The Overflow
How Not To Get A Preacher
One of the largest churches in Texas was looking for a preacher. It is in a nice city, and has a fine building. Said the wife of one of the elders, "Oh, we won't have any trouble getting a preacher here. Probably there isn't a preacher in the brotherhood who wouldn't jump at the chance to preach for this church." Well, offhand, we just can't think of a better way not to get a preacher. We knew an Oklahoma church once some of whose officers had the same idea. They went sixteen months without a preacher...
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Regular attendant Then there was the fellow who prided himself on being such a regular attendant at church — why, he hadn't missed an easter in more than twenty years.
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He'd make it hard on the devil. According to a story often told by J. D. Tant there was a deacon in a Baptist church in Tennessee who was called on one Sunday morning to lead in prayer. In the course of his prayer this deacon repeated three or four times an earnest petition that "Bro. Jones may go to hell" As quickly as the service closed the pastor and several others cornered the deacon and demanded an explanation for his prayer. Said the deacon, "Well, Bro. Jones used to belong to the church of Christ, but he was such a troublemaker he tore them all to pieces. Then he joined the Methodist church: and it wasn't long till he had completely wrecked them. Now he is in our church, and is about to tear it up. I just feel that if he could go to hell, it wouldn't be three months till he'd have the place so completely disorganized that the devil would be begging for help. Yes, brethren, I believe it would be a wonderful thing for this world if Bro. Jones could go to hell"
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The living present The clock of life is wound but once, And no man has the power To tell just when the clock will stop, At late or early hour.
Now is the only time you own, Live, love, toil with a will;
Place no faith in to-morrow, For the clock may then be still.
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Benjamin Franklin's retort One day in Anderson, Indiana, the venerable Benjamin Franklin was taking some people down to the branch to baptize them. The town atheist, seeing the procession, called out, "Where are you going with those people, Brother Franklin?" Franklin replied, "I'm taking them down to the branch to baptize them. You'd better come along and obey the gospel yourself." "No, thank you," the man said; and then, with studied insolence, "I'll be damned if you ever get me in that water!" There was a moment of stunned silence as the little group stood in embarrassment at the insult of this profanity. Then Franklin rose to the occasion, "Young man," he thundered, "You say you'll be damned if you do; but God says you'll be damned if you don't. Take your choice damned if you don't. Take your choice, sir!"
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Lockney At this writing the editor is in the midst of a good meeting in Lockney, Texas, a name familiar to a past generation as the site of Lockney Christian College. Started in 1898 this school during its life of about twenty years was very influential on the plains of Texas. One of its early presidents was G. H. P. Showalter; its last was Will F. Ledlow. Men like Early Arceneaux and Jim and Luther Norman were in its student body. It was pre-eminently a "Bible" school (as were nearly all the schools operated by Christian men in those days); literary and other subjects received little emphasis as compared with the Bible. There was no effort or desire on the part of the men operating the school to make it a competitor to the public and state schools in these subjects. Men who held gospel meetings for the Lockney church (such as A. J. McCarty, W. A. Schultz, the Wallace's, J. D. Tant, C R. Nichol, and others) were welcomed into the class rooms to teach Bible classes to the students. It is of some personal interest to the writer (though possibly not to anybody else) that J. D. Tant was engaged in a gospel meeting with the Lockney church just a short time before he was called back to Tennessee to be present on the occasion of the birth of his seventh child, a son, the editor.
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Refreshing novelty in these days
"Our work in Africa is going to show wonderful results I believe. The men are all on their way, and we have no other plan than just simply to preach the gospel and start congregations. We will have none of the work usually attached to such "missionary" endeavors.
—Reuel Lemmons
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And we didn't like the smell of the cat Not long ago we were in conference with the elders of a church which had been accused of being sympathetic toward premillennialism. One by one the elders denied the accusation; one by one they avowed their own personal opposition to the heresy. Then, just as the meeting was about to close one of the elders let the cat out of the bag with, "Of course I personally don't believe the doctrine; but I do believe there are good scriptures on both sides of that question!"
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Letter of protest We see where some members of the church in Tulare, California, sent a letter of protest to President Truman, objecting to his maintaining Myron G. Taylor as his "personal envoy" to the Vatican. Of course the whole nation (including the president) knows our national law prohibits any kind of an official representative of our government at the Vatican. But both Roosevelt and Truman seem to have deliberately set about to circumvent this provision by keeping a man there on an "unofficial" basis. As citizens of the nation these California Brethren (as well as brethren anywhere) have a perfect right to protest against our nation's president flouting our nation's laws.
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Spellman and Mrs. Roosevelt And while we're on the subject of Catholicism, did you take note of the little spat between Cardinal Spellman and Mrs. Roosevelt over the federal aid to education bill? Personally, we have a whole lot more respect for Mrs. Roosevelt in her attitude toward Catholicism than we ever had for her husband. We are encouraged by her willingness to oppose publicly the aims of the Catholic church in their nefarious efforts to gain control of our public school system.