Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1900-01-08

ing facts. Of course understand you
can't all go out of your way to hunt up
jobs for people like me. / m not asking
you to, but what I feel puzzled about is
what is meant by following Jesus. Do
you mean that you are suffering and
denying yourselves and trying to save
lost suffering humanity just as [ I'M
derstand Jesus did? What do you mean
by it? 1 see the ragged edge of things
good deal I understand there are
more than 500 men in this city in my
case Most of them have families. My
wife died four months ago. I'm glad
she is out of trouble My little girl is
staying with a printers family until I
find a job. Somehow I get puzzled
when see so many Christians living
in luxury and singing, Jesus I my
cross have taken, all to leave and fol-
low thee, and remember how my wife
died in tenement in New York city,
gasping for air and asking God to take
the little girl too. Of course I don't ex-
pect you people can prevent every one
from dying of starvation, lack of proper
nogrishment and tenement air. But
what does following Jesus mean? /
understand that Christian people own
good many of the tenements. A mem
Der of church was the owner of the
one where my wife died, and I have
wondered if following Jesus all the
way was true in his case I heard some
people singing at church prayer meet
ing the other night,
"All for Jesus, all for Jesus,
All my beings ransomed powers,
All my thoughts and all my doings,
ALI my days and all my hours,
"and 1 kept wondering, as 1 sat on
the steps outside, just what they meant
by it. It seems to me there's an awful
lot of trouble in the world that some
how wouldn't exist if all the people
who sing such songs went and lived
them out. suppose I don't under
stand But what would Jesus do? Is
that what you mean by following his
steps2 It seems to me sometimes as if
the people in the city churches had good
clothes and nice houses to live in, and
smoney to spend for luxuries, and could
go away on summer vacations and all
that while the people outside Of the
churches, thousands Of them, I mean,
die in tenements, and walk the streets
for jobs, and never have piano or
picture in the house, and grow up in
misery and drunkenness and sin. +" The
man gave queer lurch over in the di
rection of the communion table and laid
one grimy hand on it. His hat fell upon
the carpet at his feet. A stir went
through the congregation. DR.. West
half rose from his seat, but as yet the
silence was unbroken by any voice or
movement worth mentioning in the
audience. The man passed his other
hand across his eyes and then, without
any warning, fell heavily forward on
his face, full length, up the aisle
Henry Maxwell spoke, 1--WE will con-
slider the service dismissed. He was
down the pulpit stairs and kneeling by
the PROSTATE form before any one else
The audience instantly rose, and the
aisle was crowded. DIR. West pro-
nounced the man alive He had tainted
away.
"Some heart trouble" the doctor
also muttered as he helped to carry him
into the pastor study.
Henry Maxwell and a group of his
church members remained some time
in the study. The man lay on the couch
there and breathed heavily. When the
O1 WudG 10 40 Will n1u CduO
up, the minister insisted upon taking
him to his house. He lived near by and
had an extra room. Rachel Winslow
said: Mother has no company at pres
emit. / am sure we would be glad to
give him place with US. She looked
strangely agitated. No one noticed it
particularly. They were all excited over
the strange event, the strangest that
First church people could remember.
But the minister insisted on taking
charge CT the man, and when a carriage
came the unconscious but living form
was carried to his house, and with the
entrance of that humanity into the
minister spare room a new chapter in
Henry Maxwell's life began, and yet no
one, himself least of all, dreamed Of the |
remarkable change it was destined to
make in all his after definition of Chris |
tian discipleship
The event created great sensation |
in the First church parish People
talked of nothing else for a week. It |
was the general impression that the |
man had wandered into the church in |
condition of mental disturbance caused |
by his troubles and that all the time he |
was talking he was in a strange de-
irium of fever and really ignorant Of |
his surroundings That was the most |
charitable construction to put upon his
action. It was the general agreement |
also that there was a singular absence
of anything bitter or complaining in
what the man had said. He had through
out spoken in mild, apologize tone,
almost as if he were one of the congre-
cation seeking for light on. very diff
cult subject.
The third day after his removal to
LIE ministers house there was marked
change in his condition The doctor