188? 



GLEANINGS IN BiilU CULTURE. 



4sl 



bring happiness, neither does i)roperty, nor 

 having plenty of help an<l plenty of money 

 to pay your help promptly. On the con- 

 trary, these things bring trials that many 

 know nothing of. I have sometimes thought 

 Satan seemed to take it for granted that 

 plenty of money would spoil the best Chris- 

 tian, and that his best chance was to lay 

 siege to the Christian who had been i)ros- 

 pered in this world's goods. Some of you 

 may have thought it would be nice to have 

 people to do your work for you. My friend, 

 when you have once had the burden on 

 your shoulders, of keeping one hundred or 

 more men at work, and at work in a way 

 that will be profitable to you and to them- 

 selves, you may change your mind about it. 

 It may be nice and pleasant for a while ; but 

 when "the novelty wears off, and when you 

 find that you are harnessed up, and that 

 your time" is not your own, and that your 

 brains, yoiu* muscles, and your surplus en- 

 ergy, are not your own, yon may pine for 

 freedom. 



Now, I do not complain of my lot in life ; 

 I do not mean to complain t)f the work 

 whereunto God has called me. At first 

 thought I might say, if Satan would just let 

 me alone, and take his fingers off from me 

 entirely, then I should be satisfied ; but if 

 God has, in his infinite wisilom, seen fit to 

 test and try me, perhaps iu a very small 

 measure as he did his servant Job, then I 

 hope I am willing to say, " Amen ; thy will, 

 not mine, be done.'' 



It may be a simple matter to some Chris- 

 tians to keep iii heart as well as deed this 

 first commandment— •' Thou shalt. have no 

 otlier gods before me ;" but it has not been 

 by any means an easy task for me to keep 

 this command as I think it ought to be kept. 

 The question may be asked, " IIow shall we 

 know when we are letting any of the things 

 of this world get where they are in danger 

 of coming before God?" My test is this: 

 Whenever any thing takes so much of my 

 thought and time that it seems to stand be- 

 tween me and God, I feci I am surely in 

 danger of breaking the first commandment. 

 AVhenever you are so absorbed in business, 

 pleasure, or in laying plans for this world, 

 that you are forgetting your Maker, and 

 seem to be getting away from him, then are 

 you in danger. The sense of this danger 

 seems to be more acute with me when the 

 time comes for me to write these Home Pa- 

 pers. WJien the printers inform me that 

 they are ready for Our Homes, then comes 

 a test of my spirituality. If I have been get- 

 ting off the track, my faith and love toward 

 God seem to be dull and cold. At such 

 times I often feel myself totally unfit for any 

 such sacred office as ministering to those 

 who are hungering for the bread of life ; 

 and woe betide me if any thing that has 

 happened dims my sense of the presence of 

 Gods love in my heart. Sometimes these 

 things that seem to come between my men- 

 tal vision and God come in such strange and 

 unexpected ways— in such guise, as it were, 

 that I fail to detect the presence of Satan, 

 until I begin to feel my spirituality gone. 

 Sometimes a disposition takes hold of me to 

 have my own w^ay, no matter what may be 



the consequences. Again, Satan whispers 

 that I can not help myself ; the tide of af- 

 fairs is sweeping me along without my being 

 to blame at all. At another time the things 

 of this world that come between me and 

 God's love seem to be too great for all my 

 strengtli. Even going off by myself does not 

 always seem to answer. They get between 

 me and (iod, even wiiile on bended knees. 

 I will now tell you how 1 have triumphed 

 over Satan in such cases. 



You have perhaps noticed a child that 

 had got his temper up, and it seemed almost 

 impossible to conquer it. May be you have 

 seen a boy in school who be"liaved as if he 

 would die rather than give up ; or two men 

 engaged in a lawsuit. They seem deter- 

 mined to lose all jthe property they have, in 

 a contest that is insignificant. Well, a good 

 many times there is wisdom in dodging such 

 issues. I think there is wisdom in the parent 

 who evades the necessity of stirring up a 

 child's stubbornness and evil temper; the 

 same with the boy in school, and the same 

 with a neighbor. May be you think it 

 strange that I should talk about dodging 

 Satan. Well, I have dodged him a good 

 many times, and I will tell you how I do it. 

 He plants himself right before me. If 

 I stop and look at him, or argue the case, it 

 seems as if he comes out best— at least I 

 never get ahead of him in that way. If I go 

 off by myself to pray, if I dont look out he 

 is before me, even there. Now. then, /io?r 

 shall we dodge him? Why, my good friends, 

 if you are ever in such a predicament, just 

 use your plain common sense. Pick up a 

 hoe and go out into the field and hoe pota- 

 toes until yon are tired and hungry; or, 

 better still, busy your mind and body in 

 something that will do somebody some good, 

 and keep busy.* Raise potatoes if nothing 

 else offers. Put your heart and soul into it. 

 and, before you know it, God's love will 

 come into your heart again, and you will 

 feel the approving voice, '' Well done, thou 

 good and faithful servant." To tell the 

 truth, that is just where I stand this morn- 

 ing. I tried facing Satan, and did not make 

 any headway. I left him, and, naturally 

 enough, when I got busy with mind and 

 body, in some good work, 1 had soon forgot- 

 ten all about him, and was surprised when I 

 discovered that he was gone. At such times 

 a peace comes into my mind that I can not 

 exactly describe. It is the peace that God 

 gives to every one wiio has dropped and 

 abandoned folly, and chosen wisdom— toone 

 who, by his acts in life, as well as by words, 

 has declared he has no other god in the wide 

 universe than the one true God wiio created 

 the heavens and the earth. To him he is 

 loyal, honest, and true. IntheGospel Hymns 

 is a verse composed from the text, " He said 



* When Moody was in Cleveland some years asro, 

 some leading- skeptics and infidels wanted to discuss 

 the matter with him. They challeng-ed him to meet 

 them and arg-iie the case. He refused to arjz-ue or 

 discuss with them. When somebody protested 

 against such a course, and asked an explanation, he 

 replied, " My friends, I have no time." And he was 

 right. The man who is doing good to his fellow- 

 men in the way that Moody was and is. has no time 

 to discuss theology, and a great many times we 

 waste our time, and get ourselves into trouble, by 

 attempting to discuss or dally with Satan. 



