Newspaper Page Text
March 27, 1912. ] T H ? P
single Sunday for nearly two years. I have discovered
also that he is always on the look-out
lor the best ways and methods. For instancy, in
January the Presbyterians held a really great
Sunday School Institute for a week. A prize
was offered to the person who was most punctual
and attended the largest number of hours. Our
busy superintendent got the prize. He is eager
to learn. That is one of the traits of a good
superintendent. I have known xnnerintendpnts
who never attend a convention, who never reads
a book on Sunday school work, and who never
seem to think of the school except for an hour on
Sunday morning. Such a superintendent is
doomed to hopeless failure. I have heard it said
of the best superintendent that I know anywhere
that if he were to take a young lady to a baseball
game he would talk Sunday school to her
during the whole progress of the game. An interested
superintendent is generally an interesting
superintendent.
2. Separate class rooms add much to the efficiency
of the Sunday school in the Seminary.
Few Sunday schools have such equipment as this
one. All the class rooms of the Seminary are
at its disposal. What a luxury for a teacher to
have a large room with blackboards, maps,
charts and chairs all for herself and class. We
i have a very efficient corps of teachers and the
separate class rooms enable them to do their
best. When I look at the equipment of the
average Sunday school I am fully convinced that
the Sunday school is of divine origin or it would
have been dead long ago. It would be a good investment
for every Sunday school to buy Marion
Lawrence's book, "Housmg the Sunday School"
just for the one chapter which telL how any
church or building may be transformed without
disfiguration or much expense into a fairly comfortable
Sunday school building with separate
class rooms.
3. The Sunday school in the Seminary has an
almost ideal teachers' meeting every week. TUjii
is at the same time a teachers' training clasS ?
Pew classes have such a teacher. He is none
other than Dr. G. B. Strickler. No wonder that
business men, weary with the toil of the day, are
always found at his meeting. It is not a large
meeting. Dr. Strickler has never gone mad on
the subject of numbers. If some one were to
preach on the sin of David in numbering the
people and make a very apparent application to
some modern methods he would not hit Dr.
Strickler. He is neither dependent on numbers
nor intoxicated by them. During the thirteen
years of his pastorate in Atlanta he was quietly
k meeting with a small band of young men every
Thursday night and patiently training them for
leadership. Those same young men are leaders of
the Presbyterian ehurch in Atlanta to-day. I am
afraid sometimes that we who are ministers do
not realize sufficiently the great importance of
training our people for leadership in Christian
work. It takes time and patience, but it pays.
I A CI J --1 * v i i - -
-TV ouuuuy scnooi wmcn nas a corps of trained
leaders is going to be a successful Sunday
school.
4. I am continually struck with the large use
that is made of the Bible in the Sunday school
in the Seminary. At an appointed time every
A Sunday every one who has a Bible with him is
asked to hold it up. Nearly everybody has a
Bible every Sunday. Even the wee tots bring
their Bibles. These Bibles are used largely in
the class work. In this I rejoice. Lesson papers
and helps have their place, but they ought not
to be in sicrht duriner the recitation nerind Thp
Bible ought to be used then. In this way the
children will become acquainted with the Holy
Scriptures. The school of which I am writing
also memorizes whole chapters of the Bible during
the year. This is as it should be.
RESBYTEKIAN OP THE 80
5. The Bible class for adults is a fine feature J
of this school. It has an average attendance of I
forty or more. Dr. Hersman is the teacher. He
is the only member of the faculty who teaches i
in the Sunday school. Tthe other professors are (
away nearly every Sunday preaching in some 1
part of Virginia or surrounding states. When- i
ever I have the opportunity 1 slip in with Dr. (
Hersman's class. What a privilege! In my i
student days 1 met Dr. Craie late nrofessor of i
theology in McCormick Seminary, on one oc- t
casion. When he learned that I was from Union 1
Seminary he said: "Dr. Hersman of your Sem- a
inary is the best New Testament exegete in t
America." I believe that Dr. Craig knew what i
he was talking about. 1
Dr. Hersman prepares each lesson with the (
greatest pains and when the class enters the room \
they always find a careful and detailed analysis t
of the lesson written on the blackboard. i
I observe members of the class copying these
analyses in their note books. 1 wish that every s
teacher knew that the great secret of successful (
teaching is thorough preparation./ The teacher j
who has something to teach will not lack for ,
pupils. i
6. The Sunday school in the Seminary has the
missionary spirit. I believe that this is absolutely
necessary to the well being of any Sunday
school. I notice that they give to missions
and talk of missions and pray for missions. 1
notice them bring bundles of religious papers
for the prisoners in the penitentiary. Best of all
they have a Sunday school in the Seminary
chapel every Sunday afternoon for colored people,
with an attendance of forty or fifty. Thus
in many ways I see the missionary spirit cropping
out.
There are others things which 1 would like to
mention about the Sunday school in the Seminary.
but space forbids. In closing let me say
that I rejoice that our students have such a
Sunday school literally in their midst. Besides
^the spiritual good that it brings, it gives them
a valuable lesson in practical Sunday school
olinics. i
Walter L. Lingle. j
HOW GOD MOLDS US. \
Gud desires to do the best for each of hits c
children; to crowd as much usefulness and 1
blessedness into our existence as it can hold; to J
make it as full of all which is really best as the
spring meadows are full of flowers, or as streams
brim with water after the spring rain. There is
an exquisite sentence in the English liturgy j
which says that God hates nothing that he has \
made. So far from hating, we believe that he 1
loves with an intense love, and will never rest j
until he has tried every means of achieving the t
loving purpose on which he is bent. There are
two methods in which God seeks to execute his
purpose. First, by his spirit in the heart. A
friend of mine told me he called one day upon a
brother clergyman who had been ill for six
months. He said to this man, "I expect
that God Almighty had a good many things
to say to you, but you were too busy to
listen, and so he had to put you on your back
that you might be able to give him time." "When
he was .going out the thought struck him, "I,
too, am a busy man, and God Almighty may have
to put me on my back that he may tell me all his
wishes." So he resolved that each night he would
sit quietly in his study, not reading, not writing,
but opening his heart, that God's Spirit might
impress upon him what he designed to teach, and <
criticise the life of the previous day. God is the i
critic of the thoughts and intents of the heart, i
and I hardly can conceive of a better way of !
achieving saintliness than every night to sit still ]
and let God say to you whatever he has to say. i
DTK (397) 11
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I3y the touch of his Spirit he seeks to mold men,
:>ut you must give the Spirit of God time.
lu other words we must live and walk in the
Spirit. The Spirit of God i*> ever passing through
>ur life as the wind through the world, and as
;he vane yields to the course of the wind,so must
ve allow ourselves to be swayed by the Spirit of
jlod; or as the river molds the banks along which
t pansess, so must we allow tht constant gentle
ipple or the mighty rushing tide of the Spirit
o fashion us according to his will. The Spirit
)lowefch where it listeth; thou canst not tell
vhence it cometh or whither it goeth, but it is for
hee to yield to it, and to let it bear thee whither
t will, and if as in the case of Ezekiel, it would
)ear thee up and carry thee, put no impediment
>r reluctance of thine own in its way. Work out
vhat God worlds in; strive according to the en rgy
of that Spirit which worketh in the saints
nightily.
Secondly, God seeks to mold us by circumitances.
You must believe that God has put you
lown just where you are, because your present
>osition is the very best place in the universe to
nake you what he wants you to become. He
OilId lhavp TJlll/t<1 vnil a lfinn a Kiolinn o mil
ionaire, or a statesman, a cook, or a housemaid,
)ut God had the whole universe to choose from
ind he wanted to do his best for you, and he put
four soul just where it is because he kne\v that
here you would be surrounded by the best conlitions
to make you what he wanted you to be;ome.
Do you not believe it; Then you mean
o infer that you have done better for yourself
han God has done ? No; God had all power, all
vikdom, and he loved you, and he made you
vhat you are because lie saw that you might have
he shortest cut to the highest life.
What a revolution this would make in our ways
>f thinking about life. We are apt to groan and
;omplain because our lot has been cast amid comnonplaces,
or in a daily routine which, is highly
mcongeniai. We do not realize that probably
n no other way could we learn the passive vir;ues
of patience, long-suffering, resignation,
idelity. Do not try to evade your lot, Jo shirk
ts yoke or to get away from its inevitable presmre,
but Set yourself calmly down to learn the
esson that God would teach, and to make your
>wn the principle of action which Christ would
lave pursued had he been circumstanced as
rou.?Rev. F. B. Meyer.
IN EVERYTHING GIVE THANKS.
Not give thanks for everything, but 'rejoice
n the midst of all. We do not understand that
ve are to give thanks for evil in itself, but we
nay offer praise fo. the overruling of it for
;ood. Again, much that we regard a\ raisforunes
are blessing-i. Trials and crosses are often
imong the greatest blessings in disgui e, for it
s only through such disciplinary processes that
he character is perfected. When we consider
that the disagreeable is indispensable enrichnent
and strengthening of character, we see
that we should offer thanks for this phase of experience
as well as for the agreeabV. What
) change would be wrought in our lives if we
thus acted!
George Matheson, the well known blind
preacher of Scotland, who recently went to be
with the Lord, said: "My God. 1 have never
hanked thee for my 'thorn.' I have thanked
thee a thousand times for my roses, but not once
for my 'thorn.' I have been looking forward to
i world where I shall get compensation for my
;rc?8; but I have never thought of my cross as
itself a present glory. Teach me the glory of
my cross; teach me the value of my 'thorn.'
Show me that I have climbed to thee by the
path of pain. Show me that my tears have made
ny rainbow."?Living Water.
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