NEWS OF DR. MARY ARMOUR.

White Ribbon, Volume 33, Issue 388, 18 November 1927, Page 6

NEWS OF DR. MARY ARMOUR.

The following extracts from a letter written by Dr. Mary Armour, will be of interest to our readers:— “First I xvant to say I was so struck with your heading for your Evangelistic Department, 1 thought of writing and asking you if 1 might copy it. It is lovely and so very significant. “I still get the White Ribbon, and enjoy it immensely. Have been thinking for the longest time that 1 would send Mrs Peryman a few lines for publication, but have never seemed to be able to get to it. I travel and lecture continually, and try to my department goiiu besides, and you can imagine what u load I carry. "I believe with all my heart, that where we are failing .n our work twhen we do fail), is in not praying enough. I was so struck with some words from Dr. Joseph Parker, that I pass them on to you: ‘When the Church forgets to put on tier beautiful garments of holiness, tho’ it be made up of a thousand Sampsons it cannot strike one blow at tlie enemy. Count the Church by the volume of

its prayers; register the strength of the Church by the purity and completeness of its consecration, if you number the Church in millions and tell not w’hat it is at the altar of the cross, you but return a census of a

ceim tery. not the statistics of a living, mighty, irresistible host. Genius nothing, learning is nothing, organisation is but a sarcasm and an irony, apart from that which gives every one of them value and force—the praying heart and the trustful spirit.’

“When I fail in what I undertake, I know i either dfd not work hard enough or I did not pray hard enough. “We live in this wonderful marble region, and the marble works fascinate me and teach me a lesson every time 1 visit them. They have a machine in which a man sits and lifts blocks of marble weighing ten thousand, thirty thousand, forty thousand. fifty thousand pounds—all with equal ease, anti no more effort than it takes for me, in my own strength, to lift a pound. The work is done by electricity as you have guessed. Well, every time 1 go there I think that when we try to do things without praying, it is as foolish as if those men all got ror-J one of those huge blocks and tried to lift it without turning on the power, and I revolve anew to turn on the |n>wer. “We had a moat wonderful Convention. which I will not try to tell you about, as you get the Union Signal. Our preliminary devotional meeting was great. “ ‘Heaven came down our souls to greet, And glory crowned the mercy seat.’ “There was not room for all who wanted to get In. Then when 1 ‘preached the Convention Sermon* on Sunday, p.n\.. the house was packed. I spoke from 2 Peter 1; 5. 6, anti 7, on charactei building.*’