464 THE KING’S BUSINESS But this is not all. Countless thousands of homes in England, Scotland, Ireland, France, sGermany, Austria, Poland, Russia and Servia are darkened and desolate through the loss of husbands, fathers, sons. The story is almost enough to drive one mad. And some one is responsible for all this, the one who is responsible for the war. Who that some one is, we do not feel able to say at the present moment, but God knows who it is, and within a few years at the outside the- whole world will know who it is. The specious reasons and excuses that are put up to defend those who are guilty will not stand the merciless test of time. The whole world will know, and when the world does know, that man (or those men) will be hated and execrated and despised more than almost any man in history—-more despised than Nero or Caligula. And probably in the ultimate outcome will be despised in no other land so much as in his own, upon which he has brought such dreadful calami ties, and he will have to go up before the judgment bar of God and answer to a God who cannot be deceived for the enormity of his offenses. How mad men are to think that they can ever gain anything in the final outcome by unjust and unnecessary war. We have been greatly surprised by an editorial Would Moody Attract paragraph in the April issue of The Christian Notice if He Were Worker’s Magazine. We usually agree with pretty Living Today? much everything that is said in this excellent peri odical, but certainly the editor must have been sleeping when this crept in. We read: “And yet how different is Sunday from Moody. Different in his appear ance,'his surroundings, his methods, his style; different in the tone and char- . acter of his message, in his attitude toward the church and its ministry, and s especially in the vision and outlook before him. Tempora mutcmtur, nos et matamur in illis. The change from Moody to Sunday measures the change which has taken place in the church and in the world during the last thirty-five years. Sunday’s ways would not have been tolerated in Moody’s day, and if Moody were now living his type of evangelism would be so quiet and respect able as to attract no notice.” We have nothing to say against Mr. Sunday and his work. We rejoice in all that God is doing with him, but we do not believe for one moment that his methods are any more demanded In our day than they were in “Moody’s day.” If Mr. Sunday’s success is real, it is not largely dependent upon his methods, but because he is preaching the truth in the power of the Holy Spirit. And the marvelous success of Mr. Moody's work was due not so much to his methods as to the fact that he had a message from God which he delivered in the power of the Holy Spirit. If Mr. Moody were living today, backed up by the prayers of so many godly people as he was in his own day; and If he spoke today, as he did then, so manifestly in the power of the Holy Spirit sent down from heaven, he would attract just as much notice today as he did in his own day. The present day is not essentially different from the day in which Mr. Moody lived and worked. People are perishing for lack of the Gospel today as they were then, and when men arise, backed by the believing, persistent prayers of many godly people, and preach the simple Gospel in the power of the Holy Spirit, they will attract attention in any day. It is a mis take that dishonors God to think that in order to attract notice and win many souls for Christ, it is necessary to resort to extravagant and extraordinary methods.
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker