Fisherman & farmer. [volume] (Edenton, N.C.) 1887-19??, 1892-02-26

ND by controversies, anu ulcu Win "AOAS
libraries on their backs are diSputing as to
what proportion of sweet Oil and cayenne
pepper should make up the creed. cry,
'tGet out of the way and let the hungry
world come in"
The Christian church will bave to change
its tack or it will run on the rocks of demo
lition. The worlds population annually in
creases fifteen millions. NO one preCends
that half that number or people are con-
verted to God There are more than twice
as many Buddhists as Protestants: more
than twice as many Buddhists as Roman
Catholics. Protestants, 135, 900, 600; Catho-
lies. 1876 OO0 900: BudGhists, 400, 100000.
There are Us. 600, 600 Mohammedans and
220 600, 900 Brahmans.
Meanwhile. MANY of the churches are only
religious clubhouses, where few people go
on Sunday morning, averaging one person
to pew or one person TO q half dozen peWS,
and leaving the minister at night to sweat
through a sermon with here and there lone
traveller, unless, by Sunday evening sacred
concert, he can get out an audience or re-
spectacle size.
The vast majority of the church member
ship around the world put forth no direct
effort for the salvation OF men. Dld L say
there would have to be a change? L correct
that and say, there will be a change. III
there be fifteen million persons added every
year to the worlds population, then there
will be thirty million added to the church,
and forty million and fifty million and sixty
done when the church will meet Christ
the plain. Come down out of the mountain
of exclusiveness. Come down out Of the
mountain Of pride. Come down out OF the
mountain of Journalism. Come down out OF
the mountain of freezing and Indifference.
Old Dr. Stephen II. Tying, great on earth
and in heaven, once said to me: ~ am in
favor of change. do not know what is
the best way Of doing things in the churches,
but know the way we are doing now is not
fhoh hos wOriH
its salvation than it seems to be-" SO feel;
SO we all feel that there needs to be
change. The point at which we all come
short is presenting Christ on the plain, Christ
on the level with all the worlds woes and
wants and necessities.
The full change will have to come from
the rising ministry. We now in the field
are too set in our ways. We are numbered
I'D with technicalities. We have too many
concordances and dictionaries and encyclo-
pedias and systems Of theology on our head
to get down on the plain. Our vocabulary
is too frosted. We are too much under the
domination of customs regnant for many
centuries. Come on, young men of the
ministry. Take this pulpit. take all the
pulpits, and in the street, and the market
place, and the family circle preach Christ
on the plain
AS soon as the church says by its attitude,
not necessarily by its words ''My one mis-
sion is to help for this life and help for the
life to come all the people," and it proves its
earnestness in the matter, people on foot and
on horseback and in wagons aud in car
RACES will come to the churches in such
numbers that they will have to be met at the
door by ushers, saying: "YOu were here
last Sunday; you cannot come to-day.
Gentlemen and ladies' you must take your
turn"
ana IL VIII De as in the Johnstown freshet
and disaster, when a government station
was opened for the supply Of bread, and it
took the officers of the law to keep the suf-
ferers in line because Of the great rush for
food. When this famine struck world real
izes that the church is government station
set up by the government of the universe to
provide the bread of eternal life for all the
people, the rush will be- unprecedented and
unimag ENABLE.
Astronomers have been busy measuring
worlds and they have told us how great is
the circumference of this world and how
great is its diameter, yea, they have kept on
until they have weighed our planet and found
its weight to be six saxt1lliOn tons. But by
no science has the weight of this worlds
trouble been weighed. Now Christ stand
ing on the level of our humanity stands in
sympathy with every trouble. There ars 50
many aching heads; His ached under the
thOrns. There are so many weary feet; His |
were worn with the long journey up ana
down the land that received Him not. There
are many prosecuted souls. Every hour
of His life was under human outrage. The
world had no better place to receive Him
than a cattle pen, and its farewell was a slap
on His cheek and a spear in His side. So in
tensely human was He that there has not
been in all our race grief intirmity or
exhaustion or pang that did not touch Him
once and that does not touch Him now.
The lepers, the paralytics, the imbecile,
the manic the cOurtesan, the repentant
brigand-which one did He turn off, which
one did He not pity, which one did He not
help? The universal trouble of the world is
bereavement. One may escape all the other
troubles, but that no soul escapes. Out of
that bitter cup every one must take a drink.
For instance, in order that all might know
how He sympathizes with those who have
lost daughter, Christ comes to the house of |
Jarius. There is such big crowd around |
the door He and His disciples have to push
conclude that this girl must have been very
popular. She one OF tn ose children
whom everybody likes.
After Christ got in the house there was
such loud weeping that the ordin ary tones
of voice could not be heard. | do not won
der. The dead daughte' was twelve years
of age It is about the happiest time in
most lives. Very little children suffer many
injustices because they children, and
childhood is not desirable part of human
existence-they get whacked or set on. But
at twelve years OF q &c the child has cometo
self assertion and is apt to make her rights
known. And then, twelve years of age is
too early for the cares and anxieties of life.
So this girl was, l think the nerriment Of
the household. She furnished for them the
mimicrY and the harmless mischief, and
reused the gutfaw that often rang through
that happy home. But now she is dead, and
the grief at her departure is as violent as her
presence had been vivacious and inspiriting.
Oh, the bereavement was SO sharp, so over
bo1C c0nlA