Community Soul-Saving Work
By David Paulson
HAVE you experienced the blessing there is in definite daily study of the Bible, and in endeavoring to make life more pleasant and endurable for at least one human soul each day? If you have not, begin to-day. And then you will appreciate for the first time some of the real sweetness of life, and you will wonder how you ever could have been satisfied to drift along year after year with such a desultory Christian experience. God wants to give each one of us a liberal installment of heaven here below. He wants us to travel toward the eternal city with our faces lightened up with a sweet satisfaction, instead of going along like a crippled band of mourners. But it is not enough for God to want us to have this; for he can no more give it to us without our active co-operation than he can give a crop of corn to a farmer who neglects to either plant or cultivate the same. No drunkard or tobacco slave was ever delivered from his bondage who did not take a positive and determined stand on that question. “Daniel purposed in his heart,” and the Lord made something appear in his life. “If any man willeth to do his will, he shall know.” There are some precious things that we may know in this world that we never shall know till we will to do some other things. “If there is first a willing mind, it is accepted.” We have compassed this mountain of inactivity long enough. Let us launch out into the deep, and as we do so, our souls will catch a heavenly breeze that will waft us toward the heavenly harbor. Looking back at somebody or something, as Peter did, is not only a violation of the Master’s command, “Follow thou me,” but in the very act of doing so we are unfitting ourselves not only for the future kingdom, but also for the present kingdom of service and usefulness. Have you added so much to the sum total of human happiness in your community that your fellow men are thanking God that you live among them? If not, why not? The most important thing is to begin. God cannot guide us while in inactivity, any more than a captain could steer a vessel that was not moving. Resolve to commit to memory, and to make your own, some portion of Scripture each day. We need spiritual food daily just as much as we need physical food. Then allow no day to pass without some one’s being made better or happier because you have lived. Remember that the influence of a cheering smile, a kind word, or a loving deed is immortal; it can no more die than God himself. It will be9a part of our joy hereafter as well as in this life. Gideon had to cast down the idols in his own home before God could trust him with one of the mightiest victories ever recorded. There may be a lesson in that for us. Has the morning worship hour become distasteful to your children? Perhaps they have some cause for this feeling. Let several mornings of each week be devoted to memorizing portions of Scripture, to relating some of the experiences of the previous day, and to cultivating that genuine family spirit that is now becoming so rare, even in Christian families. Write out some of the most encouraging experiences you meet with in community soul-saving work, for they will serve to inspire some timid ones to begin, just as Paul said the zeal of the Corinthian brethren had provoked very many. 2 Cor. 9:2.