An Army with Banners
The man who is right with God will not be wrong with anything that is
good.--BILLY SUNDAY.
The oldest problem of the Christian Church, and the latest problem of
democracy, is how to reach the great mass of the people. Frequently the
charge is made that the Church merely skims the surface of society,
and that the great uncaring masses of the people lie untouched beneath
it. Commonly, a revival reaches only a short distance outside the
circumference of church circles. The wonder and greatness of the Billy
Sunday campaigns consist in the fact that they reach to the uttermost
rim of a community, to its greatest height and its lowest depth. There
can be no question that he stirs a city as not even the fiercest
political campaign stirs it. Sunday touches life on all levels,
bringing his message to bear upon the society woman in her parlor and
the humblest day laborer in the trench.
This does not come to pass by any mere chance. Organized activity
achieves it. The method which produces the greatest results is what is
called the Delegation Idea, whereby detachments of persons from various
trades, callings and organizations and communities attend in a body
upon the services of the Sunday Tabernacle.
By pre-arrangement, seats are reserved every night for these visiting
delegations. Sometimes there will be as many as a dozen delegations
present in one evening. As the campaign progresses towards its
conclusion real difficulty is experienced in finding open dates for
all the delegations that apply. At the outset, Mr. Sunday's assistants
have to "work up" these delegations. Later, the delegations themselves
besiege the workers.
In variety the delegations range from a regiment of Boy Scouts to a
post of old soldiers; from the miners of a specified colliery to the
bankers of the city; from the telephone girls to the members of a
woman's club; from an athletic club to a Bible class.
Not only the community in which the meetings are being held furnish
these delegations, but the surrounding territory is drawn upon. It
is by no means an unknown thing for a single delegation, numbering
a thousand or fifteen hundred men, to come a distance of fifteen or
twenty-five miles to attend a Sunday Tabernacle service. Almost every
evening there are lines of special cars waiting for these deputations
who have come from afar, with their banners and their badges and their
bands, all bent upon hearing and being heard at the Tabernacle.
The crowd spirit is appealed to by this method. The every-day instinct
of loyalty to one's craft or crowd is aroused. Each delegation
feels its own identity and solidarity, and wants to make as good
a showing as possible. There is considerable wholesome emulation
among the delegations representing the same craft or community. Of
course, the work of making ready the delegation furnishes a topic
for what is literally "shop talk" among working men; and naturally
each group zealously watches the effect of its appearance upon the
great congregation. Delegations get a very good idea of what their
neighbors think of them by the amount of applause with which they are
greeted. Thus when the whole force of a daily newspaper appears in
the Tabernacle its readers cheer vociferously. Every delegation goes
equipped with its own battle cry, and prepared to make as favorable a
showing as possible.
All this is wholesome for the community life. It fosters loyalty in
the varied groups that go to make up our society. Any shop is the
better for its workers, led by their heads of departments and by their
employers, having gone in a solid phalanx to a Tabernacle meeting.
Every incident of that experience becomes an unfailing source of
conversation for long days and weeks to follow.
[Illustration: THE TABERNACLE AT SCRANTON, PENNSYLVANIA, TYPICAL OF
THE AUDITORIUMS THAT ARE ERECTED WHEREVER CAMPAIGNS ARE CONDUCTED.
TO DEADEN SOUND THE FLOOR IS COVERED WITH SAWDUST, WHENCE THE NAME
"SAWDUST TRAIL." TO PREVENT THE POSSIBILITY OF A PANIC, NO BOARD IS
FASTENED WITH MORE THAN TWO NAILS, AND THERE IS A DOOR AT THE END OF
EVERY AISLE.]
Naturally, too, each delegation, delighted with the showing it has
made at the Tabernacle, and with the part it has borne in the meeting,
becomes one more group of partisans for the Billy Sunday campaign. Men
who would not go alone to the Tabernacle, cannot in loyalty well refuse
to stand by their own crowd. So it comes to pass that the delegation
idea penetrates every level and every section of the community. A
shrewder scheme for reaching the last man could scarcely be devised.
Thousands who are impervious to religious appeals quickly respond to
the request that they stand by their shop-mates and associates.
Participation in the meetings makes the people themselves feel the
importance of their own part. They are not merely a crowd coming to be
talked at; they share in the meetings. The newspapers comment upon them
even as upon the sermon. All are uplifted by the glow of geniality and
camaraderie which pervades the Tabernacle. For the songs and slogans
and banners of the delegations greatly help to swell the interest of
the meetings.
All this is wholesome, democratic and typically American. This
good-natured crowd does not become unreal or artificial simply because
it is facing the fundamental verities of the human soul.
Outspokenness in loyalty, a characteristic of Sunday converts,
expresses itself through many channels. Taught by the delegation idea,
as well as by the sermon, the importance of standing up to be counted,
the friends and converts of the evangelist are always ready for the
great parade which usually is held toward the close of the campaign.
The simple basis for this street demonstration is found in the old
Scripture, "Let the redeemed of the Lord say so." The idea of the Roman
imperial triumph survives in the Billy Sunday parade. It is a testimony
to the multitudes of the loyalty of Christians to the Gospel.
Beyond all question, a tremendous impression is made upon a city by
the thousands of marching men whom the evangelist first leads and then
reviews. A street parade is a visualization of the forces of the
Church in a community. Many a man of the street, who might be unmoved
by many arguments, however powerful, cannot escape the impression
of the might of the massed multitudes of men who march through the
streets, thousands strong. Some twenty thousand men were in the Sunday
parade at Scranton. Nobody who witnessed them, be he never so heedless
a scoffer, could again speak slightingly of the Church. Religion loses
whatever traits of femininity it may have possessed, before the Sunday
campaign is over.
Those most practical of men, the politicians, are quick to take
cognizance of this new power that has arisen in the community's life.
They know that every one of these men not only has a vote, but is a
center of influence for the things in which he believes.
The heartening effect of such a great demonstration as this upon the
obscure, lonely and discouraged saints is beyond calculation.
The great hosts of the Billy Sunday campaign are returning to first
principles by taking religion out into the highways and making it
talked about, even as the Founder of the Church created a commotion
in the highways of Capernaum and Jerusalem. These marching men are a
sermon one or two miles long. The impression made upon youth is not to
be registered by any means in the possession of men. Every Christian
the world around must be grateful to this evangelist and his associates
for giving the sort of demonstration, which cannot be misunderstood by
the world at large, of the virility and the immensity of the hosts of
heaven on earth.
Many of the utterances of Billy Sunday are attuned to this note of
valiant witness-bearing for Christ.
"SPIRITUAL POWER"
Samson didn't realize that the Spirit of the Lord had departed from
him; he walked out and shook himself as aforetime; he weighed as much;
he was as strong physically; his mind was as active, but although he
possessed all that, there was one thing that was necessary to make him
as he had been: "He wist not that the Spirit of the Lord had left him."
A man may have a fine physique; he may have strength; he may have
greatness; he may have a beautiful home; and a church may be
magnificent and faultless in its equipment; the preacher may be able to
reason; the choir may rival the angels in music; but if you have not
the Spirit of the Lord you are, as Paul says, as sounding brass and
tinkling cymbals, and the church is merely four walls with a roof over
it.
Nothing in the world can be substituted for the Spirit of God; no
wealth, culture nor anything in the world. By power we do not mean
numbers; there never has been a time when there were more members in
the Church than today; yet we haven't kept progress in the number
of members in the Church with the increased number of people in the
nation. Our nation has grown to over 90,000,000 of people, but we are
not correspondingly keeping pace with the number of church members.
God's Church has not increased correspondingly in power as it has in
numbers; while increasing in numbers it has not increased in spiritual
power. I am giving you facts, not fancies. We are not dealing with
theories. I am not saying anything against the Church; you never had a
man come into this community who would fight harder for the Church of
God Almighty than I would. I am talking about her sins and the things
that sap her power--and by power I do not mean numbers. If you had an
army of 100,000 and increased it another 100,000 it ought to be doubled
in power.
Derelicts in the Church
In the Church of God today you know there are a lot of people who are
nothing but derelicts and nothing but driftwood.
By power I do not mean wealth. We are the richest people on the
earth; nineteen-twentieths of all the wealth or all the money in
the United States today is in the hands of professing Christians,
Catholic and Protestant. That ought to mean that it is in God's hands;
but it doesn't. They are robbing God. I was in a church in Iowa that
had three members who were worth $200,000 each and they paid their
preacher the measly salary of $600 a year, and I will be hornswaggled
if they did not owe him $400 then. If I ever skinned any old fellows
I did those old stingy coots. A man who doesn't pay to the church is
as big a swindler as a man who doesn't pay his grocery bill and he is
dead-beating his way to hell. You let somebody else pay your bills, you
old dead-beat. God hasn't any more use today for a dead-beat in the
church than he has for the man who doesn't pay his grocery bill--not a
bit!
By power I do not mean culture. There never was a time when the
people of America were better informed than they are today; they have
newspapers, telephones, telegraphs, rural delivery, fast trains. You
can leave home and in five days you are in Europe. If something happens
in China or Japan tonight you can read it before you go to bed. The
islands of the sea are our neighbors.
A stranger once asked: "What is the most powerful and influential
church in this town?"
"That big stone Presbyterian church on the hill."
"How many members has it?"
"I don't know, my wife is a member."
"How many Sunday-school members?"
"I don't know; my children go."
"How many go to prayer-meetings?"
"I don't know; I have never been there."
"How many go to communion?"
"I don't know, I never go; my wife goes."
Then the stranger said: "Will you please tell me why you said it was
the most powerful and influential church in the community?"
"Yes, sir; it is the only church in the town that has three
millionaires in the church." That was why he thought it was a great
church. The Church in America would die of dry rot and sink forty-nine
fathoms in hell if all members were multi-millionaires and college
graduates. That ought not to be a barrier to spiritual power. By power
I do not mean influence.
I'd hate to have to walk back nineteen hundred years to Pentecost.
There were 120 at Pentecost who saved 3,000 souls.
Some of the most powerful churches I have ever worked with were not the
churches that had the largest number or the richest members. Out in a
town in Iowa there were three women who used to pray all night every
Thursday night, one of them a colored woman. People used to come under
her windows at night and listen to her pray. She murdered the king's
English five times in every sentence, but oh, she knew God. They had
500 names on their list for prayer and when the meetings closed they
had checked off 397 of them. Every Friday I would be called over the
telephone or receive a letter or meet those women and they would tell
me what assurances God gave them as to who would be saved. I have never
met three women that were stronger in faith than those three. That town
was Fairfield, Iowa, one of the brightest, cleanest, snappiest little
towns I ever went into.
The Meaning of Power
Samson wist not the Spirit of the Lord had departed. So might we have
money, so might we have members, so might we have increase in culture;
but we have not increased in power. I mean spiritual power; power to
bring things to pass by way of reform. What do I mean by power? I have
told you what I did not mean.
By power I mean when the power of God comes upon you and enables you to
do what you could not do without that power. That comes to you through
confidence and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. There was a time when
the Church had more spiritual power than she has today; there never was
a time when she had more members than she has today; there never was
a time when she had more money than she has today; more culture; but
there was a time when she had more spiritual power than today.
And when she had more spiritual power she was a separate institution.
She was not living for the devil as she is today. And the Church had
not become a clearing house for the forces of evil. We are told that at
Pentecost tongues of fire came upon the expectant worshipers.
I don't mean this gabby stuff they have got today that they call the
things of the spirit; I don't mean that jabbering and froth and foaming
at the mouth when you can't understand a word they say. Try the Spirit,
whether it be of God, and in all ages when the Church has stood for
something she has had power.
So few of us dream of the tremendous power at our command. At the
World's Fair at Chicago the door to one of the great buildings was
without doorknob or latch, for these were not needed. There was a great
mat at the entrance, and as you stepped upon it your weight would cause
an electrical connection to be made and the great doors would swing
open. I take this old Book and stand upon it, and all the wonders of
life and eternity are opened to me. The power of the Holy Spirit is at
my command.
Church Needs Great Awakening
Let's quit fiddling with religion and do something to bring the
world to Christ. We need a Pentecost today. The Church needs a great
awakening. Now, I'll not stand anyone's saying anything against the
Church as an institution; but I will rebuke its sins and point out its
shortcomings. Nobody who loves the Church can be silent when so much
needs to be said. I love the Church. I want to explode that old adage
that "Love is blind"; I tell you, love has an eagle's eyes.
Lots of churches are wrong in their financial policy. It is a wrong
that the churches have to resort to tricks that would shame the devil
in order to filch a quarter out of a fellow's pocket to help pay the
preacher's back salary. There is hardly a church in this country that
couldn't have abundant funds if the people would only give of their
means as they are commanded by God.
Then, too often you put the wrong men in places of authority in
the church. You elect some old fellow who would look better in a
penitentiary suit, just because he had a "drag" somewhere. We must quit
putting such men in church offices.
When I was a boy I was taught how to put glass knobs on the feet of a
chair and charge the chair with electricity. So long as I didn't touch
anything but the chair I was all right, but if I touched the wall or
something else I got a shock. The power passed through and from me.
As Christians we cannot come into touch with defiling things without
suffering a loss of spiritual power. You can't go to the dance and the
card party and the cheap-skate show without losing power. Yes, you can
do those things and be a church member. But you can be a church member
without being a Christian. There's a difference.
I read in the Bible that Lot first pitched his tents near Sodom. Next I
read that Lot moved right into Sodom, and lived there for twenty years.
He lost his power there, too. When God warned him to get out of the
city he went and told his sons and daughters, but they wouldn't heed
him. He had lost his power over them. He warned his sons-in-law, but
they wouldn't heed him. He even lost power over his own wife, for he
told her not to look back as they fled, and she rubbered.
If you have lost spiritual power it is because you have disobeyed some
clear command of God. Maybe you're stingy. God requires tithes. He
commands you to give one tenth of your income to him, and maybe you
don't do it. It may be your temper. It may be that you have neglected
to read the Bible and haven't prayed as you should.
The Church is a failure because she is compromising with the men
that sit in the seats and own saloons whom she never rebukes; she
is compromising with the men who rent their property for disorderly
houses, and whom she never rebukes. They are living off the products
of shame and if they buy food and clothes for their wives and children
from such money, they, too, are living off this product of shame. We
have lost our power because we have compromised.
When I played baseball I used to attend every theater in the country.
Since I was converted I have not darkened a theater's door, except to
preach the Gospel. We've lost our power because we've lost our faith.
Our leading members are leaders in nothing but card parties and
society; they are not leaders in spiritual things. A man comes to me
and says, "Mrs. So-and-So is one of my leading members."
I ask: "Does she get to prayer-meetings?"
"No."
"Does she visit the sick?"
"No."
"Does she put her arms around some poor sinner and try to save her for
Christ?"
"No."
And I find she is a leader in nothing but society, card parties, dances
and bridge-whist clubs. I don't call that kind a leading woman in the
church; she is the devil's bell-wether. That is true. I tell you people
what I call your leading woman: She is the one who gets down on her
knees and prays; she is the one that can wrap her arms around a sinner
and lead her to Christ; that is a leading church member. You have it
doped out wrong.
Did Martin Luther trim his sails to the breeze of his day? If he had,
you would never have had a Reformation. I will tell you why we have
lost our power; I have told you what I don't mean by power.
Lost Power
We have lost our power because we have failed to insist on the
separation of the Church from the world. The Church is a separate body
of men and women; we are to be in the world, but not of the world. She
is all right in the world, all wrong when the world is in her, and the
trouble with the Church today is that she has sprung a leak. The flood
tides of the world have been swept in until even her pews are engulfed,
yes, even the choir loft is almost submerged. We have become but a
third-rate amusement bureau. The world has got to see a clean-cut line
of demarkation between the Church and the world. So I believe.
If there's anything the Church of God needs it's to climb the stairs
and get in an upper room.
Come out from the things of the world. When you hand out a pickle
and a bunch of celery for the cause of good, then will my Father not
be glorified; nor will he be glorified when you sell oyster soup at
twenty-five cents a dish, when one lone oyster chases around the dish
to find his brother. It doesn't require much power to do that, for two
dollars would hire a girl to dish up ice-cream. That does not get you
spiritual power.
There is deep heart hungering in the Church today for the old-time
Pentecostal power.
Now, I do not know that the Spirit will ever come to us as he came
to Pentecost, for you must remember that he came to usher in the new
dispensation, or the dispensation of the Holy Ghost. It is true he was
present in the Old Testament. He was in Abraham and Moses.
You'll have power when there is nothing questionable in your life.
You'll have power when you testify in a more positive manner.
Do as the disciples did, believe and receive the Holy Spirit by
waiting. The Holy Spirit is ours. He is the promise of Jesus from the
Father as a gift to the prayers of the Son. God can no more fill you
with the Spirit if you are not right, willing and waiting to receive
Him, than he can send the sunshine into your house if you have the
blinds and shutters all closed. You can pray till you are black in
the face and bald-headed, but you're wasting your time unless you
agree with God. There can be no wedding unless two parties are agreed.
If the girl says "No," that ends it. Don't think you are walking with
God just because your name is on a church record. Walk in the path of
righteousness even if it leads to a coffin and the graveyard.
Jesus gave his disciples power to perform miracles. That same power can
be delegated to you and me today. He always spoke of the Holy Spirit in
the future. He was not there. He didn't have to be. They had Jesus, but
the Church needs him today. It needs a baptism of the Holy Ghost. There
are no substitutes. You can organize, prepare, hire the best singers
and preachers in the universe, but you'll get no power. No matter what
Scriptural knowledge he may have, no matter if he prays so that it
reaches the stars, no matter if his sermons sway the congregation with
their word pictures, no matter if the singers warble faultlessly and to
beat the band--the preacher and the singers will produce no more effect
than the beating of a drum or the running of a music box. The preacher
who murders the king's English four times to every sentence and has the
Holy Ghost will get the revival.
The Church today needs power. It has plenty of wealth, culture and
numbers. There is no substitute for the Holy Spirit and you cannot have
power without the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is ours by the promise
of Christ. To receive him we must give up all sin and walk in the path
of righteousness even if it carries us to our graves or across the seas
as a missionary. Give up everything the Lord forbids even if it is as
important to you as your hand or your eye.
[Illustration: Facsimile of Page One of Circular Handed to Every
Convert.
Dear Friend:
You have by this act of coming forward publicly acknowledged your faith
in Jesus Christ as your personal Saviour. No one could possibly be more
rejoiced that you have done this, or be more anxious for you to succeed
and get the most joy out of the Christian life, than I. Therefore, I
ask you to read carefully this little tract. Paste it in your Bible and
read it frequently.
W. Sunday.
_2 Tim:2:15_
WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A CHRISTIAN
"A Christian is any man, woman or child who comes to God as a lost
sinner, accepts the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal Saviour,
surrenders to Him as their Lord and Master, confesses Him as such
before the world, and strives to please Him in everything day by day."
Have =you= come to God realizing that you are a lost sinner? Have
=you= accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as =your= personal Saviour; that
is, do =you= believe with all your heart that God laid all =your=
iniquity on Him? (Isa. 53:5-6) and that =He= bore the penalty of
=your= sins (1 Peter 2:24), and that =your= sins are forgiven because
Jesus died in =your= stead?
Have =you= surrendered to Him as your Lord and Master? That is, are
=you= willing to do His will even when it conflicts with your desire?
Have =you= confessed to Him as your Saviour and Master before the
world?
Is it =your= purpose to strive to please Him in everything day by day?
If you can sincerely answer "YES" to the foregoing questions, then you
may know on the authority of God's Word that =you= are NOW a child of
God (John 1:12), that you have NOW eternal life (John 3:36); that is
to say, if you have done =your= part (i.e., believe that Christ died
in your place, and receive Him as your Saviour and Master) God has
done HIS part and imparted to you His own nature (II Peter 1:4).
HOW TO MAKE A SUCCESS OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE
Now that you are a child of God =your= growth depends upon =yourself=.
It is impossible for you to become a useful Christian unless you
are willing to do the things which are absolutely essential to your
spiritual growth. To this end the following suggestions will be found
to be of vital importance:
=1. STUDY THE BIBLE=: Set aside at least fifteen minutes a day for
Bible Study. Let God talk to you fifteen minutes a day through His
Word. Talk to God fifteen minutes a day in prayer. Talk for God
fifteen minutes a day.
"As new-born babes desire the sincere milk of the Word, that ye may
grow thereby."--1 Peter 2:2.
The word of God is food for the soul.
Commit to memory one verse of Scripture each day.
Join a Bible class. (Psa. 119:11.)
=2. PRAY MUCH=: Praying is talking to God. Talk to Him about
everything--your perplexities, joys, sorrows, sins, mistakes, friends,
enemies.
"Be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication
with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God." Phil. 4:6.
=3. WIN SOMEONE FOR CHRIST=: For spiritual growth you need not only
food (Bible study) but exercise. Work for Christ. The only work Christ
ever set for Christians is to win others.
"Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature."
Mark 16:15.
"When I say unto the wicked, thou shalt surely die; and thou givest him
not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to
save his life; the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his
blood will I require at thine hand."--Ezek. 3:18.
4. =SHUN EVIL COMPANIONS=: Avoid bad people, bad books, bad thoughts.
Read the First Psalm.
"Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what
fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness, and what communion
hath light with darkness--what part hath he that believeth with an
infidel--wherefore come out from among them and be ye separate, saith
the Lord."--II Cor. 6:14-17.
Try to win the wicked for God, but do not choose them for your
companions.
5. =JOIN SOME CHURCH=: Be faithful in your attendance at the Sabbath
and mid-week services.
"Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of
some is."--Heb. 10:25.
Co-operate with your pastor. God has appointed the pastor to be a
shepherd over the church and you should give him due reverence and
seek to assist him in his plans for the welfare of the church.
6. =GIVE TO THE SUPPORT OF THE LORD'S WORK=: Give as the Lord hath
prospered you.--I Cor. 16:2.
"Give not grudgingly or of necessity, for God loveth a cheerful
giver."--I Cor. 9:7.
7. =DO NOT BECOME DISCOURAGED=: Expect temptations, discouragement and
persecution; the Christian life is warfare.
"Yea and all who will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer
persecution."--II Tim. 3:12.
The eternal God is thy refuge. We have the promises that all things,
even strange and hard unaccountable obstacles, work together for our
good. Many of God's brightest saints were once as weak as you are,
passed through dark tunnels and the hottest fire, and yet their lives
were enriched by their experiences, and the world made better because
of their having lived in it.
Read often the following passages of Scripture: Romans 8:18; James
1:12; I Corinthians 10:13.]