Herald of Holiness Volume 54 Number 30 (1965)
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OF HOLY TESTIMONY THE SCRIPTURES make very clear the he departed, and began to publish in privilege and power and the necessity Decapolis how great things Jesus had of verbal testimony on the part of God’s done for him: and all men did marvel” children. (Mark 5:19-20). Of course, a holy life is indispensable. On the Day of Pentecost the promise To fail at this point is to neutralize the was, “But ye shall receive power, after testimony. We must be holy in all man that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: ner of conversation and living; but a and ye shall be witnesses unto me both holy life, according to the Scriptures, is in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and not enough. The redeemed of the Lord in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part must say so. Verbal testimony to both of the earth” (Acts 1:8). the saving and sanctifying grace of God In Romans 10:10 the apostle very must accompany and complement a holy pointedly states the necessity of verbal life. testimony. “For with the heart man be- Scriptural illustrations are abundant lieveth unto righteousness; and with the even in the Old Testament. David, the mouth confession is made unto salva sweet singer of Israel, said: “The spirit tion.” of the Lord spake by me, and his word In the building of strong Christian was in my tongue” (II Samuel 23:1-2). character the faith of the heart and the And again, “Then was our mouth confession of the mouth are like Siamese filled with laughter, and our tongue twins; they must both live or both die with singing: then said they among the heathen, The Lord hath done great things for them. The Lord hath done great things for us; whereof we are glad” General (Psalms 126:2-3). The Psalmist’s invitation was, “Come Superintendent and hear, all ye that fear God, and I Powers will declare what he hath done for my soul. I cried unto him with my mouth, and he was extolled with my tongue” (Psalms 66:16-17). together. The outward conduct can This same truth is taught everywhere never be a substitute for the verbal tes in the New Testament. It is stated in timony, for it cannot report the spiritual Matthew 10:32-33 and again in Mark work wrought in the heart. This verbal 8:38. And on one occasion Christ in a testimony scripturally given does make direct exhortation said: “Howbeit Jesus high profession, but it attributes nothing suffered him not, hut saith unto him, Go to self, and gives all the glory to home to thy friends, and tell them how Christ. Happy, victorious, verbal testi great things the Lord hath done for thee, mony backed up by a holy life is God’s and hath had compassion on thee. And method of reaching a godless generation. A HERALD PERSONAL-EXPERIENCE FEATURE THANK A By JAMES BARTZ, Pastor, Lander, Wyoming On a good horse—Montana ranch days. RODEO—dust—ex saved because a group of Nazarenes held out in citement—act ion— prayer and faithful visitation in our behalf. It —and through all was glorious and I felt called—to what I did not of it—ego! I loved know. it! Wild sport for I inquired of God in prayer, and that very night rugged men, and He sent an angel, who sat on the foot of my bed. self! My name over His light was so dazzling I could not look directly the speaker system, all eyes on bull—and clown. upon Him. He told me I was to preach the gospel. Everyone cheers the clown!! My name—watching My only regret now is that, unlike Paul, I was not me! The old Jim Bartz! true to that heavenly vision. Due to circumstances The statement has been made many times, “A and my own folly, I backslid, and was in that state long way from an arena to the pulpit.” One of for some time, fighting the call to preach. The my former contesting friends asked, “When did you Voice came again. see the light?” My answer, “One night in my sleep, an angel” . but I ’m getting ahead of myself. There was the Voice. It seems now as if there The Cover . always had been. It came to me once when I was The Mackinac Bridge, built at a cost of $100 just a boy on a farm driving a team of horses. Again million, is a five-mile span which connects when I was a teen-ager employed in a riding acad Michigan’s upper peninsula with the mainland. emy in Illinois; a ranch in Montana; armed ser The bridge is the third longest suspension bridge in the world. In addition to tieing the vices basic training in Kentucky; service in Eng state together, the bridge also links the work land, France, Germany, and Austria. of the Church of the Nazarene on the Michigan District, which is composed of the western part The Voice was recurrent in good times and bad, of the mainland and the eastern half of the in peacetime or on the battlefield. Thank You, upper peninsula. The Michigan District has 105 Lord—for the Voice. He was with me in an air active churches and more than 7,000 members. The Sunday school enrollment is more than plane and when I was in the deepest mines in 16,000. The district during the past year raised Butte, Montana. (When one is running he will go approximately $1.4 million. Dr. Fred J. Hawk anywhere!) I ’m so glad for the truth of Psalms is the district superintendent. 139! I came in contact with the Church of the Naza- Volume 54, Number 30 SEPTEM BER 15, 1965 Whole Number 2786 rene after my return from World War II. My fian HERALD OF HOLINESS: W. T. Purkiser, Editor in Chief; Elden Rawlings, Managing Editor; Velma I. Knight, Office Editor; B ill Lakey, Staff A rtist. cee attended our Billings, Montana, church with Contributing Editors: Hardy C. Powers, G. B. Williamson, Samuel Young, Hugh C. Benner, V. H. Lewis, George Coulter, General Superintendents, Church her mother. I went along with her once before we of the Nazarene. Unsolicited manuscripts w ill not be returned unless postage accompanies the material. Opinions expressed in signed articles are those of were married and they seemed like a friendly, sensi the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position of the Church of the Nazarene. Published every Wednesday, by the NAZARENE ble people. (I had been warned in advance to ex PUBLISHING HOUSE, M. A. Lunn, Manager, 2923 Troost Ave., Kansas City, Missouri. Subscription price, $3.00 per year, in advance. Second-class postage pect the unordinary from them.) paid at Kansas City, Missouri. Address all correspondence concerning subscrip After marriage, we moved to Sidney, where I was tions to: Nazarene Publishing House, P.O. Box 527, Kansas City, Mo. 64141. CHANGE OF ADDRESS: Send us your new address, including " Z IP '' code, as well employed by the Montana Livestock Commission as the old address, and enclose a label from a recent copy. Printed in U .S.A. PHOTO CRED ITS: Cover, Michigan Tourist Council, Lansing, Mich.; page 15, as an inspector of cattle brands. Here I first got bottom, Jack and Bill Levy, Homestead, F la .; page 16, bottom, Dave Lawlor. SEPTEM BER 15, 1965 • (623) 3 After numerous jobs, each a different kind of work in which I grew increasingly dissatisfied, and after having returned to rodeo, 1 was reclaimed un der the anointed ministry of my good friend and then pastor, Mendal Collins. After some time the LOYALTY urgency of the (till to the ministry returned and I promised God, if He would give me a sign that He could still use me, I'd try to prepare myself for IN THE DAYS OF fitting service. He gave me such a sign in the form of souls at the altar when I preached in our Butte church soon after. I hadn’t finished high school (it didn't seem too MR. M. important during the war years) , but Rev. A. L. McQuay, my wonderful district superintendent, told me I could go to Northwest Na/arene College and encouraged me to write for admittance. It is all By Evangelist PAUL MARTIN a wonderful dream from there. College with little money and a wife and four children, despite the fact of no high school diploma. MR. M. IN TRIG U ES ME. And I like him. Ziba, Dedicated, understanding professors. The help of that intrepid self-made farmer, got away with the the Holy Spirit. The encouragement of Christian burros, so Mephibosheth had no way to join David friends. And the Voice! Our needs were many in retreat before Absalom. He couldn’t march; he but always God saw to it that necessities were was lame in both feet. And to add to his problem, supplied and finances stretched so as to be ade Ziba, whose idea of truthfulness was based on ex quate. I finished the academic requirements for pediency, gave David a funny answ'er about Mr. M. ordination, and the district superintendent gave But in all of this confusion and disappointment, me a church. God saw me through a two-year pas Mr. M. found a way to show' the invader, Absalom, torate there and into the fifth year of my present and the weak-hearted who remained, on whose side tenure. Through four years as district N.Y.P.S.