Newspaper Page Text
February 14, 1912) THE
Editorial
AT THE CONVENTION.
Ideal weather, crisp and clear, a hearty local
welcome, admirable provision for the reception
of the members, commodious and convenient
meeting place, crowded hotels and boardinghouses
and homes, an enrolment of above seventeen
hundred, were the features of the Second
Convention of the Presbyterian Laymen's Movement,
in Chattanooga, February 6-8. The First
Convention, in Birmingham, 1909, had a registration
of a little under twelve hundred.
The atmosphere was electric. The interest
grew from the first. The opening day seemed to
be unsurpassable, but each day showed something
even better. The program was skillfully
constructed and wrought itself out in a cumulative
way. Every speaker scheduled to appear
was on hand, and excelled himself in richness
and power.
Imagine seventeen hundred men in a solid
mass, in a very compact auditorium, reinforced
by hundreds of local attendants and ladies, the
latter all in the balcony; hear the great volume
of song which ascended when the familiar old
hymns were given out; feel the intense silence
with which the multitude listened to the thrilling
stories and resistless logic and tender appeals of
speaker after speaker; see strong hands lifted
to tear stained cheeks ever and anon, and you
will have something of the scene of the thrice
daily sessions.
Old men, young men, dignified professors from
college and seminary, chancellors and presidents,
bright-faced students from secular and church
institutions, bankers, merchants, farmers, lawyers,
teachers, pastors, editors, made up the
throng. We thought of naming the ministers
present, but there is not room, for there were between
three and four hundred of them. Two
hundred students for the ministry appeared.
All of the Clarksville and Louisville theological
students came, and twenty-five from Richmond,
with large delegations from Columbia
and Austin. "Tell it not in Gath, nor publish
it in Ashkelon," scores of those on whose hack
anm n L n /% L / ? v? i/\ nn/v 1 lit ama
ouiuc nave uccu trjruig iu uiuw, iu, lutsc
many years, were there, just as earnest, and
just as full of missionary zeal as the most
clamant "modernist." Scores of ladies came,
many of them from distant States, to enjoy
the women's meetings in a chur. h near by.
Every State and Synod had its representation,
far off Texas showing one of the largest.
Were we to give a column of mere "notes,"
we would mention the delightful reception given
by the First church, Dr. J. W. Bachman, pastor;
the crowded hotels, but everybody goodnatured
and happy; the wonderful meetings of
oia irienas, wun me surprised "iou ncrci '
thousands of times; the kind lifting of the mercury
in the thermometers from near zero to a
comfortable thirty or forty degree point; the
fine singing of the Union Seminary quartet;
the magnificent testimony to the work and call
of missions given hy the great gathering of itBelf;
the fine spirit of devotion that prevailed,
with prayer and song frequently brought into
the exercises; the clear'and forceful character
of the speeches, all extemporaneous, aqd evidently
most carefully prepared, with never a
dull sentence, and interrupted reasonably hy
spontaneous applause; the large number of
able and experienced men, masters of assem
blies. brought' from other churches, and
the North, such as Speer, Innis, Dowty, Flicks,
Jays; the optimistic spirit, the glow and enthusiasm
that prevailed.
Were we to name some of the features whieh
PRESBYTERIAN OF THE S
\otes and
were such as one might inquire about, it would
be to say that it would have pleased many to
hear at least mention of foreign missions' twin
sister, home missions, especially as in some
quarters of our church the two are so intermingled
that one can hardly tell whether the
work is home missions in a foreign field or
foreign missions in a home field and many
whose hearts are full of desire to see the
foreign missions debt lifted would have re
joicccl to see this great convention, with its
tremendous power and intense interest give some
thought to that most serious problem.
The Convention will live in the history of the
Church. As one said, in private, and a careful
observer and conservative man he is, there were
no wheels showing in the meeting. It was
genuine, thorough, full of spirit of the highest
order, utterly unmarked by artificiality or galvanized
activity. Its influence will be long felt
throughout the church.
Dr. Balcom Shaw, of Chicago, who has been
one of the most successful pastors of the day, declares
that the secret of. filling the church is, in
his opinion, in the personal touch. He tries to
keep himself and his people in touch with those
whom he would win, and he finds it far more
effective than sensational methods, hired evangelists,
institutionalism and other modern ways of
trying 10 gatner in the people.
Among the orphanages of our church no one
is more deserving of generous support than that
which the Synods of Mississippi and Louisiana
are maintaining at Columbus, Miss., the "Palmer
Orphanage." The close of the first half of
the recent fiscal year found the institution somewhat
in straits, owing to the falling off of receipts
and increased expenses for many things.
The Thanksgiving and Christmas offerings, however,
enabled the management to pay off all debts
and to start the new year with a small balance in
bank. Just now this balance is about to disappear
from the proper side of the ledger and to
take its position on the other side. "Will not the
friends of this splendid work prevent this?
In these days of foreign mission opportunity
it should be made plain that volunteers for service
may be drawn from many vocations other
than the ministry. Secretary Wilbert B. Smith
of the Student Volunteer Movement says that
at present twenty-five of the principal foreign
mission societies of the United States and Canada
are calling for more than six hundred persons
who are qualified to take up work at once. Of
this number there are needed two agricutural
teachers, seven builders, four business agents and
commercial teachers, one mechanical engineer,
one institutional worker, one practical mechanic,
one printer, two student Christian association
workers, fifty teachers, forty-eight physicians,
besides two hundred and forty-four ordained
men. For wompn thprp flrp npp/lnrl rmn dnmnct!/i
science teacher, fourteen kindergartners, six
music teachers, twcnty-forur nurses, three orphanage
mothers and directors of boys' homes,
eighty-two teachers who are college or normal
trained, twenty-six physicians, and one hundred
and fourteen evangelistic workers and Bible
teachers. The use of capable men and women
in practical every-dny pursuits in foreign work
has not been sufficiently appreciated and will
recpiv*? mnrr* pmnVinaia no 1m toakIt a ^
~ -w?f' i?'? i/iiv; ?? vi n. au * nuura.
Missionary biography shows that some of the
most useful men in the field have been engaged
in vocations which in the homeland we
call secular.
- - ? _
/
OUTH (153) 9
Comments
NOTES IN PASSING.
BY BERT.
That was a fine quality of
Obedience, obedience displayed by Philip, who
"arose and went" when he was
commanded by the angel to leave the fine work
going on in Samaria and go down into t.h?
desert. We can imagine reasons which would
be pronounced very good for his not going, or at
least, for his stopping to argue how great a loss
the kingdom would suffer if he left Samaria just
at that time. But he did not stop even to argue.
He went at once. His spirit wa3 the same as
Abraham's, who was told to leave a comfortable
home in a thriving city where he was no doubt
doing a good work and go to a place of which he
should be informed later. How great the contrast
with these Jonah presents, who being commanded
to go to Ninevah, and feeling that he
must move, wont in the opposite direction.
Now looking at Jonah, on the one hand, and
Philip and Abraham, on the other, the thing that
impresses us is that Jonah's action was perfectly
natural, judged by ordinary human standards;
and the others were not. Jonah's argument for
doing as he did would appeal to all men who do
not live by faith. Ilis reasons were racial, religious.
and nprsnnal a 1 ~~? 1' ?
W , , .... , u punbHUI CUIllUUlUllOn.
Philip could have argued against going, the work
already going on, the greater opportunities of
the city, the richer advantages to himself. Abraham
could have made strong picas. And so by
our relationship to Christ we are forced to condemn
the natural, and commend the unnatural.
Isn't that just what the Bible teaches!
A true spirit of obedience deS
elf -interest, mands a course of conduct often
entirely at variance with every
consideration of self-interest. If it did not there
would be no virtue in obedience. Faith would
lose its charm if we always walked by sight.
Courage would cease to exist if we had no enemies
to face. So obedience to be entitled to be
called a virtue must call for effort, and must
work against gravity. A man controlled by consideration
of self-interest thinks he is working
to his own advantage, and so long as he thinks
that way he will prosecute that line of action,
even though he knows the Word of God is against
him. In effect he is saying he is wiser and knows
better than God what will pay. And when at
length he comes to grief he will declare himself
unable to comprehend why it is so, since he has
always followed what be believed to be the wise
and open course. lie can plead that he did not
know what the results would be if he suddenly
made a chancre at. nnv nnii.t o?/i *-J
j v urn piowcuen in
obedience to the Bible and against every plausible
argument to walk in the opposite, or at least,
a different direction. Now it is just for this that,
the lives of such as Philip and Abraham and
Jonah were recorded. None of them knew what
the results would but those who obeyed were
both blessed. a:?d beenme a blessing; while he
who disobeyed suffered in agony and loss. So,
do not try to fathom the reasons. When it is
clear that God wants you to make a change,
make it, no matter what the cost. Every day
you refuse is a separate offence, and incurs a
senarate oerinltv
- r ?
Samuel Smiles says self-control is
Courage, only conrapre in another form. But
is it not something moret Ts it not
conrapre in its hiehest form? Snch. at least, we
may take to be Sir Thomas Browne's idea from
his words: "Behold thv trophies within thee,
not withont thee. Lead thine own captivity captive,
and be Cesar nnto thyself." To excel in