Page:Southern Presbyterian Journal, Volume 13.djvu/868

 doing what the Church intends in the definition of the sacrament, the thing does not work. Now, there was a priest who came to rebel against the whole system of his church. He came to have a hatred of religion. While in this state of mind, according to his later confession, he baptized many infants with the intention, not of doing what the Church defined, but of sending them to hell. Of course the priest is hardly to be commended for such evil intentions, as he himself later came to see; but consider the position of the Roman church which deprived these infants of regeneration by making a valid baptism to depend on the priest. On the Romish view a priest may outwardly pronounce every word and perform every action prescribed by the ritual, and the recipient may fulfill every condition required of him; yet if the priest has the wrong intention, the worshipper goes away destitute of the grace he thinks he has received.

How different is the position of Paul, of the Reformers, and of the Confession. "The grace which is exhibited in or by the Sacraments, rightly used, is not conferred by any power in them; neither doth the efficacy of a Sacrament depend upon the piety or intention of him that doth administer it, but upon the work of the Spirit, and the word of institution, which contains, together with a precept authorizing the use thereof, a promise of benefit to worthy receivers."

ANGLERS

(By the Editor of The Testament for Fishers of Men)

Lesson No. 98

"THE MOUNTAIN" (Mark 11:23)

Accompanying my pastor on a soul-winning visit, inspired in me the desire and purpose to make an effort to win somebody. I asked the Holy Spirit to guide me to the right prospect, and immediately came to my mind a young man in the congregation whom I had heard was not a professing Christian, though his father was an elder and his brothers and sisters were active in the church's work. He was always at the Sunday morning service in the family pew, and I learned this was keeping a promise to his mother who had recently died. I began to cautiously inquire and further learned that his father had earnestly pleaded with him to accept Christ and join the church; also that his pastor had talked with him and prayed with him about it, but he had steadfastly resisted. Then I thought well if these who knew him so intimately had failed how could I, a comparative stranger, hope to do anything with him? But the Spirit kept saying "You go and win him." I went to the store to see him. He was the main salesman in his father's popular grocery store, quite a favorite with the customers; and each time I went I found him busily engaged. He was a very attractive fellow, about 30 years old; everybody liked Frank. Then I learned something that convinced me I was on a "fruitless trail." When his saintly mother died, all the family were gathered in her room, including Frank. Just a few minutes before she passed away she called Frank to the bedside and said, "O Frank I do want you so much to be a Christian; all the family, except you, I can expect to meet in Heaven; won't you surrender your heart now to Jesus, so I can know I will meet you there, too?" And Frank turned away from his mother and leaned his head against the wall, refusing her dying request. When I heard that, I said to myself I would be a fool to try to do anything with him when he had turned down an appeal like that. But the Spirit would not let me alone; He kept saying "You go and win him." The thing haunted me night and day. I would awake in the night with the thought PAGE 6 THE SOUTHERN PRESBYTERIAN JOURNAL