p. 10 | The Minister’s Visit by Daniel Nettleton

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Jul 29, 1913

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 40, No. 29.

The Minister’s Visit

By Daniel Nettleton

IT was when we were living on our old homestead in Nebraska, some fifty years ago. He was a Methodist minister, a circuit-rider. He came with Bible, hymn-book, a Methodist discipline, and gospel tracts in his saddle-bags, and John 3:16 in his heart. He came much the same way that Christ came to the home of Zacchaeus. We, too, were without hope and without God in the world, sinners by choice, and aliens by birth; but he sought us out, he brought salvation—the glad tidings of great joy—to our house. He spoke in kindly tones to us and called us children by our names, as Christ did Zacchaeus, and that helped us to get acquainted with him, and then we learned to love him.

But we were much unlike Zacchaeus in one respect—he was very rich, we were very poor. It seemed to us we needed much to make us happy; we, like Martha, were careful and troubled about many things. But the circuit-rider brought us the one thing needful—gospel—and we, like Mary, chose the good part, which has not been taken from us. The impressions made on my mind by that first visit of the minister of God have never been erased. I have been in great assemblies since then, I have heard many and great and eloquent speakers, but none of them, nor all of them, have impressed me or done for me what that humble, earnest man of God did in his visit to my father’s house, when I was a child.

We were in a new country, about seventy-five miles north of Omaha, in the Missouri Valley, where corn is raised, and where corn is king. There was no railroad west of the Missouri River at that time. It was about one hundred miles east to the nearest railroad station. We, like many others, came west with ox-teams and took our claim, built our log and board house, broke prairie to raise corn to feed hogs, to sell, to buy more land, to raise more corn, to feed more hogs, to sell, to buy more land, for land was comparatively cheap then and we wanted, like others, to get all we could. There was no family altar and very little Bible reading in our home. We were too busy; had no time for that. We had caught the western fever, the inspiration to get rich.

With this westward course of empire came the Methodist evangelist, the itinerant preacher. He did not take a claim. He did not come to get rich, he came to seek and save the lost, and he found what he came to seek. I was then far away from the Saviour, and as vile as a sinner could be. I wondered if Christ the Redeemer could save a poor sinner like me. But He did save me, and it was a happy day for the minister and me. Soon after his visit I could sing, “No longer in darkness I’m sitting, for the light is now shining on me.” Now unto others I am telling how He saved a poor sinner like me.

Many changes have taken place since then. Many miles of mountains and plains, of hills and valleys, lie between me and the old homestead by the river. But I can see him now, as I write these lines, sitting in father’s house with Bible in hand, our family gathered about him, reading from God’s blessed Book, and then singing “Sweet Hour of Prayer,” “Come, Ye Sinners Poor and Needy,” or “O, happy day! that fixed my choice on Thee, my Saviour and my God!”; then kneeling and praying for us. He mentioned our names in his prayer,—father, mother, and us children,—and that did us more good than if he had prayed for the president of the United States. He sold father a Bible, and a Methodist hymn-book, and Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress. We soon were interested in the blessed Bible stories, and I am singing the good old hymns still, that made us so happy then. The reading of that interesting allegory, “The Pilgrim’s Progress,” did much to help me to be a Christian. He gave us a few of his gospel tracts, and they talked to us after he was gone. When he left to go on his way, he had won the hearts of us children. He not only shook hands with father and mother, when he bade us good-by, but he laid his hands on our heads and wished us the blessing of “our Father which art in heaven.” He gave us a card with the Lord’s Prayer on the one side and the Ten Commandments on the other. I learned the prayer and commandments by heart so I could repeat them in our Sunday-school, and I know and can repeat them now.

Did we attend his meetings? And hear him preach? Indeed we did! He was “our preacher.” He had been at our house; he had eaten at our humble table. From him we learned many precious hymns, which were a great power in bringing us to Christ. Father and mother and several of us children were converted and united with the church. Father set up the family altar, and from that time on till father and mother died and the old home was left to other people, father’s house was a house of prayer. I believe that minister’s visit and instruction was God’s preparation for me to receive the present truth. That experience in that good Methodist home opened my heart to the third angel’s message, which later came to us. Through the reading of the Review and Herald, and our missionary paper—the SIGNS OF THE TIMES—I was led to become a Seventh-day Adventist, and then to me, who am less than the least of all saints, was this grace given, that I should preach the unsearchable riches of Christ.

And now after many years’ experience in the gospel ministry, I can truly say that what success has attended my work as an evangelist has not been so much from my public preaching in the congregation, as from my personal ministry in the homes of the people. The whole congregation may be convinced of the truth under the influence of the sermon; but it is the tears and prayers and earnest, personal entreaties of the faithful minister, in the homes of the people, that lead them to make their decision to serve God, that bring men and women and children to Christ. Victories may be won on knees, at the fireside, that can not be won in debates, public discussion, or strong, unanswerable arguments in the pulpit.

It was Christ’s visit with Zacchaeus, in his home, that brought salvation to his house. It was the night visit with Nicodemus that opened to him, and many thousands since, the mystery of the new birth. “Ye must be born again,” spoken to Nicodemus, startled and aroused the proud Pharisee, and later, made him a humble and influential disciple. Christ’s visit with the woman at the well not only led her to be a disciple of the Man who told her all things that ever she did, but many of her neighbors testified, “We have heard Him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world.” It was not only Paul’s preaching, but his personal letters, “weighty and powerful,” and teaching from house to house, that made him the prince of soul winners.

O, my dear fellow gospel workers, if you chance to read these lines, permit me to exhort you not to neglect this part of our ministry! We must not only feed the flock of God like a shepherd, but we should gather the lambs with our arms and carry them in our bosom. Not many of us can be great preachers, but we all can take the hand, and speak a word to him that is weary. Remember Christ’s words of commendation at the last great day are, “I was sick, and ye visited Me.” The blood of consecration was put not only on Aaron’s ear but on the great toe of his foot. Not only did tongues of fire rest on the disciples, but their feet were shod with the preparation of the gospel. If we are thus prepared, and go forth weeping, bearing precious seed, we shall doubtless come again rejoicing, bringing our sheaves with us.

DANIEL NETTLETON.