Responsibilities of the Church for the Youth
By G. B. Thompson
As the dark, muttering clouds foreshadowing the world's doom become darker and more threatening, great earnestness should characterize the lives of God's people, and great activity be seen in the work of saving lost souls. Your ability is the measure of your responsibility at this time. To whom much is given of him much will be required. It is not sufficient now to be a nominal church member, lukewarm and faint-hearted. We must be in earnest, ready to spring into the battle at the sound of the trumpet. The trumpet call of Moses, “Who is on the Lord's side? let him come unto me,” is the call to us to take our stand on the Lord's side. It is no time to dance around the golden calf while souls are being lost. If we saw a person in a burning house, stupefied by the smoke, or saw him wandering on the brink of a precipice, blind to his peril, and left him to perish, we should be held accountable for his death. Likewise, we will be held accountable if we neglect to warn those ready to perish. Within our ranks are many thousands of youth and children, a heritage of the Lord. Many of these are unsaved. The time for their rescue will soon be past. Surely we cannot sit indifferent and unmoved while they are without hope. The responsibility for their salvation rests with the church. Than this there is no greater responsibility. God will hold us accountable for the flock which he has given us. A preacher has said, “He who saves the children saves the church.” The work of saving the youth and children within our churches God has laid upon the older members of the church,—a work the magnitude of which can be measured only in the light of eternity. There is an hour coming when the question will be asked, “Where is the flock that was given thee, thy beautiful flock?” What shall we say when this searching question is asked, if we have allowed the youthful flock to be devoured by wolves? One day from the deck of an ocean liner a boat was seen drifting in mid-ocean. It had come from a sinking vessel. A boat and crew were sent in pursuit. In the bottom of the drifting boat a man was found, exhausted and unconscious. As he was lifted up and taken into the other boat, he partly revived, and the first feeble words heard from his lips were, “There's another man in the boat.” Saved himself, his first thought was to have another saved. This illustrates the spirit of the true Christian. One of the first evidences of conversion is an interest in some other soul. Surely this interest should go out toward our youth. The child who sits by your side in the church may not be your boy or girl, but he is somebody's child, and untiring labor should be put forth for his salvation. We must come into sympathetic touch with the young people. Much can be done by manifesting a warm-hearted, personal interest in them. Sociability will go a long way in winning their respect and confidence. Our teaching and admonition should not fall like hard gravel, but like the gentle rain. I sometimes fear our efforts are illustrated by the story of the man who was drowning in a pond on a cold day. One wishing to help him gave him the end of a plank which was covered with ice. The man tried repeatedly to get hold and save himself, but finally said, in despair, “For God's sake give me the other end of the plank; this end is icy.” We need to be sure in our efforts to win the young that we do not hold out to them the icy end of the plank, but get in close personal touch with them. Our work is to resurrect the dead; to bring life to those who are “dead in trespasses and sin.” The miracle wrought by Elisha throws some light on how this may be done. The son of the Shunammite woman was dead. In her sorrow and distress the woman laid him on Elisha's bed, and hastened to the man of God for help. “And when Elisha was come into the house, behold, the child was dead, and laid upon his bed. He went in therefore, and shut the door upon them twain, and prayed unto the Lord. And he went up, and lay upon the child, and put his mouth upon his mouth, and his eyes upon his eyes, and his hands upon his hands: and he stretched himself upon the child; and the flesh of the child waxed warm. Then he returned, and walked in the house to and fro; and went up, and stretched himself upon him: and the child sneezed seven times, and the child opened his eyes.” 2 Kings 4: 32-35. Elisha had to deal with a dead child. So have we in many of our churches. He was not satisfied with merely cleaning the dead body, wrapping it in linen, and leaving it still a corpse. Neither was he satisfied when the corpse seemed to wax warm. The dead must live. He lay on it until life was restored. Our responsibility is to do likewise. It is not enough to teach the youth about the Bible, to instruct them with beautiful lessons drawn from Holy Writ, to inculcate ideas concerning moral duty. Our work is to bring life from heaven into their souls. If we fall in this, our work is a19failure, and we have failed in the discharge of our responsibilities. In every church there are lost boys and girls who need some one to show them the way to the Father's house. Their condition is a mute appeal to us for help. I was on a camp ground once when the word went out that a little boy, who had been left in a tent while his parents attended the morning meeting, was lost. Soon the whole camp was astir. Anxiety was seen on every face; breakfast was forgotten; nobody cared to eat. The people were scattered in every direction, and continued their search until the lost child was found, then all rejoiced. But in every church there are lost boys and girls, and no such stir as this is made. Why is it, I ask? Can anybody give a satisfactory reason for this indifference? What can you say personally? A clergyman was once walking on Broadway, in New York. Noticing a crowd, he stopped. The people had gathered about a little stray child who had become separated from friends and did not know his way home. The child looked up, and seeing a look of sympathy on the gentleman's face, stretched out his hands and pleadingly said, “Won't you please show me my way home?” The clergyman says, “That cry has been sounding in my ears ever since when I find myself near a wandering soul like that boy in the city.” Would that this cry might sound in our ears until we take a personal interest in every boy and girl who does not know the way home, and labor unceasingly until he is restored to his Father's household. This work cannot be done by proxy. We must ourselves come into close personal relationship with the young. A visitor at a pottery observed a workman molding a piece. The process seemed very slow, and the visitor asked if there was no tool that could do the work. “No,” replied the potter, “we have tried several, but somehow in this work we must have the human touch.” So in molding the souls of the youth for the Master, there must be the personal touch. We must do the work ourselves, not through some other person. Have we discharged this responsibility in the past as we should? If not, what shall be our attitude in the future? It would help us, perhaps, to manifest greater interest in the youth if we could realize fully the value of even one child. How much are the children worth who sit in your church? What is each one of them worth? Who can tell? If one of them is your child, how much is he worth? What should you give to have him saved? How much would it take to reconcile you to have him eternally lost? The following incident will serve to impress this thought upon our hearts:— “A farmer in North Carolina once drove with two high-spirited horses into the town. Stopping in front of one of the stores, he was about to enter, when his horses took fright. He sprang in front of them, and heroically seized the reins. Maddened by strange noises, the horses dashed down the street, the man still clinging to the bridles. On they rushed, until the horses, wild with frenzy, reared, and, leaping upon the man, all came with a crash to the earth. When the people came to rescue the bleeding body of the man, and found him in death's last agony, a friend, bending tenderly over him, asked:—
“‘Why did you sacrifice your life for horses and wagon?’
“‘He gasped with his last breath, “Go and look in the wagon.”’
“‘They turned, and, there asleep in the straw, lay his little boy.’
“‘As they laid the mangled form of the hero in his grave, no one said, “The sacrifice is too great.”’” It was this little boy asleep in the wagon that caused the father to sacrifice his life. He was entirely oblivious to danger; willing, if necessary, to die to save his little boy sleeping in the straw. Did he make too great a sacrifice? Nobody would say he did. There are boys worth just as much as this boy, who sit unsaved in our churches every Sabbath. While we are doing splendidly in raising funds for Korea, China, and India, and other parts of the world, we must remember that our own children are just as valuable as any child in Korea or China, or any of the Hindu boys or girls; and while putting forth efforts for the salvation of those in distant lands, we must not neglect the salvation of those near us. The story is told of a famous statue in the Fine Arts Gallery in Paris. It was the work of a man who, like many other men of genius, had struggled with poverty. His room in a garret served for both studio and sleeping room. “One midnight, when the statue was just finished, a sudden frost fell upon Paris. The sculptor lay awake in his fireless garret, and thought of the still moist clay, thought how the moisture in the pores would freeze, and the dream of his life would be destroyed in a night. So the old man arose from his cot, wrapped his bedclothes reverently about the statue, and lay down to his sleep. In the morning the neighbors found him lying dead. His life had gone out into his work.” Such devotion to duty on the part of church officers, parents, teachers, and others will result in the salvation of many of the young within our reach, and make our churches all that they should be in saving the lost. This is our glorious opportunity, as well as our sacred responsibility. It is given us of God. Shall we be true to the trust he has given us? G. B. Thompson.