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She said: “Oh! have you heard the sad news?”
“What news?” I answered.
She replied: “Why, Mrs. So and So lost her
precious little boy last night with membranous
croup. Isn’t it sad?”
I said: “It certainly is sad. But have you
heard the other news?”
“No. What is it?” she asked.
I said: “Back of that house is a little alley—
an alley tilled with dirt and filth. And in as hum
ble a little cottage as you ever saw occurred a
much sadder thing than that. Last night that
poor widowed mother who lives there lost both of
her little boys. They died within an hour of each
other. ’ ’
“No,” she replied, “I hadn’t heard of .that,”
and she went on to that house on the comer.
The next day it was funeral time, and the car
riages lined that street in front of that first men
tioned house for a whole block. The people couldn’t
go into the house hence they stood on the lawn,
which was crowded, and the flowers were so nu
merous that it took a special vehicle to cany them
to the cemetery, and they were mostly given by
members of her church.
That same afternoon it was funeral time in that
alley also. Though those women were members of
the same church, there wasn’t a single solitary soul
there in that house but the preacher. There was
not a vehicle of any kind except an old spring
wagon at the front of the house which was to carry
the two little boys to the potters’ field. The coffin
which was to contain those two little bodies had
great cracks in it; and there wasn’t a single flow
er; not a faded rose. And yet that mother had
never done anybody any harm. All that she had
done was to work at the wash-tub, after her hus
band died, to try to raise those two little boys.
You tell me that that church knew anything
about the spirit of the Lord Jesus! But, hold on.
If everybody should do just exactly like you do,
would that not be true of every church? While
you sit here and think of that treatment ask vouv
self, “How many funerals of the poor have I at
tended? How many flowers have I sent? How
many words of comfort have I spoken? How many
coffins have I helped to buy? How many carriages
have I hired?”
Jesus Christ was in the world sympathizing with
those whose hearts were broken, and that is o»m
thing that made His preaching’ attractive and pow
erful to them. I have no doubt that, when Jesus
stood by the grave of Lazarus and wept, ev
ery tear that He shed was talked about all over
that country. If He had been weeping with some
of the upper class, there would not have been any
thing said about it.
Then, of course, Jesus ministered to the souls
of men. About that, of course, I need not speak
this morning. I simply wish today to impress this
fact: The common people of this world are just
as eager for Jesus as they were when He walked
this earth.
THE CHURCH AND THE COMMON PEOPLE.
There are men who claim that there is a bread:
existing between the church and the masses. I
have yet to see this in my own church, but I see it
in other churches. If there is such a thing, it is
because the church is not representing Jesus Christ
to the masses. Understand, Jesus has no way of
teaching this world except as he does it through
the church. He is dependent upon the church; and
if the church is derelict: if the church fails to
exemplify His spirit among men, Jesus Ims no
chance at the world. The church is to be His ex
pression to the world of those characteristics that
made Him the mighty power that He was when He
walked among men. So, if there is such a thing
as a breach between Christ and the church, or the
church and the masses, it is because the church is
not faithful in the representation of Him to the
needs of this needy age.
What is the church to do in order that Jesus
may be attractive to the common neople? It is
to do just exactly what he did. It is to preach
and minister. It is to teach a present blessedness.
It is to teach in the vernacular and experience of
the common people.
T think we make a very great blunder art this
The Golden Age for February 21, 1907.
point. I am sure, and let me state it emphatical
ly, I am sure that the majority of the preaching of
today is entirely over the heads of the people.
What we want is to learn a lesson from Jesus and
talk to the people in their own language.
The church that would reach and hold the com
mon people has got to be a church that cares and
provides for, as far as possible, the pleasures of
the people. My brethren, the common people are
dependent upon diversions afforded by something
without. There is nothing within that can divert
Everything that is within tends to break down and
discourage. They are dependent upon some out
side source for diversion and pleasure and recrea
tion. The Church of Christ that would reach the
common people; that would serve humanity; that
would improve our civilization, is the church that
does its utmost to provide for the recreation and
pleasure of the neople to whom it ministers.
I do not believe that there is a single thing that
concerns the interests of humanity that is not
part of the field of the church.
Again, the church that would hold the masses
of the people must practice as Jesus did the min
istry of the body. We have got to look out for
people when they get sick. There are hundreds
of people today who are not able to provide for
their physical bodies. Here’s a man who
upon a small salary. He has a family to
He gets down with a spell of illness. His salary
stops. His grocery bill goes on until the grocer
refuses anything more. His doctor bill goes on.
His wife is broken down. His children are too
young to work. I say to you that there is tl>e
field of the church, and the church that will let
one of its members suffer in that condition has no
right to he called the church of Christ.
My! My! What a work this is. after all! I
know nothing like it. The thing I like most about
Spurgeon is the fact that after he had achieved
his greatness, after his name was sunken almost as
a household word around the world, a friend said
to him one day: “Mr. Spurgeon, haven’t you
stayed over there among those poor people loim
enough? Why don’t you come over on this sUe
among the West Enders and preach to lords and
members of parliament?” Mr. iSpurgeon looked
him straight in the eyes and said, “The delight of
my life is to minister to the needs of the needy,
as well as to preach the gospel.”
My brethren, Spurgeon was not the greatest
preacher in the world any more than many other
men. He was a great preacher, but that was not
all of it. The thing that made Spurgeon go down
in history as the greatest preacher was both his
preaching and his great life of ministry; the way
he helped the helpless and contended for the com
mon people who were so numerous in that w*" 1 -
This is what made him and his church, and it is
what will make any man and any church. The
church to win the people must be a church of min
istry as well as preaching and teaching.
Nine Hundred College Boys.
(Continued from page 1).
lege” is not a misnomer and J would like to com
mend this fact to the new Agricultural schools be
ing established in Georgia and in many other places.
The literary courses here are up to date, of course,
but they are planned and correlated in such away
as to make them fit thoroughly and helpfully into
the strictly agricultural and mechanical training,
for which the institution was established.
Two thousand acres of rich Mississippi land pay
actual tribute to the daily training of the students.
The Horticultural Department, under Prof. A. B.
McKay, assisted by Profs. Geo. L. Clothier and D.
C. Mooring, is a marvel of perfection in scope and
effectiveness. The students are carried out on the
farm, down into the Green House, off into the for
est —everywhere that practical experience calls for.
A Mule in the Lecture Room.
And when Dr. J. C. Robert is teaching science
in the Live Stock Department, he doesn’t just tel!
about things—he rides a mule into the lecture
room, so to speak, or a cow or a calf, and proceeds
to give an ocular demonstration of the science
he is teaching. Students are being taught the care
of cattle, and they go in person to take part
in the caring. About five hundred head of cattle,
reared on the farm, are killed every year to fur
nish the Dormitory, not with Chicago “long
horns,” but with Mississippi beef, and the students
look after everything that they need to know and
to do in this great practical industry.
Boys as “Milkmaids.”
< The fact that I was “milkmaid” my own self
from my sixth birthday until my accident put me
on bed, caused me to enjoy very greatly the part
that the students play in the big College Dairy.
They not only learn how to feed cows just right
in order to “make the milk and butter come,” but
they don their overalls and do the milking them
selves, and thus become equipped in this particular
to make good husbands —for if I were a girl and
my “Prince Charming” should propose to me, I
think I would be forced to ask before the question
was settled if he would go to the cow pen and do
the milking for me. These A. & M. boys—that is,
a great company of them—are making that question
unnecessary on the part of Mississippi girls, and I
hope in my soul that the last one of them will
get the good wife he deserves.
The Working Boys’ Paradise.
The A. & M. College is a paradise for working
boys. There is a special line of work known as
“The Working Boys’ Course.” Speaking of this
work, President Hardy says:
“ This course hrs been arranged for the benefit of
those young men of the State who are unable to
take the regular course. Where the means may be
obtained, of course, it is much better to take one
of the regular courses; but this course opens up
away by which a boy or young man may come here
without a dollar and by grit and determination
finally get an education. Those taking this course
are only prospective students at first, working on
the farm every day that the weather permits, be
ing paid what their work >s worth. They are taught
an hour every night and at such other times as
circumstances will permit. In one year a boy
ought to save enough to enter College regularly
the next session. During this year on the farm
he will become familiar with all the improved
breeds of cattle and how to feed them; with all the
improved agricultural implements and how to han
dle them; and with the most scientific methods of
farming. This course is supplying a long-felt
want, and will soon be one of the most popular in
the College.”
It is positively refreshing to see these boys with
their overalls on 'hurrying to and fro about their
duties, moving among the handsomely uniformed
upper class-men, among whom they hope and in
tend some time to take their place. These working
boys are the heroes of the institution.
Other Work and Workers.
The Engineering and Textile Departments are
very similar, of course, to the work done in all of
our A. & M. Colleges. As Professor of Physics
and Electrical Engineering I found the genial
Chas. Edgar Ard, a graduate of our own great
“Georgia Tech,” and as Director of the Textile
School I found the cultured Wm. R. Meadows,
whom I met at Howard College years ago, and who
look the full literary course there, and then at
Chicago University, as the foundation soil in which,
to plant his technical training.
My invitation to spend a week or ten days with
the Y. M. C. A. grew out of a lecture date at the
A. & M. last spring. (Spending’ Sunday with my
royal friend, M. K. Thornton, at Starkville, we
drove out for an afternoon service with the boys.
The sight that greeted me was overwhelming.
Looking at so many hundreds of college boys—
each one “some mother’s son” —inspired me to the
limit of my own feeling, thinking, and speaking. A
platform lecture the next night—and then the
promise to accept the call to “come back next
year and spend a week with the boys.” The co
operation on the part of the Y. M. C. A. leaders
was, of course, expected; but the heartiness with
which the President and many of the professors
entered into the work was something, to say the
least, that is not found at every state institution.
All the time I wanted was given at the morning
chapel exercises, and at night, while the audience
tCon eluded nn paare 12).
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