April 2015 Signs of the Times Email Newsletter

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April 2015 Signs of the Times Email Newsletter

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The Signs of the Times newsletter is a collection of stories and quotes from past issues ofSigns and These Times.
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     Pastor John Macnab preached at a communion season on the subject of “Heaven”. It was a long sermon; but the people thought it as beautiful as a series of various views. It had, however, one defect—the length of the descriptive part left no time for the “application.” Old George Brown met the preacher at a friend’s house, and astonished him by the review he gave of the sermon.
     “It was a grand sermon as far as it went,” he said after he had finished his report. “I never enjoyed a description of Heaven better. You told us everything about Heaven excepthow to get there; and Pastor Macnab, you’ll excuse me, my young friend, for saying that should not have been left out; for you’ll admit yourself it was lacking! You’ll remember the king’s son’s feast? The servants didn’t only tell that it was ready, but they compelled them to come in.”
     The young preacher was too intelligent not to see the aptness of the criticism, and when George had retired, he said to his friend:
     “I have been criticized by learned professors and doctors of divinity, by fellow-students and relatives; but that good old man has given me more insight into what preaching should be than all the others put together. I hope as long as I live I shall never again, when delivering God’s message to my fellowmen, forget to tell them ‘how to get there.’”—From The Presbyterian, Signs of the Times, February 18, 1886.

Quote: “Make yourself an honest man, and then you may be sure that there is one less rascal in the world.”—By Carlyle, Signs of the Times, March 1, 1899.

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     Preachers seldom face as large an audience as confronted Dudley A. Tyng on a March day in 1858. More than five thousand men were gathered in Jaynes Hall in Philadelphia to hear the beloved rector. At the time the city was being stirred by a great revival.
     There was a singular charm and appeal about this speaker. He seemed to find just the right words to satisfy the soul hunger of his listeners. He was so moving and convincing in his plea that he drew hundreds to those gatherings.
     But three weeks later he was dead. The city was shocked when it read of the accident that had claimed him as its victim.
     Mr. Tyng had gone to his home at Brookfield, near Conshohocken, Pennsylvania. One day he left his study, expecting to be gone only a few minutes, to look into the barn where a mule was being used to operate a corn sheller.
     As he patted the animal on the neck, his clothing got caught in the machinery, and his arm was horribly mangled. The surgeons tried desperately to save him, performing three amputations, but it was all in vain. The beloved rector died within a few hours.
     Shortly before he passed away, he was briefly conscious. Those by the bedside heard him whisper, "Tell them to stand up for Jesus." Undoubtedly it was the message he wanted carried to his friends in the minister's union who were conducting the city-wide revival.
     There was one acquaintance in particular to whom these words came as a challenge. George Duffield, pastor of the Fifth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, had been the late rector's intimate associate and close fellow worker. To him it hardly seemed possible that one so beautiful in spirit and so dedicated to the Master's cause could have passed so abruptly from the scene.
     When he attended the funeral, his friend's parting words kept ringing in his mind. The more he thought about them, the more urgent and impressive they became. It was as if his old associate were still alive, asking that his moving farewell message be translated into some enduring form of memorial. Mr. Duffield was not only touched by those words--he was genuinely inspired.
     The following Sunday, when the time came for the sermon in his own church, Mr. Duffield preached from the text in Ephesians 6:14: "Stand therefore." At the close he read a poem he had written, "Stand Up! Stand Up for Jesus!"
     Probably the author never dreamed that he had written a great hymn. A copy of the lines was given to his Sunday school superintendent, who in turn had them printed on a special leaflet so that they could be sung by all the children.
     It could not stop there. The words seemed to fire men's souls throughout the land. When the author made a trip to the battlefront in Virginia a few years later, he was deeply stirred as he heard thousands of army men sing "Stand Up! Stand Up for Jesus!" Inspiring fresh courage and high resolve wherever it was sung, the hymn grew steadily in popularity.--By Vincent Edwards, These Times, May 1960.

Quote: “I have no fear that the candle lighted in Palestine years ago will ever be put out.”—By William R. Inge, These Times, December 1960.

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     Kagawa of Japan, one of the busiest of men, touching creatively the life of his nation at every vital point, was asked how he could find time to pray. His face shone as he answered, “From three to four each morning—that is my hour. Then I am free from interruption, and from the fear of interruption. Each morning I wake at three, and live an hour with God. It gives me strength for everything. Without it I would be utterly helpless. I could not be true to my friends, or do my work, or preach the gospel which God has given me for his poor.”—From The Pulpit, These Times, January 1958.

Quote: “We do not go deep enough in our search for truth. God can teach you more in one moment by His Holy Spirit than you could learn from the great men of the earth.”—By Ellen G. White, These Times, April 1963.

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     Lorenzo Dow, an eccentric circuit preacher, lives in tradition chiefly for his oddities; but he was a man of strong character, who loved the souls of men. His sermons and his ways of doing good were peculiarly his own, but they were often surprisingly effectual—not merely because he was singular, but because he was sincere. An aged lady whose father’s large farmhouse was one of Mr. Dow’s favorite stopping places, related some years ago the following story of him from her earliest recollections:
     One winter afternoon my father overtook the eccentric preacher on his way to fulfill and engagement, and took him into his wagon.
     “I am glad to ride,” said Dow, “for one of my boots has sprung a leak.”
     As they went on, my father suggested a way to repair the damage. “A cobbler lives in that little red house yonder,” he said. “He is poor, lame, crabbed, and cross, but a good workman.”
     “Just the place for me,” said Dow, jumping off, and going into the little shop. He sat down silently in front of a few brands smoldering upon the hearth, and, pulling off his boot, handed it to the cobbler. The man looked at the leak, and swore.
     “I am afraid you are not a Christian, my man,” said Dow, quietly.
     “There are no Christians,” retorted the cobbler. “There are plenty who pretend to be;” and he waxed his thread with an angry jerk, which seemed to emphasize what he said.
     “Your room is so cold that your wax is hard. Shall I put more wood on your fire?”
     “I work to keep warm,” was the shoemaker’s curt reply, as he pushed a last into the boot and adjusted his clamp. “I’ve little enough wood cut, and no one to cut more, and this lame leg won’t allow me to do it myself.”
     Dow removed his long-caped cloak, put his bootless foot into an old shoe lying near, and going out to the shed, found an ax and went to work. Before the boot was ready, he had split and carried in all the wood in the shed, piled it neatly in a corner, and made a blazing fire of the chips.
     When the boot was done, he put it on, paid for the work, and, taking his cloak, said, “Thank you, my friend; you have proved yourself ‘a workman that needeth not to be ashamed.’ “
     The reply came this time with real civility, “I’m much obliged to you. I shouldn’t wonder if there are some Christians in the world—and you are one of ‘em.”
     “I try to be one; good-by;” and Dow was off, leaving the astonished cobbler saying to himself: “Well, if he’s tryin’, he don’t take it all out in talk. He never preached at me so much as a word.”
     That evening, Dow, who often picked up his text on the way to meeting, spoke from the words that had come to him in the shop—2 Timothy 2:15: “Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed.” He had a large audience, and he preached practical religion to them, enforcing in his original way the truth that everywhere there were poor and unfortunate people for Christians to look after, and this work must be done if we expect the world to believe in our Christianity.
     Dow spent that night with us, and the next morning one of my father’s teams left a load of wood at the lame cobbler’s door. Passing the shop on his way to his next appointment, Dow looked in, and said:
     “Good morning, my friend, I would saw this wood for you, but there are duties awaiting me further on. I think there must be Christians enough in this community to look after a useful citizen like you.”
    Before the cobbler had recovered from his astonishment at being called a “useful citizen,” two or three schoolboys came to have little jobs of cobbling done; and while they waited, they acted on the hint given by Dow in his sermon, and worked at the woodpile.
     From that time on, little kindnesses done to the cobbler became so common that he quite lost his crabbed temper; his neighbors gave him no use for it.
     “Everybody seems to be helping me,” he said. “If I’m ‘a useful citizen’ I ought to be ashamed not to help somebody myself.”
     The next time Dow came to our neighborhood he was told, “The cobbler has given up his cider and pipe; he sings hymns instead of foolish songs, and reads the Bible to a blind neighbor.”
     Dow replied: “A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump—and a good example goes a great way.”
     Whatever Lorenzo Dow’s singularities were, he understood the religion of the New Testament. He knew that a Christian is at his best only when he makes himself an object lesson of his doctrine.—Christian Advocate, Signs of the Times, March 6, 1907.

Quote: “A wicked tongue kills three—he who tells a lie, he about whom it is told, and he to whom it is told.”—By Charles G. Bellah, Signs of the Times, November 5, 1929.

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     An old man and a young man were riding in a stage-coach. The old man was grave but sprightly, short of stature, spare, with a smooth forehead, fresh complexion, and a bright and piercing eye. The young man swore a great deal; until once when they stopped to change horses, the old man said to him, “I perceive by the registry books, that you and I are going to travel together a long distance in this coach. I have a favor to ask of you. I am getting to be an old man, and if I should so far forget myself as to swear, you will oblige me if you will caution me about it.” The young man instantly apologized, and there was no more swearing heard from him during that journey. The old man was John Wesley.—Unknown, Signs of the Times, December 20, 1883.

Quote: “The surest way to heal your own sorrow and soul is to endeavor in a spirit of love and helpfulness to comfort another who is bowed down with some weight of woe. When Jesus was bearing the sorrows of the world upon the cross of Calvary, He was concerned to comfort a weeping woman and forgive a dying thief. If we would follow Him in a full ministry of service, we must learn to lay aside even the weight of our own sorrow by ministering to others who need our help.”—Selected, Signs of the Times, February 26, 1929.

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Compiled by Dale Galusha. Please pass this newsletter on to others.