^ In a list of Indian missionaries of Mohammedanism, pub- lished in the journal of a religious and philanthropic society of Lahore, says Arnold in The Preaching of Islam, " We find the names of schoolmasters, government clerks in the Canal and Opium Departments, traders, including a dealer in camel carts, an editor of a newspaper, a bookbinder, and a workman in a printing establishment. These men devote the hours of leisure left them after the completion of the day's labour to the preaching of their religion in the streets and bazaars of Indian cities, seeking to win converts from among Christians and Hindus, whose religious belief they controvert and attack." This is what constitutes the power of Islam. With no missionary organization, with no missionary order, the religion yet spread over Western Asia and Northern Africa, and retains still its foothold on the soil of Europe. Where the common man believes his religion and spreads it, other men believe it, too.^
III.
A Great Service.
"He brought him unto Jesus."
" He brought him unto Jesus " ; it was the kindest and best service that any human being could do to any other.
1. Consider the nature of the man who performed this service.
^ K. E. Speer, A Young Man's QuestionSy 55.
ST. JOHN I. 40-42 109
(1) Andrew was an ordinary man. He was not a genius. He does not play a conspicuous part in the gospel drama. We know him better than some of the other disciples, better than Bartholomew and Jude, but not nearly so well as Peter and John. He is one of the subordinate characters stepping on the stage here and there to do a bit of modest work, and then vanishins into the background. Men like Andrew are the one-talented men who use their one talent sweetly and nobly, and show us all the way we ought to go and the work which we can do.
Tj We often think that if we had that man's means or that man's ability or that man's opportunity, we could do something worth doing ; but, as we are, there is no possibility of any great thing. Yet God does not want us to fill any other man's place, or to do any other man's work. God wants us to improve our own opportunity with the possessions and the powers that He has given us. It is a very great thing for us to do the very best we can do just where and as we are. God asks no one of us to do more than this, nor has any one of us a right .to do less.^
(2) Andrew had come from commicnion with Christ. He had spent a night with the Master, and in the sacred, secret converse of those few mysterious hours his whole life was altered. He had seen and had found the Christ. Here we have the secret of success. It is to be found in communion with Christ. This is the indispensable qualification of every Christian worker. It makes of the dwarf a giant, and without it the giant becomes a dwarf. In the Christian realm we can influence others only as we ourselves are influenced.
^ Place a bar of iron, cold and lifeless, by a piece of wood. The wood is not influenced at all, but when the iron is placed in the furnace and left there for a while and afterwards withdrawn, a change is then effected, for the iron seems to have ceased to be iron and to have become a mass of fire. If placed then by the side of the piece of wood how different is the result ; as it has been influenced, so it influences, and the wood too becomes a mass of fire.2
(3) This ordinary man, coming from communion with Christ, shows three remarkable qualities — the courage which initiates, the sympathy which communicates with others, the humility
^ M. D. Babcoek, Thoughts for Everyday Living^ 19. * William Arthur, The Tongue of Fire.
no PERSONAL SERVICE
which obliterates self. Courage, sympathy, humility — three chief elements in the saintly character.
(a) There is first of all the courage of the man, the boldness which takes the first step, the spirit which comes bravely forward while all others are hanging back, timid or irresolute. We have many phrases which bear testimony to the value and the rarity of this courage. We speak of breaking the ice, of shooting Niagara. It is a plunge into an unknown future, where none has gone before, of which none can foretell the consequences. We say that it is the first step which costs. We are lost in admira- tion of the soldier who steps forward to lead the forlorn hope, to storm the breach, though almost certain death is his destiny. The forlorn hope — does not the very phrase tell its own tale ? Yes, it is the first step which costs. Where one — though only one — has gone before, it does not cost half — not a twentieth part — of the bravery, the resolution, for a second to follow. And for a third and a fourth the degree of courage required lessens in a rapidly decreasing scale. The first step was taken by Andrew. He was the leader of the forlorn hope of Christendom, the first to storm the citadel of the Kingdom of heaven, taking it as alone it can be taken — taking it by force. Be not deceived. Only the violent enter therein — only the brave, resolute, unflinching soldiers, who will brook no opposition, who make straight for truth and righteousness and love, come what may, who are ready to lose their lives that they may save them. This unique glory is Andrew's. Peter may have held a more commanding position in the Church of Christ ; Paul may have travelled over a larger area and gathered greater numbers into the fold; but Andrew's crown has a freshness and a brightness of its own which shall never fade — a glory of which no man can rob it.