The Old Helmet, Volume I

by Susan Warner

The house was full and still. The beginning of the service again was the singing; here richer and fuller voiced than it had been in the barn. Somebody else made the prayers; to her sorrow; but then Mr. Rhys rose, and her eye and ear were all for him. She threw back her veil now. She was quite willing that he should see her; quite willing that if he had any message of help or warning for her in the course of his sermon, he should deliver it. He saw her, she knew, immediately. She rather fancied that he saw everybody.

It was to be a missionary sermon, Eleanor had understood; but she thought it was a very strange one. The text was, "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's; and to God the things that are God's."

The question was, "What are the Lord's things?"

Mr. Rhys seemed to be only talking to the people, as his bright eye went round the house and he went on to answer this question. Or rather to suggest answers.

Jacob's offering of devotion and gratitude was a tenth part of his possessions. "And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father's house in peace; then shall the Lord be my God: and this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God's house; and of all that thou shalt give me, I will surely give the tenth unto thee."

Mr. Rhys announced this. He did not comment upon it at all. He went on to say, that the commandment given by Moses appointed the same offering.

"And all the tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land, or of the fruit of the tree, is the Lord's: it is holy unto the Lord. And if a man will at all redeem ought of his tithes, he shall add thereto the fifth part thereof. And concerning the tithe of the herd, or of the flock, even of whatsoever passeth under the rod, the tenth shall be holy unto the Lord. He shall not search whether it be good or bad, neither shall he change it; and if he change it at all, then both it and the change thereof shall be holy; it shall not be redeemed."

So that it appeared, that the least the Lord would receive as a due offering to him from his people, was a fair and full tenth part of all they possessed. This was required, from those that were only nominally his people. How about those that render to him heart-service?

David's declaration, when laying up provision for the building of the temple, was that all was the Lord's. "Who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able to offer so willingly after this sort? for all things come of thee, and of thine own have we given thee… O Lord our God, all this store that we have prepared to build thee an house for thy holy name cometh of thine hand, and is all thine own." And God himself, in the fiftieth psalm, claims to be the one sole owner and proprietor, when he says, "Every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills."

But some people may think, that is a sort of natural and providential right, which the Creator exercises over the works of his hands. Come a little closer.