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10 (1424) THE
its when wrapped in the mists of the future they
.summoned us onward and taught us to set our
hope in God. M.
THE END IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WORK.
Every enterprise is determined largely by
the end which it has in view. Without an end
it is vague, spineless, unproductive. It is to he
feared that in religious matters this vagueness
and indefinileness of end is found more than
elsewhere.
There is a distinction between purpose and
end. Purpose contemplates the determination
to reach a given result. The end is that result
itself. A high end makes a high purpose
rather than the reverse. The end is the task to
which the worker sets himself.
The chief end in the Sunday school work is
the glory op God. tSuhordinate to tnat cmer
'md, however, and as its Victors, there are three
others. The first is to effect a turning. We
call this, usually, conversion. Conversion and
turning mean the same thing. The Sunday
school worker's first effort is to he, under God,
the turning of a soul from sin to holiness, from
death to life, from Satan to Christ. Tt is to
s?>e the soul placed in new relations to God. It
is to start it upon a new and better career. It
is to induce it to leave the weak and beggarly
elements of the world, arid to lay hold upon a
new life. There is a life that is iustly called
"the higher life." Tt is not that vain thing wliioh
like an ignis fatuus the foolish pursue and the
ignorant sometimes think they attain. It is a life
apart and away from the sordid life of this
world, a life spent under the sunshine of God's
favor, shot tthrouch with beams of hope. joyou3
with the love of God and radiant with his light.
Tt is a life made more and more like God's. It is
1 he restoration to man of the image of God.
Can the mind conceive of anything more exalted
than such a life' That is what the earnest
worker in the Sunday school enterprise is seeking
as the great end in the work. "If any do
err from the truth and one convert him, let him
know that he which convertcth the sinner from
the error of his way shall save a soul from
death, and shall hide a multitude of sins."
A second phase is a training. Training is
development in the use and application of
powers. The soul turned to Christ is yet to be
fitted for its work. Tt has in it all the potentiality
of 1he new life, hut not its development.
It is the lily in the bulb, not in full flower and
fragrance. The Sunday school worker's business
is to be the hand that lifts up the lily from
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and leaf and bud become the full blown flower,
scattering its perfume on all around and entrancing
the eye with its beauty. Was ever a
work more full of grace and charm? What
more God-like than to train a soul for God and
glory? There is no employment on earth that
gives a richer joy than that of tending this
tender but 3nre-growing. living plant, a pre
e.ious soul, and bringing it, whether it be o
little one's or a youth's or an adult's, into
closer likeness to Christ. Believers are saved
to serve, and they may serve the saved!
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A imra pnase is inning. 10 nring ituoui ?
taking. The world is to be won for Christ. Ii
is going to be won for him, so that the onl.>
question with us is. Shall we have a part in th<
winning? In every act of ours in Christiar
effort for others we are contributing a part t(
the building of the kingdom of Christ. No par*
is so lowly as to he beneath one's pride. /
laborer proudly told the first Emperor Willian
Hi at he was one of the builders of the grea
cathedral at Cologne. "And what did yoi
do?" the Emperor asked. "Why," answerei
PRESBYTERIAN OF THE SO
the man proudly, "1 helped to mix the mor- c
tar!" Our particular work, and there is none
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is a section of the Lord's kingdom. The Lord
is the power, and Lis shall he the glory of the
completion. But he permits us to be co-workers
with himself, lie and we are partners. We
work in company. "We fight, but 'tis he who
nerves our ann." Taking' Taking tke citadel
of the soul, turning its batteries upon the retreating
foes from whom we have captured
them! Taking the power from Satan which he
has wielded with undisputed sway over this
world ! Taking the world for Christ, that it
may become the abode of peace and righteousness
forever! "And from the days of John the
Tlnntist until now tlie kingdom of heaven suffereth
violence, and the violent take it by force."
To he in the triumph of Christ when he conies
with his own, what a glory it will be!
ADHERENTS.
Some figures prepared by Rev. Charles Stelzle
are to this effect: In the United States the
Protestant Church has a membership of 22,000,
('00 and an adherency of 60,000,000. with a
Sunday school enrollment of 16,000.000; it has
'62,000 ordained ministers, 215,000 church organizations,
210.000 church buildings, with a
seating capacity of 60,000,000 and a total valuation
of $1,300,000,000.
Notice the discrepancy between Protestant
membership and Protestant adherency?about
33,000,000 adherents refusing to aceept Christ,
to confess him, to serve him. They consent that
he is the Saviour and onlv Saviour of immortal
.souls; that all the blessings of our civilization
came through him; that their treasured friendships,
their security and comfort, their civil liberties
and temporal welfare are his gifts. They
believe that he lovec them and offers them salvation
by his grace, yet they reject him. More
than one-half of Protestant America rejects the
Saviour that is acknowledged to be the source of
all temporal bounty, of modern enlightenment,
o? every refining element in society, of all material
good and every hallowed spiritual agency.
What shall we say of these millions of responsible
recipients of Christ's marvelous bounty, who refuse
to confess the Name that they concede to be
above every name; who refuse to enlist in the
warfare against the powers of darkness to which
he has summoned them; that stolidly reject the
clean heart and the hallowed life wtiich he offeru
to impart? Can we call these men and women
brave, or true, or grateful or generous or reennnoivn
fa lrinrlnnoo 9 fit? 14.1,
f v w uiuvuivoo i iliC tilCJ CIIUUWCU W 1 til
noble impulses or capacity for gratitude t Do
not they deliberately resolve that otheTs shall
hear the burdens of Christian service and wage
the warfare for truth and righteousness while
they themselves gather the fruits of the victories
of faith?
One other inquiry: Can we not do more than
we are doing to awake these more than thirty mil,
liens of accountable Protestant adherents to a
sense of the reproach and shame, to say nothing
of the awful guilt and peril of continued rejection
of Christ? The crisis of the present con
flict against the powers of darkness calls for the
r enlistment of these unresponsive, unprofitable
, millions of pensioners. Shall they not be won to
, Christ f
> The Church cannot regenerate these millions;
^ that is the work of the Spirit. Yet there is tre^
men dons import in the command to tell the glad
1 tidings; in the assurance. "Ye are my witt
nessos;" in the faot that the early disciples
i "went forth and preached everywhere, the Lord
1 also working with them." Most evidently one
U T fl [January 1, 1913
>f the tremendous tasks that await the consecrated
efforts of the whole Protestant Church is, by
testimony, example, sympathy, personal ministration
and prayer, to commend Christ to the unsaved
millions of ite adherents. M.
INDIVIDUALISM IN CHURCH WORK.
There are two tendencies in the thought of
the day. The one emphasizes the individual,
develops the unit, builds up the man by and
for himself. The other sinks the individual in
the ma?s?acts on the co-operative basis?practices
"team-work'* ?applies the power of the
whole to each single individual problem.
Unquestionably the trend i'9 strongly to the
latter. Consolidation rules the day. The atom
is invisible. The organization is apparent. The
tremendous advance of modern civilization has
been due to the unification of separate units.
A man may travel across the continent without
change of cars and in perfect ease and comfort.
i' ltTy years ago it was by a dozen different ways
and at peril of life. It takes eighty men working
together to make one pin. but pins are
cheaper than ever in the history of the world.
Tn this, as in some other things, the men of the
world are wiser than the children of light.
"We have splendid agencies for the evangelization
of the world, but we are frittering our
strength away on individualizing our efforts
Take some examples:
In all our cities an individual church will
undertake a mission by itself, instead of the
whole Church, acting through the Presbyterial
Home Mission Committee, or through the City
Missions Committee. The result is the work
is not strategic; does not command the interest
of the whole Church community. Conflicts occur
between different churches. The mission
languishes and dies or is of such :?low growth
lhat it becomes a burden.
How much better to work together and put
the whole force of the whole Church behind the
work in the best situation 1
It has been quite the fashion for individual
churches, and sometimes persons, to support a
missionary in the Home or Foreign field. Quite
u deal of interest is aroused by the fact, ""We
have our own missionary." Perhaps the missionary
work, at home and abroad, has been
stimulated ever so much and grown more rapidly.
But is it the best plan?
The Church is a kingdom. No kingdom would
allow its resources and efforts to be divided up,
eaeh part furnishing something, as people do
at a picnic. It would never do for the State
of Georgia to say, "We will build and furnish
a battleship for the United States nnr nai-t
of the common support;" nor for New York,
with more ambition, to say, "We will pay the
r.rmy bill for 1913."
No earthly government could be run on any
such plan. Why should the kingdom of God
be so conducted?
There are some reasons why all our mission
workers should not bei sent out and supported
by a common agency, and not by individuals,
whether churche* or persons.
it seems far better tr> give into the common
treasury and allow the present trustworthy committees
to administer it.
We caw appeal to the Church from the highest
motives. We call upon them to support the
work because it is the work of our Lord and
Saviour. It. Is dpflr to Viio too** Ti i_
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kingdom. Too often when the individual church
is appealed to to support its missionary, the
personality of the man enters in. "TTe is such
a choice young man; we know him; he will
represent us on the field .** Not that the other
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