Langholm Old Church Parish Magazine

No.130                       Price 1/8p - with LIFE AND WORK - 8d LOCAL MAGAZINE ONLY                        May 1972.

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

Organist: Mr. A. C. Mallinson, A.R.C.O., L.R.A.M., 72 Henry Street.

Church Officer: Mr. W. Elliot, 3 Buccleuch Terrace.

Hall Caretaker: Mr. John Scott, 54 William Street.

Text for May “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” Genesis 18. 25. 1.

Sermon preached in our Old Parish Church by the Rev. James Beverley, B.D. on the subject, “Bargaining With God”.

Preachers sometimes give the impression that believing in God solves all problems in heaven and earth. We list the advantages that accrues to the believer, confidence, happiness, hope, a radiant spirit, peace of mind. I firmly believe that there are such by-products for the genuine believer, but they are surely not the real reasons nor the only results of having faith in God! There is another side to the picture. Real belief is demanding. It is not a soft option for those who are trying to find the answers in this mysterious business of life. And all who hold on to faith in God in every generation, including this one, have to wrestle with some darks suggestions that are not easily mastered. You might call these the disadvantages of believing in God, for there’s a cost to be paid when we take religion seriously. And it could be much easier just to coast along without bothering about belief at all.

Any sensitive man or woman who professes the Christiian faith, for instance, is bound to be troubled from time to time by what we might call the unfairness of God. We believe in God the Father Almighty, but we wonder why He has not kept a better balance between goodness on the one hand and what we call good fortune on the other. It seems terribly unfair that some of the best people we know are hit by illness and accident, while many who don’t seem to give-a-darn, or contribute anything worthwhile to life seem to get away unscathed. We sympathise with the psalmist when he complains:

“I have seen the wicked in great power and spreading himself like a green bay tree.”

And it seems unfair that when disaster strikes a community the innocent are the victims equally with the guilty. A group of unscrupulous Scoundrels may lead a nation into war, but when retaliatory bombs come they flatten the homes and kill the families of ordinary, decent people. It is surely unfair that a good man should be penalised just because he happens to live in an unsavoury society, or that wicked men should live like parasites on the benefits of a decent community. This is one of the agonising questions the believer wants to ask his God: “Why is life not more fair?”

This leads us to the point where we want to bargain with God. Just how much goodness is enough? we want to say. Surely if I try to do what is right and worship my God, He will protect my family from hardship? Surely a group of decent, God-fearing citizens can generate enough goodness to save a nation from disaster? There must be a scale somewhere, some kind of profit and loss account by which our sense of justice can be satisfied.

These are questions that torment me, as a believer, from time to time, and maybe they torment some of you too, although it is usually the unbeliever who voices them. But for the unbeliever they are no problem because he doesn’t acknowledge any God to whom he can protest. The believer is oppressed by them, but is often afraid to bring them out into the open. Some keep them so quiet that they come to think they are the only ones who have ever wanted to question the fairness of God or have wanted to bargain with the Almighty.

One of the refreshing features of the Bible is the directness with which these silent complaints of ours are forthrightly expressed. The Bible writers are not interested in working out philosophical theories to offer a neat answer to all our problems. They show real men and women giving voice to their questions to a real God! These Bible writers are not afraid to talk bluntly and honestly with their God and to respond to His invitation to “come let us reason together”. We often miss the point of Bible stories today because we have gotten so sophisticated we thing that we shouldn’t talk to God like that! We think that these old Bible writers were too naive with their pictures of a God with whom human beings entered into a lively dialogue. But the Bible writers knew just as well as we do that God is not a glorified kind of man up there in the sky. They had the most exalted conception of His itnfinite glory far beyond the reach of men. At the same time, however, they knew of His nearness to man, the man He had formed in His own image. And so they spoke with the utmost realism and simplicity as sons to a father which was also you remember, the way that Christ Himself encouraged His followers to speak.

One of the most vivid and fascinating stories in the Old Testament describes 3,.dialogue between a believer and his God. Here is a good and sensitive man, terribly conscious of the unfairness of life, and he talks it over with God.

The ancient city of Sodom has become a symbol of depravity and vice. The Bible simply says:

"The men of sodom were wicked and sinners before the Lord exceedingly"

And Sodom for its wickedness was to be destroyed. So far this looks like the kind of naive point of view that modern man expects to find in the Bible. It’s all black and white! The good escape; the wicked are punished! When nations behave well they prosper when they misbehave, they are destroyed! But this tale from Genesis is by no means so straightforward. Abraham comes into the story, Abraham the man who trusted God implicitly, the man who refused to be contaminated by the men of Sodom. And Abraham, sensing that Sodom is about to be destroyed, begins his extraordinary conversation with the Almighty.

“And Abraham drew near and said, ‘Wilt Thou really destroy the righteous with the wicked?'”

He is asking precisely the question we have in mind when contemplating the terrible disasters that swallow up whole communities by earthquake, volcanic eruption, or mean-made explosions. He is asking what we ask when we see someone in the prime of life being lost to us by death, or when a much longed for child is still-born or brain-damaged. How about the innocent?

Abraham goes on trying to strike a bargain with God.

“Suppose there are fifty good men in the city; will you really destroy it, and not pardon the place because of the fifty good men? Far be it from you to do this to. kill good and bad together for then the good suffer with the bad. Far be it from you.”

So far this voices our own sense of justice Why is life like this? Were there not fifty righteous in Hiroshima in August 1945? Butt Abrahamfis next words ring out from the page of the Bible as the ultimate cry of the man of faith confronted with this brute fact of history, and our almost daily experience.

"Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?”

Here we see the difference between the shallow belief that refuses to ask questions, or the petulant spirit that angrily accuses God of injustice, we see the difference between this and real faith. Abraham, a man of the utmost goodness and integrity, himself, cannot believe that his God can be less just, less merciful, than he is! So he is bold to raise the question, but humble enough to know he may not understand the answer.

"Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?”

That is still the only final answer to the question that torments us about this life or the next. You may remember how the story goes on:

“The Lord said, ‘If I find in Sodomy fifty righteous within the city, then I will pardon the whole place for their sake’.”

The Abraham ventures farther and with the profoundest humility:

"May I presume to speak to the Lord, dust and ashes.that, I am suppose. there are five short of the fifty good men? Wilt Thou destroy the whole city for a mere five men?”

God replied

"If I fmd forty five there I will not destroy it.”

So Abraham bargained farther still:

“Suppose that forty can be found there?”

God said:

“For the sake of forty I will not do it.”

And so the strange auction goes on as Abraham lowers the bid: “Forty, thirty, twenty then, he said:“I pray Thee not to be angry, O Lord, if I speak just once more: suppose ten can be found there?”

The Lord replied again:

“I will not destroy it for ten’s sake.”

I have always wanted this story to go on to the final countdown: ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one. But the point is made! The question is asked! The Lord responds! And the implication is that not one single righteous man was to be found in Sodom! The real twist of the story, however is its bold confrontation with the problem of justice, its assurance that the Lord God is not only the righteous, but merciful Judge, and above all its dramatic illustration of the power of the righteous to redeem a sick society.

The man of faith, in the Bible, whether it is Abraham, or Moses, or Job, or Peter, or Paul, is never shown sitting with folded hands, calmly accepting everything as the inscrutable will of God. Real faith is not a matter of kidding oneself that “everything is for the best in the best of all possible worlds.” Real faith means trusting God through light and darkness trusting God often in spite of what seems to us unreasonable and unfair. Such trust is not the soft and simple thing it is often made to appear. These men of the Bible and their successors today, are prepared to voice their protests, to reason with God, to pour out their senses of pain and injustice. At the very heart of the Bible we find such a cry on the lips of Christ Himself. For the words that came from the: Cross in the first agonizing moments were:

“My God why . . . . .?"

The very fact that we feel compelled to protest, to reason, even to bargain with God, indicates how deeply we believe in Him. We are not doing ourselves a favour when we pretend that we accept everything that comes along without a question! We are only kidding ourselves and perhaps doing serious injury to our relationship with God if we smother the impulse to protest toGod that He has dealt unfairly with us or with the world! Surely the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is great enough to put up with our protests! What is important, however, is that we stay long enough in His presence to reach the final and sufficient conviction:

“Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?”

This story of Abraham pleading with God for the people of Sodom is not only a surprising example of true faith in action; it brings to the surface a theme that lies deep in book after book of the Bible and is basic to our Christian faith, which is the mystery whereby the goodness of few, the faith even of only one, can be the means of bringing deliverance and health to a whole nation, a whole community.

When we talk about the unfairness of life, the uneven way in which good and bad fortune falls in individuals, we forget how closely bound we are together in the human family. There is no such thing as a lone individual who gets his exact desserts! We are interdependent from the moment of our birth. We share the lot of the family into which we were born. We accept the consequences of being raised in one particular community, of being citizens of a particular nation. We have already today been fed and clothed by the labour of others. Our education and our pleasures are bestowed on us from the society around us. If we share so much that is good, we must also share a great deal that is evil. By that I don't mean that we simply acquiesce in what is evil in our society, but that it is impossible for us to withdraw into an isolation booth and Say: “I’ll have nothing to do with the consequences of crime and bigotry and injustice and profligacy and war.”

We are so closely linked together in the human family that there can be no even handed distribution of rewards and punishments exactly according to our desserts! Who but God can judge, in any case, what these desserts really are?

The glorious thing about this passage from Genesis is the revelation of how the man of faith can take upon himself the burden of a community he knows to be almost wholly evil, and how a righteous minority can be the means of saving a world that is corrupt. Abraham, who had every reason to wash his hands of this city of Sodom, which was not the city he had chosen to live in, in sheer humanity pleads with God for their survival. And God is shown as accepting his plea that if only a handful of righteous can be found in the city, it will be spared. What more dramatic way could be found of declaring the central theme of the Bible that through the trust, the prayers, the goodness, and the suffering of the faithful new life and hope can be injected into the human family at its worst?

When you and I have seen terrible misfortune fall on one of the best families We know, or pain strike down the finest of our friends, or innocent people caught up in a tragedy they could not avoid, or one we would call a saint agonising over a desperate situation.

How do we respond? Do we revolt against the injustice? Do we talk of tragedy and waste? Do we become cynical and even bitter about the way things work out in this world? No one can give us a neat and satisfying answer. But look again at the Bible. It doesn't disguise for a moment these rough passages of human life. In fact, in the Book of Job and in the Gospels they are given more powerful expression than anywhere else where books are written and even though we may still be left with many questions unanswered, we are given the only light by which we can keep our trust and hope. For we are told of the immense and boundless power for good that is released into the world through the faithfulness and the suffering of the pure in heart.

We sometimes hear today of the “creative minority” that activates society, the few who really mould our.ways and stimulate the art and culture of our times. The Bible speaks of what the prophets called a “saving remnant” by which they meant a purifying minority through whose prayers and faith, through whose suffering and trial, human life is cleansed and strengthened and lifted nearer God.

“The Lord said, ‘If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare all the city for their sakes’.”

That's the twist in an ancient tale that delivers this truth even to us today. There is no limit to the power and goodness and trust in God incarnated in a human life, and offered to Him for others.

The deepest insight of the Old Testament was just here. .For they saw Ismael called to be such a saving remnant, to be such a purifying people in our world. And when national hopes collapsed and the vision was dimmed, they still believed that a faithful remnant would be the means of deliverance and new hope.

And through the swirling mists of history they perceived the figure of one solitary Man, the perfect Servant of God who through His suffering would bring deliverance an-d new life to the human race.

All we like sheep have gone astray: we have turned everyone to his own way: and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.

Don't we know who this Servant is? There was One who came to be Himself the purifying representative of all, the One wholly innocent who underwent the final darkness of mankind.

“Thou shalt call His name Jesus: for He shall save His people from their Sins.”

This is the One for whose sake we are healed restored, and accepted in the family of God. And it is in His name, and by His power, that we also are called to that same work of service and reconciliation. For He says to all who follow Him:

“You are the light of the world . . . . You are the salt of the earth.”

The question you and I must answer, the question His Church must answer is:

“Are we that in the world today?”

LETTER FROM THE MINISTER

Dear Fellow-Member,

I wish to take this opportunity of expressing my warmest thanks to Rev. James Beverley for giving me two Sundays holiday in April, and conducting inspiring Services in our Old Parish Church. The best tribute that could be paid to him was the large congregations Morning and Evening at each of the four Services he conducted. We were all greatly impressed by his telling preaching and his delightful personality. Langholm people are proud of Jim, now minister of one of the largest Churches of the Presbyterian Church in the United States. I am taking one of his sermons for our May Parish Magazine message, a sermon which reveals something of the quality of Jim’s mind and preaching ministry.

April Communion

I wish to thank our Session Clerk and elders for fulfilling their duties once again in such a quiet and devoted manner. The attendance at both Morning and Afternoon Communion Services was 374 which was 94 down on the attendance of the April Communion in 1971. The weather was imfavourable for many of the older members turning out, and the farming members are hindered at this season with hill lambing demands upon their time.

General Assembly

The 1972 General Assembly of the Church of Scotland opens in Edinburgh on 23rd May, when over 1300 ministers and elders will attend and hear reports on all aspects of the Church’s work at home and overseas, and take part in discussions and debates on future projects and policies. The Assembly will open with the traditional ceremony, with the retiring Moderator the Rt. Rev. Andrew Herron installing his successor, the Rev. Dr. R. Selby Wright, minister of the Canongate, Edinburgh. The Lord High Commissioner, the Queen’s representative at the Assembly, will for the second year be Lord Clydesmuir. After 17 years of distinguished service to the Church of Scotland the Very Rev. Dr. J. B. Longmuir, retires as Princinpal Clerk in the Autumn. His successor will be appointed on the opening day of the Assembly. While the Assembly meets in the Assembly Hall at the top of the Mound in Edinburgh, women's meetings will be held throughout the first week in the McEwan Hall. On the opening day of the Assembly the Woman’s Guild will hold their annual mass meeting when the guest speaker will be Mrs. Mary Whitehouse, leader of the Viewers and Listeners’ Association. Other women's .meetings on Home Board, Overseas‘ Mission and Social and Moral Welfare will be held throughout the week. A feature of this year's Assembly will be a “Family Festival” to be held on Assembly Sun-day in Princes Street Gardens. "Our elder, Mr. James Maxwell, and myself are commissioners this year.

Holidays for Irish Children

Boys at Geilsland Senior Boys School at Beith, a school managed by the Church of Scotland's Social Service Committee, are busy working on a children's holiday home at Millport, Isle of Cumbrae, which is to be made available to mothers and small children from the strife torn areas of Northern Ireland. This is part of a scheme being organised by the Church of Scotland in parallel with the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland, to provide holidays for Irish children from some of the worst affected areas of Northern Ireland. An appeal was launched by the Social Service Committee in February, and so far £1200 has been received from congregations and individuals. Other means of providing holidays are in hand, and further contributions to the Fund will be required to meet this.

Boys’ Brigade Annual Inspection and Display

The Fourteenth Annual Inspection and disp1ay of the 1st Langholm Company of the Boys’ Brigade took place in the Buocleuch Hall on Friday, 14th April. Bailie James Harkness presided, and the Inspecting Officer was Commander Ian D.S. Forbes, D.S.C. This was the first occasion for the 1st Langholm.Company of the Boys’ Brigade to have an officer of the Royal Navy as Inspecting Officer. There was a large attendance of parents and friends, and the display was well up to the usual high standard.

Commander Forbes paid tribute to the Boys’ Brigade as an organisation that encouraged lads to respect discipline and courtesy. The Captain’s report given by Ramsay Johnstone expressed thanks to the officers for their loyal and faithful service. Awards were presented by Mrs. Sheila A. Johnstone.

Plaque Recording Visit of Professor Neil Armstrong

At a recent meeting of the Kirk Session and Congregational Board Mr. E. C. Armstrong, Town Clerk, intimated that the Town Council would like to present a plaque to the Old Parish Church, recording the visit to Langholm and the Old Parish Church of Professor Neil Armstrong, the first man to set foot on the moon. Approval was given and appreciation expressed to the Provost who first proposed the giving of a plaque.

Special Services in May

The 9.30 a.m. Half-Hour Service commences on Sunday, 7th May and these early half-hour Services will continue until the end of September. It has been decided by the Kirk Session to hold a monthly Evening Service during the period the Half-Hour early Services are held, except in any special circumstances. The Evening Service on Sunday, 7th May will be conducted by the Moderator of Hawick Presbytery, Rev. George Urquhart, M.A., when Mr. J. MacIntosh will be appointed a Reader of the Church of Scotland.

On Sunday, 14th May I will be conducting the Morning Service in St. Margaret’s and Wilton South, Hawick, and the 11 a.m Service in our Old Parish Church will be conducted by Mr. J. Maclntosh.

On Sunday, 21st May the Evening Service will be attended by the Worthy Matron, Mrs. Milligan and members of the Order of the Eastern Star.

On Sunday, 28th May, the 11 a.m. Service will be conducted by the Rev. J. Douglas Duff, M.A., B.D., when he will baptise his granddaughter, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Neil Douglas, Arresgill.

. Sympathy With the Bereaved On 12th April Gillian Graham of Old Irvine passe-d away at the age of five and half years, after -two years illness. Her parents and doctors and nurses fought Fhard for her recovery, and we all prayed earnestly "with this hope in our hearts. Our tenderest sym- pathy with her father and mother, Fergie and Ann, and her brother Stuart.

On 13th April Mathew Douglas of the Parsonage, Langholm, passed away at the age of 68. For the past five years since his retirement he battled against failing health, but remained always hopeful and cheerful. For many years he served our Old Parish Church as a devoted elder, and was a regular worshipper when health allowed. For many years he was a member of the Langholm Town Band, and was widely known throughout the Border district through his occupation and high reputation as a builder. Our deepest sympathy with his widow Annie and his daughter Marion and her family of David and Rosalind.

On 23rd April Margaret Hume passed away in Greenbank Eventide Home at the age of 80. One of the first to be admitted when the Home was opened Miss Hume brought a lot of cheer and consideration into Greenbank. She was devoted to her Church and always anxious to help in any way. Miss Hume had many friends in Langholm and will be greatly missed, by them. We are specially grateful to Matron Blackwell and the staff of Greenbank for the devoted care bestowed upon Margaret Hume.

On 26th April Jane Murray passed away at Erkinholme at the wonderful age of 94. Her relatives have happy memories of their visits to her and of always finding her cheerful.

With greetings to all our people.

Yours sincerely,

TOM CALVERT, Minister.
KIRK SESSION REPORT

The following were received into the membership of our Church on Sunday, 30th April.

First Communicants, Scott Haldane Morrison, Commercial Place, Andrew L. Ritchie, 18 High Street, Joseph Brent Thomlinson, 66 Townfoot.

By Certificate Rev. R. S. Wilson, St. Francis Erkinholme, formerly minister of Ecclefechan; Capt. David and Dr. Lethem-White, Watcarrick; Mrs. Ian Rodger, 11 Charlotte Street; Mrs. Pearson, 99 Townfoot.

CHURCH CALENDAR

May 14 9.30 a.m. Half-Hour Service. 11 a.m. and 6 p.m. Rev. Tom Calvert. Flowers, Mrs. R. Douglas, Westwater.

May 21 9.30 a.m. Half-Hour Service. 11 a.m. Morning Service. 6 p.m. Evening Service attended by members of the Eastern Star. Rev. Tom Calvert. Flowers, Mrs. W. Elliot, 3 Buccleuch Terrace.

May 28 9.30 a.m. Half-Hour Service. 11 a.m. Moring Service. Rev. Tom Calvert and Rev. J. Douglas Duff, B.D. Flowers, Mrs. David Hendrie, Cleuchfoot.

June 4 9.30 a.m. Half-Hour Service. 11 a.m. Morning Service Rev. Tom Calvert. Flowers, Mrs. Stuart Paisley, Thisbe.

MARRIAGE

April 15 John Robert Johnstone, 2 Braehead, to Alexis Jarzyna, 8 Holmwood Crescent.IN MEMORIAM

April 12 Gillian Graham, Old Irvine. Age 5 years.

April 13 Matthew Douglas, The Parsonage. Age 68 years.

April 23 Margaret Hume, Greenbank Eventide Home, Age 80 years.

April 26 Jane Murray, St. Francis Erkinholme. Age 94 years.

“Because I live, ye shall live also”. St. John 14. 19.