Live in a simple, plain manner, without needless luxury on the one
hand or undue asceticism on the other. Preach fearlessly to the
hypocrites in the church, no matter what their social importance or
wealth. Show in some practical form His sympathy and love for the
common people as well as for the well-to-do, educated, refined
people who make up the majority of the parish. Identify Himself with
the great causes of humanity in some personal way that would call
for self-denial and suffering. Preach against the saloon in Raymond.
Become known as a friend and companion of the sinful people in the
Rectangle. Give up the summer trip to Europe this year. (I have been
abroad twice and cannot claim any special need of rest. I am well,
and could forego this pleasure, using the money for some one who
needs a vacation more than I do. There are probably plenty of such
people in the city.)
He was conscious, with a humility that was once a stranger to him,
that his outline of Jesus' probable action was painfully lacking in
depth and power, but he was seeking carefully for concrete shapes
into which he might cast his thought of Jesus' conduct. Nearly every
point he had put down, meant, for him, a complete overturning of the
custom and habit of years in the ministry. In spite of that, he
still searched deeper for sources of the Christ-like spirit. He did
not attempt to write any more, but sat at his desk absorbed in his
effort to catch more and more the spirit of Jesus in his own life.
He had forgotten the particular subject for his prayer meeting with
which he had begun his morning study.
He was so absorbed over his thought that he did not hear the bell
ring; he was roused by the servant who announced a caller. He had
sent up his name, Mr. Gray.
Maxwell stepped to the head of the stairs and asked Gray to come up.
So Gray came up and stated the reason for his call.
"I want your help, Mr. Maxwell. Of course you have heard what a
wonderful meeting we had Monday night and last night. Miss Winslow
has done more with her voice than I could do, and the tent won't
hold the people."
"I've heard of that. It is the first time the people there have
heard her. It is no wonder they are attracted."
"It has been a wonderful revelation to us, and a most encouraging
event in our work. But I came to ask if you could not come down
tonight and preach. I am suffering from a severe cold. I do not dare
trust my voice again. I know it is asking a good deal from such a
busy man. But, if you can't come, say so frankly, and I'll try
somewhere else."
"I'm sorry, but it's my regular prayer meeting night," began Henry
Maxwell. Then he flushed and added, "I shall be able to arrange it
in some way so as to come down. You can count on me."
Gray thanked him earnestly and rose to go.
"Won't you stay a minute, Gray, and let us have a prayer together?"
"Yes," said Gray simply.
So the two men kneeled together in the study. Henry Maxwell prayed
like a child. Gray was touched to tears as he knelt there. There was
something almost pitiful in the way this man who had lived his
ministerial life in such a narrow limit of exercise now begged for
wisdom and strength to speak a message to the people in the
Rectangle.
Gray rose and held out his hand. "God bless you, Mr. Maxwell. I'm
sure the Spirit will give you power tonight."
Henry Maxwell made no answer. He did not even trust himself to say
that he hoped so. But he thought of his promise and it brought him a
certain peace that was refreshing to his heart and mind alike.
So that is how it came about that when the First Church audience
came into the lecture room that evening it met with another
surprise. There was an unusually large number present. The prayer
meetings ever since that remarkable Sunday morning had been attended
as never before in the history of the First Church. Mr. Maxwell came
at once to the point.
"I feel that I am called to go down to the Rectangle tonight, and I
will leave it with you to say whether you will go on with this
meeting here. I think perhaps the best plan would be for a few
volunteers to go down to the Rectangle with me prepared to help in
the after-meeting, if necessary, and the rest to remain here and
pray that the Spirit power may go with us."
So half a dozen of the men went with the pastor, and the rest of the
audience stayed in the lecture room. Maxwell could not escape the
thought as he left the room that probably in his entire church
membership there might not be found a score of disciples who were
capable of doing work that would successfully lead needy, sinful men
into the knowledge of Christ. The thought did not linger in his mind
to vex him as he went his way, but it was simply a part of his whole
new conception of the meaning of Christian discipleship.
When he and his little company of volunteers reached the Rectangle,
the tent was already crowded. They had difficulty in getting to the
platform. Rachel was there with Virginia and Jasper Chase who had
come instead of the Doctor tonight.
When the meeting began with a song in which Rachel sang the solo and
the people were asked to join in the chorus, not a foot of standing
room was left in the tent. The night was mild and the sides of the
tent were up and a great border of faces stretched around, looking
in and forming part of the audience. After the singing, and a prayer
by one of the city pastors who was present, Gray stated the reason
for his inability to speak, and in his simple manner turned the
service over to "Brother Maxwell of the First Church."
"Who's de bloke?" asked a hoarse voice near the outside of the tent.
"De Fust Church parson. We've got de whole high-tone swell outfit
tonight."
"Did you say Fust Church? I know him. My landlord's got a front pew
up there," said another voice, and there was a laugh, for the
speaker was a saloon keeper.
"Trow out de life line 'cross de dark wave!" began a drunken man
near by, singing in such an unconscious imitation of a local
traveling singer's nasal tone that roars of laughter and jeers of
approval rose around him. The people in the tent turned in the
direction of the disturbance. There were shouts of "Put him out!"
"Give the Fust Church a chance!" "Song! Song! Give us another song!"
Henry Maxwell stood up, and a great wave of actual terror went over
him. This was not like preaching to the well-dressed, respectable,
good-mannered people up on the boulevard. He began to speak, but the
confusion increased. Gray went down into the crowd, but did not seem
able to quiet it. Maxwell raised his arm and his voice. The crowd in
the tent began to pay some attention, but the noise on the outside
increased. In a few minutes the audience was beyond his control. He
turned to Rachel with a sad smile.
"Sing something, Miss Winslow. They will listen to you," he said,
and then sat down and covered his face with his hands.
It was Rachel's opportunity, and she was fully equal to it. Virginia
was at the organ and Rachel asked her to play a few notes of the
hymn.
"Savior, I follow on,
Guided by Thee,
Seeing not yet the hand
That leadeth me.
Hushed be my heart and still
Fear I no farther ill,
Only to meet Thy will,
My will shall be."
Rachel had not sung the first line before the people in the tent
were all turned toward her, hushed and reverent. Before she had
finished the verse the Rectangle was subdued and tamed. It lay like
some wild beast at her feet, and she sang it into harmlessness. Ah!
What were the flippant, perfumed, critical audiences in concert
halls compared with this dirty, drunken, impure, besotted mass of
humanity that trembled and wept and grew strangely, sadly thoughtful
under the touch of this divine ministry of this beautiful young
woman! Mr. Maxwell, as he raised his head and saw the transformed
mob, had a glimpse of something that Jesus would probably do with a
voice like Rachel Winslow's. Jasper Chase sat with his eyes on the
singer, and his greatest longing as an ambitious author was
swallowed up in his thought of what Rachel Winslow's love might
sometimes mean to him. And over in the shadow outside stood the last
person any one might have expected to see at a gospel tent
service--Rollin Page, who, jostled on every side by rough men and
women who stared at the swell in fine clothes, seemed careless of
his surroundings and at the same time evidently swayed by the power
that Rachel possessed. He had just come over from the club. Neither
Rachel nor Virginia saw him that night.
The song was over. Maxwell rose again. This time he felt calmer.
What would Jesus do? He spoke as he thought once he never could
speak. Who were these people? They were immortal souls. What was
Christianity? A calling of sinners, not the righteous, to
repentance. How would Jesus speak? What would He say? He could not
tell all that His message would include, but he felt sure of a part
of it. And in that certainty he spoke on. Never before had he felt
"compassion for the multitude." What had the multitude been to him
during his ten years in the First Church but a vague, dangerous,
dirty, troublesome factor in society, outside of the church and of
his reach, an element that caused him occasionally an unpleasant
twinge of conscience, a factor in Raymond that was talked about at
associations as the "masses," in papers written by the brethren in
attempts to show why the "masses" were not being reached. But
tonight as he faced the masses he asked himself whether, after all,
this was not just about such a multitude as Jesus faced oftenest,
and he felt the genuine emotion of love for a crowd which is one of
the best indications a preacher ever has that he is living close to
the heart of the world's eternal Life. It is easy to love an
individual sinner, especially if he is personally picturesque or
interesting. To love a multitude of sinners is distinctively a
Christ-like quality.
When the meeting closed, there was no special interest shown. No one
stayed to the after-meeting. The people rapidly melted away from the
tent, and the saloons, which had been experiencing a dull season
while the meetings progressed, again drove a thriving trade. The
Rectangle, as if to make up for lost time, started in with vigor on
its usual night debauch. Maxwell and his little party, including
Virginia, Rachel and Jasper Chase, walked down past the row of
saloons and dens until they reached the corner where the cars
passed.
"This is a terrible spot," said the minister as he stood waiting for
their car. "I never realized that Raymond had such a festering sore.
It does not seem possible that this is a city full of Christian
disciples."
"Do you think any one can ever remove this great curse of drink?"
asked Jasper Chase.
"I have thought lately as never before of what Christian people
might do to remove the curse of the saloon. Why don't we all act
together against it? Why don't the Christian pastors and the church
members of Raymond move as one man against the traffic? What would
Jesus do? Would He keep silent? Would He vote to license these
causes of crime and death?"
He was talking to himself more than to the others. He remembered
that he had always voted for license, and so had nearly all his
church members. What would Jesus do? Could he answer that question?
Would the Master preach and act against the saloon if He lived
today? How would He preach and act? Suppose it was not popular to
preach against license? Suppose the Christian people thought it was
all that could be done to license the evil and so get revenue from
the necessary sin? Or suppose the church members themselves owned
the property where the saloons stood--what then? He knew that those
were the facts in Raymond. What would Jesus do?
He went up into his study the next morning with that question only
partly answered. He thought of it all day. He was still thinking of
it and reaching certain real conclusions when the EVENING NEWS came.
His wife brought it up and sat down a few minutes while he read to
her.
The EVENING NEWS was at present the most sensational paper in
Raymond. That is to say, it was being edited in such a remarkable
fashion that its subscribers had never been so excited over a
newspaper before. First they had noticed the absence of the prize
fight, and gradually it began to dawn upon them that the NEWS no
longer printed accounts of crime with detailed descriptions, or
scandals in private life. Then they noticed that the advertisements
of liquor and tobacco were dropped, together with certain others of
a questionable character. The discontinuance of the Sunday paper
caused the greatest comment of all, and now the character of the
editorials was creating the greatest excitement. A quotation from
the Monday paper of this week will show what Edward Norman was doing
to keep his promise. The editorial was headed: