Religious meeting

“ But since it has become the custom to throw open the meetings for remark and exhortation, there has been a jubilee among the religious bores who wander around pestering the churches. We have two or three outsiders who come about once in six weeks into our prayer-meeting; and if they can get a chance to speak, they damage all the interest. They talk long and loud in proportion as they have nothing to say. ”

“ We had a wonderful display of the spirit of God among us, and we found it good to be there. There is nothing too hard for the Lord to do. I committed the meeting into the hands of the elder, who afterwards invited me to preach in the meeting house. He had said he did not believe that ever a soul was converted under the preaching of a woman—but while I was laboring in his place, conviction seized a woman, who fell to the floor crying for mercy. This meeting held till 12 or 1 o’clock. O how precious is the sound of Jesus’ name! ”

“ A monthly meeting is usually composed of several particular congregations, situated within a convenient distance from each other. Its business is to provide for the subsistence of the poor, and for the education of their offspring; to judge of the sincerity and fitness of persons appearing to be convinced of the religious principles of the society, and desiring to be admitted into membership ”

“ The most cheering of closing incidents was found in the prayer meeting. We have regretted the lack of a decided religious influence—it has been the one failure of the year. In the last meeting we were not left without evidence of the Spirit’s work. Two young men confessed their trust in Christ and determination to be his avowed followers. Another young man, whose voice has been silent for years, and who has seldom attended meetings either at school or church, asked prayers for himself in a manly way that spoke well for his expressed desire to resume his place in the ranks of Christian workers. ”

“ Delegates from the different congregations shall meet from time to time, to consult the general interest. At every meeting for religious worship, collections shall be made for the poor, and the promulgation of the gospel among the Heathen. ”

“ Sometimes many resort to the same place. Preceding any public meeting held either for religious or festive purposes, or the assembling of a counsel, they uniformly retire to their respective places of private worship, and solicit the counsel and protection of the Great Spirit. ”

“ Let us consider the way in which these great forces get to work. I will take the meetings of the Church as my illustration. I am not one who says that the only kind of Friends’ meeting is a meeting for worship. I believe that there are three or four types of Friends’ meetings, in all of which we may have personal responsibility and group fellowship and the spiritual power and guidance of Jesus Christ. ”

“ We have reflections with regard to the faith of the people, and the fervency of the Saints in their faith in the Gospel when our meetings are thinly attended, as they are to-day. Some may think the brethren and sisters are backsliding and growing cold, when they do not attend meeting. It may sometimes be just as good and profitable to stay at home as to come to meeting. ”

“ Revival meetings, however they may be laughed at by the more refined and fastidious of church people, have had the effect in late years of attracting a great many thousands of people toward religious life. ”

“ And when the meeting is over they will not get their hats and see how quick they can get out of the church, but will begin to shake hands with one another, and there will be liberty there. A good many go to the prayer-meeting out of a mere cold sense of duty. ”

“ Every man, and every woman, too, found a tongue. We broke up into little knots. A busy hum of many voices replaced the dead silence. The "social meeting" commenced when the "prayer-meeting" ended. This, I think, is a fair portraiture of our prayer-meetings at Wheathedge as they were during our late pastor's presence with us. ”

“ The religious world will regard the acts of your conference as a noble illustration of the true spirit of a Christian ministry, whose benign influence can never be more consistently exerted than when vindicating the cause of the poor and destitute. ”

“ The manifestation of our common participation in each other's gifts cannot be fully given at such meetings, if the whole meeting is, necessarily, conducted by one individual. This mode of meeting does not, however, take off from those who have the gifts of teaching or exhortation the responsibility of edifying the church as opportunity may be offered. ”

“ As we have seen that whatever the primitive churches did by the approval of the apostles, they did by divine authority, now, as Paul approved their meeting on the first day of the week, it is as high authority as could be required for the practice of meeting to worship on the first day of every week. ”

“ I exhort every Bishop and presiding Elder in this city as well as throughout the country to lay this matter to heart as one subject requiring their special attention. Not to make it a hobby to the exclusion of everything else, so as to disgust the people, but in the true spirit of the Gospel seek to bring this matter home to the hearts and understandings of the people of their respective wards and settlements. Feel after those who may be stupid and ignorant, who do not come to meeting, and do not receive the spirit of this Conference. ”

“ To-day our quarterly meeting convened, and it was signally owned by the holy Head. In and over the first meeting was a sweet solemnity, which lost none of its sweetness after separation to transact the weighty business of the Church, which to me never seemed more weighty. I was mercifully helped again to spread the important prospect before the Church, which received its full and cordial unity, and many living testimonials were given forth to the power and goodness of Him [77] whose ways are not as our ways. ”

“ Their minds become so dark that they cannot see the true riches. If any of you feel that there is no life in your meetings, as I occasionally hear some of the brethren say, then it becomes your duty to go and instil life into that meeting, and do your part to produce an increase of the Spirit and power of God in the meetings in your locality. If there is a fast meeting, or prayer meeting, why not somebody in that district go filled with the spirit and power of God, and assist to encourage, instruct, comfort and edify the Saints? ”

“ It is a blessing to have the privilege of meeting together in our general Conference, where the Authorities of the Church can assemble from different parts of the Territory, and of the earth, to learn the law of God, to transact business pertaining to His Church and kingdom, and to build up and establish righteousness on the earth. ”

“ It affords me great pleasure to welcome you to our first annual meeting held in the extension of The Mother Church. I shall not attempt to speak of the deep significance of this momentous occasion. I realize that only as infinite good unfolds in each individual consciousness can we begin to comprehend, even in small degree, how great is the work that has been inaugurated by our beloved Leader, how faithful is her allegiance to God, how untiring are her efforts, and how successful she is in the performance of her daily tasks. ”

“ The prayer-meeting ought to be the place of expressed heed and expected blessing—the place of expressed weakness and expected power—the place where God's people assemble with one accord, to take hold of the very throne of God, to get into the very treasury of heaven, and draw thence all we want for ourselves, for our households, for the Whole Church of God, and for the vineyard of Christ. ”

“ In our incipient movements every member was a preacher, if not publicly, privately, and every preacher was at work, as opportunity opened the way, in private, the social circle, the prayer-meeting, the established and regular meeting on the Lord’s day for the commemoration of the suffering of Jesus, anywhere and everywhere, as a sense of propriety dictated on all occasions. ”

“ They are building a meeting place in the midst of them and there is a monthly and general meeting set up which will be of great service in those parts in keeping up the gospel order and government of Christ Jesus, of the increase of which there is no end, that they who are faithful may see that all who profess the holy Truth live in the pure religion, and walk as becometh the gospel. ”

“ And such a person or persons should be men whose duty it shall be to stay until the Conference is over, attending every meeting, and paying the strictest attention to all instructions given and to all Church business transacted. ”

“ These are the things which cast a withering influence over our prayer-meetings, robbing them of their freshness, their interest, and their value. Those who really know what prayer is—who feel its value, and are conscious of their need of it, attend the prayer-meeting in order to pray, not to hear orations, lectures, and expositions from men on their knees. If they want lectures, they can attend at the lecture-hall or the preaching-room; but when they go to the prayer-meeting, it is to pray. ”

“ And thus it undoubtedly often is in those congregations where the word of God is most faithfully dispensed, notwithstanding all that ministers can say in their clearest explications and most searching applications of the doctrines and rules of God’s word to the souls of their hearers, in their meetings one with another. But in the day of judgment they shall have another sort of meeting; then the secrets of every heart shall be made manifest, and every man’s state shall be perfectly known: 1 Cor. ”

“ Comparatively few are regularly in these mission enterprises. For those at home there is the quiet hour and prayer meetings, a gathering in the interests of purity or temperance--enough to employ the time to the early supper hour. After that comes the last public meeting of the day in the chapel, which for some time has been conducted by our Society of Christian Endeavor. The day is a full one, with large opportunities for personal growth and usefulness.
From a recent visit, I am able to write more fully of one of the meetings of the Young Men's Christian Association. ”

“ As we have met in the capacity of a General Conference, we shall expect to hear instructions from the Elders pertaining to the building up of the kingdom of God on the earth This is our calling, this is the labor devolving upon us, and it should occupy our attention day by day from morning until evening and from week to week; in fact, we have no other calling or business, and if we are humble and faithful, God will strengthen us and increase our ability and give us power sufficient to accomplish the tasks devolving upon us in the performance of His work. ”

“ It is not to a religious festival that Deborah and Barak have called the tribes. It is to serious and dangerous duty. Yet the call of duty should come with more power than any invitation even to spiritual enjoyment. The great religious gathering has its use, its charm. We know the attraction of the crowded convocation in which Christian hope and enthusiasm are re-kindled by stirring words and striking instances, faith rising high as it views the wide mission of gospel truth and hears from eloquent lips the story of a modern day of Pentecost. ”

“ They shall not meet them to hear about an absent Christ, an unseen Lord and future Judge; but to appear before that Judge, and as being set together in the presence of that supreme Lord, in his immense glory and awful majesty, whom they have heard so often of in their meetings together on earth.
(4) The meeting, at the last day, of ministers, and the people that have been under their care, will not be attended by any one with a careless, heedless heart. ”

“ It is proposed that all religions taught and practiced throughout the British Empire shall be represented at the conference, including the Christians, Muhammadans, Buddhists, Brahma Somaj, Theosophists and others, and that each one in turn shall have at its disposal a day or part of a day for a meeting to expound its principles and deal with its organization and objects. ”