Sivut kuvina
PDF
ePub

He binds the ocean in his chain,

Lest it should drown the earth again.

"When earth was covered with a flood, Which high above the mountains stood, He thundered, and the ocean fled,

And sought its own appointed bed.

"Let clouds, and winds, and waves agree
To join their praise with blazing fire;
Let the firm earth and rolling sea
In this eternal song conspire.

"Speak of the wonders of that love

Which Gabriel plays on every chord;

From all below, and all above,

Loud hallelujahs to the Lord."

ANECDOTE OF REV. E. F. HATFIELD.

IN the month of June, 1848, I labored for some weeks in Calloway county, Missouri. Many of the early settlers in that county were religious people; and the ordinances of the gospel have now been sustained among them, with little interruption, for quite a number of years. About the year 1833 or '34, brother Hatfield, now of New York, labored among this people with very great success. He was with them at a sacramental meeting of five or six days' continuance. He preached every day. The gospel was accompanied with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. Christians were revived, backsliders were reclaimed, and many souls were brought from the bondage of sin into the liberty of the children of God. During my visit, in 1848, I was delighted to find, that after the lapse of so many years, the memory of that brother, who had been so much blessed as the messenger of God among them, was still affectionately embalmed in their hearts. Knowing that I had been much associated with brother Hatfield since he left Missouri, they called on me for such portions of his subsequent history as were in my possession. Among many other facts, I gave them the following anecdote, which, as it was favorably received, I now lay before the reader.

In the winter of 1836, the Lord poured out his

Spirit, in a remarkable manner, on the Seventh Presbyterian Church in the city of New York, of which brother Hatfield was then the pastor, and, indeed, of which he is the pastor now. The awakening was extensive and powerful.

The number of serious inqui

rers was great, and soon there were many cases of hopeful conversion. As is usual in such an attitude of affairs, the tidings went abroad that the Lord had visited his people of the Seventh Presbyterian Church, and the friends of Zion in neighboring churches would occasionally come to weep and to rejoice with them.

Brother John

my acquaintance has been

was pastor of a church not far distant. That church had been blessed, in years gone by, with precious revivals. Many of its most efficient members had been born to God in those interesting seasons. Such individuals, of course, when they could find opportunity, that is, on Sabbath afternoon or evening, when they felt at liberty to leave their own place of worship, would go to brother Hatfield's church, and share in the blessings of the revival. With brother John very limited. I have never had the opportunity to hear him "define his position" in relation to revivals. But it seems that his zeal did not carry him so far as to approve of members going from his own church in order to witness the progress of a revival in another. And yet, from Sabbath to Sabbath, as he appeared in the pulpit to address his people, empty pews, with alarming frequency, were yawning in every quarter of the church, and the evil was evidently on the increase. Brother John determined that the offenders should meet with speedy rebuke. Accordingly, one Sabbath

morning, when they were mostly in their pews, at their own church, brother John arose in the pulpit. Perhaps it could scarcely be said, as in the case of Goldsmith's village schoolmaster,

"Well had the boding tremblers learned to trace
The day's disasters in his morning face."

[ocr errors]

But when he announced his text, they began to look one upon another. His text was Matt. xi. 8: "What went ye out for to see?" This text he repeated, looking earnestly, now on one part of the congregation, and now on another. As he fixed his eyes on those on the right hand of the pulpit,—and a number of the delinquents were there, he demanded, "What went ye out for to see?" Then turning to those on the left hand, he repeated, "What went ye out for to see?" And then the assembly in front were addressed, “ What went ye out for to see?" The preacher, (I pretend not to give his identical words, but the substance, merely,) according to the good old custom, raised from the text an important doctrine, to wit: That when he preached in that pulpit, there was no propriety in those who ought to attend his church, going to hear or see what might be transacting in other churches. "What went ye out for to see?"

Brother John maintained that any departure from the above doctrine was unauthorized: 1. By Scripture; 2. By the confession of faith; and 3. By the Catechisms, both the Larger and the Shorter. And to many of his hearers the sermon abounded in “striking remarks. It was not long, however, until there came one that had "escaped," and told brother Hatfield. On the Sabbath afternoon, therefore, when many of the same

[ocr errors]

persons were present, of whom it had been demanded, "What went ye out for to see?" brother Hatfield arose in his pulpit, and announced his text: "Go and show John again 'those things which ye do hear and see the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them. And blessed is he whosoever shall not be offended in me." (Matt. xi. 5, 6.)

[ocr errors]

A friend desires to be informed of the difference between Calvinism and the Fatalism maintained by Mahometans. I answer, Fatalism teaches that all things are governed by blind, undesigning fate atheism asserts that all things are the sport of blind chance and contingency. The Bible teaches that "all things are of God." On this holy ground Calvinism plants her standard, distant alike from the two extremes of blind fate and blind contingence, (Truth lies in the middle,) and rejoices, with joy unspeakable, that an infinitely INTELLIGENT and Benevolent Being, for his own glory and the greatest good, "works all things after the counsel of his own will."

« EdellinenJatka »