MOODY'S STORIES (continued 2)

Reaping As They Sowed

Although God forgave the sins of Jacob and David, and the other Old Testament saints, yet there were certain consequences of their sins which those saints had to suffer after they were forgiven.

If a man gets drunk and goes out and breaks his leg, so that it must be amputated, God will forgive him if he asks it, but he will have to hop around on one leg all his life. A man may sow thistle-seed with grain-seed in a moment of pique against his master, and the master may forgive him, but the man will have to reap the thistles with the grain.

Small Beginnings

An obscure man preached one Sunday to a few persons in a Methodist chapel in the South of England. A boy of fifteen years of age was in the audience, driven into the chapel by a snowstorm. The man took as his text the words, "Look unto me and be ye saved," and as he stumbled along as best he could, the light of heaven flashed into that boy's heart. He went out of the chapel saved, and soon became known as C. H. Spurgeon, the boy-preacher.

The parsonage at Epworth, England, caught fire one night, and all the inmates were rescued except one son. The boy came to a window, and was brought safely to the ground by two farm-hands, one standing on the shoulder of the other. The boy was John Wesley. If you would realize the responsibility of that incident, if you would measure the consequences of that rescue, ask the millions of Methodists who look back to John Wesley as the founder of their denomination.

Saying and Doing

A man was once conversing with a Brahmin priest, and he asked:

"Could you say, 'I am the Resurrection and the Life?'"

"Yes," replied the priest, "I could say that."

"But could you make any one believe it?"

Christ proved His superiority right there. His character and His actions were back of His words. He exhibited His divine power to silence His enemies.

Climb Higher

I remember being in a meeting after the Civil War had been going on for about six months. The army of the North had been defeated at Bull Run; in fact, we had nothing but defeat, and it looked as though the Republic was going to pieces; so we were much cast down and discouraged. At this meeting every speaker for a while seemed as if he had hung his harp upon the willow; it was one of the gloomiest meetings I ever attended. Finally an old man with beautiful white hair got up to speak, and his face literally shone.

"Young men," he said, "you do not talk like sons of the King. Though it is dark just here, remember it is light somewhere else." Then he went on to say that if it were dark all over the world, it was light up around the Throne.

He told us he had come from the East, where a friend had described to him how he had been up a mountain to spend the night and see the sun rise. As the party were climbing up the mountain, and before they had reached the summit, a storm came on. This friend said to the guide:

"I will give this up; take me back."

The guide smiled, and replied: "I think we shall get above the storm soon."

On they went; and it was not long before they got up to where it was as calm as any summer evening. Down in the valley a terrible storm raged; they could hear the thunder rolling, and see the lightning's flash; but all was serene on the mountain top.

"And so, my young friends," continued the old man, "though all is dark around you, come a little higher, and the darkness will flee away."

Often when I have been inclined to get discouraged, I have thought of what he said. If you are down in the valley amidst the thick fog and the darkness, get a little higher; get nearer to Christ, and know more of Him.

The Greatest Miracle

Jesus said, "The works that I do shall ye do also, and greater works than these shall ye do because I go to the Father."

I used to stumble over that. I didn't understand it. I thought what greater work could any man do than Christ had done? How could any one raise a dead man who had been laid away in the sepulchre for days, and who had already begun to turn back to dust; how with a word could he call him forth?

But the longer I live the more I am convinced it is a greater thing to influence a man's will; a man whose will is set against God; to have that will broken and brought into subjection to God's will—or, in other words, it is a greater thing to have power over a living, sinning, God-hating man, than to quicken the dead. He who could create a world could speak a dead soul into life; but I think the greatest miracle this world has ever seen was the miracle at Pentecost. Here were men who surrounded the apostles, full of prejudice, full of malice, full of bitterness, their hands, as it were, dripping with the blood of the Son of God, and yet an unlettered man, a man whom they detested, a man whom they hated, stands up and preaches the Gospel, and three thousand of them are immediately convicted and converted, and become disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Different Kinds of Murder

One young man at college, an only son, whose mother wrote to him remonstrating against his gambling and drinking habits, took the letters out of the post-office, and when he found that they were from her, he tore them up without reading them. She said:

"I thought I would die when I found I had lost my hold on that son."

If a boy kills his mother by his conduct, you can't call it anything else than murder, and he is as truly guilty of breaking the sixth commandment as if he drove a dagger to her heart.

"It Is Not For You!"

Commenting on the text: "It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in His own power," Spurgeon said:

"If I were introduced into a room where a large number of parcels were stored up, and I was told that there was something good for me, I should begin to look for that which had my name upon it, and when I came upon a parcel and I saw in pretty big letters, 'It is not for you,' I should leave it alone. Here, then, is a casket of knowledge marked, 'It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in His own power.' Cease to meddle with matters which are concealed, and be satisfied to know the things which are clearly revealed."

Stolen Goods a Burden

I heard of a boy who stole a cannon-ball from a navy-yard. He watched his opportunity, sneaked into the yard, and secured it. But when he had it, he hardly knew what to do with it. It was heavy, and too large to conceal in his pocket, so he had to put it under his hat. When he got home with it, he dared not show it to his parents, because it would have led at once to his detection.

He said in after years it was the last thing he ever stole.

The story is told that a royal diamond valued at $600,000 was stolen from a window of a jeweler, to whom it had been given to set. A few months afterward a miserable man died a miserable death in a poor lodging-house. In his pocket was found the diamond, and a letter telling how he had not dared to sell it, lest it should lead to his discovery and imprisonment. It never brought him anything but anxiety and pain.

Unlocked By Prayer

God's best gifts, like valuable jewels, are kept under lock and key, and those who want them must, with fervent faith, importunately ask for them; for God is the rewarder of them that diligently seek Him.

The Faithful Promiser

God is always true to what He promises to do. He made promises to Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Joshua, and the others, and did He not fulfill them? He will fulfill every word of what He has promised; yet how few take Him at His word!

When I was a young man I was clerk in the establishment of a man in Chicago, whom I observed frequently occupied sorting and marking bills. He explained to me what he had been doing; on some notes he had marked B, on some D, and on others G; those marked B, he told me, were bad, those marked D meant they were doubtful, and those with G on them mean they were good; and, said he, you must treat all of them accordingly. And thus people indorse God's promises, by marking some as bad and others as doubtful; whereas we ought to take all of them as good, for He has never once broken His word, and all that He says He will do, will be done in the fullness of time.

Throw Out the Ballast

When men go up in a balloon, they carry with them what they call ballast—that is, small bags of sand, and when they want to rise higher they just throw out some of the sand. So we, if we want to rise nearer heaven, must just throw out some of the sand, and cast aside every weight. We won't rise higher till we do so.

A Mother's Love

The closest tie on earth is a mother's love for her child. There are a good many things that will separate a man from his wife, but there isn't a thing in the wide, wide world that will separate a true mother from her own child. I will admit that there are unnatural mothers, that there are mothers that have gone out of their heads, mothers that are so steeped in sin and iniquity that they will turn against their own children, but a true mother will never, never turn against her own child. I have talked with mothers when my blood boiled with indignation against the sons for their treatment of their mothers, and I have said:

"Why don't you cast him off?"

They have said: "Why, Mr. Moody, I love him still. He is my son."

I was once preaching for Dr. G. in St. Louis, and when I got through he said that he wanted to tell me a story. There was a boy who was very bad. He had a very bad father, who seemed to take delight in teaching his son everything that was bad. The father died, and the boy went on from bad to worse until he was arrested for murder.

When he was on trial, it came out that he had murdered five other people, and from one end of the city to the other there was a universal cry going up against him. During his trial they had to guard the court-house, the indignation was so intense.

The white-haired mother got just as near her son as she could, and every witness that went into the court and said anything against him seemed to hurt her more than her son. When the jury brought in a verdict of guilty a great shout went up, but the old mother nearly fainted away; and when the judge pronounced the sentence of death they thought she would faint away.

After it was over she threw her arms around him and kissed him, and there in the court they had to tear him from her embrace. She then went the length and breadth of the city trying to get men to sign a petition for his pardon. And when he was hanged, she begged the governor to let her have the body of her son, that she might bury it. They say that death has torn down everything in this world, everything but a mother's love. That is stronger than death itself. The governor refused to let her have the body, but she cherished the memory of that boy as long as she lived.

A few months later she followed her boy, and when she was dying she sent word to the governor, and begged that her body might be laid close to her son. That is a mother's love! She wasn't ashamed to have her grave pointed out for all time as the grave of the mother of the most noted criminal the State of Vermont ever had.

The prophet takes hold of that very idea. He says: "Can a mother forget her child?" But a mother's love is not to be compared to the love of God.

Restitution

I was preaching in British Columbia some years ago and a young man came to me, and wanted to become a Christian. He had been smuggling opium into the States.

"Well, my friend," I said, "I don't think there is any chance for you to become a Christian until you make restitution." He said, "If I attempt to do that, I will fall into the clutches of the law, and I will go to the penitentiary." "Well," I replied, "you had better do that than go to the judgment-seat of God with that sin upon your soul, and have eternal punishment. The Lord will be very merciful if you set your face to do right."

He went away sorrowful, but came back the next day, and said: "I have a young wife and child, and all the furniture in my house I have bought with money I have got in this dishonest way. If I become a Christian, that furniture will have to go, and my wife will know it."

"Better let your wife know it, and better let your home and furniture go."

"Would you come up and see my wife?" he asked; "I don't know what she will say."

I went up to see her, and when I told her, the tears trickled down her cheeks, and she said: "Mr. Moody, I will gladly give everything if my husband can become a true Christian."

She took out her pocketbook, and handed over her last penny. He had a piece of land in the United States, which he deeded over to the government. I do not know, in all my backward track, of any living man who has had a better testimony for Jesus Christ than that man. He had been dishonest, but when the truth came to him that he must make it right before God would help him, he made it right.

No amount of weeping over sin, and saying that you feel sorry, is going to help it unless you are willing to confess and make restitution.

Willie and the Bears

I said to my little family, one morning, a few weeks before the Chicago fire, "I am coming home this afternoon to give you a ride."

My little boy clapped his hands. "Oh, papa, will you take me to see the bears in Lincoln Park?"

"Yes."

I had not been gone long when my little boy said, "Mamma, I wish you would get me ready."

"Oh," she said, "it will be a long time before papa comes."

"But I want to get ready, mamma."

At last he was ready to have the ride, face washed, and clothes all nice and clean.

"Now, you must take good care, and not get yourself dirty again," said mamma.

Of course, he was going to take care; he wasn't going to get dirty! So off he ran to watch for me. However, it was a long time yet until the afternoon, and after a little he began to play. When I got home, I found him outside, with his face all covered with dirt.

"I can't take you to the park that way, Willie."

"Why papa? you said you would take me."

"Ah, but I can't; you're all over mud. I couldn't be seen with such a dirty little boy."

"Why, I'se clean, papa; mamma washed me."

"Well, you've got dirty again."

But he began to cry, and I could not convince him that he was dirty.

"I'se clean; mamma washed me!" he cried.

Do you think I argued with him? No. I just took him up in my arms, and carried him into the house, and showed him his face in the looking-glass. He had not a word to say. He would not take my word for it; but one look at the glass was enough; he saw it for himself. He didn't say he wasn't dirty after that!

Now, the looking-glass showed him that his face was dirty—but I did not take the looking-glass to wash it; of course not. Yet that is just what thousands of people do. The Law is the looking-glass to see ourselves in, to show us how vile and worthless we are in the sight of God; but they take the Law and try to wash themselves with it, instead of being washed in the blood of the Lamb.

Christ For All

An old Welshwoman said Christ was Welsh, and an Englishman said:

"No, He was a Jew."

She declared that she knew He was Welsh, because He spoke so that she could understand Him.

Starting Right

Many a man is lost because he does not start right. He makes a bad start. A young man comes from his country home, and enters upon city life. Temptation arises, and he becomes false to his principles. He meets with some scoffing, sneering man, who jeers at him because he goes to a church service; or because he is seen reading his Bible; or because he is known to pray to God. And the young man proves to be weak-kneed; he cannot stand the scoffs and the sneers and the jeers of his companions; and so he becomes untrue to his principles, and gives them up.

I want to say here to young men, that when a young man makes a wrong start, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred it is ruin to him. The first game of chance; the first betting transaction; the first false entry in the books; the first quarter-dollar taken from the cash-box or the till; the first night spent in evil company—either of these may prove the turning-point; either of these may represent a wrong start.

Napoleon and the Conscript

There is a well-known story told of Napoleon the First's time. In one of the conscriptions, during one of his many wars, a man was balloted as a conscript who did not want to go, but he had a friend who offered to go in his place. His friend joined the regiment in his name, and was sent off to the war. By and by a battle came on, in which he was killed, and they buried him on the battle-field. Some time after, the Emperor wanted more men, and by some mistake the first man was balloted a second time. They went to take him, but he remonstrated.

"You cannot take me."

"Why not?"

"I am dead," was the reply.

"You are not dead; you are alive and well."

"But I am dead," he said.

"Why, man, you must be mad. Where did you die?"

"At such a battle, and you left me buried on such a battle-field."

"You talk like a madman," they cried; but the man stuck to his point that he had been dead and buried some months.

"Look up your books," he said, "and see if it is not so."

They looked, and found that he was right. They found the man's name entered as drafted, sent to the war, and marked off as killed.

"Look here," they said, "you didn't die; you must have got some one to go for you; it must have been your substitute."

"I know that," he said; "he died in my stead. You cannot touch me; I died in that man, and I go free. The law has no claim against me."

They would not recognize the doctrine of substitution, and the case was carried to the Emperor. He said that the man was right, that he was dead and buried in the eyes of the law, and that France had no claim against him.

This story may or may not be true, but one thing I know is true: Jesus Christ suffered death for the sinner, and those who accept Him are free from the Law.

Green Fields or Desert?

When I was out in California, the first time I went down from the Sierra Nevada Mountains and dropped into the Valley of the Sacramento, I was surprised to find on one farm that everything about it was green—all the trees and flowers, everything was blooming, and everything was green and beautiful, and just across the hedge everything was dried up, and there was not a green thing there. I could not understand it. I made inquiries, and I found that the man that had everything green, irrigated; he just poured the water right on, and kept everything green, while the fields that were next to his were as dry as Gideon's fleece without a drop of dew.

So it is with a great many in the church to-day. They are like these farms in California—a dreary desert, everything parched and desolate, and apparently no life in them. They can sit next to a man who is full of the Spirit of God, who is like a green bay tree, and who is bringing forth fruit, and yet they will not seek a similar blessing.

Well, why this difference? Because God has poured water on him that was thirsty; that is the difference. One has been seeking this anointing, and he has received it; and when we want this above everything else God will surely give it to us.

Religion In the Home

What we want is family piety, righteousness in our homes. A young minister came to me, and said he couldn't get along with his wife, and what should he do? I told him to get out of the ministry. A man has no right to be in the pulpit unless he can get along with his family.

A Universal Failing

It is a false idea that all pride is confined to the upper classes. You will find it in the lanes and alleys. You will find little dirty, barefooted children who will get a string of shavings, put it round their necks, and strut down the street as if they were wearing golden beads. Pride is born and grows in the human heart. You do not plant it there; it grows there of itself. There is as much pride among the poor as among the rich; and that is one reason why more of them do not come to the Lord Jesus Christ: they do not like to be laughed at, scoffed at, sneered at, and ridiculed. It costs them too much.

Words and Actions

A man may preach with the eloquence of an angel, but if he doesn't live what he preaches, and act out in his home and his business what he professes, his testimony goes for naught, and the people say it is all hypocrisy after all; it is all a sham. Words are very empty, if there is nothing back of them. Your testimony is poor and worthless, if there is not a record back of that testimony consistent with what you profess. What we need is to pray to God to lift us up out of this low, cold, formal state that we live in, that we may dwell in the atmosphere of God continually, and that the Lord may lift upon us the light of His countenance, and that we may shine in this world, reflecting His grace and glory.

The One-Eyed Doe

There is an old fable that a doe that had but one eye used to graze near the sea; and in order to be safe, she kept her blind eye toward the water, from which side she expected no danger, while with the good eye she watched the country. Some men, noticing this, took a boat and came upon her from the sea and shot her. With her dying breath, she said:

"Oh! hard fate! that I should receive my death wound from that side whence I expected no harm, and be safe in the part where I looked for most danger."

Lost Opportunities

If a farmer neglects to plant in the springtime, he can never recover the lost opportunity; no more can you, if you neglect yours. Youth is a seed-time, and if it is allowed to pass without good seed being sown, weeds will spring up and choke the soil. It will take bitter toil to uproot them.

An old divine said that when a good farmer sees a weed in his field he has it pulled up. If it is taken early enough, the blank is soon filled in, and the crop waves over the whole field. But if allowed to run too late, the bald patch remains. It would have been better if the weed had never been allowed to get root.

Steer Clear

A steamboat was stranded in the Mississippi River, and the captain could not get her off. Eventually a hard-looking fellow came on board, and said:

"Captain, I understand you want a pilot to take you out of this difficulty?"

The captain said, "Are you a pilot?"

"Well, they call me one."

"Do you know where the snags and sand-bars are?"

"No, sir."

"Well, how do you expect to take me out of here if you don't know where the snags and sand-bars are?"

"I know where they ain't!" was the reply.

Beware of temptations. "Lead us not into temptation," our Lord taught us to pray; and again He said, "Watch and pray, lest ye enter into temptation." We are weak and sinful by nature, and it is a good deal better for us to pray for deliverance rather than to run into temptation and then pray for strength to resist.

Looking for Revivals

Men are anxious for a revival in business. There is a great revival in politics just now. In all departments of life you find that men are very anxious for a revival in the things that concern them most.

If this is legitimate—and it is perfectly right in its place—should not every child of God be praying for and desiring a revival of godliness in the world at the present time? Do we not need a revival of downright honesty, of truthfulness, of uprightness, and of temperance? Are there not many who have become alienated from the Church of God and from the house of the Lord, who are forming an attachment to the saloon? Are not our sons being drawn away by hundreds and thousands, so that while you often find the churches empty, the liquor shops are crowded every Sabbath afternoon and evening? I am sure the saloon-keepers are glad if they can have a revival in their business; they do not object to sell more whisky and beer. Then surely every true Christian ought to desire that men who are in danger of perishing eternally should be saved and rescued.

Opportunity

A sculptor once showed a visitor his studio. It was full of statues of gods. One was very curious. The face was concealed by being covered with hair, and there were wings on each foot.

"What is his name?" said the visitor.

"Opportunity," was the reply.

"Why is his face hidden?"

"Because men seldom know him when he comes to them."

"Why has he wings on his feet?"

"Because he is soon gone, and once gone can never be overtaken."

It becomes us, then, to make the most of the opportunities God has given us.

The Usual Way

I used at one time to read so many chapters of the Bible a day, and if I did not get through my usual quantity, I thought I was getting cold and backsliding. But, mind you, if a man had asked me two hours afterward what I had read, I could not tell him; I had forgotten it nearly all.

When I was a boy I used, among other things, to hoe corn on a farm; and I used to hoe it so badly, in order to get over so much ground, that at night I had to put down a stick in the ground, so as to know next morning where I had left off.

That was somewhat in the same fashion as running through so many chapters every day. A man will say, "Wife, did I read that chapter?"

"Well," says she, "I don't remember."

And neither of them can recollect. And perhaps he reads the same chapter over and over again; and they call that "studying the Bible." I do not think there is a book in the world we neglect so much as the Bible.

Getting On Splendidly

One man said to another, some time ago: "How are you getting on at your church?"

"Oh, splendid."

"Many conversions?"

"Well—well, on that side we are not getting on so well. But," he said, "we have rented all our pews and are able to pay all our running expenses. We are getting on splendidly."

That is what the godless call "getting on splendidly." They rent the pews, pay the minister, and meet all the running expenses.

A man was being shown through one of the cathedrals of Europe; he had come in from the country. One of the men belonging to the cathedral was showing him around, when he inquired:

"Do you have may conversions here?"

"Many what?"

"Many conversions here?"

"Ah, man, this is not a Wesleyan chapel."

The idea of there being conversions there! And you can go into a good many churches in this country and ask if they have many conversions there, and they would not know what it meant, they are so far away from the Lord; they are not looking for conversions, and don't expect them.

A Hundred Years Hence

Once, as I was walking down the street, I heard some people laughing and talking aloud. One of them said:

"Well, there will be no difference; it will be all the same a hundred years hence."

The thought flashed across my mind, "Will there be no difference? Where will you be a hundred years hence?"

Young man, just ask yourself the question, "Where shall I be?" Some of you who are getting on in years may be in eternity ten years hence. Where will you be, on the left or the right hand of God? I cannot tell your feelings, but I can my own. I ask you, "Where will you spend eternity? Where will you be a hundred years hence?"

A Free Gift

Remember, salvation is a free gift, and it is a free gift for us. Can you buy it? It is a free gift, presented to "whosoever" will accept it.

Suppose I were to say, I will give this Bible to "whosoever" will take it; what have you got to do? Why, nothing but take it. But a man comes forward, and says:

"I'd like that Bible very much."

"Well, didn't I say 'whosoever' will can have it?"

"Yes; but I'd like to have you mention my name."

"Well, here it is."

Still he keeps eyeing the Bible, and saying, "I'd like to have that Bible; but I'd like to give you something for it. I don't like to take it for nothing."

"But I am not here to sell Bibles; take it, if you want it."

"Well, I want it; but I'd like to give you something for it. Let me give you a cent for it; though, to be sure, it's worth about five dollars."

Suppose I accept the cent; the man takes up the Bible and marches away home with it.

His wife asks, "Where did you get that Bible?"

"Oh, I bought it."

Mark the point; when he gave the penny, it ceased to be a gift. So with salvation. If you were to pay ever so little, it would not be a gift.

What Seed Are You Sowing?

Suppose I meet a man who is sowing seed, and say, "Hello, stranger, what are you sowing?"

"Seed."

"What kind of seed?"

"I don't know."

"Don't you know whether it is good or bad?"

"No; I can't tell. But it is seed—that is all I want to know, and I am sowing it."

You would say that he was a first-class lunatic, wouldn't you? But he wouldn't be half so mad as the man who goes on sowing for time and eternity, and never asks himself what he is sowing or what the harvest will be.

Father, what seed are you sowing in your family? Are you setting your children a good or a bad example? Do you spend your time at the saloon or the club, until you have become almost a stranger to them? or are you training them for God and righteousness?

Bound Hand and Foot

When I was speaking to five thousand children in Glasgow some years ago, I took a spool of thread and said to one of the largest boys:

"Do you believe I can bind you with that thread?"

He laughed at the idea. I wound the thread around him a few times, and he broke it with a single jerk. Then I wound the thread around and around, and by and by I said:

"Now get free if you can."

He couldn't move head or foot. If you are slave to some vile habit, you must either slay that habit, or it will slay you.

Unity

There is one thing I have noticed as I have traveled in different countries; I never yet have known the Spirit of God to work where the Lord's people were divided. Unity is one thing that we must have if we are to have the Holy Spirit of God to work in our midst.

If a church is divided, the members should immediately seek unity. Let the believers come together and get the difficulty out of the way. If the minister of a church cannot unite the people, if those that were dissatisfied will not fall in, it would be better for that minister to retire. I think there are a good many ministers in this country who are losing their time; they have lost, some of them, months and years; they have not seen any fruit, and they will not see any fruit, because they have a divided church. Such a church cannot grow in divine things. The Spirit of God doesn't work where there is division, and what we want to-day is the spirit of unity amongst God's children, so that the Lord may work.

Get Inside!

You have looked at the windows of a grand church erected at the cost of many thousands of dollars. From the outside they did not seem very beautiful; but get inside, when the rays of the sun are striking upon the stained glass, and you begin to understand what others have told you of their magnificence. So it is when you have come into personal contact with Christ. You find Him to be the very Savior and friend you need. You will see in Him what you have never seen before.

Hunt For Something

We must study the Bible thoroughly, and hunt it through, as it were, for some great truth.

If a friend were to see me searching about a building, and were to come up, and say, "Moody, what are you looking for? Have you lost something?" and I were to say, "No, I haven't lost anything; I'm not looking for anything particular," I fancy he would just let me go on by myself, and think me very foolish. But if I were to say, "Yes, I have lost a dollar," why, then, I might expect him to help me to find it.

Read the Bible, my friends, as if you were seeking for something of value. It is a good deal better to take a single chapter, and spend a month on it, than to read the Bible at random for a month.

"When Ye Think Not"

McCheyne, the Scotch preacher, once said to some friends, "Do you think Christ will come to-night?"

One after another they said, "I think not."

When all had given this answer, he solemnly repeated this text, "The Son of Man cometh at an hour when ye think not."

Home Piety

If a Christian is unsound in patience or unsound in love, we take no notice of it; but let him be unsound in faith, and off goes his head. I do hate to see a minister or professing Christian mean and peevish to his wife, and yet be as polite as a dancing-master to other women. I tell you he is not fit to preach the Word of God. I don't want to have anything to do with him. The home was established before the church, and he sadly needs more home piety.

Constant Watching

The Persians had an annual festival when they slew all the serpents and venomous creatures they could find; but they allowed them to swarm as fast and freely as ever until the festival came round once more. It was poor policy. Sins, like serpents, breed quickly, and need to be constantly watched.

The Wrong Physician

I heard once of a man who went to England from the Continent, and brought letters with him to eminent physicians from the Emperor. The letters said:

"This man is a personal friend of mine, and we are afraid he is going to lose his reason. Do all you can for him."

The doctor asked him if he had lost any dear friend in his own country, or any position of importance, or what it was that was weighing on his mind.

The young man said: "No; but my father and grandfather and myself were brought up infidels, and for the last two or three years this thought has been haunting me, 'Where shall I spend eternity?' And the thought of it follows me day and night."

The doctor said, "You have come to the wrong physician, but I will tell you of One who can cure you"; and he told him of Christ, and read to him the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah, "With His stripes we are healed."

The young man said, "Doctor, do you believe that?"

The doctor told him he did, and prayed and wrestled with him, and at last the clear light of Calvary shone on his soul. He had settled the question in his own mind at last, where he would spend eternity.

I ask you, sinner, to settle if now. It is for you to decide. Shall it be with the saints and martyrs and prophets, or in the dark caverns of hell, amidst blackness and darkness forever? Make haste to be wise; for "how shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?"

Seeking the Lost

I remember, when we were in London, they found one old woman who was eighty-five years old, and not a Christian. After the worker had prayed, she made a prayer herself:

"O Lord, I thank Thee for going out of Thy way to find me."

He is all the time going out of His way to find the lost.

He Got Time To Think

I was once preaching on the text, "Be not deceived; God is not mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." No sooner had I read it than a man stood right up in the audience and said:

"I don't believe it."

I said: "My friend, that doesn't change the fact. Truth is truth, whether you believe it or not; and a lie is a lie, whether you believe it or not."

He didn't want to believe it. When the meeting broke up, an officer was at the door to arrest him. He was tried and sent to the penitentiary for twelve months for stealing. I really believe that when he got into his cell, he believed that he had to reap what he sowed.

The Motherless Child

Once I heard of a little sick child, whose mother was seriously ill; and so, in order that she might have quiet, and that the sick child might be no trouble to her, the little one was taken away to a friend's house, and placed in charge of a kind lady for a time. The mother grew worse, and at length died. The father said:

"We'll not trouble the child about it; she is too young to remember her mother; just let her remain where she is until the funeral is over."

This was done, and in a few days the little girl was brought back to the house. No mention was made of her mother, or of what had occurred; but no sooner was she taken to the house than she ran first into one room, then into another, into the parlor, the dining-room, and all over the house, and then away into a little room where her mother used to go to pray alone.

"Where is mother?" she cried. "I want mother!"

And when they were compelled to tell her what had happened, she cried out:

"Take me away, take me away; I don't want to be here without mother."

It was the mother made it home to her. And so it is in heaven. It is not so much the white robes, the golden crown, or the harps of gold, but it is the society we shall meet there. Who, then, are there? What company shall we have when we get there? Jesus is there, the Holy Father is there, the Spirit is there—our Father, our elder Brother, our Comforter.

Converted the Regular Way

I never yet knew a man converted just in the time and manner he expected to be. I have heard people say, "Well, if ever I am converted, it won't be in a Methodist church; you won't catch me there." I never knew a man say that but, at last, if converted at all, it was in a Methodist church.

In Scotland a man was converted at one of our meetings—an employer. He was very anxious that all his employés should be reached, and he used to send them one by one to the meetings. But there was one employé that wouldn't come. We are all more or less troubled with stubbornness; and the moment this man found that his employer wanted him to go to the meetings, he made up his mind he wouldn't go. If he was going to be converted, he said, he was going to be converted by some ordained minister; he was not going to any meeting that was conducted by unordained Americans. He believed in conversion, but he was going to be converted the regular way. He believed in the regular Presbyterian Church of Scotland, and that was the place for him to be converted.

The employer tried every way he could to get him to attend the meetings, but he wouldn't come.

After we left that town and went away up to Inverness, the employer had some business up there, and he sent this employé to attend to it, in the hope that he would attend some of our meetings.

One night, as I was preaching on the bank of a river, I happened to take for my text the words of Naaman: "I thought; I thought." I was trying to take men's thoughts up and to show the difference between their thoughts and God's thoughts. This man happened to be walking along the bank of the river. He saw a great crowd, and heard some one talking, and he wondered to himself what that man was talking about. He didn't know who was there, so he drew up to the crowd, and listened. He heard the sermon, and became convicted and converted right there. Then he inquired who was the preacher, and he found out it was the very man that he said he would not hear—the man he disliked. The very man he had been talking against was the very man God used to convert him.

Crazy from Sin

I was once preaching in Chicago, and a woman who was nearly out of her mind came to me. You know there are some people who mock at religious meetings, and say that religion drives people mad. It is sin that drives people mad. It is the want of Christ that sinks people into despair.

This was the woman's story:

She had a family of children. One of her neighbors had died, and her husband had brought home a little child. She said, "I don't want the child," but her husband said, "You must take it and look after it." She said she had enough to do with her own, and she told her husband to take that child away. But he would not. She confessed that she tried to starve the child; but it lingered on. One night it cried all night; I suppose it wanted food. At last she took the clothes and threw them over the child and smothered it. No one saw her; no one knew anything about it. The child was buried. Years had passed away, and she said:

"I hear the voice of that child day and night. It has driven me nearly mad."

No one saw the act; but God saw it, and this retribution followed it. History is full of these things. You need not go to the Bible to find it out.

Don't Swear!

I was greatly amazed not long ago, in talking to a man who thought he was a Christian, to find that once in a while, when he got angry, he would swear. I said: "My friend, I don't see how you can tear down with one hand what you are trying to build up with the other. I don't see how you can profess to be a child of God and let those words come out of your lips."

He replied: "Mr. Moody, if you knew me, you would understand. I have a very quick temper. I inherited it from my father and mother, and it is uncontrollable but my swearing comes only from the lips."

When God said, "I will not hold him guiltless that takes My name in vain," He meant what He said, and I don't believe any one can be a true child of God who takes the name of God in vain.

The True Sheep Knows

I tell you the true sheep know a true shepherd. I got up in Scotland once and quoted a passage of Scripture a little different from what it was in the Bible, and an old woman crept up and said:

"Mr. Moody, you said——."

I might make forty misquotations in an ordinary audience, and no one would tell me about them. Like two lawyers: one said in court that the other didn't know the Lord's Prayer. The other said he did:

"Now I lay me down to sleep."

"Well," the first said, "I give it up. I did not think you knew it."

Didn't either one of them know it, you see.

The Father Knew Best

Dr. Arnot, one of the greatest Scotch divines, was in this country before he died. His mother died when he was a little boy only three weeks old, and there was a large family of Arnots. I suppose they missed the tenderness and love of the mother. They got the impression that their father was very stern and rigid, and that he had a great many laws and rules.

One rule was, that the children should never climb trees. When the neighbors found out that the Arnot children could not climb trees, they began to tell them about the wonderful things they could see from the tops of the trees. Well, tell a boy of twelve years that he mustn't climb a tree, and he will get up that tree some way. And so the Arnot children were all the time teasing their father to let them climb the tree; but the old sire said:

"No."

One day he was busy reading his paper, and the boys said:

"Father is reading his paper. Let's slip down into the lot and climb a tree."

One of the little fellows stood on the top of the fence to see that father did not catch them. When his brother got up on the first branch, he said:

"What do you see?"

"Why! I don't see anything."

"Then go higher; you haven't got high enough."

So up he went higher, and again the little boy asked:

"Well, what do you see now?"

"I don't see anything."

"You aren't high enough; go higher."

And the little fellow went up as high as he could go, but he slipped, and down he came, and broke his leg. Willie said he tried to get him into the house, but he couldn't do it. He had to tell his father all about it. He said he was scared nearly out of his wits. He thought his father would be very angry. But his father just threw aside the paper, and started for the lot. When he got there, he picked the boy up in his arms, and brought him up to the house. Then he sent for the doctor. And Willie said he got a new view of that father. He found out the reason why that father was so stern. He said the moment that boy got hurt, no mother could have been more loving and gentle.

My dear friends, there is not one commandment that has been given us which has not been for our highest and best interest. There isn't a commandment that hasn't come from the loving heart of God, and what He wants is to have us give up that which is going to mar our happiness in this life, and in the life to come.

"Help Yourself!"

When I was out on the Pacific coast, in California, some years ago, I was the guest of a man that had a large vineyard and a large orchard. One day he said to me:

"Moody, while you are my guest I want you to make yourself perfectly at home, and if there is anything in the orchard or in the vineyard you would like, help yourself."

Well, when I wanted an orange, I did not go to an orange tree and pray the oranges to fall into my pocket; but I walked up to a tree, reached out my hand, and took the oranges. He said "Take," and I took.

God says, "There is my Son; take Him as your Saviour. The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life."

The Rich Husband

There was a shop-girl in Chicago, a few years ago. One day she could not have bought five dollars' worth of anything; the next day she could go and buy a thousand dollar's worth of whatever she wanted.

What made the difference?

Why, she had married a rich husband; that was all. She had received him, and of course all he had became hers. And so we can have all, if we only receive Christ.

Settle It Now!

Some years ago, in one of the mining districts of England, a young man attended one of our meetings and refused to go from the place till he had found peace in the Savior. The next day he went down into the pit, and the coal fell in upon him. When they took him out, he was broken and mangled, and had only two or three minutes of life left in him. His friends gathered about him, saw his lips moving, and, bending down to catch his words, heard him say:

"It was a good thing I settled it last night."

Settle it now, my friends, once for all. Begin now to confess your sins, and pray the Lord to remember you. He will make you an heir of His kingdom, if you will accept the gift of salvation.

The True Source of Joy

God doesn't ask us to rejoice over nothing; He gives us ground for our joy. What would you think of a man who seemed very happy to-day and full of joy, and couldn't tell you what made him so? Suppose I should meet a man on the street, and he was so full of joy that he should get hold of both my hands and say:

"Bless the Lord, I am so full of joy!"

"What makes you so full of joy?"

"Well, I don't know."

"You don't know!"

"No, I don't; but I am so joyful that I just want to get out of the flesh."

"What makes you feel so joyful?"

"Well, I don't know."

Would we not think such a person unreasonable? But there are a great many people who want to feel that they are Christians before they are Christians; they want the Christian's experience before they become Christians; they want to have the joy of the Lord before they receive Jesus Christ. But this is not the Gospel order. He brings joy when He comes, and we cannot have joy apart from Him. He is the author of it, and we find our joy in Him.

The Meanest Kind of Murderers

When I was in England in 1892, I met a gentleman who claimed that they were ahead of us in the respect they had for the law. "We hang our murderers," he said, "but there isn't one out of twenty in your country that is hung."

I said, "You are greatly mistaken, for they walk about these two countries unhung."

"What do you mean?"

"I will tell you what I mean," I said; "the man that comes into my house and runs a dagger into my heart for my money is a prince compared with a son that takes five years to kill me and the wife of my bosom. A young man who comes home night after night drunk, and when his mother remonstrates, curses her gray hairs, and kills her by inches, is the blackest kind of a murderer."

Where your Treasure Is

You can soon tell where a man's treasure is by his talk. If it is in heaven, he will not be long with you before he's talking about heaven; his heart is there, and so his speech isn't long in running there, too. If his heart is in money, he will soon have you deep in talk about mines, speculation, stocks, bank rate, and so on. If his heart is in lands, it won't be long before he's talking about real estate, improvements, houses, and so on. Always the same, wherever a man's heart is, there his tongue will be sure to go.

Some one in England said, if you see a man's goods and furniture come down by the luggage train, you're pretty sure he'll be down by the next passenger train; he won't be long after; he'll follow his goods. And so it is with heaven; if your treasure is on before you, you'll be wanting to follow it; you'll be glad to be on the road thither as soon as possible.

Why his Life was Spared

Two Americans who were crossing the Atlantic met on Sunday night to sing hymns in the cabin. As they sang the hymn, "Jesus, Lover of my Soul," one of them heard an exceedingly rich and beautiful voice behind him. He looked around, and although he did not know the face he thought that he recognized the voice. So when the music ceased he turned around and asked the man if he had not been in the Civil War. The man replied that he had been a Confederate soldier.

"Were you at such a place on such a night?" asked the first.

"Yes," he said, "and a curious thing happened that night; this hymn recalled it to my mind. I was on sentry duty on the edge of a wood. It was a dark night and very cold, and I was a little frightened because the enemy were supposed to be very near at hand. I felt very homesick and miserable, and about midnight, when everything was very still, I was beginning to feel very weary and thought that I would comfort myself by praying and singing a hymn. I remember singing this hymn—

"After I had sung those words a strange peace came down upon me, and through the long night I remember having felt no more fear."

"Now," said the other man, "listen to my story. I was a Union soldier, and was in the wood that night with a party of scouts. I saw you standing up, although I didn't see your face, and my men had their rifles focused upon you waiting the word to fire, but when you sang out—

I said, 'Boys, put down your rifles; we will go home.' I couldn't kill you after that."

The Sinner's Heart

When I was in Dublin some years ago I got up to go to an early meeting, and found the servants had not opened the front door; so I pulled back a bolt, but I could not get the door open. Then I turned a key, but the door would not open. Then I found there was another bolt at the top and another bolt at the bottom. Still the door would not open. Then I found there was a bar, and then I found a night-lock. In all I found five or six different fastenings.

I am afraid that door represents every sinner's heart. The door of his heart is double-locked, double-bolted, and double-barred. Oh, my friends, pull back the bolts, and let the King of glory in!

Nothing Small

There are a great many different ways of doing good. A lady once visited a hospital, and noticed with what pleasure the patients would smell and look at the flowers sent to them. Said she:

"If I had known that a bunch of flowers would do so much good, I would have sent some from home."

As soon as she got home, she sent some flowers out of her garden. It was a little thing—a bouquet of flowers. It might be a very insignificant work—very small; but if it was done in the right spirit, God accepted it. A cup of water given in His name is accepted as given to Himself. Nothing that is done for God is small.

An Anecdote about Tennyson

It is said that Tennyson once asked an old Christian woman if there was any news.

"Why, Mr. Tennyson," she replied, "there's only one piece of news that I know, and that is—Christ died for all men."

"That is old news, and good news, and new news," Tennyson responded.

On Satan's Ground

There is a legend that the Apostle John was much distressed over the fall of a young convert. He summoned Satan before him, and reproached him for ruining so good a youth.

"I found your good youth on my ground," said Satan; "so I took him."

The only safe course is to avoid temptation altogether.

Two Bidding for the Soul

There are two who are bidding for your soul and mine—the Lord Jesus and Satan.

Satan bids, and he offers that which he cannot give. He is a liar, and has been from the foundation of the world. I pity the man who is living on the promises of the devil. He will never satisfy. But the Lord Jesus is able to give all that He offers. And what does He offer? He offers peace and joy and comfort that the world knows not of. He offers eternal life in the kingdom of God. He offers a seat in His mansions. We are to sit with Him upon His throne.

May God help you to make a right choice! Make up your mind you will not rest until the great question of eternity is settled, until you have crossed the borderland, and pressed into the kingdom of God.

Tried and Proven

I knew an old lady that marked in the margin of her Bible, opposite the promises. T. P.; T. for "tried," and P. for "proven." What we want is to try the Bible and see if it is not true.

The Prairie Fire

Out in the Western country, in the autumn, when men go hunting, and there has not been any rain for months, sometimes the prairie grass catches fire, and there comes up a very strong wind, and the flames just roll along twenty feet high, and travel at the rate of thirty or forty miles an hour, consuming man and beast. When the hunters see it coming, what do they do? They know they cannot run as fast as the fire can run. Not the fleetest horse can escape. They just take a match and light the grass around them, and let the flames sweep, and then they get into the burnt district and stand safe. They hear the flames roar as they come along, they see death coming toward them, but they do not fear, they do not tremble, because the fire has swept over the place where they are, and there is no danger. There is nothing for the fire to burn.

There is one mountain that the wrath of God has swept over—that is, Mount Calvary; and the fire spent its fury upon the bosom of the Son of God. Take your stand by the cross, and you will be safe for time and eternity.

Perfect Order

A good many people are afraid of doing anything out of the regular lines—of doing anything out of order. Now, you will find perfect order in a cemetery. You will find perfect order where there is death. Where there is life you will find something out of order.

Is your Soul Insured?

"Pa," said a little boy as he climbed to his father's knee, and looked into his face as earnestly as if he understood the importance of the subject, "pa, is your soul insured?"

"What are you thinking about, my son?" replied the agitated father. "Why do you ask that question?"

"Why, pa, I heard Uncle George say that you had your house insured, and your life insured; but he didn't believe you had thought of your soul, and he was afraid you would lose it; won't you get it insured right away?"

The father leaned his head on his hand, and was silent. He owned broad acres of land that were covered with a bountiful produce; his barns were even now filled with plenty, his buildings were all well covered by insurance; and as if that would not suffice for the maintenance of his wife and only child in case of his decease, he had, the day before, taken a life-policy for a large amount; yet not one thought had he given to his own immortal soul. On that which was to waste away and become part and parcel of its native dust he had spared no pains; but for that which was to live on and on through the long ages of eternity he had made no provision. "What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?"

Memory

I have been twice at the point of death. I was drowning once, and just as I was going down the third time I was rescued. In the twinkling of an eye my whole life came flashing across my mind. I cannot tell you how it was. I cannot tell you how a whole life can be crowded into a second of time; but everything I had done from my earliest childhood—it all came flashing across my mind. And I believe that when God touches the secret spring of memory, every one of our sins will come back, and if they have not been blotted out by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, they will haunt us as eternal ages roll on.

We talk about our forgetting, but we cannot forget if God says "Remember." We talk about the recording angel keeping the record of our life. I have an idea that when we get to heaven, or into eternity, we will find that recording angel has been ourselves. God will make every one of us keep our own record; these memories will keep the record, and when God shall say, "Son, remember," it will all flash across our mind. It won't be God who will condemn us; it will be ourselves. We shall condemn ourselves, and we shall stand before God speechless.

There is a man in prison. He has been there five years. Ask that man what makes the prison so terrible to him. Ask him if it is the walls and the iron gates—ask him if it is his hard work, and he will tell you no; he will tell you what makes the prison so terrible to him is memory; and I have an idea that if we got down into the lost world, we would find that is what makes hell so terrible—the remembrance that they once heard the Gospel, that they once had Christ offered to them, that they once had the privilege of being saved, but they made light of the Gospel, they neglected salvation, they rejected the offer of mercy, and now if they would accept it they could not.

Balaam's Ass

A friend of mine was going back to Scotland, and he heard a couple of these little modern philosophers discussing the Bible. One said: "The Bible says that Balaam's ass spoke. Now, I am a scientific man, and I have taken the pains to examine an ass's mouth, and it is so formed that it couldn't speak."

He was going to toss the whole Bible over because Balaam's ass couldn't speak.

My friend said he stood it just as long as he could, and finally he said:

"Ah, man, you make an ass, and I will make him speak."

The idea that the God who made the ass couldn't speak through his mouth! Did you ever hear such stuff? And yet this was one of your modern philosophers!

The Border Apple-Tree

If you want real peace and rest to your soul, keep separate from the world.

I remember when I was a boy in Northfield, right near the old red schoolhouse there was an apple-tree that bore the earliest apples of any tree in town. They had a law in that town that fruit on a tree overhanging the street belonged to the public, and any fruit on the other side of the fence belonged to the property-holders. Half that apple-tree was over in the street, and it got more old brooms and brickbats and handles than any other tree in town. We boys used to watch to see when an apple was getting red. I never got a ripe apple from that tree in my life, and I don't believe any one else ever did. You never went by that tree that you didn't see a lot of broom-handles and clubs up there.

Now, take a lot of Christians who want to live right on the line, with one foot in the world and one foot in the church. They get more clubs than any one else. The world clubs them. They say, "I don't believe in that man's religion." And the church clubs them. They get clubs both sides. It is a good deal better to keep just as far from the line as you can if you want power.

Bad Company

A friend of mine said he had a beautiful canary bird; he thought it was the sweetest singer they had ever had. Spring came on, and he felt it was a pity to keep the poor bird in the house, so he put it under a tree right in front of his house. He said before he knew it a lot of these little English sparrows got under that tree (and you know they cannot sing any more than I can, and I don't know one note from another), and went, "Chirp, chirp, chirp." Before he knew it, that little canary had lost all its sweet notes. It had got into bad company.

After he found out that he had made a mistake, he took the bird into the house, but it kept up that "Chirp, chirp, chirp." He bought another bird, but the canary nearly ruined it. He said that bird never got back its sweet notes.

Now, don't you know lots of Christian people who had a fine testimony several years ago, but they have lost their witness, and all they do now is talk, talk, talk, talk? Why? Because they are out of communion with God, and have lost their witness.

"Hitch On" and "Cut Behind"

Some one tells of an incident that happened in a New England town the other day. All the boys were sleighing. A big sleigh—we call it a "pung" up there—was being driven through the streets by an old man who looked like Santa Claus. He was calling out to the small boys to hitch on, for a pung is like a 'bus, it always holds one more.

There were already about twenty rollicking boys hitched on, when one little fellow dropped off behind. He tried, but couldn't catch up again, and pretty soon he began to look out for another chance for a ride. A man's sleigh was standing near by, and the boy began to eye the man. When the man in the sleigh started off, the little fellow hitched on behind, and the man grabbed his whip and struck him directly in the eye. It looked as if the eye had been put out, but it wasn't.

Now, that's the way we go through this world. Some say, "Hitch on, hitch on"; others, "Cut behind, cut behind." The hitch-on people fill the churches, and the cut-behind ones empty them.

Known by Name

A friend of mine was in Syria, and he found a shepherd that kept up the old custom of naming his sheep. My friend said he wouldn't believe that the sheep knew him when he called them by name. So he said to the shepherd:

"I wish you would just call one or two."

The shepherd said, "Carl."

The sheep stopped eating and looked up.

The shepherd called out, "Come here."

The sheep came, and stood looking up into his face.

He called another, and another, and there they stood looking up at the shepherd.

"How can you tell them apart?"

"Oh, there are no two alike. See, that sheep toes in a little; this sheep is a little bit squint-eyed; that sheep has a black spot on its nose."

My friend found that he knew every one of his sheep by their failings. He didn't have a perfect one in his flock.

I suppose that is the way the Lord knows you and me. There is a man that is covetous; he wants to grasp the whole world. He wants a shepherd to keep down that spirit. There is a woman down there who has an awful tongue; she keeps the whole neighborhood stirred up. There is a woman over there who is deceitful, terribly so. She needs the care of a shepherd to keep her from deceit, for she will ruin all her children; they will all turn out just like their mother. There is a father over there who wouldn't swear for all the world before his children, but sometimes he gets provoked in his business and swears before he knows it. Doesn't he need a shepherd's care? I would like to know if there is a man or woman on earth who doesn't need the care of a shepherd. Haven't we all got failings? If you really want to know what your failings are, you can find some one who can point them out. God would never have sent Christ into the world if we didn't need His care. We are as weak and foolish as sheep.

The Right Time for Action

A man was always telling his servant that he was going to do a great thing for him. "I am going to remember you in my will."

Sambo got his expectations up very high. When the man came to die, it was found that all he had willed Sambo was to be buried in the family lot. That was the big thing, you know. Sambo said he wished he had given him ten dollars, and let the lot go.

If you want to show kindness to a person, show it to him while you are living. I heard a man say that he didn't want people to throw bouquets to him after he was dead, and say, "There, smell them."

Now, this is the time for action. I have got so tired and sick of this splitting hairs over theology. Man, let us go out and get the fallen up. Lift them up toward God and heaven. We want a practical kind of Christianity.

Criticising the Sermon

Very often a man will hear a hundred good things in a sermon, but there may be one thing that strikes him as a little out of place, and he will go home and sit down at the table and talk right out before his children and magnify that one wrong thing, and not say a word about the hundred good things that were said. That is what people do who criticise.

A Reminiscence

I remember blaming my mother for sending me to church on the Sabbath. On one occasion the preacher had to send some one into the gallery to wake me up. I thought it was hard to have to work in the field all the week, and then be obliged to go to church and hear a sermon I didn't understand. I thought I wouldn't go to church any more when I got away from home; but I had got so in the habit of going that I couldn't stay away. After one or two Sabbaths, back again to the house of God I went. There I first found Christ, and I have often said since:

"Mother, I thank you for making me go to the house of God when I didn't want to go."

Transplanting the Lily

"It is easy to go when the time comes. There are no ropes thrown out to pull us ashore; there are no ladders let down to pull us up. Christ comes and takes us by the hand, and says:

"'You have had enough of this. Come up higher!'

"Do you hurt a lily when you pluck it? Is there any rudeness when Jesus touches the cheek, and the red rose of health whitens into the lily of immortal purity and gladness?"—Talmage.

Election

How many men fold their arms and say:

"If I am one of the elect, I will be saved, and if I ain't, I won't. No use of your bothering about it."

Why don't some of these merchants say: "If God is going to make me a successful merchant in Chicago, I will be one whether I like it or not, and if He isn't I won't."

If you are sick, and a doctor prescribes for you, don't take the medicine—throw it out the door. It does not matter, for if God has decreed you are going to die, you will; if He hasn't, you will get better. If you use that argument you may as well not walk home from this tabernacle. If God has said you'll get home, you'll get home—you'll fly through the air.

I have an idea that the Lord Jesus saw how men were going to stumble over this doctrine, so after He had been thirty or forty years in heaven He came down and spoke to John. One Lord's day in Patmos, He said to him:

"Write these things to the churches."

John kept on writing. His pen flew very fast. And then the Lord, when it was nearly finished, said, "John, before you close the book, put in one more invitation. 'The Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst, come. And WHOSOEVER WILL, let him take the water of life freely.'"

The Mysteries of the Bible

Dr. Talmage tells the story that one day while he was bothering his theological professor with questions about the mysteries of the Bible, the latter turned on him and said:

"Mr. Talmage, you will have to let God know some things you don't."

The Little Lone One

I sometimes think if an angel were to wing its way to heaven, and tell them that there was one little child here on earth—it might be a shoeless, coatless street Arab—with no one to lead it to the cross of Christ, and if God were to call the angels round His throne and ask them to go and spend—aye, fifty years, in teaching that child, there would not be an angel in heaven but would respond gladly to the appeal. We should see even Gabriel saying, "Let me go and win that soul to Christ." We should see Paul buckling on his old armor again, and saying, "Let me go back again to earth, that I may have the joy of leading that little one to his Saviour."

Ah! we need rousing; there is too much apathy amongst professing Christians. Let us pray God that He may send His Holy Spirit to inspire us with fresh energy and zeal to do His work.

Doubting Castle

It is the privilege of every child of God to know that he is saved, and yet I find ever so many people living in Doubting Castle. Why, it is salvation by doubts nowadays, instead of by faith; there are so few that dare to say, "I know that my Redeemer liveth; I know in whom I have believed." We find most Christians nowadays shivering and trembling from head to foot—they do not know whether they are saved or not.

Faith

Bishop Ryle has very well likened faith to a root whose flower is assurance. To have the latter, he says, it is necessary that there must first be the hidden source of faith.

Faith is the simplest and most universal experience in the world. Call it by whatever name you may, confidence, trust, or belief, it is inseparable from the human race. The first sign of a dawning intelligence in the mind is the exercise of the infant's faith toward those it knows, and its fear toward those it does not know. We cannot even remember when we first began to have faith.

Confessing Christ at Home

I was preaching in Chicago to a hall full of women one Sunday afternoon, and after the meeting was over a lady came to me and said she wanted to talk to me. She said she would accept Christ, and after some conversation she went home. I looked for her for a whole week, but didn't see her until the following Sunday afternoon. She came and sat down right in front of me, and her face had such a sad expression. She seemed to have entered into the misery, instead of the joy, of the Lord.

After the meeting was over I went to her and asked her what the trouble was.

She said, "Oh, Mr. Moody, this has been the most miserable week of my life."

I asked her if there was any one with whom she had had trouble and whom she could not forgive.

She said, "No, not that I know of."

"Well, did you tell your friends about having found the Saviour?"

"Indeed I didn't. I have been all the week trying to keep it from them."

"Well," I said, "that is the reason why you have no peace."

She wanted to take the crown, but did not want the cross. My friends, you must go by the way of Calvary. If you ever get peace and joy you must get it at the foot of the cross.

"Why," she said, "if I should go home and tell my infidel husband that I had found Christ, I don't know what he would do. I think he would turn me out."

"Well," I said, "go out."

She went away, promising that she would tell him, timid and pale, but she did not want another wretched week. She was bound to have peace.

The next night I gave a lecture to men only, and in the hall there were eight thousand men and one solitary woman. When I got through and went into the inquiry meeting I found this lady with her husband. She introduced him to me (he was a doctor and a very influential man), and said:

"He wants to become a Christian."

I took my Bible and told him all about Christ, and he accepted Him. I said to her after it was all over:

"It turned out quite differently from what you expected, didn't it?"

"Yes," she replied; "I was never so scared in my life. I expected he would do something dreadful, but it has turned out so well."

She took God's way, and got the joy and peace she sought.

How to Settle the Theater Question

A lady came to me once and said, "Mr. Moody, I wish you would tell me how I can become a Christian." The tears were rolling down her cheeks, and she was in a very favorable mood. "But," she said, "I don't want to be one of your kind."

"Well," I asked, "have I got any peculiar kind? What is the matter with my Christianity?"

"Well," she said, "my father was a doctor, and had a large practice, and he used to get so tired that he used to take us to the theater. There was a large family of girls, and we had tickets for the theaters three or four times a week. I suppose we were there a good deal oftener than we were in church. I am married to a lawyer, and he has a large practice. He gets so tired that he takes us out to the theater," and she said, "I am far better acquainted with the theater and theater people than with the church and church people, and I don't want to give up the theater."

"Well," I said, "did you ever hear me say anything about theaters? There have been reporters here every day for all the different papers, and they are giving my sermons verbatim in one paper. Have you ever seen anything in the sermons against the theaters?"

She said, "No."

"Well," I said, "I have seen you in the audience every afternoon for several weeks, and have you heard me say anything against theaters?"

No, she hadn't.

"Well," I said, "what made you bring them up?"

"Why, I supposed you didn't believe in theaters."

"What made you think that?"

"Why," she said, "do you ever go?"

"No."

"Why don't you go?"

"Because I have got something better. I would sooner go out into the street and eat dirt than do some of the things I used to do before I became a Christian."

"Why!" she said; "I don't understand."

"Never mind," I said. "When Jesus Christ has the preëminence, you will understand it all. He didn't come down here and say we shouldn't go here and we shouldn't go there, and lay down a lot of rules, but He laid down great principles. Now, He says if you love Him you will take delight in pleasing Him." And I began to preach Christ to her. The tears started again. She said:

"I tell you, Mr. Moody, that sermon on the indwelling Christ yesterday afternoon just broke my heart. I admire Him, and I want to be a Christian, but I don't want to give up the theaters."

I said, "Please don't mention them again. I don't want to talk about theaters. I want to talk to you about Christ." So I took my Bible, and I read to her about Christ.

But she said again, "Mr. Moody, can I go to the theater if I become a Christian?"

"Yes," I said, "you can go to the theater just as much as you like if you are a real, true Christian, and can go with His blessing."

"Well," she said, "I am glad you are not so narrow-minded as some."

She felt quite relieved to think that she could go to the theaters and be a Christian. But I said:

"If you can go to the theater for the glory of God, keep on going; only be sure that you go for the glory of God. If you are a Christian you will be glad to do whatever will please Him."

I really think she became a Christian that day. The burden had gone, there was joy; but just as she was leaving me at the door she said:

"I am not going to give up the theater."

In a few days she came back to me and said: "Mr. Moody, I understand all about that theater business now. I went the other night. There was a large party at our house, and my husband wanted us to go, and we went; but when the curtain lifted everything looked so different. I said to my husband, 'This is no place for me; this is horrible. I am not going to stay here, I am going home.' He said, 'Don't make a fool of yourself. Every one has heard that you have been converted in the Moody meetings, and if you go out it will be all through fashionable society. I beg of you don't make a fool of yourself by getting up and going out.' But I said, 'I have been making a fool of myself all of my life.'"

Now, the theater hadn't changed, but she had got something better, and she was going to overcome the world. "They that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit." When Christ has the first place in your heart you are going to get victory. Just do whatever you know will please Him. The great objection I have to these things is that they get the mastery, and become a hindrance to spiritual growth.

What a Sister Can Do

I want to say to young ladies, perhaps you have a godless father or mother, or a skeptical brother, who is going down through drink, and perhaps there is no one who can reach them but you. How many times a godly, pure young lady has taken the light into some darkened home! Many a home might be lit up with the Gospel if the mothers and daughters would only speak the word.

The last time Mr. Sankey and myself were in Edinburgh, there were a father, two sisters, and a brother, who used every morning to take the morning paper and pick my sermon to pieces. They were indignant to think that the Edinburgh people should be carried away with such preaching. One day one of the sisters was going by the hall, and she thought she would drop in and see what class of people went there. She happened to take a seat by a godly lady, who said to her:

"I hope you are interested in this work,"

She tossed her head and said: "Indeed I am not. I am disgusted with everything I have seen and heard."

"Well," said the lady, "perhaps you came prejudiced."

"Yes, and the meeting has not removed any of it, but has rather increased it."

"I have received a great deal of good from them."

"There is nothing here for me. I don't see how an intellectual person can be interested."

To make a long story short, she got the young lady to promise to come back. When the meeting broke up, just a little of the prejudice had worn away. She promised to come back again the next day, and then she attended three or four more meetings, and became quite interested. She said nothing to her family, until finally the burden became too heavy, and she told them. They laughed at her, and made her the butt of their ridicule.

One day the two sisters were together, and the other said, "Now what have you got at those meetings that you didn't have in the first place?"

"I have a peace that I never knew of before. I am at peace with God, myself, and all the world." Did you ever have a little war of your own with your neighbors, in your own family? And she said: "I have self-control. You know, sister, if you had said half the mean things before I was converted that you have said since, I would have been angry and answered back, but if you remember correctly, I haven't answered once since I have been converted."

The sister said, "You certainly have something that I have not."

The other told her it was for her, too, and she brought the sister to the meetings, where she found peace.

Like Martha and Mary, they had a brother but he was a member of the University of Edinburgh. He be converted? He go to these meetings? It might do for women, but not for him! One night they came home and told him that a chum of his own, a member of the university, had stood up and confessed Christ, and when he sat down his brother got up and confessed; and so with the third one.

When the young man heard it, he said: "Do you mean to tell me that he has been converted?"

"Yes."

"Well," he said, "there must be something in it."

He put on his hat and coat, and went to see his friend Black. Black got him down to the meetings, and he was converted.

We went through to Glasgow, and had not been there six weeks when news came that that young man had been stricken down, and had died. When he was dying he called his father to his bedside and said:

"Wasn't it a good thing that my sisters went to those meetings? Won't you meet me in heaven, father?"

"Yes, my son, I am so glad you are a Christian; that is the only comfort that I have in losing you. I will become a Christian, and will meet you again."

I tell this to encourage some sister to go home and carry the message of salvation. It may be that your brother may be taken away in a few months.

How one Man Treated Doubts

A wild and prodigal young man, who was running a headlong career to ruin came into one of our meetings in Chicago. Whilst endeavoring to bring him to Christ, I quoted this verse to him: "Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out."

I asked him: "Do you believe Christ said that?"

"I suppose He did."

"Suppose He did! do you believe it?"

"I hope so."

"Hope so! do you believe it? You do your work, and the Lord will do His. Just come as you are, and throw yourself upon His bosom, and He will not cast you out."

This man thought it was too simple and easy.

At last light seemed to break in upon him, and he seemed to find comfort from it. It was past midnight before he got down on his knees, but down he went, and was converted. I said:

"Now, don't think you are going to get out of the devil's territory without trouble. The devil will come to you to-morrow morning and say it was all feeling; that you only imagined you were accepted by God. When he does, don't fight him with your own opinions, but fight him with John vi. 37: 'Him that cometh to Me I will in nowise cast out.' Let that be 'the sword of the Spirit.'"

I don't believe that any man ever starts to go to Christ but the devil strives somehow or other to meet him and trip him up. And even after he has come to Christ, the devil tries to assail him with doubts, and make him believe there is something wrong in it.

The struggle came sooner than I thought in this man's case. When he was on his way home the devil assailed him. He used this text, but the devil put this thought into his mind:

"How do you know Christ ever said that after all? Perhaps the translators made a mistake."

Into darkness he went again. He was in trouble till about two in the morning. At last he came to this conclusion. Said he:

"I will believe it anyway; and when I get to heaven, if it isn't true, I will just tell the Lord I didn't make the mistake—the translators made it."

Use or Lose

An Eastern allegory runs thus: A merchant, going abroad for a time, gave respectively to two of his friends two sacks of wheat each, to take care of against his return. Years passed. When he came back, he applied for them again.

The first took him into a storehouse, and showed him his sacks; but they were mildewed and worthless.

The other led him out into the open country, and pointed to field after field of waving wheat, the produce of the two sacks given him.

Said the merchant: "You have been a faithful friend. Give me two sacks of that wheat; the rest shall be thine."

Let us put to good use the talents God has given us.

The Anchored Boat

I once heard of two men who were under the influence of liquor. They came down at night to where their boat was tied. They wanted to return home, so they got in and began to row. They pulled away hard all night, wondering why they never got to the other side of the bay. When the gray dawn of morning broke, behold! they had never loosed the mooring line or raised the anchor!

That's just the way with many who are striving to enter the kingdom of heaven. They cannot believe, because they are tied to this world. Cut the cord! Confess and forsake your sins! Cut the cord! Set yourselves free from the clogging weight of earthly things, and you will soon rise heavenward.

Not Much up There