"Billy" Sunday, the Man and His Message: With his own words which have won thousands for ChristEllis, William T. (William Thomas)
Religion
"Billy" Sunday, the Man and His Message: With his own words which have won thousands for Christ
Ellis, William T. (William Thomas)
Baseball players -- United States -- Biography; Evangelists -- United States -- Biography; Sunday, Billy, 1862-1935
"Ma," as the whole party call Mrs. Sunday, is responsible for the
home, as well as for many meetings. Primarily, though, she looks
after "Daddy." Sunday is the type of man who is quite helpless with
respect to a dozen matters which a watchful wife attends to. He needs
considerable looking after, and all his friends, from the newspaper men
to the policeman on duty at the house, conspire to take care of him.
The Pittsburgh authorities assigned a couple of plain clothes men
to safeguard Sunday; of course he "got them" early, as he gets most
everybody he comes into touch with. So these men took care of Sunday as
if he were the famous "millionaire baby" of Washington and Newport. Not
a sense of official duty, but affectionate personal solicitude animated
those two men who rode in the automobile with us from the house to the
Tabernacle.
This sort of thing is one of the most illuminating phases of the
Sunday campaign. Those who come closest to the man believe most in
his religion. As one of the newspaper men covering the meetings said
to me, "The newspaper boys have all 'hit the trail.'" Then he proved
his religion by offering to do the most fraternal services for me.
From Mrs. Sunday, though, I learned that there was one bright reporter
who had worked on aspects of the revival who had not gone forward. He
avoided the meetings, and evaded the personal interviews of the Sunday
party. The evangelist's wife was as solicitous over that one young
man's spiritual welfare as if he had been one of her own four children.
Ten of the policemen stationed at the Tabernacle went forward the night
before I arrived in Pittsburgh. I was told that twenty others were
waiting to "hit the trail" in a group, taking their families with them.
The personal side of Sunday is wholesome and satisfactory. He is a
simple, modest chap, marked by the ways of the Middle West. Between
meetings he goes to bed, and there friends sometimes visit him. Met
thus intimately, behind the scenes, one would expect from him an
unrestrained display of personality, even a measure of egotism. Surely,
it is sometimes to be permitted a man to recount his achievements.
Never a boast did I hear from Sunday. Instead, he seemed absurdly
self-distrustful. These are his times for gathering, and he wanted me
to tell him about Bible lands!
CHAPTER XII
"The Old-Time Religion"
I am an old-fashioned preacher of the old-time religion, that has
warmed this cold world's heart for two thousand years.--BILLY SUNDAY.
Modern to the last minute Sunday's methods may be, but his message is
unmistakably the "old-time religion." He believes his beliefs without
a question. There is no twilight zone in his intellectual processes;
no mental reservation in his preaching. He is sure that man is lost
without Christ, and that only by the acceptance of the Saviour can
fallen humanity find salvation. He is as sure of hell as of heaven, and
for all modernized varieties of religion he has only vials of scorn.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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