p. 245 | THE THREEFOLD CORD

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Tuesday, April 21, 1885

FromAdvent Review and Sabbath Herald, Vol. 62, No. 16

THE THREEFOLD CORD.

Some one has said, “Knowing, giving, praying, are the three strands of the rope by which the car of missions is drawn.” Much is contained in the remark, and, following out the figure, we find that each strand is indispensable to the successful twining of the other two strands of the cable. Without knowing, the giving will be constrained and meager; without knowing and giving, the praying will lack earnestness and definiteness. We cannot take an interest in the subjects of which we are ignorant, and we cannot expect believing prayer where there is lack of interest in the subjects for which prayer is offered. Information must always precede enthusiastic work. Giving will follow when the mind has been informed, the conscience enlightened, and the heart interested; and prayer, earnest prayer, will follow knowing and giving, prayer being the golden strand that will twine into strength and beauty the other cords of the cable, and give them a permanence and power without which they will be useless. All the knowledge we can obtain, all the gifts we can bestow, all the service we may render, will fail in their purpose unless the whole be interwoven with the strand of prayer. It is said that “through every fathom of cordage manufactured for the British government, there runs a scarlet thread, so that every fragment of it, whether found among the icebergs of the North or on the beach of some coral island in the tropics, may speak of the ‘Sovereign of the Seas.’” Shall we not give to our work that prayer, that faith, that consecration of self, that shall be the scarlet thread that marks it indeed the King’s cordage? And the heathen shall know the sign, and shall say, “These be the King’s messengers.”—Rel. Intelligencer.