Almost half a mile from the Medicine Lodge camp, on a rise of ground, stands a little Christian church—plain but beautiful. From it seem to flow visibly those purifying and redeeming forces that are destined to transform the darkened lives of these Indian children of the great All-father.
It is prayer-meeting night. The bell is rung and the audience begins to gather. A number of alert, intelligent-looking, English-speaking young men come in together.
One of these, an earnest Christian, will interpret, sentence by sentence, the Scripture reading and the message of the speaker.
Some older men and women come next, heavy of feature and step. One is blind and feels his way to his accustomed seat.
Old women come wrapped in blankets, their faces seamed with toil and showing the hardness of heathen customs, when sickness and death, unrelieved by faith, wear the heart and waste the body.
Mothers come with bright-eyed babies tucked in their blankets, or leading children of various sizes—also some young women, beautiful and intelligent—and a few white employees from the Agency—and the workers from the Mission—until the room is nearly filled.
The meeting is opened with prayer, and a quiet fills the room as all are brought into the very presence of the loving Father.
And then follows the singing, "My faith looks up to Thee,"
"Lovingly, tenderly, Jesus is calling, calling to you and to me."
Did ever the words seem so fraught with meaning, so filled with
the yearning love of the Master?
The message that follows is one of passionate earnestness, as the missionary seeks to make clear to them the meaning of purity of life—of faith in God, of His saving, keeping power.
At its close an Indian elder, using his own soft, Indian language, pleads in prayer for the presence of the Holy Spirit to lead his people.