Langholm Old Church Parish Magazine
No.138 Price 1/8p - with LIFE AND WORK - 8d LOCAL MAGAZINE ONLY February 1973.
Minister: Rev. Tom Calvert, The Old Manse, Langholm. Tel. 256.
Session Clerk: Mr. Archibald Findlay, Langholm Lodge. Tel. 453.
Clerk to Board: Mr. E. C. Armstrong, Town Hall, Langholm. Tel. 255.
Treasurer: Mr. Robert C. Craig, 5 Rosevale Place, Langholm
Church Officer: Mr. W. Elliot, 3 Buccleuch Terrace.
Hall Caretaker: Mr. M Tweddle, 17 John Street, Langholm
Text for January and New Year And Pharaoh said unto Jacob, How old art thou?" Genesis 47. 8.
Text for February – “Behold he had sackcloth within upon his flesh”. 2 Kings 6. 30.
Sackcloth as referred to in the Old Testament was made of camel's and goat's hair, and was used for making the rough garments worn by mourners.
We read that when Jacob learned that the coat of many colours belonging to his lost son Joseph had been found, in his distress he rent his clothes and put on sackcloth as a way of expressing his deep distress.
In the Book of Kings we read that when King Hezekiah heard that the great Assyrian army had surrounded his city and it seemed inevitable that the city would fall to the invaders, that he rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth.
In the Book of Esther, we read that when Queen Esther's uncle Mordecai heard that a plot was in hand to massacre all the Jews in Persia, that he rent his clothes, and put on sackcloth, and went out into the city with a loud and bitter cry.
But there is a difference in the sackcloth referred to in our text. It was a sign of deep sorrow on the part of the King of Samaria, when his city was under siege from the Syrian army, and the people were on the brink of starvation, the King rent his clothes and the people looked, and behold he had sackcloth within upon his flesh. The difference was that it was hidden sackcloth. Here was a man going about weighed down by cares and sorrow, but hiding it all behind a brave front. Here was a man refusing to wear his heart upon his sleeve, whom you might have met and never even suspected that behind his outward show of good cheer he was hiding an aching sad heart.
This is the subject of this sermon, based upon a King of ancient Samaria, who was going about as though he hadn't a care in the world. But when told by a woman of the terrible state of things in the besieged city, the King rent his clothes and the people looked and behold he had sackcloth within upon his flesh. And there are a lot of brave people in life like that ancient King of Samaria, who keep their cares and sorrows hidden and carry on with the great game of life as though they hadn't a care in the world.
Let me give you a few examples of the kind of people I am thinking about.
Early in the last war the three Service Commanders in the Middle East were Admiral Cunningham, General Wavell, and Air Marshal Tedder. They met in conference every day, and went about their work directing the war with a confidence and flourish and discipline that is typical of men of their high training. During those days Air Marshal Tedder suffered a grave sorrow. His wife came out to live with him in Cairo, and gave wonderful service under the Red Cross visiting military hospitals in the Western Desert, and providing comforts for the wounded. She had gone down to Benghazi by air to visit the wounded in hospital there, and on the return flight the plane crashed and burned out on approaching Cairo. He was waiting to meet her, as they were great companions. I remember an R.A.F. Chaplain telling me how completely Air Marshall Tedder was stunned after his wife's sad death, and for days could hardly speak. So deep was his grief. But after a few days, and realising that the work in hand, like life, had to go on, he would turn up at his office and at conferences without a sign of his great sorrow. Like the ancient King of Samaria, he was wearing his sackcloth within - keeping his grief hidden, and going about his task as though he hadn't a care.
Or take a rather different example, that of a great London preacher, Pat McCormack. His voice was the first to be listened to over the radio in religious broadcasting. It was in the twenties when Lord Reith, Director of the newly formed British Broadcasting Corporation, introduced broadcasting a religious service every Thursday evening. Those were hard days for the people of our country, following the big slump after the First World War. Owing to the steep fall in prices most farmers were on the verge of bankruptcy, and the masses of workers in the land were unemployed, and being subjected to demoralising means-tests for a bare existence. During those years people came to look forward to the Thursday evening broadcast messages of hope from Pat McCormack. He always seemed to put new heart and courage into people as they listened to his messages coming from St. Martins-in-Fields, London. But few people who listened realised that the preacher, Pat McCormack's own domestic life was a tragedy. His wife couldn't bear going on living with a man who was out every day and every night helping troubled people in the great city of London, and decided to leave him. He was also a victim of chronic asthma, and endured such terrible bouts that he said he used to use the words in the Lord's Prayer, not "give us this day our daily bread". but "give us this day our daily breath" But he kept this hidden from the thousands of people who used to find his weekly messages of hope kept them going in those terrible years. Pat McCormack was wearing his sackcloth within upon his flesh.
Yes, you can never tell what secret cares people who are called upon to bring cheer to others are bearing themselves.
Take the story of the life of Paderewski, the famous Polish pianist. He could stand up and acknowledge storms of applause from vast audiences as though he was really enjoying himself, but all the time his heart was filled not with pride or elation, but with the picture of a little cripple daughter whose life was nothing more than a weakness and a weariness. Yes, so often the world sees nothing but signs of success and joy when behind it all there is the sad story that is being kept secret, "sackcloth within upon their flesh". And because this is true of far more people than we ever imagine, it behoves us to cultivate wider sympathies with one another for you can never tell what even your nearest friends are feeling or suffering.
And what I have said about how brave people hide their cares from others, the same thing is true of many whose lives are failures and who are filled with regrets.
Some people whom we readily condemn and criticise have met with temptations and circumstances we have never had to face. And this is why Robert Burns in his Address to the Unco Guid counsels us, "Then gently scan your brother man, Still gentler sister woman; Tho' they may gang a kennin' wrang, To step aside is human, What's done we partly may compute, But know not what's resisted."
The story is told of Thomas Carlyle and Froude one day out for a walk when they were met by a blind beggar who asked for assistance. Carlyle gave him 6d and then they stood and watched what he would do. His dog led him straight to the nearest pub. Froude made some cynical remark, but Tom Carlyle said, "Poor devil, if only we knew how he has come to this, perhaps we would not be so hard on him".
Yes, if only we knew what lies behind the lives of some of the people we condemn and criticise for being cold or unfriendly or of foolish choice, we would see them in a different light.
Now notice what the King of Samaria did with his secret care: he let it turn his life into a passionate effort to alleviate sufferings of the of the people of his beseiged city.
And this is something which can happen with us all. We all have our sorrows, some more some less, and if they remain secret they tend to imprison us in gloom and hopelessness. But we can all do what the King of Samaria did, let our sorrow turn our thoughts away from ourselves to others, drive us to help relieve the sad lot of others.
This is what Thomas Barnardo did with a terrible sorrow. He didn't go about carrying his grief of the loss of his little son by diphtheria, secretly, brave as that would have been. Rather, he made a vow that he would "by God's grace consecrate himself to the task of rescuing all such helpless little ones from the evils of neglect and sin". And the grand work of Dr. Barnardo Homes over the years, giving thousands of unwanted boys and girls a real chance in life, has been the result.
I have known many who have done just this, while carrying about with them secret cares, have found relief in taking their minds away from themselves by seeking to lighten the burdens others have to carry. I knew a man in Portsmouth, John Gordon, who in the war days had a terrible grief. While he was on duty as an air raid warden, saw a landmine fall on the shelter in which his wife, two daughters and a son were taking refuge, and they were all killed. A few years later he took me with him to see the face of his favourite nephew in death. A young army officer who had taken his life out of some love disappointment.
But my friend John Gordon who had lost everything in life that was precious to him buried his grief in coming to my Church and making it a place where strangers found welcome, and if there was any work needing to be done in keeping the church premises clean and decorated he made it his job and his care.
But to conclude I would like to tell you of one to whom we can go with our secret cares and find ourselves understood because He had hidden cares - our blessed Lord Jesus.
Jesus knew the meaning of wearing sackcloth within upon his flesh, of carrying an inner sorrow he couldn't tell to anyone because they would never understand. As Holman Hunt pictures him in The Shadow of the Cross, of the shadow of the cross falling upon the heart of Jesus while he was still in the carpenter's shop. He couldn't have talked to anybody about this because even his own household couldn't understand, they said "he is beside himself". And right through the years of his public ministry he had the sense that suffering awaited him. He once tried to tell his disciples how he would go up to Jerusalem where he would suffer and die at the hands of his enemies, but they couldn't understand such talk. Peter said, "Far be it from thee Lord". And Jesus had to rebuke poor Peter, "Get thee behind me Satan". Yes Jesus through all his ministry had a secret care which he carried about with him, and he can understand us. In him we have a Friend who understands us when no one else can, because he had to pass through our kind of life before us. As the writer of the Hebrews says, "We have not an high priest who cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but one who was in all points tempted like as we are". Or as the Scottish Paraphrase puts it, "In every pang that rends the heart, the Man of Sorrows has a part. He sympathises with our grief, and to the suffering send relief". It was of Jesus the hymn writer was thinking when he wrote, "Be with me what no other friend, Thy mystery of my heart can share."
A prayer for all who carry secret cares.
We give Thee thanks O God that in Jesus we have a Friend with whom we can share our secret cares, that He understands our life because He has lived it.
Help us daily to lay at His feet our secret fears, our secret regrets, our secret sorrows which we can never really forget, and help us to go forth upon each new day sharing with others the gladness of Life. And this we ask for Jesus sake. Amen.
LETTER FROM THE MINISTER
Dear Fellow-Member,
David Livingstone Centenary
On Sunday. 6th May, we hope to celebrate by a Special Service the Centenary of David Livingstone. He was born at Blantyre, in Lanarkshire, on 19th March, 1813, of humble and devout parents. The family was of Highland descent, his great-grandfather having fallen at Culloden in the Stuart cause. At the age of 10 the boy became a "piecer" in the local cotton factory, and continued in this laborious occupation for 14 years. Such was his thirst for knowledge that with his first earnings he bought a Latin primer, which he studied at night school at the end of his long day, which started at 6 a.m. At the age of 20 he decided to become a medical missionary, "in order", as he wrote, "to devote my life to the alleviation of human misery". In November, 1840, he was admitted a Licentiate to the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons in Glasgow University, and in the following month embarked for the Cape of Good Hope, ordained by the London Missionary Society, to serve under the Rev. Dr. Moffat at Kuruman in Bechuanaland.
The story of his adventurous life is well know, how he refused to spend his time ministering to native Christians at the Coast, and after learning the languages and customs of the native tribes, he launched forth into the unknown interior, accompanied only by native helpers, preaching, prescribing medicines, building, teaching, and studying nature, and surveying the land. This of course brought him into conflict with his employers, the London Missionary Society, and he returned home to resign his post. After 15 months the Government appointed him as chief of an Expedition to explore the Zambesi and the surrounding country, and the party left for Africa in March, 1858. Then followed his exciting life of exposing the atrocities of the slave trade, and helping the Royal Geographical Society to settle disputed questions regarding the watershed of Central Africa, and discovering the source of the Nile. At the same time he was first and last in Africa as a missionary.
On the morning of 1st May, 1873, in the village of his faithful servant Chitambo, he was found on his knees by his bedside, dead. His body was embalmed as best the natives could, and his remains were put aboard a British cruiser, and on 18th April, 1874 were buried in Westminster Abbey.
The Livingstone Memorial at Blantyre has been vastly extended for visitors and will be visited by parties of young and old from all over the country this year. As part of the celebrations this year, a special weekend Festival Camp is to be held in the grounds of the Livingstone National Memorial at Blantyre from 8th June to 10th June. The camp for young people between the ages of 14 and 20 will be able to cater for 1,000 from all over Scotland. The weekend will include experimental theatre, sports, discussions, folk-singing, dancing, films and there will be an open air Service highlighting the life of David Livingstone in drama and folk-singing. Full details for young people wishing to attend from Mrs. MacLeod, 17 Silvertonhill Avenue, Hamilton.
25th February adopted by General Assembly to be observed as Family Sunday.
In order to draw attention to the importance of guarding the institution of family life, the General Assembly of May, 1972, instructed that on Sunday, 25th February, 1973, special family Services be held in all Parish Churches throughout the land. The design of the Service is suggested to include three sections; (1) Children taking part; (2) Young people and parents participating; (3) Grandparents also to have a part. In the Old Parish Church we will observe Family Sunday at the 11 a.m. Service.
Invitation to members to consider contributing to our Church by Deed of Covenant.
With the increasing cost of maintaining our Old Parish Church and meeting our assessments to the Church of Scotland, we require to make an appeal for increased giving. One of the most advantageous methods of giving to the Church is by Deed of Covenant. Anyone who pays Income Tax can contribute in this way, either by giving a certain sum annually or through the Weekly Freewill Offering Envelopes. Forms can be obtained from the Church Treasurer. The advantage of this method of giving is that our Church gains refund of the tax you have paid in the amount covenanted. For example a Covenant of £7 will also yield a further Income of £:3 from the Tax refund. I note from the newsletter of my previous charge in Blackburn that the Covenant income for 1972 was £1084 which produced a Tax Refund of £:645. Further information on giving by Covenant is to be found in the February issue of Life and Work on page 27 under the heading "Start Now".
Services in February
On Sunday, 18th February I have undertaken to conduct the Services in Fisher Street Presbyterian Church, Carlisle. The Services in the Old Parish Church on that Sunday will be conducted by Mr. J. MacIntosh, our elder. On Sunday, 25th February we will observe Family Sunday at the 11 a.m. Morning Service, and I am inviting the Guides and Brownies to attend the Evening Service in observance of Guide Thinking Day.
News Item
I have a letter this month from Barry Buchanan, nephew of the late Rev. James Buchanan, whom many of you will remember visited Langholm about two years ago and occupied the pulpit on that occasion. Barry is now married and has been living in South Africa. At the time of writing me he was about to set out on a 3500 miles yacht race. The name of his yacht is Christela, which may well figure in the news. Barry hopes to visit Scotland again perhaps later this year.
I also had a welcome letter from Ian Innes in Australia giving me all the news of his marriage to Cheryl Elizabeth Cooper in St. John's Church, Cessnock. Our best wishes go to Ian and Cheryl for happy years to come.
In Sympathy with the Bereaved
Mr. Malcolm Carmichael, 5 West Street, passed away on 22nd January at the age of 89. Malcolm was wonderfully fit right up to the last day with us. He lived a full and good life, joining the Guards in 1904 and serving with the same Regiment throughout the First World War. He leaves behind him happy memories of a life well spent in adventurous service, and of a man with a high sense of honour and a kind nature. His widow Mary Jane enjoyed 61 years of happy marriage, and to her and their family Helen Cowing, Grace Moore, Madge Murray, James and Malcolm, we extend our very sincere sympathy.
Miss Mary Elliot, Farringdon Cottage, passed away at St. Francis Home on 25th January at the age of 80. Mary spent her early years nursing in America and in London. We remember her for her quiet manner of life and her love of Sunday worship. Our sympathy in bereavement with her sisters Minnie and Margaret.
Mrs. Mary Black, 18 Waverley Road, passed away on 31st January at the age of 68. She is remembered as a former member of the Old Parish Church choir. Our deepest sympathy with her bereaved husband James Black, and with their family Jean and Robert.
Our highly esteemed Organist, Mr. James Cecil Carmichael, passed away on 2nd February at the age of 62. His passing away is a very great loss not only to our Old Parish Church, but to Langholm and a much wider community. Cecil, as he was familiarly known, played as piano soloist before he was a teenager, and as an organist studied under the well-known Dr. Wadley who was for long organist of Carlisle Cathedral. At the age of 17 he was appointed organist of the former Chalmers Church, and later became organist of Ewes Parish Church, and later in the Erskine Parish Church. Later, when our beloved Mr. Andrew Mallinson passed away in August, 1970, Cecil was appointed his successor. For 16 years he was official accompanist of the Langholm Operatic and Dramatic Society. He has spent his life finding joy and giving joy, in the leading of Sunday worship, in training choirs junior and senior, in teaching private pupils the knowledge and love of music and the piano. We remember him as a fine influence over musical instrumentalists in concerts and other social occasions. In his last months of failing health he displayed a wonderful courage, and fought bravely to regain his health and strength. Our deepest sympathy with his widow Jane, his son Leslie, and Douglas and Fiona who loved their grandfather very dearly.
Here I would like to express our warmest gratitude to Mr. A. Douglas McBay, Dip. Mus. Ed., R.S.A.M., A.R.C.O., Music Master, Langholm Academy, for standing in for Cecil in his last illness. And to Dr. W. R. C. Lang of Canonbie, for his services at a wedding during Cecil's illness.
With warm regards to all our people.
Yours sincerely,
TOM CALVERT, Minister.
TREASURER'S REPORT
January, 1973
F.W.O. 1973 £63.62 1972 £:45.63
Ordinary 1973 £:24.26 1972 £:36.78
Annuals 1973 £:10.10 1972 £:1.00
Covenant 1973 £:37.00 1972 £:37.00
Total 1973 £:134.98 1972 £:120.41
Increase in Offerings £:14.57.
NOTE: Freewill Offering envelopes for 1973 may be had on application to the Treasurer. New Covenant forms are also now available on application as above.
WOMAN'S GUILD
The next meeting of the Guild is Tuesday, 13th February, when Mr. Rodger Blamire, Rector, Langholm Academy, will speak on Border History and his talk with films.
On Tuesday, 27th Mr. W. McMillan will show films of local country interest.
YOUNG WIVES FELLOWSHIP
The next meeting will be on Tuesday, 20th February when the programme will be a demonstration on Floral Art.
CHURCH CALENDAR
February 11 - 11 a.m. and 6 p.m. Rev. Tom Calvert. Flowers, Miss Graham, Whita Cottage.
February 18 - 11 a.m. and 6 p.m. Mr. J. MacIntosh. Flowers, Miss Elizabeth Rowe, 30 Henry Street.
February 25 - 11 a.m. and 6 p.m. Rev. Tom Calvert. Flowers, Mrs. W. Kay, 22 Caroline Street.
March 4 - 11 a.m. and 6 p.m. Rev. Tom Calvert. Flowers, Mrs. James Morrison, Pathways.
BAPTISMS
January 14 - Anita Jane, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Grieve, Rosevale Bungalow.
January 21 - Richard Ian, son of Mr. and Mrs. Richard Howe, 73 Ashley Street, Carlisle.
MARRIAGE
January 31 - Mr. Hugh Barclay, Shillahill, Lockerbie, to Miss Barbara Marion Paterson, Hopsrig Farm.
IN MEMORIAM
January 22 - Malcolm Carmichael, 5 West Street. Age 89.
January 25 - Miss Mary Elliot, Farringdon Cottage. Age 80.
January 31 - Mrs. Mary Black, 18 Waverley Road. Age 68.
February 2 - James Cecil Carmichael, 10 Holmwood Drive. Age 62.
Our Lord's promise: "I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand." St. John 10. 28.