The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1908-01-05

, Spirit purifying and ennobling our spirit
ual lives? Can you not thank God for
your Christian wives and mothers and
grandmothers, your Lydias Marthas,
Decreases and Annas? Have not the
women whom yon have seen publishing
Gods tidings been a great host?
Giving Thanks for Good Wives.
First, let us thank God for the Sarahs-
the Christian wives who are now by our
sides. How many men have reason to
thank God for the women who, as young
girls, gave them their hands and hearts
in marriage when they too were young
and had nothing and who with them have
fought the battle of life? We ought to
thank God for the wives who in more
senses than one have merged their lives
in our lives, and yet are never SO happy
as when the world praises us for the
work which they to great extent ena-
, bled us to achieve. l once knew a man
who declared in the presence of q party
of friends that his wife had nothing to
do with his success. He boastfully said,
II have made my success entirely indie
pendent of my wife," But l do not he
leve there is one man among us all who
can honestly make a statement like that
We know, deep down In our hearts,
that what we achieve in life is due to
a great extent to the wives who have
labored faithfully by our side. Happy is
the poor man who has a good wife. She
may be the foundation of his success. The
good wife does not become a heavy drag
upon her husband by accommodating lot
of unnecessary debts If l were to ask
for the testimony of some Of you today
you would say: I'm those days of strait
ness and struggle our wives stepped to
our side and said, We will be breadwin-
ners with YOU They went to the kitchen
and bent over the stove as cooks. They
hi '11ar ia
their own gowns last so long that it
seemed as though the clothes father and
mother gave would never wear out They
vgilantly guarded every dollar of ex-
penditure." The result was, though you
and three or four children to support you
were able to accumulate a little capital,
and gradually and yet surely you pressed
ahead until you now own your home, and
you have been able to put aside some
money for rainy day. What husband
today is not willing to thank God for the
financial reinforcement his wife has
been to him by her domestic economies?
The Wifes Faith.
And then, has she not been a moral and
spiritual reinforcement as. well as
financial helper? When you left home in
the morning you felt that, like Daniel OF
old, you are entering the lions den. Ev-
erywhere around you were lions of temp
the lion of falsehood, the lion of theft, the
lion of drink, the lions of innumerable
dshonesties. "Oh," you said, what is
the good of my trying to live right when
SO many of my business associates are
dishonest and trying to overreach me?'
When you came home at night and she
came to greet you at the door, as you
looked into her honest blue eyes you
knew that no impure or dishonest thought
had passed through her mind. When you
saw her gather the children about her for
prayers and then knee to command her
own soul and the souls of her husband
and dear ones to the Heavenly Father
somehow all your evil thoughts disap-
peared. Through the touch Of her hand
you went back true man to your work.
Tell me honestly, would you be the Chris
tian man you are today If your wlfe's
faith had not been as sheet anchor
holding you to the cross? Am l wrong
when say that God giveth the word, but
the Christian wives who surround us and
publish the tidings are a great host?
But the second proper name of this old