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Mary Wilder Tileston
Mary Wilder Tileston was born on August 20, 1843, in Salem, Massachusetts, to Caleb Foote, owner and editor of the Salem Gazette, and Mary Wilder White Foote. Raised in a family with strong intellectual and religious ties—her brother Henry Wilder Foote became a Harvard-educated minister, and her brother Arthur Foote a noted composer—she attended private schools in Salem. On September 25, 1865, she married John Boies Tileston, a publisher’s son, and they had seven children: Mary, Margaret, Roger, Amelia, Wilder, Edith, and Eleanor. The family lived in Concord, Massachusetts, on a 200-acre farm from around 1874 to 1882, then moved to Salem and later Brookline, Massachusetts, where she died on July 3, 1934. Tileston’s career was centered on her literary contributions rather than preaching. Her most notable work, Daily Strength for Daily Needs, a collection of prose, verse, and scripture for daily reading, sold over 250,000 copies by 1910 and was highly regarded. She compiled other devotionals, including Prayers Ancient and Modern (1897) and children’s works like The Child’s Harvest of Verse (1910), reflecting her love for spiritual literature. While not a preacher by occupation, her anthologies served a preaching-like function, offering spiritual guidance to readers. Her legacy lies in these writings, which continue to inspire, rather than in a formal ministerial role.
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Mary Wilder Tileston preaches about the profound joy and rest found in the presence of God, emphasizing that true fulfillment and peace come from dwelling in His presence. She highlights the concept of God's unchanging nature and the eternal joy that comes from being close to Him, contrasting it with the emptiness felt when distant from God. Tileston encourages believers to seek and abide in God's presence as the ultimate goal and source of contentment and rest.
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In Thy presence is fulness of joy. PSALMS 16:11 My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest.,br> EXODUS 33:14 O REST of rests! O peace serene, eternal! Thou ever livest, and Thou changest never; And in the secret of Thy presence dwelleth Fulness of joy, for ever and for ever. HARRIET BEECHER STOWE I HAVE no home, until I am in the realized pres-ence of God. This holy presence is my inward home, and, until I experience it, I am a homeless wanderer, a straying sheep in a waste howling wilderness. ANONYMOUS, 1841 Heaven consists in nothing else than walking, abid-ing, resting in the Divine Presence. There are souls who enter into this heaven before leaving the body. If thou believest that thy God, found, felt, and rested in, is heaven, why not, under the gracious help which He vouchsafes to thee in His Son, begin at once to discipline and qualify thy soul for this heaven? If this be thy chief good, why turn away from it, as though it were a thing not to be desired? If it be the very end of thy being, the only right, good, and blessed end, why postpone thy qualification for it, as though it were a bitter necessity? Suffer thy soul, so noble in its origin, to be withdrawn from dust, noise, multitudes, vain treasures, and vain pleasures, to find its sweetness and fulness in God. JOHN PULSFORD
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Mary Wilder Tileston was born on August 20, 1843, in Salem, Massachusetts, to Caleb Foote, owner and editor of the Salem Gazette, and Mary Wilder White Foote. Raised in a family with strong intellectual and religious ties—her brother Henry Wilder Foote became a Harvard-educated minister, and her brother Arthur Foote a noted composer—she attended private schools in Salem. On September 25, 1865, she married John Boies Tileston, a publisher’s son, and they had seven children: Mary, Margaret, Roger, Amelia, Wilder, Edith, and Eleanor. The family lived in Concord, Massachusetts, on a 200-acre farm from around 1874 to 1882, then moved to Salem and later Brookline, Massachusetts, where she died on July 3, 1934. Tileston’s career was centered on her literary contributions rather than preaching. Her most notable work, Daily Strength for Daily Needs, a collection of prose, verse, and scripture for daily reading, sold over 250,000 copies by 1910 and was highly regarded. She compiled other devotionals, including Prayers Ancient and Modern (1897) and children’s works like The Child’s Harvest of Verse (1910), reflecting her love for spiritual literature. While not a preacher by occupation, her anthologies served a preaching-like function, offering spiritual guidance to readers. Her legacy lies in these writings, which continue to inspire, rather than in a formal ministerial role.