Laicus; Or, the Experiences of a Layman in a Country Parish.Abbott, Lyman
Religion
Laicus; Or, the Experiences of a Layman in a Country Parish.
Abbott, Lyman
Christian fiction; New York (State) -- Fiction; Parishes -- Fiction
Deacon Goodsole warmly favored the minister's idea-was its most
earnest advocate, and was the man who first started the plan for
buying Mr. Wheaton's acquiescence.
Mr. Line hadn't a great deal of faith in it. This was not the way
the church used to raise money when he was a boy. Still, he wanted
to support the minister, and he wanted to have the poor reached, and
he hadn't anything to say against it.
Squire Rawlins said, "Go ahead. The minister takes all the risk,
don't you see? He's a big fool in my opinion. But there's no law
agin a man makin' a fool of himself, ef he wants ter."
Miss Moore organized that very night a double force to carry the
plan into effect. One was a ladies' society to pay the interest; the
other was a band of workers, young men and young women, to go out on
Sunday afternoons and invite the people who now do not go anywhere
to church, to come to ours.
On the final vote the plan was carried without a dissenting voice. I
beg Mrs. Potiphar's pardon. Her voice was heard in very decided
dissent as the meeting broke up. But as the ladies do not vote in
the Calvary Presbyterian Church, her protest did not prevent the
vote from being unanimous.
Maurice Mapleson is sanguine of results, I am not. I am afraid he
will come out bankrupt himself at the end of the year. I wanted to
raise a special subscription quietly to ensure his salary. But he
would not hear of it. He replied to my suggestion, "I said I would
trust the Lord, and I will. If you want to add to your envelope
contribution, very well. But I do not want any more than that will
give me."
But one thing I notice and record here. Our congregation have
increased from ten to twenty per cent. Miss Moore's invitations have
met with far greater success than I anticipated. I never could get
any of the boys from the Mill village to come to church at all
regularly under the old system. When this change was made I gave
notice of it, and now over half my Bible-class are in the
congregation. But I can get no intimation from Maurice how the plan
is prospering financially. All he will say is, "We shall all know at
the close of the year."
CHAPTER XXX.
Mr. Hardcap's Family Prayers.
"JENNIE," said I, the other evening, "I should like to go and make a
call at Mr. Hardcap's."
Our new pastor had preached a sermon on that unapplied passage of
Scripture, Luke xiv: 12-14. It had made a great stir in our little
village. Mr. Wheaton thought it was a grand sermon, but
impracticable. Mrs. Potiphar resented it as personal. Deacon
Goodsole thought it was good sound doctrine. I thought I would give
the sermon a trial; meanwhile I reserved my judgment.
It is not a bad method, by the way, of judging a sermon to try it
and see how it works in actual experiment.
Jennie assented with alacrity to my proposition; her toilet did not
take long, and to Mr. Hardcap's we went.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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