520
T h e
K i n g ’ s
B u s i n e s s
November 1930
Orange today, but crimson versus orange, tomorrow! Hey whát, Marg?” ejaculated Douglas, thinking of the yearly struggle that was to occur the next day in the Bos- t°n (Stadium to which they were going on the night train. “ Do you think it’s all right to pray about football?’’ asked the boy, as they drew up to the gate of the field. We can talk to God about anything,” replied Douglas, with his arm over the boy’s shoulder. “ If you find you can’t pray about anything you’re do ing, don’t do it.” “ I’ve prayed about this,” the boy said. “ I ’m the new captain. Got a half back. Good runner. Need a play for tomorrow. Family always prays about business, so thought I would.” “What’s the line-up?” asked Douglas, smiling oddly at this new instance of the faithfulness of the God who hears and answers ; who sees the sparrows fall; who had brought Douglas himself to this boy captain—Douglas, the old star of the crimson team! The two disappeared into the training quarters. The rest hardly knew Nikolai! His beard was gone, ahd^with it, his old unkept careless appearance. I m the child of a King,” wás his only remark when he was complimented upon this improvement. And Eleanor, with her hand through Margaret’s arm, listened, wide-eyed, to the loving praise of Christ that poured in a perfect volume from the lips o f this man who had once called himself “ Red.” “ I didn’t know they could be like that!” she exclaimed to herself. “ The lower down they áre when—when the Lord gets them, the higher they g o ! Thev seem nearer to Him!” * Margaret was telling Nikolai where, in that troubled embroiled Europe, he might find the Princeling. He would be a little oasis for him, she thought. The prince and the Bolshevik! The high-born and the lowly, all one in Christ Jesus! The Personage was talking of coming over later, perhaps, to help Nikolai. In the meantime, Douglas was explaining the intri cacies of the delayed pass. “ You see! You’ve just received the ball from the cen ter. They think you’ve passed it, but you haven’t, see? You hold it like this—close against you. Then quick! Just after they all get in action! Attention will be diverted from you. Ball to the half-back, and he’s off around the end for a touchdown. Hide your ball and time your delay and you can’t fail.” The boys of the team were gathered respectfully around this new coach whose splendid dimensions attracted them. When they heard that it was through' this very game they were playing, that he had been so injured that he would always be lame, they turned away soberly enough. But he called them back. It s all right with me now, boys. My sister and her friends prayed, and last Thanksgiving I came to know Christ. That’s worth anything!” “ You’ve said it!” added the captain. “ And He’s here today because I prayed.” “ I’ll be thinking o f you tomorrow,” said Douglas as they wrung his hand gratefully. And somehow everyone on the team knew that Douglas would be praying for them the next day. And so he was, as he sat next Margaret, in her new fur coat, with its diagonal stripes, in the great Boston Stadium. He watched the crimson champions twist the Tiger’s tail, and followed the teams every inch of the way from goal post to goal post. But even when the triumphant Crimsons chanted the death chant of the ex
piring Tiger, and he cheered with the rest, his heart was down there, on a high school athletic field, with the team of boys who had been so quick to learn the intricacies of the delayed pass. And he carried still, in his buttonhole, despite its inconsistency, the orange ribbon, that the boy captain, whose father ran a doll hospital, had given him— the color o f the high school, whose team he ardently hoped had fought their way to victory. * “ What are you doing with the Tiger’s colors on?” he was asked again and again. “ This is lucky!” he replied. And once he added, “ Take the yellow out of orange and you get red.” And then he joined in the old alma mater song: “ Thou then wast our mother — The nurse o f our souls, We were moulded- to manhood by thee! As they drew up to the high stoop of the old house on Beacon Street, where they were to stay until next week’s Thanksgiving turkey was out of the way, they met a mes senger boy coming down the steps. “ It’s a telegram from the boys!” he said. It was. They had written:— “ Delayed pass worked. Score seven to six. Winning team orange.” Destruction of the Bible Destroy this volume, as the enemies of human happi ness have vainly endeavored to do, and you render us pro foundly ignorant of our Creator, of the formation of the world which we inhabit, of the origin and progenitors of our race, of our present day future destination, and con sign us through life to the dominion of fancy, doubt, and conjecture. Destroy this volume, and you deprive us of the Christian religion, with all the animating consola tions, hopes, and prospects which it affords, and leave us nothing but the choosing (miserable alternative!) between the cheerless gloom of infidelity and the monstrous shadows of paganism. Destroy this volume, and you un people heaven, bar forever its doors against the wretched posterity of Adam, restore to the king of terrors his fatal sting, bury hope in the same grave which receives the bodies, consign all who have died before us to eternal sleep or endless misery, and allow us to expect nothing at death but a similar fate. In a word, destroy this volume, and you take from us at once everything which prevents existence becoming of all curses the greatest; you blot out the sun, dry up the ocean, take away the atmosphere of the moral world, and degrade man to a situation from which he may look up with envy to that of the brutes that perish.—Dr. Payson. Power Jesus promised power to His disciples. He set up no machinery by which they could get it. He told them to tarry and power would come. It is often harder to wait than it is to work. But trusting the Word of Christ, we can afford to wait. The people and churches we have known which were spiritually powerful have usually worked very quietly and very simply. There was no great planning or demonstration when the disciples gathered to await the fulfillment of the promise. But when the Spirit came, there were great results .— The Presbyterian. Till freighted with treasure, Thoughts, memories, hopes, Thou didst launch us on Destiny’s Sea!"
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