A new name

by Grace Livingston Hill

“We’re late!” he said anxiously, and there was a strained look about his eyes.

“The bell is still tolling,” she replied. “We’ll get there before the Doxology. You look tired. Did you have a pleasant Convention?”

“It was wonderful!” he said, and then realized that he was not thinking of the Convention at all, but of his own experience. It gave him comfort that in the midst of the perplexities that seemed pressing him on every side he could still thrill to the thought of that experience. It was not just imagination. It was real. It had stayed with him over night! It was his! Whatever came he would have this always, this sense of forgiveness and redemption from the blackness of darkness!

He escorted Mrs. Summers to her seat, as he had been doing ever since his advent in Marlborough, and after he had settled himself, he realized that perhaps he ought to have inquired what was wanted of him, and where he ought to be when needed. Then he remembered that the minister had said he need do nothing but come forward when his name was called, so he settled back once more and gave attention to the thought of that letter at home in his bureau drawer, and what he ought to do about it. All through the opening hymn and prayer he was thinking and praying, “Lord, My Lord, My new Lord, show me what to do next!”

Through the anthem and the scripture reading, and collection, he kept on with the same prayer. He roused to the consciousness that the collection was being taken without his aid, and without any apparent need of him, and decided that the minister had not had need of him after all. Or perhaps there was to be a circular or something passed around at the close. That was maybe what he had meant by “letter,” probably a letter from the pastor to the people, a sort of circular.

Then all at once an innovation took place, quite out of the routine of service with which he had come to be familiar since he had been in Marlborough. A white-haired man named McCracken, whose name he had heard spoken with the title of “elder,” though he had never understood what it meant, came forward and began to read names. He had been too much absorbed in his own thoughts to have heard what the minister said beforehand about it. But as the names were read he sat up and gave attention. This likely was where he was supposed to come in. He noticed that the people got up and came forward as their names were called, and he wondered what they were supposed to be going to do. He would just watch the others. Perhaps they were to pass those “letters” around, whatever they were, and probably somebody would tell him which aisle they wanted him to take. He would just have to feel his way this once more, as he had been doing all these weeks, and get away with the situation, but he resolved that not another day should pass before this sort of thing should be ended.

But as the names went on and the people responded there began to be a strange assortment down there in front of the pulpit. There were young men and maidens, old men, and actually children. Some twenty-five or thirty quite young people came forward, one little boy only ten years old came down the aisle on crutches, with a smiling face and a light in his eyes. Murray wondered why they selected a lame boy to pass things, and such a little fellow! And if they were going to have children do it, why didn’t they have them all children? It would be much more uniform. And there were some women, too. Queer! But they did a great many strange things in this church. Probably there would be some logical explanation of this also when he came to understand it.

“And from the First Presbyterian Church of Westervelt, Ohio, Mr. Allan Murray—”

Murray arose with a strange look around the church, a kind of sweeping glance, as if he were in search of somebody. Somehow it seemed to him that perhaps while he sat there the real Allan Murray had entered and might be coming down the aisle, but as his glance came back to the pulpit, Doctor Harrison nodded to his questioning look, and seemed to beckon him, and he found himself walking down the aisle and standing with the rest. He did not know what he was about to do, but he had a strange serenity concerning it. He was not going of his own volition. It was as if he were being led. He thought of Saul with scales on his eyes, being led into the street called Straight by his soldiers and companions, and his spirit waited for what was about to happen to him.

The minister came to the front of the platform and looked down upon them with his pleasant smile. It came to Murray that he stood there to represent God. That was a strange feeling. He had never thought about a preacher in that way before. He had had very little ever to do with ministers. And then the minister spoke, in his strong, kind, grave voice: