REV. MR GANGE'S VISIT.

Evening Star, Issue 13013, 7 January 1907, Page 4

REV. MR GANGE'S VISIT.

The Rev. E. G. Gange. F.R.A.S., oxprosident of the Baptist Union of Great Britain and Ireland, who is now touring tho colony with Mrs Gange, preached at Hanover street Baptist Church yesterday to very large congregations, forms having to be placed in the aisles at the evening service to accommodate the crowd, and oven then a few stood "in the porch. Mr Gangc's preaching is exceedingly attractive j and after listening to him one can well understand how he has held such important pastorates as Broadmead, Bristol, and Regent Park, London, with such success through many years. His sermons are full of intellectual and spiritual power, his teaching is strongly evangelical, and flashes of wit and homely humor are interspersed among fine poetic and oratorical passages. In tho morning Mr Gange preached from 1 Peter V., 10, " The God of all grace, who hath called us unto His eternal glory." "Every man to-day," said Mr Gange, " believes there is a God—some Divine Being, some great First Cause. The Atheism of Tom Poine and Voltaire is dead and buried. But conceptions of this God are various. He is a God of omnipotence, but of what comfort is that to me? If Ho is merely omnipotent, He may crush me like a moth. He is a God of unsullied holiness, but of what comfort is that to me if I am sinful? But when I learn He is a God of grace I can begin to hope. Grace is a beautiful name for a girl, but what a grand name for a God! Don't run away with the idea that God is a spy. a constable on the look-out for your faults. Ho is a friend and a father. And grace is a spring from which many rivers flow; it comes to us in many ways." ' Then followed such concise, pregnant, pungent passages as these: "Tho riches of God's grace are of far more worth than the riches of the world. People have to leave their money behind them when they die; they can't take it to Heaven. There is something far better there, and if they took it to another place it would melt."

"'As thy day, so shall thy strength be.' I am convinced that the secret of happy living is to take short views of life. Don't send a telegram to to-morrow to learn whether it has any trouble. I never wish that onyono shall die and loavo mo a large fortune, but I do hope to always havo a sovereign in my pocket, and when that is gone to "have another. You have no right to walk into a lion's deH expecting that God will send angels to shut the lions' months unless you know that God is sending yon there. You can do so then, and need have no fear. You have no right to put your son into a trade that is a red-hot fiery furnace, but if God sends anyone into the furnace God's grace •will be sufficient."

" A man who feels fit for every part in life is not fit for any. Ability and modesty go together. But if God is calling you to any task in life you must not let modesty Stand in your way. His grace will be enough. Bnt there is something elso in my text—glory." "I am not going to preach a funeral sermon. I don't believe in funeral sermons. I believe in breaking the -alabaster box, and saving all the good things you can while people are alive. I don't believe, in ministers talking a lot in the pulpit about the bliss of dying. What do tbev know about it? But don't be afraid to die. You who' know the gr;y*e of God through Christian experience will find the hjjt ready, and you'll find a R uide. You'll know Him by the print of the nails. And when you get near to the valley you'll find it to ho the land of Beuloh. Don't bo too fascinated by the future to take a living interest in the present. You'll be an angel one day, but your wings have not .begun to grow yet. On tbe other hand, don't let the clouds of earth shut out the pinnacles of the eternal." In the evening Mr Gange preached to a crowded house from the text "There standeth one among you whom ye know not" (John i., ?& nnd 27) The preacher gave first a graphic word picture of the scene lo> which the text refers. "WeVo be*n asking tho secular Press," said Mr Gange, " to suppose that Christ came to Chicago and London and so forth, but soppose everybody realised that drist was 1 in Dunedin? There wouldn't be an empty seat m any church, there wouldn't be a late cemer, there wouldn't be a listless hearer; everyone would be on the qui vivc, and asking: 'ls Habere? Point Him out to me.' What would be the effect upon the preacher? How that preacher's lips would glow! How his eyes like two stars as ho spoke of tho crucifixion m tbe presence of the crucified! WhAt would he the effect upon the oheir? If I did not live under the British flag I would like to live, under the Stars and Stripes. But there T& one American, practice I hope will never become popular here—the congregations <h> their singing by proxy- They will have a trio or chair away up in tbe gallery, and they do the singing on behalf of the congregation. But tho choir cannot think too highly of your work. You should think nothing too hard, no pains too great to get light nnd shade, expression nnd soul in your surging; yours is the groundwork of leading the praise of the oongregation up to the. Throne of God. I have sometimes missed my Lord in the prayer and in tbe sermon, but He has come to me in the hymn. You lead, remember, in the presence of Christ. " What would be the effect upon, the prayer?" A. great deal of prayer has no point- "/Some people pray for everything,' and in doing *w pray for nothing. A man called' out ouce in a Yorkshire congregation to the minister, who was praying in generalities: 'Call Him Farther amd ax Him seme-

tiling.' We'll bare, a great t*ti&&f maS Mr Gauge, "when the •Obtareh " cam shako the Throw by prayer. What would bo the effect of realising Chriai's presence upon the collection? What woulcf be tie effect if Jesus Christ Trent round and held the plate with His wounded baud? A lady in an Anglican church, in England left the church after the morning servioe by the front door, and to escape giving to tbo collection, she said to the sidesman t 'I shall be bore this evening.' She 'was, and left the church in the evening at tbo other end of the building, and eud to the officer at that end: ' I -was hero- this morning.' She was, bat God's house and. Qo£m treasury were no richer. for her poaamca. Would she have done that if she had bad to pass Jesus Obristf" The preacher, trtthl great impressdveness and pathos, dealt with! assertion (the tiiird division of his subject)—* —the assertion of tbo reality of Christy presence—and concluded with an eloquent and touching appeal.