PHYSICAL HELP IN RESCUE WORK.
We are well aware that there is a difference of opinion in regard to the usefulness of physical help in rescue work, but undoubtedly there is a growing sentiment in favor of doing everything possible to help physically while helping spiritually. A great many people criticise the plan of giving free lunches in rescue missions where there are men, because it is claimed that free lunches only bring the paupers, the tramps, and the bums. But is not this exactly what Christ wants of his children,—to rescue these very tramps? No one would dare undertake to say that a tramp has not a soul. No one would dare to say because a man is lazy and does not want to work and has not been willing to work for a long time, that he has no soul to save. Thousands in this army of tramps have been saved by the Lord Jesus Christ, and instead of being lazy, good-for-nothing vagabonds, they are now to-day respected men, many of them holding good positions, cleanly dressed, active in the work of rescuing the fallen. Many and many are the testimonies of thousands who have been reached through free lunches or through some help in the way of lodgings or other physical help. And while everything needs to be done to encourage men to work and fix it so they can earn their lunches and their lodgings by work, yet it must not be forgotten that the great object is to12bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ to these lost people. We seem to forget sometimes that Christ came to save the outcast, whether man or woman. He died on the cross just as much to save the woman who is in rags and the man who is a reprobate and a vagabond as he did to save one who is living a life of industry. The great difficulty is that people who criticise the methods of rescue workers are so lax in information on this subject that they judge prematurely. So very few go down to see what is being done and how it is being done and why it is being done. If those who are in doubt about the question of whether or not we should help physically those who are degraded, will visit the rescue work in this country that is being carried on for Christ's sake and the salvation of souls, there can be only one decision reached. “For I was an hungered, and ye gave me no meat; I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink; I was a stranger, and ye took me not in; naked, and ye clothed me not; sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not. Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungered, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee? Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.”—Union Gospel News.