Across the street, under the shadow of two wide-spreading elms, stands
a very modest cottage nestled in vines and flowers, with curtains
drawn up to let in the light of God's blessed sun, and an ever-open
door with a great chair in full view, holding out its time-worn arms,
as if to invite and welcome in the weary passer-by. The birds are
always remembered here in their times of scarcity, and so in token of
their gratitude, they gather in the trees and carol out sweet and
merry songs by way of paying their bills.
God's peace, as well as his plenty, rests on this place, and while its
owners call it, in their hearts, "God's house," they speak of it to
others, always as "our house."
Twenty-five years ago a sturdy, brave-hearted young mechanic bought
this one acre of land, and with his own hands dug and walled a cellar,
at times when he had no work to do for others. When he had earned an
additional hundred or two dollars he bought lumber and began to build
a house. People asked him what he was going to do with it, and he
replied that if he should live to finish it, he was going to live in
it.
Well, in two years the house was finished, to the last nail and hook.
Then he went away, as it was thought, for a wife. In a week he
returned, bringing with him some neat household furniture, and three
persons instead of only one.
He did bring a wife--a bright-eyed, merry-hearted young girl--and
also two aged women, "our mothers," as he called them.
The first night in the house they dedicated their humble home--"our
house" to God, and in the name of the Lord they set up their banner,
praying that ever after this his banner over them might be love.
Many a family moves into a new home and asks God to come in and
prosper them, and take up his abode there; but they do nothing to draw
him thither. They begin for self, and go on for self; and sometimes
God leaves them to themselves.
But the young owners of "our house"--the children of "our
mothers"--made their little home His home and the home of His poor
and feeble ones. "Our mothers" now laid down the weapons of toil over
which they had grown gray, and came out of the vale of honest poverty
into the sunshine of plenty. Their hearts grew warm in this gift of
double love. They renewed their youth.
In their first days at their children's home, one of "our mothers"
spoke of "Henry's new house," when he checked her, saying, "Never call
this my house again. I built it for God and for all of you, and I want
it always called 'our house.' There is yet one thing I want done here
before I shall feel that I have made my thank-offering to God for the
health and strength and the work which have enabled me to build and
pay for this house. I promised then that no stranger or wanderer
should ever go hungry or weary from this door. You have made sure of a
neat and sunny room for our friends. Now I want a bed, a chair, and a
table put in the shed-chamber for such strangers as we cannot ask into
the house. I want also to fill the little store-closet under the back
stairway with provisions to give the needy. They will then not be our
own; and if at any time we should be short of money, we will not be
tempted to say, 'I have nothing to give.' I want to live for more than
self, and I know you all share the feeling. I want to feel that God is
here, and to live as if we saw him and were all under his actual
guidance and care, and to realize that he sees and approves our way in
life."
Thus was "our house" opened, and thus was it kept--a home sanctified
to humanity and to God.
The years rolled away, not without changes, but peace and plenty still
reign in the modest home whose owners are looked up to by all the
town's people--rich as well as poor--as friends and benefactors; for
all men alike need human sympathy and comfort.
The young carpenter of twenty-five years ago, is now a prosperous
builder in the great city near his home. He could afford to erect and
occupy a house worth four times what the cottage cost. But he loves
the place, and cannot tear himself from it. He has added more than one
L to it, and he has refurnished it, and brought into it many articles
of taste and luxury.
When asked why he does not build a house more in accordance with his
means, he replies:--
"No house could be built which would be like 'our house.' I can never
forget the night we and our mothers dedicated it to God in prayer and
simple trust; and ever since that night I have felt as if we were
dwelling in the secret of his tabernacle, under the shadow of the
Almighty. We might have a larger and more fashionable house, but it
would bring a weight of care on its mistress, and steal the time she
has made sacred to others. No other house could have the memories this
one has; no other house be hallowed as this house has been by the
prayers of the holy and the blessings of the poor."
And so the family still live on and are happy in "our house." Still
the pastor's weary wife is relieved of church company, for, from force
of habit, all ministers and others on errands of good, draw up their
horses before the well-filled stable, and ring, for themselves, at
this open door. Still the poor are fed from that store-closet under
the back stairway; still the wanderer--though he be a wanderer in a
double sense--rests his weary head in that shed-chamber.
The squire wonders at the builder, because he lives in such a modest
way compared with his means, and says, "If I were he, I'd be ashamed
of that cottage which was all well enough when he was a young
journeyman."
The builder wonders what the squire does with all that great house,
and why, when half a dozen rooms are empty there, he doesn't allow
himself the pleasure of company, and of sheltering strangers and
getting the blessing they bring.
The squire's wife peeps through her fine curtains, and says, "I wonder
that pretty and intelligent woman hasn't more taste. She might live
like a lady if she pleased, and dress as I do; but she pokes on just
as she began, and dresses no better than the minister's wife, and has
a rabble of poor, forlorn creatures whom I wouldn't let into my house,
nor into my wood-shed, running after her for food and clothing, and
nobody knows what."
So you see, "my house" is literally "my house," and "our house" is
God's house.