The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1896-06-08
THE PLACE FOR PRAYER
The Rev. Charles j. Aliens First
!. Sermon as Pastor of the
Greenville Church.

The Rev. Charles T.. Allen, the new
pastor of the Greenville Reformed
Church, preached his first sermon there
yesterday morning to a large congrega-
ton, in which was the majority of those.
who, it was said, had Withdrawn from
the church on account of disagreement
in the selection of a pastor.
His sermon was on the place for
Prayer" and he took for his text a por-
ton of Acts v, 81: And we kneeled
down on the shore and prayed, He
said:-"Adjoindng that province where to-
day the Kurds Turks are numbering
~defenceless men, women and children,
because of their belief in Jesus the
Christ, are the routes of the Journeys
covered by St. Paul, whose heart had a
burning desire that all men might be
saved. In view of the marvellous ac-
complishments of the king of ~evangel-
ism one is annoyed to learn that the
Armenian sections of bold Asia Minor
should in this day be drenched with the
blood of martyred Christians, but such
is the truth. It is there now as it was
once in Syria. about three years after
the death of Jesus, when from Jerusalem
to Damascus one named Saul of Tar
sus governed, breathing direful threat
enings against the disciples of the cru
Gifted one that saved the Paul who fig
ures most prominent in my text.
hi journey, so Kurd-like and Turk
like in its conception and pursuit, was
only as far as the suburb of Damascus.
$50 miles, slightly northwest from Jeri-
chic; but if it had been continued on,
Saul, the prosecutor of Christians, would
have entered the Armenian provinces,
could have stood at the door of the
homes of those whose descendants have
in al! probability very recently been
b~eheaded, or Drained. or burned, or shot
down for their faith in Jesus, whom
Saul came to know and to believe in
and to preach for.
God speed the day when every soul
from the Sultan of Turkey down to the
humblest of all his subjects, will be
changed from prosecuting Christians to
preaching the Christ, from Sauls to
phemyS to apostles of suppIication and
worshippers of the living Jesus. God
speed the day when the scene pictured
IN my text as having taken place on the
shore of the sea will be re-enacted. when
ever on land or at sea souls are taking
a journey.
That is the best place in all the world
to pray where you and God are alone
together. Posture and place have no
more to do with the spirit and the act
of prayer than has to do with the ans
wer. The child of the Woodworking
mechanic throws its tiny arms around
it's fathers neck, kisses his cheek. whis-
pers, Papa, my feet are cold, Won't you
get me a pair OF shoes That is a
prayer, the kind that brings the shoes.
The words are made significant by the
light squeeze of the little arms about
the fathers neck, the angel kiss, the
confidence in the whisper of his child,
that father would sell his coat off his
back, If the need We're, to get those
shoes. Call to me, said God, and l will
answer you. l will show you great and
mighty things. A spark drops in the
powder magazine, there is a flash, an
Observation-Disclosures combustion says
the chemist.
W kneeled down on the shore and
prayed. We kneeled in the place where
sorrow was about to overcome the heart,
trouble ahead was about to shatter
every hope. We prayed spontaneously;
prayed eagerly, prayed trustingly, and
as God and angels watched that scene.
heard that prayer, they were mutually
agreed as touching one sublime truth.
There are a few on earth who are plod-
ding along the thorny, trying path that
leads to the Heavenly palace gates. Live
on. but pray; watt not for sorrrsvs
call, pray on from day to day. God
knows long before you CALI