When the wild crab-apple puts forth blossoms, Nature sermons preached, in... Aurora, Ill.

Front matter

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT:

A REVELATION OF THE LOVE OF GOD

When the Wild Crab- Apple Puts Forth Blossoms

Contents

I. When the Wild Crab -Apple Puts

Forth Blossoms, - - - - 21

II. Where Wast Thou When I Laid the

Foreword

Xt

THESE sermons have been preached at varying intervals of several months. They have come from the heart of one who has intensely loved nature from a boy, who believes and has always believed that this is God's world, that He thinks enough of it to make it His winter-residence and summer-residence alike, that He is always at home, and can be found in it by one who seeks to know Him ; and that as God teaches the parent bird to care for its young, to protect them and feed them, so will He teach and guide and protect His children.

These sermons are sent out with the hope that they may arouse pleasant memories in the minds of lovers of God's world, that they may stimulate a greater love for God and His world, and that they may help some to find Him who somehow may have come mistakenly to believe 13

FOREWORD that the God of the Bible, the Christian's God, and the God of the Universe are different Beings. There is but ONE GOD, whether we worship Him in church or in field, while listening to singing choir or singing brook, to the voice of the prophet or the voice of the stars.

"GOOD MORNING'

Chickadee at Home

Introduction

U

HUGH MACMILLAN has shown the depth and beauty there are in natureinterpretations of the Holy Scriptures. The God who made all things which bear the stamp Good, "and God saw that it was good," — that God will have pleasure in having His Scriptures interpreted in terms of the wood and the wild and the field.

Besides, this is no longer an inference since the Christ preached in our town; for His method was so flushed with the dawn and restful with the dusk and did so distil the meanings of the growing things and the foxes and the birds and the smell of the new-plowed fields, He made a picture-book in words of such things as call the open sky their house.

My friend Carpenter, who knows so much about God's wild beasties and who knows the Christ to love Him, has done well to speak with 2 17

INTRODUCTION picture and with word on the parables of God which are forever present in the Scriptures of Written Truth and in the scriptures of Nature. I have been afield with him and have been at prayer with him, and know he cares for the whole of the Kingdom of the Heavenly Father.

Therefore, welcome this volume. May it bring forth fruit both by winter and by summer, being one of God's perennials which shall wear blossoms and ripened fruit together all the year.

William A. Quayle.

I

"My beloved spake and said unto Me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away. For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land ; the fig tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell. Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away. . . . Let us get up early to the vineyards; let us see if the. vine flourish, whether the tender grape appear, and the pomegranates bud forth. . . . The mandrakes give a smell, and at our gates are all manner of pleasant fruits, new and old." — Song of Solomon.

"And the Lord smelled a sweet savor; and the Lord said in His heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake ; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done. While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease." — Genesis 8:21, 22.

"And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth." — Genesis 9 : 16.

I

"When the fig-tree puts forth leaves." — Matthew 24:32. Or, "When the wild crab-apple puts forth blossoms." — Author's Revised Version.

IF we were dwellers In Palestine we would stand where Jesus stood and watch the unfolding of the draperies of the fig tree. Being dwellers elsewhere, but with the same spirit, we stand entranced by the beauties of this land, and in the presence of the spirit of the springtime our hearts are filled with praise to God. There is an epidemic abroad in our land; I know not how many victims, but they are legion; and if our prayers are offered for the ceasing of the epidemic of foul disease which ravages and kills, I pray for the spread of this epidemic until every one has become its victim; and as a result of this fever there is prayer and worship and praise to God, the Builder of the world.

It is an epidemic of spring-fever, and a thoroughly inoculated victim stands before you. 21

Perhaps some of you will think you hear the ravings of a disordered brain. My thought, expressed with all gentleness, is that the ailment, the disorder, is in the brain of the man who can walk abroad at this season of the year and not be bewitched by the ravishing enticements of Nature.

There is no calendar able to tell when spring will come any more than it can tell when the measles will come. In both cases the fevers are catching and are known by their fruits. A man who is interested enough to know one season from another, and to whom it makes any difference when spring does come, will have no difficulty in telling. The evidences are within him.

Spring-fever is as definite a disease as measles and much more pleasant. I have had both, and speak from experience. As with bodily ills, this fever may not manifest itself at the same time to all its victims. Some catch it rather late in the season; but if so, they miss some of the delightful preliminary stages. It is of these early symptoms that I speak first.

As a boy, when the fever came on, I made 22 whistles from slender willows, vented my spirits by blasts long and loud that would send the blue jays scurrying from the crab-apple thicket with wild cries of alarm, and I cunningly noted

WILD CRAB-APPLE BLOSSOMS the tallest of the willow-shoots and carefully spared it for another day. But already in imagination, I saw it bending from the frantic endeavors of a minnow — or "shiner," in boy language — to run away with my bobber. If I were a woman it would manifest itself in numberless plans for assaults upon the dust that had accumulated during the winter months. Being a man, and therefore not compelled to "ask ma whether I can go a-fishin','' or to ask my husband whether I may clean house, with his assistance on the carpets, with light heart and impatient mood I wait for the first robin, then blithely snatch my cap and start for — Oh ! anywhere, away from houses and folks.

The robin is the harbinger of spring and the forerunner of spring-fever, and therefore I seek first for him. The robin is a gallant gentleman (indeed, most birds are) and does not ask the lady to come north until he has explored the land. I admire the robin's manner. He has a jaunty way which leads us to believe that he knows spring is on the way. And he is so pert when he drops down upon the elm branch and carelessly sings, "Wake up; wake up! Spring is coming, coming, coming," we can scarcely believe that he has made a long journey to bring us this glad news. He knows from experience that there will be blustery days and ice and snow; but he refuses to be dismayed or frightened, and sings his roundelay so merrily, 24

"Cheer up; cheer up! Spring is coming, coming, coming," that he makes the words bubble to my lips, "Cheer up; cheer up! What does blustery weather amount to, anyhow?"

I thank God for the robin in the early spring; and driven by the spring-fever, I go abroad to look for the bluebird. It has been banished from our yards and bird-boxes by the ill-mannered English sparrow, but it has a cheerful way of doing the best it can under the circumstances. Not being wanted about our homes, it has taken to the fields and fence-posts. Out in the country I find it. This winged comrade of mine carries the blue of the sky upon its back; tinted, we may easily imagine as it has made its way through the blue sky from the distant South; and it has painted its breast from the same terra-cotta jar the robin used. And there are the meadow-larks, bearing the yellow of the dandelions upon their throats, and the wild ducks circling about the ponds, and the song sparrow announcing its arrival from the topmost twig of the pussy willow.

On a southern slope I bask in the sun and watch the mud turtles crawling out of the cold 25 waters onto an old log, that they too may bask in the sun. They remind me of the village street-corner where men are basking on drygoods boxes or lazily leaning against the warm side of buildings. Work does not suffer at their hands, either men or turtles ; but probably nothing else will. I pick up a turtle as it is crawling to another pond, and note the picture on the under shell, and the brilliant lines of red and yellow, and marvel at the generosity of God in dealing out the beautiful colors to the humblest creatures. How is the turtle able to find its way from pond to pond without compass and without getting lost? It may satisfy some to say that God created the creature that way, which is true; but others will ask how it has been done, and in what way do these powers manifest themselves; and they add to the world's store of knowledge through this spirit of investigation.

Driven by the frenzy of this early spring-fever, I am searching for the first flowers: in the marshy land the brown pod of the skunk cabbage, encasing a thick head bearing numerous tiny blossoms, crowds through the earth, 26 preceding the huge heart-shaped leaves; and the marsh marigold with its cluster of kidneyshaped leaves and loved by country folk for "greens," opens many tufts of golden flowers. On the rocky bluffs are the hepaticas, delicate blossoms of varying tints of white and pink and purple; in the thicket along the old rail-fence, the bloodroot, as delicate as an invalid maid; in the woods, the anemones and spring beauty; on the gravel-bank, the windflower, anemone too, but wearing its name gracefully as it sways in the breeze. And while the search continues, new ones are coming on : buttercups and violets and trilliums and adder's tongues ; and the procession seems endless and is endless. As we watch them pass we give our word of praise to the early blossoms that have pushed their way through the cold ground and dead leaves, and have defied the chilling winds and flurries of snow. And we give a word of praise to God, who has made the blossoms and who has sent us abroad this day.

Spring is coming, always coming. The spirit of adventure is in the air; and as one gets in touch with the great world about him, the spirit 27 of adventure — to dare and to do — takes possession of a man, and he is more of a man than when he grabbed his hat and started afield at the call of the robin and the spring-fever. The fever ebbs and flows, but is so pronounced this May day that we must go abroad again, forgetting, if we can, these pews and walls and vaulted arches, and seeing rather the aisles and arches of the leafy temples of the forest.

When the wild crab-apple puts forth blossoms the trees are in various stages of robing themselves for the summer's journey. Some seem to have forgotten the call of May, the branches are so bare and ungainly. Others have lately aroused, and now a delicate pink blush suffuses the more tardy oaks, while others are putting on a dress of yellow-green; and almost while we look we can see the yellow fading into deeper green. When the wild crab-apple puts forth blossoms it is helping to adorn the woods as the streets of the city are decorated for some festive occasion. The thorn-apple assists with blossoms of snowy whiteness, and blossoms so numerous that one would fain believe some lingering gust of winter day had whirled a million 28 snowflakes about the tree; and the redbud or Judas tree, unwilling to be outdone, not waiting for the leaves to unfurl, arrays itself in tints of reddish-purple.

But the wild crab is not satisfied with one tone, however handsome it may be. It paints the flower-leaves with white and pearl and pink and red in such exquisite shadings, and submerges them all in such a sea of perfume, through which one wades, by which one is drenched, as he comes near to the color-display, that he is intoxicated by the very beauty, the very fragrance. And the flowers, more modest in stature than the trees but more persistently numerous, are adding beauty and grace and life to the scene; anemones and shooting-stars, puccoon and phlox and columbine, colored pink and white and red and yellow are lending variety and gayety to the landscape. When the wild crab-apple puts forth blossoms, the birds are trooping through its branches, trooping through the forests. Describe them? Why, if one were to gather great handfuls of dandelion blossoms and bluebells and tulips and wakerobins, and throw them hither and thither 29 among the branches, he would not add new or more color than is already there because the birds are there: grosbeak and tanager, towhee and wood thrush, and warblers with yellow and red and black, with blue and white, with orange as bright as morning-dawn, with brown as deep as chestnut-stain.

Perhaps now that the wild crab-apple has put forth blossoms, the spring-fever is at its height, and bewildered and delirious the victim throws himself beneath its branches and scarcely breathes as he listens to the avian May festival. It is morning. During the night the carpet of green has been washed by the falling rain, and now it is vivid in brightness of green, set with limpid drops of water shining like silvery jewels. About him and overhead the trees are breaking the sunlight into flecks and scattering them on the ground. Behind him the brook is dancing down the riffles, playing with pebbles, working itself into foamed frenzy as it uselessly beats against the rough-shouldered boulder, tossing some stray leaf as the waves of the sea toss the fisherman's boat, and the music of the water is throbbing in the background. The oriole is the 30 master of ceremonies, and while his orange-andblack cap and robe flash among the branches he mounts a twig and gives the trumpet-call to song. The soloists respond : the catbird from yonder thicket of thorny gooseberries, the wood thrush hiding behind the hazel-brush, the roseate grosbeak from the willow, the brown thrasher from the swaying elm; and there are the choruses, the gurgling notes of blackbirds, the batlike notes of goldfinches, the silverybelled notes of bobolinks, and the choruses of warblers with dripping tones falling from the leafy foliage as thickly as the great drops of rain that fall like tinkling bells on the leaves of the trees. And the music is not sweeter and more resplendent than the robes they wear.

After a time he may stagger to his feet, may make his way homeward; but I mistake if there has not crowded in upon him the sense of overwhelming, abounding life. The streams are leaping with the accumulated energy of winter, and the banks will hardly contain the whirling, swerving waters. The trees seem full to overflowing with life, so superabundant it must find a way out through twig and leaf. The birds 31 are full to overflowing with life; it must find a way out through quiver of wing and flitting of tail, and swelling throats that can not hold all the music and rhapsody contained — it spills out like bubbling waters from the spring. I mistake if one does not return in religious mood with an overwhelming sense of the nearness of God, the energy of God, the activity of God. All that God is doing is so fertile, so productive, so growing, so bubbling over with life; God is so near, so present, so crowding into all things He has made and through all things He has made, that instinctively I find myself recognizing Him in my life, feeling that He belongs in my life, acknowledging Him as my Maker and Keeper and Master.

I can see how some might not be brought to religious mood in the summer time when the sun burns with fiery rays, and the heat is oppressive, and the dry dust stifles the nostrils, though there is evidence enough here of God for those who are not so easily disturbed by these superficials. I can see how some might not be made religious by the autumn when the sky is drear with cloud and fog, and the shiver- 32 ing wind pierces to the very marrow, and the fields are brown and the leaves are dead and the flowers are withered, killed by the frost. I can see how some might not be thrown into religious mood by the biting, stinging wind of winter that nips the cheek and nose, that drives the frost against the window-panes until we can not look out upon the abandoned world, that drives the snow in great banks across the streets and roads, and piles it about our doors so that we can scarcely plow our ways through and would fain sit by the fireside, though there is ecstasy enough in each of these seasons for

. . . "him who in the love of Nature holds Communion with her visible forms;" . . .

but it seems to me that a man is without mind and heart who is not moved to God in the spring time, when the wild crab-apple puts forth its blossoms and the redbud blooms by the swollen waters: mind given by God that a man may measure himself alongside of the abounding energy and life of God everywhere revealed in the spring time; mind given of God so that we are able to seek after Him and find Him and know Him and be grateful for His com- 3 33 panionship; heart given of God that we may measure up toward the glory of things ; that we may be stirred to laughter, to ecstasy, to poetry, to music, to wonder, to worship; and that we may cry out, u O Mighty One, I have love for the world Thou hast made, and for Thee, the Maker of the world, love surpassing the love of man for woman."

Nature is a revealer of God; and to the theologian who thinks his craft is the interpreter of God and who scoffs at Nature's teachings or ignores them, I say that Nature is a better, more certain, more authoritative teacher of great principles of God than he is. I do not trust theology. Oh ! I trust my own ; for it is an honest attempt on my part to frame words that will tell of the relations existing or that might exist between my God and myself. Other theologians, professional or laymen, I assume, are equally honest; but they present such different ideas, I am confused by their endeavors at times. How many pictures of the Madonna or the Christ there are ! what different interpretations there have been ! — and none has told the whole story, has given the per- 34 feet likeness. I trust the love that is in the heart of the man who draws the portrait of God; yes, I will trust the love that is in the heart of the pagan; but I do not fully trust

THE REDBUD BLOOMS BY THE SWOLLEN WATERS his judgment, his knowledge. I do not impute the motive, I impute the results that spring from imperfect knowledge.

What blunders and crimes have been committed in the name of theology! Folks have mutilated their bodies by rites of circumcision until they could not defend their firesides. Children have been offered in sacrifice to the leaping flames or the greedy waters. Man by predestination has been robbed of his chance to make his peace with God; and babes snatched from their mothers' arms in all the sweetness and innocence and helplessness of babyhood, unbaptized, have been committed to the world of lost spirits. What crimes have been committed in the name of the Church ! The Sanhedrin issued its decrees against Jesus and sent Him to the cross; Diana's followers cried out against the Christians of their day and mobbed them; the Pope of the Roman Church has anathematized men, and that Church has passed sentence of death upon many; the Puritans, ushering in a new and better reign of morality, issued their decrees against the Quakers and persecuted them; the Episcopalians ridiculed and opposed the work of the Methodists in their early day, and the Methodists ridiculed and opposed the work of the Salvation Army in its early day.

This is no argument against God: it is an argument against the imputed perfect wisdom 36 of man. It is no argument against the Church or theology : it is an argument against the wrong use and arrogant claims of these. A razor is essential for the happiness and pleasing appearance of man : but suicides have been committed with it. Gas is a blessing in the lighting of our homes and preparing of our meals: but it has destroyed the food and burned the house when improperly used. The theologian and the Church are necessary for the advancement of the Kingdom of Christ in the hearts of men : but they have missed their calling at times. Galileo was a helpful man, fighting God's battles for truth in the human mind: but he was woefully misunderstood and abused by the theologians of his day. God has been misrepresented and His cause has run with lame and halting feet because of imperfect man, sometimes ignorant, sometimes overzealous, and sometimes cruelly ambitious and selfish.

Theology is not the speaking of God to man, though it is often so understood. The Bible is God speaking to man, the Holy Spirit is God speaking to man, conscience is God speaking to man, nature is God speaking to man; theology 37 is man talking about God, speculating about God; and because man is imperfect and ignorant it is mistaken and imperfect, and will change and continue to change as the mingled dawn and dark of the morning twilight change into the perfect day. Let us be grateful for every honest endeavor of man to learn about God, and to tell us with all the wisdom of mind and fervor of heart he possesses about God; but let him not endeavor to supplant other sources of knowledge concerning God with the theology he has built, however helpful it may be.

When the wild crab-apple puts forth blossoms the world is revealing God as mighty Creator. It is saying what it has said every day since it came into being, "In the beginning, God." In the midst of the changing, building, growing world a man is transported to those first days sketched and outlined on the first pages of the Bible. He sees the building of the heavens, the building of the sun, the building of the earth, the finishing of the earth as the carpenter finishes the dwelling-house, until there are land and sea, mountains and valleys, forests and plains, waving grass and waving fronds of ferns 38 and waving branches of palm trees, and animals that creep and fly and run; and he, amazed and dumb and awe-stricken in the presence of it, sees God, the mighty God, the Master- Builder. He reads, "God made every tree to grow," and as he sees the springing trees putting forth leafage and blossoms and fruit he bows to God, the mighty God. If he listens too much to the word of some man he may shut his eyes and say that after God worked for a few days He rested; He finished the world, He started it going, and then went away and has never come back to look after it. But if he is a wise man, when the wild crab-apple puts forth blossoms he will make it a visit, will look at the growing trees, swelling waters, flitting birds, blossoming flowers, humming bees; and as he sees these things coming into being, and growing into larger being, again will he be amazed and dumb and awe-stricken, and in the presence of it he will see God, the mighty God, the PRESENT Master-Builder.

Nature shows that God is at work NOW. He works nights as well as days, Sundays as well as week-days. There is as much rain and 39 sunshine and singing of birds and building of their nests while we worship as while we toil in the shop or field. And have you not heard the corn growing during the night? and have you not seen the leaves unfurled with the coming of the dawn as banners are unfurled by the breeze? Here is no excuse for man. Here is no argument against the Sabbath day or the eight-hour law. Man is not built on a twentyfour-hour schedule or a seven-day-a-week plan. He needs a portion of the day for other work than his regular job : for the home, society, selfimprovement. He needs the Sabbath for rest and worship, the reading and study of the Bible, more uninterrupted communion with God, attendance upon church-services, doing of acts of mercy. If man finds his highest joy in jaunts to parks and out-of-door pleasures, then he is merely an animal, a beast of the field.

But nature is not an end in itself, is not the highest aim of man: it is the revealer of God; and it shows Him always interested, always present with and always caring for the things He has made. It denies that He is dead or sleeping or gone upon a journey. If my heart 40 aches because of the burdens and disappointments of life, as I look upon Him busied with His creatures, He comes into my heart

"With a mild and healing sympathy, that steals away Its sharpness, ere I am aware."

Yes, the Lord rested then, and He rests now; His strength is so boundless, His burden is so light, there is such joy in His labor, such certainty of the perfect work that shall one day have proceeded forth from His hands. As I see Him in His world I cry out in wonder: "O Lord, how manifold are Thy works! In wisdom hast Thou made them all; the earth is full of Thy riches."

Nature suggests and proves God. I know some of the technical playing with words by which philosophers may confuse us and assert that it is impossible to prove God. Maybe so; but I know the satisfaction of my own mind and heart that can not be taken away with technical subterfuges. I speak to the common, hard-thinking man, and say that Nature will strongly argue for God and prove God. Here is revealed matchless comprehension that runs 41 into perfect wisdom. I am sure this is God's world; there is so much of it.

There was a time when I might have named several hundred plants growing about here, giving common and scientific names; but most of the names have gone and many of the faces have become strangers to me, so that I do not recognize those that once were friends, when I meet them in the woodland or meadow or marsh. My mind is so small and feeble that other things coming in have demanded and have taken the room. Now assume what has never existed : a human brain big enough to carry all the names of all the plants that grow in every corner of the world, and to know something of their habits and their processes of growth; it would be in dense ignorance of other departments of thought and knowledge. But a human brain does not exist big enough so that we would think of imputing comprehension to it even of the plant-world. It may be suggestive of such a brain, but nothing more; it may bear resemblance to a brain mighty enough to comprehend all things, as the brain of a babe that has grown enough so that it recognizes its mother's face 42 bears resemblance to the brain of a Blaine or a La Follette who recognizes the faces of countless people. But as I look upon this world I say that who is Creator of it must have a mind big enough to number and name all the stars and flowers and beetles and birds and all things that are made, and not only to name them but to know about them, whence they came, how they live and grow and multiply, and whither they are going. I am in the presence of Matchless Comprehension, I am in the presence of God.