It is well to talk about separation from all that is displeasing to the Lord, but this, like unto charity, be gins at home, and many would do well to rest from talking until their walking has caught up with it. Once I knew an old separated saint, who because of the unpleasantness of his everyday ways, estranged family and friends, but this was no scrip tural separation. God is surely not interested in secret walking of this fashion, for he who would walk with Him, must do so, not in a shad ed glen, or in a dusky arbor, or in a mountain retreat, but right down there in the office, or in the shop. For let us rest with certainty upon this solemn fact that God watches the Monday steps with greater in terest than we imagine. God’s own Son was no recluse or hermit, but walked amidst the defil ing scenes of His time and situa tion; and as He thus walked, so are we to walk in the pattern of His marking. It was in this world, openly, that Jesus Christ died for our sins, and it is in this world that we are to testify openly and to witness openly by our lives of our relation to Him. If one chooses to be a hermit in order to walk with God, he will soon find that he is walking alone, for God does not keep company with ascetics. Rather is He companioning with His own in the midst of their ordinary round of living, with those who are pointing the finger of faith to the Lord of Life in the very midst of death. Yes, ours is a holy faith, but let it not become so holy that it becomes dainty and fragile and must needs be sheltered in the soft and secluded places. The cross of the Lord Jesus Christ was set down in the open, be fore the view of every eye. The sermons that are spoken by godly living, in the midst of rampant indifference and godlessness, are in truth the “homiletics of the Holy Ghost,” for they touch men at the crucial points where sin and iniquity likewise touch them. They speak when every other voice must be silenced. “And Enoch walked with God . . . and begat sons and daughters.” Yes, Enoch was quite an ordinary man, after all. He begat sons and daugh ters and bore family responsibility. He walked where the walking count ed for most. But had he shirked that, or considered it but an irksome interruption, and gone away to some “meditative haven,” it is very doubt ful whether Scripture would then have recorded those other words, which for so many appear to form the whole of the text: "And Enoch walked with God.”
YOUTH [OR CB
By Rev. Charles T. Cook Editor, The Christian, London, Eng. me glowing reports of the blessings experienced. In England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales, the largest build ings have been unable to contain the crowds, and not infrequently hun dreds and thousands have been turned away. Of course, not every mission began with overflowing at tendances, but I think I am right in saying they invariably ended with them. I know of no evangelical e f fort in modem times that has been so successful as Youth for Christ in reaching the young men and women who ordinarily do not darken our church doors. I am thinking not only of the rallies conducted by our friends from America, but of similar successful efforts by Mr. Tom B. Rees in London and in various pro vincial cities. We have the same gos pel as that so powerfully preached by the great evangelists of former gen erations. What is new is the tech nique, and new methods can only be justified when they are used to arrest the godless, to produce conviction of sin, and to bring men into assurance of divine forgiveness. During these recent weeks, we have seen thous ands of young men and women, and boys and girls of the high school class, as well as those who work in shops and factories, crowding the in quiry rooms. I recall one evening in February last, wheji I made a journey across London to hear Billy Graham preach in a church which seated about 1,400 people. It was during the se verest period of our exceptionally severe winter. Snow lay thick every where, and roads and sidewalks were rendered perilous by their icy surfaces. Yet I looked around the stately Gothic church in which young folk predominated, and where every seat appeared to be occupied. No less impressive was a glowing enthusi asm calculated to melt the heart of the coldest critic. At the end of a searching message on the Lord’s Sec ond Coming, boys and girls in their ’teens, and many between the ages of twenty and thirty, came forward from every part of the building, and Pege Twenty-nine
R ECENTLY it has been my privilege here in Britain to have close contact with the would like to give our friends in America a few impressions of the way that God had blessed this great movement in its labors among us. The journal I have the honor to edit has been closely identified with every revival and evangelistic move ment in this country and other lands during the past eighty-eight years, its original name being The Revival. It was first launched in order to give news of the great Revival of 1859 which, beginning two years earlier in the United States, event ually swept over Ireland and made its influence felt throughout Great Britain. Later, in 1870-1880 came the mighty impact of the campaigns of Moody and Sankey. Then, in the early years of the twentieth century, we welcomed Dr. Torrey and Charles M. Alexander, and a few years after that, Dr. Wilbur Chapman conducted some memorable missions. Now, and most evidently in this great succes sion, comes another breath of revival which has gladdened our hearts, in the visit of Dr. Torrey M. Johnson, Rev. Billy Graham, and Mr. and Mrs. Cliff Barrows. Torrey Johnson and Billy Graham made an excellent impression upon the listeners on the occasion of their first visit a year ago. The resolve of Billy Graham to accept Invitations to return last autumn, in response to numerous invitations, kindled the spirit of prayer and expectation. After seven strenuous months wholly occupied with evangelistic cam paigns, youth rallies and conferences, he has returned home for a well-de served and much-needed rest. I know of no man who has spent himself with so little regard for the physical consequences, in a consuming desire to be used for the salvation of mod ern youth. Everywhere the results have been extremely gratifying. Local minis ters and leading laymen have sent
leaders of Youth for Christ, and I
AUGUST, 1947
Made with FlippingBook Online document