yoy. Real joy! Joy unspeakable and full of glory!"
O H, Now Happy I was. How the days sang their way into blessed weeks. My joy was so complete there seemed nothing more to be desired. I felt that Jesus was with me every moment; a glorious, understanding companion, I was alone no more. He walked by my side, brushing away my troubles. His presence was real to me.
For the first two weeks I was happy almost beyond expression, Then one day in prayer there came surging over me the realization that my Christian life was a somewhat selfish one. The Lord was doing all the giving, I all the receiving. It emed so one-sided. How I longed to do something for Him. Over and over the question revolved in my mind—"What service can a Christian render that is the most acceptable and pleasing to the Lord?”
Straight as an arrow the answer winged its way to my heart. ‘Be a winner of souls.”
Just how I was to become a soul winner, I did not know, but so desirous was I of pleasing the Master that I felt I would willingly cross the continent on my knees to say to one sinner,
‘Jesus loves you.”
I began to read my Bible afresh, with the desire of discoyering the secret of a soul winner's power and success. As nearly as I could tell, the enduement of power for service was synonymous with the baptism of the Holy Spirit
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There was the apostle Peter, for instance—an ignorant, illiterate, sunburned, wind-whipped Galilean fisherman, mending a torn net upon the shore—undependable, unstable. One moment he was cutting off the ear of the high priest’s servant, the next denying that he ever knew the Master, wincing from the taunts of a little maid and a little later plunged into despair saying, “I go a-fishing,” despondently giving up the whole thing.
But that same man, upon entering the upper room and receiving the Holy Ghost, was utterly transformed, The moment that rushing, mighty wind filled the room and tongues of flame fell upon him, and he began to speak with the languages of heaven and the nations, something tremendous happened to him. It was as though into the empty bulk of his own vessel had been poured shining liquid gold of divine strength and courage, power and eloquence. In that moment he stepped out of the role of an unlearned man, and became a God-inspired, eloquent evangel of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
The man who but a few days before had run from the questionings of a little girl, now strode boldly to the front, faced a milling mob, lifted his hand and cried in a ringing voice that reached all ears and penetrated all hearts:
“Ye men of Jerusalem, hearken to my words and be this known unto you—”
What a sermon! What a challenge! It was as though Peter had become but the mouthpiece, the overflowing channel through which poured the water of life from the throne of God into a desolate wilderness—a sermon that brought a cry to the lips of three thousand men:
“What shall we do to be saved?”
I read of Stephen, of Paul, of Andrew and all that company whose worthy lives are silhouetted against the sky of religious history. They had certainly received some divine enduement of power in a specific and definite experience—an experience that so charged them and was so worthy of note that as they entered a town the men of that place cried out:
“These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also.” The high priests, listening to their message, exclaimed:
“Are these not ignorant fishermen? How is it that they speak as oracles of God?” Then too, I found that the Master spoke definitely regarding this experience, He had commanded His servants to go into all the world and preach the gospel, but bade them tarry first in Jerusalem until they received the gift of His Holy Spirit from on high.
Had not Paul closely questioned the Ephesiar
“Have you received the Holy Ghost since you believed?”
Surely here was the answer to my question, the solution to the problem that faced me. Somewhere, locked up in the mystery and wonder and glory of that which was embraced in the term “The baptism of the Holy Spirit,” lay the secret of enduement of power for service.
I remembered the time that my father had taken me to the world’s fair at Buffalo. With thousands of others I had stood at eventide marveling at the beauty of the Tower of Jewels— flashing, flaming, scintillating with the lights that covered it from top to bottom,
Oh, to live a life like that, a life so shining and beautiful, so radiant and so bright as that tower, for Christ.
“Would you like to see where the power comes from?” my father had asked me one day
At my eager acquiescence he had taken me down a scemingly endless flight of stairs until we stood below the great Niagara Falls. With a deafening rush and roar the foaming avalanche of water came pouring over the brink. Putting his lip to my ear, father shouted through the din:
“Look, dear; here are the power houses.”
There were the drab little buildings of brown stone, and inside were flying turbines, turned by the power of that mig hty cataract. Niagara had been harnessed to drive the power-giving machinery that hummed down there at the bottom of the falls, generating the power for that radiant thing of living beauty that caused multitudes to gather every evening and gasp in amazement, the Tower of Jewels.
Was not that Tower of Jewels emblematic of the Christian soul-winner’s life, and was not the real secret of success in soul-winning service for Jesus generated in the power house of the baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire?
This, then, was what Robert Semple, the evangelist in the
Ingersoll mission, had meant. This, then, was the secret of his power,
From that moment I became a ceaseless supplicant for the Spirit that energized and motivated those successful soul winners of old.
The evangelist had, by this time, gone on to Stratford, for another campaign, but the wonderful light that he had left shone on, Services were held in the hall by other speakers whom he left to carry on the work. There were cottage prayer meetings also in the home of one of the ladies of the congregation.
Her home was only two blocks from the high school, and it was necessary for me to pass her door daily. It became a shrine of blessing to me. They were poor folk with a large family of growing children. They set a humble table—when there was more company they merely added more water to the soup.
This good woman usually had potato soup, seldom having the meat or vegetables to make other dishes. One never would have believed potatoes and water with a dash of salt and pepper could taste half so good.
The charm of the hours spent in her home lay in the fact that the little housewife and mother had received this shining, glorious gift, the baptism of the Holy Spirit, and she earnestly prayed for me that I might receive the desire of my heart.
Somehow the fact did not strike me as incongruous until later that I, who had always been so full of pranks, was now spending all my spare periods in a prayer meeting, or that I had tucked away inside my algebra, where a novel used to repose, a New Testament, poring over the words, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you:... If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him?"
One morning at nine o'clock, the great moment came, I had been snowbound for a week. Neither the wagon roads nor the railroads had been open. Snow plows and snow shovels alike had been unavailing.
As fast as men shoveled out the white fleece that fell so
42 - THE STORY OF MY LIVE gently from the sky, the Lord of the storm clouds poured it in again.
Being snowbound in town with the telephone lines down, I spent the week with this good lady; spending the greater part of it on my knees, praying by the hour, eating a little, sleeping a little, rising in the middle of the night and, wrapping blankets around me, dropping on my knees by the bed and praying again that my heart might be cleansed, that I might be emptied of self, sanctified wholly, and be deemed a worthy vessel, that the Lord might vouchsafe unto me His gracious imbuement with power for service, the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Saturday morning and the end of the week.
I arose early, before any one was awake in the house, before the big base-burner in the living-room had been shaken down. In the pale dawn the red plush rocker and chairs stood out gaunt, stark figures. Jack Frost too completely painted the windows with his magic brush to allow but a filter of the cold morning light to penctrate that chilly room
Kneeling down by a Morris chair I lifted my hands up and began to pray.
Not one hour of my waiting upon the Lord had seemed a burden. Each hour of prayer throughout the week had been a precious, hallowed thing which gleamed and shone with unearthly beauty
“Lord, fill me!” I prayed. “Fill me that I may serve Thee truly, that I may serve Thee acceptably, and fittingly tell the story of Thy love.’
In a moment the blessing fell, Streams of glory from on high came pouring down, joy like the billows of the sea swept over me. The fountains of the deep were broken up, my soul was flooded with an indescribable joy. The whole earth seemed to be spread out before me as a wheat field—white unto harvest.
Suddenly, as I prayed with fast closed eyes, the wheat seemed to change before me into human faces and the leaves turned to human hands upstretched, and over it all I seemed to e the words of the Saviour:
x fields are white unto harvest, the harvest truly is great and the laborers few. Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest that He send forth laborers.”
In that hour He placed in my hand a sharp two-edged sickle—the Word of God—and in my heart rang these words: “Go gather in the grain, but ever remember that thy sickle is given thee for the cutting of the wheat. Many reapers, alas, use their sickle rightfully for a few brief hours, then turn to cut and slash their fellows. None other can wound so deeply, _for none have so sharp a weapon, Apply thyself to the task before thee. Cut but the wheat and gather precious sheaves.”
Somehow it was a lesson that I have never forgotten to this day; and while so many preachers, of so many denominations spend so much time quibbling, criticizing and denouncing one another, even taking time to honor me with an occasional side thrust, I have made it a steady policy never to answer back or return the blow.
Besides, I was not cut out for fighting preachers. It always has seemed such a silly waste of time and energy when there is a real work to be done.
The Lord filled me full that day—full to overflowing—and at last took my tongue and spoke through me in a language I had never learned, the ecstatic praises of His own glorious name, even as He filled the hundred and twenty on that memorable day of Pentecost so long ago.
I arose from my knees with beaming face. Outside, the storm was over. The streets were being cleared. It was almost noon. Members of the household came in, shook my hands and rejoiced with me.
But within my heart there were two great realizations:
First, that the Comforter had come in to abide; and that I must live and walk in consecrated obedience to His will.
Second, that I had been called to preach the everlasting gospel.
In the evenings I would sit for hours in our little Canadian home, playing and singing:
“Tl go where You want me to go, dear Lord, ‘Over mountain of plain or sea; T'll say what You want me to say, dear Lord, Till be what You want me to be.”
My parents would come to the door and listen with eyes tear-dimmed. They knew the call had come. They knew that soon the great farmhouse would be empty and the shining new piano, a recent birthday gift, would be locked. Still there was no wavering when the great cause just out beyond the hills was calling.
Yet, how could I go? How absurd and far-fetched it all was! I knew I was called, but where was the door? In my own room on my knees Human Reasoning and the Bible argued the question:
“Why, you are but a child,” whispered Reason. “What do you know about preaching, anyway?” nodded Common Sense
“Here are preachers, a country full of them, learned, college bred, who have read books and digested theological studies for years. It is preposterous for you even to think of going out as a worker.”
“Not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called,” argued the Word of God; “but God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things that are mighty.”
"Has God not declared that with a worm He will thresh a mountain—then when we are weak then are we strong, and that a little child shall lead them?” the voice of the Father whispered to my heart, "Has God not said that upon the servants and the hand-maidens He will pour out His Spirit in the last days, and they shall prophesy? Did He not say that after the Spirit had come, ‘out of your innermost being’ (not out of your head, intellect or knowledge) ‘shall flow rivers of living water’? Open your mouth wide and He will fill it.”
“Yes, but remember, in addition to your youth and lack of mental equipment,” cried Human Affection, “there are your parents to be considered. You are an only child.”
“Here you have love and home and comfort, all you can wish for,” added Love of Comfort. “If you go forth as a worker you will have to leave all that.”
If any man love father or mother more than Me, he is not worthy of Me,” reminded the tender voice of Jesus. “No man hath given up houses or lands for My sake and the gospel’s, but he shall receive a hundred fold in this present time, and in the world to come life everlasting. If you would come after Me you must take up your cross daily, denying yourself, and follow Me."
“But what about going out with no salary and living by faith?" objected Prudence and Forethought. “What about shoes, clothes and necessary expenses?”
“Take no thought for what you shall eat or for what you shall drink or what you shall put on, for the Lord knoweth you have need of these things,” calmly interrupted Implicit Faith.
“Lord, by Your grace I will take up my cross,” sang Consecration. “I will trust and follow Thee, come what may. My all is on the altar. Have Thine own way with me. Whether ‘tis ‘go’ or whether ‘tis ‘stay,’ let Your perfect will be wrought out in my life. I feel my own weakness and insufficiency—know not what the future holds—am but a child; but here I am, Lord, if Thou canst use so humble and unworthy a vessel.”
The question was settled in my heart that day—settled for time and settled for eternity. An abiding peace came into my soul—a peace which has never left me. I knew that God had called me to the ministry—I knew not where, I cared not how it should be His will to have me serve Him. I had once and for all accepted that high calling, my life was in the hands of the Master to mold and to use as He should see fit.