The Missionaries 2

Joseph Townend's First Sermon

The Rev. W. Dlingworth was instrumental in my conversion
to God. Before he came, I was told by my fellow-workmen in
the warehouse that I should be brought in when he arrived.
Mr. Dlingworth was a revivalist, but I detested Methodist cant; and
believed that many who professed to be converted at these
excited meetings deceived themselves ; and, I thought, I
would never go to the penitent form. Mr. Dlingworth's first
sermon, under God, broke my heart ; I sought to hide my
tears and emotions, but could not. His text was, "Thou shalt
guide me with thy counsel, and afterward receive me to
glory." Psalm Ixxiii. 24. He preached again in the evening,
and held a prayer-meeting ; and, standing on the very seat
where for years I had sat (the singers' seat), he made
powerful and solemn appeals, requesting the earnest
seekers to stand up and decide just then. I rose the first; a
hundred eyes were upon me ; and I felt, as the preacher
stated,  “that the eyes of God, of angels, and of demons
were upon me ! " It was several weeks before I found peace.
I had pictured to my mind how it would be, that I should feel
great elevation of spirit, be filled with joy; and instead of
leaving the mode to God, and simply believing the testimony
of God concerning his only-begotten Son, I was practically
making a saviour of my repentance, and expecting the
effects before I had exercised faith in Christ as my Saviour.
One Sabbath evening, towards the close of a powerful prayer-
meeting, I felt very much discouraged. Many had found
peace, amongst whom was my dear friend Thomas Howarth. I
was weary in body because of the disquietude of my mind.
Mr. Dlingworth came, and somewhat sternly said, "Young man,
stand up and listen to me! " I did so. He proceeded, "You are
stumbling at the simplicity of the Gospel ; you want the blessing
before you have believed;'' and then he said, ''What is it you
want? Do you expect God to lift you up into the air? You will
have to begin over again, and learn how, as a guilty sinner, to
take God at his word." He and many others went home, but I
went into the vestry with a few select friends. The words, "You will
have to begin again," ran through my mind. I thought, "What?
All this wrestling, weeping, and praying to be done over
again!" I said to myself, " You will have to believe at last — why
not believe just now?" and composing my mind, I thought, " I do,
I do believe !" I was then calm, peaceable, tranquil. The following day
was one of severe conflict. The enemy suggested that I had not been
brought in like others — I should not be able to stand fast — but I kept
praying and believing, and the tempting power decreased, and I felt
that " Old things had passed away, behold all things had become new."
The water as it ran down rippling, and the birds as they flew about and
sung, yea, even the smoke of the long chimney of the mill, all seemed
new ; all praised God ; and though I had no ecstacy, I had abundant
sweetness and entire satisfaction.

When I began to think about being more extensively useful,
I was sincerely afraid that I should feel it to be my duty to
call sinners to repentance. The responsibility I saw to be great,
and to have my name on the plan, and to take the sacred place,
without benefiting the people, I viewed with abhorrence. Besides,
I had little time, few books, and it would be such a task, that to
have been satisfied that the Sabbath-school and the prayer-leader's
plan was all that I was called upon to attend to, would have removed
a heavy burden from my mind. The impression deepened,
and I got very uneasy. One Sabbath evening, being planned, at an
obscure place, to assist in carrying on a prayer-meeting, at six
o'clock, I resolved, on my way, to attempt talking a little to the
people, and fixed in my mind a few plain thoughts. When my
turn came, I gave out the page, and whilst the people stood
finding the hymn, I began to talk. The old man of the house said,
“Sit you down, folks, this lad will talk to us a bit!"  I proceeded until my
voice became natural, and for about ten minutes, with pleasure to
myself and profit to the people, spake of the necessity of personal
religion. It was reported that I had begun to preach, and being urged to
preach the next Monday evening but one, in a large house in
Kawteiptal Fold, I reluctantly consented. I made what preparation I
could, but at the same time I was in hopes that I should not
be able to proceed, and if so that I should take it as an indication
that I was not called, and that so my mind might be at rest, and
the matter would end. The night came, the house was full of
people, all of whom I knew. I stood behind a chair, on a log of
wood, and gave out my first hymn, “O God, our help in ages
past” and before the hymn was gone through, I felt as certain
that I must preach as I felt certain of my conversion to God. It
was a solemn meeting. I did not take a formal text, but stated as
my subject, “The shortness of time," which I proposed to illustrate
and improve.

“Time is short compared with eternity.  We cannot comprehend the
range of time because we do not know the exact period when time
would cease to be. But what do you know of eternity? Go back in
search of its beginning, pass the time of the formation of our planet, the
creation of chaotic matter, the creation of angels, and, as far as
our shallow conception of the subject can go, when nothing
existed but God. Let the mind dart backward and backward, and
still farther; we have to come back to the Bible for a
solution of the problem. "Before the mountains were brought
forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even
from everlasting to everlasting thou art God.'' Standing on imagination's
post bring back the mind, pierce the cloak of time, pass the
general resurrection of the dead and the judgement, the final destiny of
man and demons.  There is some proportion between a single grain of
sand and the largest mountain in the world — because the mountain is
composed of so many grains, were it possible to count them. There is
some proportion between a single drop of water and the unfathomable
ocean — this is accounted for on the same obvious principles.
There is some proportion between the light of a candle and the
brightness of the Sun but there absolutely is not any
proportion whatever between time and eternity. Time only
recently commenced, and it will soon terminate. Eternity, as to
God, never began, and eternity, as it regards your existence and
mine, will never end. But in the illustration of this important
fact we remark —
2ndly, — " That time is short," if we think of it as the period
allotted for human life. Ever since man fell into sin the laws of decay
have been in operation: " Dust you are and to dust you shall return."
The lives of those who lived before Noah’s flood were very long :
some of them lived six or eight hundred years.  Of Methuselah, the
oldest man, we read that he lived nine hundred and sixty-nine years.
But after the flood, -human life was considerably shortened ; and ever
since the days of the ninetieth Psalm, the age of seventy has been
regarded as an old age— and if, in cases of more than ordinary
health, a few persons have reached eighty years
or more, the final years of their life might be painful and difficult. It is
difficult to impress the brevity of life upon the mind, and most especially
on the minds of the young ; arising from the fact that we do not measure
time as we should and so time plays the cheat with us : for whilst
looking to the future time is like the slow imperceptible tide, when we
look back on the years they have flown like the swiftest torrent.  When
the venerable patriarch Jacob stood before Pharaoh, and was asked,
by that monarch, his age, he answered — "The days of the years of my
pilgrimage are an hundred and thirty years: few and evil have the
days of the years of my life been, and have not attained unto
the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their
pilgrimage !" Job says, " Man that is bom of a woman is of few
days and full of trouble. He cometh forth like a flower, and is cut
down ; he fleeth also as a shadow, and continueth not." The
Psalmist says, "Behold thou hast made my days as an hand-
breadth, and mine age is as nothing before thee : Verily, every
man at his best state is altogether vanity."  The voice said, "Cry."
And he said. "What shall I cry ? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness

thereof is as the flower of the fleld : the grass withereth, the
flower fadeth; because the Spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it;
surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth :
but the word of our God shall stand for ever." Isaiah xl. 6, 7, 8.
Unto what in Scripture is the life of man compared ? Is it compared to
the everlasting mountains — so called in reference to time
— which are the same to-day as they were a thousand years ago ?
No ; but unto the grass ; which, though now beautiful and healthful,
will soon be scorched by the heat, withered by the drought,
blasted by the storm, or cut down with the scythe. " All flesh
is grass.'' Unto what, in this blessed book, the Bible, is the life of
man compared ? Is it compared to the stately oak, which hath
long survived the angry pelting of the winter's storm ? No ; but
unto the leaves which adorn that tree. We see them in all the
beauty, and freshness of spring, in all their strength
and summer maturity ; but they wither in autumn, and, falling
from the trees, they rot under our feet in winter.  We do all fade
as a leaf."

See how quick that shuttle glides across the loom ; “Our days
are swifter than a weaver's shuttle." How often, seated by the fire
listening to a story, has the winter's night passed imperceptibly away,
when we suddenly realised it was midnight.  'Our years on Earth are
like a story that is told.'

3rdly and finally, — Time is short, if we think of its great
uncertainty — we repeat, its great uncertainty. Let’s think of the two
general features of uncertainty — accident and disease. An accident
comes unexpected ; it takes its victim unawares — alas ! we fear, in
many cases, when he is unprepared — and hurries him into eternity
without a moment's warning.  How many whom we have personally
known have met their death in such a way. And had we the all knowing
eye of God, what a spectacle would this be at this instant ! Here is a
man tumbling from a tremendous precipice, and he is dashed to
pieces at the bottom ; there is an individual buried under the
load which was suspended over his head ; and another is struck dead
by lightning. The raging dog, the furious bull, the galloping horses, the
swelling torrents of the sea, the sweeping winds, the raging ocean,
the dreadful explosion destroy men's lives. Yes, in a hundred ways
men have been taken suddenly, by accident, to their account. Our poet
justly says —

“Dangers stand thick through all the ground,
To push us to the tomb.”

Yes; the traveller on the coach, the driver of the horses, the
farmer in the field, the miner in the pit, the mariner on the ocean,
the merchant in his counting-house, the weaver in the loom, and
the maid in the kitchen — all, more or less, are exposed to danger.

As to the second feature of uncertainty — Disease — he devours
his millions at a meal. Not satisfied with victims from the aged
and infirm, he seizes the young, the thoughtless, and the care free.  
Whilst we see here and there a solitary aged person, how many of the
young are wasting with consumption, burning with fever, strangling with
quinsy, suffocating with the asthma, stabbed with the knife of luxury, or
poisoned with excess wealth. How many in our different
neighbourhoods, who were our former companions and acquaintances,
are now no more ; persons who were our associates at the
Sabbath- school or at the nightly parties of debauchery. We think of one,
gone ; another, gone ; and another, gone ; — truly, we stand almost
alone.

Did I speak only of neighbours and acquaintances ? has Death
come no nearer? has he not also entered our own homes?

"Has not the monster played his deadly weapon
In the narrower sphere of our sweet domestic comfortable homes,
And cut down some of the fairest of our family joys ? "

Yes; a brother, sister, parent, child, husband, wife. We
marked the progress of consumption; stood appalled at the
dreadful fever ; were confounded at the unexpected accident.
How many can adopt the language of the impassioned poet,
Young —
"Insatiate archer, could not one suffice?
Thy shaft flew thrice, and thrice my peace was slain; "
and some of you can go on and say,
" And thrice, ere thrice yon moon had filled her horn."
" Death more than causes sorrow, he confounds ;
And ere we cease to weep for one, another falls."

I think I hear some one say, "Yes, it's all very true ; but I have
a good constitution ; I need not fear, I wish while young to enjoy
myself, and shake off such gloomy thoughts.'* My friends, listen!
Your departed friends, some of them at least, thought as you now
think, spoke as you now speak, acted as you now purpose to
act; their sparkling eyes, healthful countenances, and active limbs
all spoke of years of pleasure yet to come. Oh, with what tenacity
they clung to life ; with what reluctance they marked the power
and progress of disease ; and when convinced they must die how
it shocked them,
"How the conscious tears stood thick
As the dew-drops on the bells of flowers : honest effusion ;
In vain the swollen heart works hard
To put a gloss on its distress."

O you happy triflers, you simple souls in quest of butterfly enjoyments !
You who, waking, dream that religion is sad and morbid ; you who
dream of passion, pastime, and laughter as the essence of human
bliss, come with me and visit the graveyard
where your friend lies. Remove that earth, take off that lid —
See, on that once fair and handsome cheek,
“The high-fed worm, in lazy volumes rolled,
Birds unscared. Was this all you got for your caution ?
For this your painful labours at your mirror,
To improve those charms and keep them in repair ;
For which the spoiler thanks thee not? Foul feeder !
Coarse fare and carrion please thee full as well,
And leave as keen a relish on the sense."
" Boast not thyself of to-morrow ; thou knowest not what a
day may bring forth." Come, let us ponder over the lines on
yonder tomb —
" Pause here, and think ; this simple rhyme
Demands one moment of your fleeting time.
Consult life’s silent clock ; thy bounding mean
Seems it to say, Health here has long to reign.
Have you the vigour of your youth ;
An eye that beams delight, a heart untaught to sigh ;
Yet fear ; youth of times, healthful and at ease,
Anticipates a day it never sees ;
And many a tomb, like Hamilton's aloud
Cries, Prepare thee for an early shroud."