Bryan daily eagle and pilot. [volume] (Bryan, Tex.) 1909-1918, 1914-03-02
BISHOP MOUzON
AT N. {. CHURCH
Delivered Two Eloquent Sermons Full
Of HelpfuIness and
Inspiration.

The visits of Bishop L. ID. Mouzon
of San Antonio to Bryan are always
sources of pleasure to his many
friends here, and especially when he
consents to fill the pulpit of the First
Methodist Church, as he did yester-
day.
TWENTY-FIVE years ago Bishop Mou-
zon, then quite young man Just out
OF college, decided to cast his fortunes
with Texas and camel o this great
State to become one of its citizens.
He was sent by the Texas Conference
to Bryan, this being his first pastorate
and almost the first work he had done
in the ministry. Though young in
years, he displayed unmistakable evil
dence OF remarkable mind and in
tellectual power. During his pastor
ate here he was married to Miss Mol
lie Mike and naturally has visited
here often since, and as we stated at
the outset, his visits are always
sources of pleasure.
With the passing years he has ripen-
ed in wisdom and the fullness OF his
great intellectual powers and his rise
was rapid. He held some of the great
est pastorates of this and other States,
and was few years ago elevated to
the exalted station of bishop.
The great First Methodist Church
was crowded to its capacity yesterday
at both the morning and the evening
services by the people Of Bryan and
vicinity who were eager to hear the
distinguished diyine>
At the morning service his theme
was Prayer" and the discourse was
based on Matthew 1913: ASK and
We shall receive, seek and we shall
find, knock and 1t shall be opened
unto you. For he that asketh receiv-
eth, and he that seeketh findeth and
to him that knocketh II shall be open
ed" The bishop said in part:
A great minister reviewing his life's
work in the ministry to see wherein
he had failed, was forced to the con-
clusion that he had failed to pray. He
had not neglected his other ministerial
duties, but because of them and the
rush of outside matters and duties, he
had failed to pray. We should ex'
anime ourselves and determine If this
, is not wherein we have failed and the
reasons for the failure. This failure
is the secret of our povertystricken
souls. The barrenness of our lives.
The fruitfulness of our efforts. Prayer
moves the arm that moves the world.
| Prayer means asking for things, and
as to what we may ask for, the list
included everything that concerned
our spiritual life, our temporal affairs
and everything that affects us funda-
mentally. Prayer is not a higher kind
OF magic and never reversed the law
of nature. For this reason many
prayers are idle and vain, for in our
praying we would have the ahnds turn
back on the dial of time. Prayer is
the Christians communion with God,
and we have never prayed as we
should unless we have felt the invisi-
BILE touch Of God. Prayer is the heart
of religion, and there is no religion
without prayer. There is a difference
between morality and religion. Moral
Iity looks always toward man, while
religion looks first toward God and
then toward man. Jesus the exemplar
prayed, Jesus lived in communion
with the Father. Prayer is the
struggle OF the soul to meet God and
know him.
Even as the fountains OF living
water will dry up and the streams be
turned to dust unless the source is
kept open, so the spiritual nature OF
man will wither and die Unless the
great source-prayer-is kept open.
He closed by urging his hearers to
keep the living waters of prayer ever
falling.
At night his theme was THE Sure
Foundation" taking for his text the
account in Matthew of the two
houses, one founded on the sand and
that fell when the storm came and the
winds blew and beat upon it, and the
other that stood because 1t was build.
ed upon the rock. The great thought
of the sermon was an injunction to all
to build their lives upon the solid rock
so they will stand when the searching
to come in every mans life