106 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



to the city, so he got discouraged and thought, what is the use of 

 keeping up the church, why not close the doors. He had heard 

 about the great churches down in the city and what they were 

 doing there, and one year, he said to his wife, "Wife, at vacation 

 time this year, instead of going into the country and up north, 

 let's go to New York City and see some of the work going on there 

 in the big churches." They spent a month in New York. The 

 Sabbath after his return he got up in his pulpit and said to his 

 people, "Beloved, I want to tell you why it is we are working here, 

 why it is God is having us live here. He is doing it in order that 

 there may be elders and deacons furnished for New York City 

 churches." And then he called the roll of men down in New York 

 whom he had met that had come from that little rural church, and 

 who were trained there for God. That is work, and if the highest 

 Christian work is a sacrifice, if the highest service we offer unto 

 God is to minister and not to be ministered unto, the country church 

 .stands at the head of them all. 



I would call your attention to the change of population. Let 

 me illustrate by something in my own family's history. My grand- 

 father came from Vermont to Northern Ohio, to the old western 

 reserve. In his day that was the west; there was nothing there 

 but Indians. They came in colonies; his brothers came and two 

 sisters and another relative, five families in all. They made that 

 hard and long trip across the mountains and through the woods — 

 it was all mountains and woods at that time — taking weeks and 

 months to make the trip. My grandfather took his bride on such 

 a wedding trip through that district. Well, they were all from the 

 same church, from the same family. What was more natural, then, 

 that in that community — a thousand or two acres that they pur- 

 chased at that time and settled up — what is more natural than that 

 church should be a Presbyterian church. That was the one they 

 belonged to in the old home. Here another colony comes along; 

 another community springs up and so the churches that have given 

 to the country nine-tenths of the ministers, as I said before, started 

 from such little colonies, from people belonging to different 

 churches. This is all changed now, the homes are broken up, and 

 people moving to town do not ask what church it is the tenant 

 belongs to, but, "Is he a good farmer and has he got the money to 

 pay the rent?" This is one reason why the country church has a 

 real serious problem. Then another reason is denominationalism. 

 I want to tell you something tonight; I believe the devil has had 



