Covenanter Witness Vol. 54 - Rparchives.org

nations."
you.'
prayer."
us!"
years.'
This is an epitome of such commands as we
have in the New Tetament as, "Go ye therefore, and
teach all In such commands Jesus pro
claims the duty of teaching the gospel ; here in Dan
iel He presents the reward. What greater reward
could the child of God ask than to shine as the fir
mament and as the stars for ever The stars, though
they may seem small to us, are far greater and
brighter than the sun.
Men of the world seek some great gain or ambi
tion for themselves, and they frequently trample
down others in the effort to reach their goal. Nebu
chadnezzar, Darius, Alexander and Caesar rose to
places of power by physical force, wading through
blood and crushing their rivals. Christ presents to
us a far higher ideal and a far greater reward. The
places of honor under Him are promised to those
who have been most like Him in holiness, in the con
secration of their lives, in the eminent spiritual in
fluence they have manifested, and in the testimony
they have given. Paul went to the far ends of the em
pire beseeching men night and day with tears to be
lieve in Christ and be saved. He considered himself a
debtor to the Jew and to the Greek, to the barbarian
the bond and the free. We too, have the call to be
wise teachers, seeking to turn many to righteous
ness.
No Door Closed to God
Have we been discouraged about the future of
Christian work at home or abroad If you are dis
couraged and think the door is closed or closing
listen to Samuel H. Moffett, missionary to China,
who was arrested, imprisoned, and tried by the Com
munists before being expelled from that country.
In a recent article he declares that no door stays
closed to God.
When the Communists had come into China, had
arrested one of the pastors and the door seemed
about to close, a commencement speaker thrilled his
discouraged audience, students and teachers, when
he took as his text: Revelation 3:8, "Behold I have
set before thee an open door, and no man can shut
it."
As he spoke they could almost see the graduates,
about to leave the shelter of the campus for the hard
and hostile future of a Christian in a Communist
land, "Graduates, teachers, all, straightened their
shoulders and lift their heads. It was Red China;
the Communists were upon us, but God was speaking
to us, 'Behold I have set before thee an open door,
and no man can shut it.' "
The missionary continues: "It is high time we
stopped this deadly talk about closed doors before us.
It is time we listened to God, not to our own de
feated hearts. Our God is able, and it is He who is
speaking, the Almighty God, maker of Heaven and
earth, Alpha and Omega, who by the word of His
power rolled away the stone that closed the tomb at
Calvary. No door stays closed to Him."
The door seems to be closed, "closed by the
might of the Red Army. But it is not closed to our
brothers, the Chinese Christians, 800,000 of them,
some weak, some dying, some deserting, and yet, by
the grace of God, still bearing their witness as the
remnant of the faithful. . . .
"There is the door of new methods of reaching
the unreached with the gospel of Jesus Christ. Every
year the Bible is translated into new languages,
un
locking yet more frontiers to the Word of God ....
360
"There is the magic door of the radio. On a bul
letin board in the office of the Presbyterian Mission
Board in New York there is the slogan : 'Our (radio)
programs reach more people in one week than heard
the gospel in the first one-thousand The
Christian mission has rimmed the whole world with
broadcasting stations, and we have not even begun
to exhaust the possibilities of this wide-open door
that is spread ibefore us. . .
.
"There are some doors that never have and
never can be closed. There is the door of prayer.
Jesus said, 'Ask, and it shall be given to you ; seek ;
and ye shall find ; knock, and it shall be opened unto
How easily we forget this door that never can
be closed to
As Mr. Moffett was about to leave China he said
"
to an earnest Christian girl, 'Is there anything that
I can do for you now ' She looked at me straight in
the eye and said, 'Yes, there is, you can pray for
me.'
"
And he adds : "How dare we say there is noth
ing we can do about the doors that are closing all
over the world to the Christian mission We have
in our hands a power greater than all the Commun
ist armies of Asia and Europe, a power that can
split the Iron Curtain wide open as the veil of the
temple was rent at Calvary, a power that can open
any and every door known to man. It is the power of
Daniel's Prayers Heard
Christ who heard Daniel and his three friends
and preserved them from being cut to pieces by the
cruel king; the Christ who heard their plea and
walked with them in the fire : the Christ who broke
in pieces the Chaldean, Persian and Grecian and
Roman empires of old, can hear the prayers of His
people today
and put down and break in pieces all
dictators and heathen powers that resist the onward
march of his kingdom.
Our Lord who promises that they who turn
many to righteousness shall shine as the stars, ex
pects of us a courageous, faithful, persistent effort
to seek those who are lost and to witness to the na
tions. They shall shine as the stars! What a won
derful reward! How that reward held before us
should revive and enthuse us when we tend to be
come weary with well doing !
The Joy of Home
A terrible storm was sweeping over the Great
Lakes. A steam tug towing a barge began to found
er. The captain and his crew took to a small boat.
Throughout the night they were tossed about fear
ing for their lives. In the morning they were rescued
by a passing ship. Later the captain testified that
all night long as they were beaten and tossed by the
tempest there was one thing which encouraged them
to row on and kept their hearts from sinking in des
pair. It was this: shining through the darkness and
the storm they saw the lights of home.
When in the midst of the storms and struggles
of life we are tempted to yield, may we keep before
us the fact that Christ rules and the assurance of
the resurrection and our eternal home, and may we
never yield to despair!
Let us not become weary of witnessing or
preaching for Christ ! If we are faithful to Him and
exert our talents for Him, He promises a glorious
and eternal reward.
COVENANTER WITNESS