December 12

The power I possess

“A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump” (1 Cor. 5:6).
“For what knowest thou, O wife, whether thou shalt save thy husband? or how knowest thou, O man, whether thou shalt save thy wife?” (1 Cor. 7:16).

The stone flung from my careless hand into the lake splashed down into the depths of the flowing water, and that was all. No, it was not all. Look at those concentric rings rolling their tiny ripples among the sedgy reeds dipping the overhanging boughs of yonder willow and producing an influence slight but conscious, to the very shores of the lake itself. That hasty word, that word of pride or scorn, flung from my lips in casual company produces a momentary depression, and that is all. No, it is not all. It deepened that man’s disgust at godliness, and it sharpened the edge of that man’s sarcasm, and it shamed that half-converted one out of his penitent misgivings, and it produced an influence slight but eternal on the destiny of an immortal life.


Oh, this power that I have—this power of influence, and it clings to me. I cannot shake it off. It is born with me. It has grown with my growth and strengthened with my strength. It speaks, it walks, it moves; it is powerful in every look of my eye, in every word of my lips, in every act of my life. I cannot live to myself. I must either be a light to illumine, or a tempest to destroy. I must either be an Abel, who by his immortal righteousness being dead yet speaketh, or an Achan, the saddest continuance of whose otherwise forgotten name is the fact that man perishes not alone in his iniquity.
O brethren, this necessary element of power belongs to you all. Thy sphere may be contracted, thine influence may be small, but a sphere and an influence you have.
—W. Morley Punshon.

A note so low that none but Echo heard,
Was sung into the world one Summer day;
The singer died,—the song went on its way,
At first as faint as call of sleeping bird,
While Echo carried it in rhythmic word
From rock to rock, until it went astray
Into the outer space, where Freedom lay,
And all the world then listened and was stirred.
And none could name or trace its humble birth,
Not even Echo, who had simply known
It as a broken note of little worth;—
So many voices now had swelled the tone,
It floated far beyond the bounds of earth
And blended with the songs around the Throne.
—Mary A. Mason

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