The Birmingham age-herald., 1906-02-11


 and abler for the battle of life through the strength the soul derives from such seasons of retirement and contempla- ton. The text Is Galatians 1, 1T, But I went into Arabia"
 "What to you is the most wonderful country in the world?" I once asked an old traveller Without any doubt" he said Ut Is Egypt" What, Egyptm exclaimed. Why. Egypt was not to me very absorbing Then said my friend. you have never sailed up the river Nile. You may have stopped a few days at Cairo and perfunctorily visited the pyramids, but you have never sailed up the river Nile and explored the ruins Of Memphis and Assiout and Abydos and Thebes I went to Egypt expecting to stay there only few days. l stayed three weeks. wish I might have stayed there three years And one of my lifes dreams is to go back to Egypt before l die and do as did Georg hOers when he wrote his famous book, "Picturesque Egypt" He not only travelled through the country, but he lived there for months and months. He fitted up one of the tombs of the kings for his study. He ate and slept anu breathed there the atmosphere of Egypt's historic past by dwelling there as Tissot studied the life of Christ by going and dwelling for years among the natives of Palestine.
 Then after my friend had vividly de- scribed for me the Journey up the Nile he gave me a. description of trip he took into the Sahara desert Mile after mile he went until there was nothing be- fore him or on either side of him or be- hind him but a great sea of sand. Along the valley of the river Nile there were the most iuxuriant harvest fields Of the worIu but as soon as he turned his back upon that river he found nothing but an apparently endless area of sand. Not one spear of grass was growing there. Not one tree was reaching out its strong branch and beckoning, Come, traveller and lie under my shadow" Not one bird was cooling his parehed throat by some running brook to sing another song. Not one farm house or one village greeted his vision. There were mountains Of sand, valleys of sand, plateaus of sand, rolling prairies of sand, great heaving tidal waves of sand; nothing was there but sand. So completely devoid of all life was this region of sand that not even a lizard or a jackal came in sight. Not a fly or a mosquito buzzed about his eyes. Not a buzzard's wing was seen afioat in the heavens of blue. There was not the rustic of one leaf or the snapping of one twig. The only sound heard was the pattering of his camels feet as they sank Into the awful, the appalling, the endless sand.
 A Dreary Waste.
 1 What the Sahara desert is to northern Africa the Arabian desert Is to south western Asia. Like the Sahara. with it's i luxurian valley of the river Nile, Arabia has its oases, its places where vegetable l life can grow But for the most part l Arabia is a weary waste of sand. If you would like a full description of 1t read about Arabia in Lew Wallace's "Prince l of India" There is found as wonderful a piece of word painting in reference to l it's sands and its endless silence as the i Indiana author gave in his famous char i iot race of Ben-Hur. But not alone to i Lew Wallace do we have to go to find a description of it's loneliness The Greeks and Romans used to say, "All Arabia Is divided Into three parts-Arabia Petrae, or the stony part; Arabia Deserta, or the 1 desert part, and Arabia Felix, or the l happy part But where the stony part 1 ends and the desert part begins is very hard to distinguish, while the happy part i Is of very small area, so small that for 1 the most part Arabia is inhabited only i by wandering nomad Bedouin tribes. ! Thus when Paul wrote the words of my l text, ''Neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles before me. but went into Arabia he practically meant this "1nstead of going at once 1 Into a great city as soon as l was con- verted I departed into desert place. went off to be alone with Christ. I tar ried for three long years in Arabia in order to fit myself spiritually for the work God was to give me to do. Then went I up to Jerusalem to see Peter and abode with him fifteen days
 | We all ought to have our sacred Arabas We should ever and anon turn our backs upon the world and have our quiet communion with Christ. What is desert of sand 10 many human eye may be a spiritual Arabian harvest field to the children of God
 The Arabian desert, in the first place, meant for Paul a theological education. It meant thirty-six long months, when he did little but study the science of Goa relation to the world. It meant weeks and weeks and weeks of reading Scripture and of saturating himself with | the history of Jesus Chrst's life. It meant Paul living over again his past ! scholastic life and interpreting his studies | from a new spiritual standpoint, and this | for a man of Paurs mental calibre was no short or light task.
 | The stronger "a man is mentally the wider is the range of his spiritual hor- izon; the more 8 man natures the more he is desirous of probing into the cau- sation of things in every way. Let me l illustrate this thought fin simple form: The great railroad train is starting across the continent. Its dozens of coaches are filled with all classes of people. Here is young boy thinking only of the dinner ent to the mechanism of the locomotive that Is drawing the train. Here is an 1 ignorant man concerned only with the sordid details of his journey and taking no notice of the country through which 1 he Is passing. But here is an alert, intel 1 ligent man. who .s eager to learn all he 1 can When the train stops he gets out and examines the brake couplings. He asks questions about the trucks; he in | quires about the industry of the sur rounding countries which has made this | railroad possible: he asks this and that | and the other thing. If he cannot get
 satisfactory replies from one man he I goes to another man and keeps on going until he gets rational answers. Such was this man Paul in his mental and spiritual
 makeup. He was not willing to ronow 1 Christ blindly; he was not willing to fol- 1 low him as an ignorant man to whom the name of Jesus means but little more than fetich, but he wanted to know to the l fullest extent who Christ was and what Christ wanted him to do.
 | nr th. 0aeie