Scottish Heart Warmers
and Thought Provokers:
(With an occasional Englishman.)
C. T. Studd - Great British Cricketer: From a message entitled: Chocolate Soldier Heroism?
Chocolates are very fond of talking loud and long against some whom they call fanatics, as though there were any danger of Christians being fanatics nowadays! Why, fanatics among Christians are as rare as the 'dodo'. Now, if they declaimed against 'tepidity', they would talk sense. God's real people have always been called fanatics. Jesus was called mad; so was Paul; so was Whitfield, Wesley, Moody, Spurgeon. No one has graduated far in God's School who has not been paid the compliment of being called a fanatic. We Christians of today are indeed a tepid crew. Had we but half the fire and enthusiasm of the Suffragettes in the past, we would have the world evangelized .... in no time. Had we the pluck and heroism of the Flyers, or the men who volunteered for the North or South Polar Expeditions, or for the Great War, or for any ordinary dare-devil enterprise, we could have every soul on earth knowing the name .... of Jesus Christ in less than ten years."
Spurgeon on the passage, "Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it."
"I gather from this promise, first, that it is a promise only made to those who do open their mouths wide. Some brethren never get their mouths filled because they never open them to any extent. They ask for some little mercy, and they may get it, or may not; there is no promise about such shut-mouthed prayers, but if they had opened their mouths wide they would to a certainty have had the mouth-filling blessing. With the world it is, the less you ask for the more likely you will be to obtain it, but God's thoughts are not as our thoughts: with God the more you ask the more likely are you to be heard. Half open your mouth and it may or may not be filled, but "Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it." We always pray well and successfully when the Spirit of God enables us to stand on elevated ground, and plead on Godlike terms for blessings which for value, number, and greatness are worthy of the infinite bounty of Jehovah. We are then dealing with God as he loves to be dealt with, for He is a rich and great God, and loves to be approached with great prayer and great request, and when we draw near in that fashion we shall be quite sure to succeed."
Charles Finney, on preaching, taken from his Memoirs. (He preached in Edinburgh.)
"The captain of a fire company, when a city is on fire, does not read to his company an essay, or exhibit fine specimens of rhetoric, when he shouts to them and directs their movements. It is a question of urgency, and he intends that every word shall be understood. He is entirely in earnest with them, and they feel as if criticism would be out of place in regard to the language he uses. It is a question of too much importance and urgency for his company to expect that he is going to trim his language, and speak to them under such circumstances with all the fine drapery and furniture of a studied and ornate discourse. So it always is when men are entriely in earnest about a thing. Their language is direct, simple, in point. Their sentences are short, cogent, powerful. The appeal is made directly to them for action; and hence all such discourses take effect. This is the reason why the ignorant Methodist preachers, and formerly the earnest Baptist preachers produced so much more effect than our most learned theologians and splendid divines. They do so now. The mere effort of a common exhorter will often move a congregation far beyond anything that those splendid exhibitions of rhetoric will do.
Great sermons lead the people to praise the preacher. Good preaching leads the people to praise the Savior."
James Robe, Kilsyth, Scotland in defence of the revival that was taking place.
"I seriously beg of any who are prejudiced against this dispensation of God's extraordinary grace, and look upon it as a delusion, that they will show themselves so charitable, as to direct me and other ministers, what we shall answer distressed persons of all ages, who come to us crying bitterly that they are undone, because of unbelief and other sins -'What shall we do to be saved!' And as a young girl about twelve, who had been in distress for some time called upon me in the house where I was, and asked me with great sedateness,'What shall I do to get Christ?', shall we tell them that they are not Christless, and are not unconverted, when we evidently see many of them to be such? Shall we tell them that their fears of the wrath of God are all but delusion, and that it is not such a dreadful thing that they need to be much afraid of it" Shall we tell persons lamenting their cursing, and swearing, Sabbath-breaking, and other immoralities, that it is the devil that now makes them see these evils to be offensive to God, and destructive to their souls? Shall we tell them, who, under greatest uneasiness, inquire of us what they shall do to get an interest and faith in Jesus Christ, that Satan is deluding them, when they have, or show any concern this way" In fine, shall we pray and recommend it to them to pray to God, to deliever them from such delusions? It would be worse than devilish to treat the Lord's sighing and groaining prisoners at this rate; and yet such treatment is a natural consequence of reckoning this the work of the devil, and a delusion." The Log College, by Archibald Alexander
George Whitefield, English Evangelist,
who saw revival in Scotland.
"In nothing, perhaps, did Whitefield keep Paul more before him, than in this strong solicitude to 'speak as he ought to speak.' No phrase occurs so often in his journals as, 'preached with much power; with some power.' ... the word 'power' occurs so uniformly, that it tells plainly what he was thinking about, after all sermons which produced a visible effect. His enemies said he was complimenting his own sermons. They little knew his heart, and still less the humility which springs from 'an unction' of the Spirit! To prevent unnecessary misunderstanding, however, he explained his meaning thus, in a note to his revised journal: 'By the word power, I mean, all along, nor more, nor no less, than enlargement of heart, and a comfortable frame, given me from above; by which I was enabled to speak with freedom and clearness, and the people were impressed and affected thereby.' This is only explaining - not retracting nor qualifying. He knew, and tens of thousands felt, that God was with him of a truth, making the gospel rebound from his heart to their hearts; melting them by warming him; winning their souls, by absorbing his soul with the glories of salvation." - The Life and Times of George Whitefield, by Robert Philip
James Gilmour,
Scottish Missionary to Mongolia:
"Having decided as to the capacity in which I should labour in Christ's kingdom, the next thing which occupied my serious attention was the locality where I should labour. Occasionally, before, I had thought of the relative claims of the home and foreign fields, but during the summer session in Edinburgh I thought the matter out, and decided for the mission field; even on the low ground of common sense I seemed to be called to be a missionary. Is the kingdom a harvest field? Then I thought it reasonable that I should seek to work where the work was most abundant and the workers fewest. Labourers say they are over-taxed at home; what then must be the case abroad, where there are wide stretching plains already white to harvest, with scarcely here and there a solitary reaper? To me the soul of an Indian seemed as precious as the soul of an Englishman, and the Gospel as much for the Chinese as for the European; and as the band of missionaries was few compared with the company of home ministers, it seemed to me clearly to be my duty to go abroad.
"But I go out as a missionary not that I may follow the dictates of common sense, but that I may obey that command of Christ, 'Go into all the world and preach.' He who said 'preach,' said also, 'Go ye into and preach,' and what Christ hath joined together let not man put asunder.
"This command seems to me to be strictly a missionary injunction, and, as far as I can see, those to whom it was first delivered regarded it in that light, so that, apart altogether from choice and other lower reasons, my going forth is a matter of obedience to a plain command; and in place of seeking to assign a reason for going abroad, I would prefer to say that I have failed to discover any reason why I should stay at home."
Quote of C. T. Studd an Eglishmen. Missionary to China, India and Africa
"Nail the colours to the mast! That is the right thing to do, and, therefore, that is what we must do, and do it now. What colours? The colours of Christ, the work He has given us to do — the evangelization of all the unevangelized. Christ wants not nibblers of the possible, but grabbers of the impossible, by faith in the omnipotence, fidelity, and wisdom of the Almighty Saviour Who gave the command. Is there a wall in our path? By our God we will leap over it! Are there lions and scorpions in our way? We will trample them under our feet! Does a mountain bar our progress? Saying, 'Be thou cast into the sea,' we will march on. Soldiers of Jesus! Never surrender! Nail the colours to the mast!"
"Some wish to live within the sound
of Church or Chapel bell;
I want to run a Rescue Shop
within a yard of hell."
Quotes of David Livingstone:
"If you have men who will only come if they know there is a good road, I don't want them. I want men who will come if there is no road at all."
"I will go anywhere, provided it is forward."
"I will place no value on anything I have or may possess except in relation to the kingdom of Christ."
Quote of John Paton taken from "John G. Paton Scottish Missionary to the New Hebrides."
"Amongst many who sought to deter me, was one dear old Christian gentleman, whose crowning argument always was, 'The Cannibals! You will be eaten by Cannibals." At last I replied, 'Mr. Dickson, you are advanced in years now, and your own prospect is soon to be laid in the grave, there to be eaten by worms; I confess to you, that if I can but live and die serving and honouring the Lord Jesus, it will make no difference to me whether I am eaten by Cannibals or by worms; and in the Great Day my resurrection body will arise as fair as yours in the likeness of our risen Redeemer."
Another Quote from Missionary Paton.
"How much my father's prayers at this time impressed me I can never explain, nor could any stranger understand. When, on his knees and all of us kneeling around him in Family Worship, he poured out his whole soul with tears for the conversion of the Heathen World to the service of Jesus, and for every personal and domestic need, we all felt as if in the presence of the living Saviour, and learned to know and love Him as our Divine Friend. As we rose from our knees, I used to look at the light on my father's face, and wish I were like him in spirit, -hoping that, in answer to his prayers, I might be privileged and prepared to carry the blessed Gospel to some portion of the Heathen World." - John Paton, Scottish Pioneer Missionary to the New Hebrides.
Quote of Robert Moffat found in "A Scottish Christian Heritage."
"Oh! Christians of England, can you as subjects of divine love, as possessing the blessed Gospel of the Son of God, and as holding his last commission from the Mount of Olives to publish it to the ends of the earth, - can you gaze on these fields of human blood, these regions of unutterable woe, without emotion? Ah! brethren, could you behold the scenes your missionaries witness, you would wake up with a power of pity which would impel you to deeds of compassion, compared with which your past exertions would appear as nothing."
- Robert Moffat, 1842, Scottish Pioneer Missionary to Africa. Father-in-law to David Livingstone.