“The dying woman joined feebly, with an ecstatic smile on her wan face and soon passed away. Before her death she had started a subscription in Angoon to build a new church. Sam and his brothers took up this work, and a beautiful little building called ‘The Frances Johnson Memorial Church’ was erected, almost entirely by the Indians.”[24]
CHAPTER X
Hymns of Youth
The questioning attitude of youth is impelled by a desire for deeper reality. Some of their words and ways may scandalize the conventional, but back of it all we find eager sincerity and animated purposefulness to make life count for more. We need to show the patience of confidence towards skeptical young people. We must encourage them to work out their problems not by holding up danger signals, but by magnifying the ways of sure deliverance. We are not wedded to methods but are inspired by motives. So long as these latter are right we might well disagree about how they are to be expressed.
An interesting sidelight on the essential loyalty of young people was recently given when, at a summer institute attended exclusively by them, a popular vote was taken of the best ten hymns. The following were named: “Holy, Holy, Holy;” “Nearer, My God, to Thee;” “Rock of Ages;” “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross;” “Abide With Me;” “Sweet Hour of Prayer;” “Jesus, Lover of My Soul;” “O Love, That Wilt Not Let Me Go;” “Just As I Am;” “Lead Kindly Light.”
This is certainly not the choice of erratic radicals, but of rational conservatives who desire to retain what is best in the past while going forward with characteristic adventuresomeness to new fields of activity and of achievement.
The new program of religious education is an attempt more satisfactorily to meet the needs of children and adolescents. Previous efforts had their limitations but all who grew up under the conditions of the former generation will appreciate this testimony from Sir Harry Lauder in Roamin’ in the Gloamin’ about
The Influence of the Sunday School
“I forget many of the hymns we sang at the Band of Hope, but such favorites as ‘Shall We Gather at the River?’, ‘Throw Out the Life Line,’ and similar haunting airs stand out in my memory. I loved every note of them and yelled them out most lustily. The old Scottish psalm tunes we occasionally sang at the Band of Hope, and also at the Sunday School I attended, likewise made an extraordinary appeal to me. ‘All People That On Earth Do Dwell,’ to the tune of the ‘Old Hundred;’ ‘O, God of Bethel by Whose Hand’ to the tune of ‘St. Kilda,’ were among my favorites. The last mentioned melody is in a most unusual minor key. It was written by a young Scottish musician named Bloomfield, who died early in life and whose body, I have been told, is lying in an ancient cemetery in Aberdeen.”[25]
These words recall an experience of Captain John Lauder in France, which led him to declare he was