you, Miss Marion, only a quarter, when both of you could go and sup port yourselves.” “ Five cents from the father and a cent from each of the family. I guess John Hull and family don’t love the heathen very hard.” ' “ Ah, Mrs. McRunion, that means a good deal to you. The Lord keep you well until you join the good man that’s gone.” “ Charlie Baker, and you too, Effie — I doubt if the Lord will take any substitute for you.” “Nothing from Mr. Cantile? Heath en at home? Perhaps you are one of them.” “ Five cents, John Donald. I doubt if you’d want to put that in the Lord’s hand.” Then the old man came to his own pew, and his wife put in an envelope. “Ah, Mary, my dear, I am afraid that we have been robbing the Lord all these years. I doubt if we’d have put Jack on the plate, wife. Jim my boy, you’d be worth far more than that to the Lord.” Jack and Mary sat in the choir. So it went from pew to pew till the old man came to the front again, and there he stood a moment, the plate in his left hand, and after fumbling in his vest pocket awhile he said: “ No, that isn’t enough, Lord; You ought to get more than that; You’ve been very good to me.” So he put the plate down, and taking out an old leather wallet, counted out some bills on the plate, and said: “ I’m sorry, Lord, I won’t keep back Jack any Jonger^ and Mary’s been wanting to go too, only I wouldn’t let her. Take them both, Lord.” Then while the old man sat down and buried his face in his hands Deacon Wise jumped up and said: “ Dear pastor, we haven’t done our duty. Let’s take up a collection again next Sunday.” And a chorus of “ Amens” came from all over the church. But the pastor got up, with tears in his eyes, and said: “M y friends, I haven’t done all I could, either. I want to give more next Sunday, and I’ll give my boy, too.” Then we sang a hymn as we closed, but it sounded different than it ever had before.
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ister’s son, and they went to Africa. The old deacon has gone to his rest now. I wish we had more like him. Jim keeps his mother on the farm yet, but she’s getting pretty feeble. You’re much obliged? O, that’s nothing. I’m glad to tell you. You see I have two of my own boys that are in the work, one in India and the other in Formosa, and another getting ready to go. My name? John Donald. You’re laugh ing? Yes, I was the one who gave only five cents that day. What the old man said about putting it in the Lord’s hand struck me. But I hope to give the Lord a boy or a girl for every one of those five cents. Even my two youngest are talking about going al ready. You see the Lord said, “ Go ye” so we’re going. Good-by.
The organist said she believed it went through the roof, and I guess the Lord thought so, too. “ Love so amazing, so divine, de mands my soul, my life, my all.” I think that old deacon felt pretty bad when he found that his day dreaming had been done aloud. And one or two felt pretty hard at first, but they knew it was true. So that was what started our missionary church, and we’ve kept on ever since. There have been fourteen members of our young people’s society to go as missionaries in the last five years — six of our best young men and eight of our brightest girls. Jack Bright? He married the organ ist, and they are on the border of Tibet. Mary Bright married the min
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FEBRUARY, 1959
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