USA > Pennsylvania > York County > Memorial of the Fiftieth Year, 1836-1886, St Paul's English Evangelical Lutheran Church > Part 5
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story perhaps of the two countrymen who saw for the first time a locomo- tive. There was the long train of cars, and there also was the locomotive which was to draw them. But how could it? How could that one draw so many. But it did : for very soon the engineer's bell rang, and the wheels began to revolve, and the train swept away to its destination. The countrymen were confounded. But soon another train camne gliding into the station. And then they determined to find out, if possible, what exactly it was that made the engine thus move-where exactly was this source of all-propelling power. And so they walked around it, and peeped into it, and over it, and under it, until at last, the one said to the other : "I see it: it's the fire that's inside her !" That's it. The man was right. The source of the power was all in the fire. And so also in churches. The power is not in the building, not in numbers, not in wealth, not in the eloquence of the preacher. All these are only the cold iron and brass of the locomotive. The power is in the fire in the loco- motive. Let that burn, and the power will be set loose, and the train will move on, and will carry its freight of precious gospel blessings wher- ever it goes !
Brethren ! You have the engine and the train! Stir up the fire: get down on your knees to do it: the fire of the Holy Ghost and of divine life in your souls ! Feed it well with the rich fuel of God's word ! Keep it ever, through the means of grace, in a bright white heat ! And then all will move. The whole grand machinery of your church work will then become animate with life and power. The train then will sweep out, in endless continuance, laden with precious souls, toward the City and Church of God on high.
But I measure my ministry among you, as a church, once more :
IV. By the SPIRIT and METHODS with which I ever SOUGHT TO PROSE- CUTE IT.
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These, above everything else, are the tests by which God measures our work; and by which, therefore, we also should, above everything else, measure it. If the methods adopted be the methods which God has pre- scribed, and if the motives be such as will bear His sanctioning and secure His favor, then is our work indeed a work upon which, both in time and in eternity, even though in itself it be exceedingly defective, we can look with satisfaction and with assurance of divine recognition and approval in the last great day.
Measured by this high test, the review of my ministry here among you brings me, I must, to-day, humbly but gladly say, unspeakable comfort. As already confessed, it was by no means a faultless ministry. On the contrary it was marked, as I have said, by many imperfections, short- comings, neglects, inconsistencies, sins-for all of which, as they come up in memory this morning before me, I am deeply humbled, and ask for divine forgiveness. Yet before that God who is the Searcher of our every heart, I can, as I now stand here, say that, with all its imperfec- tions, my one, supreme, and steadfast aim was, in all things, to make my ministry the ministry among you of a true ambassador of Jesus Christ. I look back now over all those nearly twelve years, and call up in review the work which I crowded into them, and then look up to the throne of Him before whom I must finally appear to give account for them, and I cry : "Imperfect-but sincere ; defective, but yet honest, and with no higher motive, and no other governing motive than Thy glory in the con- version, sanctification, and salvation of the souls entrusted to my pastoral care !" My endeavor always was to teach and instruct more than to simply amuse and entertain ; to have your faith rest intelligently upon the solid basis of God's word ; to help you up into the formation of a religion of character, of principle, of conscience, of loyalty to the right, of supreme obedience in all things to God ; and not a religion of mere emotion, of
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mere religious "gush and splurt," not a sort of Yellowstone Geyser religion, shooting up grandly in religious zeal towards the sky to-day, but soon sinking down, and growing rapidly less, and bubbling away into entire silence and invisibility to-morrow.
My methods and measures, therefore, in the prosecution of my ministry, were wholly unsensational, and only those that I believed purely and en- tirely scriptural. I employed only God's word and sacraments. I preached only Christ and Him crucified. I depended for success in my work only upon the presence and power of the Holy Ghost. I encouraged myself and my people to be much engaged in prayer. I made much of our good old Lutheran system, and, I believe, scriptural system, of faith- ful catechisation of the young. I recognized, as a power for boundless good, the Sunday-school, and was always personally an active worker in it. I recognized the power of the religious press, and the value of religious and especially denominational literature, and hence did all I could to cir- culate it. I believed the work of missions to be the work of Christ, and hence organized and encouraged missionary societies, both among the young and old. I believed in Christian work, both as a means of grace to the worker, and as a help to the spread of the gospel, and hence did what I could to give my people, from time to time, something to do,- with the needle, by visitation of the poor or sick or strangers, by teaching in the Sunday school, by the distribution of tracts and religious papers, in any and every Scriptural way, only so it was something by which good might be done and souls might be saved. I believed wealth, whether it be much or little, to be a trust from God, to be used for His glory ; and hence I tried to have all my people give something, and give liberally, according to their ability, to all the various benevolent operations of the church. I believed in the power of a good ministerial example, and hence sought, in my daily life, to be consistent with the gospel which I
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preached from the pulpit, and myself to be what I exhorted others.to be. I believed myself to be the pastor, the spiritual shepherd, as well as the preacher and teacher of my people ; and hence I was much in the homes of my flock, making, as you know, your sorrows my sorrows, your joys my joys, watching over your spiritual state, joining with you often in pastoral prayer for you and yours, comforting you in your times of trial, bearing as well as I could your burdens, entering into all your experiences-such a pastor, from house to house, and to each one of you, I, at least, always tried to be, and thus, by this method, I ever sought to be to you the kind of spiritual shepherd which I believe the Master Himself would have been had HE been in person your pastor. Thus, by all these various methods, all of them, I believe, thoroughly scriptural, did I here prose- cute my ministry among you. "Ye know," as Paul here says concerning his ministry among the Thessalonians, " Ye know how we exhorted and comforted and charged every one of you, as a father doth his children, that ye would walk worthy of God who hath called you unto his Kingdom and glory."
And the spirit, back of all these methods, and my inspiration in them all, ye also know. “ Yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you," and " ye know after what manner," from the first day of my minis- try to the last, I was with you. I do not boast ; but you know the spirit of my ministry while I was here. It was a ministry, I thank God, whose clear, unfaltering key-note was Christ. With Paul I can say : " I determined not to know anything among you save Jesus Christ and him crucified." And I did not. Christ, directly and indirectly, was my one theme, in all my preaching ; yes, and shall be, wherever I am, long as these lips of mine can speak His precious name, long as I shall be honored with the privilege of going in and out before any people as pastor. It was a con- scientious and sincere ministry : "For neither at any time used we flat-
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tering words, as ye know, nor a cloak of covetousness : God is witness." It was a courageous and outspoken ministry: "I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you "-" I shunned not to declare unto you all the counsel of God." It was an industrious and laborious ministry : "Ye re- member, brethren, our labor ; laboring night and day we preached unto you the gospel of God." It was an impartial ministry : " Ye know how we exhorted and comforted and charged," as our text says, "every one of you, as a father doth his children." I was a pastor and friend and spir- itual helper, as far as lay in my power, alike to you all. It was a tender and loving ministry : my labors here were indeed labors of love-as Paul writes concerning his ministry among the Thessalonians : "We were gentle among you, even as a nurse cherisheth her children ; and so, being affec- tionately desirous of you, we were willing to have imparted unto you, not the gospel of God only, but also our own soul, because ye were dear unto us." It was a happy and joyous ministry : " Ye were our glory and our joy." It was an appreciated ministry, also-appreciated more than it merited-an appreciation shown in countless different and beautiful and tender ways, for all of which I pray God to reward you, both now in time and forever in eternity. And I may, and must in gratitude to God, yet add that my ministry was not an altogether unfruitful or barren min- istry, but instrumental in leading many to turn from sin to Christ, and helpful to many of you in your Christian life. And, as I, to-day, thank God, and will always thank Him that I was ever privileged to be your religious teacher and pastor, so, I believe, will some who have already gone before us into the spirit world, and so will also, I believe, many of you who are still here, bless God norever for what my ministry, feeble and defective as it was, yet, with His blessing, was to your souls. And better and greater reward than that, for all my ministry among you, I do not want, and cannot possibly have. "For what is my hope, or joy, or
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crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming ? Ye are my glory and joy."
But, whatever my ministry may have been, it is now all closed. The work, whatever its character, is now all, for good or evil, finished. The record is made. The book is complete and shut. "What I have written I have written "-and now abides written, indelible, unalterable, eternal -to remain, in its influences and consequences to you and to me, and to many after us, in moral curse or blessing, forever.
And thus everything in which we have engaged upon earth is fast has- tening to the end. "Finis" will soon be inscribed both upon us and all our work. We will all soon be at the close of our life journey, and will have entered upon our career in eternity.
I am, as I stand here to-day, deeply impressed with the rapidity with which our earth life is passing away, and how quickly even a whole con- gregation like this, in its composition, undergoes a change. It seems only yesterday since, on Easter Sunday morning, in April, 1874, I first stood here as your pastor. How many-how very many-who heard that in- troductory sermon hear not this one to-day ! How many, one after the other, I myself, as pastor, laid away to their rest in the grave ! And how some, very dear to me, even in the short time since I bid you farewell, and said farewell to them, little thinking I should see them no more, have also gone out and up from this congregation here below to the better and larger and holier congregration of God's saints above. Thus we are all fast passing away. Thus whole congregations change. Thus some go, and others come to take their places; the individual dies, but the church lives -the workman dies, but the work, in new workmen's hands, immortally goes on. So be it. It is God's order. It is well that it all is so : well that we are thus passing away. Heaven is better than earth-reward better than toil-joy better than sorrow- sight better than faith and hope.
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Only let us all, then, whether pastors or people, be faithful in the service of our Lord and Master-and to each of us shall there at last be given a crown of eternal life, and in unbroken fellowship shall we share together the joys of Heaven.
God bless you as a church, God bless you as families, God bless you as individuals. And may God especially bless you, my brother, my successor as pastor of this dear people, make your labors abundant in good results, and may you, and we, your predecessors, and all our people, living and dead, at last be one with each other, forever, in the church above.
SERMON BY REV. WM. S. FREAS.
" Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?" Solomon's Song, vi. 10.
There comes to every true soul at some time a vision of the future. Earth's noblest and best have talked and planned and hoped for the mor- row, like Paul, " forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before."
Value as we may and do the sacred memories of the past, only the years to come can set the soul on fire and quicken every sluggish pulse.
" Not a toiler who plods 'neath a burden of care, But dreams of relief and liberty there ; Not a weary seeker for truth and light, But waits for a morning tranquil and bright."
Even amid the splendors of his capital and kingly estate, Solomon was not content. His prophetic soul looked eagerly forward and revelled in the glories yet to be revealed ; and in the Song of Songs he chants the praises of the Bride of Christ, as she appeared through the mellow light of the years to come. "Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?"
It has been for us a privilege beyond all price, to hear from the lips of three former pastors, ripe in wisdom, rich in experience, and crowned with the honors of successful and blessed work in the Master's cause, the history of fifty years of congregational life. No luring bribes of future success and honor ought to tempt us from a loyal, courageous, and humble study of the years that have fled, or incline us to detract in the smallest degree from the high esteem in which the actors in them are
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justly held. Nevertheless, the faces of the living ought, for the most part, to be turned forward, not backward. The outlook of these beloved pastors, who have discoursed with such power and profit of the era fin- ished, is also towards the morning coming, and they all hope and pray yet grander things for the congregation they have served and loved.
With what mingled emotions then do we now turn to the golden years, through whose high possibilities and rich privileges our Zion is about to take her way! The voice of seer and prophet has long been dumb, but may we not with eyes of love and faith catch glimpses of the glory yet to be revealed ? Look at the church of our hopes and prayers through the vista of the years, and no cry of the Bible will better express the triumph and joy of our kindling hearts than these words from the Song of Songs. Her looking forth as the morning describes the brightening glory of the church, her fresh young hopes, and her outlook of promise ; she is called "fair as the moon" to set forth her peerless beauty, without spot or blemish or any such thing ; she is "clear as the sun " because of the un- dimmed shining of the pure truth ; and, like an army with flying banners marching into battle, she shall strike terror to the hearts of all her ene- mies, and pass on and up to certain victory.
My pleasant duty it is to-night to discourse on the outlook before this beloved congregation. It can be rightly done only by keeping in mind that we form a part, a little company of this embattled host, whose cap- tain is the Prince of peace and whose country is Immanuel's ground.
Let us ask then,
I. What is our preparation for these years ?
We are like the youth leaving home to seek his fortune. His mother watches his departing figure through blinding tears, and the sad father crushes down his rising grief; but the boy with a careless wave of the hand is off into the great world lying before him. But what of his prep-
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aration for earnest life? On this will depend the record of all his future. St. Paul's congregation is now fifty years of age. Through these few blessed days we have been holding sweet converse with the fathers. Now with a sad, but we trust, not a careless adieu to the half century gone, we must move forward. How do we stand prepared for the de- mands of the hour? Are we ready for the future? This will affect, on every page, the character of the history the generation yet unborn will read. We need but look around us, and out on this earnest congregation to-night for answer. What we have and are is owing in part to the dead. They labored, and we have entered into their labors. They, like David, prepared with all their might; we, like Solomon, are busy building the temple which God makes His dwelling-place.
We come to the work before us enriched with the experience and les- sons of fifty years. Something has been learned in the past. The story of faith and unselfish devotion told over in these days enables us to set a right value on the treasures of wisdom and the teachings of experience. This church is no inexperienced mission, no mere experiment in congre- gational history, but a disciplined host, crowned already with the laurels of victory, and wise with the lessons learned in half a century.
Among our advantages in view of the future not the least is found in the examples left by the fathers of this church-
" Still shines the light of holy lives Like star-beams over doubt ; Each sainted memory, Christ-like, drives Some dark possession out."
It is good to be the heir of honest ancestry and bearers of an untar- nished name: the fathers sleeping set up the standard, and set it high, and we must needs maintain it. They are worthy of all gratitude, not only because they labored, but because they so labored that we are the stronger and richer in their examples.
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THE FIFTIETH YEAR.
We now start forward with the prestige of past success. It is not boasting but honest truth to say that this church has succeeded and suc- ceeded grandly. To fail in any good undertaking is always sad ; to fail in the Lord's work is doubly so. The memory of such a misfortune lingers, like a hereditary taint, to sap our strength, quench every hope, and retard every new effort to rise. But with success the contrary is true. It inspires, transforms, gives confidence and courage, and enriches with all the fruits of victory. As we turn towards the opening pathway before us, we look confidently for further success, because of the success behind us already attained.
But, above all, God is among us ; therefore we press fearlessly forward. When we were small and weak His pillar of fire was behind us, the cloud went before us and the Shekinah beamed out from the mercy-seat. Now that we have attained strength and honor, our joy and glory are that God is known in our palaces for a refuge. Many things bring us to the conclusion God is with this congregation and views it with loving favor. Among them is the steady advance made, the unbroken regularity with which new converts have been gathered around the altar, the large and increasing liberality of the people, the regular and large attendance at the communion board, the many workers found in our societies and church organizations, and the host of youthful spirits among us who come with eager hope and shining eyes looking onward towards the future. We have rich equipment in the consecration of the members, the oneness of mind among us, the love of Zion which all cherish, and the fresh youthful spirits being nourished at our altars, trained in Christian labor and growing strong with the strength of the sons and daughters of God.
This is the answer we make to those who ask us. whether we are ready for the future. Behind us is a past on which there is no stain. Signally blessed in the heritage left us of honor, faith, courage, zeal and godly ex-
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ample, we face the years to come without misgiving. But above all among us is the Angel of the Covenant, strong, calm, approving, and dis- pensing all help and blessing. Why should we pale or shrink or fear be- fore the responsibilities or the duties we meet in pressing forward ?
" The mightiest souls of all time hover o'er us, Who labored like gods among men, and have gone Like great bursts of sun on the dark way before us; They're with us, still with us, our battle fight on, Looking down, victor-browed, from the glory-crowned hill, They beckon us, beckon us on, onward still :
And the true heart's aspirings are onward, still onward ; It turns to the Future, as earth turneth sunward."
II. The possibilities and opportunities of the years to come.
The years to come! How the mere thought of what they hold in their secure embrace quickens hope. How unequal are we to even conceive of the full glory the church of Christ may yet attain! Who among the sixty-eight members that signed the constitution fifty years ago imagined for a moment what is now reality-a congregation of five hundred mem- bers, a place in the church second to no other, a name held in universal honor ? Who could have pictured at that time the scenes presented dur- ing this feast of jubilee ?
Dare we, without presumption or charge of extravagance, venture on a forecast of the years before us? Solomon looked down through the march of the ages, and as he looks he cries out with amazed and trem- bling soul, "Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?" Through the coming years, faith, hope and love, shining lights of piety, cast for- ward their brightening rays, and in their radiance, without either pro- phetic power or apostolic inspiration, we may catch a view of the St. Paul's yet to be when I and all here have passed away.
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THE FIFTIETH YEAR.
We ask first about the outer temple. What sort of a sanctuary will other generations build when in course of time the present house shall be stained by age and long service, and fall into decay? Can you picture the stately edifice that will rear its domes and spires towards Heaven where this beautiful temple now stands? Among the things in which I heartily be- lieve is richness and splendor in all the appointments of the courts of the Lord. In building the third St. Paul's, like David, the coming congre- gation will say, " the house that is to be builded must be exceeding mag- nifical, of fame and of glory throughout all countries," since " the palace is not for man, but for the Lord God." Its mere appearance will elevate the soul and suggest the unseen Tenant in and through whom is all its glory. The doors of that house will be open wide, even as now, and with the streaming multitude we may enter without challenge. A sacred awe steals over us, for there will be a voice in each soul that enters, saying, " Surely the Lord is in this place," " Holy, Holy, Holy Lord God Al. mighty."
And what of the worship there? I think I am safe in saying it will be grander, truer, nearer the ideal than now. We may hope the con- gregation will have learned to sing together then, so that the arches of the temple will tremble with the mighty volume of their praise. Upon each worshiper there will steal the solemn, mysterious, holy awe, communi- cated by the presence of the Divine Spirit. Each worshiper will get near to God, and feel it good to be there.
< But some things will not have changed at all. In the first place, the - one who stands in the pulpit will be no angel, only a weak mortal. The message from the King may be delivered with far higher gifts and greater light and more persuasive voice and moving power than now ; yet it will be but a vessel of clay through whom it shall be poured into the listening ears and glad hearts of the people. Then again, the story told will be
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still the same sweet, matchless, tender story of redeeming love and good will to men. But, even as now, some will hear, and some will forbear to hear. I believe there will be more children in that congregation than are here to-night. Parents then, more than now, will come as Christian families, with sons and daughters, into the house of the Lord. There will be more of a home feeling then, and greater joy in the service than now, for the church is getting wiser and the light is growing brighter.
Without reflecting on either the past or the present, I think I may say, there will be a better spirit among the worshipers then, more brotherly love, and hearty sympathy and earnest good will. A hundred years of the preaching of the Gospel of love will not be in vain. The people of those days will understand more clearly that the red, warm heart of true religion is love-love to God and brother man. There will be a warmer social feeling among the members, and a heartier expression of it. Mem- bership in this congregation then will mean more, and be regarded a still greater privilege. The mind which was in Christ will dwell more mani- festly in the disciples of to-morrow.
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