For the children's hour : more five-minute sermons

Front matter

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Contents

I. The Children’s Crusade . . 9

II. The Man in the Moon . 13

III. The Little Girl who Made Herself

II The Man in the Moon

“Love envieth not.” — 1 Corinthians xiii. 4.

Have you ever seen the man in the moon? If you haven’t, the next time the moon is full go and look at it, and you will see down in one corner of it what looks like a man’s face. Those black ridges you see on the sur¬ face of the moon are really mountains, but when you look at them in a certain way they look like the face of a man.

There are many strange stories about this man in the moon. The Italians used to say that the man in the moon is Cain, who killed his brother, Abel. God punished him by making him a wanderer in the earth, without any home or friends, and when he died He made him go and live there in the moon. There are no other people in the moon, and if Cain couldn’t get along with other folks he had better go and live by him¬ self. So poor Cain has to live, they say, al¬ ways by himself in the moon. But some¬ times he is very lonely, and then he comes and looks out to see if he can see someone else.

I know that every time you see that man in the moon you are going to think about 13 poor old Cain, so I am going to tell you about him to-day.

Cain and Abel were the first little boys that ever were. Your fathers and mothers have so many people and so many things to think about that very often they do not have much time to give to you. But then there were no other people on the earth, so that Adam and Eve could spend as much time as they wanted to with their little boys.

Adam had a fine farm, and when the boys grew older he taught them to help him with the work. Cain looked after the farm and Abel took care of the sheep. Cain was a very jealous sort of a boy. Now and then we see a boy like him nowadays. If some other boy gets a better mark at school, or a bigger piece of pie at dinner, or wins a game on the playground, he is very angry and jealous. There are some children that never have any fun at all. They are so jealous that it spoils everything. That was the trouble with Cain. He thought to himself, “Father is putting all the hard work on me. I have to plow, and sow, and reap, and do all the rough labor about this farm, and all that Abel has to do is to sit on a rock under a nice shade-tree and watch a few sheep all day.”

The more Cain thought about it the more angry he became. J ealousy is a very danger-

The Man in the Moon ous thing. It spoils our dispositions and makes us do mean and contemptible things.

Adam and Eve tried to teach Cain and Abel to honor the Lord. The first and best of everything that they had was to be given to Him. Abel went to the flock and picked out the finest little lamb that he had and gave that to the Lord. Cain went to his gar¬ den and took some vegetables and fruit and offered them to God. The Lord accepted Abel’s gift. He wants our best. But He would not accept Cain’s. He does not care for anything but the very best.

This made Cain more angry and jealous than ever. Abel was always getting the best of everything, first, from his father and mother, and now from the Lord. It made him so furious that he killed his brother.

After that, the Bible tells us, he heard a voice that said, “Where is Abel, thy broth¬ er?” He ran away from home to get away from the voice, but it followed him wherever he traveled. And so he became a wanderer in the earth.

We think that jealousy is a very small thing sometimes, and that a little will not hurt. But it always leads us to sin and trouble. So whenever you find the least sign of it in your heart, stamp it out. Re¬ member the words of my text this morning, “Love envieth not.”

Ill

The Little Girl Who Made Her¬ self Good-Looking

t( Favor is deceitful and beauty is vain, but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised.” — Proverbs xxxi. 30.

Sometime ago there were three little girls quarreling, and what do you think they were having all that trouble about? It is bad enough to quarrel about anything, but this dispute they were having was about the strangest I ever heard of. They were having a fuss about which was the ugliest. One little girl told another that she was the ugli¬ est child she had ever seen, and the other little girl said she was not, that somebody else was the ugliest.

Almost every little girl thinks a great deal about her looks. Boys don’t usually care much about how they look till they are a lit¬ tle older, and then they think about it, too.

There is a little Scotch fairy story, about good looks that I think we all ought to hear.

Once, long ago, there were two little prin¬ cesses in Scotland. Their names were Rose and Marion. Rose was very beautiful and 16

Making Herself Good-Looking 17j

Marion was very ugly. Poor Marion hated Rose because everyone praised her and loved her. She was so unhappy that she became unkind and unpleasant to everyone about her.

Not very far from the castle was a deep grotto, in which the queen of the fairies lived. Someone told Marion that Rose had fallen asleep there one day and the fairy queen had dipped her in a lovely fountain, and that was what had made her so beauti¬ ful.

Every time Marion looked into the mirror and saw how homely she was she thought about that fountain, and at last she made up her mind that she would try to be beautiful too. When no one was looking one day she went to the grotto, and lay down there on the grass and fell asleep. When she woke up she was in a beautiful hall, full of all kinds of lovely flowers, and gorgeous things. There before her on a lovely throne was the queen of the fairies. Marion said to her with trembling voice, “Will you please make me as handsome as my sister Rose?”

“I will do as you ask,” said the queen, “if you will do as I ask. I want you to go home, and for one week you must not say one un¬ kind word to your sister or anyone else. When you have done that come back and see me again.”

Marion went home very happy. She did not find it easy to be kind to her sister, but she wanted to be beautiful so much that she succeeded, and at the end of the week she went back to the grotto.

She went to sleep and again she was in the magic hall before the queen. “Have you done as I told you?” said the queen.

“I have,” answered Marion.

“Then follow me,” said the queen, and she took Marion and showed her some of the wonders of fairyland. Then she said, “Now, you must go back, and for one month try to do kind deeds, and see how happy you can make other people.”

So she went home, and for one month she did everything she could to make the world better. She was kind to Rose, and everyone saw that some great change had come over her.

At the end of that month she went again to the grotto to see the queen of the fairies. She asked Marion if she had done as she asked. She said, “Yes.” “Now,” she said, “you must go home and for one whole year you must think nothing but good thoughts. And you must do it, not because you want to be beautiful, but because it is right.” This was the hardest thing the queen had asked. Marion tried it three times, and each time she failed, but at last she succeeded. Then

Making Herself Good-Looking 19

she went back to the grotto. There was the queen, and with her all the faries. “Now,” said the queen, “look mto that mirror.” She looked and she was even more beautiful than her sister Rose. She had made herself good-looking by learning to be good, and to do good, and to think only the things that are lovely.

There are some people who think that the way to make themselves pretty is to put on fine clothes and new hats, and lots of paint and powder, but those things will not make anyone beautiful. The way to be good-look¬ ing is to take care of the heart, and the face will take care of itself.

IV The Horse That Was Afraid of His Shadow

tl Looking unto Jesus. ” — Hebrews xii. 2.

The historian, Plutarch, in his “Life of Alexander the Great,” tells a very interest¬ ing story of a horse.

Philip, king of Macedon, the father of Al¬ exander, once bought a beautiful horse. This horse’s name was “Bucephalus.” “Bu¬ cephalus” is a Greek name, and it means “bull-headed.” They called him by this name because he was as strong and wild as a bull. The king had paid thirteen talents for him, which would be about twelve thou¬ sand dollars of our money, so you see he was a very valuable horse. The great trouble was that no man could be found who could tame him. He was so wild and vicious that they could not get on his back.

At last King Philip became displeased and told the servants to take the horse away. Alexander, the king’s son, heard what his father said, and it made him very sorry to think that they should lose such a magnifi- 20

The Horse That Was Afraid 2h cent horse. He turned to the king and asked if he might try to tame him. His father said, “What, you tame a horse that has been too much for the king’s grooms?” But he let him try.

It was a very sunny day, and Alexander had noticed that Bucephalus’ shadow fell on the ground just in front of him and fright¬ ened him. So he ran to the horse and, tak¬ ing hold of the bridle, turned him about so that he faced the sun, and the shadow fell behind him, where he could not see it. Then he began to talk to him and stroke his face, and before long he was on his back, and the horse was tamed.

The king was so delighted that he gave Bucephalus to Alexander, and when he died shortly after and Alexander became king, this horse helped him to conquer the world. For many years he carried his master through battle, and at last was killed in India. There is a town in India now that is called Bucephalia, after him.

Alexander conquered Bucephalus and took away his fear simply by turning his face toward the sun.

We have been told to look to Jesus. I think that most of our troubles come when we turn our faces away from Him, as this horse turned his away from the sun.

Some days we wake up in the morning and everything goes wrong. We are cross and fretful, and don’t like our breakfast, and there is trouble at school, and we aro pun¬ ished, and altogether it is a bad day all the way through. Do you know what the trou¬ ble was? We did not look to Jesus that morning and ask Him to help us through the day. Instead of that we turned our faces away and the black shadow of trouble was there all day to vex us.

The good Apostle Paul had many troubles in his life, but one day when he was talking of them he said, “None of these things trou¬ ble me.” They did not trouble him because he kept his face toward Jesus, and always went to Him in time of need.

Here is something to remember. When the shadows of life become black and trou¬ blesome and you are afraid, look to Jesus, and see how very quickly they all pass away.

y

Doing Our Best

“Not slothful in business.” — Romans xii. 11.

Paul couldn’t stand a person who was lazy. He tells us to do our very best with everything that we undertake. Most of you know about the “Corn Clubs” which the gov¬ ernment officers started several years ago among the boys of the South. Many of the farmers were not getting half as much from the land as they should. The land was poor, the crops were poor, and the farmers were poorer, because they did not know how to farm in the right way. These government officers tried to teach them to do better, but they wouldn’t learn. So they gave up try¬ ing to do anything with the men and went to the boys. They taught them to raise corn in a new way. Then they offered prizes to those who produced the most from an acre of ground. The average yield in Alabama had been seventeen bushels to the acre. There was a boy in the State who two years ago raised two hundred and twenty-eight bushels from one acre. This set the men to thinking, and they began to do things in a different way too.

Now what was the trouble before? They had had as good land, and as good arms, and as good brains, but they had not done their very best, and until they did that they could not succeed.

No man or boy ever gets the most out of the soil, or the world, or himself, until he has tried his very best. There is no better time for boys and girls to think about this than now, when so many of us are beginning our school work for another year. There are some of you who will go to school and you will do as little as you can, just enough to get through, and then, after a while, you will wonder why you do not get more out of your school days. It isn’t the clothes you wear, or who your family are, or even the brains that you have, that will count the most during your school days. It is your diligence. It is whether you are going to do your very best with the tasks that are given you.

There was a boy in Scotland many years ago who had to leave school when he was ten years old and go to work in a factory. He had to work from six in the morning till eight at night. He made up his mind that he would have an education. At first he tried to study at home at night, but that would not do. He was so tired that he fell asleep over his book. So what do you think

Doing Our Best

he did? He took his book to the factory with him, set it on the spinning machine, and studied while he worked. In this way he went through book after book till he was ready for the university. That boy was David Livingstone. He did great things with a very poor opportunity. Some of you are going to do a very little with fine oppor¬ tunities. There is not one of you who has not far more chance than this boy had.

This is what we ought all to remember as we look forward to the year in school : Be diligent. Do your very best.

But Paul meant more than this. He wanted us to be diligent not only in our school work, but in our Christian lives, too.

Once, while in the West, an old man said to me, “I joined the Church back East, when I was a boy, but I haven’t worked at it much for over forty years.” That old man had the right idea, though he did not carry it out. Being a Christian is a real business. It is the biggest, and the hardest, and the finest business in the world, and God wants us all to work at it all the time, and do our very best. I have been thinking, if some of us did not work any harder over our lessons for the day-school, than we do over the les¬ son for the Sunday school, we would never have much chance of getting into the high school by and by. God wants us all to be as diligent and careful over our work in the Sunday school and the Church, as we are over our work in the ^ay-school and in busi¬ ness.

VI A Little Bit Late

“And the door -was shut.” — Matthew xxv. 10.

Jesus told the story of a wedding. There were some girls who were invited. In the days when Jesus lived, if people came late to a wedding, they could not get in. The door was shut. They had to be there before the wedding began. They could not come straggling in whenever they felt like it, as they do now.

These girls of whom Jesus spoke, had re¬ ceived the invitation, but they were thought¬ less and careless, and did not begin to get ready till it was very late, and when at last they came to the door it was shut and they could not get in. They missed the wedding and the fun, and the wedding cake, and everything, because they were a little bit late.

It will not do to be late. It makes trou¬ ble for ourselves or for somebody always. The great battle of Waterloo was lost by Napoleon because someone was late. He had ordered Marshall Grouchy to march with his army to help him. Marshall 27

Grouchy did not start at once, as he should have done. When he did move Waterloo had been fought and Napoleon had been de¬ feated.

There are several reasons why children should be very careful about being late. One is that they are starting habits that will fol¬ low them all their lives. Every morning I see children going late to school. And they are usually the same children. They think that it will not make any difference if they are a few minutes behind. But all the time they are forming a habit that will stay by them all their lives, and some day they will be late when it matters very much.

There was a man like that who had fallen into the habit of always being late. He had a fine position. One day the firm that em¬ ployed him sent him to another city on a very important errand. There was only one train he could take and he was told that he must not miss it. He was late in starting, and on the way he stopped to talk to some¬ one. When he reached the station it was one minute past the time for the train to go. He rushed through the waiting room and up to the gate, but it was shut. He had lost the train, and he lost his place, because he was a little bit late.

Then we must be careful about being late because of the trouble it makes for others.

A Little Bit Late

There were eight women once, who had an important meeting set for a certain hour. Seven of them were on time, but the eighth kept the rest waiting for a quarter of an hour. When she came in, she said, “I hope you will excuse me for being late.” There was a plain-spoken old Quaker lady there. She said, “I don’t know whether we can ex¬ cuse you or not. It is bad enough for you to have lost a quarter hour of your own time. But there are seven others here whose time you have wasted for a quarter of an hour each, making nearly two hours, which was not your own.” When we are tardy we waste other people’s time as well as our own, and we have no right to steal their time any more than we have a right to steal their money or their watches.

Being late is a bad habit, and bad habits are like weeds. They ought to be rooted up and destroyed. You should all be sowing the seeds of good habits. One of the most useful of all habits is punctuality. Always try to be on time. Then other people will come to rely upon you.

But there is something more important about this subject than anything that has yet been said. In this story that Jesus told about the wedding feast, He was really thinking of heaven. We all expect to go to heaven sometimes. We have all been invited, and we are all going, we think. But some of us are putting off getting ready, as these foolish girls did. We will delay until, when by and by, we do start, maybe we will find that the door is shut. We will be too late.

When you have anything to do, the best time to do it is now. Don’t put it off. You all intend to be Christians some time : Do not delay. Now is the time.

VII A Child Christian

“ Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man.” — Luke ii. 52.

What is it for a boy or girl to be a Chris¬ tian? There are so many people who have wrong ideas about this. They think that if a child isn’t a Christian in the same way that a grown-up person is, he isn’t a Chris¬ tian at all. That is not fair, is it? Chil¬ dren do not walk like grown people do. In¬ stead of going soberly along, they skip and run and jump. They do not read the same sort of books, or play the same kind of games, that men and women do. And they are not Christians in the same way their fa¬ thers and mothers are.

Sometimes a good woman will say to me, “I am so troubled about my little girl. I do not believe that she will ever be a good Christian. She cannot sit still, and she does not listen to the sermon, and she is so full of mischief.”

I say to her, “Of course she is full of mis¬ chief and can’t sit still. You musn’t expect a little girl to be a Christian like a grown- 31 up woman. She will have to he a Christian in her own way, which is a little girl’s way. By and by, when she has grown up, she will be a Christian in your way. Some of the finest Christians I have ever known were little boys and girls, as full of fun and mis¬ chief as they could be. But they were boy and girl Christians.”

Now let me tell you how boys and girls can be Christians. First, they must never be afraid to show their colors. There was a boy once who went away to boarding school. He was put in the same room with several other boys. When it came time to go to bed he knelt down and said his prayers. The other boys began to laugh and make fun of him. They threw things at him and tried to make him stop. But the next night he knelt down and said his prayers again. The boys didn’t make fun of him then. After a night or two more, one or two of the other boys started to say their prayers, too. They had known all along that they ought to pray, but they had been afraid. Because that one boy was not afraid to show his colors, it made better boys of all of them.

Never be afraid to show your colors. If you are Christians don’t be afraid to have other people know it. It will do you good and will do them good, too.

Then, second, Christian boys and girls

'A Child Christian must be brave enough to fight against Satan. There are some boys who are brave enough when it comes to fighting other boys, but they haven’t very much courage when Satan is around.

The greatest teacher who ever lived in England, Dr. Thomas Arnold, once said, “I have had enough of boys who love God. I want more boys who love God and hate the devil.”

If we are to be real, true Christians we must hate the devil, and be brave enough to resist him when he comes trying to make us do what we all know is wrong.

Third, Christian boys and girls always obey their parents. In His twelfth year Jesus went up to Jerusalem. After this visit we are told that He went home with Joseph and Mary and was subject unto them. The best way that Jesus could do God’s will when He was a boy was by being obedient to them, and doing all that He could to help them. The old records say that Jesus helped Joseph by picking up the chips and shavings in the carpenter shop, and He helped His mother by carrying water for her from the well. There is no better way for boys and girls to show that they are Christians than by being obedient and help¬ ful at home.

There is one more thing that boys and girls must remember when they start out to be Christians. We must never forget that we are partners of Jesus. If you have a very good chum you always share every¬ thing that you have with him. If you are thinking of going somewhere or of doing something, you go and tell him about it. When we are Christians Jesus becomes our chum. We ought to tell Him everything that we are planning to do, and if it is some¬ thing that is not going to please Him we ought not to do it.

They said that Professor Blackie always wore an old plaid shawl about his shoulders. One day a friend asked him why he did it. He said, “Long ago, when wife and I were young, she came to me one day and said, ‘Your overcoat is very thin and shabby.’ I told her that I could not afford to have a new one. It costs too much. So she went upstairs and fetched her plaid shawl and put it over my shoulders that winter day, and now I always wear the plaid to remem¬ ber her love.”

That is the biggest part of being a Chris¬ tian. We must never forget our friend and Lord, Jesus Christ.

VIII Words That Fit

“ A word fitly spoken is liko apples of gold in pictures of silver.” — Proverbs xxv. 11.

Did you ever have a pair of shoes that did not fit? You know how they pinched, and rubbed, and hurt, until you were very glad to take them off. Sometimes words do not fit. Instead of being easy, and comfortable, they are stiff and tight and uncomfortable.

When Joseph was a boy he had a dream one night. It was a queer dream and the next day he told it to his brothers. It made them very angry. A little while after J oseph dreamed again. And what do you think he did? He went and told this dream, too, to his brothers. It was a very foolish thing to do, for he knew that it would make them angry. His words did not fit and they made his brothers very uncomfortable.

Once in college one of the boys went home for the Christmas holiday. While he was at home his father died. It was a great shock to him and almost broke his heart. A week or two later he came back. One of the boys met him, and said, "I hope you had a good time while you were away.” The poor boy did not say a word, but turned away and walked off alone. His friend did not mean to hurt him, but the words did not fit.

Sometimes when we are downhearted, and discouraged, and need some one to cheer us up, along comes a friend who says some¬ thing that makes us feel a great deal worse than we did before, because the words do not fit.

I have a good tailor. When he makes a suit for me I know it is going to fit. There are some people like that. Their words al¬ ways fit. There was a good woman whom everyone loved. She was the most popular person in the village. A stranger came one day and asked what it was that made every one like her so much. She was not good-looking. She was not rich, and could not wear very fine clothes. Some one said to him, “I will tell you why we all love her. She always says something that makes us feel better.” That was the secret. Her words were always a fit and people loved her.

There is a little story of Bishop Wilberforce. He was walking along the street one day when he met a crowd of boys. After he had passed they began to call out impudent things after the good man. One of them shouted out, “Can you tell me the way to