Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1914-11-28
TWENTY-FIVE Pc.
MPL0YES. RESPOND
EVANGELIST PLEADS FOR MORE
coNvERTs-2oo MEN AND
WOMEN ANSWER CALL
[BY GORDON LATHROP.l

WlIucoScu Illedl Wucll lWcAly-ANc luCA
from the postoffice department, dress
ed in their neat grey uniforms and
carrying silk flag, marched down the
sawdust aisles and gave their hand to
Preacher Bill and their hearts to God
at the close of the sermon: mo Man
Cared For My Soul.'
"Postotfice boys with the flag Billy
pleaded in his prayer, come down and
give me your hand and by that act
say, 4 care for my souls salvation
The Lord cares. Jesus cares though
the world doesn't. Come men,"
The first line of these men left their
flag behind them but Billy cried:
Bring the flag with you, boys" and
the standard bearer carried the en-
blem to the platform. The evangelist
took it in his left hand and continued
beckoning with the free hand for more
converts. They came in a steady
stream after that. Two hundred in all
answered the call. There were in
Guided more than the usual number of
men and women in the prime of life.
Young girls and boys were there, as
were old men and women but this
sermon seemed to make an especial
appeal to those between 80 and 40
years of age; class that has been
hitherto rather conspicuous by it's alb
sence.
The sermon was strong but simply
worded plea for a revival of individual
and community concern for salvation
of the soul; like concern for spiritual
well-being as the world, particularly
American exhibits about physical dis
tress. Sunday cited the quick and
San Francisco was shaken by earth
quake and devastated by fire and
when Italy was stricken by an erupt-
ing volcano.
Particularly appropriately on this
day, the day set aside as tag day for
the suffering Belgians, he cited what
we are doing now to alleviate physi-
cal distress.
This concern was contrasted with
the Indifference with which men and
women view the struggles of those
about them against the powers of sin
and darkness. Billy did not deal in
glittering generalities in his denuncia-
ton of those church members who
| ldll W uuCluuc pei SOldA oCANlSO
their churchly accomplishments. II
he hadn't previously committed him
self as having never denounced pub
licly an individual, and disbelieving in
it, there might have been a near col
lapse of three eminently respectable
ladies who live in East Dies Moines Cor
Sunday was vexed, to say the least,
with them. 1t had come to him, so he
explained, that lady, not a church
member, one who was in the taber-
nacle at that time, had gone to three
neighbors, church members, and had
asked to be taken by one or all of them
to the tabernacle. She presumed that
the ladies would be interested in her
soul struggles but they seemed not to
be. Two of them declined outright
and the third evaded the request by
pleading symptoms of quinsy. That
tho symptoms speedily disappeared
was the conclusion drawn by the evan
gelist, as the sick lady was there
with bells" at picture show that
same night.
In the sermon, Sunday graphically
depicted the latter days of those who
had achieved what the world called
fame. The Incompetence OF the
lives of Caesar, Charles ", Gallileo,
Napoleon, Mirabeau, Robert Burns and
Sir Walter Scott was contrasted with
the perfect, though less dramatic
lives, to the final heart beat, of those
who had relinquished what of the
things worldly they could not grasp
and hold except at the expense of
their spiritual selves.
The story of the man of Tolstoy S
pen who was to be granted all the
fields, valleys, hills and waters that in
certain time he could traverse was
wonderfully told. He pictured how
the man, with the lust for more and
yet more consuming him ran over land
and battled his way through lakes,
tearing his very clothes from his back
in his race and finally, just at the last
minute of the last hour was up, how
he gained his goal, to cry I've won,
I've won," then fall lifeless to the
ground. The use of the phrase won
derfully told or depicted graphical
ly' or any other of like strength may
be used with full justification in writ,
ing of Billy Sunday sermon. When
Billy said: "Then he fell lifeless to
the earth smack went the evangeliSt's
hands to the rostrum and his 1.-the
body stretched on the floor in one of
the neatest state falls ever staged
anywhere.
The entire sermon was graphically
unfoded and wonderfully depicted. If
it were not, it would be strangely I'M
Sundaylike 1t was one of the best of
the sermons he has preached during
the twenty-three days he has been
in Des Moines, during which time
$40 converts have been registered.
"Behoid Stand at Door" Etc.
In the sermon from the text: Be
hold Stand at the Door and Knock, ;
Billy Sunday had to say of the man or
woman who persistently unheeds the
call for admittance of Christ and steels
his or her heart against Christianity S
hand maidens, faith, sobriety, honor,
love and personal service: God pity
you, you miserable wretch who hears
Christ at the door and will not let him
into your heart
After the sermon he had more to say
concerning those who have protested
desire for Christ's influence in their
lives but who put him ".in the spare
ROOM These compose considerable