RELIGIOUS INTEREST IN TALLADEGA.
The second Sabbath in May was a notable day with our college church at Talladega. It was a feast of ingathering.
As early as eight o'clock a band of young men assembled on the banks of Talladega Creek, that three of their number might be immersed. It was a lovely spring morning, and the green banks, the running waters, the sweet air, the bright sunshine, the hymns, the prayers, the remarks of the pastor, and the Sacrament itself (administered by Rev. Spencer Snell, the pastor having had a congestive chill the preceding week, and being forbidden to go into the water) were full of solemnity and sweet instruction.
Two hours later we met again in the college chapel. One of the most pressing needs of this church is a house of worship. There has not been, rain or shine, since I came here, a Sabbath congregation that was not too large for our chapel. Growth is impossible. How it will be during the college vacation, I cannot say; but during this college year it has always been uncomfortably crowded, and every Sabbath has overflowed up on to the platform. This morning all seats were filled and extra benches occupied. The Lord's table was spread for His people, and after a sermon from the text, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" forty were received into the fellowship of the church and welcomed to the table. Of these, thirty were baptized by sprinkling. To those acquainted with the ways and prejudices of these people, the fact that we sprinkled thirty, while we immersed only three (these three were mature men), will be full of significance. None others asked to be immersed, or suggested it.
This addition to our church embraced about one-third of the number professing conversion during our recent series of meetings, conducted by Brother Field. Others will come to us, but many who are students here will join the churches at their homes. The success of those meetings, reaching as they did every student in the college buildings, with a single exception, was so notable that a word as to the manner in which they were conducted may be of interest.
The beginning of the extra meetings was providentially postponed more than once. They did not begin with the coming of the new pastor in the fall, nor with the week of prayer, nor with the day of prayer for colleges. These occasions were all used, but our extra meetings did not begin until the desire for them and the feeling of our great need of the Divine blessing had grown strong in the church, nor until they had been talked and prayed over, prepared and planned for.
The meetings were held for a special purpose. They were for the salvation of the students of the College. Students and church members, teachers, professors, president and pastor—we all felt this truth. But when every member of the College who felt that he was not a Christian, was asked to write his or her name on a slip of paper, and put it into the contribution basket at the chapel door when coming into the first meeting—and lest any should fail, from any cause, to give us his own name, every student was asked to furnish the name of any unsaved fellow-student of whom he knew—the real object sought in the meetings was brought home to every member of the College and Church. When we had the list of names (with hardly an exception they furnished their own names), we were vividly reminded of the individuals for whom we were working and praying, and they knew, every one, that we were definitely working and praying for them. This gave a feeling of practical, concentrated work, such as seldom attends such meetings.
Excepting this, there were no unusual means employed. The truth was very earnestly and simply preached. Immediate decision for Christ was pressed. Personal efforts were conscientiously made by teachers and students. Little prayer meetings, where from two to a dozen met for special prayer, were frequent, and the Lord blessed all the means used.
Since the close of the protracted meeting, each Sabbath-school class has had its own weekly prayer meeting—a means of great good. Also a general young Christians' prayer meeting has been held weekly. In it effort has been made, not only to lead these new converts to take part in prayer and conference, but to instruct them upon some points too often neglected. Those who on this day united with the church could each, I think, give an intelligent statement of reasons why they should unite with the church; and, in so uniting, why they gave public assent to a confession of faith, and why they joined in covenant with God and his people.
Mason Noble.