Scottish Heart Warmers

 

Scottish Heart Warmers
and Thought Provokers:
 
John Gillies - Kylsyth, Scotland
Historical Collection of
Accounts of Revival.
"They were men of patience.  They were not discouraged, though they
had to labour long without seeing all the fruit they desired.  They
continued still to sow.  Day after day they pursued what, to the eye of
the world, appeared a thankless and fruitless round of toil.  They
were not soon weary in well-doing, remembering the example of the
husbandman in regard to his perishable harvest: 'behold the husbandman
waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience
for it until he receive the early and latter rain.' Many a goodly plan
has been rendered abortive by impatience.  Many a day of toil has been thrown away by impatience.  Many a rash step has been taken and hasty
changes adopted in consequence of impatience. Attempts have been made
to force on a revival by men who were impatient at the slow progress
of the work in their hand; and seldom have these ended in anything but
calamitous failure, or at best a momentary excitement which scorched
and sterilised a soil from which a little more patient toil would have
reaped an abundant harvest.  There may be and there always ought to be
the calmest patience in conjunction with the most intense longing for
success.  'He that believeth doth not make haste.' A friend and
brother in the Lord some years ago was called to till a portion of the
Master's vineyard in our own land.  He laboured and prayed and sought
fruit with all his soul.  Yet at that time he saw but little.  He was
called away to another circle of labour.  After some years he heard
that a work of God had taken place in his former field under another
faithful brother and fellow-worker in Christ. On visiting the spot he
was amazed and delighted to find that many of those who had been
converted were the very individuals whom he had several years before
visited, and warned, and prayed for. 'One man soweth and another
reapeth.'"
Arthur W. Pink - The Life of David.pg.67 Pink is from the Isle of Lewis.
"It is easier to trust God in days of sunshine than in times of gloom and darkness. 'David had often, indeed, before known difficulty and danger: from the day of his conflict with Goliath he had known little else: but then, there was this difference - in former difficulties he had been enabled to triumph.  Some ray of brightness had gilded every cloud; some honor awaited him out of each affliction.  But now, God seemed no longer to interfere on his behalf.  The full enmity of Saul was allowed to take its course; and God interfered not, either to subdue or to chasten.  He appeared no longer to intend raising David above circumstances, but to allow him to be overcome by them. David's heart seemed unable to bear this.  To trust God whilst overcoming is one thing; to trust Him when being overcome is another' (B. W. Newton)."
 
Thomas Payne, Prayer-The Greatest Force on Earth.
(He appears to be a Welshman.)
 
Whenever there are limitations, and we fail to reach the highest possibility in the prayer life, the fault is always on the human side and never on the divine.  We get a remarkable picture of this, only under rather different circumstances, when the prophet Elisha commanded Joash to take a bunch of arrows and smite the ground with them.  'He smote thrice, and stayed' (II Kings 13:18,19).  The prophet was deeply grieved in spirit and said, 'Thou shouldest have smitten five or six times; then hadst thou smitten Syria till thou hadst consumed it: whereas now thou shalt smite Syria but thrice.' It is evident that God had intended to give him several signal victories to the complete overthrowing of Syria; but, through lack of perseverance, Joash gave in just at the point of splendid final victory.
 
And, Oh!  beloved brethren, is not this the cause of much of the failure and disappointment in our prayer life and revival effort of the present day?  How often has it happened that, when a splendid opportunity has been given for the winning of some glorious victory for Christ and His kingdom, through the lack of perseverance or the want of knowing how to make the most of the victory, we have failed to rise to the occasion!  Let us endeavor always to have a clear and definite aim in our petitions to the throne of heavenly grace, and look for a victory such as is
worthy of God.
 
James O Fraser, missionary to the Lisu people of China, 
from his biography - Mountain Rain
(James' father was a Scots-Canadian.)
"What a number of earnest, spiritually-minded Christians there are at home and how correspondingly rich are the prayer forces of the Church! How I long for some of this health for myself and the Lisu here. Yes, I have had it in measure already ... but I should very, very much like a wider circle of intercessors. 
 
Our work among the Lisu is not going to be a bed of roses spiritually.  I know enough about Satan to realize that he will have all his weapons ready for determined opposition.  He would be a missionary simpleton who expected plain sailing in any work of God.  I will not, by God's grace, let anything deter me from going straight ahead in the path to which He leads, but I shall feel greatly strengthened if I know of a definite company of pray-ers holding me up.  I am confident that the Lord is going to do work, sooner or later, among the Lisu here."
 
(Earlier in his biography he shared....)
"'It seems a big responsibility to be the only preacher of the gospel within a radius of about a hundred and fifty miles,' he wrote home to his former class leader. 'I feel my weakness very much, yet the Lord seems to delight in making His power perfect in weakness.  May I ask you then to remember me specially in prayer, asking God to use me to the salvation of many precious souls?'
 
He was feeling more and more that the prayers of God's people were what called down blessing on the work.  It didn't matter whether those people were directly engaged in the work or not. 'Paul may plant and Apollos water, but it is God who gives the increase,' he explained, 'and this increase can be brought down from heaven by believing prayer, whether offered in china or in England.'"
 
Jim Elliot -
From His biography,
"Shadow of the Almighty"
(Jim Elliot's heritage is Scottish.)
"Father, make of me a crisis man. 
Bring those I contact to decision.  Let me not be a milepost on a single road; make me a fork, that men must turn one way or another
on facing Christ in me."
- as recorded in his journal.
 
We have been very much encouraged - to believe again for some sort of New Testament pattern to be worked out among forest Quichuas.  How false and fleshly to reason that God will do a work here "because Pete, Ed, and Jim (Jim Elliot) are trained, capable, young, and strong!" I have been much impressed lately of the absolutenecessity of God Himself rousing the conscience.  I do not know how, nor even where, to begin to make a man think seriously about sin and judgment, and must look to the work of the Holy Spirit for the beginning move toward any hint of such a working.... To see Christ honoured and testified to publicly by one of these young Indian fellows we now know as friends would be something like seeing a miracle before my very eyes.  Indeed, it would be a miracle, but I have never realised this fact so clearly as now.  God must do His work, or it will not be done, and we stand waiting for him here.
 - from a letter to his future wife.
 
C. H. Spurgeon - 
The Secret of Power in Prayer.
Abide in him as to your very life. Do not say, "I have been a Christian man now twenty years and can do without continued dependence upon Christ." You could not do without Him if you were as old as Methuselah.  Your very being as a Christian depends upon your still clinging, still trusting, still depending... To sum it all up, if you want that splendid power in prayer, you must remain in loving, living, lasting, conscious, practical, abiding union with the Lord Jesus Christ.

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 groaning 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.