LAST SABBATH IN SCOTLAND
One by one the weeks and months have slipped away, and the evangelists have come to the last Sabbath of their third visit to Scotland. On Saturday evening they came on to Galashiels from Melrose in a snowstorm. Sabbath morning dawned with several inches of snow on the ground. The early morning meeting for workers was held in the drill hall, which is said to be seated for over two thousand. In spite of the heavy walking, there was not a vacant seat when all had gathered; some had to stand. In addition to the local pastors on the platform, there was the local M.P., Mr A, L. Brown, who has the distinction of being one of the small band of preaching Members of Parliament. Mr Sankey's first solo was the inevitable "Life Line"; it has become so popular during this campaign that it has to be sung wherever the singer goes. His second song, if not new, was one of the best and most enduring in his book. Never, in all the writer's lengthened experience of our brother's musical ministry, has he sung more finely, and with more swelling pathos and thrilling power, than when he sounded out on Sabbath morning this timely exhortation:-
There's no time for idle scorning,
While the days are going by;
Let you face be like the morning
While the days are going by,
Oh, the world is full of sighs,
Full of sad and weeping eyes ;
Help your fallen brother rise,
While the days are going by.
The song was an admirable prelude to Mr Moody's address from Dan. xii. 3: "They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever." The preacher was in his most characteristic vein, the fire seemed to burn in his very bones, and it came out in impetuous, red-hot speech. These words, he said, were the dying testimony of the old warrior-statesman, Daniel, whose fame has outlived and outshone that of Darius, Cyrus, mighty Alexander, Nebuchadnezzar, and all the other generals of ancient empires. Many throughout Scotland have said that their particular town was a specially hard field for Christian work. Think of the hard field that Daniel had in heathen Babylon. Yet he commenced to shine for God early in life, and he shone on right to its close. No cloud veils the brightness of his testimony. It was the spirit of unselfishness that made him shine, and that is the spirit that we need today.
Early in his discourse Mr Moody let fling very vigorously at the whisky traffic, and at the supine indifference in the churches which allows men to go down to death through this evil, and never reaches out a hand to save them. He said he had been told that if he was so outspoken on this question, the churches would be closed against him. Well, the warm weather is coming, and I will take to the open air. If our Christianity does not prompt us to try and save someone else it is a sham.
‘The set time to favour Zion' comes when we are ready; God is always ready. These dark waves of sin and damnation that are rolling through the towns and villages of Scotland can be driven back."
The two words "concentrate" and " consecrate" formed a basis for a fervid appeal, in the course of which Mr Moody told of his visit to Scotland in 1867 to hear the venerable Dr Duff speak, and of the devoted missionary's thrilling speech in the
Free Assembly the previous year, when he said: "If it be true that Scotland has no more sons to give to India, I will go back to the shores of the Ganges and let these Indians know that there is one poor old Scotchman who will die for them if he cannot live for them." Mr Moody closed with a graphically powerful presentation of the consuming zeal and singleness of purpose shown by the Apostle Paul, who was not to be daunted by stripes, persecutions, shipwrecks, or imprisonments, but in the midst of all said, "This one thing I do."
The workers
RETURNED TO GALASHIELS,
straight to a mass meeting of women in the Drill Hall, where there was a great breaking down under one of Mr Moody's most tender and earnest utterances.
A very large after-meeting was held in the Free Church close by, and numbers were conversed with individually about salvation. Meantime Mr Sankey had been singing and speaking to a crowded mixed company in the U.P. Church. Here, also, there was much manifestation of anxiety, and the workers had a busy time. The experiences of the afternoon were to a large extent repeated in the evening. Mr Moody had a magnificent audience of men in the Drill Hall and a good inquirers' meeting in the church. In the overflow one of the speakers was the second son of Lord Polwarth, who, in a simple and manly way, told the story of his own conversion ten years ago, his soul-awakening having been brought about through the singing of the hymn, "I have a Saviour, He's pleading in glory," by a lady in his father's drawing-room. Altogether, the last Sabbath of the evangelists in Scotland was one of the very best they have had throughout their campaign. On Monday, they received news of a great Gospel temperance meeting in Hawick on Saturday, when 850 persons were enrolled as abstainers. Large and fruitful meetings were also held there on Sabbath. Mr J. M. Scroggie has had a successful time in following up at Dunbar.
From, "The Christian," March 31st, 1892.