The Saint of the Wilderness Chapter 15
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Page 324- “It will not alter my course, for that course is so clearly set before me that my sweet Lord Himself holds the torch that lights my way.”
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In the spring Robert came home from an engagement in Montgomery County to find that his son had taken a new job without consulting him.
“You weren’t here, Papa, and I needed the work.”
“I’m partly to blame, Robert,” Eliza confessed. “I don’t think my saying ‘no’ would have mattered anyway, but I didn’t say no.”
“It’s a good job, Papa, better than the one I did here for our little paper. I’m going to be a printer’s devil at the Pearisburg Virginian.”
Eliza gave aid to her son. “Our little Staffordsville paper can’t survive longer, Robert.”
“But it’s a big ride to Pearisburg and you’ve no horse ... and school and everything …” Robert objected.
“Uncle John will give me a horse or help me find a ride with somebody else. I’ll just work on Saturdays until school is out, and when summer comes my wages will really fly high and I can start paying Uncle John and Uncle Dan back regular-“
“So that’s it,” Robert said sorrowfully.
“No, that’s not altogether ‘it,’ dear husband. The boy is smart and industrious and he wants to work and help himself and to pay back some of what we owe my brothers. It’s the right thing to do and it needn’t make you feel any shame.”
“There’s no call to soften it, Mamma. I can’t sit at my desk in school without the other boys, and girls too, pointing at me and saying, ‘Eddie Sheffey’s uncles have to keep him and his mother from starving to death because his daddy is so crazy on religion he won’t ask for money and he won’t come home half the time because of chasing sinners up every hollow’.”
“Eddie! Not in front of your father,” Eliza pleaded.
“Why not? It’s the truth, isn’t it!”
Robert did not even debate the point but tears spilled down his wrinkled cheeks.
“He didn’t mean it, Robert,” Eliza said softly when her husband had gone remorsefully to another room.
“Yes, dear Eliza, he meant it. It is the thing I could expect to hear. But it will not alter my course, for that course is so clearly set before me that my sweet Lord Himself holds the torch that lights my way.”
‘We have made out fine. Now don’t you be worrying about anything, for whatever we need, somebody will provide,” Eliza said.
“Bless them all. I do know about the whispering, but I know about the joys too!”
Robert rode away in June to attend the affairs of his circuit and Eddie took up his full-time job at the newspaper office. The boy had left with a countenance shining with challenge, and Robert admitted for the first time that he himself was growing old. And, for the first time also, he admitted to a bone-deep tiredness; in spite of it, there was something renewing about seeing his son so young, so full of hope and energy, go riding off into the world. How strange that God would let the old siphon strength from the young. It was not the first time he had felt this way. The same feeling had come hundred, and perhaps thousands of times when he had held a newborn baby or a little child, whether in a ramshackle mountain hovel or a rolling plantation farmhouse.
“Yes, Gideon, renewal comes with holding onto another human being, even if he is the smallest squirming thing.”
They rode along back toward Pearisburg again for a service there; and, for a week after that. No engagements would prevent his going to Independence, in Grayson County, to help out an old friend in a series of services.
“It’s been a while since we’ve been to Independence, old friend,” he said to Gideon. “You will like it there when the time comes for us to go. The water is cool and the clover is tasty and green, and, for me, my sweet Lord has provided me with so many dear people – so my pastor friend has told me.”
The twisting road into Pearisburg finally straightened, and the edge of the village came into view. So did the rock on which he had chalk-sketched that commanding line which hopefully had caused many a passer-by to stop and ponder on.
At least the words still stood out boldly in glistening white against a dark gray background. But what was this! Something new had been added in smaller letters that he could read only as he came very close to the rock. He had written WHAT SHALL I DO TO BE SAVED? And under it a man whose occupation was self-evident had added, USE HITE’s PAIN CURE.
“Well, Gideon, the sweet Lord never objected to a little humor, and Eliza tells me that I’m a regular smiley compared to when she married me. Bless her sweet soul, Gideon, she’s all the world to me. Now what was I going to say? Oh yes, we had best not let that medicine salesman get the best of God’s message.”
He dismounted then and added a third line: AND PREPARE TO MEET THY GOD.
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Page 324- “It will not alter my course, for that course is so clearly set before me that my sweet Lord Himself holds the torch that lights my way.”
===============================
In the spring Robert came home from an engagement in Montgomery County to find that his son had taken a new job without consulting him.
“You weren’t here, Papa, and I needed the work.”
“I’m partly to blame, Robert,” Eliza confessed. “I don’t think my saying ‘no’ would have mattered anyway, but I didn’t say no.”
“It’s a good job, Papa, better than the one I did here for our little paper. I’m going to be a printer’s devil at the Pearisburg Virginian.”
Eliza gave aid to her son. “Our little Staffordsville paper can’t survive longer, Robert.”
“But it’s a big ride to Pearisburg and you’ve no horse ... and school and everything …” Robert objected.
“Uncle John will give me a horse or help me find a ride with somebody else. I’ll just work on Saturdays until school is out, and when summer comes my wages will really fly high and I can start paying Uncle John and Uncle Dan back regular-“
“So that’s it,” Robert said sorrowfully.
“No, that’s not altogether ‘it,’ dear husband. The boy is smart and industrious and he wants to work and help himself and to pay back some of what we owe my brothers. It’s the right thing to do and it needn’t make you feel any shame.”
“There’s no call to soften it, Mamma. I can’t sit at my desk in school without the other boys, and girls too, pointing at me and saying, ‘Eddie Sheffey’s uncles have to keep him and his mother from starving to death because his daddy is so crazy on religion he won’t ask for money and he won’t come home half the time because of chasing sinners up every hollow’.”
“Eddie! Not in front of your father,” Eliza pleaded.
“Why not? It’s the truth, isn’t it!”
Robert did not even debate the point but tears spilled down his wrinkled cheeks.
“He didn’t mean it, Robert,” Eliza said softly when her husband had gone remorsefully to another room.
“Yes, dear Eliza, he meant it. It is the thing I could expect to hear. But it will not alter my course, for that course is so clearly set before me that my sweet Lord Himself holds the torch that lights my way.”
‘We have made out fine. Now don’t you be worrying about anything, for whatever we need, somebody will provide,” Eliza said.
“Bless them all. I do know about the whispering, but I know about the joys too!”
Robert rode away in June to attend the affairs of his circuit and Eddie took up his full-time job at the newspaper office. The boy had left with a countenance shining with challenge, and Robert admitted for the first time that he himself was growing old. And, for the first time also, he admitted to a bone-deep tiredness; in spite of it, there was something renewing about seeing his son so young, so full of hope and energy, go riding off into the world. How strange that God would let the old siphon strength from the young. It was not the first time he had felt this way. The same feeling had come hundred, and perhaps thousands of times when he had held a newborn baby or a little child, whether in a ramshackle mountain hovel or a rolling plantation farmhouse.
“Yes, Gideon, renewal comes with holding onto another human being, even if he is the smallest squirming thing.”
They rode along back toward Pearisburg again for a service there; and, for a week after that. No engagements would prevent his going to Independence, in Grayson County, to help out an old friend in a series of services.
“It’s been a while since we’ve been to Independence, old friend,” he said to Gideon. “You will like it there when the time comes for us to go. The water is cool and the clover is tasty and green, and, for me, my sweet Lord has provided me with so many dear people – so my pastor friend has told me.”
The twisting road into Pearisburg finally straightened, and the edge of the village came into view. So did the rock on which he had chalk-sketched that commanding line which hopefully had caused many a passer-by to stop and ponder on.
At least the words still stood out boldly in glistening white against a dark gray background. But what was this! Something new had been added in smaller letters that he could read only as he came very close to the rock. He had written WHAT SHALL I DO TO BE SAVED? And under it a man whose occupation was self-evident had added, USE HITE’s PAIN CURE.
“Well, Gideon, the sweet Lord never objected to a little humor, and Eliza tells me that I’m a regular smiley compared to when she married me. Bless her sweet soul, Gideon, she’s all the world to me. Now what was I going to say? Oh yes, we had best not let that medicine salesman get the best of God’s message.”
He dismounted then and added a third line: AND PREPARE TO MEET THY GOD.
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