The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1881-10-14
THE DUTY OF MISSIONARY WORK.

The whele duty of mortals in this life has
been crowded into the two great command
ments; Thou shalt love the Lord thy God
with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and
with all thy strength, and with all thy mind !;
and thy neighbor as myself" Although the
fulfllment of the first necessitates that of
the second, and in spite of the fact that we
are taught that without obeying the second
we have not obeyed the first, we are ready to
exclaim sometimes, that this second great
command is an almost impossible one
While it may be in certain state of affairs,
we are none the less responsible for such
conditions-it is our business to put our
selves into the way of obeying Gods COM
mands. While it is not natural for us to
care for entire strangers, those with whom
we have had no personal relations, yet if we
give self-denying work, or its equivalent, to
help the needy and benighted ones of earth,
and follow this aid with daily prayers that it
may be made powerful for good by Gods
own blessing, it matters not whether these
stranger-neigh are here at home or be-
yond the sea, it does follow as natural re-
suit, that we will love them even as ourselves
In answer TO the question, "Who is my
neighbour" We are told that the good
Samaritan was neighbor to him who fell
among thieves, and that we are to 90 and
do likewise. The old adage that "Pity is
akin to love,"-which is but a short way of
saying that pity acted upon, produces re-
ciprocal love,-holds true down to the very
brute creation; we are conscious of a tender
ness toward the creation we have taken from
danger and death, and many times the res
cued shows manifest signs of grateful affec-
tons; how much stronger, between members
of a common humanity, must be this beauti-
full double relation between the helper and
helped. And SO it was not hard for the
good Samaritan TO love the man he had so
cared for in that time of distress and need !;
and this very service could not fail of awak-
ening as tender feeling in the heart of the
wounded man. And in this worldwide good
Samaritan service of rescuing the perishing
from the danger of sin and death, we find
that those who have sacrificed most, who
have toiled hardest and longest, are those
who love most and best; while they who
have sacrificed but little. and who do but
little, can not even comprehend the intense
yearning love of the others, for the sinful
and suffering.
We are admonished to lay up for ourselves,
" treasures where neither moth nor rust doth
consume, and where thieves do not break
through nor steal.' Treasures of what?
Treasures of kindly, helping deeds words
of sympathy and encouragement; memories
of golden opportunities improved; abiding
riches of grateful love won by sacrifcial
gifts of oil and wine to those who have fallen
among thieves; priceless treasures of jewels
shining in the Masters crown,-rescued souls
whose light will reflect back its intensified
beauty upon US even as it is written: "And
if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and
rise in obscurity and thy darkness be as the
monday
We are told that when the dead, small and
great, shall stand before the great white
throne and Him who sits upon it, when the
books shall be opened and we are judged out
of those things which are written there ac-
10 al e
ship shall be this: For was an hungered
and we gave me meat; / was thirsty and we
gave me drink; was stranger and we took
me in; naked and We clothed me; was sick
and We visited me; was in prison and We
came unto me-
Who are SO hungry as those who are starv-
ing for the " Bread of Life: who so thirsty
as those who are fainting for draught of
living water; who more like strangers in
strange land than those who have wandered
SO far from the Fathers house that they can
never return, except some man guide them !;
who 50 destitute and naked as those who
have never even heard of the "robes of
righteousness bought and provided at the
price of the blood of the Son of God who
so sick as those whose souls are unclean
with the loathesome leprosy of sin, and who
know not where to seek the great Physician !;
who so terribly imprisoned as those who sit
in the shadow of death, blinded by supersti-
ton and ignorance and chained by cankered
letters of vice to corruption, without hope
and without God in the world? Great is the
Macedonian cry for laborers. Swiftly and
increasingly the days go by, while with every
setting sun, we know not how many of the
reckoning hands may have dropped motion
less in death, how many of the pitiful voices
which cry "Come over and help US" may
have been hushed into an unbroken silence.
All may not go forth upon the mountains
to proclaim the glad, good news: but many
can abide in the valleys to wait and watch
and pray; and truly has the poet sung !:
"More things are wrought by prayer than
the world dreams Of"
Let them who are mighty in Israel stand
out upon the heights with outstretched