The Greatest Of These John Bradshaw

Visit to download the full and correct content document:

https://ebookmass.com/product/the-greatest-of-these-john-bradshaw/
More products digital (pdf, epub, mobi) instant
download maybe you interests ...

The Power Of The Cross John Bradshaw

https://ebookmass.com/product/the-power-of-the-cross-john-
bradshaw/

Steps To Salvation John Bradshaw

https://ebookmass.com/product/steps-to-salvation-john-bradshaw/

Beneath a Frosty Moon Rita Bradshaw [Bradshaw

https://ebookmass.com/product/beneath-a-frosty-moon-rita-
bradshaw-bradshaw/

Legacy of Time: The Story of John, the Greatest Time

Traveler of All Time Sara Bahou

https://ebookmass.com/product/legacy-of-time-the-story-of-john-
the-greatest-time-traveler-of-all-time-sara-bahou/
These Are the Words Nikita Gill

https://ebookmass.com/product/these-are-the-words-nikita-gill/

The Greatest Possible Being Jeff Speaks

https://ebookmass.com/product/the-greatest-possible-being-jeff-
speaks/

The Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games

(2006) Graham Burgess

https://ebookmass.com/product/the-mammoth-book-of-the-worlds-
greatest-chess-games-2006-graham-burgess/

The Greatest Romance Novels of Grace Livingston Hill

Grace Livingston Hill

https://ebookmass.com/product/the-greatest-romance-novels-of-
grace-livingston-hill-grace-livingston-hill/

The Pearl of Greatest Price: Mormonism's Most

Controversial Scripture Terryl Givens

https://ebookmass.com/product/the-pearl-of-greatest-price-
mormonisms-most-controversial-scripture-terryl-givens/
 Published by It Is Written
P.O. Box 6, Chattanooga, TN 37401

Copyright © 2023 by It Is Written. All rights reserved.

Edited by Vanessa Boeser.
Cover design by Nestor Rasi.
Layout by Jennifer Sarria.

Additional copies of this book and a

host of other spiritual resources are available
from It Is Written. For more information call
toll free 1-888-664-5573 or visit
itiswritten.shop

Unless otherwise noted, all Bible texts are from the

Authorized King James Version or from the
New King James Version, copyright 1979, 1980, 1982
by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission.

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN 978-1-63569-405-5
 It’s one of the most talked about, sung about,
and written about things in the history of talking,
singing, and writing and yet is still not easy to
define. A dictionary might define love as a deep
affection for or a strong liking or interest in some-
thing. Which, when it comes to love, is about as
inadequate a definition as you can find.
One might feel affection for one’s niece
or nephew or puppy or one’s neighbor’s
grandchild. Is that love? It may well be. If love
were a strong liking or interest in something,
one may love baseball, jigsaw puzzles, or
accordion music. Yet when the songwriters write
about love, they’re not typically talking about
jigsaw puzzles or polka.
2 The Greatest of These
There have been so many songs written about
love that Paul McCartney even wrote a song
about the preponderance of love songs. “You’d
think that people would’ve had enough of silly
love songs,”1 he wrote in his 1976 number-one
hit song. The chorus of the song contained just
three words: “I love you.”2
But the question is: What is love? “O my
Luve’s like a red, red rose, that’s newly sprung
in June,”3 wrote Robert Burns in the 1700s. In
“When You Are Old,” a young W.B. Yeats wrote
in 1891, “But one man loved the pilgrim soul
in you, and loved the sorrows of your chang-
ing face.”4 King Solomon wrote the Song of
Solomon, a love story, about 1,000 years before
Jesus was born.

1 Paul McCartney, “Silly Love Songs,” Songfacts, https://

www.songfacts.com/lyrics/paul-mccartney-wings/silly-
love-songs, accessed January 2, 2023.
2 Ibid.
3 Robert Burns, “My Luve is like a Red Red Rose,” BBC,
https://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/robertburns/works/my_luve_
is_like_a_red_red_rose/, accessed January 2, 2023.
4 William Butler Yeats, “When You Are Old,” Poetry Foun-
dation, https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43283/
when-you-are-old, accessed January 2, 2023.
 The Greatest of These 3

One of the highest-grossing movies of all time

was a love story titled, “Love Story.”5 And while
the motion picture (starring Ali MacGraw and
Ryan O’Neal) told the tale of university students
who married and then went through adversity to-
gether—a love story—much of what is referred to
today as “love” would not nearly rise to that level.
What is termed “love” might often more appro-
priately be termed “lust” or “infatuation.”
The human love affair with love goes back a
very long way. Ancient Romans had a goddess of
love, Venus. To the Greeks, she was Aphrodite.
Temples were built and dedicated to her. Rome
and Greece were not unique in their homage to
love, as many cultures had gods and goddesses
of love.
Today, the Western world has even set aside
a day on which to remember love. It is esti-
mated that Americans spent almost $24 bil-
lion on Valentine’s Day in 2022,6 making it the

5 Arthur Hiller (director) and Erich Segal (writer), “Love

Story,” IMDb, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0066011/,
accessed January 2, 2023.
6 “2022 Valentine’s Day Spending,” National Retail Feder-
ation, https://nrf.com/research-insights/holiday-and-sea-
sonal-trends/valentines-day, accessed January 2, 2023.
4 The Greatest of These
fifth-largest consumer spending event on the
calendar.7 However, other than goosing retailers’
profits, it’s hard to see what Valentine’s Day ac-
tually accomplishes. A cynic might wonder if the
man who buys his wife a gift on Valentine’s Day
is doing so because he has to or if the woman who
buys something for her man does so because she
knows how bad it might look should she not do
so. Americans spending $24 billion celebrating
Valentine’s Day does nothing to mitigate the di-
vorce rate. While there are 1.6 million marriages
each year, there are 630,000 divorces (a statistic
that fails to include data from five US states).8
And this at a time when more and more people
are choosing to forego marriage and live instead
in common-law arrangements.
Some of the most well-known and best-loved
verses of the Bible deal with the subject of love.
“For God so loved the world that He gave His

7 Elana Dure, “Valentine’s Day Shoppers Are Expected

to Spend $23.9B in 2022,” The Balance, https://www.
thebalancemoney.com/happy-valentine-s-day-retailers-
feeling-the-love-3306043, accessed January 2, 2023.
8 “Marriage and Divorce,” CDC, https://www.cdc.gov/
nchs/fastats/marriage-divorce.htm, accessed January 4,
2023.
 The Greatest of These 5

only begotten Son,” according to John 3:16. “I

have loved you with an everlasting love,” God de-
clared through the prophet Jeremiah (Jer. 31:3).
And then, one of the most profound statements
ever written about God—and about love. John
wrote in 1 John 4:8, “God is love.” Not that God
loves, which, of course, He does. But that God is
love. The thought impressed John so much that
he repeated it eight verses later. “God is love.”
And we can think of many instances that
would support that incredible proposition. The
Creation of the world. That was an act of love.
Extending the lives of Adam and Eve after they
sinned. Liberating Israel from Egyptian tyranny.
Relocating Israel to the Promised Land. Jesus for-
giving the woman taken in adultery. Jesus healing
people or raising some from the dead, forgiving
the thief on the cross.… There are many, many
examples of the immense love of God in action.
However …
It wouldn’t be fair or honest to ignore some
of the more challenging aspects of God’s deal-
ings with the human family. About 1,600 years
after the Creation of the world, God destroyed
the world. A cataclysmic flood ended the lives of
6 The Greatest of These
every person on the planet with the exception of
only eight souls. Everyone else—dead. The plan-
et itself was destroyed. Apart from those animals
that got on the ark—seven of every clean creature
and two each of the unclean—animal life was
also destroyed. Every person but eight, and every
creature other than those that got on Noah’s ark,
was destroyed. And yet, God is love.
Some of the most spectacular movements of
the power of God involved the death of many
people. At Mt. Carmel, shortly after God sent fire
from heaven, the prophet Elijah killed 400 false
prophets. A day of great victory for God was also
a day where blood was shed in abundance. What
was it John wrote? “God is love.”
God was repeatedly responsible for the defeat
of great armies. In the time of King Jehoshaphat,
a powerful military bloc threatened to total-
ly destroy the inhabitants of Judah. But by the
power of God, Judah’s enemies turned on each
other. A signal victory was won for the armies of
Jehoshaphat, without them having to fire a shot.
But while it was a glorious day for Judah, it can-
not be forgotten that what made the day espe-
cially glorious was something especially tragic.
Multitudes lost their lives. And God willed it so.
 The Greatest of These 7

People are troubled by this. And perhaps they

would be less troubled if the Bible did not confi-
dently proclaim that “God is love.” It was under the
aegis of the Holy Spirit that the city of Jericho was
destroyed. The inspired record states that Joshua’s
armies “utterly destroyed all that was in the city,
both man and woman, young and old, and ox, and
sheep, and ass, with the edge of the sword” (Josh.
6:21, KJV). Six hundred or so years later, during
the reign of King Hezekiah, 185,000 Assyrians lost
their lives in a single night. In Gideon’s day, the
Midianites and the Amalekites, “like grasshoppers
for multitude” (Judges 7:12, KJV), were routed by
Gideon’s God-directed armies.
So why did God direct the destruction of en-
tire people groups? And how can He do such a
thing and still be “love”? First, we remember that
God is “not willing that any should perish but
that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).
While someone is putting together a list of na-
tions defeated at the behest of God, it should not
be forgotten that God not only created the world
but has extended life and breath to everyone
who has ever lived. His mercies are “new every
morning” (Lam. 3:23, KJV). “Great is thy faith-
fulness,” the prophet wrote (Ibid.). It is God who
8 The Greatest of These
upholds “all things by the word of His power”
(Heb. 1:3). It isn’t intellectually honest to charge
God with cruelty while choosing to ignore the
many, many evidences of His goodness and love.
Yet the fact remains, “God is love” (1 John
4:8) appears in the same Bible as “Now go and
attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they
have, and do not spare them. But kill both man
and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and
sheep, camel and donkey” (1 Sam. 15:3).
So why did God—who is love—direct King
Saul to destroy the Amalekites?
The Amalekites were the descendants of Esau.
The union of Esau’s son, Eliphaz, and a concu-
bine named Timna produced, among others, a
child named Amalek.
The Bible record states that shortly after
Moses led God’s people out of Egypt via the mi-
raculous Red Sea crossing, “[t]hen came Amalek,
and fought with Israel in Rephidim” (Exod.
17:8, KJV). This unprovoked attack resulted in
the famous battle during which Aaron and Hur
secured victory for God’s people by holding up
Moses’ arms during the battle. “And it came to
pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel
prevailed: and when he let down his hand,
 The Greatest of These 9

Amalek prevailed” (verse 11, KJV). Duplicitous

Balaam, who once carried on a conversation with
a donkey, spoke of Amalek under the inspiration
of the Spirit of God and said, “Amalek was the
first of the nations; but his latter end shall be that
he perish for ever” (Num. 24:20, KJV).
In Deuteronomy, God said of Amalek:
‘Remember what Amalek did to you on
the way as you were coming out of Egypt,
how he met you on the way and attacked
your rear ranks, all the stragglers at your
rear, when you were tired and weary; and
he did not fear God. Therefore it shall be,
when the LORD your God has given you
rest from your enemies all around, in the
land which the LORD your God is giving
you to possess as an inheritance, that you
will blot out the remembrance of Amalek
from under heaven. You shall not forget.’
(Deut. 25:17–19)
So, God holds a grudge? Not by any means.
God knew that the same people who had attacked
Israel once would do so again and again. The
Amalekites were not upstanding citizens. By the
time Saul was king, a little more than 1,000 years
10 The Greatest of These
before the birth of Jesus, they were profoundly
wicked, having rejected every evidence they had
witnessed for the goodness and power of God.
Fully aware of Israel’s miraculous deliverance
from Egypt, they remained defiant. Yet it wasn’t
anger that moved God to order their destruction.
God knew that several hundred years after
Amalek’s first encounter with Israel and Israel’s
God, the Amalekites would never repent. The
Amalekites were not like your rowdy neighbors,
with a penchant for playing loud music late into
the night, leaving old cars in their front yard,
drinking too much, and getting into occasion-
al trouble with the law. These were not lovable
rogues. Every Amalekite child grew up to be a dev-
il, to live a miserable life, and to make other people
miserable. Rather than leave them to pollute the
earth with their presence; rather than leave them
to commit atrocity after atrocity; rather than let
their children grow up with a hopeless future, God
knew it was better that they were gone.
It does sound harsh: “Go and destroy them
all.” But it wasn’t mayhem, malice, hate, or ven-
om that led to the destruction of the Amalekites.
It was … love. A God of love knew in His wis-
dom that this group of people would never repent
 The Greatest of These 11

and that Israel would be better for the Amalekite’s

absence. Also, God was safeguarding the birth of
the Messiah. The Amalekites, left unchecked,
fueled by the devil, may well have succeeded in
carrying out Satan’s plans.
Since the fall of the world, the promise of the
Messiah has been the ultimate beacon of hope
for this sinful planet. And while the advent of the
Savior has meant hope for humanity, it also prom-
ises the end of evil. While promising everlasting life
to human beings, the same event guarantees the de-
struction of Satan and his angels. God told Satan as
far back as the Garden of Eden, “He [the Messiah,
Jesus] shall bruise your head” (Gen. 3:15).
So, it’s easy to understand why Satan was so
determined to prevent the Messiah from being
born. The birth of the Messiah meant the guar-
antee of Satan’s ultimate destruction was draw-
ing near. There is no doubt that throughout His
life on Earth, Satan sought to distract and derail
Jesus. The Bible records that when Jesus was a
man, Satan did all he could to distress and even
destroy the divine Son of God. If Jesus had yield-
ed to the devil’s temptations in the wilderness, all
would have been lost for the human race. Satan
knew that and therefore bent his every energy
12 The Greatest of These
that Jesus might fail in His mission to redeem the
human family.
This is why Satan worked so hard through
groups like the Amalekites. He intended to
thwart heaven’s attempts to save sinners. There
was too much at stake for God to allow the dev-
il to succeed. Further, in the destruction of the
Amalekites and others like them, it was revealed
to the surrounding nations that Israel’s God
was the only true God. The destruction of the
Amalekites was an appeal to other nations to turn
from their sin and surrender their hearts to God.
What’s fascinating is that King Saul’s refusal
to obey God and destroy the entire Amalekite na-
tion very nearly resulted in the total annihilation
of Israel.
Approximately 500 years after Samuel or-
dered Saul to eradicate the children of Amalek,
the remarkable drama that was the story of
Queen Esther unfolded. Furious that Mordecai
refused to pay him homage, the vile Haman, an
official in the Medo-Persian government of King
Artaxerxes, conspired to commit genocide against
the entire Jewish nation. It was only the bold
intervention of Esther that prevented Haman’s
murderous plot from being carried out. The Bible
 The Greatest of These 13

states that Haman was an Agagite (Esther 3:1), a

descendent of the people group Saul faithlessly
failed to deal with after the will of God.
It was love that moved God to call for the erad-
ication of the Amalekites. Love for the Amalekites,
as God saw the future of the nation and knew in
His wisdom that the Amalekites would never rise
above their wickedness and sin; love for His peo-
ple, Israel, as He sought to preserve them from
their vicious enemies; and love for all who would
afterward have the opportunity to accept Jesus as
Lord and Savior and inherit everlasting life.
The same could be said for the world in the
time of Noah’s flood. It was love that led God to
destroy a world that was marinating in sin, whose
inhabitants were completely given over to sin and
wickedness. It wasn’t spite or acrimony that saw
God kill all but eight people. It was love; love for
the lost, and love for the world to come.

Part Two
What is love, really?
Real love is often confused for something
far less consequential. While a 14-year-old boy
14 The Greatest of These

might think he loves his pretty neighbor, he is not

experiencing what a person of experience would
identify as love. He is infatuated. Love is often
confused with lust. It is not love that separates a
home. The employer didn’t “love” her handsome
employee, nor did the man “love” the attractive
co-worker who ended up wrecking his marriage.
Illicit “love” is not love but lust. People have a
happy knack for confusing love with a rush of
dopamine or norepinephrine.
Genuine love is always in accordance with
the will of God. It is so important to God that
we accurately understand love, that He placed
an entire chapter in the Bible for the purpose of
helping us to recognize and therefore aspire to
genuine, biblical love.
In 1 Corinthians chapter 13, Paul wrote:
Love suffers long and is kind; love does
not envy; love does not parade itself, is not
puffed up; does not behave rudely, does
not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks
no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but
rejoices in the truth; bears all things, be-
lieves all things, hopes all things, endures
all things. Love never fails. (1 Cor. 13:4–8)
 The Greatest of These 15

The inspired writer penned what must be the

greatest explanation of love that has ever been
written. He states that love “suffers long and is
kind.” Love is patient, according to Paul. And
tellingly, Paul doesn’t say love is mostly patient or
almost always patient. Paul challenges his readers
by telling them that love is patient—always and
in every situation.
Most people are going to read Paul’s words
and quickly realize that they don’t possess that
kind of love. Which may well be the point of Paul
writing what he wrote. Humans have not been
called by God to be better versions of themselves
but instead to “press toward the mark for the prize
of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Phil.
3:14, KJV). The objective of the gospel is that
sinners might become “a new creature,” where
“old things are passed away; behold, all things are
become new” (2 Cor. 5:17, KJV). In other words,
we are called to love as God loves.
Love, according to the inspired apostle, “does
not envy.” Love is not jealous. In Acts 7:9 (KJV),
Luke writes that Joseph’s brothers were “moved
with envy” when they sold him into slavery. There
is no competitiveness or jealousy in the heart of
the one who has true love for another.
16 The Greatest of These
Paul states that love “does not parade itself.” It is
not boastful. Love does not brag, and it is not arro-
gant. It is not rude and does not seek its own benefit.
That one point may be a revelation for many peo-
ple. Real love, genuine love, does not seek its own
advantage. We’ll come back to this idea. Genuine
love is more inclined to seek the good of another
person than to seek one’s own advantage.
According to Paul, love is “not provoked.”
Which means the irascible person with a hair
trigger for a temper still has a lot of growing to
do. Between road rage, stress, a lack of sleep,
and challenging personal circumstances, it seems
more people than ever default to venting their
frustration. Yet the love of God, according to
Paul, is not provoked.
Love “thinks no evil,” Paul writes. And as if
the bar had not yet been raised high enough, Paul
takes love even higher. Love “does not rejoice in
iniquity, but rejoices in the truth.” Love doesn’t
delight in unrighteous behavior, whether one’s
own or that of another. It bears, believes, hopes,
and endures. And Paul sums up this phenomenal
passage of his letter to the Corinthian church by
stating succinctly that “love never fails.” It never
comes to an end.
 The Greatest of These 17

No one knows a single person who manifests that

kind of love. It’s worth asking the question: What
kind of love is this? The follow-up question is obvi-
ous: How can a selfish, fallen person love that way?
The sixth of the seven churches in the book
of Revelation is the church at Philadelphia.
Situated about seventy-five miles inland from
the Aegean Sea, and roughly the same distance
from the churches at both Ephesus and Smyrna,
Philadelphia, known as Alasehir, is also known
for the production of raisins and fresh fruit. It
was named Philadelphia in honor of a man who
earned the nickname, Philadelphos or “one who
loves his brother.” Derived from the Greek words
adelphos, which means “brother,” and phileo,
meaning “love,” Philadelphia means, “brotherly
love.” It is one of several Greek words that mean
“love.” Phileo is brotherly love. You don’t phileo
your mother or your parakeet. When Mary and
Martha alerted Jesus about the failing health of
their brother, Lazarus, their message said, “Lord,
behold, he whom You love [phileo] is sick” (John
11:3). With some exceptions, phileo in the Bible
connotes brotherly love.
Although the word eros does not appear in
the Bible, the concept of eros does. Eros is the
18 The Greatest of These
sensual love of a man for a woman or a woman
for a man. The word “erotic” is derived from the
Greek word eros. Eros was the Greek god of love
and sex. To the Romans, he was Cupid.
Another Greek word for love which, like eros,
does not appear in the Bible, is storge, a familial
love, such as the love of a parent for a child. But
beyond phileo, eros, and storge, there is another
love which all people are called to manifest. And
this is the love of God for the fallen human race.
In the most famous verse in the Bible, Jesus
states, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his
only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him
should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John
3:16). The word translated “love” is not phileo, eros,
or storge but agape. “For God so agaped the world,
that he gave his only begotten Son.”
When John wrote that “God is love,” he wrote
that “God is agape” (1 John 4:8,16). Paul wrote
to the church in Rome and said that “tribulation,
or distress, or persecution, or famine, or naked-
ness, or peril, or sword” shall not be able to “sep-
arate us from the love [the agape] of God” (Rom.
8:35, 39). He wrote, “I am persuaded, that nei-
ther death, nor life, nor angels, nor principali-
ties, nor powers, nor things present, nor things
 The Greatest of These 19

to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other

creature, shall be able to separate us from the love
of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom.
8:38–39, KJV). Again, the word used for “love”
is the Greek word “agape.”
Agape is not a sentimental love. Love is a prin-
ciple, not an emotion. Agape love, the love of God
for the human family, the love God calls us to
exercise towards Him and our fellow human, is a
self-sacrificing love. It wasn’t phileo love that drove
Jesus to the cross. It isn’t storge love that God feels
towards the lost. Instead, it is a deep, unshakable
love that puts others first without expecting any-
thing in return. Which makes agape very different
to what most people consider love to be.
True, biblical love isn’t expressed by chubby
angels with bows and arrows. The trivialities of
Valentine’s Day, when entire supermarket aisles
are dedicated to candy and chocolate, entirely miss
the mark in terms of expressing the depths of love.
Agape love is a choice and is not forced or coerced.
Love cannot be separated from God. And
the Bible depicts love in some beautiful ways.
In Genesis, “Jacob served seven years for Rachel;
and they seemed unto him but a few days, for the
love he had to her” (Gen. 29:20, KJV). Solomon
20 The Greatest of These
wrote, “Many waters cannot quench love, nei-
ther can the floods drown it: if a man would give
all the substance of his house for love, it would
utterly be contemned” (Song of Sol. 8:7, KJV).
Jesus said, “[T]he Father Himself loves you”
(John 16:27).
The agape love of God is so vast that even
Bible writers wrestled with how best to explain it.
Writing in 1 John 3:1, John wrote, “Behold what
manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that
we should be called children of God!” To under-
stand it, John wrote, “Look upon it. Behold it.”
Hearing about it evidently wasn’t enough. John
urged his readers to look upon the love of God,
to examine the way it was manifest. “We sinners,”
John wrote, “the children of God! That is love!”
As mentioned, John 3:16 equates the depth of
the love of God with the death of Jesus in behalf of
the human family. The divine Son of God dying
in behalf of sinful mortals; the sinless One, dying
for the sins of the world; Perfection itself, coming
so low as to assume the guilt of a rebel planet, that
the undeserving might be treated as though they
were deserving of the honor due the Savior. This is
the love of God for humanity. Every sinful, erring,
flawed, wicked, corrupt individual that ever lived
 The Greatest of These 21

means so much to the God of heaven that He was

willing to give Jesus that we might be “reconciled
to God by the death of his Son” and “saved by his
life” (Rom. 5:10, KJV).
Romans 5:8 says, “But God demonstrates His
own love toward us, in that while we were still
sinners, Christ died for us.” It’s not just that God
died for us, as incredible as that is. Paul said Jesus
died for us “while we were still sinners.” That
“when we were enemies we were reconciled to
God through the death of His Son” (verse 10).
Jesus prayed for the very people who put Him
to death! “Father, forgive them,” He prayed, “for
they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34, KJV).
In a similar way, the martyr Stephen, when he
was about to be executed, “kneeled down, and
cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to
their charge” (Acts 7:60, KJV). After the golden
calf apostasy, Moses prayed God would forgive
Israel before adding, “[B]ut if not, I pray, blot me
out of Your book which You have written” (Exod.
32:32).
You’ll notice what characterizes the love of
God for undeserving sinners. Jesus came into the
world “not to be ministered unto, but to minister,
and to give his life a ransom for many” (Matt.
22 The Greatest of These
20:28, KJV). Jesus washed the feet of His disci-
ples, including the feet of the one who would,
minutes later, betray Him to be ruthlessly killed.
Paul described Jesus when he wrote:
Let this mind be in you, which was also
in Christ Jesus: who, being in the form of
God, thought it not robbery to be equal
with God: but made himself of no rep-
utation, and took upon him the form of
a servant, and was made in the likeness
of men: and being found in fashion as a
man, he humbled himself, and became
obedient unto death, even the death of the
cross. (Phil. 2:5–8, KJV)
The love of God is a love that puts others first.
God’s love is a self-sacrificing love that doesn’t ask
what it may receive in return. Loving God’s way
is to love with that same attitude. Love without
gain. Love without self-interest. Love without ego
or pride or greed.
It is a concept that is foreign to the natural
human heart. Since sin entered the world, people
have been naturally selfish, motivated primarily
by their own interests and desires. Not so with
God. Hebrews 7:25 states that Jesus “always lives
 The Greatest of These 23

to make intercession for” “those who come to God

through Him.” It’s an incredible thought. Unlike
kings and queens and heads of state and earthly
dignitaries, Jesus did not seek honor for Himself
when He came into the world. He sought to glo-
rify His Father (John 8:49) and reveal His Father
to the world (John 14:9).
This is why the Bible is specific in identifying
the kind of love Christians are to have for God
and their fellow person. God calls us higher than
manifesting brotherly love or familial love or sen-
sual love. God calls us higher by calling us lower.
God calls us to honor by commissioning us to be
servants of others and to live and love with the in-
terests of others before the interests of ourselves.
So, what does that look like when it comes to
loving God? How is genuine love for God to be
demonstrated in the life of a believer?

Of course, Valentine’s Day has nothing at all

to do with the Bible. It has little to do with love.
Caricatures of little angels with bows and arrows
portraying love actually represent the Roman god
of love, Cupid. Frankly, a little blasphemous.
24 The Greatest of These
Imagine if the love of God was like Valentine’s
Day. That is, if just once a year God showered
His love upon you! Thankfully, God’s love is con-
stant. It never fails. Every single day, God’s love is
towards you. Jeremiah wrote that God’s mercies
are “new every morning” (Lam. 3:23).
The sad truth is that many people don’t know
the love of God. And for some people, that’s com-
pounded by their experiences. Some people have
been rejected or been through tough times or have
made choices that didn’t turn out the best. Some feel
as though nobody loves them and that they’ve made
too many mistakes. Under some circumstances, it
can be hard to really know the love of God. So how
can you know—for sure—that God loves you?
Whenever I have asked people how they have
seen God’s love in their life, I have been told some-
thing like, “When I needed a new vehicle, I got
one.” “I found a new job right after losing my last
one.” “We have food on our table.” “We went to
the Bahamas on vacation.” “I almost wrecked my
car, and it was a miracle I didn’t.” Yes, and all that’s
good. But the problem is, what if the accident
had occurred? What if you lost your job and went
broke? What if you DIDN’T get a new vehicle and
you had to rely on public transport? The blessings
 The Greatest of These 25

we receive from God are no doubt good, but bless-

ings can be up and down. Today, your brother-in-
law gives you a car he no longer needs. “God loves
me!” Tomorrow, a semi drives over top of it in a
parking lot. And it was uninsured. Now? Maybe
God doesn’t love me quite so much.
When I worked years ago at a radio station,
I noticed a line in Canadian singer-songwriter
Gordon Lightfoot’s hit song, “The Wreck of the
Edmund Fitzgerald.” It’s the story of the Great
Lakes freighter which sank in Lake Superior in
a storm in 1975, with the loss of all twenty-nine
men on board. Lightfoot wrote, “Does any one
know where the love of God goes when the waves
turn the minutes to hours?”9 The inference is
stark. In fact, the inference is not an inference but
a statement of belief that when bad things hap-
pen, God’s love is not present. However, nothing
could be further from the truth.
God’s love is a constant. Like the sun, it is
shed upon everyone. And like the sun, even when
it can’t be seen, it is still present and apparent.

9 “Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald - Gordon Lightfoot

Song Lyrics,” Gordon Lightfoot, https://gordonlightfoot.
com/WreckOfTheEdmundFitzgerald.shtml, accessed
January 11, 2023.
26 The Greatest of These
Remember Paul’s statement? “I am persuaded
that … [nothing whatsoever] shall be able to sep-
arate us from the love of God which is in Christ
Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 8:38–39).
So how are people to demonstrate their love
for God? What does self-sacrificing, genuine
love for God look like? During His last night
on Earth, Jesus spoke to His disciples and said,
“If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John
14:15, KJV).
And there is the acid test for the believer. As the
old saying goes, talk is cheap. And the fascinating
thing is that the devil’s work has been so thorough
in recent times, there are people who genuinely be-
lieve that obedience is not a factor in a Christian’s
relationship with God. Well, of course it is. Not that
obedience has any part to play in a sinner receiving
everlasting life. It doesn’t. A lost person cannot do
anything to merit the forgiving or enabling grace of
God. As Paul wrote to Titus, “Not by works of righ-
teousness which we have done, but according to his
mercy he saved us” (Titus 3:5, KJV). We are most
definitely saved “by grace … through faith” (Eph.
2:8, KJV). Or, in the spirit of the Reformers, by
grace alone, through faith alone. But the question is:
Once saved, how does a believer order his or her life?
 The Greatest of These 27

The truth is obedience becomes an inev-

itability for the person who has chosen Jesus
as Savior. Jesus described the nature of the
Christian life when He said, “‘Abide in Me, and
I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of it-
self, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you,
unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are
the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in
him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can
do nothing’” (John 15:4–5). Christianity isn’t
merely a belief system. It isn’t a philosophy, such
as stoicism or relativism. Faith isn’t an approach
to life. Faith is life.
The death of Jesus on a cross in Israel 2,000
or so years ago is a historical fact. People today
have the choice to believe in the death of Jesus or
not. When one chooses to accept Jesus as Lord
and Savior, that belief radically impacts the life.
Your sin is forgiven. Your guilt is removed. You
are adopted into the family of God. In spite of
your sins and mistakes and missteps, God’s love
FOR YOU is real. The choice becomes to contin-
ue in that love or to return it like an unwanted
Christmas gift and choose the life you had before
Jesus. The life with sin and guilt and condemna-
tion. Some choice.
28 The Greatest of These
The Bible tells us that “if anyone is in Christ,
he is a new creation; old things have passed away;
behold, all things have become new” (2 Cor.
5:17). The same author wrote to the church in
Rome explaining that “[t]here is therefore now
no condemnation to them which are in Christ
Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the
Spirit” (Rom. 8:1, KJV).
Confronted by a love so broad and deep, a
sinner will resonate with the idea that “this is the
love of God, that we keep his commandments:
and his commandments are not grievous” (1 John
5:3, KJV). The one scarred by adultery or dis-
honesty or a broken home will recognize there is
nothing “grievous” about the law of God. In fact,
he or she will surely acknowledge that “love is the
fulfilling of the law” (Rom. 13:10, KJV).
Jesus described the two great commandments
in the law as, briefly put, love to God and love to
our fellow man or woman (Matt. 22:36–40). The
One who died for our sins (1 Cor. 15:3) grants us
grace to die to self (1 Cor. 15:31) and live for Him.
Concluding his epic chapter on the subject of
genuine love, Paul wrote, “And now abide faith,
hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is
love” (1 Cor. 13:13).
 The Greatest of These 29

That Jesus was willing to die a hideous death

on behalf of every sinner who ever lived … is
love. Jesus leaving heaven on a rescue mission so
daring He ran the risk of being separated from
His Father eternally. True love. Look to the cross
and you see the love of God. For you. And see-
ing that love will have a powerful effect on you
and your life. What do you do about a God who
became sin for you, who defeated sin and Satan,
and has prepared a mansion for you in heaven?
The only answer is you surrender your life to
Him, and your life is changed more and more
into the image of Jesus.
It was probably the sternest test God could
have given, and the remarkable thing was that
Abraham chose to accept it. “‘Take now your
son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go
to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a
burnt offering on one of the mountains of which
I shall tell you’” (Gen. 22:2). At every step of the
three-day journey to the appointed location, the
thought of his bitter task pained his aged heart.
When Abraham was about to carry out the will
of God, the Lord Himself spoke. “[N]ow I know
that you fear God, since you have not withheld
your son, your only son, from Me” (Gen. 22:12).
30 The Greatest of These

Like God Himself would do centuries later,

Abraham gave his son.
His love for God was demonstrated by obedi-
ence, and his obedience was honored by the bless-
ing of heaven. Abraham was moved by love for
God, by a sense of God’s goodness and greatness.
How could he not act faithfully toward the One
who had been so faithful to Him?
Abraham had faith that God would bring
Isaac back to life (Heb. 11:19). Hope convinced
him there were still precious days ahead. And
love compelled Abraham to walk in faithfulness,
to surrender his will to the will of God, no matter
how difficult that seemed.
Led by the love of God, you also may yield
your heart to God. Faithfulness to God will be
seen to be a privilege. The power of the Holy
Spirit will uphold you. A life lived fully in refer-
ence to God is a life that ultimately never ends.
In eternity, the redeemed of all ages will consider
the love of God, their love for God, and will agree
with the inspired writer that “the greatest of these
is love” (1 Cor. 13:13).
 The Greatest of These 31

Bibliography
Burns, Robert. “My Luve is like a Red Red Rose.”
BBC. https://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/robertburns/
works/my_luve_is_like_a_red_red_rose/ (accessed
January 2, 2023).

Dure, Elana. “Valentine’s Day Shoppers Are

Expected to Spend $23.9B in 2022.” The Balance.
https://www.thebalancemoney.com/happy-valen-
tine-s-day-retailers-feeling-the-love-3306043 (ac-
cessed January 2, 2023).

Hiller, Arthur (director) and Erich Segal (writer).

“Love Story.” IMDb. https://www.imdb.com/title/
tt0066011/ (accessed January 2, 2023).

“Marriage and Divorce.” CDC. https://www.cdc.

gov/nchs/fastats/marriage-divorce.htm (accessed
January 4, 2023).

McCartney, Paul. “Silly Love Songs.” Songfacts.

https://www.songfacts.com/lyrics/paul-mccart-
ney-wings/silly-love-songs (accessed January 2,
2023).
32 The Greatest of These
“2022 Valentine’s Day Spending.” National Retail
Federation. https://nrf.com/research-insights/hol-
iday-and-seasonal-trends/valentines-day (accessed
January 2, 2023).

“Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald -

Gordon Lightfoot Song Lyrics.” Gordon
Lightfoot. https://gordonlightfoot.com/
WreckOfTheEdmundFitzgerald.shtml (accessed
January 11, 2023).

Yeats, William Butler. “When You Are Old.”

Poetry Foundation. https://www.poetryfoundation.
org/poems/43283/when-you-are-old (accessed
January 2, 2023).
Be a blessing!
At It Is Written, our entire focus is on sharing the
good news of the gospel with people around the world.
We do this by producing weekly and daily television
programs, conducting global evangelism, training
young people, creating spiritual resources for all ages,
sponsoring outreach to remote locations, printing Bi-
bles, and offering free Bible lessons to those who desire
to know God’s love.
All this is made possible by generous supporters like
you. If It Is Written has been a blessing to your spiritu-
al growth, why not “pay it forward”? Perhaps
someday you will meet someone in heaven
who made a decision for Jesus as a result
of your gift! Thank you for your faithful
support of It Is Written.

John Bradshaw, President

Visit itiswritten.com/give
 ®

FREE Bible Studies!

Gain a deeper understanding of the Bible as
you study with our guides:

• It Is Written Bible Study Guides

(English and Spanish)
• My Place with Jesus Bible Guides
for Children (English and Spanish)
• Creation Life Health Studies

Visit itiswritten.com/biblestudy today!

23
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
We went on the trail of fires, where we poked among the fallen
timbers for half-burnt sticks. There were skirmishes in the vicinity of
coal-yards, at the rear of the sheds, where, through breaks and
large, yawning cracks, pieces of coal sometimes dropped through.
We scouted on the trail of coal wagons through cobbled, jolt streets,
and managed to pick up what they lost. We adventured on
dangerous spurs of railroad track, on marshy cinder dumps outside
mill fences, and to the city dumping-grounds for loads of cinders,
coal, and wood.
After a washing rainstorm, in the night, my aunt would say, “Now, Al,
there’s been a good rain, and it must have washed the dust off the
clinkers and cinders so that you might get a good bagful of cinders.
You’d best go before someone else gets ahead of you.” True
enough, I would find them in the ash heaps, as black as seeds in a
watermelon, the half-burnt coals, which I loaded in my bushel bag
and carried home in my wagon at five cents a load. If I returned with
my bag empty, there was always some drastic form of punishment
given me.
Pat and Tim Led Me to the Charles Street Dumping Ground
—Which
Was the Neighborhood Gehenna
Life on the city dumping-grounds was generally a return to the
survival of the fittest. There was exemplified poverty in its ugliest
aspect. The Charles street dumps were miniature Alps of dusty
rubbish rising out of the slimy ooze of a pestiferous and stagnant
swamp, in which slinking, monstrous rats burrowed, where clammy
bullfrogs gulped, over which poisonous flies hummed on summer
days, and from which arose an overpowering, gassy nauseation. On
a windy day, the air was filled by a whirling, odorous dust of ashes. It
stirred every heap of rubbish into a pungent mass of rot. When the
Irishmen brought the two-horse dump-carts, and swung their load on
the heap, every dump-picker was sure to be smothered in a cloud of
choking dust, as sticks, hoes, rakes, and fingers, in mad competition,
sought whatever prize of rag, bottle, wood, or cinder came in sight.
This was the neighborhood Gehenna, in which the Portuguese, Irish,
and Polish dwellers thereabouts flung all that was filthy, spoiled, and
odorous, whether empty cans, ancient fruit and vegetables, rats from
traps, or the corpses of pet animals or birds.
Pat, Tim, and I, in our search for fuel, met quite a cosmopolitan life
on those ash-hills. There they were, up to their knees in filth, digging
in desperation and competition, with hungry looks and hoarse,
selfish growls, like a wolf pack rooting in a carcass: the old Jew, with
his hand-cart, the Frenchwoman, with her two-year old girl; the
Portuguese girls and the Irish lads, the English and the American
pickers, all in strife, clannish, jealous, pugilistic, and never free from
the strain of tragedy. Pat and Tim could hold their own, as they were
well-trained street fighters.
“Git on yer own side, Sheeny,” Tim used to scream to the venerable
Israelite; “I’ll punch yer in the plexus!” and without a word, but with a
cowed look of the eyes, the old man would retreat from the property
he had been cunningly encroaching upon. Then Tim’s commanding
voice could be heard, “Say, Geeser, hand over that copper-bottomed
boiler to yer uncle, will yer, or I’ll smash yer phiz in!” But when
“Wallop” Smitz brought his rowdy crowd to the dump, it was like an
invasion of the “Huns.” We were driven from the dump in dismay,
often with our clothes torn and our wagons battered.
And oh, what prizes of the dump! Cracked plates, cups and saucers,
tinware, bric-à-brac, footwear, clothing, nursing-bottles and nipples,
bottles with the dregs of flavoring extracts, cod-liver oil, perfumes,
emulsions, tonics, poisons, antiseptics, cordials, decayed fruit, and
faded flowers! These were seized in triumph, taken home in glee,
and no doubt used in faith. There is little philosophy in poverty, and
questions of sanitation and prudence come in the stage beyond it.
“Only bring me coal and wood,” commanded my aunt, in regard to
my visits to the dumps, but I managed to save rubbers, rags, and
metal, as a side product, and get money for them from the old Jew
junk-man.
 Chapter VI. The Luxurious
Possibilities of the Dollar-Down-
Dollar-a-Week
System of Housekeeping
 Chapter VI. The Luxurious
Possibilities of the Dollar-Down-Dollar-a-Week
System of Housekeeping
DURING the remainder of the school year, from March to June, no
public-school officer came to demand my attendance at school.
“Aren’t we lucky?” commented Aunt Millie. “It gives you such a
chance to help out. The instalment men must be paid, and we need
every cent. It’s such a mercy that the long holiday’s on. It gives you a
good chance.”
By this time I had added to my activities that of carrying my uncle’s
dinner to the mill. My aunt always considered this a waste of time. “It
takes Al away from his own work,” she would remonstrate with my
uncle. “If he has to carry your dinner, I wish he would take it in his
wagon so that he can bring back what coal and wood he finds on the
street.” When that combination was in effect, she was mollified, for I
managed to secure a load of fuel almost every day in my journey
from the mill to the house.
This was the first cotton-mill I ever entered. Every part of it, inside,
seemed to be as orderly as were the rows of bricks in its walls. It
was a new mill. Its walls were red and white, as were the iron posts
that reached down in triple rows through the length of it. There was
the odor of paint everywhere. The machinery seemed set for display,
it shone and worked so smoothly. The floor of the mule-room, where
uncle worked, was white and smooth. The long alleys at the ends of
the mules were like the decks of a ship. The whirling, lapping belts
had the pungent odor of new leather about them, and reminded me
of the smell of a new pair of shoes. The pulleys and shaftings
gleamed under their high polish. Altogether it was a wonderful sight
to my eyes, which, for some time, had only seen dismal tenements,
dirty streets, and drifting ash heaps.
The mill was trebly attractive on chilly, rainy days, when it was so
miserable a task outside to finger among soggy ash piles for coals
and to go splashing barefooted through muddy streets. At such times
it was always a relief to feel the warm, greasy boards of the mill
underneath my feet, and to have my body warmed by the great heat.
No matter how it rained outside with the rain-drops splashing
lonesomely against the windows, it did not change the atmosphere
of the mill one jot. The men shouted and swore as much as ever, the
doffers rode like whirlwinds on their trucks, the mules creaked on the
change, the belts hummed and flapped as regularly as ever.
It was very natural, then, that I should grow to like the mill and hate
the coal picking. My uncle gave me little chores to do while he ate
his dinner. He taught me how to start and stop a mule; how to clean
and take out rollers; how to piece broken threads, and lift up small
cops. When the doffers came to take the cops off the spindles, I
learned to put new tubes on and to press them in place at the bottom
of the spindles. I found it easy to use an oil can, to clean the cotton
from the polished doors of the mules, to take out empty bobbins of
cotton rope, and put in full ones to give a new supply for the thread
which was spun.
I became so valuable a helper during the noon hour that my uncle
persuaded my aunt to put in some dinner for me, also, so that I could
eat it with him. He did this simply because he wanted me to have
some reward for my work besides the fifteen cents a week he gave
me. So I used to sit with him, and he would divide a meat-pie with
me, let me drink some coffee from the top of the dinner pail, and
share a piece of pudding. There was always a bright gleam in his
eyes as he watched me eat, a gleam that said as plainly as words,
“It’s good to see you have a good time, Al, lad!”
By the end of the summer I was so familiar with the mill that I wanted
to spend my whole time in it. I had watched the mill-boys, some of
them not much older than myself—and I was only eleven—and I
wanted to swagger up and down the alleys like them. They were
lightly clad in undershirt and overalls, so that in their bared feet they
could run without slipping on the hot floor. They were working for
wages, too, and took home a pay envelope every Saturday. Just
think of going home every Saturday, and throwing an envelope on
the table with three dollars in it, and saying, nonchalantly, “Aunt,
there’s my wages. Just fork over my thirty cents spending money. I’m
going to see the matinee this afternoon at the theater. It’s ‘Michael
Strogroff,’ and they say there’s a real fight in the second act and
eight changes of scenery, for ten cents. They’ve got specialties
between the acts, too!”
Other temporal considerations entered into this desire to go into the
mill. I wanted to have a dinner pail of my own, with a whole meat-pie
in it, or a half-pound of round steak with its gravy dripping over a
middle of mashed potatoes with milk and butter in them! Then there
were apple dumplings to consider, and freedom from coal picking
and the dirty life on the dumps. All in all, I knew it would be an
excellent exchange, if possible. I spoke to my uncle about it one
noon-hour.
“Why can’t I work in the mill, too?” I asked.
“Wouldn’t you rather get some learning, Al?” he asked. “You know
men can’t do much in the world without learning. It’s brains, not
hands, that makes the world really go ahead. I wish you could get a
lot of schooling and perhaps go to college. It’s what I always wanted
and never got, and see where I am to-day. I’m a failure, Al, that’s
what I am!”
“But aunt says that I’ve got to go in the mill as soon as I can, uncle.”
His face grew sad at that, and he said, “Yes, through our drinking
and getting in debt! That’s what it’s all leading to! It’s a pity, a sad
pity!” and he grew so gloomy that I spoke no more about the matter
that day.
It was one of the paradoxes of my home, that being heavily in debt
for our steamship tickets and household furnishings, and both giving
a large amount of patronage to the saloons, my aunt and uncle
involved themselves more inextricably in debt by buying clothes and
ornaments on the “Dollar-Down-Dollar-a-Week” plan. There was no
economy, no recession of tastes, no limit of desire to save us. Every
penny that I secured was spent as soon as earned. I learned this
from my foster parents. Uncle had his chalk-mark at the saloon, and
aunt received regular thrice-a-week visits from the beer pedler. On
gala days, when there was a cheap excursion down the bay, aunt
could make a splendid appearance on the street in a princess dress,
gold bracelets, a pair of earrings, and gloves (Dollar-Down-Dollar-a-
Week plan). When Mrs. Terence O’Boyle, and Mrs. Hannigan,
daughter to Mrs. O’Boyle, and Mrs. Redden, the loom fixer’s wife
with her little baby, came to our house, after the breakfast had been
cleared away, and the men were hard at work, Aunt Millie would
exclaim, “Now, friends, the beer man’s just brought a dozen lagers
and a bottle of port wine. Sit right up, and make a merry morning of
it. You must be tired, Mrs. Hannigan. Won’t your babby take a little
sup of port for warming his stomach?” Of course, Mrs. O’Boyle
returned these parties, as did her daughter and Mrs. Redden.
My uncle dared not say too much about the visits of the beer-wagon,
because he had his own score at the saloon, and his appetite for
drink was transcendant. Aunt had little ways of her own for pacifying
him in the matter. She would save a half dozen bottles till night, and
then, when he came home, she would say, “Now, Stanwood, after
tea, let’s be comfortable. I’ve six bottles in for you, and we’ll take our
comfort grand!”
By Friday morning the financial fret began. My aunt, as financier of
the house, had the disposal of her husband’s fifteen dollars in
charge. In the disposal of this amount, she indulged in a weird,
incomprehensible arithmetical calculation, certainly original if not
unique. In place of numerals and dollar signs, she dotted a paper
with pencil points, and did some mysterious but logical ruminating in
her head. Her reasoning always followed this line, however:
“Fifteen dollars with a day out, that leaves—let me see—oh, say in
round numbers, thirteen, maybe a few cents out. Well, now, let me
see, out of that comes, first of all, forty cents for union money, if he
pays it this week; two and a half for rent, only we owe fifty cents from
last week, which we must pay this, or else we’ll be thrown out. Then
there’s fifteen cents for that dude of an insurance man—he says he’ll
lapse us if we let it run on like we have. Let him do it, the old cheat! I
don’t believe they’d plan to pay us if any of us should die. They’re
nothing but robbers, anyhow. Where was I, Al? Let me see, there’s
owing a dollar for the furniture—WHEN will we have it paid for?—
and there’s two dollars that should be paid the Jew, only we’ll have
to satisfy him with fifty cents this week, because there’s a day out.”
(The Jew was the man who kept the “New England Clothing and
Furnishing Company,” from whom we had bought our clothes, a set
of furs, and the gold bracelets on instalments.) “This week’s bill for
groceries is five dollars and sixty-three cents, the baker has owing
him about seventy-five, the meat man let me have them two ham
bones and that shank end, and I owe him for that; there’s some
white shirts and collars at the Chinaman’s, but I want to say right
here that your uncle will have to pay for those out of his own
spending money. That’s too much of a luxury, that is; we can’t go on
with such gentlemanly notions in this house and ever get ahead. Oh,
these debts, when will they be paid! That is all I think of except the
beer man. He won’t wait, whatever comes or goes. There, that
reckons up to—why, how in the name of God are we going to face
the world this way? I’m getting clean worn out with this figuring every
week!”
After finding that she would not have money enough to go around to
satisfy all the clamorants, she would proceed with a process of
elimination, putting off first the tradesman who received explanations
with the most graciousness. The insurance man she did not care for,
so he had to be put off, but, with his own interests in mind, he would
carry us out of his own pocket until some grand week when aunt
would feel kindly towards him, and she would generously make up
all back payments. Aunt always went to the uttermost limit of credit
possibility, arranging her numerous creditors like checkers on a
board to be moved backwards and forwards week by week. The
beer man got his pay every week. He did not allow his bills to grow
old. In arranging for that payment, aunt used to say, as if protesting
to her own conscience, “Well, suppose some others do have to wait!
I want to have a case of lager in over Sunday. We’re not going to
scrimp and slave without some enjoyment!”
Week after week this same exasperating allotment of uncle’s wage
took place, with but minor variations. Time after time the insurance
would drop behind and would be taken up again. Time after time the
Jew would threaten to put the lawyers on us. Time after time the
grocer would withhold credit until we paid our bill, yet the beer-
wagon stopped regularly at our door, and Mrs. O’Boyle, her
daughter, and Mrs. Redden would exchange courtesies and bottles.
And Aunt was always consoling her sister women on such occasions
with this philosophy: “The rich have carriages and fine horses and
grand mansions for enjoyment; we poor folks, not having such, must
get what comfort we can out of a stimulating sup!”
And Mrs. Redden would reply, “Yes, Mrs. Brindin, you’re right for
sure. Just warm a bit of that ale with a bit of sugar stirred in, will you,
please? It will warm the baby’s belly. I forgot to bring his milk bottle,
like the absent-minded I am.”
Chapter VII. I am given the
Privilege of Choosing my
own Birthday
 Chapter VII. I am given the
Privilege of Choosing my
own Birthday
THE reopening of the public-schools in the fall found Aunt Millie
stubbornly refusing to allow me to enter. “I shall never know
anything,” I protested. But she replied, with confidence, “All
knowledge and wisdom isn’t in schools. There’s as much common
sense needed in getting a living. I’ll keep you out just as long as the
truant officer keeps away. Mind, now, and not run blind into him
when you’re on the street. If you do—why, you’ll know a thing or two,
young man!”
Uncle pleaded with her in my behalf, but she answered him
virulently, “Stop that, you boozer, you! We must get out of debt and
never mind making a gentleman, which you seem set on. I’d be
ashamed if I was you. Let him only earn a few dollars, and we’d be
relieved. Goodness knows when you’re going to drop out, the way
you’re guzzling things down. It wouldn’t surprise me to see you on
your back any day, and I want to be ready.”
But some days later, my uncle came back home from work with
much to say. “Look here, Millie, it might be good for us to send Al to
school right away. If he must go in the mill, as it seems he must as
soon as he can, then it’s to our advantage to get him in right away!”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that he can’t go into the mill, according to law, until thirty
weeks after he’s thirteen, and can show his school-certificate.”
“But he’s only just turned eleven,” protested my aunt, “that would
keep him in the school practically three years. Three years!”
“Normally, it would,” agreed Uncle Stanwood, “but it don’t need to
take that long, if we don’t care to have it so.”
“I’d like to know why!”
“Well, Millie,” explained uncle, “Al’s not been to school in America,
yet. All we have to do is to put his age forward when he does go in—
make him a year or two older than he actually is. They won’t ask for
birth certificates or school papers from England. They will take our
word for it. Then it won’t be long before we can have him working.
Harry Henshaw tells me the trick’s common enough. Then when Al’s
worked a while, and we get out of debt, he can go on with his
schooling. It’s the only way to keep ahead, though I do hate to have
him leave school, God knows!”
“None of that cant,” snapped aunt; “if it wasn’t for your drinking he
wouldn’t have to go in the mill, and you know it.”
“Yes,” agreed uncle, sadly, “I know it!”
“Then,” said aunt, once more referring to the immediate subject of
the conference, “it’s all decided that we get him in as soon as
possible.”
“Yes,” agreed uncle, “we can put him any age we want, and lie about
it like many are doing. What age shall we make him, Millie?”
“Better push his age forward as near to thirteen as possible,” said
aunt. “He’s big for eleven, as big as some lads two years older. Lets
call him twelve and a half!”
“Twelve, going on thirteen,” answered my uncle.
“Yes,” mused his wife, “but nearly thirteen, say thirteen about
Christmas time, that would give him thirty weeks to go to school, and
he would be in the mill a year from now. That will be all right.”
“If we get caught at it,” warned uncle, “it means prison for us,
according to law.”
“Never mind, let’s take our chances like the rest,” answered aunt
with great decision. “You tell me there aren’t any ever get caught!”
“Oh,” sighed uncle, “it’s safe enough for that matter, though it’s hard
and goes against the grain to take Al from school.”
“Stop that cant!” thundered Aunt Millie. “I won’t have it. You want him
to go into the mill just as bad as I do, you old hypocrite!”
“Don’t flare up so,” retorted uncle, doggedly. “You wag too sharp a
tongue. It’s no use having a row over the matter. Let’s dispose of the
thing before bedtime.”
“What else is there to settle?” asked my aunt.
“Al’s got to have a new birthday.” Aunt Millie laughed at the notion,
and said, addressing me, “Now, Al, here’s a great chance for you.
What day would you like for your birthday?”
“June would do,” I said.
“June won’t do,” she corrected, “the birthday has got to come in
winter, near Christmas; no other time of the year is suitable. Now
what part of November would you like it? We’ll give you that much
choice.”
I thought it over for some time, for I seriously entered into the spirit of
this unique opportunity of choosing my own birthday. “The twentieth
of November will do, I think,” I concluded.
“The twentieth of November, then, it is,” answered my aunt. “You will
be thirteen, thirteen, next twentieth of November, mind you. You are
twelve, going on thirteen! Don’t forget that for a minute; if you do, it
might get us all in jail for per-jury! Now, suppose that a man meets
you on the streets to-morrow and asks you what your age is, what
will you tell him?”
“I’m thirteen, going on——no, I mean twelve, going on thirteen, and
will be thirteen the twentieth of November!”
“Say it half a dozen times to get it fixed in your mind,” said aunt, and
I rehearsed it intermittently till bedtime, so that I had it indelibly fixed
in my mind that, henceforth, I must go into the world and swear to a
lie, abetted by my foster parents, all because I wanted to go into the
mill and because my foster parents wanted me in the mill. Thus
ended the night when I dropped nearly two years bodily out of my
life, a most novel experience indeed and one that surely appeals to
the imagination if not to the sympathy.
The following week, a few days before I was sent to the public-
school, we removed to a part of the city where there were not so
many mill tenements, into the first floor of a double tenement. There
were only two of these houses in the same yard with a grass space
between them facing the highway. In this space, during the early fall,
the landlord dumped two bushels of apples every Monday morning
at half-past eight. It was definitely understood that only the children
of the tenants should be entitled to gather the fruit. No one was
allowed to be out of the house until the landlord himself gave the
signal that all was ready, so we could be found, peering from the
back and front doors, a quick-eyed, competitive set of youngsters,
armed with pillow-slips and baskets, leaping out at the signal, falling
on the heap of apples, elbowing one another until every apple was
picked, when the parents would run out, settle whatever fights had
started up, note with jealous eyes how much of the fruit their
respective representatives had secured, all the while the amused
landlord stood near his carriage shouting, “Your Harry did unusually
well to-day, Mrs. Burns. He beat them all. What a pillow-slipful he
got, to be sure!”
Finally I found myself in an American school. I do not know what
grade I entered, but I do know that my teacher, a white-haired
woman with a saintly face, showed me much attention. It was she
who kept me after school to find out more about me. It was she who
inquired about my moral and spiritual welfare, and when she found
that I did not go to a church, mainly on account of poor clothes, she
took me to the shopping district one afternoon, and with money
furnished her by a Woman’s Circle, fitted me out with a brand new
suit, new shoes and hat, and sent me home with the promise that I
would go with her to church the following Sunday morning. In
passing down a very quiet street on my solitary way to church, the
next Sabbath, I came to that high picket fence behind which grew
some luscious blue grapes. I clambered over the fence, picked a
pocketful of the fruit, and then went on to meet my teacher at the
doors of the sombre city church, where the big bell clamored high in
the air, and where the carpet was thick, like a bedspread, so that
people walked down the aisles silent like ghosts and as sober. It was
a strange, hushed, and very thrilling place, and when the massive
organ filled the place with whispering chords, I went back to my old
childish faith, that angels sat in the colored pipes and sang.
My days in the school-yard were very, very strenuous, for I had
always to be protecting England and the English from assault. I
found the Americans only too eager to reproduce the Revolution on
a miniature scale, with Bunker Hill in mind, always.
My attendance at this school had only a temporary aspect to it.
When my teacher spoke to me of going to the grammar school, I
replied, “Oh, I’m going in the mill in a year, please. I want to go into
the mill and earn money. It’s better than books, ma’am.” I had the mill
in mind always. Every day finished in school was one day nearer to
the mill. I judged my fellows, on the school-ground, by their plans of
either going or not going into the mill as early as I.
This desire to enter the mill was more and more strengthened as the
winter wore on, for then I was kept much at home and sent on the
streets after wood and coal. It was impossible to pick cinders with
mittens on, and especially the sort of mittens I wore—old stocking
feet, doubled to allow one piece to hide the holes in its fellow. On a
cold day, my fingers would get very blue, and my wrists, protruding
far out of my coat-sleeves, would be frozen into numbness. Any lad
who had once been in a mill would prefer it to such experiences.
My aunt kept me at home so often that she had to invent a most
formidable array of excuses to send to my teacher, excuses which I
had to write and carry. We never had any note-paper in the house,
as there were so few letters ever written. When there was an excuse
to write, I would take a crumpled paper bag, in which had been
onions or sugar, or, when there were no paper bags, and the school
bell was ringing, requiring haste, I would tear off a slip of the paper in
which salt pork or butter had been wrapped, and on it write some
such note as this:
“Dear Miss A: This is to say that Al had to stay home yesterday for
not being very well. I hope you will excuse it. Very truly yours,” and
my aunt would scribble her name to it, to make it authoritative.
It must have been the sameness of the notes, and their frequency,
that brought the white-haired teacher to remonstrate with my aunt for
keeping me away from school so much.
“He can never learn at his best,” complained the teacher. “He is
really getting more and more behind the others.”
My aunt listened humbly enough to this complaint and then
unburdened herself of her thoughts: “What do I care what he learns
from books! There is coal and wood that’s needed and he is the one
to help out. I only let him go to school because the law makes me. If
it wasn’t for the law you’d not see him there, wasting his time. It’s
only gentlemen’s sons that have time for learning from books. He’s
only a poor boy and ought to be earning his own living. Coal and
wood is more to the point in this house than books and play. Let
them play that has time and go to school that has the money. All you
hear in these days is, ‘School, school, school!’ Now, I have got
through all these years without schooling, and others of my class
and kind can. Why, Missis, do you know, I had to go into the mill
when I was a slip of a girl, when I was only seven, there in England. I
had to walk five miles to work every morning, before beginning the
hard work of the day, and after working all day I had to carry my own
dinner-box back that distance, and then, on top of that, there was
duties to do at home when I got there. No one ever had mercy on
me, and it isn’t likely that I’ll go having mercy on others. Who ever
spoke to me about schooling, I’d like to know! It’s only people of
quality who ought to go to get learning, for its only the rich that is
ever called upon to use schooling above reading. If I got along with
it, can’t this lad, I’d like to know?”
And with this argument my teacher had to be content, but she
reported my absences to the truant officer, who came and so
troubled my aunt, with his authority, that she sent me oftener to
school after that.
About this time, at the latter end of winter, uncle removed to the
region of the mill tenements again. I changed my school, also. This
time I found myself enrolled in what was termed the Mill School.
As I recall it, the Mill School was a department of the common
schools, in which were placed all boys and girls who had reached
thirteen and were planning to enter the mill as soon as the law
permitted. If you please, it was my “finishing school.” I have always
considered it as the last desperate effort of the school authorities to
polish us off as well as they could before we slipped out of their care
forever. I am not aware of any other reason for the existence of the
Mill School, as I knew it.
However, it was a very appropriate and suggestive name. It coupled
the mill with the school very definitely. It made me fix my mind more
than ever on the mill. Everybody in it was planning for the mill. We
talked mill on the play-ground, drew pictures of mills at our desks,
dreamed of it when we should have been studying why one half of a
quarter is one fourth, or some similar exercise. We had a recess of
our own, after the other floors had gone back into their classrooms,
and we had every reason to feel a trifle more dignified than the usual
run of thirteen-year-old pupils who plan to go through the grammar,
the high, and the technical schools! After school, when we mixed
with our less fortunate companions, who had years and years of
school before them, we could not avoid having a supercilious twang
in our speech when we said, “Ah, don’t you wish you could go into
the mill in a few months and earn money like we’re going to do, eh?”
or, “Just think, Herb, I’m going to wear overalls rolled up to the knees
and go barefooted all day!”
If the thumbscrew of the Inquisition were placed on me, I could not
state the exact curriculum I passed through during the few months in
the Mill School. I did not take it very seriously, because my whole
mind was taken up with anticipations of working in the mill. But the
coming of June roses brought to an end my stay there. The teacher
gave me a card which certified that I had fulfilled the requirements of
the law in regard to final school attendance. I went home that
afternoon with a consciousness that I had grown aged suddenly.
When my aunt saw the card, her enjoyment knew no bounds.
“Good for you, Al!” she exclaimed, “We’ll make short work of having
you in the mill now.”
As I attempt to visualize myself to myself at the time of my
“graduation” from the common school, I see a lad, twelve years of
age and growing rapidly in stature, with unsettled, brown hair which
would neither part nor be smoothed, a front tooth missing, having
been knocked out by a stone inadvertently thrown while he was in
swimming, a lean, lank, uncouth, awkward lad at the awkward age,
with a mental furnishing which permitted him to tell with authority
when America was discovered, able to draw a half of an apple on
drawing-paper, just in common fractions, able to distinguish between
nouns and verbs, and a very good reader of most fearsome dime
novels. The law said that I was “fitted” now to leave school and take
my place among the world’s workers!
But now that I was ready to enter the mill, with my school-certificate
in my possession, Uncle Stanwood raised his scruples again, saying
regretfully enough, “Oh, Al mustn’t leave the school. He might never
get back again, Millie.” My aunt laughed cynically, and handed two
letters to her husband.
“Read them, and see what you think!” she said. Uncle read the two
letters, and turned very pale, for they were lawyer’s letters,
threatening to strip our house of the furniture and to sue us at law, if
we did not bring up the back payments we owed on our clothing and
our furniture! “You see, canter,” scoffed aunt, “he’s got to go in.
There’s no other help, is there!” Uncle, crushed, said, “No, there
isn’t. Would to God there was!” And so the matter was decided.
“In the morning you must take Al to the school-committee and get his
mill-papers,” said my aunt, before we went to bed.
“I’ll ask off from work, then,” replied my uncle.
I always enjoyed being in the company of Uncle Stanwood. He was
always trying to make me happy when it was in his power to do so. I
knew his heart—that despite the weakness of his character, burned
with great love for me. He was not, like Aunt Millie, buffeting me
about, as if I were a pawn in the way. He had the kind word for me,
and the desirable plan. On our walk to the school-committee’s office,
in the heart of the city, we grew very confidential when we found
ourselves beyond the keen, jealous hearing of Aunt Millie.
“That woman,” he said, “stops me from being a better man, Al. You
don’t know, lad, how often I try to tone up, and she always does
something to prevent my carrying it out. I suppose it’s partly because