The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1919-04-07

new faith" that one with God is
greater than a thousand without
God" and when Or. Greer left tins
congregation 1t is said to have been
one of the most powerful single Pro-
testant congregations iii the world. 1t
was then spending more than two
hundred thousand dollars a year, the
old edifice remodeled and crowded to
the door every Sunday morning. There
were two thousand members in the
Sunday school. He had two Sunday
schools in English, one in Armenian,
n in Chinese. one in German and
n in Swedish. He had idustrial
schools and clubs and employment
bureaus that. obtained positions for a
hundred people u week. There was a
clinic that cared for $50 people a day,
a boarding house for girls and many
other important things of phiian-
thropical ~endeavor. This great tnsti-
tation was built up piece by piece as
this great man breathed into it new
life and new faith.
There is a chance at your door and
mine today. Not a chance for our
selves but a chance for God If we
work with Him. We too often start
out for ourselves, plan for ourselves.
strive for ourselves ana at last lind
everything but ourselv as. We ought
to start with tho Oh &c today aad
tomorrow to do some /. :. 10 cheer
heart, to encourage ON
who is respondent. 1t isn't the big
things that count the most, it's the
sincere things, the things that come
from our hearts that VIII live the
longest. Let us learn to help men
while we may. -
w. ]. Dawson tells us that Burns
sick II poor and in debt. The
last letter that he wrote was an APP
peal to his cousin to lend him ten
pounds and ave him from the ter
rors OF n debtors dungeon. II would
not have been much TO expect from
society OF culture Of Edinburgh, but
no help came. There he lay his hairs
mixed with gray, DOC crushed. penni-
less, just suffocating with distresses..
Even TO the last he was writing his
songs. which won him no
ton then. but now men can praise
him. When Richard Is, Sheridan
passed out and his funeral was held,
many noblemen came to pay tribute
to his talent, bat weeks before his
death he was really destitute. Men
were pressing him for his debts, he
passed his last days in the GUS
tody of sheriff officers who had mercy
enough not to move him to prison.
Let US think OF those about us that
need Dur words of comfort, thai need
the help that you may bring them.
"Oh! that good we all may do, while
the days are going by"
But the worst tragedy Of all Is for a
man to fail to cultivate his soul. The
need today is for men and
wonen to have dream and visions, 20
have conviction and courage, TO have
faith n fortitude. A business man
one day who had his conscience re-
buking him and he knew he had not
been living up to his opportunity be-
gan to mak excuses by saying, 81
have not been in business where l
could be a Christian, and IL / became
Christian now l could not go back
in that business and be n Christian"
All right, you had better give up yoLr
business thar to give up Christ, you
had better lose your money than TO
lose your soul.
1t is stated that on one occasion
Henry Nv of France asked the Duke
of Alva If he had observed the eclipses
happening in that year. He replied
that he had so much business on
earth thai he had no time to look UP
to heaven. What folly! And yet we
are SO busy here and there. SO busy
with clothes, so busy with meat and
bread, so busy with stocks and bonds,
SO busy looking after our own bodies,
devising our W pleasures and
planning our own comfort that we
have not time to look up and no time
to lift up.
The Whole Thing.
You may gain everything else but
If you lose your soul you have lost
everything, ! am not speaking of
merely losing your soul in hell after
you are dead. I am speaking Of
losing 1t here. SO that it becomes IT.
capable of approaching and enjoy
ing God. An old historian tells us
that Alexander the Great being much