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home, the place we can go when every other place
has shut its dors in our face, the place to which
we can go to communicate ourselves as we can to
no other place, the place where dwell those who
believe in us, the place where perfect freeoom
reigns—' l Home, Sweet Home. ’’
THE ELIM OF FRIENDSHIP.
Have you ever thought how much there is in the
friendships of life from -which we never get any
benefit? Jesus Christ had the good sense to appre
ciate this. Would you have a real picture of him
as he appreciated the friendship of his friends?
Look and see him coming down that dusty road that
leads to the home of Mary and Martha and Laza
rus. He is tired and worn. Perhaps he has been
mocked, and jeered, and laughed at. He needed
some one to whom he could go, and be free enough
to talk out the secrets of his heart. He felt the
need of it. And I speak very reverently when 1
say Jesus never felt the need of it any more than
some of us. Oh, pity the man who disregards his
friends! Pity the man who is so conceited as to feel
he is independent of his friends. Os all men, he is
most dependent.
THE ELIM OF THE SANCTUARY.
Then, we have the Elim of the sanctuary. My
beloved, I am sure we have never appreciated what
the sanctuary is to us in the time of need. I often
think of those old Jews’ fondness to get to the sanc
tuary marching miles and miles through hardships
and toils and struggles and dangers to get to the
sanctuary. I wish we were more like them.
There is nothing to me more beautiful in the lives
of the English people than their fondness for
church going. It is a perfectly beautiful sight to
«pe the great crowds that throng the streets of Lon
don, To hear the tramp of their feet is not like
the tramp of any other day.
I talked to an old Englishman the other day who
had not missed a service in forty-seven years at
his church. I said: “Well, you have attended serv
ice sufficiently to take a vacation.” “I take a va
cation every Sunday,” said he. “My vacation is in
church going. If it had not been for the church and
the pleasure it has given me, I would have been in
my grave long ago.” The only joy that some people
have is in going to church on Sunday; one oasis
in the whole desert of the week. Thank God for the
church.
PRIVATE PRAYER.
Then, my friends, let me mention the Elim of pri
vate prayer. Jesus knew what this meant. You re
member how he sought his place of private prayer.
He had his busy days in the sanctuary, his busy
days in the work, and yet in the midst of all this
business, he found time to get off occasionally, and
drink from the clear, sparkling springs of prayer.
I don’t know whether I shall e able to tell you
this or not, but in it lies wrapped the secret of
this message. Recently, I was crossing the Atlan
tic. I was taken ill. I had not been well for sev
eral days. I went to my cabin and sent for a doctor.
I had such a pain in my right side that I could not
breathe well. I said: “I have pneumonia, and I
am two thousand miles from New York. I cannot
stand this dampness.” The doctor made a careful
examination. “I don’t think you have pneumonia,”
he said, “but I think you are very close to pleurisy.
I will prepare some medicine for you, and come
back. Meanwhile, if you have any friends on board,
have them come and sit with you, so you won’t wor
ry, and fret over your condition.” He went out,
and I got to thinking. I said: “I do not believe
it is the will of God I should suffer this way, and
I have preached so much on prayer, why can’t I
get from him a real, sure enough evidence of an
swered prayer?” I got up, and fastened my door,
got back in my berth, lay flat on my back, and tried
to pray. As near as I can reproduce it, this is the
prayer I prayed: “Oh, Lord, my life is in your
hands to serve you the best I can, living or dead.
I am suffering. I don’t want to die on this ship, and
I don't want to suffer this way unless it is for the
best. If you will heal me of this pain now so when
I get home I can stand before my people, and say
God can ease pain, and cool fever in answer to
prayer, I should love to give that testimony.” Some
hing said: “Yes, you won’t do it, if I do.” I
said: “I will do it.” .After awhile, I got such a
comfort as I never had before. In thirty minutes,
The Golden Age fer October 25, 1906.
there wasn’t a single pain in my body. Oh, I thank
God for prayer! What would we do witliou pray
er- Let Marah with the biter waers come along.
It will only make the victory when we pass through
the sweeter. If you are in trouble, the one thing I
commend to you is the Elim of private prayer. Go
to your closet. Shu the door, and push your way
through by prayer.
HEAVEN AT LAST.
Then, just this one other thing I must mention:
The Elim of Heaven. I don’t know much about it,
but it is the great, big never-failing oasis that lies
at the end of the journey. When we get there we
-will stay forever.
I have read somewhere of an old miner who
had lived all his'life in the mines. He had never
seen the sun. One day some friends carried him
away from the smoky district in which he lived,
and seated him upon one of the highest peaks of
the mountain range and kept him there all night
until next day. The next morning the cloud passed
away just in time for the sun to get up, and when
the old fellow looked out and saw the sun for the
first time without any smoke intervening, he put
his arms around one of his fellows and said: “Oh,
my God, I never thought it would be like this.”
So some of these days God is going to come, and
take us from these old mines of mortality, where
we have been forced to drink from the bitter wa
ters of Marah, and carry us up the peaks. Just
how long He will be taking us I do not know; but
after awhile in His own good time, we shall see
the Sun of Righteousness rise from His bed of ob
scurity and fling His rays of glory out over the
wreck and ruin of the earth. Then, I think, we
shall be like the old miner. We will say: “Oh,
God, we have seen enough. We have seen Him,
and we never thought He would be like this, so
gracious and so good.” Come, tired soul, and take
comfort.
A young soldier was passing away, ad the nurse,
raising his. head from the pillow, one day discov
ered a few lines of poetry written in his own hand
writing. She started to take them and read them.
“Please put them down,” he said; “they are
not to be read until I am gone.” After he was
dead, she read them, and gave them to the world:—
“I lay me down to sleep,
With neither thought nor care,
Whether the morning’s breaking light
Shall find me here or there.
“A bowing, burdened head,
That only asks to rest,
Unquestioned and unquestioning,
Upon a loving breast.
“My half day’s work is done,
And this is all my part.
I can but give a patient God
An uncomplaining heart.
“I grasp His banner still,
Tho’ all the blue be dim.
And wait the bugle revielle,
That bids me follow Him.”
Oh, that the Spirit could possess us every one.
It would be the greatest blessing we could claim—
a life resigned to the plan of God.
Remarks of Reuben R. Arnold at the
Sam Jones Memorial.
Lives of great men are the strongest lessons hu
manity can have. It is for this reason biographies
are written. It is for this reason we scan with
close scrutiny the birth, the environment, the
growth, the characteristics, tne successes and the
failures which mark the careers of the illustrious
dead. Well it has been said that the proper study
of mankind is man. The history of the world, so
far as it entertains or instructs us, is only the his
tory of the human race.
While it is said that no man’s life can be truly
chronicled until the impartial hand of the future
historian lifts the veil, still it is a glorious senti
ment which calls us together over the bier of a de
parted brother to discuss his virtues and glean
from his life its teachings. In his life Sam Jones
has been so recently a part of our country’s histo-
ry, that under the inspiration of these surround
ings, under the spell of this music, I feel that he
has burst the cerements of the tomb to be with
us again.
Sam Jones was a pioneer in his particular field
of evangelistic work. No narrowness of creed held
him in its grip. His soul was as broad as the uni
verse. No denomination could claim that he be
longed peculiarly to it. In death, as in life, he
was the common property of us all, and before
he was surrendered back to the earth, it was meet
that his body should lie in state in the marble
halls of Georgia’s capitol, where the people he lov
ed so well could take a last look at his mortal
remains.
Mr. Jones’ career shows the remarkable possibil
ities of American life. The opportunities afford
ed in our republic bring out all of merit that there
is in every citizen. With no training for the min
istry Mr. Jones rose to heights that few men, bred
to the cloth, can ever hope to attain. As I listen
to the story of his life, it reads like some dream.
And his was not a career which shot up suddenly,
and as suddenly, like a rocket, shot down again.
He became a fixed star in the firmament, and his
lustre grew brighter with the years.
His career shows that strong traits of character
will assert themselves and break through that all
environment. He began life as a lawyer, but that
calling did not suit him. His life as a lawyer ended
with a short period of dissipation. But though
dissipated for a short season, Sam Jones never
could have been anything but a good men. This
straying away before taking his final step for good
made him all the stronger when he turned his face
towards the light. It was impossible for him to
have wandered except for a brief season. The
Arabian philosophers applied to those who were
possessed of mental vagaries, this test: “If thou
be such by the will of God, then remain as thou art:
but if thou be such as the result of mere passing
conjuration, then resume again thy former shape.”
Sam Jones fairly rushed to his great work for which
he was, above all men, fitted by nature.
His methods were not artificial. He talked in
simple language, as do all great men. He imitat
ed nobody. He realized the great truth that if
a man is to have force it is by being himself. He
spoke great truths in a line which other men would
take pages to cover. He reached men whom the
more scholarly could not impress. There is no
calculating the good he has done.
He was absolutely fearless. Like Brutus he was
so armed in his honesty that the threats of the vi
cious passed him by as the idle wind which he
heeded not.
And yet with all the force, with all his denuncia
tion of crime and vice, there was not the slightest
touch of bitterness in anything he said. Those who
differed with him, respected him. He exemplified
the great truth that vice and sin are to be de
nounced, but the poor erring mortals who succumb
to them, are to be pitied and reformed—not hat
ed and driven further from the path of right.
He had wonderful balance, common sense and
judgment. In reading his newspaper articles, I was
struck with his knowledge of politics, economics
and other material questions.
But the crowning glory of Sam Jones’ method
of discourse was his never failing sense of humor.
It was this power which attracted other men and
first got their attention. He was then enabled to
drive home his great truths.
In conclusion, let us hope that long may the mem
ory of this wonderful man live in our country; and
I am thankful for the privilege of being able to say
a word in praise of his virtues.
It is a fact worthy of some notice and of much
commendation that in the recent marriage of the
daughter of Herr Krupp, the famous German gun
maker, the cost of the bride’s trousseau was just
about S2OO. This, too, when the girl is rated as
“the richest young woman in the world”! Many
American brides might do well to pattern their
bridal expenditure by this sensible Fraulein. The
German shopkeepers are not of this opinion and
indignation is felt in Berlin that the
hoped for latishness was not displayed in the bridal
arrangements of the young heiress.
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