In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of shaping the confidence of our children in us. He shares a story told by a theologian about a father who promised his son a knife before leaving for work. The father gets caught up in his busy day and forgets about the promise, but the son eagerly waits for him at home. The speaker highlights the significance of family worship and the impact it can have on children's faith. He also mentions the decline of traditional practices like gathering around the piano to learn hymns.

Rest late to eat the bread of toil, for so he giveth unto his beloved's sleep. Lo, children are a heritage of Jehovah, and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows in the hand of a mighty man, so are the children of youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of it. They shall not be put to shame when they speak with their enemies in the gate. Blessed is every one that fearest Jehovah, that walketh in his ways. For thou shalt eat the labour of thy hand, happy shalt thou be, and it shall be well with thee. Thy wife shall be as a fruitful vine in the innermost parts of thy house. Thy children, like olive trunks round about thy table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed that fearest Jehovah. Jehovah bless thee out of Zion, and see thou the goods of Jerusalem all the days of thy life. Yea, see thou thy children's children. Peace be upon Israel. So ends the reading from the word of God. My friends, if you have examined this little syllabus of our subject, doubtless you will have noticed that for these evenings together, we do not have any general feast. We have attempted to select a number of subjects that we felt were subjects of vital importance. Subjects worthy of our reconsideration together in such a series as this. And you notice the particular subject for this evening is the Christian hope. And I would base our thinking upon words found in the epistle to the Ephesians. And the third chapter and verses 14 and 15. And in those verses you will find these words. The Father, from whom every family on earth is named. The Father, from whom every family on earth is named. My friends, I think it was Henry Drummond, who once said that sacred and happy home are the surest guarantee for the moral progress of a nation. And surely Henry Drummond never uttered fewer words. And consequently the importance of our subject this evening, the Christian hope. Now my friends, when I first got down to work in my study at home, to prepare this particular message, the first thing I did, just as a matter of interest, was to pull down from my shelf the best English dictionary I possess and look up the word hope. I found it quite interesting. To begin with, I discovered that that word hope is older than historic Christianity. In its origins it is a Teutonic word. And in varying forms it is found in all Teutonic languages. I was interested to discover that in Old and in Middle English the word home was used of a village or of a town as a collection of dwellings. Of course we realize that that use of the word home is now obsolete. Today the word home is used of a dwelling place, the sixth residence of a family. Of course I do realize that with our deplorable habits of carelessness in the use of words, we do sometimes hear the word home used of a hotel, in which I'll say it's tranches, or of a boarding house, in which individuals not related by ties of blood more permanently reside. Nevertheless, the word hope in its true sense certainly conveys a very different idea. Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam, be it ever so humble, there's no place like home. A charm from the sky seems to hallow us there, which thought through the world is met with elsewhere. Home, home, sweet, sweet home. There's no place like home. An exile from home, splendor dazzles in vain. Oh, give me my lowly thatch cottage again. The birds singing daily that came at my call, give me then and the peace of mind dearer than all. Home, home, sweet, sweet home. There's no place like home. Certainly when we sing that, we do not usually think of an hotel nor of a boarding house. Now, my friends, the peculiar sanctity of our idea of hope is due to biblical influence. To the Hebrew people, the idea of hope was a very sacred idea. That fact is clearly evident as we read their sacred literature, the Old Testament. Indeed, the idea of home is still a very sacred idea among Jewish people. You do not often read of Jewish people passing through the divorce court. I remember a number of years ago now, I was speaking at the retreat for Methodist ministers in the great state of Texas, and I remember chatting with one of those Methodist ministers who told me that for a period of two years, he had been doing a piece of special work in connection with the juvenile delinquency court in the city of Dallas. And he told me that during those two years, some 2,000 young people had passed through his house. He went on to tell me that the first thing they did always was to write a letter attempting to contact the parents. And he said, you would be astonished and amazed how many parents never even troubled to answer our letters. And then he went on to tell me that during those two years, with 2,000 young people passing through his hands, only one was a Jewish lad. And he said, we wrote the ordinary letter to the father who lived in Chicago. He said not merely did that father harm us, but he got on the next plane from Chicago to Dallas and was very angry with us that we merely had written him a letter and did not wire or long-distance telephone collect. Oh the idea of home is a very sacred one among the Jewish people. Now the idea was further ennobled by Christ and his church. In that Roman world into which Jesus came, the home had fallen into utter contempt and shame. As all the great historians revealed, that Christ redeemed the idea and wherever his messengers went, the sacredness of the idea of home was reborn. Now my friend, in the passage from which our text is taken, the apostle Paul is thinking of the Christian church. He is thinking of the church as a family. And his argument is the souls to whom he was writing form part of that one great family. And then in the 15th verse, in an aside, the apostle declares that the family idea is a divine one. It results from the fatherhood of God. And then as you may remember in our text itself, the apostle declares every family on earth is named from the father. There is a great preacher of a little more than a generation ago now in England, who once uttered these words, great human institutions have heavenly originals. And if you would study them, you must study them in God. Those words are certainly worthy of a good deal of careful thought. Great human institutions have heavenly originals. And if you would study them, you must study them in God. My friend, certainly that is true of the family. If you would know God's ideal for the family, you must study it in God. And so let me at once suggest three lines of thinking along which I would leave you this evening. First, I want to try and get down to basic things as we consider the divine ideal for the family. And then secondly, I want us to consider the character of a fitting home for such a family. And in our last moments, I want us to think about the present situation in these United States. But first, I want to get down to basic things as we try and consider the divine ideal for the family. What is God's ideal for the family? It is suggested in the words of our text, the Father from whom every family on earth is named. Great human institutions have heavenly originals. And if you would study them, you must study them in God. As I've said, that certainly is true of the family. And so let me begin by asking you just to bear in mind three great basic facts concerning God. And I start with that stupendous declaration in the Bible concerning God. God is love. I attempt no exposition of that great declaration. I merely ask you to keep it in mind. Then secondly, I remind you that the Bible reveals this God, who is thus finally declared to be love. The Bible reveals this God in a duality of nature. All of us realize of course that the Bible reveals God in his fatherhood. Like as a father pities his children, so Jehovah pities them that fear him. So yes, that the Bible also reveals God in his motherhood. As one whom his mother comforted, so will I comfort you, saith Jehovah. Now the Bible reveals God in his fatherhood as true, frank, and yet frank forever cares. The Bible reveals God in his motherhood as great, essential comfort, and yet essential comfort forever strengthens. But the third fact, the Bible reveals God as Trinity in unity. The duality is completed in the Son. So that when John wrote the prologue to his gospel narrative, he wrote, we beheld his glory. The glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. That the Son was the revealer of motherhood's grace and fatherhood's truth. Now my friends, of course all these things are eternal in God, without beginning, without ending. Fatherhood, motherhood, sonship. And we never really begin to understand God's ideals for fatherhood, and motherhood, and childhood on earth, until we perceive that these things are all intended of God, to be the image and the likeness of that which is essential and eternal in God. The family is named from the Father, not the father of the family alone, but the father, and mother, and children. The family is named from the Father. These in their interrelationship, father, mother, children, these in their interrelationship with each other, are named a family because they are intended to be an expression in those relationships of truth concerning God. Would the God that young people contemplating holy matrimony could just realize that ideally, God's ideal for the family is that it should be a sort of miniature picture of God on earth, a bit of heaven on earth. Very well, the family being named from God has its final function the expression, as I've said, of truth concerning God in the world. And so I begin where I began before. The essence of the fact of God is love. Very well, the family, or the foundation of the family, which is intended to be a miniature picture of God, the foundation of the family is love. And I but remind you, according to the biblical revelation, love is at its very heart light, its very strength is holiness. The foundation of the family is love. The one condition of marriage is love, love growing out of and created by a fundamental unity between a man and a woman, like unto the fundamental unity existing as within the mystery of the God. The foundation of the family, love. And then the law of the family is the rule within the family of father and mother. All truth and all grace. The special emphasis of truth being manifested in the rule of the father in the home. The special emphasis of grace being manifested in the rule of the mother in the home. Oh, young people can only see it. What a gracious, what a loving, what a wise provision it is of God that children should obey their parents. It relieves the little one of the burden of the responsibility of making decisions. The law of the family is the rule within the family of father and mother, all truth and all grace. And then the purpose and aim of the family should be the perfecting of the divine expression, the perfecting, shall I say, of the miniature picture in parenthood. The perfecting of the divine expression in childhood. In the home the father should lift his eyes to God that he may know what he himself should be. The same thing is true of mother. If being recognized, then father and mother in fellowship with God have been given the sacred and wonderful function of bringing into the world and training children through whom God can express himself in the world. Children who look to God for funds that they may know how to live. This and nothing less than this is God's ideal for the family. Every family, an expression of truth concerning God in the world. Every home a bit of heaven on earth. Well very well now let's think for a while concerning the character of a fitting home for such a family. Now my friends of course the home for the fulfillment of this family ideal must first and fundamentally be spiritual. The material is altogether secondary to the making of a true home. Price has nothing whatever to do with it. Wealth has nothing to do with it. Just a small home, just a little old copy can show at once that it is inhabited by a big soul and a true family. And on the other hand the possession of wealth may simply mean that it enables its possessor to write to write vulgarity with a big capital V. And so I begin not with the material but the spiritual. And here again I'm going to fall back upon the most familiar words. The spiritual secrets that make a true home are faith, hope, love, faith. Faith is mutual confidence. Now my friends whatever shapes that undermines the home every time. And once it is shaped then it is very seldom if ever restored. Therefore if you would know the perfection of home life, let me give you two simple rules. First never give cause for suspicion. And secondly never for a split fraction of a second allow yourself to entertain suspicion. And that applies equally to husbands and wives, parents and children. Concerning the former husbands and wives I think I may need not say a single word. A heart, who is it that says a heart once poisoned by suspicion has no longer room for love. Therefore as fathers and mothers, husbands and wives, if you would know the perfection of home life there must be mutual confidence. Never give cause for suspicion. Never allow yourself to entertain suspicion. Concerning the latter, parents and children, I would simply say to you who are parents, hang on to your children's confidence in you by never violating. Oh if you and I could only see the ultimate issues we would much rather lose our right arm or our right eye than shake the confidence of our children in us. Makes me think of a of a lovely story I came across just recently. I was rereading a little book by my dad, Dr. Campbell Morgan. Matter of fact it was just a popular lecture he used to deliver in the old days called The Music of Life. But rereading it I came across this story. A story told my dad by old Dr. A.T. Pearson, who was a great theologian and a great biblical scholar about the turn of the century. And he was telling my dad at the time he was pastor of a very busy city church and leaving home one morning early to go down to the city. Just as he was leaving his little boy, little chap named Delavan, came running up to his dad and he said, dad I want a knife, I want a knife. And old Dr. Pearson looked at the lad he said, son you shall have a knife, you shall have one. Well he went down to the city and had a very very busy day at the church. And at the end of the day he got an evening paper and jumped on the trolley car to go home. And was sitting in the trolley car, immersed you might say in the evening paper, he suddenly remembered that night. And he pulled the cord and stopped the trolley and had to walk back I think maybe a block or a couple of blocks to a good hardware store. And he thought a good boy's knife, just put it in his pocket. Got back on the next streetcar, again got immersed in his evening paper and forgot all about the knife. But when he got home he had his own latch key and he was just fumbling with his keys just going to open the door when little Delavan came running. Never said a word but he felt his dad's pocket. And old Dr. Pearson said to my dad, in certain senses Morgan I was never more thankful to God for anything than that the knife was in the pocket. Simple story but illustrating a great truth. You hang on to your children's confidence in you by never violating. The very first element of the spiritual atmosphere of a true home must be faith, mutual confidence between husband and wife and parents and children. And then of course in the home there must be hope. Now if we stop and think about a minute of course hope is holy of the future. What a man has, why does he yet hope for it? Consequently that in the home which is of hope is the onlooking and the outlook. The hope of the parents is pre-eminently that of the future of the child and the children. All but three men and women have dreamed as they stood by the side of the cot in which their firstborn lay asleep. Indeed as the years run on I sometimes wonder what hope some of us have, save the hope centered in our children. And what a grand and glorious thing it is in the life of men and women when hope is re-lit for them every morning as they listen to the laughter of the children in the home. Now the hope of the children lies in their potentialities, their possibilities. Let this be cultivated in the home. Talk of the future with your children. We dream with them about the coming day. And then together with them move towards the realization of those dreams. Now my friends wherever there is such faith and hope inevitably there will be joy. And then finally and fundamentally home is perfected by love. How shall I describe home? I like to go to that very familiar passage. I dare say many here could recite it without missing a word. But tonight I just want you to hear the words with no thought, say the thought of home. At home love suffereth long and is kind. Love envious not. Love wanteth not itself, is not puffed up, does not behave itself unseemly. At home love seeketh not its own, is not provoked, taketh not account of either, rejoiceth not in unrighteousness, but rejoiceth in the truth. At home love beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. At home love never fails. Oh I'm not going to spoil those words by any attempted exposition. I'm merely suggesting that we test our homes by them. And I say it reverently, thank God there are two homes in which the great ideal is fulfilled. Happy is the family whose home though large or small is a temple of the spirit, whose members seeking God need not go far away, but find him in the midst where faith and hope and love are all in daily course incarnate in domestic way. Home, the fit dwelling place for the family founded upon love, for the expression of truth concerning God must be the abode of faith and hope and love, and where those are to be found inevitably there will be joy. Now my friends when we pass from spiritual matters to the material, of course I do realize a great deal might be said concerning the location and the structure of a true home. But I think I'll have to leave that to Christian architects. Again a great deal might be said concerning the furnishing of a true home. At that point I'll merely sling out one hint, possibly to you young marriage couples, a hint that has come out of my own experience, and it is this. When it comes to the furnishing of a true home, a few good strong articles of furniture are worth a thousand gym cracks, cheap showy stuff for the building of character. Don't clapper off that home of yours with a lot of gym cracks, and then when the children romp around and smash them to bits, get angry with them. At any rate during those early years when they're growing up involved, a few good strong articles of furniture go towards the making of good strong character. And then a great deal might be said concerning beauty in a true home. In so far as possible let there be loveliness, beautiful things for those little eyes to rest upon. But as they grow up they will be getting a beautiful idea of the universe. Well I know someone might say, well we've looked at beautiful things but we can't afford them. Well if you'll pardon an expression I've picked up in these United States, I'm inclined to say you're telling me. But my friends, some simple things we need to bear in mind. For example the intrinsic value of a book is not confined to its first edition, neither is it created by its binding. Same sort of thing is true of a picture. The peculiar beauty of a picture is not exhausted in an original. A common print of many a great picture can be a thing of beauty and joy forever. Let there be lovely things for those little eyes to rest upon as they're growing up in the home. A great deal might be said concerning tidiness in a true home. If the children grow up in an untidy home they're going to have an untidy idea of the universe. And if I may speak a word to you who are fathers, it certainly would be this. In the name of God and in the name of humanity abandon that dignity of yours and come off your stilts ever and anon in the home with your children. Laugh and be merry with them, romp with them. Oh in that sublime and final picture of the father from the lips of Jesus, do you remember the words? Let us be merry. For these may be minor matters I grant you, but they're not to be neglected. I know some fathers who locked their children because they never were able to unbend. Never able to come off their stilts. All was pompous and the children never got close. And if I may sing out one other hint to you fathers, don't be stingy with your children. Because if you are they'll get a stingy idea of God. Oh I've seen it in homes. A lad come running in. Dad can I have a quarter? What do you want a quarter for? What do you think the lad wants a quarter for? Suspend. Don't be stingy or they'll get a stingy idea of God. And if at this point I might sing out one hint to mothers listening to me, I might well do it in the words of that old Spanish father. An ounce of mother is worth a pound of clergy any day. Oh I wish those words could be written up in every home and every church. Tragedy today is all too many homes are wanting the church to do that which never can be done. Saved by mother. An ounce of mother is worth a pound of clergy. I wonder if you ever came across this. It's called Happily Night. Placing the little hats all in a row. Ready for church on the mother you know. Watching these faces in little black fists. Getting them ready and fit to be kissed. Putting them into clean garments in white. That's what mother was doing tonight. Pying out holes in the little warm hose. Laying by shoes that are worn through the toes. Looking all garments so faded and thin. Who but a mother knows where to begin. Changing a button to make it look right. That's what mothers are doing tonight. Calling the little ones all round her chair. Hearing them lift forth their soft evening prayer. Telling them stories of Jesus of old. Who loved to gather the lambs to his foals. Watching they listen with dreary delight. That's what mothers are doing tonight. Creeping so softly to take a last peep. After the little ones all over sleep. Anxious to know if the children are warm. Tucking the blanket round each little form. Kissing each little face rosy and bright. That's what mothers are doing tonight. Kneeling down gently beside the white bed. Lowly and meekly she bows down her head. Praying as only a mother can pray. God guides and keeps them from going astray. Oh an ounce of that kind of mother is worth a pound of clergy any day. The whole spirit is a refuge and a resting place. And a veritable palace of recreation. That to which tired men hasten at the end of the day. And that to which the boy or girl gone out into the world will hurry back someday. When assaulted or when they fail. Well what about the present situation? Where do we stand in the United States? Certainly a nation of such hope. Named from the Father is a strong nation. But where does America stand? My friends I do have reluctances to say. But I fear that to an alarming degree the old home life is disappearing. Thousands of rented houses or apartments are becoming hotels where men and women and children eat and sleep and happen to be of the same kiss and kin. The unification of morning family worship is largely passing from home life today. Because men and women are forgetting that God takes great pleasure in the family. And the family is intended to be an expression of truth concerning God. Oh I thank God that in the home in which I grew up all was family worship. Why I could spend the rest of the evening here just telling you stories. Clustering around family worship. There was never anything sanctimoniously pious about it. It was a joyful occasion. I remember in the old home in England we used to have gongs. I don't think they have them much now. But the first gong used to ring through the house at 6 45 a.m. That meant you got an hour until family worship. The second gong boomed through the house at 7 15. That meant you'd drop half an hour. If you weren't out you'd better get out. And then on the dot of 7 45 the third gong rang. And we were there always. Oh I can remember some occasions when my sisters looked as though they'd been dragged through a hedge backwards. But we were there. And there was never anything sanctimoniously pious. We usually sang a hymn. Then dad would read a bit of the word of God and lead in prayer. As I said I could tell you one story after another. I think of one lovely summer morning at our country home in England on the coast. That morning at family worship we had sung that old gospel song. And that's where we learned hymns. Nowadays they don't learn anything. They got to sit and look at television for three hours at a time. No time to gather around the piano or an organ and learn. But at any rate that particular lovely summer morning we sang that old gospel song. We feel the gift of God's love. And I remember when family prayers were over we moved into the dining room. My brother who was just a little tiny chap was sort of leading the procession. And as he walked into the dining room all he noticed at the center of the table a lovely vase of flowers. And he said, sweet please, the gift of God's love. He hadn't the slightest idea what we were singing about. But he knew the name of those flowers. Oh I could go on all evening just for his pasturing around family worship. I remember when we were living in Winona Lake, Indiana. The honored guest in our home was old Dr. John McNeill, that great old cottage preacher. One morning we were all gathered and we were waiting for the honored guest to come. And when he did arrive, Dad thought of parts of Bible and said, John won't you leave this morning? And old Dr. McNeill looked across he said, Morgan. He said, are you going to have prayers before breakfast? My dad laughed at him. He said, you usually do John. Oh he said, Morgan I'm afraid the smell of that bacon cooking will interfere with my devotion. I could go on all the evening just telling you stories coming out of family worship. And now so many children are growing up, they don't have any such happy memories, that they don't any longer gather for worship in the home. And then those mutual counsels amongst parents and children about the individual needs of each are largely being abandoned because each goes his or her way and finds friends outside the home to consult rather than inside. And that's always tragic. And then the sacramental nature of meal time is largely destroyed. Because it's no longer as it used to be, the gathering time of the family. Now my friends, why are these things first? I can only give you one or two reasons as I see them and I intend to do it with all bluntness. To begin with, I believe one cause for the disappearing of the old home life is that of a growing tendency to dissociate marriage from its religious sanction and significance. In the great Roman branch of the church, you know, they consider marriage a sacrament. Just exactly what they mean by that I'm not sure and therefore I do not criticize. But of this I am sure among us Protestants there is at least a tendency to speak as though marriage were a trivial matter only. Why the marriage relationship that is not entered into with an almost overwhelming sense of divine sanction and divine approval and divine purpose is almost inevitably foredoomed to failure. No man can build a permanent palace, beautiful and strong, on the foundation of sand. We do need a new religious sanction, a new religious significance in marriage. And then I firmly believe my friends, another reason for the breakdown of the old home life is that of the failure of fathers to recognize their spiritual responsibility for the children. There are thousands of men, very good men in many senses, who seem to think they've fulfilled their duty towards their children if they feed them and clothed them and provided them with an education, made possible certain recreation, and then exercised the office of a sort of a moral policeman in the home. Oh that conception of fatherhood is pernicious and utterly false. In the old Hebrew economy, which I but remind you was a divine economy, it was the father who was responsible for the spiritual teaching and the religious instruction of his children. And we who are fathers need to remember that we are to our children in the place of God. That may sound terrifying, but it's true whether we like it or not. Our boys and our girls are forming their estimates of God by that which they see in us. They're climbing toward faith in God through what we are, or else they're being driven away from faith in God by what we are. That's why I said don't be stingy, for if you're stingy they'll get an idea of God's stinginess. I expect we've all heard the story of that poor little chap on the streets of New York City. Some dear good Sunday school worker got hold of the little chap and fixed him up with some nice clothes, just a little waist, fixed him up with some nice clothes and got him to Sunday school. Oh the first Sunday the little chap was in France and listened to everything with rapt attention, until in some connection the teacher happened to speak of God's father and his little face went as white as a sheep. So he said miss if God is part I don't want to know anything about it. Poor little chap coming out of a home where the dad was a drunken sod and the very word father struck panic into his soul. Being driven away from faith in God by that which he's seen in his father. But my friends another reason for the breakdown of home life, now hear me carefully, is that of certain false elements in the movement towards the emancipation of women. Now don't misunderstand me with certain elements in that great movement. I am in profound disagreement, but I do think sometimes that in what someone has called the revolt of the daughters, there is not merely revolt from limitations that I grant you are utterly fault, but from functions that are necessary. If true homes are to survive in our lives, whenever there is on the part of women a forgetfulness of the fact that in the inner recesses of the home, she is to fulfill her most sacred function, then I say the nation and the home is in danger. A woman who's a mother of a child, a woman who's a mother of children and to help meet your man and neglect them for anything else, is an unnatural monster. And I'm afraid there are a heap of unnatural monsters, why if the mother of children shall find more interest in friends outside the home in public affairs or social engagement or even church work than in her children and her husband, she's guilty of that very sin. Only as women return to an exalted and spiritual sense of the sublimity and sanctity and marvel of wifehood and motherhood will the home ever again be what it ought to be. So my friends as I travel around and this city is no exception, almost everywhere I go chatting with folks, someone will come up and speak so kindly and graciously about my beloved father Dr. G. Campbell Morby. And I'm always full of appreciation, but I never listen to any one of them without thinking of that little woman in the inner recesses of the home. Fifty years stood at the back of that man in the inner recesses of the home. Many a time I've seen him come in exhausted after giving himself without stint in preaching. I sit down in the study and I've seen that little woman go and untie shoes and run. Oh you say menial, menial? I tell you it's royal. With the royalty of heaven, with the royalty of the king who skirts himself with a towel and washed the tired feet in the inner recesses of the home, fulfills her most sacred, will the home ever again be what it ought to be. And then I believe another reason for the breakdown of the old home life is that of the falling drift of daily life into such complexities why it's almost impossible to find any time for the home. Society, humanitarian, philanthropic, I grant you, clubs, clubs. I pause a moment with that particular word because it made me think of a story which I believe I'll pass on to you. Did you ever hear the story of the two typical Englishmen sitting in their London club and one turned to the other and he says, look here old boy, do you think women should have clubs? And the other replied, well not till you've tried kindness. Well let me go at that. You see it's an Englishman speaking. But these clubs, book and musical and bridge clubs, they're clamoring for the presence of men and women, young and old, and they're answering the clamor and forgetting the old home. And in my judgment, my friends, the church of God is guilty in this respect. If you can persuade me that the time has now come when either the church or the home must go, then I say let the church go, that the home may be retained. But we are driven to no such alternative because the church and the home are alike divine, rightly apportioned. Now hear me carefully, rightly apportioned. There are enough workers in any church to do all the work that church ought to do without destroying the home. Oh I know how frequently the trouble is many church members are not doing anything, consequently contributing to the destruction of the homes of other people. I remember when I was pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Concord, North Carolina. One morning, Sunday morning, I said to my morning congregation, if the moment comes when you find that your church work is making such demands upon your time and force and strength, that your home is being neglected, you come and see me at once as your pastor and I'll relieve you of your duties. And then of course last of all, if the home is ever again to be what it ought to be, we must get back to religion. But it must be religion and not some bastard's imitation of it. Religion is simply right relationship to God and that right relationship in daily life. And so I'll end with the words of that old hymn, O happy home where thou art loved the dearest, thou loving friend and savior of our race, and where among the guests there never cometh one can hold such high, such honored place. O happy home whose little ones are given early to thee in humble faith and prayer, to thee their friend who from the heights of heaven guides them and guards with more than mother's care. O happy home where each one serves thee lowly, whatever his appointed work may be, till every common task seems great and holy when it's done O Lord as unto thee. O happy home where thou art not forgotten when joy holds us flowing full and free. O happy home where every wounded spirit is brought physician, comforter to thee. Until at last when earth's work is ended, all meet thee in that blessed home above. From whence thou camest, where thou hast ascended, thine everlasting home of peace and joy and love. Let us stand for the benediction. May the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the love of God our Heavenly Father, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit our Comforter abide with you and in your home tonight and forevermore.