Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 99, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 April 1912 — THE VALUE OF A DEFINITE MESSAGE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THE VALUE OF A DEFINITE MESSAGE

By Rev. H. W. Pope,

a iTi ’ —l* -of Men of MMdhßftb fatiuia

TEXT—Tlila then Is the message which we have heard of Him, and declare unto you.—l John 1*„ The world has always oven willing to listen to a man with a real message

from heaven. Since the days of JOhn the Baptist whenever an/ow* has manifestly' been sent from Gqd, and haw borne witness of the truth, the people have turned out to hear from. Luther.-in his day/, and Wesley and Whitefleld In their, were recognized as true messengers of God. brought another

great thought from heaven, and Robert Raikes another. In our own land' Dwight L. Moody and Francis EL Clark and Frances Willard have each been the bearer of rich messages from God, All these have met with stout opposition, for “My thoughts are not your thoughts, saith the Lqrd,” and yet eventually their message has been received, and has been incorporated Into the life of the church. One accent of the Holy Ghost, The heedless world hath neyer lost. i That God has for f&||| church of today no one can doubt Never was there an age which neededdivine wisdom more than ours. Great problems confront us, great dangers threaten us. Many of God’s people seem dazed by the difficulties them, and cry out in pitiful tones, “Who is sufficient for these things?” Instead of waiting upon God for a renewal of their strengthJjjthey resort to all manner fff worldly expedients to gain the attention of the fickle crowd,; Others recognizing clearly the same difficulties and dangers are: clamoring, loudly for “A man with a message.” Why should not every Christian be “A man with a message?" Was it not said iff our day, “I will pour out my spirit upon.all flesh; and your sons, and your daughters shall, prophesy, and your young men shall see visions and your old men shall dream dreams?” Was it not said of all believers, “Ye shall be witnesses unto How to Obtain a Messages- 4| There are grave difficulties in the way of even those who are busiest ti| the service of God. This is an age of hurry and worry, and unless we are> very careful we shall fall Into the it of the age, and allow ourselves to be robbed dt that quiet and repos*: which is essential to a deep acquaint*! ance with God. Somehow We must** get time to be alone with God, timeto let the truth as it is in Jesus fllteil down through our being until oar ' whole life is saturated with its spirit,*! So shall we come forth from closets each day with the dew otj> heaven upon our hearts, and with a| fresh message upon our lips. “He that! hath an ear to bear, let him hear whatj the spirit saith unto the churches.*'! Avoid the Danger. |j It Is a dangerous thing to knoili God’s 1 wil! and not do it And one of; the most perilous things a Christians can do, is to try to hold his own sisi|| ply, and not go forward into the deeff| things of God when thus led by thig spirit I have read of a Christian ma§| who became so engrossed in his business that be largely lost his fellow*! ship with God. After a while his bu*i| ness began to fail; he found that injg few weeks the vein of coal from whici| he had been drawing his suppllw would be exhausted, and all his investment would be useless. He was alsi| impressed that bis business trouble!! were due to bis departure from Ge||f and this led him to much prayer. One night in a dream a voice geemjf| to say to him, “Go deeper.” It seemed to him to be the voice of God, aad s led to an entire transformation of l|H life. As be entered upon a closers walk with God his heart was with new joy and power. But atiH voice kept speaking to him so pejl| sistently that be began to think &|£| something to do with his business. ’ And so one day be proposed to foreman that they should abandon 811 old vein of coal, and sink a new shafts with a view of finding a deeper staNgl Hie foreman ridiculed the idea for the indications were against it But# he insisted and at length a shaft wBH sunk, and after th*y had gone dqjfl| a reasonable distance they ctrackfflHL a vein of coal, but 10, an im J|S| vein of iron, and suddenly the Wfigm rupt miner found himself a ihHUIB Is hot this God’s message tp ua td(t" day, “Go deeper? 1 ’ ' If we M .. > bsv<3 exhausted all the there is in our ‘present egg truth, let us enter into the deep ftingsL of God, depths of wisdom, O my soul, deeper yet>hour' Too can never tell bv the'leneth of a man’s Just what he wiß~do ||

William Carey