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2 THE NATION'S PRAYER CALL [[line]] [[column 1]] THE NATION'S PRAYER CALL [[double line]] Published every other month in the interest of nationwide Prayer Revival by the National Prayer League, Inc., at Zion Baptist Church, 432 W. 9th. St., Cincinnati 3, Ohio [[double line]] Official Publication of THE NATIONAL PRAYER LEAGUE Founded by L. Venchael Booth [[double line]] EDITORIAL BOARD L. Venchael Booth Mrs. Georgia M. Booth Mrs. Frances M. Bettis [[double line]] Subscriptions $1.00 a year 20c a copy [[double line]] PRAYER, ITS PLACE IN MY LIFE By James Faulks I have tried several times to put into words my feelings concerning the subject of Prayer in my life, and what Prayer has done for me. So, again I will try. First, let me say that from the days of my youth I have been taught faith and prayer by my mother. She reared two of us children alone, which was a hard struggle. And her great faith in prayer was many times the only help that she had, it never failed. It still works in my life. Through many dangers, toils and snares, I have already come. And I want to say that everyday in every way God's power is working in my life, because Prayer does change things. That is why I count it a blessing to be a subscriber to The Nation's Prayer Call, and deem it a great privilege to be on speaking terms with it's founder and editor, as well as acknowledge him as my pastor and leader. [[line]] SOUL MIGHTIER THAN ATOM The human soul is mightier than the atom, and everything which harms the soul, warps the mind, blinds the vision and prevents people from becoming true children of God, are wrong, a college president told the American Baptist Convention. The speaker was Dr. Harry L. Dillin, head of Linfield College in McMinnville, Ore., and president of this national body of Baptists, 12,000 of whom were attending annual sessions in Convention Hall. If Jesus walked the earth today, said Dr. Dillin, he surely would declare that the atom bomb is less powerful than the human soul which, he added, must be protected, served and helped to expand to its fullest possibilities. Paul Sullivan Religious Editor Cinti. Times-Star [[/column 1]] THE ROLE OF THE CHURCH IN TEACHING AND PRACTICING CHRISTIANITY AMIDST COMMUNITY AND WORLD CRISES [[column 2]] (Concluded in this Issue) [[image - black & white photograph of Dr. Benjamin Mays]] By Dr. Benjamin E. Mays THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH Certainly this is the basic problem confronting the nations. I make bold to assert that modern nations do not believe in the Christian God. We trust our industrial might, our army, navy, airplanes, submarines, atomic and hydrogen bombs. Nations recognize no sovereignty beyond themselves. The problem confronting the world is not political, not economics, not war, not race. The problem confronting the world today is the problem of God. As long as nations set themselves up as gods, as long as races set themselves up as the ultimate authority, and as long as men give their supreme allegiance to a political or economic system, we are going to have catastrophe and war. The words of Sinai are more significant today than ever before: "Thou shalt not have no other gods before me." The Church must rededicate itself to the task of making new creatures; calling men to repentance. The Church must make it clear that man is not autonomous -- that he is not able to lift himself by his own boot straps. That knowledge and science are not enough. Prophets and poets have known this for centuries. Paul knew it when he said in essence, I find myself doing that which I know I ought not to do and I find myself failing to do that which I know I ought to do. Paul is saying that knowledge alone is not enough. My mind doesn't help me. I know the truth and yet I lie. I see the light but I cannot always walk in it. I see the high road beckoning to me but I take the low road. I know that peace [[/column 2]] [[column 3]] is better than war but I choose war. Tennyson sensed the same thing when he said: "Let knowledge grow from more to more but more reverence in us dwell--that mind and soul according well may make one music as before but vaster." John Drinkwater was conscious of this when he wrote: "Knowledge we ask not, Knowledge thou has lent. But, Lord, the will, there lies our bitter need. Give us to build above the deep intent, the dead, the deed." Surely this is what Jesus meant when he said to Nicodemus: "Except a man be borne again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God." Teach that no man is good enough, no man is wise enough, and no man is strong enough, for mankind to put its trust in man. The church must teach this in these terrible days. The Romans trusted the Augusti and the Ceasers but the Roman Empire fell, never to rise again. The people trusted Alexander the Great but his kingdom fell apart and he died in a drunken stupor in Babylon. The French trusted Napoleon. But he died a prisoner of war on St. Helena. The Germans trusted Hitler. But he lost the war and committed suicide with his mistress, Eva Braun. The Italians trusted Mussolini. But he was killed by his countrymen and his body, along with that of his mistress, was hanged up for ridicule on the streets of Milan. Stalin was worshipped and idolized as a god but he died or was killed and now he is being discredited. Tennyson was so right when he said: "Our little systems have their day. They have their day and cease to be. They are but broken lights of these. But thou, O God, are more than they." REPENTANCE The church must teach repentance and call all men to repentance. The great and the small, the rich and the poor, the high and the low, the learned and the illiterate. As a rule, the evangelists and often the churches teach and preach love in the abstract but fail to practice it in the concrete. We call little sinners to repentance but leave the big sinners alone. We call little gamblers, the little thieves, the harlots and the drunkards but not the men at the top. The learned and the powerful are considered beyond the need of redemption. The masses of [[/column 3]] [[column 4]] Germany and Italy needed to be reborn but Hitler and Mussolini needed it more than they. India's untouchables needed redemption but those who kept them untouchable needed it more. The masses in America need to be redeemed but the men at the top those in Congress and state legislatures who hold the fate of men in their hands need it more than the masses. These are the things the church is called to teach, to preach, and to practice. But I hear your misgivings. I hear you say that human nature cannot be changed, that man has always been a war monger and he always will, that the strong has always exploited the weak and always will, and that race prejudice is as old as the hills and cannot be eliminated. But I would remind you that in less than a generation Hitler changed the nature of the German youth. In less than a generation Hitler turned the German nation against Jews and six million of them were exterminated. In less than a generation Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin and others made a new Russian people. They were made communists. In less than a generation Mussolini made the Italian people fascists. Between 1870 and 1910 we in the United States completely segregated the Negroes in the South and made them untouchables. If Hitler, Lenin, Mussolini could change human nature for the worse, we can change it for the better. if they could do it for evil purposes, we can do it for good purposes. I refuse to believe that human beings can be changed for the worse but cannot be changed for the better. I refuse to believe that war is inevitable, that the strong must always dominate the weak, that a man must be kept down because he doesn't belong to a particular race. i believe that man can be born anew. I believe he can be redeemed. If human nature cannot be changed for the better, we of all creatures are the most miserable and the church has nothing to preach and may God have mercy on our souls. I hear you complain further. Who am I to set man right, to set America and the world right? I am one lone teacher, a business man, minister, doctor, or lawyer. I must be careful. I've got to live. I need my job. What can I, One woman, one man do. There is nothing I can do to set the world right. But listen, we may not be (Continued on Page 3) [[/column 4]] [[end page]]
