was able regularly to attend the chapel where she is in membership; and during this long absence her weekly feast has been your sermons, which she reads and re-reads con amore. Though she has never seen you, she always inquires most eagerly of me concerning your work and your health.
(19.) At A — , I heard of a military officer, who owed his conversion to reading one of the Metropolitan Tabernacle Sermons; and who, for years after, until removed to the service of the King of kings, bought half-adozen of the weekly issue for circulation among his brother officers — an example worthy of imitation by all who themselves profit by these sermons.
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle. — June 26, eight; June 29, twelve.
Chap 23. SEPTEMBER, 1882.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
SEPTEMBER, 1882.
INAUGURAL ADDRES
AT THE EIGHTEENTH ANNUAL CONFERENCE OF THE
PASTORS’ COLLEGE ASSOCIATION, APRIL 18, 1882.
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
(Concluded).
HITHERTO we have been going round the text, after the example of Rowland Hill; now let us come fairly up to it. “When I am weak, then am I strong.”
I. Here is, first, A DEPRESSING EXPERIENCE. “When I am weak:” when is that? Truly, we are so always. Is there ever a time when the strongest Christian is not comparatively weak? But there are seasons when we are consciously weak. Take Paul’s case as an illustration. He had been caught up into the third heaven, but he could not bear revelations so well as John, who had enough of them to fill a book, and yet was never elated by them; but Paul was not so well qualified to be a seer, for he was more at home with arguments than with visions, and therefore when he saw a vision he set great store by it. He kept his secret for fifteen years; but it was such a very remarkable thing for him, and so much out of his own natural line of things, that the tendency in him was to be exalted by the abundance of the revelation; and therefore the Lord sent, not Satan, but “a messenger of Satan,” a mean, despicable spirit, not to fight with him with sword and buckler, but to “buffet him,” as boys do their playmates. Have you never had an insignificant thing to vex you, like a fly buzzing around you? Have you not felt the trial to be intensely worrying, and yet meanly trifling? You could have girded yourself to meet a lion, but this trouble was a mere yelping cur, and it irritated you to the last degree, and inflicted a pain upon you. Paul does not describe his trial as the cut of a sword, else he would have bound it up; it was only the prick of a thorn; he could scarcely see the cause of the pain, or he would have taken a needle and extracted it; but it was a little thorn which had buried itself in the flesh, and festered there. This was Paul’s worry, and it was sent to keep him humble. Paul might have gloried in wrestling with the devil; but this was a wretched business. To grapple with a great temptation, and to hurl it to the ground, has a grandeur in it which inspires you; but it is very different when you are assailed by a thing so small that you despise yourself for taking notice of it, and yet it frets your soul. You say to yourself, “How weak I am! Why am I thus irritated and disturbed? If anyone else made half this fuss about a little thorn I should say, ‘You ought to know better’; and yet here am I, a preacher of the gospel, greatly tried by a trifle, and beseeching the Lord thrice to take it away from me, for I cannot bear it.” Do we ever get into such a condition? I wish that at such a time we would confess our abject weakness and cast ourselves upon God, for then should we be made strong.
This festering of the thorn does not afflict us all, because it does not happen to all to see visions; but many servants of God are made to feel their weakness in another way, by an oppressive sense of responsibility. Brethren, I speak to you as unto wise men, who will not misunderstand me. I hope you will always feel your responsibility before God; but do not carry the feeling too far. We may feel our responsibility so deeply that we may become unable to sustain it; it may cripple our joy and make slaves of us. Do not take an exaggerated view of what the Lord expects of you. He will not blame you for not doing that which is beyond your mental power or physical strength. You are required to be faithful, but you are not bound to be successful. You are to teach, but you cannot compel people to learn. You are to make things plain, but you cannot give carnal men an understanding of spiritual things. We are not the Father, nor the Savior, nor the Comforter of the Church; We cannot take the responsibility of the universe upon our shoulders. While vexing ourselves with fancied obligations we may overlook our real burdens. I could sit down and meditate until I felt the responsibility of the whole south of London upon my back, and this would render me unable to look after my own church. What is the practical result of making yourself, as one man, responsible for the work of twenty men? Will you do any more? Will you do it any better? I saw a horse this morning which was pulling at a three-horse load. How he tugged! How he strained himself. I thought to myself, there is a good horse being ruined. His master ought to take off part of his load, or else put more horses to pull with him. Does our Lord and Master treat us in this fashion? No; we overload ourselves. We get tugging away as if the salvation of the world depended upon our straining ourselves to death. Now, I do not want you to get away from feeling a due measure of responsibility; but then you are not God, and you do not stand in God’s place; you are not the rulers of providence, and you have not been elected sole managers of the covenant of grace; therefore do not act as if you were. But, dear brethren, having said this much by way of caveat, lest I should lead any of you to despair, let me now say, — have we any of us fully felt the measure of our responsibility? If there be one such here, let him speak; but I shall not believe him. We have not done what we should have done, what we could have done, nor what we ought to have done, nor what we will yet do in God’s strength. Perhaps we have worked up to the full of what was expected of us in quantity, but how about the quality? It may be we have attended quite enough meetings, and delivered quite enough sermons; but then, has this been done in an apostolic spirit, and night and day with tears have we warned men and pleaded with them as in the sight of God? Our responsibilities, when they are thoroughly felt, crush us, and then are we weak indeed; but this weakness is the road to strength. “When I am weak, then am I strong.”
And do we not often feel weak in the sense of utter unfitness for being ministers at all by reason of our sinfulness. Paul said of his calling to the ministry, “Woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel.” We can say it too; yet sometimes we feel as if we would speak no more for Christ, and we should sink into silence were it not that his word is as a fire in our bones, and we cannot refrain. Then we think we will go away into the far West, and in some log cabin teach a few children the way of salvation, for we do not feel fit for anything higher. Our shortcomings and our failures stare us out of countenance, and then are we painfully weak; but this also is the highway to strength: “When I am weak, then am I strong.”
Sometimes we grow depressed and weak because our sphere of labor seems specially difficult. This is not the time to dilate upon the peculiar trials of our pastorates. Ministers in London could tell a tale that would astonish you, for they see things which are their burden day and night: As for our country brethren, what some of them have had to put up with! They cannot move the deacons and the church at all, but perhaps the deacons wish to move them; they cannot get at the people, and though they preach their hearts out they preach to empty pews. If we could only put certain men into the positions which their brethren faithfully occupy under great discouragement, they would know themselves better, and leave off boasting, and instead of finding fault they would wonder that so much has been accomplished under such circumstances. By that way also we become strong: when Goal makes us feel that our work is impossible to us without his aid then are we driven to his strength.
Some of you are quite alone as to the helpful fellowship of kindred spirits. This is a trying deprivation, and may well depress you. Beside this, many of you are poor, and you hardly know how to support your families. As I listened to the prayer of the brother who led our devotions just now, and remembered what he is suffering, and how he has actually worked in the harvest-fields, with working men, so that he might earn his bread and preach the gospel, I felt that I could rejoice in him. Still I know that poverty often makes a man feel sadly weak; when his children are without shoes, and the wife’s dress is nearly worn out, and he knows not where any more are to come from, his heart sinks within him. In addition to this, it may be that reproach comes undeservedly. A scandalous story from the father of lies may be forged against you, and you may be quite unable to defend yourself. You fear lest in trying to erase the blot you might spoil the page. Hearts are broken over this matter. Oh, how weak a man becomes when this is the case; he may half feel himself guilty after having heard the accusation repeated again and again, although all the while he is as pure as the driven snow. This brings a weakness which may paralyze a man. Oh to be strong in the Lord at such times.
I suppose you do not think that I ever get dried up, and find it difficult to say anything fresh in my sermons, and yet so it is. Think, dear brethren: I have more than twenty-seven volumes of sermons in print! It grows harder to say anything new as those volumes increase. Where will the next sermon come from? is the question we have asked ourselves again and again; we have feared that we could not keep up the supply, and we have felt our own weakness to a terrible degree; but this, also, is the way to strength. So prepare yourselves, my younger brethren, to become weaker and weaker; prepare yourselves for sinking lower and lower in self-esteem; prepare yourselves for self-annihilation, and pray God to expedite the process. Certain-brethren know nothing of this experience, they are not weak at all; but despise such confessions. Have you never met with preachers who can keep on and on; and though they never did say anything and never will, yet they never know what it is to be weak. They are just as able to-day as ever they were. I have heard of an old Scotch preacher, whose divisions were very numerous, and whose subdivisions were almost innumerable; so one day the people, one by one, went away, until at last the boy took the keys up and said to him, “You can lock the church up when you have done.” Some are so very long in saying nothing, and are so surely emptying their places, that it would be wise to hand them the keys so that they might retire when they are quite through. As for some of us, we are consciously feeble, and when we prose we know it. We come out of the pulpit at times feeling that we are less fit than ever for the holy work. Oar last sermon we judge to be our worst, and frequently for that reason it is our best; we grow, and among other growths we grow downwards.
We shall go on feeling less fit, and still less fit, and all the while becoming more suited to be used of the Lord. I know one who said the other night, when she was reading, that it seemed as if her eyes had dropped out. The truth was her spectacles had fallen off. Go on losing your spectacles, and be sure that you get rid of all those holy tones and whines, and grotesque methods, and stiffnesses and mannerisms, which are not your eyes, but only shockingly bad spectacles.
II. I conclude by speaking upon THE BLESSED EXPERIENCE. “When I am weak, then am I strong.” How is it, and how can it be? Well, first, it is when I am weak that I am sure to flee to God for succor and help. The little coney mentioned by Solomon was a poor, puny creature, and yet he baffled the sportsman. Learn a lesson from him. “The conies are a feeble folk; yet make they their houses in the rocks.” Brethren, because I cannot think, I hide behind a doctrine which God has thought out for me; and because I cannot invent a hypothesis I hide my soul in a self-evident fact; and because I cannot even be consistent with myself, I get behind the plain teaching of the text, and there I abide. It is wonderful how strong a man feels in such a hiding-place. When you cannot lay a stone, and cannot lift a trowel by yourself, then you rosy begin to build for God, for he will make you a worker together with him, your feebleness will be linked to the eternal strength, and then the wall will rise with speed. “When I am weak, then am I strong.”
Next, we are strong when we are weak because we gain our strength by prayer, and our weakness is our best argument in supplication. Jacob never conquered until he limped, nay, until he fell. When the sinew shrank the suppliant triumphed. When you are engaged in prayer, plead your strength, and you will get nothing; then plead your weakness, and you will prevail. There is no better plea with divine love than weakness and pain; nothing can so prevail with the great heart of God as for your heart to faint and swoon. The man who rises in prayer to tears and agony, and feels all the while as if he could not pray, and yet must pray — he is the man that will see the desire of his soul. Do not mothers always care most for the tiniest child, or for that which is most sick? Do we not spend the greatest care upon that one of our children which has the least use of its limbs? and is it not true that our weakness holds God’s strength, and leads him to bow his omnipotence to our rescue?
There is another strength in weakness which it is well for us to have. I believe that when we French in conscious weakness it adds a wonderful force to the words we utter. When Mr. Knill went out to distribute tracts among the soldiers, he tells us that there was one wicked man who said to his comrades, “I will cure him of coming to us with his tracts”; so when a ring was made around the minister and the blasphemer, he cursed Mr. Knill with awful oaths. Hearing these profane words Mr. Knill burst into tears, and said how he longed for the man’s salvation. It was years after that he met that soldier again, when he said, “I never took notice of your tracts, or of anything that you said; but when I saw you cry like a child I could not stand it but gave my heart to God.” When we tell our people how we are hampered, but how much we long for their souls’ salvation; when we ask them to excuse our broken language, for it is the utterance of our hearts, they believe in our sincerity, for they see our breaking hearts, and they are moved by what we say. The man who grinds out theology at so much a yard has no power over men; the people need men who can feel — men of heart, men, weak and feeble men, who can sympathize with the timid and sorrowful. It is a blessed thing if a minister can weep his way into men’s souls, or even stammer a path into their hearts. So, brethren, do not be afraid of being weak, — “When I am weak, then am I strong.”
Besides this, another form of strength comes of weakness, for by it our sympathy is educated. When you and I become weak, and are depressed in spirit, and our soul passes through the valley of the shadow of death, it is often on account of others. I preached one Sabbath morning from the text, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” and though I did not say so, yet I preached my own experience. I heard my own chains clank while I tried to preach to my fellow prisoners in the dark; but I could not tell why I was brought into such an awful horror of darkness, for which I condemned myself. On the following Monday evening a man came to see me who bore all the marks of despair upon his countenance. His hair seemed to stand upright, and his eyes were ready to start from their sockets. He said to me after a little parleying, “I never before heard any man speak in my life who seemed to Know my heart. Mine is a terrible case; but on Sunday morning you painted me to the life, and preached as if you had been inside my soul.” By God’s grace I saved that man from suicide, and led him into gospel light and liberty; but I know I could not have done it if I had not myself been confined in the dungeon in which he lay. I tell the story, brethren, because you sometimes may not understand your own experience, and the perfect people may condemn you for having it; but what know they of God’s servants? You and I have to suffer much for the sake of the people of our charge. God’s sheep ramble very far, and we have to go after them; and sometimes the shepherds go where they themselves would never roam if they were not in pursuit of lost sheep. You may be in Egyptian darkness, and you may wonder why such a horror chills your marrow, but you may be altogether in the pursuit of your calling, and be led of the Spirit to a position of sympathy with desponding minds. Expect to grow weaker, brethren, that you may comfort the weak, and so may become masters in Israel in the judgment of others, while in your own you are less than the least of all saints.
More than this, I believe that my text is true when a man becomes weak through love to the particular place in which he is called to labor. Suppose a brother placed in the midst of a dense, poor population, and he feels the responsibility of his work and the misery of souls around him until it gets such a hold upon him that he cannot escape from it. He tries to think of more cheerful subjects, but he cannot shake off the nightmare of the people’s poverty and sin. It is with him by day, and it is with him by night; he hears the crying of the children, and the wailing of the women; he hears the sighing of the men and the groans of the sick and dying, and he comes to be almost a monomaniac in his desperate zeal for his own part of the great field of service. Yes, that man may kill himself with anxiety; but meanwhile it is evident that he is the man whom God has sent to bless the people. He will go on thinking and praying and planning, until at last he will hit on a method which outsiders may judge to be as odd as the man; but he will carry it out, and the whole district will be the better for it. Oh, it is a blessing when God casts a godly man into the middle of a mass of misery, and keeps him there. It may not be a pleasant thing for him, but it will bring a sevenfold reward in the end. I am glad that Howard felt that he must go through all the prisons in Europe. He had a comfortable home of his own, and yet he must roam through France, and Germany, and Russia, poking his nose into every pestilential dog-hole where prisoners were to be found. He makes himself familiar with the unimaginable horrors of dungeon life, and suffers fevers born of the jail-filth. He has a choice nose for the worst atmosphere; the fouler it is the more needful that he should breathe it, for he has a passion for the discovery and destruction of prison cruelty. He comes home, and writes a book upon his pet subject, and then, after a little while, he is off again, and at last he dies a martyr to the cause he has espoused; yet it was worth while to be a Howard who could live and could die to rescue his fellow-men. Mr. Howard, it is because you are so very weak, and suffer so much from prison-on-the-brain, that you are strong; you will accomplish reforms while others are talking of them. I dare say there were some who said, “These things muse be gradually ameliorated by the progress of better principles, and we must try new notions by degrees.” Yes, this gradual reform is a prudent idea, but then Mr. Howard is such a weak-minded man that he goes raking up horrible stories; and insisting upon it that murder by imprisonment must cease at once. Brethren, may you become weak in like fashion, — almost out of your minds with restless resolve to save souls. If you break loose in an absurd way, and set the chill proprieties a-trembling, and the imbecilities ridiculing, it will cause me great joy. Little do I care if you become fools for Christ’s sake. When our weakness verges upon fanaticism it may have all the more power about it. Mr. Plimsoll did nobly when he stood up and pleaded against coffin-ships; but he was never so strong as when he lost himself, and broke the rules of the House in the ardor of his passion. It was very weak of him, but in that weakness lay his strength. Give us more of the speech which comes of a burning heart, as lava comes of a volcanic overflow. When the truth conquers us we shall conquer by the truth.
Weakness is strength, once more, because often a man’s sense of weakness arouses the whole of him; whatever there is in the man then comes out, it makes the man intense in every part. Certain small animals are much more to be dreaded in fight than larger beasts, because they are so active and furious that they bite fifty times while the greater ones are opening their mouths. A man might almost as well face a hyaena as a rat or a weasel, because these lesser creatures are all alive, and so intent on the attack, that they fight with their whole bodies; claws and teeth are all at work, and thus they become strong through that sense of weakness which causes them to use every atom of force which they possess. Have you never seen a great man, perhaps a Doctor of Divinity, concerning whom you have felt how mighty he is? We all acknowledge his strength; but what does he accomplish? A far smaller man full of grace and ardor, and all alive in working for the Lord, achieves much more. The conscious littleness of the man makes him live intensely unto God, — “When I am weak, then am I strong.” Because I cannot do much, therefore I will do all I can. Because I have little power, therefore I will use all the power I have. Do not the tradesmen say that “a nimble ninepence is better than a lazy half-crown”? I am sure it is so. A sense of weakness may bestir us to a bravery which else we had not known. Look at our country ages ago, when Spain tried to destroy her. See the Invincible Armada! Huge ships burden the sea, and Papal warriors are speeding to the prey. England must do her best. On the one side is Spain, mistress of empires, and on the other is a poor little island, with a brave queen it is true, but with an army and navy slender to the last degree. The monster ships are off Plymouth; here they come, like a half-moon, or like jaws opening to swallow us up. What is happening in Britain? Why, everybody is preparing for the battle, and every man and every woman on the island will fight to the death. All the seafaring folk are on the alert. Our sailors in their diminutive vessels are hovering round the huge galleons, waiting for an opportunity to strike a blow, and the opportunity comes.
“Look how the Lion of the sea lifts up his ancient crown,
And underneath his deadly paw treads the gay lilies down.”
God watches over England. He blows with his wind, and the sea covers the Armada, and Spain is smitten and England is saved. It was a sense of weakness that moved the valor of our forefathers, and stirred the saints to cry to God for help. Go to, ye mighty ones, ye are not strong. Come ye up, ye weak ones, to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against the mighty, for ye are strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.
And this, last of all, is the reason why we are strong when we are weak, namely, because the sacrifice is being consummated. When was Christ strongest but when he was weakest? When did he shake the kingdom of darkness but when he was nailed to the tree? When did he put away sin for his people but when his heart was pierced? When did he trample upon death and the old dragon but when he was himself about to die? His victory was in the extremity of his weakness, namely, in his death; and it must be the same with his trembling church: she has no might; she must suffer, she must be slandered, and derided, and so the Lord will triumph through her. The conquering sign is still the cross. Wherefore, brethren, let us be perfectly content to decrease even unto the end, that our right royal Lord and King may gloriously increase from day to day. Amen.
THE LITERATURE OF THE GALLOWS
IT seems shocking, almost ludicrous, to speak of a young man going through a course of reading as a preparation for the gallows, and yet it is literally true that impure reading has, before now, landed its victim on the last stage of the road to ruin. In the year 1829 a murderer named Stratford was executed at Norwich, and the following is the testimony, given at the time by a Christian friend who visited the convict in prison: Again and again he assured me that his falling into vicious and criminal practices was the consequence of his having imbibed mental poison from bad books — and the same assertion he repeated to several other persons. An infidel publication, long since notorious for its fatal influences over the human mind, became the companion of his private hours. He read it, and adopted its principles. He rejected the Holy Scriptures, looked upon their contents as a cunningly devised fable, and to use his own expressions, gave up his faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Thus was he left without compass or rudder, whereby to steer his course aright through the ocean of life.
NOTES
WE have inserted portraits of two of our evangelists, in order that friends may not forget their work of faith, or cease to plead for a blessing upon them. Never were two men better fitted for their work, nor more thoroughly devoted to it. They are engaged for some months ahead; but we would encourage friends to seek their services, for they are ready to preach the gospel wherever a door is opened.
Mrs. Spurgeon is exceedingly busy with her distribution of books to poor ministers, a work fraught with untold blessing. She wishes us to remind friends that she cannot attempt to supply preachers with books if they are in trade, or have good incomes. Her business lies with those who give all their time to the ministry, and at the same time are so ill-remunerated that they cannot afford to purchase books. If those who are ineligible would kindly not apply, it would save the distributor much trouble, and the great pain of having to refuse.
With much pleasure we note that Canon Wilberforce has made a gallant attempt to clear the Church of England from complicity with the liquor traffic. Personally he is doing all that can be expected of any man, namely, getting rid of licenses as they fall in. No one can expect the Ecclesiastical Commissioners to do more; but we hardly dare to hope that they will do as much. Evidently, the Archbishop and other commissioners will be all the better for a little stirring of their consciences. It will be an unspeakable blessing to them if the subject is kept before the public mind, and thus gently brought under eyes which are none too eager to perceive troublesome facts. Corporations are slow in being reformed, and for them to reform themselves is a thing so rare that we might almost say that it never occurred, and never will. “Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots?” We shall see what we shall see.
On the evening of September 10 we shall, God willing, have the Tabernacle open for all comers, according to our custom once a quarter. We observe that an American paper wittily says, “Let not Spurgeon’s people be proud of leaving their seats to strangers in the evening once in a quarter, for in our country we have thousands of persons who do the same every Sunday night in the year.” We are grateful that we cannot say so of our people. Though the habit of half-a-day worship is extending in many quarters, it does not come nigh to us.
On Wednesday, Aug. 16, the ministers of the Surrey and Middlesex Baptist Association dined at “Westwood,” by invitation of Mr. and Mrs. Spurgeon, and afterwards held a conference on the work of the denomination in the two counties. All who were present seemed to feel the urgent necessity for further aggressive efforts, and it is hoped that something practical will result from the interchange of opinion.
The two counties of Surrey and Middlesex, apart from London, are low down in our Baptist statistics, and indeed in all Nonconformist work. The churches are nearly all feeble, and are holding their own with great difficulty; hence, they have very little strength to spare for founding new interests. The London Association contains all the large churches, and the few who form the new Association have a huge task before them, and outward strength altogether out of proportion to the demand upon it. They need an evangelist of their own to go through all the towns and villages preaching the word, but how is he to be supported? Oh, that some wealthy brother would make these counties his own district! If the two appear too much, let one be taken up. Comparatively little money would be needed, and great results might be anticipated. We offered the friends £50 for the next year towards an evangelist, and we hope others will come forward and help also. There are places in Surrey which are far more discouraging than Zululand or Tartary, and yet present most urgent calls for gospel effort.
On Friday evening, Aug. 11, a meeting of South London ministers and church-officers was held in the Tabernacle Lecture-hall, for the purpose of conferring with Mr. R. T. Booth respecting his approaching Gospel Temperance Mission. Pastor J. A. Spurgeon, who has recently become a total abstainer, and has been elected one of the Vice-Presidents of the Tabernacle Temperance Society, presided. After a short address by the chairman, and a statement by Mr. Smithers, the Secretary, as to the arrangements already made or contemplated, Mr. Booth spoke briefly, but earnestly; and the rest of the evening was occupied with suggestions as to the best means to be adopted to secure the success of the Mission. Mr. Andrew Dunn took the chair, when Mr. James Spurgeon had to leave for another meeting, and at the close of the Conference the committee met to carry out as far as was practicable the recommendations that had been given.
The list of services, at all of which Mr. Booth hopes to speak, is as follows: — Sunday afternoon, September 3rd, at 3; Monday evening, 4th, at 8.30; Tuesday, 5th, at 8; Wednesday, 6th, at 5.30 (for children and young people only), and at 8 (for adults); Thursday, 7th, at 8.30; Friday, 8th, at 8; Saturday, no meeting; Sunday, 10th, at 3 and 8.15; Monday, 11th at 3.30 (for women only), and 8.30 (for all); and Tuesday, 12th, at 7.30, great farewell meeting. Every day during the Mission, with the exception of Saturday and Sunday, a mid-day prayer-meeting will be held at 12.30. Contributions in aid of the expenses of the Mission will be thankfully received by Pastor C. H. Spurgeon.
COLLEGE. — During the past month Mr. J. H. Grant has accepted an invitation from the church at Gold Hill, Bucks; Mr. E. B. Pearson has settled at Providence Chapel, Hounslow; and Mr. E. Richards has become pastor of the church at Lerwick, Shetland, where he will labor in connection with the Baptist Home Missionary Society of Scotland.
Mr. J. W. Comfort has removed from Ossett to Bromsgrove, Worcestershire; and Mr. E. A. Tydeman, from Devonport, to Zion Chapel, Bacup, Lancashire.
Mr. J. E. Moyle, who returned to Canada on the completion of his college course, has settled at St. Andrew’s, Quebec; and Mr. R. Holmes has removed from Ayhner to become Mr. Dyke’s successor at College Street, Toronto.
Mr. A. Fairbrother sailed on the 24th ult. for Auckland, New Zealand.
The summer session of the College was commenced on Tuesday afternoon, August 8, when the tutors and students assembled at “Westwood” for devotional exercises and social enjoyment. Twenty-three “freshmen” were introduced to their brethren, and heartily welcomed to the benefits of the institution; and addresses were delivered by the President, Vice-President, and Professors Rogers, Gracey, and Fergusson. Tutors report the new men as an exceedingly hopeful band. The Lord make them all faithful preachers of the word. The College work is the most important of all the labors that have been entrusted to our oversight by the great Master, and our heart is set upon it more and more. Let not the Lord’s stewards forget the portion for the school of the prophets, for to her rising men, now in training, the church looks for her future leaders. Our teaching has distinct and definite doctrines as the groundwork of everything; we do not upon that matter give forth any uncertain sound.
EVANGELISTS. — Mr. Burnham goes this month to labor among the hoppickers in Kent. In response to his appeal for contributions towards the extension of the work, we have received the following amounts: — Mrs. Higham, 2s. 6d.; M.M., 10s.; Readers of Word and Work, £10; A.M., Scotland, 5s. This we beg most gratefully to acknowledge. It shows that there are a few good people who care for the poor Londoners in the hop gardens.
Messrs. Smith and Fullerton, having completed their twelvemonth’s mission in London, are now resting preparatory to starting on their autumn tour in the south-west of England. We hope our friends in that region will be ready earnestly to back them up.
AUCKLAND TABERNACLE BUILDING FUND. — Mr. and Mrs. Spurgeon beg to acknowledge, with heartiest thanks, the receipt of the following contributions for their son’s new Tabernacle at Auckland, New Zealand: — Mrs. C. Parker, 10s.; Mrs. Smith, 1s.; M. C. H., £5; A widow, 12s.; Mrs. M. E. White, 3s.; Miss Farmer, 10s.; Mrs. Dix, £I0; Mr. Calder, £5; A friend, 10s.; Mrs. A. G., £2; Mr. W. R. Fox, £5; Lydia, per J. T. D., 2s. 6d.; Mrs. Virtue, £5; Mrs. Joseph Williams, 10s.; A friend, £1. There must be many more friends of our son who are intending to help: will they please quicken their pace, and cheer us thereby? A box will be going early in September. As the bazaar is to be held at Christmas, any goods to be sent must be off at once, for even now the time is short. Goods must not be later than the 15th of September, and the earlier the better. The members of the Old Tabernacle at home should be the first to help the New Tabernacle in Auckland. They cannot have forgotten young Thomas whom they were so pleased to hear. Let him not imagine that he has slipped out of the memories of those at home.
ORPHANAGE. — Notice to Collectors. The next quarterly collectors’ meeting will be held at the Orphanage on Friday evening, October 13, when all collectors are earnestly requested to bring or send their boxes or books, with the amounts collected for the institution. With girls to provide for as well as boys our needs are greatly increased, and all collectors should do their best. Double quick is marching time just now.
COLPORTAGE. — During the past month nothing has transpired that deserves special note in the work of the Colportage Association, though the usual labors of the colporteurs are still full of encouraging incidents. To understand the value and importance of the work thoroughly it is necessary to go down into the localities, and see and hear what is being done. The secretary has recently visited two of the districts, and reports progress which calls for much thankfulness. At Woodham Walter, in Essex, where Mr. Keddie is at work, a nice village chapel has been erected, mainly through the labors of the colporteur, and the pulpit is supplied chiefly by him. The first anniversary liar just been held. After a sermon by the secretary, Mr. W. Corden Jones, a crowded meeting was held in the evening at which the colporteur was supported by Congregational, Wesleyan, and Baptist friends. It was reported that some of the worst characters in the neighborhood had been converted, one of whom got up at the close of the meeting and confessed that it was through the labors of the colporteur that he had been blessed. The locality is sparsely populated, but the chapel is crowded on Sunday evenings. During the week the colporteur, who has been supplied with a donkey and cart by local friends, visits the villages for eight or nine miles round, and sells a considerable quantity of good literature, besides visiting many sick folks.
The other district visited is Bower Chalke, situated in the midst of the lovely Wiltshire downs. Here a small Baptist church subscribes nobly towards the support of the colporteur, who has to walk through the whole of his wide district, and is much respected.
After a sermon in the afternoon by the secretary, a tea-meeting was held in a large barn. The tables having been cleared the audience took their seats in the “bay,” and a wagon was wheeled on to the “floor” for a rostrum for the speakers, when addresses were delivered upon colportage work. Some £15 a year more is required to enable the Association to continue this needy district. Most of the supporters are laborers, and do well. Will any wealthy friend send a special subscription, so that the district may be continued beyond the present year? Visitors to the sea-side will find some of our colporteurs at work on the beach and we hope will encourage them by purchasing good and interesting books. Great Yarmouth, Ryde, Cowes, and Ventnor all have Colporteurs. All applications for the appointment of Colporteurs, and subscriptions or donations will be gladly received and acknowledged by the Secretary, W. Corden Jones, Colportage Association, Temple-street, St. George’s-road, Southwark.
PERSONAL NOTES.— A Baptist minister writes to us as follows: — “You ought to be a happy man. When in Scotland some time ago I got lost in a Glen-something. The folk there had never heard of the late lamented Beaconsfield. Happy is the people that is in such a case! They had no notion of Gladstone; but you should have seen them wake up when I mentioned your name. They had a sort of knowledge of that name, for they read your sermons, and fetched a lot out to show me that they did so. I assure you I never saw any man’s works with such signs of use upon them. There was no kirk in the glen, so on Sundays they got together and had a service, the scholar of the place reading the sermon. One very old man said he ‘Wad shoost gang on his twa bonds and knees a’ the way to Glasguh to get a sight o’ ye.’ I doubt if he could have done half a mile any way, but there was a look in his eye that you would have been comforted to see.”
A Christian man, who used to attend our services at the Surrey Music Hall, recently felt moved to read the sermons on the green of the village where he lives, and in the adjoining town. With the help of a few friends he has conducted a full service at each place on Sunday afternoons and evenings. In the village he has gathered from 200 to 300 people together, and in the town his congregations have ranged from 400 or 500 up to 900 or 1,000. He says that the people have been very attentive, and that from the many encouraging expressions he has received he is sure God is blessing the work. His great regret is that he did not commence the effort before. When the weather gets too cold for open-air services he hopes to secure a large building in which to continue the reading of the sermons through the winter. Are there not many other places where those who have been blessed by the reading of the sermons might with great advantage to many people carry on similar services?
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle. — July 27, eighteen; August 3, eleven.
Chap 24. OCTOBER, 1882.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
OCTOBER, 1882.
COMMUNION ADDRESS
DELIVERED AT THE CLOSE OF THE COLLEGE CONFERENCE
BY C. H. SPURGEON.
WE have nothing now to think of but our Lord. We come to him that he may cause us to forget all others. We are not here as ministers, cumbered with much serving, but we now sit at his feet with Mary, or lean on his bosom with John. The Lord himself gives us our watchword as we muster our band for the last assembly. “Remember me” is the loving command. We beseech him to fill the full circle of our memory as the sun fills the heavens and the earth with light. We are to think only of Jesus, and of him only will I speak. Oh for a touch of the live coal from him who is our Altar as well as our Sacrifice!
The text is found in the words of John, in the first chapter of the Revelation, at the seventeenth and eighteenth verses: — “And when I saw HIM, I fell at HIS feet as dead. And HE laid HIS right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am He that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.”
John was of all men the most familiar with Jesus: and his Lord had never needed to say to him, “Lovest thou me?” Methinks if any man could have stood erect in the presence of the glorified Savior it would have been that disciple whom Jesus loved. Love permits us to take great liberties: the child will climb the knee of his royal father, and no man accuses it of presuming; John had such love, and yet even he could not look into the face of the Lord of glory without being overcome with awe. While yet in the body even John must swoon if he be indulged with a premature vision of the Well-beloved in his majesty. If permitted to see the Lord before our bodies have undergone that wondrous change by which we are made like to Jesus that we may see him as he is, we shall find the sight to be more than we can bear. A clear view of our Lord’s heavenly splendor while we are here on earth would not be fitting, for it would not be profitable for us always to be lying in a swoon at our Redeemer’s feet, while there is so much work for us to do.
Permit me, dear brethren, to take my text from its connection and to apply it to ourselves, by bringing it down from the throne up yonder to the table here: it may be, I trust it will be, that as we see Jesus even here, we shall with John fall at his feet as dead. We shall not swoon, but we shall be dead in another sense, most sweetly dead, while our life is revealed in him. After we have thought upon that we shall come to what my text implies: then may we revive with John, for if he had not revived he could never have told us of his fainting fit. Thus we shall have death with Christ, and resurrection in him. Oh for a deep experience of both, by the power of the Holy Spirit!
If we are permitted to see Christ in the simple and instructive memorials which are now upon the table, we shall in a blessed sense FALL AT HIS FEET AS DEAD.
I. For, first, here we see provision for the removal of our sin, and we are thus reminded of it. Here is the bread broken because we have broken God’s law, and must have been broken for ever had there not been a bruised Savior. In this wine we see the token of the blood with which we must be cleansed, or else be foul things to be cast away into the burnings of Tophet, because abominable in the sight of God. Inasmuch as we have before us the memorial of the Atonement for sin, it reminds us of our death in sin in which we should still have remained but for that grace which spake us into life and salvation. Are you growing great? Be little again as you see that you are nothing but slaves that have been ransomed. “God’s freedmen” is still your true rank. Are you beginning to think that because you are sanctified you have the less need of daily cleansing? Hear that word, “If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another,” yet even then “the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanseth us from all sin.” We sin even when in the highest and divinest fellowship, and need still the cleansing blood. How this humbles us before the Lord! We are to be winners of sinners, and yet we ourselves are sinners still, needing as truly the bread of life as those to whom we serve it out.
Ah! and some of us have been very special sinners; and therefore, if we love much it is because we have had much forgiven. We have erred since we knew the Savior, and that is a kind of sinnership which is exceedingly grievous; we have sinned since we have entered into the highest state of spiritual joy, and have been with him on the holy mount, and have beheld his glory! This breeds a holy shamefacedness. We may well fall at Jesus’ feet, though he only reveals himself in bread and wine, for these convey a sense of our sinnership while they remind us of how our Lord met our sin and put it away. Herein we fall as low as the dead. Where is the I? Where is the self-glorying? Have you any left in the presence of the crucified Savior? As you in spirit eat his flesh and drink his blood can you glory in your own flesh, or feel the pride of blood and birth? Fie upon us if there mingles a tinge of pride with our ministry, or a taint of self-laudation with our success. When we see Jesus, our Savior, the Savior of sinners, surely self will sink and humility will fall at his feet. When we think of Gethsemane and Calvary, and all our great Redeemer’s pain and agony, surely by the Holy Ghost self-glorying, self-seeking, and self-will must fall as though slain with a deadly wound. “When I saw HIM, I fell at HIS feet as dead.”
Here, also, we learn a second lesson. Jesus has placed upon this table food. The bread sets forth all that is necessary, and the cup all that is luxurious: provision for all our wants and for all our right desires: all that we need for sustenance and joy. Then what a poverty-stricken soul am I that I cannot find myself in bread! As to comforts, I may not think of them; they must be given me or I shall never taste them. Brothers, we are Gentlemen Commoners upon the bounty of our great Kinsman: we come to his table for our maintenance: we have no establishments of our own. He who feeds the sparrows feeds our souls; in spiritual things we no more gather into barns than do the blessed birds; our heavenly Father feeds us from that “all fullness” which it hath pleased him to lay up for us in Jesus. We could not live an hour spiritually without him who is not only bread, but life; not only the wine which cheereth, but consolation itself. Our life hangs upon Jesus; he is our Head as well as our food. We shall never outgrow our need of natural bread, and spiritually we shall never rise out of our need of a present Christ, but the rather we shall feel a strong? craving and a more urgent passion for him. Look at yonder yam person! He feels that he is a great man, and you own that he is your superior in gifts; but what a cheat he is, what a foolish creature to dream of being somebody. Now will he be found wanting; for, like ourselves, he is not sufficient even to think anything of himself. A beggar who has to live on alms, to eat the bread of dependence, to take the cup of charity, — what has he to boast of? HE is the great One who feeds us, who gives us all that we enjoy, who is our all in all; and as for us, we are suppliants — I had almost said mendicants — a community of Begging Freres, to all personal spiritual wealth as dead as the slain on Marathon. The negro slave at least could claim his own breath, but we cannot claim even that. The Spirit of God must give us spiritual breath, or our life will expire. When we think of this, surely the sight of Christ in this bread and wine, though it be a dim vision compared with that which ravished the heart of John, will make us fall at the Redeemer’s feet as dead.
The “I” cannot live, for our Lord has provided no food for the vain Ego, and its lordliness. He has provided all for necessity, but nothing for boasting. Oh, blessed sense of self-annihilation! We have experienced it several times this week when certain of those papers were read to us by our brethren, and moreover we shriveled right up in the blaze of the joy with which our Master favored us. I hope this blessed assembly and its heavenly exercises have melted the Ego within us, and made it, for the while, flow away in tears. Dying to self is a blessed feeling. May we all realize it! When we are weak to the utmost in conscious death of self then are we strong to the fullness of might. Swooning away unto self-death, and losing all consciousness of personal power we are introduced into the infinite, and live in God.
II. Now let us consider how WE GET ALIVE AGAIN, and so know the Lord as the resurrection and the life. John did revive, and he tells us how it came about. He says of the Ever-blessed One, — “HE laid HIS right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am HE that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.”
All the life-floods of our being will flow with renewed force if first of all we are brought into contact with Jesus. “He laid his right hand upon me.” Marvelous patience that he does not set his foot upon us, and tread us down as the mire of the streets! I have lain at his feet as dead, and had he spurned me as tainted with corruption I could not have impugned his justice. But there is nothing here about his foot! That foot has been pierced for us, and it cannot be that the foot which has been nailed to the cross for his people should ever trample them in his wrath. Hear these words — “He laid his right hand upon me.” The right hand of his strength and of his glory he laid upon his fainting servant. It was the hand of a man. It is the right hand of him who in all our afflictions was afflicted, who is a brother born for adversity. Hence, everything about his hand has a reviving influence. The speech of sympathy, my brothers, is often too unpractical, and hence it is too feeble to revive the fainting; the touch of sympathy is far more effectual You remember that happy story of the wild negro child who could never be won till the little lady sat down by her, and laid her hand upon her. Eva won poor Topsy by that tender touch. The tongue failed, but the hand achieved the victory. So was it with our adorable Lord. He showed us that he was bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh; he brought himself into contact with us, and made us perceive the reality of his love to us, and then he became more than a conqueror over us.
Thus we felt that he was no fiction, but a real Christ, for there was his hand, and we felt the gentle pressure. The laying on of the right hand of the Lord had brought healing to the sick, sight to the blind, and even life to the dead, and it is no strange thing that it should restore a fainting disciple. May you all feel it at this very moment in its full reviving power! May there stream down from the Lord’s right hand not merely his sympathy, because he is a man like ourselves, but as much of the power of his deity as can be gotten into man, so that we may be filled with the fullness of God! That is possible at this instant. This Lord’s supper represents the giving of the whole body of Christ to us, to enter into us for food; surely if we enter into its true meaning we may expect to be revived and vitalized; for we have here more than a mere touch of the hand, it is the whole Christ that enters into us spiritually, and so comes into contact with our innermost being. I believe in “the real presence”: do not you? The carnal presence is another thing: that we do not even desire. Lord Jesus, come into a many-handed contact with us now by dwelling in us, and we in thee.
Still there was something else wanted, for our Lord Jesus, after the touch, gave the word: “Fear not; I am the first and the last.” What does he say? Does he say, “Thou art”? Open your Testaments and see. Does he exclaim, “Fear not; thou art the beloved disciple, John the apostle and divine”? I find nothing of the kind. He did not direct his servant to look at himself, but to remember the great I AM, his Savior, and Lord. The living comfort of every swooning child of God, of everyone who is conscious of a deathwound to the natural “I,” lies in that majestic “I,” which alone can say “I am.” You live because there is an “I am” who has life in himself, and has that life for you.
“I am the first.” I have gone before you, and prepared your way; I loved you before you loved me; I ordained your whole course in life before you were in existence. In every work of grace for you and within you, I am first. Like the dew which comes from the Lord, I waited not for man, neither tarried for the sons of men. And I also am the last, perfecting that which concerneth you, and keeping you unto the end. I am the Alpha and the Omega to you, and all the letters in between; I began with you, and I shall end with you, if an end can be thought of. I march in the van, and I bring up the rear. Your final preservation is as much from me as your hopeful commencement. Brother, does a fear arise concerning that dark hour which threatens soon to arrive? What hour is that? Jesus knows, and he will be with you through the night, and till the day breaketh. If Jesus is the beginning and the end to us, what is there else? What have we to fear unless it be those unhallowed inventions of our mistrust, those superfluities of naughtiness which fashion themselves into unbeliefs, and doubts, and unkind imaginings? Christ shuts out everything that could hurt us, for he covers all the time, and all the space; he is above the heights, and beneath the depths; and everywhere he is LOVE.
Read on, “I am he that liveth.” Because I live, ye shall live also; no real death shall befall you, for death hath no more dominion over me — your head, your life. While there is a living Christ in heaven no believer shall ever see death: he shall sleep in Jesus, and that is all, for even then he shall be for ever with the Lord.
Read on, “And was dead.” Therefore, though you die you shall go no lower than I went; and you shall be brought up again even as I have returned from the tomb. Think of Jesus as having traversed the realm of death-shade, and you will not fear to follow in his track. Where should the dying members rest but on the same couch with their once dying Head.
“And, behold, I am alive for evermore.” Yes, behold it, and never cease to behold it: we serve an ever-living Lord. Brothers, go home from Conference in the power of this grand utterance! The dear child may sicken, or the precious wife may be taken home, but Christ says, “I am alive for evermore.” The believing heart can never be a widow, for its husband is the living God. Our Lord Jesus will not leave us orphans, he will come unto us. Here is our joy, then: not in ourselves. but in the fact that he ever lives to carry out the Father’s good pleasure in us and for us. Onward, soldiers of the cross, for an immortal Captain leads the way.
Read once more — “And have the keys of hell and of death.” As I thought over these words I marveled for the poverty and meanness of the cause of evil; for the prince of it, the devil, has not the keys of own house; he cannot be trusted with them; they are swinging at the girdle of Christ. Surely I shall never go to hell, for my Lord Jesus turned the key against my entrance long ago. The doors of hell were locked for me when he died on my behalf. I saw him lock the door, and, what is more, I saw him hang the key at his girdle, and there it is to this day. Christ has the keys of hell; then whenever he chooses he can cage the devouring lion, and restrain his power for evil. Oh that the day were come! — it is coming, for the dragon hath great wrath, knowing that his time is short. Let us not go forth alone to battle with this dread adversary; let us tell his Conqueror of him, and entreat him to shorten his chain. I admire the forcible words of a dying woman to one who asked her what she did when she was tempted by the devil on account of her sin. She replied, “The devil does not tempt me now; he came to me a little while ago, and he does not like me well enough to come again!” “Why not?” “Well, he went, away because I said to him, Chosen, chosen!” “What did you mean by that?” “Do you not remember how it is said in the Scripture, ‘The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan; even the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee.’“ The aged woman’s text was well taken, and well does the enemy know the rebuke which it contains. When Joshua, the high priest, stood before the angel clothed in filthy garments, Satan stood at his right hand to resist him, but he was silenced by being told of the election of God: “The Lord which hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee.” Ah, brethren, when Christ’s right hand is upon us the evil one departs. He knows too well the weight of that right hand.
Conclude the verse, — “And of death.” Our Lord has the keys of death, and this will be a joyful fact to us when our last hours arrive. If we say to him, “Master, whither am I going?” He answers, “I have the key of death and the spirit-world.” Will we not reply, “We feel quite confident to go wherever thou wilt lead us, O Lord”? We shall then pursue his track in his company. Our bodies shall descend into what men call a charnel-house, though it is really the unrobing-room of saints, the vestibule of heaven, the wardrobe of our dress where it shall be cleansed and perfected. We have a fit spiritual array for the interval, but we expect that our bodies shall rise again in the likeness of “the Lord from heaven.” What gainers we shall be when we shall take up the robes we laid aside, and find them so gloriously changed, and made fit for us to wear even in the presence of our Lord. So if the worst fear that crosses you should be realized, and you should literally die at your Lord’s feet, there is no cause for dread, for no enemy can do you harm, since the divine right hand is pledged to deliver you to the end. Let us give the Well-beloved the most devout and fervent praise as we now partake of this regal festival. The King sitteth at his table — let our spikenard give forth its sweetest smell.
Chap 25. NOVEMBER, 1882.
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL.
NOVEMBER, 1882.
SWEET VARIETY IN THE GARDEN OF GOD.
A HINT BY C. H. SPURGEON.
THE plants of the Lord’s right-hand planting have many and prominent points of likeness, and yet they differ exceedingly. We shall err from the truth and from love if we look for all the same traits of character in all the children of God: some are constitutionally vigorous, and others are feeble; some are aspiring, and others drooping; many are contemplative, and more are active; many are excitable, while a few are deliberate. Each form of mind has its beauties and its uses. All flowers are so much alike that we rightly place them in one group, and never mistake them either for minerals or animals, and yet their variety is as wide as it is charming. Even so all the regenerate belong to one family, and yet no one is exactly like another. All the Israelites are of the seed of Abraham, and yet Judah is not Dan, nor Issachar Manasseh: why should they be?
Many of God’s people are naturally cheerful; in their case the holiness of their joy comes from the Spirit of God, but the joyousness itself is in a measure due to a healthy body and a contented mind. These bright Christians are like the flowers which bathe in the sunlight, and flourish best on a warm border where no biting wind ever makes its way. These joyous people may live out a depression, but they are at their best when they can rejoice in the Lord always, and yet again rejoice. See the crocus fast closed while “the clouds return after the rain,” but open and filled with glory when the sun pours its rays into its cup of pure gold like unto transparent glass. At such times did you ever note the soft golden flame which seems to burn deep down in the cup, — a sort of fiery sheen of liquid light? How like to the raptures and ecstasies which are enjoyed by certain of our Lord’s household! A clear, warm, steady sunshine is the element of the crocus; under such influence it throws out a blaze of color, and as we look within its chalice the golden glory seems to quit the leaf, “and roll like a fiery atmosphere within.” Such are the happy hearts that live in full communion with the Lord. Let us not envy them, much less tremble for their joyousness, as though it were a great peril.
On the other hand, there may be in the disposition of other Christians tendencies which naturally incline them to the shady side of life. Such bring forth the choice flowers of patience and resignation, and are seen at their best in a partial gloom; who shall, therefore, condemn them? The evening primrose exhibits nothing better than faded and dis-colored flowers all day long, as if it were altogether withering away, for noontide is not the hour of its beauty. Wait till the summer twilight is beginning, and you shall see it gradually open its fragrant blossoms, and display its pale yellow colors. It is the joy of the evening and the night: the garish sun woos it in vain, it loves the fair face of the moon. We all know godly women who would never be seen to advantage among the public activities of our churches, and yet in the sick-room and in the hour of affliction they are full of beauty, and shed a lovely fragrance all around.
We will not excuse a tendency to despondency, for there is abundance of joy in Christ Jesus for all orders of saints; but nevertheless we perceive great beauty in men and women of a sorrowful spirit, whose patience in tribulation is given them of their Lord. No one should utter a syllable against saints whose resemblance is found in the
“Fair flower that shuns the glare of day,
Yet loves to open, meekly bold,
To evening hues of silver gray,
Its cup of paly gold.”
Among the night-blooming flowers are found a few of rare beauty and delicious perfume. Take, for instance, the Cereus, or Cactus grandiflora. It is a grandee of the floral world, and wears at night a crown which is a foot in diameter, of a splendid yellow within and a dark brown without. Its scent perfumes the air to a considerable distance, and makes night fragrant as Solomon’s palace of cedar. A little before midnight this cactus displays its wondrous charms, and is seen to be one of “the precious things put forth by the moon.” We think we know believers worthy to be compared to this glorious flower; brilliant in endurance, more than conquerors in tribulation; of whom the world is not worthy.
Let not the evening primrose despise the tulip for its love of the sun; and let not the tulip find fault with the night-blooming flower for its delight in the moon. Each of these has its use, and is beautiful in its season. The bees gather about the beauties of the day, and the moths sip of the blooms of the night. The rejoicing child of God must not grow heady and high-minded, and push his weak and weeping brother; and, on the other hand, the sad and lowly one must not begin to tyrannize over his joyous friend, by measuring his heavenly experience by the standard which dolorous doubters have set up. God’s flowers must be left to bloom in their own way, and the more natural they are the better. Some of them naturally hang down while yet in bud, and yet when they are fully opened they gaze upward with clear vision; is not the drooping posture modestly suitable to the youth of their buds? It would be useless to upbraid them, they are best as they are. The gardener thinks he improves God’s handiwork, but a man of pure taste is not of his mind; true, he may gain in one direction, but he loses in several others. The distinctive features of a flower are made less striking by the processes of education, and the tendency is for all such flowers to be globular and like each other. There are eyes that love the child of nature in his own raiment more than the heir of art in his finer and stiffer apparel. Roses and dahlias in their first estate have more expression than when art has given them an aristocratic form and fashion.
You know that in the habit of opening and closing, flowers are so varied that some one or other of them is sure to be opening at each quarter of an hour of the day. The star of Jerusalem is up by three, and the chicory at four: the buttercup opens at six, the water-lily at seven, the pink at eight, and so on till the night comes on. Linnaeus made a clock of flowers. If you are well acquainted with the science of botany, you, too, may tell the time without a watch.
“On upland shores the shepherd marks
The hour when, as the dial true,
The chicory to the lowering lark
Lifts her soft eyes, serenely blue.”
God has made everything beautiful in its season, everything lovely in its own order. It were a pity that there should be a battle among the flowers, and a greater trouble still if there should be a conflict among saints as to which state of experience is the better, or as to which is the higher mark of grace.
One thing I have learned from flowers which should be a lesson for us all: it is the dependence of most of them upon the great heavenly light. If you will look on a lawn when it rains, you may at a little distance see nothing but the green grass; but as soon as the shower is over, and the sun shines forth, countless daisies, which have shut themselves up while the sun is away, will open their eyes and look up to him. Well are they called Day’seyes. The sweet marguerites lie asleep all night, shut up like pearls in their shells; but when brave Sol is up they hide themselves no longer, but come forth to meet the bridegroom. Should we not act according to such sort towards the Well-beloved, whose presence makes our day? When our Lord Christ conceals his face, let us shut up our hearts in sorrow, even “as the closing buds at eve grieve for the departed sunbeams.” When Jesus shines upon us with brightness of beauty and warmth of grace, then let our hearts unclasp their folded leaves again, and let them drink in a fullness of light and love. We may all try to be alike in this respect, for we all love Jesus. If we cannot all rejoice in him at this moment, yet we can all refuse to rejoice in aught besides. And there is no mere fancy in such refusal; for how can the flower of the day be content without the sun, and how can we be happy without our Lord? The poet says, — The tyrant night oppresses the innocent flower until its pure deep eyes are wet with tears; but when the conquering sun appears the flower smiles through its tear-drops. The Pharisees complained that, while they often fasted, the disciples of Jesus did not fast at all. Well did the Master answer them, “Can the children of the bride-chamber mourn, as long as the bridegroom is with them? but the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast.” Now, this is true of us all. While Christ is with us we could not be sad if we were to try, and if he be once gone we cannot be glad, however much we may attempt to be so. He is everything to us — our joy, our hope, our all. Our bliss depends, not upon what we are in ourselves, but upon what he is in himself. What a songster sung to a flower may be fitly applied to every believer; he would have it joy in the sun, and so he sings —
“‘Tis thine to rest in his embrace,
Nor labor to be sweet and fair;
Do thou but gaze into his face,
And all thy beauty shineth there:
Heaven thee hath made a mirror in whose sheen
The shining of you sun is in sweet beauty seen.”
Here, then, is a clear point of union for all believers of every shape of character. We are one in our need of Jesus, one in our joy in him, one in our growth beneath his heavenly influences. To him we turn as the heliotrope turns to the sun, and towards him we are moving as truly, though as slowly, as the purple orchids moves towards the south, the land of the sun. Oh, to dwell in the unclouded glory of the Sun of righteousness for evermore!
PLINY’S MYRTLE AND CHRIST’S CROSS
THE heathen naturalist, Pliny, tells of a peculiarly fragrant myrtle-tree which grew in great abundance in his own time, and which he represents as possessing a strange and even miraculous virtue. A spray cut from it and carried in the hand could so continuously sustain the body that weariness was impossible, while it exercised such an exhilarating potency over the mind that no feeling approaching the sense of discouragement or despondency could ever be experienced. That fabled tree was a fitting emblem of the efficacy of grace in healing all the soul’s diseases, and, in its ultimate result, delivering the body also from every malady which may now afflict or oppress it, raising it up on the resurrection-day in the likeness and loveliness of the glorious body of the Son of God. — R. W. Forrest.
KEEP UP THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL.
HERE is a fit place to urge our friends to look well to the Sabbath-school. Our richer people in the town churches live out of town, and so the school loses those who should be its leaders. Cannot the sons and daughters of our well-to-do people try to deny themselves, and stop up in town between the morning and evening services, so as to take classes? How richly would they enjoy a Lord’s-day thus spent! If this be thought impracticable, let more of our older friends come to the rescue. We know school after school where there are children in hundreds, but tethers are so few that dozens, if not scores, of children are taught by one person with great labor and little profit. By all the honorable records of the past we plead that the Sabbathschool must not be suffered to go down in any place on any account. Men and brethren, women and sisters, help! Help at once! Keep on helping as long as you live. — C. H. S.
HIGHER AND HIGHER
BY THOMAS SPURGEON.
WHEN the visitor asked how the invalid was, her anxious friends replied, “Oh, she’s getting lower and lower.” But when he grasped her trembling, transparent hand, and inquired if that were so, she said sweetly, “Oh, no; higher and higher!”
The condition of her poor body may be thus described: —
“Lower and lower the pulse-beats sink,
Lesser and lesser the life-cords shrink,
Looser and looser the vital link,
Little by little she nears the brink.”
But she, thinking more of her near approach to glory and to Jesus than of the sinking of her body, would not have it so: not lower and lower, but higher and higher.
“Higher and higher, not lower and lower,
Each pain proves a lever to lift;
Brighter and brighter, not darker and darker,
Each cloud has its light-letting rift!
“Nearer and nearer, not farther and farther,
I’ll soon reach the harbor of peace;
Calmer and calmer, not rougher and rougher,
For I’m nearing the happy release!”
And this was not mere fancy, nor the expression of a hope; it was a glorious, bright reality, —
“Nearer and nearer her Savior drew,
Clearer and clearer the glory grew,
Dearer and dearer the promise true,
Minute by minute, as minutes flew.
“Slighter and slighter her pain she deemed,
Lighter and lighter the burden seemed,
Brighter and brighter the vista gleamed,
Daily and nightly of Jesus she dreamed.
“Deeper and deeper the flow of grace,
Sweeter and sweeter the Lamb-lit face,
Meeter and meeter the heavenly place,
Hourly enjoying her Lord’s embrace.”
Ere long she fell on sleep. She had been gradually rising “higher and higher”: she was suddenly liked into the highest.
“Higher, and nigher, and better, — nay, best!
When Jesus said, ‘Friend, come up higher, and rest
Thy poor weary head, like John, on my breast!’
Precious Savior, vouchsafe we may each thus be blest!”
.
TWO PRAYER-MEETINGS AT THE TABERNACLE
IT has been thought that an account of Tabernacle Prayer-meetings might be useful to those who conduct these holy gatherings elsewhere. It will exhibit the great variety of which such meetings are capable, and may suggest to friends who complain of dull prayer-meetings methods for curing such a grievous ill. We do not set up our prayer-meetings as models, but merely as suggestions. We give only two meetings, but we hope to continue the account next month.
Monday evening, September 25. — The meeting opened by singing hymn 314,
“He’s gone — the Savior’s work on earth,
His task of love is o’er,”
to a tune which it was desired to introduce into the worship of the Sabbath. By singing the tune to both of the first two hymns the people caught the strain, and are now prepared to recognize it when the tune is used in the great congregation. Prayer was offered by Pastor C. H. Spurgeon, who presided. There was a large attendance, occupying both the area and the first gallery. Again we sang, and prayer was offered by our deacon, Mr. Allison, and by Mr. H. Driver, a student who has come to the College from Auckland, New Zealand. These prayers did not exceed five minutes, and followed without break.
The following request for prayer was then presented before the Lord by Mr. Harrald: — “ A lady, who has already lost several children by consumption, asks for special prayer for her daughter, who has been attacked by the same disease. Her mother begs for prayer both for her and for her only son, whom she has long since dedicated unconditionally to the Lord. The letter further says, — ‘I have no rest in my spirit till these two are brought in,’“ Upon this sentence the Pastor dilated, stating that our anxiety for others is frequently a prophecy of good to their souls. He hoped that many of us would become thus restless till our children are all saved. After Mr. Harrald’s intercession we joined in song with the lines: —
“With joy we meditate the grace
Of our High Priest above;
His heart is made of tenderness,
His bowels melt with love.
Touch’d with a sympathy within,
He knows our feeble frame;
He knows what sore temptations mean,
For he has felt the same.
He, in the days of feeble flesh,
Pour’d out his cries and tears,
And in his measure feels afresh
What every member bears.”
The Pastor read the following notes: —
“A mother requests the prayers of the Lord’s people for a daughter once good and kind, but now addicted to drink.”
A wife says, “I write these few lines to ask you to pray for my dear husband. He was once a preacher, but his present sin is drink I cannot bear the thought that after he has preached to others he himself should become a castaway. Do make special prayer for us both.”
In calling upon Elder Cox to pray for these two cases, Mr. Spurgeon said — “It is a dreadful thing that so many hopeful spirits, bright spirits, loving spirits, who were beloved by all who knew them, should fall by little and little through the insidious habit of drunkenness. They never meant to take too much; but they were lured on by the appetite. This withering sin touches the character as with a hot iron, and all the beauty and the joy of life fade away. How can this plague be stayed? No one can bear the thought that those who have preached to others should themselves fall short of the kingdom, yet drink has slain its millions; I had almost said it has dragged down men who stood like angels in their brightness, and quenched them into degradation and misery till they were like to devils in wickedness and fury. Alas, alas, for the doings and the undoings wrought by drunkenness! All sins are deadly, but this is a sword with which men play till it cuts them to the heart. God he? us to blunt the edge of that sword! Meanwhile we plead for the wounded.” Mr. Cox prayed with much earnestness, and the great congregation was stirred with strong desire.
Mr. Wm. Olney, Jun., prayed for several persons in spiritual distress, whose cases were described by the Pastor.
Elder Sedcole and Mr. Perry, one of our students, very touchingly related the way in which they were brought to Christ, and urged sinners to fly to Jesus. This was deeply interesting, and constituted the feature of this gathering. The brethren were called upon without notice, but spoke most touchingly, and we believe that their testimonies will be used of God to conversion. Hymn 499, commencing —
“Come, poor sinner, come and see,
All thy strength is found in Me,”
was sung, and then Mr. Dunn pleaded for some who desired to be healed of bodily sickness, and specially for one who was believed to be dying with cancer in the throat, who, if taken away, would leave a wife and ten children behind him. There was much fervor in the meeting at this point.
Pastor Levinsohn, himself of the seed of Israel, next prayed for his own nation, after we had sung that choice hymn —
“Wake, harp of Zion, wake again,
Upon thine ancient hill,
On Jordan’s long deserted plain,
By Kedron’s lowly rill.
The hymn shall yet in Zion swell
That sounds Messiah’s praise,
And thy loved name, Immanuel!
As once in ancient days.
For Israel yet shall own her King,
For her salvation waits,
And hill and dale shall sweetly sing
With praise in all her gates.
Hasten, O Lord, these promised days,
When Israel shall rejoice;
And Jew and Gentile join in praise,
With one united voice.”
Just before the close of the meeting a telegram arrived from Pastor C. Spurgeon, of Greenwich, who was on his way to attend the Christian Convention at Chicago. This was the message: —
“1 Thessalonians 5:25. 2 Corinthians 13:14.” — “Brethren, pray for us.” “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy G host, be with you all. Amen.”
Mr. William Olney, Senr., prayed both for Mr. Charles Spurgeon in his work in America, and for his brother Thomas in New Zealand. The Pastor pronounced the benediction, and as we left the Tabernacle we felt that we had been doing real business at the throne of grace, and that the “Sweet hour of prayer” had passed all too quickly.
Monday evening, October 2, was largely devoted to the STOCKWELL ORPHANAGE. The boys and girls marched down to the Tabernacle, and filled up the end of the first gallery. Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presided, and there was again a large congregation, the greater portion of the area and the first gallery being occupied. The meeting was opened with the hymn, commencing “I feel like singing all the time,” sung by the children and the people, after which the Pastor offered prayer. Then followed the hymn, “Art thou weary?” in which the children and adults alternately sang the inquiry and the response. Mr. Gardiner, a city missionary, prayed for a blessing upon the work of the church, and specially mentioned the various agencies for the benefit of children. Many friends, who had arrived during the last prayer, were waiting to take their seats, so one verse was sung, “Come, my soul, thy suit prepare,” and then Elder Sedcole pleaded very earnestly for fruit from the services of the preceding day, and also for a blessing upon the sermon to be preached by the Pastor on Wednesday at Liverpool.
The children having sung, “Happy! ever happy!” Mr. Charlesworth asked for special petitions for the orphans. He said that many present could remember the beginning of the institution, when there were six boys in Mrs. Gilbert’s house. The first who was received, having passed through the College, has become a successful minister of the gospel Up to the present time no less than 789 have found a home at Stockwell, of whom 449 have left, leaving 340 now in residence. A few have been “called home,” and Mr. Charlesworth was glad to be able to say that every one of them, before they fell asleep, had borne testimony to their acceptance in Jesus Christ. The growing expenses of the institution had been met by constantly increasing contributions, so that the President had not been overweighted with care on account of his large fatherless family. Parents present, who knew the trouble that one child could cause, might estimate the difficulties to be overcome in training three hundred and forty in the way they ought to go. The Sunday-school held at the Orphanage on Sunday afternoons had been the means of leading many of the children to the Savior. Mr. Charlesworth closed his short address by reading what Mr. R. T. Booth wrote in the visitors’ book after the President conducted him over the institution. This is what he said: —
“This is an autumn day in London, dark, and cold, and dreary. For the first time I step into the grounds of the Stockwell Orphanage, and am met by its thunder, my friend, Mr. C. H. Spurgeon. As I pass through the various buildings I find some 300 little fatherless children sheltered from the storm, and surrounded with every comfort of a happy home, and provided with all that a great loving heart can suggest. As I look into their bright, happy faces, listening to their-songs of glee, I observe that no two are dressed alike; the miserable, prison-like custom of uniformity being entirely banished; I find it difficult to persuade myself that these are not little ones just from the firesides of the surrounding homes come together for a childish romp. My whole heart’s best love goes out to him who is thus doing for him who said, ‘Feed my lambs.’ My dear wife unites with me in the above.”
The children sang, “Always cheerful,” — a most appropriate piece for them; Elder Everett, being called upon by the Pastor on a sudden, described the Sunday afternoon school at the Orphanage; and prayer for all children was offered by Mr. Hoyland and Elder Cox. One of the brethren having prayed “that the Lord would knock all the nonsense out of the pulpits,” the Pastor said, “That is a petition in which I very heartily join. It does seem to me surprising that men can preach sermons that have not a bit of Christ in them, sermons that would not save the soul of a mouse. They would be first-rate sermons, capital sermons, if they were good for anything: they are clever to the last degree, but they would never save souls unless the Lord were to make the people misunderstand them. Sometimes that has been the case, as it was with the good woman who was much refreshed by what her minister said about metaphysics. She thought he said that Christ was meat and physic too, and the misunderstanding was a deal more instructive than what he actually said.”
The Pastor then read a letter from Pastor C. T. Johnson, of Longton, containing cheering news of Mr. Bonser’s work at Fenton; and prayer for the laborers in the Potteries, and other spiritually dark places, was presented by Messrs. Lazenby and Newbat. The children sang “Sound the battle-cry”; and then followed the most impressive scene of the whole evening. The orphan girls alone sang very sweetly the hymn in Mr. Sankey’s book, commencing —
“Oh, what a Savior that he died, for me!
From condemnation he hath made me free;
‘He that believeth on the Son,’ saith he,
‘Hath everlasting life.’
‘Verily, verily, I say unto you!’
‘Verily, verily,’ message ever new!
‘He that believeth on the Son’ — ‘Tis true!
‘Hath everlasting life!’“
At its close the Pastor had it repeated, in the hope that some might come to Christ while it was being sung. It was like a new song caroled by the angels, and many silent supplications were ascending to God that it might be a season of salvation to many souls. Special requests for prayer were read, and presented by the Pastor, as follow: — For the restoration of a young man in consumption, or for his soul’s recovery; and for the blessing of God to rest upon a meeting to be held at Cannon-street Hotel to promote the more widespread preaching of the doctrines of grace. In closing the meeting, the Pastor asked that his brother, who was to be married the following day, might be remembered in prayer, and that the church would plead for a special outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the service he was to conduct at Liverpool on Wednesday, and that all the meetings of the Baptist Union might be productive of much practical good. So ended a session of prayer of quite another order to that of the previous Monday, but equally full of power.
Chap 26. DECEMBER 1882
THE SWORD AND THE TROWEL
DECEMBER 1882
THE SOUL-WINNER’S REWARD
A PRAYER MEETING ADDRESS, BY C. H. SPURGEON.
ON my way to this meeting, I observed upon the notice-board of the police-station a striking placard, offering a large REWARD to any one who can discover and bring to justice the perpetrators of a great crime. No doubt our legislators know that the hope of a huge reward is the only motive which will have power with the comrades of assassins. The common informer earns so much scorn and hate that few can be induced to stand in his place, even when piles of gold are offered. It is a poor business at best.
It is far more pleasant to remember that there is a reward for bringing men to mercy, and that it is of a higher order than the premium for bringing men to justice; it is, moreover, much more within our reach, and that is a practical point worthy of our notice. We cannot all hunt down criminals, but we may all rescue the perishing. God be thanked that assassins and burglars are comparatively few, but sinners who need to be sought and saved swarm around us in every place. Here is scope for you all; and none need think himself shut out from the rewards which love bestows on all who do her service.
At the mention of the word REWARD, some will prick up their ears, and mutter “legality.” Yet the reward we speak of is not of debt, but of grace; and it is enjoyed, not with the proud conceit of merit, but with the grateful delight of humility.
Other friends will whisper, “Is not this a low and mercenary motive?” We reply that it is as mercenary as the spirit of Moses, who “had respect unto the recompense of the reward.” In this matter, all depends upon what the reward is; and if that happens to be the joy of doing good, the comfort of having glorified God, and the bliss of pleasing the Lord Jesus,—then the aspiration to be allowed to endeavor to save our fellow-men from going down into the pit is in itself a grace from the Lord; and if we did not succeed in it, yet the Lord would say of it, as He did of David’s intent to build a temple, “It was well that it was in thine heart.” Even if the souls we seek should all persist in unbelief if they all despise and reject and ridicule us, yet still it will be a divine work to have at least made the attempt. If there comes no rain out of the cloud, yet it has screened off the fierce heat of the sun; all is not lost even if the greater design be not accomplished. What if we only learn how to join the Savior in His tears, and cry, “How often would I have gathered you, but ye would not!” It is sublimity itself to be allowed to stand on the same platform with Jesus, and weep with Him. We are the better for such sorrows, if no others are.
But, thank God, our labors are not in vain in the Lord. I believe that the most of you, who have really tried, in the power of the Holy Spirit, by Scriptural teaching and by prayer, to bring others to Jesus, have been successful. I may be speaking to a few who have not succeeded; if so, I would recommend them to look steadily over their motive, their spirit, their work, and their prayer, and then begin again. Perhaps they may get to work more wisely, more believingly, more humbly, and more in the power of the Holy Spirit. They must act as farmers do who, after a poor harvest, plough again in hope. They ought not to he dispirited, but they ought to be aroused. We should be anxious to find out the reason of failure, if there be any, and we should be ready to learn from all our fellow-laborers; but we must steadfastly set our faces, if by any means we may save some, resolving that whatever happens we will leave no stone unturned to effect the salvation of those around us. How can we bear to go out of the world without sheaves to bear with us rejoicingly? I believe that the most of us who are now assembled to pray have been successful beyond our expectations. God has blessed us, not beyond our desires, but yet beyond our hopes. I have often been surprised at the mercy of God to myself. Poor sermons of mine, that I could cry over when I get home, have led scores to the cross; and, more wonderful still, words that I have spoken in ordinary conversation, mere chance sentences, as men call them, have nevertheless been as winged arrows from God, and have pierced men’s hearts, and laid them wounded at Jesus’ feet. I have often lifted up my hands in astonishment, and said, “How can God bless such a feeble instrumentality?” This is the feeling of most who addict themselves to the blessed craft of fishing for men, and the desire of such success furnishes as pure a motive as could move an angel’s heart, as pure, indeed, as that which swayed the Savior when, for the joy that was set before Him, He endured the cross, despising the shame. “Doth Job serve God for nought?” said Satan. If he could have answered the question in the affirmative, if it could have been proved that the perfect and upright man found no reward in his holy living, then Satan would have caviled at the justice of God, and urged men to renounce a service so unprofitable. Verily there is a reward to the righteous, and in the lofty pursuits of grace there are recompenses of infinite value. When we endeavor to lead men to God, we pursue a business far more profitable than the pearl-fisher’s diving or the diamondhunter’s searching. No pursuit of mortal men is to be compared with that of soul-winning. I know what I say when I bid you think of it as men think of entering the cabinet of the nation, or occupying a throne; it is a royal business, and they are true kings who follow it successfully.
The harvest of godly service is not yet: “we do with patience wait for it;” but we have earnests of our wage, refreshing pledges of that which is laid up in heaven for us. Partly,
THIS REWARD LIES IN THE WORK ITSELF.
Men go hunting and shooting for mere love of the sport; surely, in an infinitely higher sphere, we may hunt for men’s souls for the pleasing indulgence of our benevolence. To some of us, it would be an unendurable misery to see men sink to hell, and to be making no effort for their salvation. It is a reward to us to have a vent for our inward fires. It is woe and weariness to us to be shut up from those sacred activities which aim at plucking fire-brands from the flame. We are in deep sympathy with our fellows, and feel that, in a measure, their sin is our sin, their peril our peril.
If another lose the way,
My feet also go astray;
If another downward go,
In my heart is also woe.
It is therefore a relief to set forth the gospel, that we may save ourselves from that sympathetic misery which echoes in our hearts the crash of soul ruin.
Soul-winning is a service which brings great benefit to the individual who consecrates himself to it. The man who has watched for a soul, prayed for it, laid his plans for it, spoken with much trembling, and endeavored to make an impression, has been educating himself by the effort. Having been disappointed, he has cried to God more earnestly, has tried again, has looked up the promise to meet the case of the convicted one, has turned to that point of the divine character which seems most likely to encourage trembling faith,—he has in every step been benefiting himself. When he has gone over the old, old story of the cross to the weeping penitent, and has at last gripped the hand of one who could say,—”I do believe, I will believe, that Jesus died for me;” I say, he has had a reward in
THE PROCESS THROUGH WHICH HIS OWN MIND HAS GONE.
It has reminded him of his own lost estate; it has shown him the struggles that the Spirit had in bringing him to repentance; it has reminded him of that precious moment when he first looked to Jesus; and it has strengthened him in his firm confidence that Christ will save men. When we see Jesus save another, and see that marvelous transfiguration which passes over the face of the saved one, our own faith is greatly confirmed. Skeptics and modern-thought men have little to do with converts: those who labor for conversions believe in conversions; those who behold the processes of regeneration see a miracle wrought, and are certain that “this is the finger of God.” It is the most blessed exercise for a soul, it is the divinest ennobling of the heart, to spend yourself in seeking to bring another to the dear Redeemer’s feet. If it ended there, you might thank God that ever He called you to a service so comforting, so strengthening, so elevating, so confirming, as that of converting others from their evil ways.
Another precious recompense is found in
THE GRATITUDE AND AFFECTION OF THOSE YOU BRING TO CHRIST.
This is a choice boon,—the blessedness of joying in another’s joy, the bliss of hearing that you have led a soul to Jesus. Measure the sweetness of this recompense by the bitterness of its opposite. Men of God have brought many to Jesus, and all things have gone well in the church till declining years or changing fashions have thrown the good man into the shade, and then the minister’s own spiritual children have been eager to turn him out of doors. The unkindest cut of all has come from those who owed their souls to him. His heart was broken while he has sighed, “I could have borne it, had not the persons that I brought to the Savior have turned against me.” The pang is not unknown to me. I can never forget a certain household, in which the Lord gave me the great joy to bring four employers and several persons engaged by them to Jesus’ feet. Snatched from the utmost carelessness of worldliness, these who had previously known nothing of the grace of God were joyful confessors of the faith. After a while, they imbibed certain opinions differing from ours, and from that moment some of them had nothing but hard words for me and my preaching. I had done my best to teach them all the truth I knew, and if they had found out more than I had discovered, they might at least have remembered where they learned the elements of the faith. It is years ago now, and I have never said as much as this before; but I feel the wound much. I only mention these sharp pricks to show how very sweet it is to have those about you whom you have brought to the Savior.
A mother feels great delight in her children, for an intense love comes with natural relationships; but there is a still deeper love connected with spiritual kinship, a love which lasts through life, and will continue in eternity, for even in heaven each servant of the Lord shall say, “Here am I, and the children whom Thou hast given me.” They neither marry nor are given in marriage in the city of our God, but fatherhood and brotherhood in Christ shall still survive. Those sweet and blessed bonds which grace has formed continue for ever, and spiritual relationships are rather developed than dissolved by translation to the better land. If you are eager for real joy, such as you may think over and sleep upon, I am persuaded that no joy of growing wealthy, no joy of increasing knowledge, no joy of influence over your fellow-creatures, no joy of any other sort, can ever be compared with the rapture of saving a soul from death, and helping to restore our lost brethren to our great Father’s house. Talk of ten thousand pounds reward! It is nothing at all, one might easily spend that amount; but one cannot exhaust the unutterable delights which come from the gratitude of souls converted from the error of their ways.
But the richest reward lies in pleasing God, and causing the Redeemer to see of the travail of His soul. That Jesus should have His reward, is worthy of the Eternal Father; but it is marvelous that we should be employed by the Father to give to Christ the purchase of His agonies. This is a wonder of wonders! O my soul, this is an honor too great for thee! A bliss too deep for words! Listen, dear friends, and answer me. What would you give to cause a thrill of pleasure in the heart of the Well-beloved? Recollect the grief you cost Him, and the pangs that shot through Him that He might deliver you from your sin and its consequences; do you not long to make Him glad? When you bring others to His feet, you give Him joy, and no small joy either. Is not that a wonderful text,—”There is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth”? What does that mean? Does it mean that the angels have joy? We generally read it so, but it is not the intent of the verse. It says, “There is joy in the presence of the angels of God,”—that is, joy in the heart of God, around whose throne the angels stand. It is a joy which angels delight to behold,—what is it? Is the blessed God capable of greater joy than His own boundless happiness? Wondrous language this! The infinite bliss of God is more eminently displayed, if it cannot be increased. Can we be the instruments of this? Can we do anything which will make the Ever-blessed glad? Yes, for we are told that the great Father rejoices above measure when His prodigal son that was dead is alive again, and the lost one is found.
If I could say this as I ought to say it, it would make every Christian cry out, “Then I will labor to bring souls to the Savior;” and it would make those of us who have brought many to Jesus instant, in season and out of season, to bring more to Him. It is a great pleasure to be doing a kindness to an earthly friend, but to be doing something distinctly for Jesus, something which will be of all things in the world most pleasing to Him, is a great delight! It is a good work to build a meeting-house, and give it outright to the cause of God, if it is done with a right and proper motive; but one living stone, built upon the sure foundation by our instrumentality, will give the Master more pleasure than if we erected a vast pile of natural stones, which might only cumber the ground. Then go, dear friends, and seek to bring your children and your neighbors, your friends and your kinsfolk, to the Savior’s feet, for nothing will give him so much pleasure as to see them turn unto Him and live. By your love to Jesus, I beseech you, become fishers of men.
TWO MORE TABERNACLE PRAYER-MEETINGS.
MONDAY evening, Oct. 9, Pastor C. H. Spurgeon occupied the chair, and before the meeting was over the area and first gallery of the Tabernacle were nearly filled. What a pleasure to see such numbers gathering to pray! Hymn 281, commencing —
“Sweet the moments, rich in blessing,”
was sung, and the Pastor said that the cross was to furnish the key-note for the whole meeting. Prayers would be offered for a revival of the pure doctrine of the cross, for the exhibition of the pure life of cross-bearing, and for a revival of that earnestness and consecration which are the true outgrowth of the cross of Christ. One of the elders prayed, and especially pleaded for those workers for Jesus who were depressed because they did not see success attending their labors. This led the Pastor to mention an interesting incident, which is described more fully in this month’s “Personal Notes,” and to ask those who had derived benefit from the preaching of pastors or evangelists to encourage the preachers by telling them of the usefulness of their words. We still kept near the cross while we sang hymn 275 —
“O sacred head, once wounded,”
and also while prayer was presented by Mr. Mountain, the Secretary of the Tabernacle Sunday-school, and Elder Hill, whose supplications were steeped in a sweet sympathy with the crucified Lord.
Hymn 303 —
“Once it was mine, the cup of wrath,”
having been sung, the Pastor read the following requests for prayer: — One of the ministers educated in the College had arranged for an evangelizing brother to hold special services in his chapel, and desired that the work might be remembered at the throne of grace. Within about nine months he had lost twenty per cent. of his members, and most of the officers of his church, by removal, and he felt that he needed special help from above. Another friend wished for prayer for a youth who was undecided, and for himself that he might be guided aright in an important matter. These letters the Pastor asked Mr. Harrald to spread before the Lord, together with one from Suffolk which had been put into his hands. Before praying, Mr. Harrald explained that on the previous day, while preaching at Bury St. Edmund’s, he had referred to a remarkable instance of the immediate answer of a mother’s prayers for one of her children. At the close of the service a good woman came to him, and asked him to join her in prayer for her son, the only unsaved one out of a family of thirteen. Much sympathy was felt as the particulars of the case were made known, and many joined in the petition that the promise might be fulfilled in this instance as it has often been before, “All thy children shall be taught of the Lord, and great shall be the peace of thy children.”
Meditating upon the cross, our thoughts had gradually mounted to the throne, so that the subject of the next hymn was “the glory of Christ in heaven,” No. 337 —
“Oh the delights, the heavenly joys,”
which was followed by a prayer from the Pastor, who pleaded that fresh glory might be brought to Christ by the salvation of sinners, and the fuller sanctification of saints. At its close, mention was made of the sore sickness of two beloved officers of the church, Deacons Higgs and Mills; and in the name of the whole assembly earnest supplication on their behalf was offered by one of their fellow-deacons, Mr. Allison. We then passed from our Lord in glory to the grand doctrine of his second coming and glorious reign, Hymn 353 —
“Hail to the Lord’s Anointed,”
was sung, and the Pastor delivered a short address upon certain matters that he had occasionally found troubling many of the Lord’s people. One of these was the difficulty that Christians experienced in their endeavors to be always thinking of God, and things divine. It was pointed out that it was quite possible to be really giving all our thoughts to God even while it was needful to think upon other things, just as a man making a journey for a friend has to consider his horse, and the road, and the inn, and yet in doing all this for his friend he is really thinking of him only. “Whether ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God,” is thus a command which may be obeyed. Some friends are a great deal troubled because they are not absolutely perfect, but these were assured that such perfection is not seen among men. The speaker declared that, of all the professedly perfect people whom he had met in his life, there had never been one who had a right to make such a profession, but they had all been most questionable persons; while amongst those whom he considered to be as nearly perfect as well could be, he had never found one who did not mourn over imperfection, and lament that he fell so far short of what he ought to be. All ought, however, to aspire after perfection, and to hate sin, and seek to destroy it. We are not to do as the Israelites did with the kings when they shut them up in the cave, but as Joshua did when he dragged them out, and hanged them up to die. Sin is not only to be imprisoned by self- denial, but to be executed through death with Christ. The Pastor then offered a few words of direction to those who seek the Savior. Prayer for the conversion of sinners was offered by Brethren Healy and Watkins; the Pastor pleaded for some sick friends who were believed to be near death, and for others whose cases had not been specially described; and so concluded another most hallowed season of fellowship with one another, and with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Eight brethren had spoken with the Lord on our behalf, five hymns had been sung, and several short addresses given, and the hour and a-half was gone, all too quickly.
Monday evening, October 16, was the time set apart by the Sunday-school Union and other allied organizations for special universal prayer on behalf of Sabbath-school work. Additional interest was given to the meeting at the Tabernacle by the attendance of many Ragged-school teachers, who had been invited to listen to an address from Mr. Spurgeon. It was a very wet night, and consequently the gathering was smaller than usual. There were, however, several hundreds present, and as most of them were earnest Christian workers they probably made up in quality what they lacked in numbers. Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presided, and in opening the meeting explained the special object for which prayer would be presented. Wesley’s joyous hymn,
“Oh for a thousand tongues to sing
My great Redeemer’s praise!”
was sung to a jubilant tune, and gave a happy key-note to the evening’s proceedings. Prayer was then presented by Elder Pearce, the Superintendent of the Tabernacle Sunday-school, and by Mr. John Kirk, the Secretary of the Ragged-school Union. As representative men they brought us into sympathy with the two classes of teachers present, and led us in supplication for the children committed to the care of their fellow laborers. We next sang the first and last verses of hymn 983 —
“Met again in Jesu’s name,”
and prayer was offered by the Pastor, and Mr. Wigney, the conductor of the separate services for children on Sunday mornings.
At the Pastor’s request Mr. Pearce then gave an account of the Tabernacle Sunday-school, in order that the friends present might understand the nature and extent of the work, and so pray the more intelligently for a blessing to rest upon it. He said that there were upon the books of the home school the names of about one thousand five hundred scholars, and one hundred and ten teachers and officers. After the teaching on Sunday mornings Mr. Wigney conducts a children’s service, and in the evening Mr. Waters has a similar meeting in the College. On Monday evenings, at the close of the prayer-meetings in the Tabernacle, the teachers assemble to plead for guidance and success in their work; Tuesday evenings are devoted to working-meetings, at which clothes are made for poor children, when there is not a Bazaar to be helped. On Wednesday evenings the Young Christians’ Association meets for the purpose of helping the young converts in Christian life. The school collects funds for the support of missionaries in China, India, and Africa, maintains a colporteur of its own, contributes to Mrs. Spurgeon’s Book Fund, and carries on quite extensive home mission operations, and so does more than many regularly-organized churches. At the close of Mr. Pearce’s remarks the Pastor read the list of the schools connected with the Tabernacle, and Mr. Newman Hall’s church. In the schools connected with the Tabernacle there are about seven thousand children.
At this stage of the meeting Mr. Chamberlain sang that touching solo, “Show me thy face,” the rendering of which always brings us to a brighter vision of the face of our ever-blessed Lord. Where there are godly men with good voices, a holy song, psalm, or hymn, sung as a solo, greatly adds to the charm of the meeting. Mr. Kirk then read the following kind letter explaining the absence of the noble and venerable Earl of Shaftesbury, who, had hoped to be at the meeting:
24, Grosvenor-square, W.
“October 13th, 1882.“Dear Kirk, — If you have an opportunity, pray read this letter to the meeting to be held at Mr. Spurgeon’s Tabernacle on Monday, 16th. I am much grieved that I am unable to be present — my attendance at the Quarter Sessions for the County of Dorset is required on the following day; and it is an official duty that I cannot well set aside. I am grieved because there is no man in the country, whose opinion and support in such matters I prize more highly than those of my friend, Mr. Spurgeon. It would give me singular pleasure, after nearly forty years of work in the Ragged-school cause, to have the testimony and counsel of so valuable a man. Few men have preached so much, and so well; and few ever have combined so practically their words and their actions. I deeply admire and love him, because I do not believe that there lives anywhere a more sincere and simple servant of our blessed Lord. Great talents have been rightly used; and, under God’s grace, have led to great issues.
“Yours truly,
“SHAFTESBURY.”
Speaking of the present position of Ragged-school work in London, Mr. Kirk stated that on Sundays two hundred and three afternoon or evening schools were held, at which thirty-six thousand seven hundred and thirtyfour children were taught by three thousand one hundred and fifty-seven volunteer teachers. On week-nights, about five thousand boys and girls above the School Board age are gathered into one hundred and fifty-five schools; nearly the same number meet in the day ragged-schools; while two thousand seven hundred and thirty-three are cared for in sixty-three industrial schools. Altogether it is calculated that at least three hundred thousand children have been taken off the streets of London through the agency of the Ragged-school Union.
In delivering the address that had been announced, the Pastor urged the necessity for the continuance of Sunday and Ragged-schools, because of the irreligion, poverty, wretchedness, sin, superstition, and evil literature that still remain to injure vast masses of the population of London. Instead of there being any cause for discouragement at the apparent results, it was pointed out that a great change for the better had been wrought in the moral habits of the people, and a large share of this was to be attributed to the influence of the teaching imparted to the young in Sunday and Raggedschools. The teachers were, however, exhorted to improve the character of the instruction given to their scholars, to look after them during the week, and to make such entertainments as they prepared for the children subservient to the great end of the salvation of the children’s souls. In closing, the Pastor referred to what had been a mystery to him in his childish days, namely, the presence in a bottle of an apple much larger than the neck through which it must have passed. The riddle was solved when he saw a bottle in which was a very tiny apple still growing on the tree. So if we mean to secure the working men and women of London as attendants at the house of prayer, we must get them in while they are little, and one way of doing that will be to make our Sunday and Ragged-school teaching so bright and cheerful that the children will be attracted to Christ by the loving, winning, happy way in which his gospel is set before them as the one thing they need for the life that now is, and for that which is to come.
The time for departing having arrived, the Pastor offered a short petition; and so brought to a close a meeting which must have refreshed and benefited many weary workers. The plan of having prayer for some special part of church work is a ready method for securing interest and variety. On the following Monday the praying people heard about the Loan Tract Society, and then pleaded for a blessing on it; and on the next they had the Green Walk Mission before them, and, after being interested with its detaits, the godly were all the better able to invoke a blessing upon it. Many a church would revive its prayer-meeting by this method. Alas! that any prayer-meeting should need reviving.
NOTES
WE call attention to the series of handbills by our son Charles, of Greenwich. We have inserted a specimen that our friends may know what they are like. Our son has had a happy and useful time in the United States, and is now on his way home. During his absence the chapel in South-street has been renovated. It is impossible to enlarge the meeting-house, though increased accommodation is greatly needed.
We write this paragraph in France, to which we have gone for rest. Will our friends kindly know that we are not taking a holiday because we are ill, but to prevent illness? The mind was growing weary with all the care of many ministries, and it needed to lie fallow for awhile that better fruit might come of it by-and-by. One year we stayed at home, and then had some sixteen weeks of sickness: we believe it to be a truer economy of lifeforce to pull up in time, and refresh. Years are beginning to sow our hair with grey, loosen the teeth, and dim the eye, and we must with care obey the warnings of prudence, lest we aid in cutting short our own career below.
The editor has left home as free from care as well can be; for the large donations of Y. Z., and other items, place nearly every work in a good position as to finances for a few weeks, and after that the subscription season begins, when many friends of the more constant class send in their aid with loving regularity. The Lord himself has given to his servant this rest. To be concerned about money matters would be to lose the benefit sought by the vacation.
On Monday evening, October 23, the annual meeting of the METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE LOAN TRACT SOCIETY was held in the Tabernacle in conjunction with the usual prayer-meeting, at which Pastor C. H. Spurgeon presided. From the report presented by Mr. G. Woods, the secretary, we learn that during the past year about four thousand families have been visited by the distributors, who every week leave the printed sermons as loan tracts; and that twenty-four cases of conversion have been reported, while many aged saints and invalids have been blessed through reading the sermons. The visitors found so many cases of poverty and distress in the houses where they called that they started a -Relief and Sick Fund, without which the leaving of a tract would have often seemed almost a mockery. A Mothers’ Meeting and Maternal Society have been for some time in operation, and under Miss Miller’s able leadership have contributed largely to the comfort and edification of the poor women in the district. The balance-sheet was presented by Mr. Harrald, the treasurer, who reported that the year’s expenditure had been about £36, and the balance in hand was under £5. He also read the accounts of the Mothers’ Meeting, which was nearly £10 in debt, and of the Maternal Society, which had £3 in hand.
In referring to the various agencies that had grown out of the tractdistribution, the Pastor spoke of the many ways in which the people visited were likely to be benefited. The visitor’s call at the house, the opportunity afforded for personal testimony for Christ, the sermon left for those who pleased to read it, the invitation to children to attend the Sunday-school, and to parents to the worship of the sanctuary, the relief afforded to those in great need, and the temperance and evangelistic and mothers’ meetings all helped to exercise an influence for the permanent good of the neighborhood.
Just before the close of the meeting the Pastor mentioned the pleasing fact that the sons of Pastors T. W. Medhurst and C. Chambers, who had in years gone by been students, had been received into the College, and he called upon them to pray; and when they had done so he gave thanks for the fulfillment to Messrs. Medhurst and Chambers, and many other parent, of the promise, “Instead of thy fathers shall be thy children.” He then pleaded for increased blessings to rest upon all the ministers educated in the College, and upon the students now in the institution.
Many instances of conversion through the tracts left in the houses are known to the visitors, and some have come under the Pastor’s own notice. The general report is that people say they are tired of tracts, but they will read the sermons.
On Monday evening, October 30, prayers of faith and works of love were again blended by the union of the regular prayer-meeting with the annual gathering of the workers connected with the GREEN WALK MISSION, Bermondsey. Mr. William Olney, jun., the leader of the mission, gave some interesting particulars of the success already achieved, and proved the sad and urgent necessity which exists for the continuance and extension of the work. Mr. William Olney, sen., and Mr. E. Crisp testified to the need of the new mission premises that are to be erected shortly, and the Pastor heartily commended the scheme to all present. We have a fine site in Bermondsey, and the plans are now ready for the building, of which we hope to give an engraving very speedily.
The following evening, Oct. 31, the annual meeting of the COLLEGE was held in the Tabernacle. The President, C. H. Spurgeon, presided, and spoke briefly of the history and work of the institution; the Vice-president, J. A. Spurgeon, read the list of brethren who have settled since the Conference; and addresses were delivered by Pastors W. Williams (Upton Chapel, Lambeth), and E. G. Everett (Dorking); Mr. C. Cole, who has been preaching at the Presbyterian Church, at Amsterdam, for the last eighteen months; and Mr. T. Perry, a student still in the College. Although the assemblage of friends was not quite as large as usual, the proceedings were of a very enthusiastic character, and the speeches of the brethren were most heartily received.
The second part of the program consisted of readings from “John Ploughman’s Pictures,” illustrated by dissolving-views photographed from life-models by Mr. York, Lancaster-road, Nottinghill, and exhibited, free of cost, by Mr. Oakley, 202, Grange-road, Bermondsey. At the close of the meeting “John Ploughman,” in the name of the whole church, spoke a few words of loving welcome to the junior pastor and his bride, and then on his own account said “good-bye,” and asked the prayers of all that his season of rest might be a time of blessing.
Special prayer was offered for the senior Pastor at the Communion on Nov. 5, which prayer has been already answered in a remarkable manner. Loving people find a joy in the outpouring of their heart for one who is very dear to them for his work’s sake.
COLLEGE. — Mr. H. Trotman has accepted the pastorate of the church at Blisworth; Mr. R. J. Beecliff, late of Bradford, has gone to Castle Donington; Mr. W. L. Mayo, late of Chepstow, has settled at Bury, Lane.; Mr. E. S. Neale has removed from Exeter to Stanningley, Yorkshire; and Mr. Jesse Gibson, of Plattsville, Canada, has become pastor at Portage la Prairie,
Manitoba. Mr. J. Wilkins, who went from Maidenhead to the United States, has returned to England in the hope of settling down on this side of the Atlantic. He is a brother worthy of the notice of any church seeking a pastor.
The Surrey and Middlesex Association having accepted our offer of help towards the support of an evangelist to labor in the two counties, Mr. Frank Russell has been selected for the work, for which we believe him to be eminently suited.
Our brethren continue to leave the old country to serve the Lord in the regions beyond the sea, and thus the College becomes increasingly a training-school for foreign missionaries. Mr. R. Wallace, whose health has not been very good for some time, has gone to Canada in the hope that in the bracing air of the Dominion he may be fitted for his life-work of preaching the gospel. Mr. J. S. Harrison, who, during his stay in England, has been greatly blessed of God in the winning of souls, has resolved to return to Australia by the S.S. Sorata, which leaves London on Nov. 30, ashe cannot keep in health in our changeable climate. We feel sure that many friends at the Antipodes will give him a warm welcome, and find him opportunities of exercising his gifts as an evangelist or pastor. Mr. M. Morris, who has won a high position in the esteem of his brethren during his twelve years’ labor in the north of England, sails from Glasgow on November 29, with his wife and family, in the S.S. Warrawcra, which is bound for Melbourne. We trust that some vacant church will speedily secure our brother’s service as pastor, and that the colonies will be all the better for every man from the College who goes out to labor for the Lord at the other side of the globe.
We are continually cheered by reports of our brethren’s progress in all quarters of the earth. Mr. C. Dallaston has sent us a photograph and description of the fine new “church” that he and his friends have erected at Christchurch, New Zealand. Dining his five-and-a-half years’ ministry there four hundred and twenty-seven persons have joined the church, and the congregations have increased so much that the new building, which will accommodate eight hundred persons, was greatly needed. Mr. J. Blaikie writes that he has quite recovered his strength since he landed in Australia. He has accepted the pastorate of the church of which our late Brother Marsden was the pastor; at Kew, near Melbourne.
EVANGELISTS. — Later reports of Messrs. Smith and Fullerton’s services at Bath are even more encouraging than those we published last mouth. Mr. Baillie, the Pastor of Manvers-street Baptist Church, writes:
“We are indeed grateful for the visit of these two brethren. Mr. Smith inspires our enthusiasm with his rousing music, and his buoyant confidence. It is, indeed, a means of grace to see him, and to hear his remarks on Christianity in home-life. I had an opportunity of hearing him at the meeting for women last Wednesday afternoon, and I am sure his words were very refreshing to the hundreds of mothers who were gathered to listen.
“The simple force and the striking pointedness of Mr. Fullerton’s gospel addresses make some of them quite models for regular ministers. I have heard him each evening, and I could pray so earnestly, ‘Lord, let that shaft strike!’ and many were praying in like manner. With such clear, simple, yet faithful preaching, backed up by earnest prayer, I was not surprised when I saw so many anxious souls at our after-meetings.”
Our brother Hamilton, who invited the Evangelists to Bath, writes just as hopefully; and Mr. Tarrant, the minister of Argyle Chapel, where Mr. Jay used to preach, gives similar testimony. He says: “They have left a sweet savor behind them in this city. Last night about one hundred and fifty of their converts met for thanksgiving and testimony. Very joyous was the assembly I believe among the results of their mission will be the elevation of the spiritual temperature, and the increase of unity in the churches.”
During the past month the Evangelists have been laboring at Gloucester, and this month they are to be at Hereford.
Mr. Burnham’s visit to Luton was blessed to the conversion of many souls, but his services at Collingham were even more greatly owned of God. The Primitive Methodists were holding special meetings at the same time, so Mr. Burnham united heartily with their Evangelist, and the result was that both churches were much profited. The whole village seems to have been stirred to an unusual extent by the public services, but many were met with and led to the Savior during Mr. Burnham’s house-to-house visitation. He says the Sunday’s work was the hardest and happiest he has ever had; and everyone seemed to regret that he could not remain longer. Mr. Burnham’s work in Knighton and Weston-super-Mare has also resulted in much blessing to many souls.
ORPHANAGE. — We scarcely need to remind our friends that Christmas is coming, and that we always try to make the orphans more than usually merry at that festive season. We shall be glad, therefore, to receive the good things in which the little ones delight, or special contributions that we can lay out on their behalf without touching the general funds of the institution. The President expects to spend Christmas day at the Orphanage, but whether he is present or absent the children must not go short, so please help, kind people, as you have done in former years: only remember that we shall need more than ever this year, as our family has been so largely increased. Do not let the girls and boys go without their plum-pudding. Each little boy says, “Please remember Christmas, sir. It comes but once a year.” All moneys should be addressed to C. H. Spurgeon, Beulah Hill, Upper Norwood; other gifts to Mr. Charlesworth, Stockwell Orphanage, Clapham Road.
A flood example. — A friend writes as follows: — “The president of a Bible-class consisting of fifty or sixty members has taken up the cause of the orphans, and has set his young men collecting for its funds. Having secured a collecting-book, it is supplied to each member of the class in turn for a period of one week, and there is a very laudable rivalry as to which shall secure the largest amount. The book, with the money collected, is brought in at each meeting, and the progress duly reported. At the end of the year it is proposed to call a meeting, and hand over the money to Mr. Spurgeon. The example is such a good one that I thought if it were mentioned in The Sword and the Trowel others might be led to initiate a similar movement, and thus augment the funds of the Institution.” [With the ever-increasing demand for the maintenance and education of our orphan family, we are thankful for every new method by which the sympathy and cooperation of our friends are manifested. — ED.]
Here is another note just to hand with seventeen penny postage-stamps: — “ For Stockwell Orphanage, seventeen hasty tempers at a penny — 1s. 5d. Dear at that rate.” If all “hasty tempers” were thus taxed, and the impost sent to us for the Orphanage, we should have a large income.
Several friends carried out the suggestion contained in John -Ploughman’s Almanack for November 1st, — The Orphans remember the first of November, and amongst others a postical friend sent a contribution with the following lines: —
“I am asked to remember, this first of November,
The case of the Orphan once more;
I send my subscription to those in affliction,
The same as I’ve sent it before.”
POOR MINISTERS’ CLOTHING SOCIETY. — Mrs. Evans desires us to acknowledge with thanks the receipt of one dozen jackets from “old stock.” Applications for clothing come in from poor ministers as numerously as ever, and contributions of money or material will still be acceptable. Surely there should be found an overflowing supply of raiment for the Lord’s own servants. What is “old stock” to many a draper would be new apparel for a poor family.
PERSONAL NOTES. — Just as we were going in to a recent meeting at the Tabernacle, two gentlemen came up to speak to us, and one of them told us the following interesting narrative, tie said that at a certain place on the Amazon River there was a Liverpool Irishman who had committed a murder, for which he was condemned to death. Our informant stated that he visited the poor man in prison, and on one occasion he found him deeply penitent, and afterwards very happy. On inquiring what had brought about the change in his manner, he replied, “I have found mercy through the blood of Christ, through this,” holding up one of Spurgeon’s printed sermons. He was not executed, but is now living a truly godly life.
The morning after the meeting above mentioned, we received a note from Buenos Ayres, stating that the writer had derived great benefit from reading our sermons, and wished for information as to believers’ baptism. He wanted to know whether God required him to give up his business, and come to England to be baptized, as he was not acquainted with any Baptists in Buenos Ayres. He was evidently quite prepared to make the sacrifice, if we could show it to be necessary. We informed him of a nearer place where he could obey his Master’s command. What a lesson this should teach to some Christians at home who allow slight obstacles to prevent them from obeying their Lord’s commands!
A letter signed “Pro Bono Publico” appeared in The Statesman and -Friend of -India, of September 7th, suggesting the desirability of “adopting the Australian custom of publishing Spurgeon’s Sermons as advertisements in newspapers as a counterblast against the injurious consequences of the visit of the Salvation Army to India.” In proof of his sincerity the writer enclosed the money to pay for the insertion of one of our sermons as an advertisement, and accordingly in the paper that contained his letter there appeared a full reprint of No. 1642, “Verily, verily.” Without expressing any opinion of the reason he assigns for his action, we heartily thank our unknown friend, and unite with him in the hope that others will follow the good example he has set them. The publication of the sermons in the Australian papers has produced very pleasing results. Oh, that like blessings may attend them in India!
Baptisms at Metropolitan Tabernacle: — October 26, twenty-three; October 30, sixteen; November 2, twenty-four.