A Service Of Praise On The Steamer
A SERVICE OF PRAISE ON THE STEAMER
"After that he was always surrounded by a company of people, giving help wherever help could be given. When Sunday morning came he gathered the people in the dining saloon, and conducted the service in his own inimitable style, and after forty-eight hours of drifting, a ship came hurrying over to us to take us safe home. Mr. Moody led a service of thanksgiving and praise, and preached as I never had heard him preach before. That is the story of his sending the cable 'Prayer saved the ship.'"
There was a hush on the little assembly, and I know of one at least who offered up a prayer of thanksgiving that D. L. Moody had not only helped save the people on board the Spree, but had been used of God to save thousands of others just as truly drifting, and whose case was just as apparently hopeless.
The Rev. F. B. Meyer, of Christ Church, London, knew Mr. Moody most intimately, and loved him not only for his work's sake, but also because of the peculiar charm and fascination of his great personality. He has recently said in an English paper:
"To have known D. L. Moody, and come within the range of his strong personality, has been to many men one of the most influential factors in their character and life-work; and it is not easy for such to imagine a world from which the inspiration of his presence has been withdrawn. It is still less easy under the immediate sorrow of such a bereavement to characterize this natural prince and leader of men.
HOW MR. MOODY FIRST BLESSED MR. MEYER'S WORK
I met him first in York, in 1873, on his arrival with Mrs. Moody and his two eldest children. Accompanied by Mr. and Mrs. Sankey, they had come to our country, as it appeared, by a divine prompting, and had just landed at Liverpool. Some time before, the secretary of the Y. M. C. A. had impressed upon him the two words, "Bennett, York;" and not knowing where else to turn, two of his friends having suddenly died, Moody telegraphed to Mr. Bennett, saying, 'I will be in York to-night.'"
This was Saturday. On the following day he preached at the chapel built for the Rev. James Parsons, and then occupied by the Rev. John Hunter (now of Glasgow). During the following week he held evening services in the old Londal Chapel, and noon prayer meetings at the Y. M. C. A. After two or three days with the Wesleyans, he came to the Baptist Chapel, of which I was minister, and conducted meetings there for about a fortnight, with everincreasing numbers and marvelous results. He and Mr. Sankey have often spoken of that little vestry, where we three spent much time in prayer, little weening that the earnestness of our desires and intercessions were the travail pangs of so great a spiritual movement as followed.
All who have heard him will recall the quiver in his voice when he told some pathetic story; but I never guessed the intensity of his tenderness till I saw him with his grandchildren. He used to drive them about in his carriage, or carry them in his arms.
"One of the most striking incidents in my memory was when he stood with them beside his mother's grave, in a summer sunset, and asked us to pray that they might be in the coming century what she had been in this. And when little Irene was dying, he used to be on the watch below her window to keep all quiet, would steal down from the meetings to hear the latest news, would be the nurse and playmate of her little cousin, that all might devote themselves to the chamber of sickness.
MR. MOODY'S SURE FAITH
"He never wavered in his attachment to the great fundamentals of the Gospel. His sermons on the Blood, the Holy Spirit, the Love of God in Jesus Christ, were great testimonies to the mighty truths which have been the theme of every revival of evangelical religion. There was no uncertain sound in the Gospel as he preached it, and it was the power of God unto salvation to tens of thousands.
"What a welcome he must have received as he entered Heaven! Surely an abundant, a choral entrance must have been ministered unto him by myriads who are there, because of the message uttered in burning acccents by his lips."
I am delighted thus to quote Mr. Meyer. I know of few men better qualified to speak than he. While in conversation the other day with Mr. Fleming H. Revell (Mr. Moody's brother-in-law), he said to me. "If you would like to find in print a good description of Mr. Moody's last hours and his triumphant entrance into the presence of God, you have only to read the closing lines of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, for in the passing over of Mr. Stand-fast, there is the most striking description of the passing away of Mr. Moody." For the help of my readers I here quote it.
"When Mr. Stand-fast had thus set things in order, and the time being come for him to haste him away, he also went down to the river. Now, there was a great calm at that time in the river wherefore Mr. Stand-fast, when he was about half-way in, stood a while, and talked to his companions that had waited upon him thither. And he said, 'This river has been a terror to many; yea, the thoughts of it have also frighted me; but now methinks I stand easy; my foot is fixed upon that on which the feet of the priests that bare the ark of the covenant stood while Israel went over Jordan. The waters, indeed, are to the palate bitter, and to the stomach cold; yet the thought of what I am going to, and of the conduct that waits for me on the other side, doth lie as a glowing coal at my heart. I see myself now at the end of my journey; my toilsome days are ended; I am going to see that head which was crowned with thorns, and that face which was spit upon for me. I have formerly lived by hearsay and faith; but now I go where I shall live by sight, and shall be with Him in whose company I delight myself. I have loved to hear my Lord spoken of; and wherever I have seen the print of His shoe in the earth, there I have coveted to set my foot, too. His name has been to me as a civet-box; yea, sweeter than all perfumes. His voice to me has been most sweet, and His countenance I have more desired than they that have most desired the light of the sun. His Word I did use to gather for my food, and for antidotes against my faintings. He hath held me, and hath kept me from mine iniquities; yea, my steps hath He strengthened in His way.'
"Now, while he was thus in discourse, his countenance changed, his strong man bowed under him; and, after he had said, 'Take me, for I come unto Thee!' he ceased to be seen of them."
And so I bring my tribute to a close, thanking God, now, as I thanked Him at the beginning, that I have had the privilege of writing; and saying of Mr. Moody yet again - he was the best friend I ever had, and more helpful to me than any other man that ever lived in all my knowledge of the world. Other men have known him longer than I, but no one, I am sure, could ever have been more helped by him. I say of him as Paul said of the Philippians, "I thank my God upon every remembrance of you."
Chapter 33
Personal Reminiscences of D.L. Moody
By Rex H.M. Wharton, D.D.
About twenty years ago, having just concluded in the city of Alexandria, Virginia, the second evangelistic meeting I had ever held, I determined to go to Baltimore in order to hear Mr. Moody, whose fame as a worker for Christ in the salvation of men was filling the world. Mr. Moody was spending the winter in the city of Baltimore, and I found difficulty, being an entire stranger, to gain access to the crowded building the one afternoon it was my privilege to hear him.
By good fortune, I met a minister with whom I had become acquainted some months before. He took me through the pastor's study to the platform. It was in this study that I saw Mr. Moody walking back and forth, his hands behind him, and apparently in deep thought. He shook hands with me, and with hardly an exchange of words put into my hands several circulars which he asked me to give to others as I went home. I found it to be a call to Christian workers to go forth into the harvest field. He preached that afternoon on Repentance, and I well remember something of the sermon, and especially his illustrations.
The years passed on and I became pastor in the City of Baltimore. One afternoon, I think it was in, 92, I was standing in front of Mr. Moody in the great Cyclorama Building, where thousands had assembled for services, the choir was singing, and I think the Scriptures had been read. I did not, of course, suppose that he would recognize me, and was surprised when he looked down and said suddenly, "Come up on the platform." As I was sure he did not know me, I turned to a minister at my side, a prominent pastor of the city, and said, "He is calling you." He started to the platform when Mr. Moody said he wanted me, and as soon as I walked up, he said, "I want you to speak to the people right away." With hardly any notice at all I made some remarks, and before I left that afternoon he had asked me to go to Chicago. It occurred to me afterwards that he had possibly heard that I had been doing some evangelistic work and, being told that I was in the audience, called me up, and was taking a sample to find if I would do as a Chicago worker.