had he not explained to them the source of unity and love? "If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask,'" said he, quoting our Lord's own words, "'it shall be done for them.' That word 'agree' is a beautiful one in the original, meaning to be in symphony or musical accord. But it is not possible for two to be in holy agreement among themselves unless each is attuned to a third, the Holy Comforter. The harp strings must be keyed to a common pitch in order to chord with each other."

How were these deep and comprehensive changes effected? Not with struggling, but in quietness and peace. Reforms were waited for in prayerful patience when opposition arose. Conferences were held for the deepening of the spiritual life. Week after week, year after year, the most spiritual truths were presented to the people. The steel was turned and wrought and tempered. Like the Japanese sword-smith who spends a lifetime on a daimio's single blade, Gordon worked at his church for twenty-five long years. No wonder it became an effective instrument. He loved his people. When at home he bound them to him by the tenderest ministries, at the side of the sick, comforting the bereaved, burying the dead. When away he wrote frequently to them.

"I am resting powerfully, and have much time for communion and quiet talking with the Lord," he writes. "I feel that my busy and hurried life in Boston robs me too much of this. How much we need the times of refreshing to fit us for toil, lest we become mere superficial and routine servants! . . . I have written to many in the parish, having time now to think of all their wants and sorrows, and all I wish to say to them by way of exhortation. So that I have written long letters and am going to write scores more."

And again: "I am using great diligence in the midst of my country work in writing letters to such as need a word of comfort or counsel. Yet I begin to feel quite anxious to get

back again to my parish, and to all the interests and labors that are so dear to me. I cannot entirely cast off the burden of it, even while so far away, but am constantly sending back my desires and longings toward those whom God has given me to watch over and care for. I really desire, above all things, back to a more devoted ministry for the good of souls." In the fragment of spiritual autobiography published after his death Gordon describes this metamorphosis, this passage of his church from pupa to imago.

to go

"Why not withdraw from the church which has become thus secularized and desecrated ?' it is asked. To which we reply emphatically, 'Until the Holy Spirit withdraws we are not called upon to do so.' And he is infinitely patient, abiding still in his house so long as there are two or three who gather in Christ's name to constitute a templum in templo, a sanctuary within a sanctuary, where he may find a home.

"What the lungs are to the air the church is to the Holy Spirit; and each individual believer is like a cell in those lungs. If every cell is open and unobstructed the whole body is full of light; but if, through a sudden cold, congestion sets in, so that the larger number of these cells are closed, then the entire burden of breathing is thrown upon the few which remain unobstructed. With redoubled activity these now inhale and exhale the air till convalescence shall return. So we strongly believe that a few Spirit-filled disciples are sufficient to save a church; that the Holy Ghost, acting through these, can and does bring back recovery and health to the entire body.

"Woe then to those who judge before the time; who depart from their brethren and slam that door behind them before which Jesus is gently knocking; who spue the church out of their mouths while he, though rebuking it, still loves it and owns it and invites it to sup with him.

"For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death,' writes the apostle. This

is the method of the Lord's present work-death overcome by life. 'I cannot sweep the darkness out, but I can shine it out,' said John Newton. We cannot scourge dead works out of the church, but we can live them out. If we accuse the church of having the pneumonia, let us who are individual air-cells in that church breathe deeply and wait patiently and pray believingly, and one after another of the obstructed cells will open to the Spirit, till convalescence is reëstablished in every part.

"With the deepest humility the writer here sets his seal of verifying experience. When the truth of the inresidence of the Spirit and of his presiding in the church of God became a living conviction, then began a constant magnifying of him in his offices. Several sermons were preached yearly, setting forth the privileges and duties of Christians under his administration; special seasons of daily prayer were set apart, extending sometimes over several weeks, during which continual intercession was made for the power of the Holy Ghost. It was not so much prayer for particular blessings as an effort to get into fellowship with the Spirit and to be brought into unreserved surrender to his life and acting. The circle of those thus praying was constantly enlarged. Then gradually the result appeared in the whole church; the incoming tide began to fill the bays and inlets, and as it did so the driftwood was dislodged and floated away. Ecclesiastical amusements dropped off, not so much by the denunciation of the pulpit as by the displacement of the deepening life. The service of song was quietly surrendered back to the congregation, and instead of the select choir, the church, who constitute the true Levites as well as the appointed priesthood of the new dispensation, took up the sacrifice of praise anew and filled the house with their song. Later came the abolition of pew-rentals and the disuse of church sales for raising money for missions and other charities. The prayer-meeting soon passed beyond the necessity of being 'sustained,' and became the most helpful nourisher and sus

tainer of the church. The pulpit, too, acquired a liberty hitherto unknown; the outward hampering being removed, the inward help became more and more apparent, and the preacher felt himself constantly drawn out instead of being perpetually repressed, as in the olden time. So noiselessly and irresistibly as the ascending sap displaces the dead leaves which have clung all winter long to the trees, so quietly did the incoming Spirit seem to crowd off the traditional usages which had hindered our liberty."

CHAPTER XXVI

A SOWER WENT FORTH TO SOW

Convention work in American cities-The convention of premillennial Baptists in Brooklyn-Dr. Gordon's address-Teaching on the Holy Spirit

THE

convention work which Gordon undertook increased yearly during the last half-decade of his life. We find notices of conferences in which he participated in Buffalo, Cincinnati, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, Chicago, New York, Springfield, Providence, Boston, Lawrence, Rochester, Detroit, the Canadian cities, and scores of minor points.

"'I laid me down and slept; I awaked; for the Lord sustained me,'" he writes on a postal from a "sleeper."

"Am

I not getting to be a traveling evangelist, an itinerant preacher, a peripatetic lecturer? It is all so contrary to my inclination, who would like so much better to settle down and to keep so. Well, the Lord would stir up my home-fixedness and beget in me the spirit of go-ye-forthedness. I trust I may do good to souls."

Most of these conferences were organized in behalf of foreign. missions. One of the more unique was the one called in Brooklyn by one hundred and fifty Baptist pastors, together with many more laymen, as a demonstration in behalf of the doctrine of the Lord's reappearing. Many of the leading men in the denomination took part, among others Professors Stifler