Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1888-09-08

thunder that bombarded Sinai al the Jaw
giving. Or how fragile craft sailed how
much Of histories imp p%riaGcc'
The parsonage a Epaorth, tnc aEd
il on ire in the nigh. and u" fl!h.r
rushed through lhc hallway for the Ees-
che of his children. seven children are
out and safe OH the ground, but one re-
mains in the consuming building. That
one wakes. and, finding his bed on fire
and the building crumbling, 10 the
window, and two peasants make a ladder
Of their bodies, one peasant standing on
the shoulder Of the other, and down the
human ladder the boy descends-JOhn
Wesley. If you would know how much
depended on that ladder of peasants ask
the millions of Methodists on both sides
Of the sea. Ask their mission stations all
around the world. Ask their hundreds
of thousands already assembled to join
their founder, who would have persisted
but for the living stairs OF peasants
shoulders.
An English ship stopped at Pitcairn
Island. and right in the midst of sur.
rounding cannibalism and squalor the
passengers discovered a Christian colony
of churches and schools, and beautiful
homes, and highest style Of religion and
civilization. For fifty years no mission
airy and no Christian influence had landed
there. Why this oasis Of light amid a
desert of heathendom? Sixty years be-
fore, a ship had met disaster, and one of
the sailors, unable to save anything else,
went to his trunk and took out a Bible
which his mother had placed there, and
swan ashore, the Bible held in his teeth.
Tho hnnl ~ raaI an oil c;lao until tho
rough and vicious population were evan
geiized, and a church was started, and
an enlightened commonwealth cstab-
lished, and the worlds history has no
more brilliant page than that which
tells Of the transformation of a
nation by one book. 1t did not
seem of much Importance whether the
sailor continued to hold the book in his
upon what small circumstances depended
what mighty results.
Practical inference: There arc no in
signifcances in our lives. The minutest
thing is part of a magnitude. lntinity is
made up Of infinitesimals. Great things
an aggregation Of small things. Bethle-
hem manger pulling on a star in the east
crn sky. One book in a drenChed sailor S
mouth the cvancliZation Of a multitude.
Ono boat Of papyrus on the Nile frcighted
with events Of all ages. The fate of
Christendom in a basket let down from "A
window on the wall. What you do, do
well. II you make a rope make it strong
and true, for You know not how much
may depend Oh your workmanship. If
you fashion "A boat let it be waterproof,
for you know not who may sail in it. If
YOU put a Bible in the trunk OF your boy,
as he goes from home, let it be heard in
your prayers, for it may have IA mission
as far reaching as the book which the
sailor carried in his teeth to the Pitcairn
beach. The plainest mans life is an is
land between two cternities-cternlty
past ripping against his shoulders, etern-
ity to come touching his brow. The
casual, the accidental, that which merely
happens so, are parts of a great plan, and
the rope that lets the fugitive apostle
from the Damascus wall is the cable that
holds to It's mooring the ship Of the
Church in the northeast storm Of the cen
turtles,
Again, notice u~nrecognized and unre-
corded services. Who spun the rope?
Who tied it to the basket Who steadied
the illustrious preacher as he steppedinto
il? Who relaxed not a muscle Of the
arm or dismissed an anxious look from
his face until the basket touched the
ground and discharged its magnificent
cargo? Not one of their names has come
to us, but there was no work done thatday
in Damascus or in AL the earth compared
with the importance Of their
work. What if they had in the
agitation tied a knot that could
Slip? What if the sound Of a mob at the
door had led them TO say Paul must
take care Of himself and We will take care
of ourselves No, no, They held the
rope and in doing so did more fer the
Christian church than any thousand ofus
Will ever accomplish. But God knows
dertaking. And they know. How eX-
ultant they must have felt when they
read his letters to the Romans. tothe Cor
inthians, to the Galatians, to the Ephe-
slams, to the PHILIPPIANS, to the Collosi-
ans, TO the Thessalonians, TO Timothy, to
Titus, TO Philemon, to the Hebrews, and
when they heard how he walked out of
prison with the earthquake unlocking the
door for him and took command of the
A~leXandrian corn ship when the sailors
were nearly scared to death and preached
a sermon that nearly shook Felix of his
Judgment seat. hear the men and wo-
men who helped him down through the
window and over the wall talking in pr.
vate over the matter and saying: How
glad | am that we effected that rescue!
In coming times others may get the glory
of Paul's work, but no one shall rob us
of the satisfaction of knowing that we
held the rope
There are said 10 he about 60, 900 min
listers OF religion in this country. About
50, 900 | warrant came from early homes
which had to struggle for the necessaries
Of life.
The sons of rich bankers and merchants
generally become bankers and merchants.
The most of those who become ministers
are the sons of those who had terrific
struggle to get their every day bread.
The collegiate and theological education
of that son took every luxury from the
parental table for eight years. The other
children were more scantily appareled.
The son at college every little while got a
bundle from home. In it were the socks
that mother had knit, sitting up late al
night, her sight not as good as ence it
was.
And there also were some delicacies
from the sisters hand for the v%oraciOus
| appctite Of a hungry student. The father