Marching Song of Veteran Ministers
When the names of the forty-five retired ministers were called in the Baltimore Annual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, in 1930, these men who were facing the sunset period of life stood and sang:
“Come, we that love the Lord,
And let our joys be known;
Join in a song with sweet accord
And thus surround the throne.”
“The light that never was on sea or land” crept into their faces as they recalled the days and the songs of their pilgrimage, and blended their voices in the triumphant refrain:
“We’re marching to Zion,
Beautiful, beautiful Zion;
We’re marching upward to Zion,
The beautiful city of God.”
Then, to give emphatic expression to their Christian joy, when Dr. Charles W. Baldwin, a veteran leader, ninety-one years of age, gave the signal, they exclaimed in unison: “Hallelujah!”
But those who are in active service show their spirit of consecration by being