Prayer for the Home
One Sunday evening at the usual services the invitation was given, as is
customary, for such persons who especially desired to be mentioned in
the daily prayers of the people to rise for a moment before the singing
of the last hymn. The sermon had not mentioned the need of prayer and
contained no special evangelistic appeal. The invitation was the
customary proceeding throughout the year. The three thousand seats were
all filled. The audience was composed, as usual, largely of men, and
they were men of middle age. There were young people, representing both
sexes, scattered through the audience, and lines of them along the back
rows of seats in the distant gallery. No attempt was made to emphasize
the ordinary invitation in any special manner. But when the solemn
moment came for the prayer-seekers to rise the response was so general
that the preacher asked those who had risen to remain standing until the
pastors could see them and count them. There were over five hundred, and
for a few weeks that was about the usual number of those who arose.
But the preacher was especially startled by the fact which he had not
especially noted on previous occasions, that the majority of those who
asked for prayer were young people. The scene, when those youthful faces
appeared on every side and in so large a congregation, filled the soul
of the beholder with almost painful awe. It led the preacher to meditate
a moment to ask Christ and himself why so many young people took such a
solemn, sincere interest in prayer at that time. The thought led him,
before the benediction, to request all who had stood forth for prayer to
write to him a personal and confidential letter explaining why they
desired to be mentioned in the prayers of the Christian people. The
letters came the next week by the hundred. It was an astonishing
revelation. The letters from unmarried people were culled out of the
collection and reread at leisure. Some of them were in need of higher
wages; some were seeking for a personal religious awakening; some asked
prayers for friends, for business, for safe journey, for health, or for
other protection and relief. But out of two hundred and eighty-seven
letters from those young people over two hundred mentioned, directly or
indirectly, their strong desire for a husband, a wife, or a home. The
details of lovers' quarrels were opened up, the anguish of broken
engagements expressed on tear-stained sheets of note paper, and many
doubtful lovers wished the Lord would reveal to them whether their
choice had been a wise one or whether their love was deep enough for
such an extremely important matter as marriage. The letters revealed
such a general longing for a home that one seldom realizes is really
existent. There were a few letters from young college women and
university men. But the greater portion were from working girls. They
were the most touchingly sacred records of the everyday thoughts of
young women, all sincerely and modestly expressed. When those young
women saw some handsomely gowned wife pass her desk, her counter, her
bench, or loom, leading a bright-faced little son, the working girl's
soul uttered an unvoiced shriek for a home, for a noble husband's
protection, and for children of her own. Women waiters who daily fed the
wives of wealthy merchants or of prosperous manufacturers wrote how
terrible was the thought that they were going to be homeless and
penniless in their old age--one great prayer going up to high heaven for
holy domestic love and a place they could call "home."
After that evening's call upon the seekers after God to rise the request
for letters was repeated. The answers which came even into thousands
revealed the general request for the leadership of the Spirit of the
all-wise God in directing the all-important affairs of the heart. Some
letters detailed the horrors of broken hearts; some revealed dark sins;
and some told of betrayal or of base and traitorous ingratitude. But the
majority were letters from lonely but upright women of high ideals and
of noble, Christian life. Some of the communications were from
conscientious young men asking God's help in deciding their choice or
for the influence of God in their favor when their chosen one should
make up her hesitating mind. Some were calls for Christ's forgiveness
and for human advice in most complicated cases where the writer had been
misunderstood or where he had thoughtlessly made a promise he must
recall. All wanted a home. The honest souls standing out in the open
before God, where the restraints of human custom and the reluctance of a
pure modesty were, for the moment, overcome, wrote out the sincerest
prayer of all. Their soul's need was a home.
Of all the holy ambitions of a normal man or woman the purpose to have a
home is the highest. A home on earth and a home in heaven constitute the
soul's chiefest need. Around that transfigured word gather all that is
highest and purest in human thinking and all that is most sacred and
heavenly in human feeling. In the beginning the Almighty created
man--"Male and female created he them." The first home was in Paradise.
The last home will be there. He who has an income to maintain a house,
who has an intelligent, unselfish wife, who can look about his table and
see children with clear intellects and loving hearts, is conspicuously
foolish if he does not see that he already has the best the world can
give. She who can cast off all anxiety for maintenance and can devote
herself to the care and training of her own little ones, and who can
respect and deeply love her chosen mate, has God's best gifts already in
her possession. Gratitude to the heavenly Father will lead such
recipients of his richest bounty to forget not to aid those who have
less. Nothing on earth of wealth, applause, or mundane wisdom can equal,
in the least measure, the temporal and eternal values of a real home.
Therefore it is wise and the mark of a godly character to pray heartily
for a husband, or for a wife, or for children.
A reasonable valuation of such domestic treasures makes a hideous crime
of every violation of the laws and customs which make a loving home
possible. Profanity of speech, theft of money, or traitorous breaking of
any other contract is a light sin compared with the brutal sins of the
libertine or the unchastity of the woman who sells herself, or who, with
evil intent, entices a man to home-breaking crime. So important is this
matter that it is the fit subject for constant prayer for those who have
not chosen to be a martyr or decided to give up all on earth for a home
in heaven. And, even in the latter case, the call to take up any work
inconsistent with the maintenance of a home should be overwhelmingly
emphatic to command obedience.
Hence, those appeals to Heaven for domestic rest of soul were all normal
and all of supreme importance. When that great collection of letters
were each answered the reply contained a counter-request for a report in
due season which should state when and how the prayer for a home had
been answered. Those reports have also been carefully tabulated. But
here again the critical adherent to the theory concerning the
unchangeable laws of nature tries to escape any committal to religious
dogmas by claiming that the mating instinct is an inborn sentiment
common to fishes, beasts, and birds, and that mankind mates by
accidental acquaintanceship or by the pressure of necessity or
ungoverned passion. Such arguments convince many people who deride the
claim that "marriages are made in heaven." But after every such theory
is suggested and analyzed, after every allowance for the outworking of
"natural selection," there is left an important place for the intrusion
or domination of a superhuman power. To that fact, the simple,
unvarnished tale of the experience of the years at the Temple bear
eloquent testimony. A book of this character requires that out of the
many reports only the most representative cases should be selected, and
that the mention should be as brief as is consistent with clearness. The
number of marriages which every church, small or great, brings about is
ever the astonishment of any preacher who goes back over the history of
forty years of church life. The church in any community is a center of
more or less of social life and furnishes an opportunity for the best
young people to meet on a plane of safe association. The married
Christian people, and especially the owners of homes, are the very best
people in any town or city. As a rule, all people possessed of Christian
character marry. The unmarried masses of the people, or those who are
most often unhappily mated, are often the unstable classes who are not
closely bound to moral principles. Religious life and home life are twin
sisters. They belong to the same family and have the same likes,
dislikes, and motives. They are congenial and necessary companions
almost everywhere.
Let us examine the leading events wherein we seem to recognize the
divine hand and which led directly to the setting up of Christian homes.
One lady clerk in a department store, in her first letter asking for
prayer, said that she was forty-one years of age and that she had been
twenty years in the store. She said that she had hoped for a home all
her adult life, but had abandoned the hope and wished only to die soon.
She asked if suicide would be wrong under such sad circumstances. The
following Sabbath morning, after the service, the pastor of her church
incidentally introduced her to a widower of her age who had a
comfortable house, but who had rented it because he had no children. The
widower asked the pastor a few days later to pray for him as he had a
"very important matter" on his mind. Several days later he came to the
minister and said that he had dreamed three times and in each dream he
had precisely the same experience. He dreamed that he was climbing a
steep hill in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and he had called for help to a
lady standing above him near the path, and when he took her hand he
recognized her as the lady to whom the minister had introduced him. He
declared that he really wished to set up a home again, but his first
impression of that lady was decidedly unfavorable. The minister
unreservedly advised the widower never to let a mere dream influence him
to overcome his calm judgment. The minister said that dreams were often
contrary to fair reasoning and should not be consulted in such important
matters. A few days later the lady called on the minister to ask him if
there was "any truth in dreams." Then she greatly surprised the minister
by saying that she dreamed several times that she was on a steep bank
near a cousin's home in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and as the earth began
dangerously to break beneath her feet a man caught her and supported her
to the safe path. The mysterious thing in her story was that she
recognized the man as the gentleman to whom she had been introduced that
Sunday morning, but whose name she had forgotten. She said that the
repetition of the dream "set her to thinking," and she had called to
inquire who the gentleman was and what trust could be placed in dreams.
The minister was too surprised to declare again that no faith could be
put in any dreams. The minister said nothing to her about his previous
interview with the widower and let her depart with the remark that if
the Lord intended she should marry that man the Lord would also speak to
the man about it in some clear manner. The Lord never advises one party
to enter into such a contract when he knows the other party is
unwilling. In every holy marriage both parties are equally inspired
with the spirit of God and are both absolutely convinced that the Lord
had brought them together. The minister soon wrote to the widower,
advising him to call on the lady and tell her frankly that he desired to
make her acquaintance with a view to a marriage, if both should be
satisfied that it would be right. Every reader of this incident
recognizes or feels the impression of the universal law of nature and
can prophesy safely that they would marry. The minister was not present
at the wedding, but he was informed by those who did attend the ceremony
that the bridegroom told the guests the history of their dreams and
claimed that they were "obeying the voice of God" when they arranged for
that marriage.
The doubting persons who claim that the repetition of the dreams and the
accidental meetings were singular coincidences that were in no way
influenced by angel spirits, do have enough support to make the angel
theory one of faith and remove the claim from the class of "scientific
demonstrations." The facts related cannot be questioned. But the
conclusions from those facts may differ widely and still be more or less
reasonable.
The mysterious attraction which leads the bird and the beast to choose
their mates is of the same nature as that mating instinct which prevails
universally among mankind. But man's reasoning power and his
self-control make his choice of a wife a far more complicated matter.
The healthiest, strongest, and most intellectual races are ever those
whose laws and customs allow the greatest opportunity for unprejudiced
choice in the selection of life mates. Intermarriage of family
relations, or the marriages within a narrow circle of the same race,
ever produce weaklings and often idiots. In the lands where the parents
arrange all the marriages there is but little progress and but few real
homes. Wherever the parties refuse to be guided by the higher law of
affinity, or by a recognition of Divine Providence, there will seldom be
found a real home. "Affinity" is an abused word, and is often used to
bolster up a bad cause or to excuse a cruel crime. But the close student
of anthropology ever finds that the known natural laws do not account
for every case, nor can a satisfactory solution of sex attraction in
human affairs be found without admitting the mysterious and potent force
that is only spiritual.
Looking back over the marriage records of the Baptist Temple for thirty
years, there appear some significant facts concerning home-making by
prayer. Through those thirty years of the record-keeping there was an
average of sixteen marriages a month, or five thousand and one hundred
in thirty years. The same pastor who officiated at the marriage of the
parents also, in many cases, officiated at the weddings of the children.
Not one case of divorce can be discovered and only two cases of
estrangement. The records of many praying churches probably show the
same conditions.
But it is a sublime, soul-satisfying thing to meditate on such a great
list of happy Christian homes. The searcher, when he notes the
birthplaces of bride and groom, finds that they often come from the most
distant places and represent nearly all the races of the world. Calcutta
united with New York, Iceland with New Orleans, Philadelphia with
Chicago, Quebec with Quakertown, Worcester (Massachusetts) with Camden
(New Jersey), Japan with Chester (Pennsylvania), Alaska with Columbia
(South Carolina), country villages with cities, obscure daughters of
prairie farmers with sailors on the Atlantic, millionaires' sons with
working girls, and thousands of members of the church of all adult ages
uniting with other members of whom they knew nothing in childhood.
From the atheist's point of view he can see nothing in that history but
a jumble of accidents or a snarl of events which cannot be untangled.
But to the devout believer in the theory that God sends his angels to
arrange the home-making as he did in the case of Rebecca and Isaac, that
list of homes presents a sublime view of a system for the kind
distribution of Heaven's chiefest blessings. Out of the seventy-two
hundred who united with Grace Church and its missions in the thirty
years mentioned above all but twenty-nine have been married. As a
home-making agency in the history of our nation the churches must hold
the leading place.
When the remarkable series of reported dreams became known and was being
discussed by the people, there arose many men and women with unbalanced
minds who testified to the most inconsistent miracles in connection with
their dreams. Among the letters which they sent in when testimonials
were called for there were nearly one hundred which related foolish and
impossible experiences and which made the whole debate ridiculous. But
that uprising of those who were "possessed of evil spirits" did not
prove that the one case so well established was not the work of an angel
of God.
There may be ten thousand dreams which are of no special value and which
are caused by natural law. But God seems to use only one here and there
for his special purposes. Thousands of seeds fall on the earth, but only
one may be selected to grow. There were cases related where dreams were
specially potent to the dreamers because of the suggestions made by the
dreams to the waking minds. A dream is often very potent as a reminder,
or as a caution, and is often a providential event used in God's plan,
although the dreams in themselves may have nothing unusual about them.
There could be no clearly remembered dream which did not have some
effect on the thought and later actions of the dreamer. With that view
many dreams need not have their origin in a special visit of an angel of
God. But again we must believe that there are dreams in which the angel
of God appears to man directly, and that such dreams are possible in any
age of the human world. Each claim, therefore, to a revelation of God in
a dream should stand alone and be accepted or rejected after a careful
study of all the causes and effects.
The experiences with the Holy Spirit during those years of constant
prayer should find a special place in this record. For there were devout
souls who seemed to be constantly filled with the divine afflatus, and
they surely enjoyed the peace of God which passeth all understanding.
Here, again, we walk near a line that cannot exactly be located and
enjoy emotions or inspirations which cannot be described. An
all-pervading joy illumined every part of the human soul. "Where are you
going so early this Sunday morning?" was often asked of the hastening
pedestrian, and it was a common experience to hear him reply, "I am
going to the morning prayer meeting in the Temple to meet the Holy
Spirit." The Holy Spirit was there awaiting him. There were Pentecostal
days--supreme hours of strange elation, seasons of heavenly bliss which
cannot be accounted for on any psychological basis. A holy brooding of a
sin-expelling spiritual atmosphere permeated by a power like a perfume.
It was an indwelling of the Spirit which carried a purifying fumigation
wherein the worshiper simply let go of himself and rested in the arms of
his heavenly Father. Many felt that sacred presence and could only
express themselves in tears. Such Pentecostal visitations of the Spirit
have doubtless come to thousands of churches and to millions of
worshipers in other places, and this experience at the Temple is not
mentioned as if it were an unusual thing where prayer is the habit of
all the people. But it confirms the history of the visits of the Holy
Spirit related in the Bible, and must be accepted as a proof of the fact
that there is communication between the spirit world and the world in
which we live in the flesh. But these spiritual conditions are so
subtle, so elusive, so delicate, that it is easy to imagine that one is
in that condition when perhaps he is not. It was so disappointing and
perplexing to the sincere and reasonable Christian to have his
communication with the Holy Spirit disturbed by a wild-eyed and
loud-mouthed "Holy Roller" or an advocate of "The Holy Ghost and Us
Society" proclaim his wild theories and tell of the silly revelations
which he claimed the Spirit had made to him. Some of those disturbers
are now in the insane asylum, where they should have been before.
Wherever God erects a house of prayer
The devil builds a chapel there.
And 'twill be found on examination
The latter has the largest congregation.
It is a marvel that the gospel of Christ has outlived its own advocates.
The "cranks" who testified for Christ in his day were more harmful than
were the same number of his open enemies. Because of them the people
believed that Christ himself was a wild fanatic. The believer in Christ
must try prayerfully and carefully to distinguish between the devils and
the angels of light, and determine by their fruits which claimant is
possessed by the Spirit of God and which is controlled by the spirit of
evil.