Audubon County Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Audubon Co., Iowa) 1885-1894, 1892-06-02
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| llVeu lOr JHls WORTH tOO lOHB. WdLS
to know if you think I can be saved,
and, if SO, / wish you would tell me
how" Upon his soul the light soon
| dawned, and the old miser, not only
revolutionized in heart but in life, began
| to scatter benefactions, and toward all
! the great charities of the day he be-
| came cheerful and bountiful almoner.
| What was the cause of this change?
every body asked; and no one was
capable of giving an intelligent
answer In another part of the church
sat, Sabbath by Sabbath, a
beautiful and talented woman, who
was great society leader. She went
to church because that was respecta-
| BILE thing to do, and in the neighbor-
hood where she lived, it was hardly
respectable not to go. Worldly was she
to the last degree, and all her family
worldly. She had at her house the
finest germans that were ever danced,
and the costliest favors that were ever
given, and though she attended church,
she never liked to hear any story of
pathos, and, as to religious emotion
of any kind, she thought it posi-
lively vulgar. Wines, cards, theaters,
rounds Of costly gaiety were to
her the highest satisfaction. One day
a neighbor sent in n visiting card, and
this lady came down the stairs in tears,
and told the whole story of how she
had not slept for several nights, and
she feared she was going to lose her
soul, and she wondered if someone
would not come around and pray with
her. From that time her entire de-
meanor was changed, and though she
was not called upon to sacrifice any OF
her amenities of life, she conse-
Grated her beauty, her social position,
her family, her all to God and
the church and usefulness. Every body
said in regard to her: Have you no.
ticed the change, and what in the
world caused it?' and no one could
make satisfactory explanation. In the
course of two years, though there was
no general awakening in that church,
many such isolated cases of such unex.
pected and unaccountable conversions
took place. The very people whom no
one thought would be effected by such
considerations were converted. The
pastor and the officers of the church
were on the lookout for the solution of
this religious phenomenon. where is
?" they said, and who is it, am
what is it % At last the discovery was
made and all was explained A poor
old christian woman in the vestibule
of the church one Sunday morning,
trying to get her breath again before
she went upstairs to the gallery, heard
the enquiry and told the secret. For
years she had been in the habit of con-
centrating all her prayers for partic-
ular persons in that church. She
would see some man or some woman
present, and. though she might not
know the PERSONS name she would
pray for that person until he
or she was converted 20 God. All her
prayers were for that one person-just
that one. She waited and waited for
communion days to see when the cam
didates for membership stood up
whether her prayers had been effectual.
1t turned out that these marvellous in
stances of conversion were the result
of that old woman's prayers as she sat
in the gallery Sabbath by Sabbath,
bent and wizened and poor and I'M
noticed. A little cloud of consecrated
humanity lowering in the galleries.
That was the secret place of the
thunder. There is some hidden, I'M
known, mysterious source of almost all
the moral and religious power demon
strated. Not one out of million-not
one ont of ten million prayers ever
strikes n human ear. On public occa-
sions a minister of religion voices the
supplications of an assemblage, but the
prayers of all the congregation are in
silence. There is not a second in a
century when prayers are not ascend
ing, but myriads of them are not even
as loud as "A whisper, for God hears a
thought as plainly as a vocalization.
That silence of upplcation-hemi-
spheric and perpetual-is the secret
place of thunder.
In the winter of 1875, we were wor-
Shipping in the Brooklyn Academy of
Music in the interregnum of churches.
We had the usual great audiences, but
| was oppressed beyond measure by
the fact that conversions were not more
numerous One Tuesday, l invited to
my house five old, consecrated Christ
ian men-all of them gone now, except
Father Pearson, and he, in blindness
and old age, waiting for the Masters
call to come up higher. These old men
came, not knowing why | had in
vited them. | took them to the top
room of my house. | said to them:
81 have called YOU here for special
prayer l am in an agony for a great
turning to God of the people. We have
vast multitudes in attendance and they
are attentive and respectful, but can
not see that they are saved. Let us
Ineel down and each one pray and not
leave this room until we are all assured
that the blessing will come and has
come" 1t was a most intense crying
unto God. l said: Brethren, let this
meeting be secret" and they said it
would be. That Tuesday night spe-.
cial service ended. On the fol-
lowing Friday night occurred the
usual prayermeeting. No one knew Of
what had occurred on Tuesday night,
but the meeting was unusually
thronged Men accustomed to pray in
public in great composure broke down
under emotion. The people were in
tears. There were sobs and silences
and solemnities of such unusual power
that the worshipers looked into each
others faces as much as to say: what
does all this meau?" And, when the
following Sabbath came, although
we were in secular place, over four
hundred arose for prayers, and a relig-
icus awakening took place that made
that winter memorable for time and
for eternity. There may be in this
building many who were brought to
God during that great ingathering, but
few of them know that in the upper
room in my house on Quincy street,
where those five old Christian men