The great problem of the times Author:Edward Smith Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. 01S(E BY OKE. " Yc shall be gathered one by one."—Isaiah xxvii. 12 li The clouds of circumstance unite ; The winds of love together roll; They... more » meet; there bursts a sudden light, And consecrates—a soul ! " NO one individualises so much as does God Himself. He looks at the world of men as being made up, not of masses, but of units. We judge that He has distinct reasons for the special creation and constitution of each soul, and that with each soul.He deals as with no other. His great "plan" for saving men is matched in ingenuity by His separate scheme for restoring each member of the family of man. Undoubtedly, according as Christian workers imitate their great Master in individualising, so will be the amount of good wrought. All spiritual harvestings consist really of gleanings of results, soul by soul. The Church, perhaps, never depended so greatly as she does now on the attention paid to the units. If the last century was an age especially of preaching for the promotion of revivals, this ought to be an age in which private believers shall distinguish themselves by lovingly fastening on to men one by one. If we take care of the ones, the myriads will take care of themselves. Whatever else is remembered or instituted, this must not be forgotten nor neglected. This essay is purposely placed in order prior to those on organisation and united work. The organising faculty is useful oaly as it teaches us how to benefit by the individual labours of thesaints. Methods of Evangelism will be permanently successful just so far as they interest godly persons in the ones. Great evangelists will fulfil their life-work only as they encourage their converts to concentrate love and influence on separate lives. Says one famous Mission-worker to his personal friend, " Be...« less