THE HENRY MISSION.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXXI, Issue 15332, 15 June 1910, Page 9

THE HENRY MISSION.

MEETINGS FOR BUSINESS MEN. There was a fair attendance at the meeting for business men conducted by the Dr Henry mission at His Majesty's Theatre yesterday. Dr Henry took for his subject " The Indestructibility of the Bible," and said that the denial of the divinity of Christ by certain men did not affect Christ's divinity, any more than their denial of God's existence affected the fact of that existence. When Jehoakim destroyed the messago in which God denounced his doom, God repeated the message to Jeremiah, showing that God was not limited to one edition or vehicle for his Word, but could communicate to man through a thousand channels. The Biblo possessed life-giving power because it partook of God's immutability and indestructibility. The Bible was the only living thing in a world in which death ruled all things. The difforenco between the Bible and other books was that the Biblo lived, while all other books died. It had a perennial freshness, because it was infused with vitality. The Bible was always thoroughly up-to-dato and never antiquated. There was not a scientific work written ten or twentyyears ago which was not obsolete today, but God's Book was still up-to-dato. ATI the information in the Biblo was definite, clear and reliable, while other books could only give guesses. The Bible teaching wan common-sense teaching, and required no more than common-sense for its understanding. The Bible had never been proved to be in error in any particular, and scientists of to-day were acknowledging their deep indebtedness to the sixth chapter of Genesis in regard to the method of the world's beginning. Some people were still talking about evolution——and man. s monkey ancestors, hut science made ten wrong guesses to every right one. If ever there was a man who was fitted to express a scientific opinion it was T. A. Edison, and ho said he reckoned that in about four hundred years we would begin to suspect we knew something. The loud-mouthed so-called .scientists of the Hacckel type—(laughter)—swallowed the theory of evolution whole without waiting to consider whether it was digestible or not. They had not yet found the " missing link," though some of the scientists who were advocating evolution might serve very well for the position. (Laughter.) Dr Henry proceeded to deal with the attacks upon theology by Tom Paine and R. Ingersoll, and said these attacks had proved futile. It was not a question as to what upstart critics might do with the Word of God, but what the Word of God would do with these rebellious and wicked men. It was docidod, as the result of a show of hands by those present, that tho meetings for business men should bo held at 12.16 p.m. to-day, to-morrow and on Friday. THE EVENING MEETING. Tho mission was continued in tho evening, in His Majesty's Theatre, before an audience that filled every available seat. For half an hour Mr Potts led the largo choir and the audience alternately in hymns and " glory songs," and prayers were offered. Dr Henry proached from Ecclesiastos 10, 8, " Whoso brcaketh a hedgo a sorpent shall bite him." The text, be said, was true to-day in respect of the divinely constituted boundaries of human conduct. The tremendous significance of environment was incalculable, and it was greatly within the province of men and women to mould and modify even the most adverse environments, so that they should contributeto the hig.hest and best development of life. When nations played fast and looso with the great fundamental laws divinoly ordainod for their government and growth they were stung by the serpent of sin, and doom would unfailingly come to them, and in-

dividuals or corporations must pay tho price. It was just as true of domestic life, and the matter of supreme importance to every people was to preserve its homos intact and maintain at all costs family felicity and domestic peace. A spiritual environment similarly was necessary to the development of a spiritual life, and a man in his spiritual life was as utterly'bereft when separtod from God as a man in his physical life would be if cut off from his physical environment and material surroundings. Jesus Christ was tho antidote for sin, and His blood cleansed from all sin.

At the close of the address a number of persons confessed penitence and were prayed for.

To-day the business men's meeting will be held nt 12.15 p.m. instead of 1.15, and will continue at that hour for the remainder of the week. There will be a Bible reading at 3 p.m., and tho ordinary evening meeting at 7.30 p.m. References were made at yesterday's meeting of tho Christchurch Presbytery to the value of tho work being done by the Henry Mission in Christchurch, one member stating that the preaching was of a sane order, and tho singing winsome and charming. The following motion was carried—- " Tho Presbytery of Christchurch. having learned with gratitude to God of the mission conducted so successfully by the Rev Dr Henry and Mr Potts in Christchurch City, assures them of its deep sympathy with them in their work ; thanks God for the conversions already recorded and for quickened life, and believes and prays that the closing days of the mission may be crowned with" still greater triumphs, and that the missioned bo themselves abundantly sustained, physically and spiritually, by God's grace, in answer to the prayers of this Presbytery and of our Christian people." .