T I M O T H Y THE TIMI D
the entire service from a transcription. All Christian friends should continue to uphold her in their prayers. She says: “All I can think of is that soon I shall be with him and with the Lord we love; and real living will begin for us at last. Surely, surely, the Lord is coming soon. Until He comes, I shall carry on as best as I can. Service, I learned long ago, is one of the surest paths to peace. So I want the tract work to continue, for God has clearly shown that His blessing is upon it.”
us. We know that our Lord Jesus has abolished death and brought life and im mortality to light through the gospel. So we talk a lot about our own going, hop ing it may be by the sky ways rather than by the valley, and the life beyond is very real and precious to us. “ For me the change from a life of ex treme activity to that of a coronary pa tient took some adjusting. I sought it in prayer, Scripture consolation and the depths of Christian faith. And the Father was pleased to give me a pic
By Vance Havner
E VIDENCE abounds to prove that young Timothy was a timid young preacher who needed more than one admonition to brace him up. To the Corinthians Paul wrote, “Now if Ti- motheus come, see that he may be with you without fear.” And he exhorted Timothy himself to war a good warfare, to let no man despise his youth, to stir up the gift of God within him, to endure hardness. He reminded him that God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. There are worse sins than timidity. Perhaps it is better to go into the pul pit timidly than to march in brazenly like a Napoleon crossing the Alps. The race horse that trembles before the race wins the race. And many a minister trembles before he triumphs. Many of God’s choicest servants, like Moses and Gideon and Jeremiah, “ lowrated” them selves unduly. Yet God seems to call men of that caliber to His work and to make of them brazen walls against their ene mies. One can think too humbly of him self as well as too highly. To say that two and two make three is as wrong as to say that two and two make five. “ Say not that I am a child,” God tells Jere miah. We are neither to boast of nor to belittle ourselves. When I hear a man always running himself down, I am as suspicious of him as when he overrates himself. Humility does not consist in thinking meanly of ourselves but in not thinking of ourselves at all. While we are to have no confidence in the flesh, we are to declare, “ I can do all things through Christ.” Whether or not Timothy had stage fright I do not know but it is likely that he did. Hambone, the negro philosopher, said, “When I stands up, my mind sets down.” The only real cure for this af fliction is to be so Spirit-filled that it is not we who speak but the Spirit, to be so impelled and compelled and propelled from above that we cannot but speak. This does not come easily to the flesh and is not learned in a school of ex pression. It is a matter of heart more than of art. The disciples did not ask the Lord to teach them HOW to pray but to teach them TO PRAY. Pray and you will learn how! Let the bone-fire burn, and you will learn to be “weary with forbearing and cannot stay.” “ Woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel.” When a man feels like that, he must preach and he will! Timothy, with a godly mother and grandmother, and with Paul for a spirit ual father, was off to a great start in his spiritual life. He had unfeigned faith Page Seven
SINCE YESTERDAY Along the golden streets A stranger walks tonight With wonder in his heart ,— Faith blossomed into sight. He walks and stops and stares, And walks and stares again. Vistas of loveliness Beyond the dreams of men. He who was feeble, weak, And shackled to a bed, Now climbs eternal hills With light and easy tread. Her bitter cup again. O never call him dead, This buoyant one and free, Whose daily portion is Delight and ecstasy! He bows in speechless joy Before the feet of Him Whom, seeing not, he loved While yet his sight was dim. Along the golden streets No stranger walks today, But one who, long homesick, Is home at last, to stay! He has escaped at last The cruel clutch of pain; His lips shall never taste
ture—just a picture that I should paint if I were an artist. I’ll give it to you, hoping it will furnish to you some of the soothing comfort it gave me. I called it ‘The Hills of Home. The Saints on the Way to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb.’ “A broad tranquil valley—the Valley of the River of Life, the River flowing through it in the shade of the Tree of Life. Valley sloping up to high crags of the mountains, the source of Heav enly light, a diffusion of light over the whole scene. On either side the valley, smooth sloping hills. On nearly every available foot of space, white-clad fig ures converging upon the valley toward the banquet hall, saints in groups and singly, some of them plainly the prophets and the faithful of all ages. Even the elders had youthful-appearing bodies, vibrantly alive. No haste (time will not run by the sun), just a steady progress toward the Eternal Hills of Home. And now to the faithful who have borne the cross to a lost world, I must add another figure—the vibrantly eternally youthful figure of our friend and your beloved.” We cannot close this brief tribute to a wonderful Christian couple in any better way than to quote one of Mrs. Nichol son’s poems, which better than another’s words, expresses the feelings that today are in the heart of this bereaved wife, and which will be shared by all who have likewise “ loved long since and lost a while.” This lovely poem was read at Mr. Nicholson’s grave. Mrs. Nicholson could not attend but was able to hear
*Title of one of Mrs. Nicholson’s books of poems.
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