Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-04-14

means his calling. He who calls us to our
work is God. He who gives us opportuni-
ties for work of different kinds, making one
man love machinery, making another man
love books, making women love their homes
and so pointing out what kind of work we
ought to do, is God. God works, and we
work. He who gathers in the grain, works
with the God of the harvest, and at the
same kind of labor. He who tends an en-
gine, works with the God of iron
and fire. He who keeps the books
of commerce, works with the God of
the winds and the waves, of the steam and
the lightning. A microscope is only an ad-
dition to the natural power of the eye. And
our work is only an addition to Gods work.
We carry Gods work on. 1--WE are fellow
laborers with God" This ennobles work,
and gives it religious meaning. When
you do your daily labor best, you are help
ing God most. 1t is God Himself who
would have every man work for all that is
in him, and make it his purpose to succeed
in business. 1t is God Himself who would
have every man continually on the alert to
do his business better; whatever the task,
no matter how humble, to know all about it
that anybody else knows and then find out
one thing more, to do it as well as anybody
else can do it, and then go out and do it two
degrees better. God has made us with
us to plod along like horses, doing
just the same thing day after day and day
after day, and tomorrow no better than yes
terdaY. This is rart of religion. This is
what Christianity means. This is one of
the reasons why the faith of Christ uplifts
and inspires men-because, whether 1t be
always put into just so many words or not,
it means just this. A young mans irst
duty is to try to find out what God wants
him to assist Him in-what he can do best
and then he ought to strive to rise till he
can get to be Gods first assistant, helping
more in that especial work than any other
workman.
EVERY HOME TOUCHED.
Again, whoever would please God must
purpose to succeed In the grace of compan-
ionship. This touches everybody's home.
God, our heavenly father, who has set the
people of the earth in families, of Whom
the whole family in heaven and earth is
named, who sent His son to become our
brother, and so ordered it that by His birth
and nurture the mark of conservation
should be set upon every human home. He
has made our life in the family part of
our religion. As God, who works, thereby
sanctifes our work; so God, who loves,
sanctifes love. God would have your home
the abiding place of happiness and helpful
ness. It is very practical truth that it
ought to be one of the purposes of every
mans life to have home-to have place
which he can call his own. But nobody
deserves a home who does not know how to
use it. The most sacred place upon the sur
face of this planet is the home. The first
and emphatic duty of every man and
woman is their duty to their home.
The homeliest work is digniied
and sweetened when it is made
contribution toward the happiness
of the home. Something is wrong when
business takes time which belongs to the
home. Even the church has no right to the
time which anybody owes to their home, the
best church work is home work. The best
services which any man or woman can rem
der to-day to church or State is the making
of Christian home. The love and loyalty
of the husband and wife, their diligence to
make home delightful for their children,
and the children's avowing affections-if
this is not an absolute essential element in
religion, I do not know what true religion
is.
You must not think that you are pleasing
God our Father, unless you have and keep
within your heart definite and emphatic
purposes so to order your speech and conduct,
that, so far as lies in you, the spirit of cour-
tesy and kindness, the spirit of charity and
love, the spirit of loyalty, the spirit of help
fulness, and the spirit of holiness shall have
dominion in your home.
THIRD EMPHATIC DUTY.
And whoever would please God must aim
also at third success. He must purpose to
succeed in culture. This is only another
way of saying that the third emphatic duty
of the Christian life is to make the most of
yourself.
Make it your distinct and religious pur-
pose to develop yourself upon all Sides
Strive daily to learn more, to do more, and
to be more. Do not neglect anything which
can minister to culture.
Culture is often interpreted, am afraid,
to mean very narrow and partial thing
Intellectual alertness, wide reading, varied
experiences, the acquisition of an accent,
accurate knowledge of the ways of the
social world, mean culture to good many
people. To be cultured is to possess the two
desirable and charming graces of good talk
ing and good dressing. That is part of
culture-a small part that is one side of
culture-a lesser side. That is what one
gets by culture of certain elements of human
nature. And we need that kind of culture
just as much of it as we can have. But
culture is the bringing out and developing of
all that is good in US. He has most culture
who is developed on the most sides of his
being. He has the best culture who is eul-
tured on the best side. The prize-fghter,
Sullivan, has culture of certain kind,
physical culture. 1 suppose that in other
directions, he could hardly be called cul-
tured. A man who eats with his knife
could hardly be called cultured man. He
would be deficient upon the social side. A
be called cultured man. He
would be deficient upon the spiritual
side. In that important direction of his
being he would be undeveloped, ,uncultured.
There is no high culture apart from religion.
is not Christian, whoever has
not the spirit of reverence, whoever takes
no interest in the high themes which en-
gage the thoughts of the religious, whoever
has in him no response to spiritual impress |
sIons, he is simply uneducated, undevel- |
oped, in the direction of the worthiest possi- |
bilities of man. He is in the spirit such a |
man, and the man who cannot read nor |
write, and the man who does not know how |
10 behave himself at a dinner table, all be- |
long together. They are all uncultured.
Make it your purpose to gain culture. |
Do not leave undeveloped any ability which |
God has given you. Be the best man, be
,he best woman upon every side.
If you keep one great, ideal life before |
your eyes, the Lille of the Master, il you
ove what He loved and hate what He |
mated, and try to think His thoughts and
10 what He said, and to attain to some dis |
ant measure of His spirit, you cannot help
gaining; you cannot help getting to be more
If genuine man, more of true and worthy
woman; you cannot help making the most
IF the best part of yourself
GEORGE Hnnnrc