Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-07-29
SOULSWERE STIRRED
The Multitude at Valley Camp
Wrought up to a Degree.
BISHOP JOYCE MOVES MEN
And Sets Them Signing, While
Women Weep and Seek Support.
A WONDERFUM POWER EXERTED
Both to Bring on the Religious Awakening
and to Hold 1t Down.
BISHOP JOYCE MOVES MEN
WONDERFUM POWER EXERTED
VAST AUDIENCES AT THE SERVICES

A perfect midsummer day ushered in the
first Sunday of the Methodist encampment
at Valley Camp. The attendance was very
large, comprising citizens from all points
within a radius OF 90 miles. Not an
unpleasant incident occurred to mar
the serene pleasure of the occasion.
The services were held in large canvas
covered pavilion, seating 1,SO0 people, with
standing room for 800 more, and room was
at a premium at every one of the meetings.
Bishop joyce, of the Southern Diocese of
the Methodist Episcopal Church, in the
morning took for his text the first four
verses of the fifth chapter of st. Luke,
"And it came to pass that, as the people
pressed upon him to hear the word of God,
he stood BY the Lake of Gennesaret." The
Bishops discourse was as follows:
1t is difficult for US to understand how much
influence there is in words, or how one man S
mind comes to have so much influence over
that of others. There was a stranger appeared
in Judea and the air was full of rumors con-
cerning his works. Some said that he had re-
stored the sight to blind man; others
that a dead brother had been restored to
life, and many other miracles. He repulsed no
one, no matter how poor or how lowly. On
this morning he is by the lake.
AND PEOPLE COME
from every portion.of the country to hear the
word of Coda great subject, grand, glorious
subject and one of which we never grow tired
of hearing. We grow weary of others;
but the word of God has something
s,,&a
seems to grow old. What is the
word of God? In many minds the Bible will
suggest itself; and SO it is, partially, but not
wholly. The word of God consists in the prin-
and conscience of man. The word of God,
therefore, consists of words, thoughts and
principles. God educates the human race;
man is powerless, only in so much as he takes
hold of Gods principles God educates, not by
mere excitement, but by intellectual and moral
suasion. But by that power He wakes them
up. When we decide that thing is SO, we are
apt to believe 1t. Men are controlled by opin-
ions, which constantly change: but they never
ontgrow principles. l could go into any market
in the country and buy opinions by the carload
at SIS a car-and when had them, what
would they amount to? Nothing Man can
not make principles God made them. Man
may make play with invention and manufact-
ure, but God it is who has packed the earth
with iron and gold and silver.
The opinions of five and ten years ago are
not worth cent now. If a man has an old,
worn-out opinion and it pleases him, L say let
him alone; he will get out of his boyishness
after awhile. and while he is bothering with
idea he can do the world no harm. With prin-
clple, however, it is a different thing. Princi-
pie is the divine thing that God has to educate
men with. We would have been 1000 years
further on if we had all followed the divine di-
recron of Providence. God educates men by
leading them, not by driving them. The world
is constantly growing wider and wider in
knowledge as God slowly educates. / heard a
man say only the other day that If he ruled the
world
HE WOULD FORCE MEN
to do exactly what be wanted them to do. I
am glad man does not rule the world. God
shows men what they have to do. God gives
man a grand idea; the man expresses it and
people laugh at him; he is ten years ahead of
his time: he is a crank, a dreamer God halts
the man until people come up to him; then, in
turn, gives another man an idea, and SO on.
There are ideas which were laughed at and
jeered at by the most inspired and polite
society of the New and Old World-ideas that,
to express, was to bring down on his head the
condemnation of all Yet to-day those ideas
are a dominant power in our country. Our
comprehension is limited, and, in considera-
tiOn, God cuts His principles up into little bits
and gives them to us gradually. Gods
thoughts, ideas and principles are lndissolu-
always been and so they always will be.
The gospel is not new; the truths that l am
now telling you were preached $40 wears ago,
and. should the world exist for that period,
they will be preached for 10000 years hence
What power Gods word has and how it ap-
peals to the conscience of man. What a COM
bination that is for good-God and human con-
science. You can't rule God out. The word of
God, it liveth and abldeth forever Men said
it was lie, fiction, and that it should go. 1t
has been sacrificed to flames, and vet the Bible
lives. No book of history, or novel, has ever
been read so much. Under one roof in New
York the Bible is printed in 200 languages and
dialects. which are distributed in all parts of
the world to be read by all minds, characters
and nations.
What is your idea of Jesus9 Did YOU ever
form an opinion of how He looked, or how He
Spoken My idea is that Jesus was a most re-
markable looking man, of imposing presence
and grand voice. What a pleasure it must
have been to hear him preach! He was no
EVERYBODY INTERESTED.
Human nature is the same in all classes, and
no distinction should be made in distributing
the word of God to them. All classes are inter
ested in the future to which we are all going.
Jesus sat In the bow of the boat and talked
to them. In the bow of fisher boat What
a pulpit that was! 1 wonder if the man who
built that boat ever imagined that the greatest
of the Christian religion would sit
there and talk to the multitude.
Nowadays ministers think that the world will
never hear of them unless they have a mag
nihcent pulpit, grand church, a fashionable
audience and a great power of money behind
them Jesus sat in the boat and preached,
and a multitude OF people from every part of
the country came to hear him; while in the
synagogue. where they had all the luxury of
the church of that day, the priests had an
audience less than corporal's guard. What
a contrast, the unknown man in the stern of a
rude fishing boat and the high priest in his
Obi it is not the place that
makes the man; it is the man that
makes the place. How 1 wish / could
impress the fact on the young men of America
| would not compel men to adopt my theories
MY doctrine is in an open field, square fight
and fair one. Keep the devil out. Go into
the field, with your ideas about you. In the
recent great fight right here in Pennsylvania
We, the people, would have won
rot. i DO not believe in coercion of the human
mind; give us fair show, and we will ALWAYS
win. Truth is bigger than man. and righteous
ness is infinite. God loves every man woman
and child on earth; he hates no one Sin is the
1nly thing he despises. Man will go to hell if |
ne keeps on SHINING; but God does not put him |
here; il is the rope of evil habit that drags |
him down.
HOW THEY ARE DIVIDED.
Hell and heaven are only di- |
Tided by the thickness of the |
Imagination. No man ever did a noble deed |
inder the inspiration of Jesus Christ that he |
lid not receive pay for it in the end, Some |
,eople are afraid to trust God. The most un- |
lappy men 1 know of are those who did not |
rust God. 1t is hard for men to get out of the /
Id life into new, but what a sweet thing it is |
Vhen successful
In conclusion, the Bishop reviewed the
tory of Christ's suffering for the human
ace and implored his hearers to come to
;brist.
The afternoon service was called prompt
v at 3 o'clock. In the absence of Rev. C.
7. Wilson, who was slated for the after
oon, Bishop Joyce was again pressed into
ervice. He opened his remarks in a semi
humorous manner; explained that he had
Lnf had tina ~ |