The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1921-09-30
International
SundaySchoolLesson
az WILLIAM q. ELLIS.

1 He 1
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airy Journey; Paul in Corinth. -
Acts 1S:1-23.
Cutters and Continuers.
In the heyday of the Laymen's Mis-
Sionary Movement, pastor wittiIy re-
marked, My concern about this up
rising Of laymen is that they may sit
down to soon" His fear has been
young men" likewise too quickly cease
rising. A majority of promising
careers" end in promise. New move
mentS AMI enterprises appear from
time to time-and then collapse or
become a mere scrap of machinery
whereby a few men grind out liveli-
hood. Where are the writer's of
whom twenty years ago we expected so
much? And we look in vain for the
fulfilled prophecies concerning scores
from whom the world was one day to
hear The theme is depressing one,
with illustrations on every hand.
Apparently. few persons are able
to utilize their highest powers to
their greatest end. They can squirt,
greatly to the farthest goal is the
last and greatest. test of character.
We are studying in this lesson a man
who had the grace Of continuance;
one who kept everlastingly at it,"
Somehow the subject is most easily
illustrated by contrasts. AS we look
upon graduating classes in higher
schools, year after. year, and listen
to their lofty ambitions and resound-
ing words we scarcely like to think
that most of them. will quickly be-
come commonplace money-grubbers,
their dreams forgotten and discard
ed. Recently it was announced that
a conspicuous figure in the religious
world of the United States, a man
often acclaimed as a prophet" has
gone into business" The cynical
French epitaph recurs to miEd:
Born a man; died a grocer"
Some Modern Instances.
To start something good and big is
easy; to keep at it to a successful end
is a proof of real quality. Almost any
enthusiast can make one missionary
journey; it takes an Apostle Paul to
make three and four. We all know
the type of person who goes thru life
talking about his one foreign trip, his
one serious illness, his one adventure,
his one honor, his one achievement:
the only way to keep from becoming
u has been" is to say with Paul,
Forgetting those things which are
behind and reaching forth unto those
things which are before, L press to-
ward the mark"
If old Paul, who had every excuse
for quitting his first and second big
trips, had been like some men we
know, he would have spent the rest
of his life in Antioch or Jerusalem,
retailing old stories and disparaging
men with fresher tales. 1t seems
law of life that no man may interrupt
the exercise of his higher powers
without deterioration. I know a man
who was once a useful missionary in
India. He returned home and took
to platform Work-and the platform
is more dangerous to mans mind
and soul than the jungles of Africa
where his missionary fervor outran all
bounds, but greatly increased his own
income. His oratory eventually be
came too hectic and unreal for even
the long-suffering church folk, and he
got an educational job. He held that
only a short time; and the last the
educational world heard of him. he
was impaled upon a phrase by pro-
fessor of pschychology as a hyper
moroni" Yet had that man stuck to
the actual performance of his mission
airy work, he might have been real
factor in the coming of the Kingdom
of India.
Once there was young missionary
at work in a remote Mosiem field,
doing remarkable and constructive
service 1t is the foolish way of Chris
tians to pull up every man who is
conspicuously producing fruit as a
preacher or a missionary and make
him a secretary or an itinerant
speaker. So this real leader of Chris
tian forces in the Moslem world was
set to talking in the homeland; and
his best friends have been most
grieved to watch the gradual atrophy
of his real powers of judgment and
scholarship and Christian statesman
ship. He should have been permitted
to continue to grow in the stern Cd
mate. of hard service. Even the
Apostle Paul did not dare trust him
self to be free of his harness betimes
A jobs Real Reward.
What a man does by his work is
matched by what his work does for
the man. Who are the sound think
ers the constructive citizens, the real
statesmen? Are they the lounSers in
the clubs, the loafers on the corners,
the social idlers and critics? Far from
it: they are the busy, burdened work
ers of the world. Somehow our tasks
have a habit of stabilizing and clari-
come queer; workers bring forth
fruit in old age" We make our work
and our work makes US. Rare is the
man who comes to his highest powers
outside of some real task.
AS we behold the ardent spirit of
Paul, faring forth to new adventures,
we are reminded that it was these very
experiences that developed his peerless
powers. In the travail of journeys
and labors and sufferings, his mind
matured the great convictions which
are today the Scripture of civilization.
without the Pauline missionary jour-
neys there would have been no Pau
line letters. Had the mighty mission
airy not been thrust again and again
into the furnace of affliction, his I'M
Outstanding of Gods great truths
would not have been refined and clari-
fled for the enrichment of the GEN.
turtles. Paul found himself" his best
possible self. in his hardest service.
We do wrong to our MODEST capabili-
ties when we fail to give them for de-
velopment the essential school Of toll
and self-denial.
Washing the Dishes Again!
Every housewife has had her mo-
ments of rebellion against the end
lessly- recurring task of washing
dishes Nobody would mind doing it