Methods Of Christian Work

Chapter Five: The Use Of Tracts

Comparatively few Christians realize the importance of tract work. I had been a Christian a good many years, and a minister of the Gospel several years, before it ever entered my head that tracts were of much value in Christian work. I had somehow grown up with the notion that tracts were all rubbish, and therefore I did not take the trouble to read them, and far less did I take the trouble to circulate them, but I found out that I was entirely wrong. Tract work has some great advantages over other forms of Christian work.

1. ANY PERSON CAN DO IT. We cannot all preach; we cannot all conduct meetings; but we can all select useful tracts and then hand them out to others. Of course some of us can do it better than others. Even a blind man or a mute man can do tract work. It is a line of work in which every man, woman and child can engage.

2. A TRACT ALWAYS STICKS TO THE POINT. I wish every worker did that, but how often we get to talking to some one and he is smart enough to get us off on to a side track.

3. A TRACT NEVER LOSES ITS TEMPER. Perhaps you sometimes do. I have known Christian workers, even workers of experience, who would sometimes get all stirred up, but you cannot stir up a tract. It always remains as calm as a June morning.

4. OFTENTIMES PEOPLE WHO ARE TOO PROUD TO BE TALKED WITH, WILL READ A TRACT WHEN NO ONE IS LOOKING. There is many a man who would rebuke you if you tried to speak to him about his soul, who will read a tract if you leave it on his table, or in some other place where he comes upon it accidentally, and that tract may be used for his salvation.

5. A TRACT STAYS BY ONE. You talk to a man and then he goes away, but the tract stays with him. Some years ago a man came into a mission in New York. One of the workers tried to talk with him, but he would not listen. As he was leaving, a card tract was placed in his hands which read, "If I should die tonight I would go to ______. Please fill out and sign." He put it in his pocket, went to his steamer, for he was a sailor, and slipped it into the edge of his bunk. The steamer started for Liverpool. On his voyage he met with an accident, and was laid aside in his bunk. That card stared him in the face day and night. Finally he said, "If I should die tonight I would go to hell, but I will not go there, I will go to heaven, I will take Christ right here and now." He went to Liverpool, returned to New York, went to the mission, told his story, and had the card, which was still in his pocket, filled out and signed with his name. The conversation he had had in the mission left him, but the card stayed by him.

6. TRACTS LEAD MANY TO ACCEPT CHRIST. The author of one tract ("What is it to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ?" received before his death upwards of sixteen hundred letters from people who had been led to Christ by reading it.

1. FOR THE CONVERSION OF THE UNSAVED. A tract will often succeed in winning a man to Christ where a sermon or a personal conversation has failed. There are a great many people who, if you try to talk with them, will put you off; but if you put a tract in their hands and ask God to bless it, after they go away and are alone they will read the tract and God will carry it home to their hearts by the power of the Holy Ghost. One of our students wrote me in great joy of how he had at last succeeded in winning a whole family for Christ. He had been working for that family for a long time but could not touch them. One day he left a tract with them, and God used that tract for the conversion of four or five members of the family. Another student held a cottage meeting at a home, and by mistake left his Bible there. There was a tract in the Bible. When he had gone, the woman of the house saw the Bible, picked it up, opened it, saw the tract and read it. The Spirit of God carried it home to her heart, and when he went back after the Bible she told him she wanted to find the Lord Jesus Christ. The tract had note what he could not do in personal work. I once received a letter from a man saying, "There is a man in this place whom I tried for a long time to reach but could not. One day I handed him a tract, and I think it was to the salvation of his whole family."

2. TO LEAD CHRISTIANS INTO A DEEPER AND MORE EARNEST CHRISTIAN LIFE. It is a great mistake to limit the use of tracts to winning the unsaved to Christ. A little tract on the Second Coming of Christ, once sent me in a letter, made a change in my whole life. I do not think the tract was altogether correct doctrinally, but it had in it an important truth, and it did for me just the work that needed to be done.

There is a special class of people with whom this form of ministry is particularly helpful, those who live where they do not enjoy spiritual advantages. You may know some one who is leading a very unsatisfactory life, and you long to have that person know what the Christian life really means. His pastor may not be a spiritual man, he may not know the deep things of God. It is the simplest thing in the world to slip into a letter a tract that will lead him into an entirely new Christian life.

3. TO CORRECT ERROR. This is a very necessary form of work in the day in which we live. The air is full of error. In our personal work we have not always time to lead a man out of his error, but oftentimes we can give him a tract that can do the work better than we can. If you tried to lead him out of his error by personal work, you might get into a discussion, but the tract cannot. The one in error cannot talk back to the tract. For example, take people that are in error on the question of seventh day observance. It might take some time to lead such a one out of the darkness into the light, but a tract on that subject can be secured that has been used of God to lead many out of the bondage of legalism into the glorious liberty of the Gospel of Christ.

4. TO SET CHRISTIANS TO WORK. Our churches are full of members who are doing nothing. A well chosen tract may set such to work. I know of a young man who was working in a factory in Massachusetts. He was a plain, uneducated sort of fellow, but a little tract on personal work was placed in his hands. He read it and re-read it, and said, "I am not doing what I should for Christ." He went to work among his companions in the factory, inviting them to the church, and to hear his pastor preach. Not satisfied with this, he went to doing personal work. This was not sufficient, so he went to work holding meetings himself. Finally he brought a convention to his city. Just that one plain factory man was the means of getting a great convention and blessing to that place, and all from reading that little tract. He was also instrumental in organizing a society which was greatly blessed of God. It would be possible to fill this country with literature on Christian work that would stir up the dead and sleeping professors of religion throughout the land, and send them out to work for the Lord Jesus Christ.

1. MINISTERS OF THE GOSPEL SHOULD USE THEM. Many ministers do make constant use of them in their pastoral work, leaving well chose tracts where they make their pastoral calls, handing out tracts along the line of the sermons that they preach. It is said of Rev. Edward Judson of New York, that he seldom makes a call without having in his pocket a selection of tracts adapted to almost every member of the family, and especially to the children. "At the close of the Sunday evening preaching service, he has often put some good brother in the chair, and while the meeting proceeds he goes down into the audience and gives to each person a choice leaflet, at the same time taking the opportunity to say a timely word. In this way he comes into personal touch with the whole audience, gives each stranger a cordial welcome, and leaves in his hand some message from God. At least once a year he selects some one tract that has in it the very core of the Gospel. On this he prints the notices of the services, and selecting his church as a center, he has this tract put in the hands of every person living within half a mile in each direction, regardless of creed or condition. He sometimes uses 10,000 tracts at one distribution, and finds it very fruitful in results."

2. SUNDAY SCHOOL TEACHERS. Every Sunday School teacher should be on the lookout for tracts to give to his scholars. In this way he can do much to supplement his hour's work on the Lord's Day.

3. TRAVELING MEN. Traveling men have a rare opportunity for doing tract work. They are constantly coming in contact with different men, and finding out their needs. A Christian "drummer" with a well assorted selection of tracts can accomplish immeasurable good.

4. BUSINESS MEN. Business men can use tracts to good advantage with the very men with whom they have business engagements. They can also do excellent work with their own employees. Many a business man slips well chosen tracts into many of the letters which he writes, and thus accomplishes an effective ministry for his Master.

5. SCHOOL TEACHERS. It is very difficult for school teachers in some cities and towns to talk very much with their pupils in school. Oftentimes the rules of the school board prevent it entirely, but a wise teacher can learn all about her scholars and their home surroundings, and can give them tracts just adapted to their needs.

6. HOUSEKEEPERS. Every Christian housekeeper should have a collection of well assorted tracts. She can hand these out to the servant girls, the grocery men, the market men, the butcher, to the tramps that come to the door. They can be left upon the table in the parlor and in bedrooms. Only eternity will disclose the good that is accomplished in these ways.

1. TO BEGIN A CONVERSATION. One of the difficulties in Christian work is to begin. You see a person with whom you wish to talk about the Lord Jesus Christ. The great difficulty is in starting. It is easy enough to talk after you have started, but how are you going to start a conversation naturally and easily? One of the simplest and easiest ways is by slipping a tract into the person's hand. After the tract has been read, a conversation naturally follows. I was once riding in a crowded car. I asked God for an opportunity to lead some one to Christ. I was watching for the opportunity for which I had asked, when two young ladies entered. I thought I knew one of them as the daughter of a minister. She went through the car looking for a seat, and then came back. As she came back and sat down in the seat in front of me, she bowed, and of course I knew I was right as to who she was. I took out a little bundle of tracts, and selecting one that seemed best adapted to her case, I handed it to her, having first asked God to bless it. She at once began to read and I began to pray. When she had read the tract, I asked her what she thought about it. She almost burst into tears right there in the car, and in a very few moments that minister's daughter was rejoicing in the Lord Jesus Christ as her personal Savior. As she afterwards passed out of the car, she said, "I want to thank you for what you have done for me in leading me to Christ."

2. USE A TRACT TO CLOSE A CONVERSATION. As a rule when you have finished talking with some one, you should not leave him without something definite to take home to read. If the person has accepted Christ, put some tract in his hands that will show him how to succeed in the Christian life. If the person has not accepted Christ, some other tract that is especially adapted to his need should be left with him.

3. USE TRACTS WHERE A CONVERSATION IS IMPOSSIBLE. For example, one night at the close of a tent meeting in Chicago, as I went down one of the aisles a man beckoned to me, and intimated that his wife was interested. She was in tears, and I tried to talk with her, but she stammered out in a broken way, "We don't talk English." She had not understood a word of the sermon, I suppose, but God had carried something home to her heart. They were Norwegians, and I could not find a Norwegian in the whole tent to act as interpreter, but I could put a Norwegian tract in her hand, and that could do the work. Time and time again I have met with men deeply interested about their soul's salvation, but with whom I could not deal because I did not talk the language that they understood.

One day as I came from dinner, I found a Swede waiting for me, and he said he had a man outside with whom he wished me to talk. I went outside and found an uncouth looking specimen, a Norwegian. The Swede had found him drunk in an alley and dragged him down to the Institute to talk with me. He was still full of whisky, and spit tobacco juice over me as I tried to talk with him. I found he could not talk English, and I talked English to the Swede, and the Swede talked Swedish to the Norwegian, and the Norwegian got a little bit of it. I made it as clear as I could to our Swede interpreter, and he in his turn made it as clear as he could to the Norwegian. Then I put a Norwegian tract in his hands, and that could talk to him so that he understood perfectly.

Oftentimes a conversation is impossible because of the place where you meet people. For example, you may be on the street cars and wish to speak to a man, but in many instances it would not be wise if it were possible, but you can take the man's measure and then give him a tract that will fit him. You may be able to say just a few words to him and then put the tract in his hands and ask God to bless it.

4. USE TRACTS TO SEND TO PEOPLE AT A DISTANCE. It does not cost a tract much to travel. You can send them to the ends of the earth for a few cents. Especially use them to send to people who live in out of the way places where there is no preaching. There are thousands of people living in different sections of this country where they do not hear preaching from one year's end to another. It would be impossible to send an evangelical preacher to them, but you can send a tract and it will do the preaching for you.

1. ALWAYS READ THE TRACTS YOURSELF BEFORE GIVING THEM TO OTHERS. This is very necessary. Bad tracts abound today, tracts that contain absolutely pernicious doctrine. They are being circulated free by the million, and one needs to be on his guard, lest he be doing harm rather than good in distributing tracts. Of course we cannot read all the tracts in other languages, but we can have them interpreted to us, and it is wise to do so. Besides positively bad tracts, there are many tracts that are worthless.

2. SUIT YOUR TRACT TO THE PERSON TO WHOM YOU GIVE IT. What is good for one person may not be good for another.

3. CARRY A SELECTION OF TRACTS WITH YOU. I do not say a COLLECTION, but a SELECTION. Tracts are countless in number, and a large share of them are worthless. Select the best, and arrange them for the different classes of people with whom you come in contact.

4. SEEK THE GUIDANCE OF GOD. This is of the very highest importance. If there is any place where we need wisdom from above, it is in the selection of tracts, and in their distribution after their selection.

5. SEEK GOD'S BLESSING UPON THE TRACT AFTER YOU HAVE GIVEN IT OUT. Do not merely give out the tract and there let the matter rest, but whenever you give out a tract ask God to bless it.

6. OFTENTIMES GIVE A MAN A TRACT WITH WORDS AND SENTENCES UNDERSCORED. Men are curious, and they will take particular notice of the underscoring. It is oftentimes a good thing to have a tract put up in your office. Men who come in will read it. I know a man who had a few words put upon his paper weight. A great many who came into his office saw it, and it made a deep impression upon them.

7. NEVER BE ASHAMED OF DISTRIBUTING TRACTS. Many people hand out tracts to others as if they were ashamed of what they were doing. People are not likely to read tracts if you hand them to them as if you were ashamed to do it; but if you act as though you were conferring a favor upon them, and giving them something worth reading, they will read your tract. It is often well to say to a person, "Here is a little leaflet out of which I have gotten a good deal of good. I would like to have you read it."

1. THEY ARE SCRIPTURAL. Jesus said, "Go out quickly INTO THE STREETS and lanes of the city, and bring in hither the poor, and the maimed, and the halt, and the blind." Every great preacher of the Bible was an open-air preacher. Peter was an open-air preacher, Paul was an open-air preacher, and so were Elijah, Moses and Ezra. More important than all, Jesus Christ Himself was an open-air preacher, and preached for the most part out of doors. Every great sermon recorded in the Bible was preached in the open air; the sermon on the Day of Pentecost, the Sermon on the Mount, the sermon on Mars Hill, etc. In this country we have an idea that open-air preaching is for those who cannot get any other place to speak, but across the water they look at it quite differently. Some of the most eminent preachers of Great Britain preach in the open air.

2. OPEN-AIR MEETINGS ARE PORTABLE, YOU CAN CARRY THEM AROUND. It would be very difficult to carry a church or mission building with you, but there is no difficulty about carrying an open-air meeting with you. You can get an open-air meeting where you could by no possibility get a church, mission hall or even a room. You can have open-air meetings in all parts of the city and all parts of the country.

3. OPEN-AIR MEETINGS ARE MORE ATTRACTIVE IN THE SUMMER THAN HOT, SWELTERING HALLS OR CHURCHES. When on my vacations, I used to attend a country church. It was one of the hottest, most stifling and sleepy places I ever entered. It was all but impossible to keep awake while the minister attempted to preach. The church was located in a beautiful grove where it was always cool and shady, but it seemed never to enter the minds of the people to go out of the church into the grove. Of course only a few people attended the church services. One day a visiting minister suggested that they have an open-air meeting on the front lawn of a Christian man having a summer residence near at hand. The farmers came to that meeting from miles around, in wagons, on foot and every other way. There was a splendid crowd in attendance. The country churches would do well in the summer to get out of their church building into some attractive grove near at hand.

4. OPEN-AIR MEETINGS WILL ACCOMMODATE VAST CROWDS. There are few church buildings, especially in the country, that will accommodate more than one thousand people; but people by the thousands can be accommodated by an open-air meeting. It has been my privilege to speak for several summers in a small country town with less than a thousand inhabitants. Of course the largest church building in the town would not accommodate more than five hundred people. The meetings, however, were held in the open air, and people drove to them from forty miles around, and at a single meeting we had an attendance of 15,000 people. Whitefield was driven to the fields by the action of church authorities. It was well that he was. Some of his audiences at Moorfields were said to number 60,000 people.

5. OPEN-AIR MEETINGS ARE ECONOMICAL. You neither have to pay rent nor h ire a janitor. They do not cost anything at all. God Himself furnishes the building and takes care of it. I remember that at a Christian Workers' Convention a man was continually complaining that no one would hire for him a mission hall in which to hold meetings. At last I suggested to him that he had all outdoors, and could go there and preach until some one hired him a hall. He took the suggestion and was greatly used of God. You do not need to have a cent in your pocket to hold an open-air meeting. The whole outdoors is free.

6. YOU CAN REACH MEN IN AN OPEN-AIR MEETING THAT YOU CAN REACH IN NO OTHER WAY. I can tell of instance after instance where men who have not been at church or a mission hall for years have been reached by open-air meetings. The persons I have known to be reached and converted through open-air meetings have included thieves, drunkards, gamblers, saloon-keepers, abandoned women, murderers, lawyers, doctors, theatrical people, society people, in fact pretty much every class.

7. YOU CAN REACH BACKSLIDERS AND PEOPLE WHO HAVE DRIFTED AWAY FROM THE CHURCH. One day when we were holding a meeting on a street corner in a city, a man in the crowd became interested, and one of our workers dealt with him. He said, "I am a backslider, and so is my wife, but I have made up my mind to come back to Christ." He was saved and so was his brother-in-law.

8. OPEN-AIR MEETINGS IMPRESS PEOPLE BY THEIR EARNESTNESS. How often I have heard people say, "There is something in it. See those people talking out there on the street. They do not have any collection, and they come here just because they believe what they are preaching." Remarks like this are made over and over again. Men who are utterly careless about the Gospel and Christianity have been impressed by the earnestness of men and women who go out on to the street and win souls for Christ.

9. OPEN-AIR MEETINGS BRING RECRUITS TO CHURCHES AND MISSIONS. One of the best ways to fill up an empty church is to send your workers out on the street to hold meetings before the church service is held, or better still, go yourself. When the meeting is over, you can invite people to the church (or mission). This is the divinely appointed means for reaching men that cannot be reached in any other way (Luke 14:21). All Christians should hear the words of Christ constantly ringing in their ears, "Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in hither the poor," etc.

10. OPEN-AIR MEETINGS ENABLE YOU TO REACH "M"E"N". One of the great problems of most ministers of the Gospel today is how to get hold of the MEN. The average church audience is composed very largely of women and children. One of the easiest ways to get hold of the men is to go out on the streets, where the men are. Open-air meetings are as a rule composed of an overwhelming majority of men.

11. OPEN-AIR MEETINGS ARE GOOD FOR THE HEALTH. An English preacher was told that he must die, that he had consumption. He thought he should make the most of the few months he had allotted to live, so he went out on the streets and began preaching. The open-air preaching cured his consumption, and he lived for many years, and was the founder of a great open-air society.

To put it in a single word, hold them where the people are that you wish to reach. But a few suggestions may prove helpful.

1. WHERE THE CROWDS PASS. Find the principal thoroughfare where the crowds throng. You cannot hold your meeting just at that point, as the police will not permit it, but you can hold it just a little to one side of that point, and the crowds as they pass will go to one side and listen to you.

2. HOLD THEM NEAR CROWDED TENEMENTS. In that way you can preach to the people in the tenements as well as on the street. They will throw open their windows and listen. Sometimes the audience that you do not see will be as large as the one you do see. You may be preaching to hundreds of people inside the building that you do not see at all. I knew of a poor sick woman being brought to Christ through the preaching she heard on the street. It was a hot summer night, and her window was open, and the preaching came in through the window and touched her heart and won her to Christ. It is good to have a good strong voice in open-air preaching, for then you can preach to all the tenements within three or four blocks. Mr. Sankey once sang a hymn that was carried over a mile away and converted a man that far off. I have a friend who occasionally uses in his open-air meetings a megaphone that carries his voice to an immense distance.

3. HOLD MEETINGS NEAR CIRCUSES, BASEBALL GAMES, AND OTHER PLACES WHERE THE PEOPLE CROWD. One of the most interesting meetings I ever held was just outside of a baseball ground on Sunday. The police were trying to break up the game inside by arresting the leaders. We held the meeting outside just back of the grand stand. As there was no game to see inside, the people listened to the singing and preaching of the Gospel outside. On another Sunday we drove down to Sell's circus and had the most motley audience I ever addressed. There were people present from almost every nation under heaven. The circus had advertised a "Congress of Nations," so I had provided a congress of nations for my open-air meeting. On that day I had a Dutchman, a Frenchman, a Scotchman, an Englishman, an Irishman and an American preach. We took care at the open-air meeting to invite the people to evening meeting at the mission. That night a man came who told us that he was one of the employees of the circus, and was touched that afternoon by the preaching of the Gospel, and had come to learn how to be a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. He accepted the Savior that night.

4. HOLD MEETINGS IN OR NEAR PARKS OR OTHER PUBLIC RESORTS. Almost every city has its resorts where people go on Sunday. As the people will not go to church, the church ought to go out to the people. Sometimes permission can be secured from the authorities to hold the meetings right in the parks. Wherever this is impossible they can be held near at hand. One who is now a deacon of our church spent his Sundays at Lincoln Park before he was converted; an open-air meeting was held close at hand, and there he heard the Gospel and was converted.

5. HOLD MEETINGS IN GROVES. It would be well if every country church could be persuaded to try this. Get out of the church into a grove somewhere, and you will be surprised at the number of people who will come who would not go near the church at all.

6. HOLD OPEN-AIR MEETINGS NEAR YOUR MISSIONS. If you have a mission, be sure to hold an open-air meeting near it. It is the easiest thing in the world to keep a mission full, even during the summer months, if you hold an open-air meeting in connection with it, but it is almost impossible to do so if you do not.

7. HOLD OPEN-AIR MEETINGS IN FRONT OF CHURCHES. A good many of our empty churches could be filled if we would only hold open-air meetings in front of them. Years ago, when in London, I went to hear Newman Hall preach. It looked to me like a very orderly and aristocratic church, but when I left the church after the second service, I was surprised to find an open-air meeting in full blast right in front of the church, and people gathered there in crowds from the thoroughfare.

8. BE CAREFUL ABOUT THE LITTLE DETAILS IN CONNECTION WITH THE LOCATION. On a hot day, hold the meeting on the shady side of the street. On a cool day, on the sunny side. Make it as comfortable for the audience as possible. Never compel the audience to stand with the sun shining in their eyes. Preach with the wind, and not against it. Take your own position a little above the part of the audience nearest you, upon a curbstone, chair, platform, rise in the ground, or anything that will raise your head above others so that your voice will carry.

1. GET IT THOROUGHLY UNDERSTOOD BETWEEN YOURSELF AND GOD THAT HE WANTS YOU TO DO THIS WORK, AND THAT BY HIS GRACE YOU ARE GOING TO DO IT WHATEVER IT COSTS. This is one of the most important things in starting out to do open-air work. You are bound to make a failure unless you settle this at the start. Open-air work has its discouragements, its difficulties and its almost insurmountable obstacles, and unless you start out knowing that God has called you to the work, and come what will, you will go through with it. you are sure to give it up.

2. GET PERMISSION FROM THE POWERS THAT BE TO HOLD OPEN-AIR MEETINGS. Do not get into conflict with the police if you can possibly avoid it. As a rule it is quite easy to get this permission if you go about it in a courteous and intelligent way. Find out what the laws of the city are in this regard, and then observe them. Go to the captain of the precinct and tell him that you wish to hold an open-air meeting, and let him see that you are not a disturber of the peace or a crank. Many would-be open-air preachers get into trouble from a simple lack of good sense and common decency.

3. GET A GOOD PLACE TO HOLD THE MEETING. Do not start out at random. Study your ground. You should operate like a general. We are told that the Germans studied France as a battle ground for years before the Franco- Prussian war broke out, and when the war out there were officers in the German army that knew more about France than the officers in the French army did. Lay your plan of campaign, study your battle field, pick out the best places to hold the meetings, look over the territory carefully and study it in all its bearings. There are a good many things to be considered. Do not select what would be a good place for some one to throw a big panful of dishwater upon you. These little details may appear trivial, but they need to be taken into consideration. It is unpleasant, and somewhat disconcerting, when a man is right in the midst of an interesting exhortation, to have a panful of dishwater thrown down the back of his neck.

4. GET AS LARGE A NUMBER OF RELIABLE CHRISTIAN MEN AND WOMEN TO GO WITH YOU AS YOU POSSIBLY CAN. Crowds draw crowds. There is great power in numbers. One man can go out on the street alone and hold a meeting; I have done it myself; but if I can get fifteen or twenty reliable men to go with me, I will get them every time. Please note that I have said RELIABLE Christian men and women. Do not take anybody along with you to an open-air meeting that you do not know. A man that is in the habit of making a fool of himself be sure to leave at home. He may upset your whole meeting. Do not take a man or woman with you who has an unsavory reputation. Probably some one in the crowd will know it and shout out the fact. Take only people who are of established reputation, and well balanced. Never pick up a stranger out of the crowd and ask him to speak. Some one will come along who appears to be just your sort, but if you ask him to speak you will wish you had not done so.

5. GET THE BEST MUSIC YOU CAN. Get a baby organ and a cornet if you can. Be sure to have good singing if it is possible. If you cannot have good singing, have poor singing, for even poor singing goes a good way in the open air. One of the best open-air meetings I ever attended was where two of us were forced to go out alone. Neither of us was a singer. We started with only one hearer, but a drunken man came along and began to dance to our singing, and a crowd gathered to watch him dance. When the crowd had gathered, I simply put my hand on the drunken man, and said, "Stand still for a few moments." My companion took the drunken man as a text for a temperance sermon, and when he got through I took him for a text. People began to whisper in the crowd, "I would not be in that man's shoes for anything." The man did us a good service that night. He first drew the crowd, and then furnished us with a text. The Lord turned the devil's instrument right against him that night. If you can, get a good solo singer, or even a poor solo singer will do splendid work in the open air, if he sings in the power of the Spirit. I remember a man who attempted to sing in the open air, who was really no singer at all, but God in His wonderful mercy gave him that night to sing in the power of the Spirit. People began to break down on the street, tears rolled down their cheeks, one woman was converted right there during the singing of that hymn. Although the hymn was sung in such a miserable way from a musical standpoint, the Spirit of God used it for that woman's conversion.

6. GET THE ATTENTION OF YOUR HEARERS AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. When you are preaching in a church, people will oftentimes stay even if they are not interested, but unless you get the attention of your audience at once in the open air, one of two things will happen, either your crowd will leave you or else they will begin to guy you. In the first half dozen sentences you must get the attention of your hearers. I was once holding a meeting in one of the hardest places of a city. There were saloons on three of the four corners, three breweries, and four or five Roman Catholic churches were close at hand. There was scarcely a Protestant in that part of the city. The first words I spoke were these, "You will notice the cross on the spire of yonder church." By this means I secured their attention at once, and then I talked to them about the meaning of that cross. On holding a meeting one labor day, I started out on the subject of labor. I spoke only a few moments on that subject, to lead them around to the subject of the Lord Jesus Christ. Holding a meeting one night in the midst of a hot election, near where an election parade was forming, I started out with the question, "Whom shall we elect?" The people expected a political address, but before long I got them interested in the question whether or not we should elect the Lord Jesus Christ to be the ruler over our lives.

7. GET SOME GOOD TRACTS. Always have tracts when you hold an open-air meeting. They assist in making permanent the impressions and fixing the truth. Have the workers pass around through the crowd handing out the tracts at the proper time.

8. GET WORKERS AROUND IN THE CROWD TO DO PERSONAL WORK. Returning from an open-air meeting years ago in the city of Detroit, I said to a minister who was stopping at the same hotel that we had had several conversions in the meeting. He replied by asking me if a certain man from Cleveland was not in the crowd. I replied that he was. He told me that he thought if I looked into it I would find that the conversions were largely due to that man, that while the services were going on, he had been around in the crowd doing personal work. I found that it was so.

9. GET A GOSPEL WAGON IF YOU CAN. Of this we shall have more to say when we speak of Gospel Wagon Work.

1. Don't unnecessarily antagonize your audience. I heard of a man addressing a Roman Catholic audience in the open air and pitching into the Roman Catholic Church and the Pope. That man did not have good sense. Another man attempted a prohibition discourse immediately in front of a saloon. He got a brick instead of votes.

2. DON'T GET SCARED. Let Psalm 27:1 be your motto: "The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?" There is not a particle need of being scared. You may be surrounded by a crowd of howling hoodlums, but you may be absolutely certain that you will not be hurt unless the Lord wants you to be hurt; and if the Lord wants you to be hurt, that is the best thing for you. You may be killed if the Lord sees fit to allow you to be killed, but it is a wonderful privilege to be killed for the Lord Jesus Christ. One night I was holding a meeting in one of the worst parts of Chicago. Something happened to enrage a part of the crowd that gathered around me. Friends near at hand were in fear lest I be killed, but I kept on speaking and was not even struck.

3. DON'T LOSE YOUR TEMPER. Whatever happens, never lose your temper. You ought never to get angry under any circumstances, but it is especially foolish to do so when you are holding an open-air meeting. You will doubtless have many temptations to lose your temper, but never do it. It is very hard to hit a man when he is serene, and if you preserve your serenity, the chances are that you will escape unscathed. Even if a tough strikes you, he cannot do so a second time if you remain calm. Serenity is one of the best safeguards.

4. DON'T LET YOUR MEETING BE BROKEN UP. No matter what happens, hold your ground if you can, and you generally can. One night I was holding a meeting in a square in one of the most desperate parts of a large city. The steps of an adjacent saloon were crowded with men, many of whom were half drunk. A man came along on a load of hay, went into the saloon and fired himself up with strong drink. Then he attempted to drive right down upon the crowd in the middle of the square, in which there were many women and children. Some man stopped his horses, and the infuriated man came down from the load of hay and the howling mob swept down from the steps of the saloon. Somehow or other the drunken driver got a rough handling in the mob, but not one of our number was struck. Two policemen in citizens' clothes happened to be passing by and stopped the riot. I said a few words more, and then formed our little party into a procession, behind which the crowd fell in, and we marched down to the mission singing.

5. DON'T FIGHT. Never fight under any circumstances. Even if they almost pound the life out of you, refuse to fight back.

6. DON'T BE DULL. Dullness will kill an open-air meeting at once. Prosiness will drive the whole audience away. In order to avoid being dull, do not preach long sermons. Use a great many striking illustrations. Keep wide awake yourself, and you will keep the audience awake. Be energetic in your manner. Talk so people can hear you. Don't preach, but simply talk to people.

7. DON'T BE SOFT. One of these nice, namby-pamby, sentimental sort of fellows in an open-air meeting the crowd cannot and will not stand. The temptation to throw a brick or a rotten apple at him is perfectly irresistible, and one can hardly blame the crowd.

8. DON'T READ A SERMON. Whatever may be said in defense of reading essays in the pulpit, it will never do in the open air. It is possible to have no notes whatever. If you cannot talk long without notes, so much the better; you can talk as long as you ought to. If you read, you will talk longer than you ought to.

9. DON'T USE CANT. Use language that people are acquainted with, but do not use vulgar language. Some people think it is necessary to use slang, but slang is never admissible. There is language that is popular and easily understood by the people that is purest Anglo-Saxon.

10. DON'T TALK TOO LONG. You may have a number of talks in an open-air meeting, but do not have any of them over ten or fifteen minutes long. As a rule do not have them as long as that. Of course there are exceptions to this, when a great crowd is gathered to hear some person in the open air. Under such circumstances I have heard a sermon an hour long that held the interest of the people, but this is not true in the ordinary open-air meeting.

1. CONSECRATED MEN AND WOMEN. None but consecrated men and women will ever succeed in open-air meetings. If you cannot get such, you might as well give up holding open-air meetings.

2. DEPEND UPON GOD. There is nothing that will teach one his dependence upon God more quickly and more thoroughly than holding open-air meetings. You never know what is going to happen. You cannot lay plans that you can always follow in an open-air meeting. You never know what moment some one will come along and ask some troublesome question. You do not know what unforeseen event is going to occur. All you can do is to depend upon God, but that is perfectly sufficient.

3. LOYALTY TO THE WORD OF GOD. It is the man who is absolutely loyal to God's Word, and who is familiar with it and constantly uses it, who succeeds in the open air. God often takes a text that is quoted, and uses it for the salvation of some hearer. Arguments and illustrations are forgotten, but the text sticks and converts.

4. BE FREQUENTLY FILLED ANEW WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT. If any man needs to take advantage of the privilege of fresh infillings of the Holy Spirit, it is the open-air worker. Spiritual power is the great secret of success in this, as in all other Christian work.

1. YOU CAN REACH PEOPLE BY THE TENT YOU CAN REACH BY NO OTHER METHOD. People that you cannot get inside of a church or mission hall, people that will not even listen to the preaching from a Gospel wagon, people that you could not step up to and talk with personally, will come into a tent. The tent itself awakens curiosity. It looks like a circus. Time and again I have preached in a tent where six-sevenths of the audience were curiosity seekers; and not only did we get them into the tent, but many of them were won to Christ. It is stated in the official report of a large and successful tent work that 95 per cent of the audience was composed of thieves, murderers, drunkards and abandoned women. The other 5 per cent were respectable people. A great many of the abandoned classes were converted. People who tried to pull the tent down, threw stones at the workers, cut ropes, and stood outside and tried to prevent people going in, before the meetings had been going on very long were on their knees calling on God for pardon. One of these had recently been released from prison where he had served fourteen years as a safe breaker. He became a very bright convert.

2. THEY ARE PORTABLE. Wherever you put a church up, there it must stay; you cannot easily move it. But if you put a tent up in one neighborhood, if it proves to be a poor neighborhood you can move it to another, or when that neighborhood is worked out you can move it to a new one, at a small cost.

3. IT IS INEXPENSIVE. A new tent can be purchased for anywhere from $150 to $350, or you can get them second hand, but this does not pay. The life of a tent is about three years. You have to pay extra for the seats, but these can be made out of lumber that can afterwards be used for other purposes. For many reasons canvas benches are better.

4. TENT WORK TURNS THE SEASON OF THE YEAR WHICH IS REGARDED THE POOREST FOR EVANGELISTIC EFFORT INTO THE VERY BEST. Ask almost any pastor what he regards the best season for evangelistic work, and he will tell you the second week in January, or Lent. If you ask him what is the worst season, he will tell you July and August, but with a tent July and August prove to be the best season in the year for evangelistic work. This has been demonstrated in Chicago, Philadelphia, New York, Boston and in many smaller cities, and in country towns. There can be little doubt that the number of conversions in tents in the summer far exceeds the number of conversions in evangelistic services in churches in the winter.
II. How To Conduct Tent Meetings

1. HAVE THE RIGHT SORT OF A MAN IN CHARGE OF THE TENT. The most important thing in any tent work is the man who has the superintendency of the tent. If you have the right man the rest will take care of itself, and if you have the wrong man, nothing that you can do will make a success of the work. What sort of a man is needed? A man who is perfectly fearless, who can stand up when ruffians are stoning the tent, and not be the least bit ruffled if a stone comes through the tent and strikes him on the back of the head; a man who can stand the boys shooting at him with tacks, and sharp double-pointed tacks striking him in the face; a man who can stand perfectly unmoved with a lot of roughs moving about and seeking to disturb the meeting in every possible way; a man who trusts God, and believes that God is going to take care of him.

In the next place he should be a man who has handled men; a man who can go into a miked crowd of various denominations, and hold the conflicting elements in the hollow of his hand so that they will behave; a man who has control of his own temper as well as control of the crowd; a man who is never ruffled, just stands there perfectly serene with sunshine in his face but with a grip like iron upon the audience; a man who can preach a plain direct Gospel sermon; a man who can hold the attention of people who are not in the habit of paying attention to ministers when they preach. To put it in a word, you want a man filled with the Holy Ghost, who preaches the Gospel in the power of the Spirit, who if he has time to prepare will prepare, and if he does not have time will stand up without a word to say, but just look to God to give him the message, and as soon as he gets it will give it to the people in the power of the Holy Ghost.

2. HAVE THE RIGHT SORT OF A TENT. The larger the tent is, the better, other things being equal. It is a great mistake to get too small a tent; they are unserviceable. If enough people do not come at first to fill your tent, you can so arrange the seats in the middle of the tent that it is not noticed that there are large vacant spaces on the sides. If the tent is small people will think it is a small thing, and your attendance will be small. A big tent makes a large impression upon the neighborhood.

3. GET THE RIGHT PLACE TO LOCATE YOUR TENT. A good place is one where the crowds gather, upon some great thoroughfare where they are sweeping by the hundreds and by thousands. Tents should often be taken into rough neighborhoods. Some one may ask, "Is it safe there?" The safest place on earth is where the Lord takes you. The safest place for Moses was out in the river among the crocodiles, when God was taking care of him in the little ark. You can put a tent anywhere with safety if God leads you to put it there. We located a tent once where there were two murders during the first week within a block of the tent. One of the men was in the tent a half an hour before he was stabbed. He was urged to take the Lord Jesus Christ that night, but he said, "No, I cannot do it tonight, I will come Sunday night." Within half an hour he was found dying in a lot, where he had been stabbed.

Always select a dry spot. Be careful not to get into a place where you are going to be flooded out. If you are not on your guard at this point, you will oftentimes see what seems to be a beautiful place for a tent, but the first thunder storm that comes up the tent will be useless.

4. CHOOSE THE RIGHT SORT OF A MAN TO BE JANITOR. The man who acts as janitor is next in importance to the man who superintends the tent. He must be fearless; he must be exceedingly wise and extremely patient. If your janitor loses his temper, you are going to get into trouble. If you have a Christian man who is wise and firm and gentle and loving and fearless, you are all right.

5. BE DETERMINED THAT YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE YOUR OWN WAY IN YOUR TENT. Set about that in the very first meeting. If you let the crowd get the upper hand of you once, they will have it for all time; but if you show them the very first time that you are going to have your way, you will have it. Be very pleasant, but be as immovable as a rock. If it becomes necessary, take a man by the collar and help him out of the tent, but be sure you do it with a genial, winning smile. This often proves a means of grace to this kind of people. Do not turn a man out if you can help it, but turn him out rather than have your meeting broken up or seriously disturbed. Drunken men may be allowed some liberties because they know no better, but have it distinctly understood that they cannot go beyond a certain point.

6. GIVE A GOOD DEAL OF THOUGHT TO THE SINGING. Have the very best singing you can get. Have as big a choir as you can possibly gather together, but allow no one in the choir who is not saved. It is well to have an orchestra if you can get it.

7. HAVE THE VERY BEST PREACHING THAT CAN BE SECURED. But what is good preaching for a church is not always good preaching for a tent. A tent preacher should be a man who can hold the attention of plain people. Many a man who can preach to great audiences in a church is an utter failure in a tent.

8. ALWAYS HAVE AN AFTER MEETING AND DO PERSONAL WORK. The purpose of tent meetings is not to keep men out of the saloons; they do keep men out of the saloons, but the purpose of tent meetings is to bring men to Christ. A man once said to me, "This is magnificent. Here are almost a thousand people here who are not Christians. It is magnificent if not a soul of them was converted, for it keeps them out of the saloons." But if all we do for men is to keep them out of the saloon for an hour or two, not much is accomplished. What tent work is carried on for is to lead men to a personal acceptance of the Lord Jesus Christ. The best way to accomplish this is by definite, personal, hand-to-hand work in the after meeting.

9. HAVE CHILDREN'S MEETINGS IN CONNECTION WITH YOUR TENT WORK. The neighborhoods where tents are ordinarily put up are thronging with children. It would be easy to fill the tent with children, but it is best not to allow them in the evening service unless they come with their parents. If they are allowed in the evening service, they will crowd out the grown people, but the children must not be neglected, therefore have special services for the children in the tent in the afternoon. Tell them they cannot be admitted to the evening service unless they bring their parents with them. In this way a great many parents will be induced to come to the evening meetings for the sake of the children. The results that are accomplished among children in tent meetings are astonishing. These children come largely from utterly unchristian homes, but many children even of Jewish parents and of drunken parents are won to Christ. A little boy came to one of our tents one afternoon. He heard the story of the Cross, accepted Christ, and went straight home. That night he brought with him his father and brother, and they were both converted, and then he brought two other brothers and two sisters, and these four were converted. His mother who was a backslider was brought back to the Lord. There were also two older daughters who led lives of sin. The whole family had been converted except these two abandoned girls. One of the workers started out with the determination to bring those two girls down to the meeting, and if possible get them to accept Christ. Some of the other workers stayed at home and prayed. This worker pled with the girls to come down to the meeting, and at last persuaded them to come. They got there very late, and just as they entered, Major Whittle was talking about wayward girls, and before the meeting was over these girls were rejoicing in Christ. Three boys, four girls, father and mother, brought to Christ through the conversion of a little boy.

10. ENCOURAGE THE MOTHERS TO COME AND BRING THEIR BABES. If they can't bring their babies they can't come at all. One very successful tent worker promised a rattle to every baby brought a certain night. The scheme took, and mothers and babies and baby carriages came pouring in that night. They had a wonderful meeting, and that man gained the love of the whole community. Another night he had a watermelon meeting, and that was a great success.

We have already spoken about putting up tents in crowded parts of our great cities, but that is not the only place.

1. IN THE PORTION OF A CITY WERE YOU WISH TO ORGANIZE A CHURCH. You may not be quite sure whether it would be wise to start a church in that locality. Set up a tent and make a test of it. In one locality in Chicago where a tent was set up, a Methodist church and Baptist church were organized, a Congregational mission revived, and one other mission started.

2. IN COUNTRY TOWNS. One of the solutions of the summer problem in country churches is for the church to get a tent and hold its services in that during the summer months. Many will go to it who will not go to the church. Oftentimes it is well for all the churches of a country town to combine in a summer tent work.

3. RELIGIOUSLY DESTITUTE SECTIONS OF THE COUNTRY. There are many places in our country where there are many people but no church for miles. Tents can be set up in these remote parts of townships, and a splendid work done. It would be well for country pastors to take tents out on to the borders of their parishes and do Gospel work there.

4. SUMMER RESORTS. We think that if people go out to spend the summer anywhere, we cannot reach them, but there is no place where you can reach them better, provided you go at it wisely. Set up a tent near where the great vacation throngs congregate. People at these resorts do not know how to spend Sunday; they do not like to go to the country churches, but they will go to a tent.

The Christian worker should always watch for new methods and new means of presenting the gospel. The message is changeless, but we must not be blind to the changes in our civilization which offer the possibility of fresh approach with our message.

1. TRAILER EVANGELISM. Not many can afford to purchase and maintain a trailer, but through such a vehicle, trailer camps, work camps, migratory groups, and otherwise inaccessible places and persons can be reached. Much of the work by means of a trailer is of the colportage type.

2. AUTO EVANGELISM. You have seen political caravans. Why not a caravan of cars to a given town for a great open-air meeting?

3. TRUCK EVANGELISM. The business man who owns a clean, open truck can make a contribution to the cause by loaning the truck for a chain of open-air meetings. The singers and speakers can use the truck as a platform. Such services should be bright and brief, and Gospels and good tracts should be left in the hands of the interested. Also, an invitation to attend services at some permanent meeting place should be extended.

There are several mechanical aids to open-air meetings which should be used where it is possible to purchase them.

1. PUBLIC ADDRESS SYSTEM. Nearly everyone has some measure of acquaintance with this help to speech and hearing. It carries the speaker's voice to all within sight, without strain on ear or throat. This device can be tuned up or down, and should never be so loud as to be annoying. Music can be played on a phonograph and carried through the loud speaker. Such a system can be purchased at a reasonable price.

An auto equipped with such a device can tour a city and announce special meetings. Some cities have ordinances against sound trucks, etc. Always inform yourself as to the law.

2. SOUND FILMS. We all recognize the value of the visual in attracting and holding attention. Biblical pictures on inexpensive films can be effectively used for children and grownups, for, remember, no one is even to old to be interested in pictures.

Machines which have films and sound synchronized are also most effective. While these are somewhat expensive to produce, they are not expensive to use. They always hold attention, if the material is good and is well presented.

In all of the things mentioned in this chapter there are a few things to be always kept in mind. The kind of evangelism presented here is what could be named rapid evangelism. In ordinary parlance it might be called "hit and run." It is an attempt to reach people who are on the move, and who rarely or never enter a church.

1. THIS EVANGELISM MUST BE OF A CONCENTRATED NATURE. The message should be short. Not more than two verses of a song should be used. The entire program should be planned. The technique used may be similar to that of radio broadcasting. Note how the broadcasters do it. They are trying to hold attention.

2. THIS DEMANDS THE BEST WE HAVE. It is always unfortunate when a Christian service in the open air has a cornetist who blows two sour notes a minute. In the days of the forty-niners the sign in the boom town saloon said, "Don't shoot the piano player. He's doing the best he can." but that isn't good enough; certainly not for the Lord's work. Because of the radio, nowadays people have an improved taste. As a Christian worker yours should always be an improved service. Let us give our Lord the best we have, and strive to make that better.

3. ALL EQUIPMENT SHOULD BE KEPT IN GOOD CONDITION. Cars and trucks should be clean and fresh. Public address systems should be smooth and clear. Pictures must be replaced when worn or faded.

Workers, too, should be neat. Women in particular should give careful thought to their dress and general appearance, that they may bear consistent testimony for their Lord. For the most part men are more effective in work of this type.

4. ALL MEETINGS OF THIS KIND SHOULD BE THOUGHTFULLY PLANNED AND PRAYERFULLY CARRIED THROUGH. Many people fail in services of this variety because they depend on their natural "gift of gab," rather than on the Holy Spirit and real preparation. A radio program may sound casual and spontaneous, but it is in reality carefully planned and rehearsed in every detail. You are not putting on a show, so you are not going to rehearse your message, but do not leave things to chance. As in all service for the Lord, work and prayer are essential to success.

What is Colportage work? By Colportage work we mean the distribution of religious literature from house to house. As a rule, the literature thus distributed is sold, sometimes for its full value, sometimes at less than cost.

1. PEOPLE WHO FAIL IN OTHER LINES OF CHRISTIAN WORK CAN SUCCEED IN COLPORTAGE WORK. There are many who wish to work for the Lord, and feel they have a definite call to give their whole time to that work, who are unable to preach to edification, who are incompetent to run a mission, who would not even succeed as house to house visitors. What can they do? They can do Colportage work and oftentimes meet with great success in it. I have in mind one man who felt a call to Christian work, but it soon became evident that he had no gifts whatever that would warrant his preparation for the ministry. He was exceedingly slow and tiresome in speech, he lacked fire, and apparently lacked energy. He was induced to take up the Colportage work, and he became one of the most successful Colporters I even knew, not only making a very generous living by the work, but also reaching many homes and touching people who could be reached in no other way. Another man who could not even speak to edification in prayer meeting, who was exceedingly limited in all directions, sold during a single month 1,200 volumes and cleared about $54 over and above expenses; the same person cleared about $400 in ten months. Going from town to town, he was the means of doing untold good. Superannuated ministers who have reached the point where their services are no longer in demand for churches, do not need to give up the Lord's work. They can take up Colportage work, and perhaps be more useful than they were in their preaching days.

Ministers and other Christian workers who are broken down physically, and unable to bear the strain of regular work, can take up Colportage work with great advantage to their health, and accomplish very much for the Master.

2. COLPORTAGE WORK REACHES NEGLECTED DISTRICTS. All over the land there are stretches of country so sparsely settled that it would be impossible to maintain religious services, yet in these thinly settled districts taken together, there are thousands upon thousands of souls that need to hear the Gospel. Oftentimes they can be reached by Colportage work better than in any other way. One solution of the religious problem in the country is to be found in Colportage work.

3. COLPORTAGE WORK IS SELF-SUPPORTING. The Colporter needs to have no missionary society back of him. He can go out and sell his books and support himself, and if he has any gift in this direction, make a comfortable living. Take for example the books of the Colportage Division of the Moody Press. They contain some of the very best evangelical literature of the day, books adapted to the unsaved to lead them to Christ, books on the deeper Christian life, books on Christian work. They are written by some of the best known and most gifted authors, men like F. B. Meyer, Campbell Morgan, Andrew Murray, D. L. Moody, Major D. W. Whittle, Charles Spurgeon, and others. These books can be secured in quantities from the Moody Press.

4. COLPORTAGE WORK CONVERTS SINNERS AND BUILDS UP CHRISTIANS. All over our land today there are many people who have been led to Christ, and many Christians who have been led into a deeper knowledge of Christ, through the work of Colporters.

5. ITS RESULTS ARE PERMANENT AND EVER WIDENING. A preacher goes away, but a book stays. One man reads a book and is blessed by it and hands it to another, and he to still another. A single book may be read by scores of persons.

6. IT OPENS DOORS TO OTHER WORK. Many a man begins Christian work as a humble Colporter, but as he goes from house to house and village to village with the little books that carry the knowledge of Jesus Christ, he soon begins to preach the Word, and is quite likely in time to receive a call to be a pastor or an assistant pastor.

7. COLPORTAGE WORK IS A SPLENDID PREPARATION FOR OTHER CHRISTIAN WORK. The Colporter gets right into the home, gets acquainted with all kinds of men, has to learn through necessity the modes of convincing men. There is perhaps no better preparation for many phases of ministerial work than the work of a Colporter.

1. GET A FEW BOOKS TO BEGIN WITH, AND THEN BEGIN. A man once came to me out of money and out of employment. I bought for him four Colportage books, and sent him out. He came back in less than half an hour. He then took his share of the money and bought himself other books, and thus the work widened. The way to begin is to begin.

2. VISIT EVERY HOUSE AND STORE AND SALOON. When one undertakes to do Colportage work in any given district, as a rule it is well to visit every house and store and saloon in the district. Of course, if one continues to work the same district, he will soon learn what houses can be visited again and again, and what places to avoid. Experience shows that many even in saloons will buy the books, and sometimes the saloon-keepers themselves, and no one can measure the good thus done.

3. LEAVE THE BOOKS IN ENVELOPES FOR EXAMINATION. Some have found it very useful to have envelopes that will contain the books, and leave the books in every house on a street, giving notice that they will be called for afterward, and if the people wish to keep the books, they can leave the money in the envelope; if not, return the books. Opportunities for conversation are often thus opened. One prominent Christian worker, wishing to experiment on the work for himself, went down one of the leading streets of a western city, leaving a book in every house. As he came back, he found interesting opportunities for speaking with people whom the ordinary missionary could not reach. Even where the books are not purchased, they will often be read and so the truth will get a hearing.

4. "Churches can employ a church visitor without expense to themselves, by equipping the church visitor with Colportage books which he can sell, and thus meet his expenses." Of course the visitor must have the public endorsement of the pastor of the church, and in this way he gets an entrance for his work. This plan has been adopted with great success in some quarters.

5. GET PASTORS TO RECOMMEND THE BOOKS. When the Colporter visits a new village, he should look up the pastors of the place and present to each of them a copy of one of his best books. In this way the interest of the pastors will be enlisted, and if they will speak a word of endorsement in the prayer meeting or some other place, it will be a great help. Many churches have the Colportage books on sale in the vestibule.

6. "Get pastors to preach on certain lines, and then go around and sell the books that bear upon the subject in which the pastor has awakened an interest." For example, if the pastor speaks upon the baptism with the Holy Spirit, go through the community with a book like McNeil's "Spirit-Filled Life".

7. ATTENDING RELIGIOUS CONVENTIONS. A great work can be done by Colporters attending religious conventions, and there disposing of books along the lines of the subjects treated in the conventions.

1. MANY PEOPLE ARE LIKELY TO BE REACHED BY SERVICES IN THEATERS, CIRCUSES, AND OTHER PLACES OF ENTERTAINMENT, WHO ARE NOT LIKELY TO BE REACHED ELSEWHERE. Actors, actresses, and the other employees of theaters seldom attend services at churches; it is difficult also to find them in their homes, but they can be reached on their own ground. At the very first service in Forepaugh's circus tent in Chicago during the World's Fair, an actor was brought under deep conviction of sin and converted to Christ. In services held in the city of Minneapolis I had frequent opportunity of speaking personally with the actors and other employees of the places. But not only can the employees be reached, but also the frequenters. We held services one New Year's afternoon in the Theater Comique in the city of Minneapolis. A few days afterward I received an anonymous letter from an Iowa city. The writer said that he had been present at the theater service that day. It was the first time he had been in a religious service for years, although in the old country he had been a local preacher. In the two or three weeks preceding that service, he had squandered over $300 in that theater, but the word spoken that afternoon had brought him back to Christ. The man afterwards returned to Minneapolis and made himself known, and subsequently became a deacon and one of the most faithful workers in our church.

2. ANOTHER ADVANTAGE OF SERVICES IN A THEATER IS THEIR NOVELTY AND ATTRACTIVENESS. The interest especially of young men is awakened by seeing a service advertised in a theater. They go out of curiosity, and an opportunity is thus offered of bringing them to Christ. Everything about the place attracts them; they like the surroundings; they are off their guard and the Gospel gets an entrance into their hearts.

3. MANY ARE CONVERTED. It has been the writer's privilege to conduct services every Sunday afternoon for several winters in the theaters of one of our American cities, and during the World's Fair to conduct theatrical services for many weeks, seven nights in the week. In both places most encouraging results followed. In the services in Chicago many were converted every night. At a recent theater service for men only in a southern city, about one hundred and fifty men professed conversion.

1. THE FIRST IMPORTANT MATTER IN THE CONDUCT OF THEATER SERVICES IS THE CHOICE OF THE THEATER. What sort of a theater to choose depends upon the purpose for which the meetings are held. If the aim is to get hold of those who have sunk into the deepest depth of sin, of course a theater of the lower order is preferable. On the other hand, there are objections to such a theater. It is not a good place to take people, but you are not likely to take anybody there except those who frequent it already, or those who go for a definitely Christian purpose. Nevertheless great care should be exercised in the choice of workers for such a place. Girls and boys should not be taken to such a place unless they already frequent it. A young man approached a prominent business man in the city of Minneapolis who was handing out dodgers on the street, inviting people to the Theater Comique for a Gospel service. The young man said, "Do you know what kind of a place the Theater Comique is?" The business man replied that he had not lived in Minneapolis twenty years not to know. The young man asked again, "Do you think that such a place is a proper place to hold a religious service?" The reply was made, "When you go fishing, where do you go?" The young man smiled and answered, "Oh, I see, I go where the fish are." A good many fish were caught in that pool, though it was a cesspool.

If the aim is to reach a better class of people, of course one must engage a theater of the higher order. During the World's Fair the Haymarket Theater and Columbia Theater in Chicago were packed to overflowing each Sunday morning, to hear the Gospel preached by leading preachers of this country and Europe, and there were a great many conversions.

Sometimes the size of the theater will be a determining factor. Twenty thousand people could be crowded into the Forepaugh tent, and were crowded into it each morning that services were held there; this in spite of the fact that the heat was almost insufferable. The circus men were so astonished at the vast audiences that came out to religious services, that they approached Mr. Moody to see if he would not furnish a speaker to go around with their show and hold services every Sunday, they offering to pay all the expenses.

It is best to select, if possible, a theater that is in use rather than one that is abandoned. If the theater has been given up, the probability is that people did not go to it, and they will not be likely to go to a religious service in that place. I knew of a case of what appeared to be a very desirable theater being purchased to hold religious services in. It seemed to be in a good locality and well adapted to the work. The theater, however, had been abandoned by the theatrical people, and it was never possible to get the people to attend religious services there in any great numbers.

2. THE SECOND POINT OF IMPORTANCE IS SECURING THE THEATER FOR THE SERVICES. Oftentimes this is not a very difficult matter. Theatrical people are frequently very glad to have their building used for religious services. I once went to the proprietor of a very vile den to see if I could secure his place for Gospel meetings. To my surprise, he received me very cordially, and said certainly we could have the place, and he only charged a nominal rent. Going the next year to another theater in the same city, only a theater of a much higher order -- a very attractive and respectable place -- I inquired of the manager if I could secure his theater for Sunday afternoon services. He replied, "Certainly." When I asked him what he would charge for it, he asked me if there was any money in it. I told him none at all, that we were going to spend money and not take it in. "In that case," he said, "you can have the theater for nothing." He stood to this agreement, furnished light and heat, ushers and everything, and would take absolutely nothing for it. Even the stage manager was in attendance every Sunday to see that everything was in perfect order. As a rule it is far better to rent a theater than to buy it. If you buy it, it ceases to be a theater and becomes your church, and the very people you wish to get hold of are no longer attracted.

3. EXERCISE GREAT CARE ABOUT THE MUSIC. Provide just as large a choir as possible. Secure the very best leader possible; the best leader is a man with a good large voice, a great deal of enthusiasm and ability to get people to sing, who is filled with the Holy Ghost, and knows how to sing to save. In addition to a good leader and a large choir, it is well to have male choruses, duets, quartets and solos. A band is sometimes helpful, but not at all a necessity. A good cornetist is of great help, but the singing attracts as much as instrumental music, and does far greater execution.

4. SECURE THE BEST POSSIBLE SPEAKERS. No man is a good speaker for a theatrical service who does not preach the straight Gospel, and preach it in a way to attract and hold the public. If there is one person in the community who has a peculiar gift in this direction, it is best usually to have him do the major part of the speaking week after week. It will do to throw in another speaker occasionally, and good may be accomplished by it, but one speaker who knows the audience and the work, and follows one sermon up by another, will accomplish the most definite and most satisfactory results.

5. BE SURE THAT THE SERVICES ARE THOROUGHLY EVANGELICAL, AND EMPHATICALLY EVANGELISTIC. Very little good comes from holding meetings in theaters and similar places unless these meetings are emphatically Gospel meetings. Preaching along ethical and social and philanthropic lines accomplishes very little good. If, however, the meetings are thoroughly evangelical and evangelistic, the ethical and social results will necessarily follow. Drunkards will be converted and give up their drinking, gamblers will give up their gambling, impure people will forsake their impurity, politicians will be brought to Christ and thus their politics will be reformed. I was talking to a converted politician last night. The night he came to the meeting where he was converted (during the World's Fair) he had been out with a number of his political friends. They had been planning for his election to an important office here in Chicago. At the service he heard nothing about political reform; he heard the simple Gospel, a Gospel that would save the slave of drink. He accepted Christ that night. The result has been that his whole life, personal, domestic, commercial and political, has been renovated. A sermon on political reform would not have touched him at all.

6. ADVERTISE THE MEETINGS LARGELY AND WIDELY. Large billboards such as the theatrical people use for their own advertisements are perhaps the best of any, but the newspapers should also be used to the utmost. Newspapers are generally willing to do a great deal of free advertising for services of this character. Men, with invitations to the meetings should be placed upon all the street corners for blocks around. Transparencies, carried through the streets by men, attract the attention and bring many to the services.

7. HAVE A THOROUGHLY DRILLED CORPS OF USHERS. Sometimes the theaters provide their own ushers, and for many reasons it is well to use them. They know the building, understand just how to seat people, and furthermore they need to hear the Gospel themselves and are likely to be converted.

8. HAVE WISE AND WELL-TRAINED PERSONAL WORKERS SCATTERED THROUGH THE AUDIENCE. This is of the very highest importance, even more important in the theater than it is in a church. No speaker can take note of what is happening in every part of a theater. Many men and women will be touched by the sermon, but only touched. If gotten hold of right then and there by a watchful and wise worker, and the effect of the sermon followed up, those persons will be converted, whereas if they are allowed to go out, the impression will soon die away and they may be lost forever. These workers should be carefully trained, as to exactly where to sit, and what to do during the service, and at the close of the service.

9. HAVE AFTER-MEETINGS. This is of the highest importance. For details regarding aftermeetings, see chapter on "Aftermeetings."

10. INVITE THE AUDIENCE TO THE CHURCHES. There is a prevalent opinion among the masses of the unchurched that they are not welcome at the churches. We should do everything in our power to disabuse them of this false notion. The theater service affords a splendid opportunity for doing it. It is well to have the ministers themselves extend the invitation. In this way a permanence is given to the work. The church is the only thing that goes on continually. Missions, theater services, tent services, come and go, but the church was established by Christ and perpetually continues. A work that does not lead the people ultimately into the churches and get them connected therewith, seldom results in any permanent good. It is well to have printed invitations from the churches to distribute among the audience. These invitations should be gotten up in an attractive form so that the people will be glad to take them home and keep them.