THE SUNDAY CIRCLE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21940, 29 April 1933, Page 4

THE SUNDAY CIRCLE

RELIGIOUS READING FOR THE HOME THY FACE TURNED TO-MK v Here in my bed low-lying, eyes held so; I cannot see, . „ . , , Lord, art Thou there in the chamber, and is Thy face turned towards me? Dost Thou hear me cry in the darkness, nor comest unto mine aid. - Thy child who is weak and helpless, and shrinldng and sore afraid? If I hear Thy voice in the silence, and know that Thou art anigh, That Thy face is turned towards my slumber where feeble and wan I he, I shall nestle soft on my pillow with pever , a thought or care, • .. , Sure that Thy love waits with me, that my Father is watching there. I shall known that Thy love is bridging long hours ’twist the dusk and dawn, Till all terrors have fallen from me and the last of my fears is gone; And ’yond the night’s strange weird fancies in the dim growing light I see Thv Presence merge slow through the gloaming, with Thy face ever turned towards me. . . —Mary M. Ghurchod, Algiers.

> *• Are• you there, father? ... asked, the little boy in the small hours of the night. “Yea my boy." “Is your face turned JSSaTW” “That’s all right. Good-night. Watchman.” in the British Weekly. PRAYER. O God Who hast included all Thy Commandments in the one Commandment of love, so that if we love not our neighbour we cannot fulfil Thy law: we beseech Thee of Thy continued patience with us, to create and foster m our hearts such an honest purpose to be fait and if need be. to be forgiving, towards others, that we may have one token ot our standing in Thy eight, that we are children of such a Father m heaven and disciples of such an One as Jes , us ,, ( ?^ r our Saviour and our Lord; and this one thing we ask in His holy name Who took upon Himself our sinful nature that it might be redeemed and cleansed by His holy nature, to Whom may our love cling with the depth of our necessities, now and ever. Amen. A TEXT FOR EACH DAY’S - MEDITATION. Sunday.—" I know whom 1 have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day.’—2 Timothy 1: 12. ' ■ '“ I know the Lord is good a stronghold in the day of trouble.”—Nahum 1: 7. Monday Know therefore that the Lord thy God. He is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mevcy with them that love Him and keep Hia commandments to a thousand generations.” —Dcut. 7: 9, Tuesday.-" Lord, it is nothing with Thee to help, whether with many, or with them that have no power: help us, U Lord our God: for we rest on Thee, and in Thy Name we go against this multitude.”—2 Chron. 14: 11. . Wednesday.—“ Behold, God is mighty, and despiseth not any: He is mighty in strength, and wisdom. He’ withdraweth not His eyes from the righteous. . . • > Behold. God exalteth by His power: who teacheth like Him? ’’—Job 36: 5, 7 and 22. ""’Thursday.—“ He will swallow up death in victory, and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces. . . • V°> this our God; we have waited for Hun, and He will save us: this is the Lord. , . . we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation.” —Isaiah 25: 8 and 9. Friday.—“ And even to your, old age I am He, and even to hoar hairs will I carry you: T have made, and I will bear;, even i ■ will carry,-, and will deliver you. Remember , the. former things of old: for I am God, and there, is none else.” — Isaiah 46: 4 and 9. , Saturday.—“ But as God is true, our word toward you was not yea and nay.

For all the promises of God in Him are yea, and in Him amen, unto the glory of God by us.”'—2 Cor. 1: 18 and 20. —H. R. Higgens, in A.C.W. OUR UNHAPPY DIVISIONS. And Shakum and the son of Shakum walked in a wood. And Shakum pondered upon those things which separated the churches and our consequent inability to save a stumbling, blinded world. And the son of Shakum looked hither and .thither.' ’

And 10, upon the path the son of Shakum discovered a hedgehog in distress, and he called unto him Shakum, and revealed unto him how the hedgehog lay with its feet beating impotently toward the heavens. And when Shakum inquired of his son what was amiss with the hedgehog his eon explained that it was standing upon its prickles. And Shakum wondered whether all the churches were-not-often doing the same. ■ M., in C. W.

WHAT ABOUT YOUR PRAYER MEETING?

• The prayer meeting is usually looked upon as a kind of spiritual thermometer indicating the spiritual temperature of the members. It has also been described as the power-house of the Church, and this it undoubtedly is or should be. _ If those Christians who attend the meetings were really in earnest, what a mighty power for God they should be. There are some who think the prayer meeting has served its day and should be abolished or abandoned. The late Sir W. Robertson Nicoll did not think so, for he has stated that “we ought to have a prayer meeting in every congregation, no matter how small their numbers. The prayer meeting ought to be expressly _ the business meeting of the Church. If it is not that, it is nothing.” Let ministers pray over the prayer meeting, plan it carefully, spend more than 15 minutes in getting up their 15 minutes’ address, and they will find that their people still crave this simple, homelike, old-fashioned service, the weekly prayer meeting. Do not abandon your prayer meetings. -

THE RELIGION OF JESUS. This religion Jesus taught is a religion of life. People who are fully alive, people who are living strongly, can understand it; but those who deny life, who do not want to live, cannot get its meaning. The God of Jesus is a God of action. . . . The religion of Jesus is

the religion of crucifixion—that is, of redemption. It is the _ religion of action which unites meditation and prayer. To walk in prayer, continually asking and receiving power from God, and again to transform this power into new actions of love, this is the religon of Jesus. —Toyo-. hiko Kagawa. “The Religion of Jesus.”

THE CHIEF BUSINESS. Ur Chariest F. Jefferson, addressing a, ministers’'conference in Chicago on “The Chief Business of the Church in This Day,” discounted the superficial and ephemeral catchwords of modern pulpiteers, that create discussion and division. _ The chief business of the Church, he said, is to inspire men to become like Jesus. YES, THAT’S TRUE. The present Archbishop of Canterbury has told us that many years a"0, when he was working in the East End, he was addressing a large crowd of working men, many of them free thinkers and atheists, In the course of his address he told the familiar story of Charles Lamb, too well known to repent. “ I will tell you what it is; if Shakespeare was to enter this room we should all stand, but if Jesus Christ were to enter we should all kneel." “I shall never forget,” he says, “the deep hush of instinctive assent which came over the audience as they heard those words. The silence was broken by a man sitting beneath me, who muttered aloud. ‘ Yes, after all. that’s true.’”

THE OXFORD GROUP MOVEMENT, The'Rev.'Wr Scott, M.A., chaplairS’. St. Peter’s Hall,. Oxford, after having. been one of tKeii;number for nearly a year, has left the Oxford Group movement. He was neither satisfied with their teaching

on the Atonement nor. the ...Bible.,: He ; says: “I wag astonished with *the emphasis which they laid upon the psychological act* of sharing and surrender, and' the scanty reference, if there was any at all, to the atoning and redeeming work of our blessed Lord." He found it likewise impossible “to fee],at home with. Christians, whose ultimate .test,of truth .was experimental and notiScriptural.. The question was never, :* What ‘ eaith v ; the /Scripture ?) but 'Does it'Work?’”' : AN UNUSUAL SALE. Mr Redwood’s companion books, “ God in the Slums” and “God in the Shadows,” have reached a joint sale of some 500,000 copies. “God in the Slums” has been translated into French, German, Spanish, Dutch, Czech, Swedish, Danish, Chinese, Japanese, and other languages.

A PEEP AT PARADISE. , ; Mr H. P. Swan, of the Irish Presbyterian Church, in a recent lecture on “A Peep at Paradise, ’’ said that- the only word in the dictionary to describe the Holy Land wag “diversity.” From Mount Hermon (9150. feet high), crowned in perpetual snow, to the Dead Sea (1292 feet below sea level, and the lowest spot on the face of the earth), there was every variety of climate and every sort of physical feature. There was the “dry, parched land” of the Psalmist —land so arid and rocky that it would not graze a goat—and on the other hand there was the land “of fadeless splendour,” “a land flowing with milk and honey”—wonderfully fertile plains, with vines, „ oranges, and other tropical fruits and flowers—a delight to the eye. i,