The Duty of the Church in Relation to Sunday Schools [pp. 377-393]

in relation7 to Sunday Schtools.
hope for their own children, and there is the best cooperation
they can have in training their families. In it are educating
their successors in the visible church, and there is the
strong-est human guaranty for its continued purity and prosperity. Individual members should well and prayerfully deliberate, before they relinquish the privilege of guiding these
minds, and decide that Providence does not call them to be
efficient agents in the cause. They well know that Christ
denounces unprofitable servants, and before a professed follower determines to avoid the duty, or is contented to spend
the Sabbaths without being engaged in some scheme of benefiting others, let he or she he certain that the reason is such
as will bear the test of the Gospel requisitions.
We are commonly left to our own perceptions to judge
when circumstances indicate any special duty as the assignment of Providence. If we seriously consider the history
and present attitude of Sunday schools, we suppose it impossible to come to any other conclusion than that they have been
sanctioned by the Saviour, not only as a means of hastening his
triumph, but that none of his followers might be without a
field for active and direct service. Its operations are so multifarious, that we can scarcely imagine a case of total disqualification. If precluded by any circumstances from direct teaching, the private member may still exert a general
influence in furtherance of the design. One of the concurrent blessings of the plan is, that it opens so wide a
door to practical benevolence, and such a person may be
excellently employed in visiting the poor and the ignorant,
to inform them of the advantages of the school, to impress
them and their children, by their kind familiarity, with favourable ideas respecting it. If poverty or sickness prevent
their taking advantage of the offer, an opportunity is afforded
of giving the most conclusive evidence of sincerity and disinterestedness, by guiding them to means of relief. In like
manner they may make friendly visits at the homes of those
who are already scholars; where they are sure of an unaffected welcome. By this proof of earnestness they open
a way to the confidence and the consciences of the child's
family, whom they may persuade to an attendance on the
means of grace, and encourage to the pursuit of holiness. Secular and moral reformation, at least, will be easily
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