Half-hours with the Christ

Front matter

Chap.: Copyright N.o.

Shell

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

Preface

Many books have been written to transfer the reader back to the days of Christ in Judea and Galilee. This aims to bring the Christ into our time. We greatly need to see Jesus present at the dawn of the twentieth century — this man of Galilee who lives in the Gospels. How may we bring our lives into touch with him, into the sweet assurance that he walks and talks with us by the way ? The writer has known one woman who lived in the sunshine of his abiding presence, and taught others to behold his glory. This story presents many facts from her real life. May she continue to win others by this record, as she has by her happy, helpful teaching !

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Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. An Anxious Question 9

II. Entertainments 14

Chapter I An Anxious Question

M RS. LYDIA BROWN had a hard question to solve. It was, however, the most interesting question of earth or heaven. She had two bright children now in their early teens, that molding period when character is soon made or marred. After years of everwidening influence she seemed to herself to be left with their care as her sole mission.

Mrs. Brown was a rare woman, whose experience had been varied and marvelous. Her own conversion at the age of twelve was simply a happy surrender of herself to Christ as her Saviour, to enter into his own most intimate friendship. From that hour her joyous confidence made Lydia a happy playmate, refining the very sports of childhood and drawing other children to her cheerful and unselfish amusements.

Her childhood home was one mile from a 9 woman’s college, in Ohio, from which she graduated with high honors when she was eighteen years of age. She was at once engaged as the assistant principal in a village high school, where her personal magnetism and unselfish interest in the young people started currents of influence that revolutionized the town.

The next year she was appointed a teacher in the college where she had graduated. Here for five years she was the beloved of all under her care. Her happy faith had thus far filled her life with constant sunshine, for a pleasant duty had always waited for her willing hand.

Then she came to an unexpected crossroads. A young man who had been accepted by the Board to go as missionary to China, wrote asking her to consider the question of united hearts and united service in a foreign field. Every affection of her heart had intertwined with her work as teacher in this school for young women. She had met David Brown, six years before, when she was a teacher in the high school. She had greatly respected his purpose and sacrifices in securing an education, and had known of his consecration to this work. She did not know that for all these years this young man had secretly cherished the hope that he should reach the shining heights of culture and chario

An Anxious Question acter where he might venture to ask her hand. Never until now had there arisen one serious thought that she was to be invited to share his life-work.

She replied that it was a question so great that she must pause to seek wisdom higher than her own. The young man then came and pressed his suit with a devotion that found a response from her deepest womanly affection. She became the betrothed of the consecrated missionary.

Then she began preparation for the voyage across the ocean. She saw a great work ready for her hand, all divinely planned ; hence her faith smiled as she bade good-bye to friends and native land. For ten years they toiled together, founding a most promising mission at Canton ; then they returned for a year’s rest.

While in America Mr. Brown was taken with typhoid fever and died. Mrs. Brown was suddenly left with two bright children demanding care and education. She moved into a cottage which her slender means enabled her to buy in her native town. She went to her kitchen with the same sense of divine appointment with which she had gone as missionary to China. Through tears of bereavement she smiled her reconciliation to the new duty.

Seven years passed, and Mrs. Brown had made her Ohio cottage very sacred in this retirement with her children. Fannie, the daughter, was past fifteen, and Barton nearing fourteen. Their mother had been their most constant companion out of school hours. Fannie had inherited much of her mother’s cheerful, buoyant spirits. Barton was mature in thought, but of strong will and impetuous temper. He had one redeeming quality, a strong affection for his mother.

These two now began to be invited to the neighborhood parties, with many who were under the dancing master’s training, and to whom worldly amusements were exceedingly fascinating. The sprightliness and courtesy of Mrs. Brown’s children made them great favorites, and they were forming ardent friendships.

This was the hard question which Mrs. Lydia Brown was called to solve : How should she still keep these two interested in all that cultivates mind and heart for beautiful Christian lives, and prepare them for large usefulness, when their own social nature, their happy companions, and fascinating amusements, all combined to draw them into a giddy round of worldly pleasure ?

If this mother, with all her experience in two hemispheres and her rare tact and talent 12

An Anxious Question in winning others where she wished, found it a difficult problem to solve, what must it be for the ordinary careworn mother without this teacher’s rare experience and special culture?

It may interest parents burdened with the same anxious question, to follow this woman in her plans. It should interest every young person stirred with that searching question, “ How can I make the most of life ? ” What boy has never paused and wondered what the answer shall be ?

The evening came when Fannie and Barton were invited to a neighbor’s to unite with two other young people in arranging a series of winter evening entertainments. George and Amelia Bancroft lived in the beautiful home of a wealthy banker near by, and their parents were devoted friends of Mrs. Brown. George was past sixteen, and was just coming to lead in all the youthful society of the neighborhood. There was already a growing excitement to know who should form his set. As Fannie and Barton were permitted to go, with this object understood, to spend the evening at Mr. Bancroft’s, it brought a very important crisis.

CHAPTER II “ \/| OTHER, we shall decide nothing fully

I I until you and Mrs. Bancroft give consent,” said Fannie Brown as she and Barton left the cottage.

“ Thank you, my daughter,” said Mrs. Brown as she wished her children a pleasant evening. Then the thoughtful mother pondered the question of this important hour. She desired to enchant these young people, not only her own children, but her neighbors’ also, with something safer for their winter evenings than the social dance and the card table.

It must be something toward which they are not driven, but drawn. Can she find it ? She took her Bible with an uplifted prayer that she might be guided to some thought of Scripture by which the Christian life might be made entrancing in its study. She had been an expert in innocent home games, by which her children were hitherto held in her affectionate grasp in the most tender attachment to the humble cottage. But she well knew that they had now come to the age when no games she could invent would be so attractive as the amusements with a score of merry young people of their own age at an evening party.

But was it not possible that some phase of Christian truth might be found for eager, immortal souls, by combining knowledge and loving fellowship and happy association, that would be deeper satisfaction than mere worldly pleasure ? At least might not such a course of evening Christian culture be arranged as should greatly modify the spell of youthful frivolity and refine their happy associations?

With these thoughts she opened her Bible, and her eyes fell upon these words concerning the youthful days of Jesus: “And the child grew and waxed strong in spirit . . . and the grace of God was upon him. ’ ’ Then suddenly there flashed upon her mind a plan of work which she had undertaken ten years before for a company of young Confucians in Canton. It was to follow for one hour each day the life of Jesus from his birth in Bethlehem to his final ascension from Mount Olivet. She had brought a group of young men from high official rank into entranced interest. In the midst of her success they were compelled to return home for rest. It had always been a mystery why her bright plans had been so suddenly snatched away.

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Ah, how that fascinating dream all came back to her again ! The wondrous life of Christ unfolded to a company of royal youths until they should turn with eager delight to his service !

In a moment she felt a thrill of delight that God had been preparing her on the other side of the world through all those fruitful plans which had been so suddenly cut short, for this crisis in the education of her own children. More clearly than ever before there stood out to her mind the life of the child Jesus in the home at Nazareth. Mary and Jesus in hallowed association at that ancient hearth — the mind of Christ expanding with heavenly wisdom — that marvelous motherhood of Mary in charge of the Christ who was to bless the world ! ‘ ‘ What a mission, ’ ’ thought she,

‘ ‘ was granted to the mother of our Lord ! But ’ tis the same mission to every mother ; she is commissioned to watch the Christ-life develop in the mind and heart of her own child. ’ ’

As these thoughts swayed her mind she felt that the true Christian home was of the same interest to our Father in heaven as that home in which Jesus dwelt at Nazareth. Now her highest mission was presented to her in clear vision.

She went at once to the beautiful home of 16

Lyman Bancroft to return with Fannie and Barton. ‘ ‘ What plans have you made for the winter, George ? ” she eagerly asked the oldest of the four as they welcomed her to the conference in the library.

“Oh, it is so difficult to suit so many tastes,” said George ; “we do not want to grieve mother, who thinks we ought not to give the whole winter to dancing and cards. Anything else we have considered seems dull and stupid ; so we have made little progress. I am glad you have come to stop our fruitless discussions. ’ ’

Mrs. Brown’s face fairly shone with her new hope. ‘ ‘ I had a beautiful vision while alone to-night, ’ ’ she said ; “I came to consult with you four to see if it might not become a reality. ’ ’ All were now eager to know what new scheme had given the ever calm and cheerful face such unusual brightness.

“Tell us, mother,” said Fannie. “If it has made you so happy in the very thought of it, we should like to catch some of that joy too.”

So Mrs. Brown then told them how great a privilege came to her the last year she was in China. For years she had longed to get access to the homes of the highest ranks, that she might teach their young people. At last it came. One day a leading official came to b 17 inspect her mission school. He saw the improvement in a class of native boys. He asked Mrs. Brown if she would take his two sons a part of each day to give them some knowledge of Western civilization, preparatory to travel in Europe. She told him that if he would arrange a class from distinguished families, such as he would choose for their associates, it would give her pleasure to instruct them.

It was arranged. Ten boys approaching manhood were given to her charge. They were choice boys, of such advantages as few have in that land. They were anxious to know of life, manners, customs, laws, in the countries whence came the great merchants and statesmen and consuls that visited China. After many months of cautious teaching she had won the confidence of the distinguished official who had so guardedly put these royal youths in her care.

“Then,” said Mrs. Brown, “I ventured to tell him that all dates in Europe and America were kept from the birth of Jesus Christ, and that in the best nations of Western civilization, the precepts of Christ had greatly molded the laws and customs and manners of the best people. 4 Distinguished sir,’ said I, ‘would you be willing for me to give one hour each day to teach these young noblemen concerning 18 the life and teachings of Jesus the Christ, so that they may be intelligent in the first principles of the great Western nations?’ ”

By this time the company in the Bancroft library had forgotten their worry about the winter’s parties, and were eager to know more about the young Confucians of royal blood. “And did he consent? ” asked George, intent to learn more of her experience.

“After consulting with the other parents interested and laying the whole matter before the emperor, ’ ’ said Mrs. Brown, “he returned to give his approval. Never has a mortal had greater joy than I then experienced. It was a privilege never before granted our missionaries to enter this rank. I carefully planned a series of lessons on the life of Jesus, from his wonderful advent at Bethlehem to his ascension from Bethany. We were in the midst of this entrancing study when Mr. Brown was ordered home for a year’s rest ; for the debilitating climate and constant toil had told seriously upon our strength. ’ ’

She paused a moment and wiped her eyes, for her disappointment and her bereavement in her husband’s death all came back as if it were but yesterday she parted from her attached Confucians never to resume her work — as if it were yesterday she had followed to the grave 19 that noble companion, leading by the hand her two fatherless children. Then she continued :

“To-night it all came back to me, the charm of those hours with Christ ! I cannot go back to China. If I could, the relations of our missionaries with the government have greatly changed. My class of Confucians is scattered to various posts of honor. Some of them, I am told, are now secretaries of Chinese legations to various lands. But while you were here planning for your winter evenings for the months to come, I had a vision of this company of young people spending an evening or two each week around this table, studying character as revealed in the life and teachings of Jesus. I am sure if we could bring the real Christ before us as he walked and talked and taught upon earth, it would charm our minds as can no round of mere worldly pleasure. Will you four, since you have found no satisfactory plan for your social evenings, consent to make this the chief series of your winter’s entertainment? ”

Mrs. Bancroft had come quietly into the library during the conversation. Amelia glanced at her mother. She was the youngest of the four. She had spent many Sunday afternoons reading “The Story of Jesus.” Now she caught her mother’s hand and said :

* ‘Wouldn’t you, mamma, like us to take that for our evenings rather than anything else in the world ? ’ ’

Mrs. Bancroft smiled her assent, and watched with interest the face of her son. George Bancroft had the previous summer graduated from the high school, and was this year taking special studies, hoping to be able to enter Yale the next autumn.

Mr. Lyman Bancroft, the wealthy banker and leading citizen, was a moralist, who prided himself in his honest and honorable reputation, and for religion contented himself with his clean, cultured life. He attended church on Sunday and respected sacred things, but he did not study the Scriptures, nor did he speak of personal religion. George was beginning to emulate his father, though he greatly admired Mrs. Brown’s happy, cheerful faith amid all her toil and trials. When she spoke of Christ it was of such a tender friendship that he felt that her religion was not like that of most people he knew.

This evening her face shone with an unwonted charm as she talked of this study of the greatest life the world has known. George gave his consent to try it, a few evenings at least, under her guidance who had led the royal Confucians over this same road.

Little did Mrs. Brown realize what secret springs of heart were to be touched, and what a crisis she had been divinely led to confront. But “Half-hours with the Christ” at length became more enchanting that any gay round of merely worldly pleasure. Let us follow these lessons, and the conflicts of these young friends thereby discovered. Their experience shows the same inner battle being now fought among the young people of almost every community, with too often no leader coming, in the hour of peril, to give conquest to the right.

Chapter III

'HE arrangements were completed. The

I first evening came, and the four young people met in the Bancroft library. They were all bright, eager minds, but differing widely, as we shall see, in natural temperament. Lyman Bancroft’s fine residence had a spacious library with a long center-table, which was richly supplied with choice literature. Mr. Bancroft had advised largely with his esteemed neighbor of wide reading, Mrs. Brown, in the selection of books for his shelves ; hence she knew them well.

A blackboard stood at one end of the room. Barton Brown was quite an expert in map drawing. His mother asked him to step to the board and give a mere outline of Palestine. He ran a crooked line down the center, ending in an oval irregular figure at the bottom. That was the Jordan emptying into the Dead Sea. To the left he drew another curve that represented the coast of the Mediterranean. With a rapid stroke or two more, there stood out a clear map of the Holy Land.

Then Mrs. Brown began by saying that the life of Jesus clustered about four cities. She said it was very helpful to carry in the mind the location of these cities. “Will some one tell Barton where to locate Jerusalem?” It was a new thought to them.

“Well, open to your map of Palestine in your Bibles,” she continued. “Notice that Jerusalem is on a line directly westward of the upper end of the Dead Sea. That one fact remembered will greatly aid you to carry in your mind a picture of the land. Jerusalem is twenty-four miles west of the mouth of the Jordan.

“ Now, let us locate Bethlehem, the place where Jesus was born. Where is it from Jerusalem ? Yes, south, six miles. Make a star at that point. Where is Nazareth? Yes, north of Jerusalem, and nearly opposite the lower end of the sea of Galilee. There is one more city — Capernaum, at the north end of this little lake through which the Jordan runs.

“Now you have fixed the location of what are called the four cities of Jesus — Bethlehem, where he was born ; Nazareth, where he was brought up ; Capernaum, where he resided during his ministry and from which he made frequent tours all through the land; and Jerusalem, where he died.

“Here at Bethlehem Jesus was born. The world had been looking forward to his coming for a long time, as we since look backward. All time is now divided, throughout the civilized world, ‘ Before Christ,’ ‘After Christ.’ Such a personage demands our attention. Why has Jesus made such an impress upon the world that we date all our letters, record all our deeds, measure all time, from his birth ? Have you thought that not an infidel in the 25 land can hold his lot without mentioning in his title-deed the birth of Jesus Christ? He cannot write a letter to a friend without acknowledging the ‘name above every name,’ in the date ! It must be a wonderful character that thus controls this mighty stream of time so that we have no way of recording our dates but from his birth ! We cannot study these events of his life, unless we get clear views of his character and mission. ’ ’

Here Mrs. Brown stepped to the board and wrote three references from the Bible. Then each of them took a Bible and turned to the places indicated, and then she asked them to fill out the three-fold mission of Christ from these passages.

“What does the first scripture say Christ has done ? ‘ He revealed God. ’ So write that

opposite the first. The second reference suggests a pure and holy life, a perfect model, so that Pilate could say, ‘ I find no fault in him.’ So write in the second blank, ‘ He lived a perfect human life.’ The last passage insists that we behold him as the atoning sacrifice for sin, so from that we may fill the last blank as to his mission.”

Then there stood out on the blackboard the complete outline of the earthly mission of Jesus Christ :

John i : 18 J ( Reveal God.

John i : 27 j- HE CAME TO-j Live a Perfect Life.

John 1 : 29 J ( Redeem from Sin.

“Now,” said the earnest teacher as all eyes were looking upon the diagram of Christ’ s mission to earth, ‘ ‘ you can never understand the life we are to study until you see this three-fold purpose of Christ’s life unfolded. This triple-lock key, and it alone, will open the treasures of his life. That most wonderful chapter of the Bible, the first of John’s Gospel, asks us to grasp this key with confiding faith as we stand on the threshold.

“His life wrought a seamless robe of righteousness for our heavenly adornment. We are now to watch the process of the matchless weaving. Three shuttles fly back and forth ; one carries the white thread of a perfect human life ; another carries the blue of the skies, betokening his heavenly nature, his divine character ; the other shuttle bears the crimson thread of his atoning sacrifice whereby he redeems from the guilt of our sins. His life was woven throughout with the white and the blue and the crimson, representing his three-fold mission.

“ He is the heavenly friend sent from above to reveal God unto us, our Emmanuel. He is the spotless man that restores to earth the 27 broken mold of a true human life. Sin had robbed the world of a perfect model, but Christ restored it for our study. He presented himself to take the sinner’s place and met all the demands of the broken law. Many did not, would not, understand him ; hence they rejected and crucified him. ”

Then George Bancroft recalled his first doubt. He had heard a neighbor talk of the mysteries of this subject. This neighbor, Mr. Blanchard, had cautiously said at their first conversation on the subject, that the doctrine that Jesus was both God and man was too mysterious for him to believe ; he thought that Jesus was a very good man but he could receive him as nothing more. This had dropped into the mind of this alert youth like a seed into the springtime soil. He had frequently met this neighbor since, and had watched for his skeptical remarks with eagerness. He was much bewildered. The mist had gathered into doubt, a dark, confusing doubt.

‘ ‘ Mrs. Brown, ’ ’ said he, ‘ * will you excuse me if I say that this subject has become such a dark mystery to me that I am bewildered whenever I think of it ? It is so deep that I seem to be in a lake where I can never touch bottom ; or, if I stay on the surface, it is so wide that I never find any landing-place ; or 28 if I should ever land, I should be away off on the other side of our plain everyday life so that I should feel lonely. It makes me confused of late to think of it. ’ ’

4 ‘Well, George,” said the leader, “if you have such thoughts, our lesson has drifted to the right theme. Feel perfectly free to disclose all your difficulties. There is one question you ought to ask as you begin this study : He claimed to be the Son of God ; did his life match this claim ? As we compare his life with all others, does it rise so far above them that we must say ‘ The mystery of the life is consistent with the alleged mystery of the origin ; his doctrine is consistent with the birth ’ ? Please take this book and read a few sentences that I have marked, which show how others have been led in this study. * ’

George was a fine reader, so he took the book with pleasure. There was a slight tremor in his voice, because of the first announcement of this inner conflict which he had kept secret to this moment. His reading gave a peculiar intensity to the words as he followed down the open page handed him :

“If there be no break in the rhythm between the sayings of the teacher and the revelation of the angel who foretold his wondrous birth, then this unity of mystery becomes itself 29 an argument which compels certain conclusions. If the man spoke the language of earth with the accent of heaven, if he encouraged men by his common human nature to approach him, and then gave them assurance that the human enshrined the divine, then this would confirm his claim to have descended from heaven. Are these traces of the two natures in Christ’s life and teachings? ”

‘‘Now, children,” said Mrs. Brown as she turned to her son Barton and to Amelia Bancroft, “our thoughts have turned to a subject which, as George said a moment ago, is like a deep lake where one could not touch bottom ; have we gone down out of your sight ? or are we sailing away to the other side, many leagues from the place you were waiting to gather fruit with us ? Have you lost interest ? ’ ’

“Oh, not at all, Mrs. Brown,” said Amelia. “I was reading only last Sunday with my mother the story of the angel song to the shepherds, ‘ Peace on earth, good will to men ’ ; I thought while George was reading, ‘ Why, yes ! his life was just like the angel song’ ; he was always giving peace and breathing forgiveness to men.”

“And, Barton, are you with us?” said his mother, “or have you fallen overboard into George’s deep lake?”

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‘ ‘ I am on board, ’ ’ said Barton, with his usual vein for the humorous side, “in front with the captain, peering out to see if any icebergs are ahead ! ’ ’

“Amelia’s thought of the angel song to the shepherds being found in the life of Christ,’’ said Mrs. Brown, “reminds me of my class of Confucians. When we came to this account of the angel choir singing beneath the stars, with the shepherds near Bethlehem for their listeners, they sat entranced. ‘ Read it again, ’ said Kwang Yu, the son of the chief official. The boys gathered close about the reader, and their lips moved and their eyes glistened. When we came the second time to the words,

‘ Behold I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people,’ Kwang Yu was greatly moved. He sat with bowed head, as if listening to catch the distant strain. When the last words were reached concerning the shepherds’ visit to find the Child of Bethlehem, ‘ But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart,’ he said, ‘Teacher, was the mother wondering what the life would be, if angels came to tell the joy of his birth ? ’

‘ ‘ Then I said to this young Confucian,

‘ That you may be the more eager to know of the teachings of the one who caused the angels to sing, “Peace on earth, good will to men,’’ 3i suppose we now turn to a few words that fell from the Master’s lips as he sat once upon the mountain side and taught the people.’ I opened to the Sermon on the Mount and read nearly through the fifth chapter of Matthew. When I came to the words, ‘ I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you ; that you may be the children of your Father which is in heaven,’ so deep and intense was the impression produced upon the mind of one that he exclaimed, ‘ Oh, how beautiful, how divine ! This is the truth ! ’ and for many days he would often repeat, c Love your enemies,’ and then exclaim, ‘How beautiful! Surely this is a teacher from heaven ! ’ ”