A Christian's Right Place.
By Cuyler
In a well-organized army every man has his place. The mathematical head goes to the engineer corps. The medical skill and steady hand is assigned to the sur-surgical department. The sharp-eyed man shall handle the Enfield rifle, and the well-taught graduate of West Point, and of a half-dozen hard-fought fields, receives the sword of the brigadier. He who has the most of Napoleon in him soon fights his way to the supreme command. A Scott or a Halleck would not be more out of place in the ranks than would a Paul or an Apollos be in spending their precious time in teaching the children of a mission school to read the alphabet. Every man in his place, is as much the motto of the church as it is of the camp; the wrong place is well-nigh as fatal as at no place at all. Now what is a Christian's right place? Manifestly it is the place that his Creator made him for and trained him for. To mistake it is a misfortune; to desert it is a disgrace and a crime. The Bible answer to our question is given in these words: "Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith, or ministry, let us wait on our ministering; or he that teacheth, on teaching; or he that exhorteth, on exhortation; he that giveth, let him do it with simplicity; he that ruleth, with diligence; he that showeth mercy, with cheerfulness." The principle here laid down is, that every true Christian, after a candid, honest inspection of his own physical and mental and moral qualifications, should take the post of duty or the line of labor for which his gifts best fit him. But no man—no! not one, is to "neglect the gift that is in him." Some men were manifestly created for the pulpit. God gave them clear heads, warm hearts, and strong lungs, a love of Jesus, and a love of saving souls. To possess these is to have a Divine call for the ministry; for such to stay out of the pulpit (if strong inclination draw them hitherward) is as grievous a mistake as it has been for hundreds of others to enter the pulpit. But because a man is not called to preach Jesus in the sacred desk, must he preach nowhere else? Is all the earnestness, and all the persuasive power, and all the hunger for souls, which a pious lawyer or a pious mechanic may possess, to run to waste? No! Let him tell his neighbor of the great salvation wherever he can find him—whether in the public meeting for conference, in the prayer-circle, by the wayside or the fireside, in the sick room, or in whatever place God brings a soul within his reach. And how successfully this may be done, let such men as Harlan Page, and Robert Haldane, and Cranfield, and the good Methodist Carvosso, answer. Let the powerful lay exhortation be heard in Fulton Street answer. God is opening a wide door for lay exhortation in our time. Brownlow North, in Great Britain, is proving what can be achieved by a practical man throwing himself upon practical men without any professional technicalities, and pouring Gospel truth into their hearts in the every-day language of life. This corps in Christ's army will bear enlargement. They are uniformed sharp-shooters, stealing singly or in squads upon the enemy wherever a point is left exposed, or a straggler can be sighted. What our churches sorely need is the development of the members. Too much is thrown upon the ministry. The church becomes Dr. Tyng's church, or Mr. Beecher's church, instead of the people's church, with those gifted men as its ministers. A pastor is expected to make three studied expositions of Bible truth every week, to conduct the public devotion of his flock, to labor at the fireside, in the sick room, and the house of death. During our early ministry we were called to do all these, and to superintend a Sabbath-school and teach a Bible-class besides. Now we love to work better than any thing else, unless it be to see other people work, and no member of our church has any more right to turn over his spiritual labors on me, than he has to hand me his market-basket, or to ask me to eat and digest his dinner for him. He needs to do his own work as much as the cause of Christ needs to have it done. And when, in seasons of revival, the latent lay power of the church is brought out, we see how much may be done by the Priscillas and Aquilas, by Onesiphorus, and by Lydia, and by the "faithful Persis," who labors in the Lord. The church then is a hive without a drone, and the air is musical with returning bees bringing in their blessed spoil. A Christian who is keen for work will soon find his right place. If he is "apt to teach," if he has the knack of breaking the truth up into small morsels for children's mouths, then he will soon scent his way into the Sabbath-school. Another one has leisure and love of souls; to such a one tract distribution is a welcome work. It requires only health enough to walk, and Christian courtesy enough to talk acceptably to the family visited with the Bible or the tract. It is not too much to say that Harlan Page, with his Gospel under his arm, is equal to many a learned divine, with his ponderous columbiads aimed forty degrees above the heads of the people. Here, again, is another whose "gift" is a melodious voice—that "most excellent thing in woman," and hardly less so in a man. A homely woman becomes beautiful while she is singing, and a melodious voice will outlive a plump form or a rosy complexion. Whoever can sing, belongs to God's great multitudinous choir. Whoever can sing, and will not sing, does not deserve a seat in church, or the feast of a good sermon. They will be ashamed to sing in heaven if they were too indolent, or too fastidious to sing in the earthly temples of God's praise. Nor are these the only gifts. We can now recall a member of our first flock who possessed no qualifications to exhort, or to teach in the Sabbath-school; he had no gold to give, and no musical skill to sing the praise of his Redeemer. But he did possess a rare earnestness, and Bible richness, and soul-fervor in prayer. That good old man's single prayer saved more than one evening meeting from drouth and dreariness. A blessed gift was that veteran's power of pleading at the mercy-seat: and a fountain of blessings did it prove to the church for which he besought the heavenly baptism. Reader, have you found your place? Then stick to it. Work there even though it be in the humblest corner of the most out-of-the-way vineyard. An idle man in the church is a monster. And you cannot give a cup of Gospel water to a beggar's child without receiving Christ's smile in return for it. Wherefore "neglect not the gift that is in thee," and whatever thou doest for the Lord, "do it heartily."—Cuyler.