The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1886-05-26
RELIGIOUS INTELLIGENCE AND
INCIDENT.


Herbert.
Believers only can decipher the shorthand
of Gods Providence.
There are III Chinese Methodist church
members in San Francisco.
A Jewish reform Conference; has been
called at Cincinnati for June 2S.
The Mexico Methodist Conference reports
72S members and 633 probationers.
The Presbyterian Board of Education is
free of debt, thanks mainly to legacies.
The Methodist Bohemian missions in Chi
cago and Cleveland report 246 members.
The Presbyterian General Assembly this
year will contain about $50 commissioners.
Revival meetings at Sardis, Miss, have
recently resulted in the conversion of 200
persons.
The cornerstone of the new Methodist
college in New Orleans will be laid on
June 90
The New York Episcopal City Mission re-
ports 100 public and 100 private services held,
with an aggregate attendance of over 1900
persons.
There is nothing will make you a Chris
tian indeed but taste of the sweetness OF
Christ ''Come and see'' will speak best to
your soul.-Samuel Rutherford.
l walk amid the darkness. My way can not see,
But still 1 know it tendeth, o Father, unto thee;
And so III journey onward, for thou art lead
ing me. Lucy Wheelock.
If we practice goodness, not for the sake
of its own intrinsic excellence, but fo- the
sake of gaining some advantage by it, we
may be cunning, but we are not good
Cicero
The religious papers for the past two or
three weeks have been very busy in discuss
ing the labor troubles and other secular mat
tiers, and have given less space than usual to
merely theological questions.
The Evangelist publishes a letter by Rev.
]. r. Miller, D. D., of Philadelphia, On "Sensa-
tional Preaching" He thinks that the only
good in preaching is the sensationalism of
intense earnestness in the presentation of the
simple Gospel of Christ.
The Baptist church at Newton. Mass, has
hired a musical PASTOR who is to have en-
tire charge of the music of the church aud
Sunday-school. Instead of hiring quartet
or choir the purpose is to turn over to him
the work of developing from the congrega-
ton volunteer gathering of singers, and
thus to have eventually congregational
singing of hitherto unknown quality.
Some of the religious papers want the
clergy to stop giving out notices of fairs, ba-
Zaars, excursions, tableaus, meetings, SER
mons. ETC., on the ground that it is relic of
of non-reading age, Just as the bell is a relic
OF an age when there were few or no watches
and clocks in any community. Possibly this
is true enough, and certainly great many
notices are given out in churches that have
little to do with either religion or morality.
But at least one thing can be said in favor of
giving out notices; they often add personal
element to the service, which interests
great many people.
Mr.. Ruskin, in recent letter, refers as fol-
lows to the Bible: LET me tell your read
nO
words what it is. 1t is the grandest group of
writings existent in the rational world put
into the grandest language of the rational
world in the first strength of the Christian
faith by an entirely wise and kind saint, st.
Jerome, translated afterward with beauty
and felicity into every language of the
Christian world, and the guide since so trans
lated OF all the arts and acts of that world
which have been noble, fortunate and hap
Ply. And by consultation of it honestly on
any serious business you may learn. a long
while before your parliament finds out
what you should do. in such business, and De
| directed. perhaps, besides to work more
serious than you had thought Of"
There is discussion going on in England
as to the merits OF the system of itinerancy
/ as practiced by the Methodist churches. The
| London Methodist Times says that it is
most successfully emptying our large
chapels in town and country" 1t stigma
/ ties the custom as one of "our stereotyped
and old fashioned methods of activity,
| against which the ever growing democracy
| of other cities revolts every year more and
| more" The same paper declares that 1--WE
have hitherto done nothing in an adequate
scale to adapt our operations to the totally
/ changed condition of English society.
| Hence our halt empty chapels, although the
/ evangelical Gospel which we preach was
never so popular and attractive to English
men as it is to-day" The churchman com
| mentiug on this says that the reason for this
| emptying of Methodist churches is that the
| Church OF England has now so thoroughly
| adapted herself to the wants of every class
| of the community that the occupation OF
the Methodist local preacher is well nigh
/ gone.