(A CHAPTER ON FAITH)
Although by January 1, 1911, we had eighty-four beds filled nearly every night with homeless men, we felt ourselves very much hampered for room. We turned many away. Many a poor fellow that winter walked the streets all night to keep from freezing.
When we pray for a thing which we think the work of the Lord requires, we begin at once to arrange for it, as if the money to do the work were already at hand. Our paper, The Gospel Tidings, of January, 1911, said, “Our Mission now does business in three different localities, and will soon be obliged to rent two more places for the wood cutting department and for opening a penny lunch-room.”
We were so sure that the Lord's work needed enlarging that we went to the very best architects we knew, Gregg & Leisenring, and told them our plans and needs, and they prepared with the greatest care, drawings for a building costing at the very least $50,000, besides the cost of the land. Then the writer visited the seats of the mighty in New York City with the best introductions that the District Commissioners and leading statesmen could give. While I was received with great kindness and courtesy, I was distinctly told by one magnate that he helped only the young and those starting in life; by another that his charity could never take a local form, that he gave along the line of research for causes and remedies of diseases. The women, whose secretaries I met, themselves not being visible to plain people, I was assured had planned all their surplus income for five to eight years ahead, so that I came back convinced that God's way for the Gospel Mission was not by way of New York City.
About that time a great fire occurred in an eastern city, and many men and women lost their lives, and the order went out in Washington that every building where a large number of people worked or slept must have plenty of fire-escapes.
We found to put fire-escapes on the Gospel Mission would cost $125, an immense sum to us, but we were preparing to put up the fire-escapes when the owner refused his permission. We told the police, and asked time to relocate, but were peremptorily ordered out of 1230 Pennsylvania Avenue, N. W. We could find no suitable building obtainable within our means.