With the beginning of the fourth chapter of Nehemiah there is a change in the story as told by the Prophet. There is a ring of triumph when he announces: "So built we the wall; and all the wall was joined together unto the half thereof; for the people had a mind to work," Nehemiah iv. 6. And the completeness of his work is described when he says: "Now it came to pa.s.s when the wall was built, and I had set up the doors, and the porters and the singers and the Levites were appointed ..."

Nehemiah vii. 1. I am sure it is quite true that out from all the despair which sometimes appals us, we shall come into the same complete victory. But if we are to win others to Christ and if our work is to be a work of prevention, so that our children shall not go astray and our friends may not wander, then it will be essential that we should, like Nehemiah of old, begin to build everyone over against his own house. It is a sad thing to find so many people in the world who are a public success and a private failure. Great superintendents of Sunday Schools, and poor fathers; experienced Sunday School teachers, and inconsistent in their own homes; eloquent preachers and poor ill.u.s.trations of the spirit of Jesus; famed for piety as revealed to the public eye and quite as famed for lack of piety, when living out of the lime light, in the common round of daily duties with those who know us best and ought to speak of us most highly.

If our work is to be as G.o.d would have it where shall it begin? By all means let it begin with ourselves. There is a text of Scripture which every Christian must say over and over. He might begin the day with it and it might not be amiss for him to say it over before he closes his eyes in sleep. "Search me, O G.o.d, and know my heart; try me and know my thoughts; and see if there be any wicked way in me," Psalm cx.x.xix. 23, 24. It is quite unnecessary to study the methods of men if we cannot bear the test of G.o.d's searching eye.

We must be right in our own homes. In a meeting conducted recently in Wales a gentleman rose to say: "I came to the meeting on Friday afternoon and made a covenant with G.o.d that I would speak to someone about Christ. It laid so hold of my heart that I went home and spoke to my little girl. I asked her if she loved the Lord Jesus Christ, and she said, 'Yes, I do.' I said, 'Will you accept Jesus as your personal Saviour?' 'Yes, I am willing to' she said. I went to the steel works, and had been praying that G.o.d would use me. I asked the young man with whom I was working if he were a Christian. He looked black at me, but I asked him to be honest before G.o.d. In a moment his face changed as he said without hesitation, 'I will accept Jesus as my Saviour now.'

"I was working during the night, and it came to food time, so I asked several of the men if they would come into the smith shop and have a word of prayer. There was a young man there whose little boy I had spoken to. This young man came to me at three o'clock in the morning to tell me that he would accept Jesus as his personal Saviour. I asked some of the men if they would come up to my house and have a little prayer meeting after work, at six o'clock in the morning. They came up and I spoke to them, quoting the texts John iii. 16 and John v. 24.

Some of the men present were not saved. I asked them if they really understood the Scriptures, and they told me they did. 'Now,' I said, 'will you not accept Jesus as your personal Saviour?' and one who was in the smith shop told me that he had definitely given himself to G.o.d at three o'clock that morning. Then I asked a boy of fifteen if he understood the words. 'Yes,' he said, so I asked him if he would not accept Christ. 'Yes' he replied, 'I will.' The following night I spoke to another in the works, concerning his soul, and asked him if he had fully surrendered, because I knew he was in trouble. About one o'clock I spoke to him and said, 'Will you give yourself to the Lord now?'

'No,' he said, 'not now.' 'Well,' I said, 'come to the smith shop at food time and have a word of prayer.' After food time he came out, and started again at his work. Presently he came across to me. 'Well,' I said, 'have you fully surrendered?' 'Yes, Tom,' he said, 'I have given myself to Christ, now.'"

Beginning in the home it is quite easy to go out into a wider circle and serve. The tendency, however, is to begin in some public place, and oftentimes because of this we fail to win those who work by our side, who sit with us at our own table and who live with us day after day and for whom we are specially responsible. It will also be necessary for us to enlarge the circle and reach the people in our own places of business.

Two business men journeyed into a New England city together for twenty years. One of them was a Christian, the other was not. They were both dying the same day, and the man who was not a Christian when he heard that his friend was dying, had a right to say to his wife, as he did, "It is a strange thing that my friend and I have known each other so well, and love each other so dearly, that he has allowed me to come to this day without a warning."

A business man rose in a meeting to say, "I have been greatly concerned about one young man who works in my office. I asked him if he would not come to the office a little earlier this morning. When he came and we were alone I asked him if he knew why I had got him to come a little earlier. When he told me that he did not, I said to him 'I am a Christian, I have never spoken to you about Christ and I have asked you to come this morning that I might explain the way to you and urge you to take your stand for Him.' That morning I had the great joy of leading my employee to Christ. I gave him a little pocket Testament in which I wrote his name, and under his name I wrote this Scripture, 'Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee,' and after that I signed my name. Three days later," said the business man, "the young man of whom I speak, led three others to Christ, one of them was the head book-keeper in my office."

If we are to be successful soul winners it is essential not only that we should get right with G.o.d but that we should keep right with Him.

There must be a quick confession of sin and a quick turning away from all that would work against Christ. Our friends with whom we live and labour are keen critics, and as a rule, just ones. They know when we are wrong and nothing so hinders a testimony as to allow a wrong to go unrighted. When before our own households and with those who know us best, and by whose side we toil, in shop, or store, or office, or with those whom we employ, we keep ourselves unspotted from the world, we have an unanswerable argument for Christ and a testimony as regards the value of following Him which cannot be gainsayed.

CHAPTER V

_No Man cared for my Soul_

"No man cared for my soul," Psalm cxlii. 4. All about us people are saying these words, and they really think we do not care. I believe there has never been a story of a man in which was found more contrast than in this account of the man who sobs out the words, "No man cared for my soul." He is a shepherd boy, then a king, a saint, writing the twenty-third Psalm, then suddenly turned into a sinner blackening the pages of the Old Testament with the story of his transgressions. The world has not had better poetry than that which came from the heart and brain of this marvellous man. In addition to all this, he is a musician, and all through the Psalms he is keeping time to heaven's music until, when he comes to the close of the Psalter, he stands like the leader of a mighty chorus, and calls upon every living breathing being to praise the Lord. He is a pursuer of men, and the hosts of the enemy run and cry and flee before him.

Suddenly the scene is changed. He is himself pursued. He is in the cave of Engedi. The cave is dark, and it is in the gloom that we hear him crying out, "I looked upon my right hand and beheld, but there was no man that would know me: refuge failed me." And as he said this I think he must have said, with a sob, "No man cared for my soul." But it is not my intention so much to tell the story of this man whose life was so filled with contrasts, but rather to speak of those who live to-day, and who think they have a right to use the same words as the Psalmist, "No man cared for my soul."

They walk on the streets of our cities; they live in our homes; they meet us in our places of business; they are members of our circle of friends; they know that we are Christians, and they are often thinking or saying, "No man cared for my soul." It is strange that we should permit this, because we read in the Bible, "He that believeth not is condemned already." "He that hath not the Son of G.o.d hath not life, but the wrath of G.o.d abideth on him." It seems strange that one could say he believes the Bible to be true; that he accepts these statements concerning the one who is not a Christian, and yet lives and works and a.s.sociates with him and never speaks to him about the salvation of his soul.

It would seem as if they at least had a right to say, "No man _seems_ to care." But some may say, "They have the Church, and the doors are wide open; they have the minister, and his message is faithful." Yet, the average man who sits in church and listens to the most impa.s.sioned appeal of the preacher, rarely considers the sermon personal. He finds himself saying, sometimes against his will, that the preacher is professional, that his plea is perfunctory, and so he goes out of church and says again, "No man _seems_ to care for my soul."

There came into my church in an Eastern city a man who worshipped with us for a time. His family were in the mountains. I made it a rule never to allow one to attend the church that I did not speak to him personally.

One day I called on this business man. He took me into his private office. When I took him by the hand I said, "I have come to ask you to be a Christian." He looked at me in amazement; and I said, "I am not asking you to join my church, that may not be the church of your choice, but I am asking you to be a Christian." He drew his hand out of mine, walked away to the window, and stood looking down upon the busy street for fully five minutes. I thought I had offended him. Then he came back, and, brushing the tears out of his eyes, he took my hand again and said, "It is the first invitation to be a Christian I have ever had in all my life. n.o.body ever asked me before. My mother never asked me; my wife has never asked me; no minister has ever asked me." Then, sinking back into the chair by his table, he used the words which are almost identical with the words of David, "I thought no one cared."

Such men are all around us; men in deepest need; men with sore aching hearts. There was a man in an American city who occupied a high position among men. He took his own life. Under the stress of political excitement he misappropriated the funds of the bank, thinking he could repay them, and in his beautiful home he put the revolver to his temple and shot himself. The saddest letter I have ever seen was written by that man. He wrote to his wife asking her forgiveness. He told her to pray for the children whom he had dishonoured. Then he concluded his farewell letter with this statement: "Through all the months I have been wishing somebody would speak to me about becoming a Christian." In the light of such facts I believe that what we need in these days is not so much, more men to preach--although that would be a great blessing--as people in the church who will be absolutely consistent. If they say they believe G.o.d's Word to be true, they must speak to those over whom they have an influence, about the personal acceptance of Christ.

I was waiting one day outside the office of the Governor of one the Western States, and while I waited, the Lieutenant-Governor spoke to me. He said, "I was in your service last night, and I want to take issue with you on what you said. You told your hearers to go up and down the streets asking the people to become Christians. I think if anyone should come into my office and ask me to become a Christian I should tell him to go about his business." "You surely misunderstood me," I said; "what I told them was this, that if a business man was not a Christian, his friend who is a Christian ought to speak to him kindly about his soul." I had been introduced to the Lieutenant-Governor by one of the great politicians of the State, who was a sincere Christian, and I said, "Suppose our mutual friend here should come to you and say, 'I am a Christian. I think it is the best thing for a man to be a Christian. I am not always what I would like to be myself, but I should like to invite you to become a Christian.' Then suppose he should tell you what a strength and help it had been to him, what would you say to him?" He looked at me for a moment, and said, "I think I should say 'Thank you.'" I am sure thousands could be won to Jesus Christ if the members of the Church were consistent in the matter of living in Christ and giving an invitation to people to become acquainted with Him.

It is not fair to charge the minister with being professional, nor to say that in his appeal he is perfunctory. Nor is it always just to criticize those who are in the church, for not speaking to the unsaved, for there may be an explanation. Sometimes we feel a sense of our own unworthiness. There are business men who know that if they should speak to their employees, the first speech would have to be a confession of failure. There are women who know that if they should go to their husbands or children, and ask them to come to Christ, they would have first of all to say, "You must forgive my inconsistency." There are fathers who know that they could not go to their homes and call their children around them, and bid them come to Christ without first saying, "You must forgive your father." But if a confession is necessary, then make it. It is sometimes a sense of unworthiness that seals one's lips, but remember if you have a friend who is not a Christian, and to whom you have never spoken of Christ, your friend counts you inconsistent because of your failure.

I said to the officers in my church one evening, "How many of you have ever led a soul to Christ?" About half of them said they never had. One officer said, "That is a sharp question for me. If you will excuse me I will go home and speak to my children, to-night." He did so, and I received two of his sons into the church shortly after.

Again, we seem to have failed to warn our friends because we have such a slight conception of the meaning of the word "Lost." A mother in Chicago one day carried her little baby over to the doctor, and said, "Doctor, look into this baby's eyes, something has gone wrong with them." The doctor took the little child and held it in his arms so that the light would strike its face, He gazed at it only for a moment, then, putting it back into its mother's arms, he shook his head, and the mother said quickly, "Doctor, what is it?" And he said, "Madam, your baby is going blind. There is no power in this world that can make him see." She held the baby in her arms close up against her heart.

Then with a cry she fell to the floor in a swoon, saying as she fell, "My G.o.d--blind!" I think any parent must know how she felt. But Jesus said, "Better to be maimed, and halt, and blind than to be lost."

If you believe the Bible you cannot be indifferent. But you say, some would not like to have you speak to them. I have been twenty-seven years a minister, and have spoken to all cla.s.ses and conditions of men and women, and only in one single instance have I ever been rebuked. I was once asked to speak to the president of a bank. I went into his office, and was introduced to him by the pastor with whom I was staying.

I said, "My friend is very interested in you, and I wish I could lead you to Christ." He looked at me in perfect amazement. Then, rising from the chair, he took me by the hand, and said, "Thank you, sir." I saw him that night, make his way down the crowded aisle of the church, give the minister his hand, and say, "I will."

But I had a sad experience at college. I roomed with a man when I was a student for the ministry, and never spoke to him about his soul. When the day of my graduation came, and I was bidding him good-bye, he said, "By the way, why have you never spoken to me about becoming a Christian?"

I would rather he had struck me. I said, "Because I thought you did not care." "Care!" he said. "There has never been a day that I did not want you to speak; there has never been a night that I did not hope you would speak." I lost an opportunity. I fear some day, I must answer for it.

You had an idea that you had no influence, but you must remember that when you speak in the name of Jesus Christ, G.o.d stands back of you; that when you plead for the salvation of a person, all the power of heaven is working through you. Some may ask, What is the best time to speak to my friends about Christ? I should say, speak to them when they are in trouble, seek them out when others are being saved, but, best of all, go to them when the Spirit of G.o.d says go, that is the best time.

Whenever G.o.d says "Go," He is always making ready the heart for our coming. I was one day walking down the streets of an American city with a Methodist minister, when he said to me, "What would you do if you were impressed that you should speak to a man?" I said, "Speak to him."

He said, "But this man has not been in church for thirteen years."

"Nevertheless," I said, "speak to him." He turned and made his way to the great house where this business man lived. He rang the bell, and the door was opened by the gentleman himself, who said, "Doctor, I am glad to see you. I have been in all day thinking you might come." And in a very few minutes he was kneeling in the library with this gentleman whom he quickly led to Christ.

A year later I was pa.s.sing through the city of Chicago, when, picking up a newspaper, I noticed that this man whom the minister had won to Christ, had died suddenly. I got a letter from the minister not long afterwards, and he said, "I was with him when he died. He sent a messenger for me to come and see him, and when I arrived he turned his face towards mine and said, "Dr ----, thank you for coming that day, for if you had missed that day, I might have missed this. Then he began to sing as best he could. He raised himself on his pillow, with his arms outreaching, and said, "Jesus Lover of My soul," and pa.s.sed away.

The minister's letter was marked with tears, and down at the foot of it was written this sentence; "G.o.d helping me, I will never hesitate again." They are all about us, men with aching hearts, men caught by the power of sin, young people and older people as well. They are waiting. Preaching may not win them; singing may not touch them. But personal effort will.

I might change the text and make it read: "The world does not care for your soul," You may win it, and it will mock you. Satan does not care for your soul. He will fascinate you and snare you, and when you say, "Oh, wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" there will be no deliverance. But G.o.d cares. Christ cares. The minister cares, and thousands of others care. Some are saying, "What must I do to be a Christian?" A gentleman once said to me, "I do not love G.o.d." Another person once said, "You talk about love for Christ; is it like love for my mother, because if it is I have not got it." No, it is not like that. That is not the first step in the way. Tell them G.o.d does not say, "Love me, and I will save you." G.o.d says, "Trust me.

Accept my conditions, believe on my Son and follow Him."

There was a great man in a Western city who had a little girl who was deaf and dumb. He loved his child so much that he would not allow anybody to teach her. She had a kind of sign language which they both understood, but n.o.body else was allowed to teach her. This gentleman at one time had occasion to leave home and go abroad. He could not take his daughter with him, so his minister persuaded him to send her over to an inst.i.tution where she could be taught to use the sign language of the deaf and dumb. He took her over himself, never for a moment imagining that she would learn to speak with her lips, as she did. The months pa.s.sed by, and when the father returned, the minister went with him to see his child in the inst.i.tution. The little girl had been told that he was coming, and looking out of the window she saw her father coming through the gate. She sprang to the door, and ran down the steps, and along the walk until she reached her father. Then she climbed up into his arms, and, putting her lips up against his ear, she said, "Father, I love you, I love you." The great man held her out at arm's length, looked into her face, then pressed her more closely to his heart and fell in a faint--when he recovered consciousness he was sobbing. All the day he kept saying, "I have heard her speak, and she loves me, she loves me." So tell the people very plainly that G.o.d does not say, "Love me." He says, "Believe on me; trust me; follow me." Then ask them, Will you do it? And if they will follow Him, having accepted His Son as their Saviour, and with his help having turned from sin, then if they will obey Him, they will come to love Him with all their hearts.

CHAPTER VI

_Winning the Young_

"There is a lad here," John vi. 9. Jesus had just crossed over the sea of Galilee and, attracted by the miracles which he had wrought, great mult.i.tudes had followed after Him. In order that He might escape the throng, He went up into a mountain and there He sat with His disciples.

When the Master saw the great company stretching out on every side of Him He said unto Philip, "Whence shall we buy bread that these may eat." Philip was so amazed at the crowd that he answered Him, "Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may take a little." Then one of His disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, said unto Him, "_There is a lad here_ which hath five barley loaves and two small fishes." Then Jesus made the mult.i.tude sit down, and took the loaves and gave to the disciples, and the disciples to them that were seated, and likewise of the fishes as much as they would, and when they were filled, the fragments that remained filled twelve baskets.

The presence of this lad and the service which he rendered to Jesus, as well as the use which the Master made of him, all help us to teach our lesson. Youth is the time to turn to Christ. The wise man knew this when he said, "Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth; while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh; when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them." Sin has not so strong a hold upon a life in the time of youth, therefore it is the easiest time to turn to Christ.

I once heard a man tell the story of his special work among outcast men and women, and when I asked him he told me how he himself was converted.

He said that as a boy in London, he was left one day in charge of the private office. He said "I wanted to write a letter and I took the firm's note-paper; I used one of their envelopes, and when I wanted postage I opened the private drawer of the safe, the door of which was swinging open, and took out one postage stamp, and when I put this stamp upon my letter and dropped it into the post-box I felt as if I had dropped my character with it. That was the beginning, and the end was a prison cell, for I went from one form of thieving to another until I was obliged to pay the penalty. I found Christ while I was in prison, but I feel as if the mark of my early sin would never leave me. I would urge every boy to accept Christ," he said, "before the cords of sin bind him too securely."

When one reaches the age of eighteen he finds it extremely difficult to turn away from the sins that are mastering him, and when he pa.s.ses beyond twenty years of age, the tide against him is extremely heavy.

The critical time in the life of boys and girls is from twelve to twenty. If they do not accept Christ during these years, it is wellnigh impossible to win them. If this is true then we must make the most of the opportunities of influencing the youth whom G.o.d is ever bringing before us.

The Scripture used in connection with this feeding of the mult.i.tude is a good ill.u.s.tration. It is a lad who confronts us, and this is, as has been said, the favourable time for bringing Christian influence to bear upon him. There is a time in the life of every boy when it is comparatively easy to win him to Christ. Parents surely know this, and Sunday school teachers may easily discover it. "How did you come to Christ?" said a New York minister to a little boy. His reply was, "My Sunday school teacher took me last Sunday out into the park. She drew me away from the crowd and took her seat beside me. She asked me if I would become a Christian. I felt that I ought to do so, and because her invitation was so definite, and she seemed so interested, I told her I would do so, and because I am a Christian I went to join the Church."

Too much cannot be said in favour of reaching the young while they are in the days of their youth. Recently in an audience of 4500 people I found that at least 400 of the audience came to Christ under 10 years of age; between 10 and 12, 600; between 12 and 14, 600; between 14 and 16, about 1000; between 16 and 20, fully one half, and in the entire audience not more than 25 people came to Christ after they were 30 years of age. Five hundred ministers were in the same audience. The majority of them were converted before they were 16 years of age; 40 of them between 16 and 20; and only 15 out of the 500 ministers were converted after they were 20. This in itself is an unanswerable argument in favour of personal work for the young.

The lad is here now before us, but he will soon be gone. Boys quickly grow into manhood. As a rule religious influence weakens as they pa.s.s on, while the power of sin increases. Many young men would turn to Christ if they thought they could, but it seems to them that the attraction towards evil is almost, if not quite irresistible. I recently heard a Christian gentleman speaking before a great audience in London. He was telling of his going over the Alps in the care of a trusted guide. As they came to one of the most dangerous places in the journey his guide stopped him, and said, "Do you see those footprints off here to the right?" The gentleman said he did, plainly. "Do you notice," said the guide, "how they get farther and farther apart?" And when asked to give an explanation he said that a week before a young telegraph operator had attempted to cross the mountains without a guide, that just at the place where they were standing his hat blew off, and, without thinking, he reached out after it, lost his balance and started to fall. In trying to recover himself he started down the mountain to the right. The way was all covered with snow; when once he started he could not stop; farther and farther apart were his footprints until at last they were lost on the edge of a great abyss. He had gone over to his death. It is thus that young men go to destruction. Because they do, we ought to be instant in season and out of season in seeking to arrest their downward progress.

When Jesus took the loaves and fishes in the possession of the lad and brought to bear upon them his own marvellous power, the results were great. No one realises what is being accomplished when he a.s.sists or influences a boy. I am wondering what that minister, who led Spurgeon to Christ, thinks of his work now that he sees it from the heavenly standpoint, and I have many times thought I should like to ask the business man who spoke to D.L. Moody about his soul, what estimate he puts upon the importance of the work he did that day. To win a boy to Christ may be to turn towards the Master one who may one day move the world for Christ.

A great number of Chinese young men have come from their native land to study in the educational inst.i.tutions of the United States. Some of them have found Christ in these inst.i.tutions, others have pa.s.sed through their course of study and returned to their native land without a hope in the Saviour. What a marvellous work might have been accomplished if the Christian students in these educational inst.i.tutions had set themselves to win these Chinese boys. The students in China are to have an increasing influence in the Government, and if the majority of them had been led to Christ, the whole Chinese Government might have been powerfully affected. Some years ago there came to the United States a little Chinese boy. He was sent to a New England educational inst.i.tution, and made his home in the house of a very humble woman. She knew Christ and loved Him, and she recognised the presence of this little boy as presenting an opportunity for service. She treated him as if he were her own child. She mothered him and grew to love him. She taught him how to read the Bible and she told him the story of Jesus and His love.

That little boy came to Christ. He pa.s.sed through the educational inst.i.tution, went back to China to exercise his strongest influence for righteousness, and has recently been entrusted with the commission of bringing to the United States a number of other Chinese boys, all of whom, it is said, he will place in inst.i.tutions that are Christian. The poor woman in New England did not realise that when she led one boy to Christ that she was touching forty others. This is the fascination of Christian work.

Some of the n.o.blest men and women the Church has ever known came to Christ in youth. Polycarp, Matthew Henry, Jonathan Edwards, the immortal Watts, John Hall, and a countless host of others who have served conspicuously in the advancement of the Kingdom of G.o.d, came to Christ before they were fifteen years of age, some of them coming as early as seven. The lad is here, it will be a pity if we allow him to grow to manhood without a hope in Christ all because we do not seek to win him.