He Being Dead...

When nasty weather struck the American frontier, pioneer farmers glanced out the door and repeated a familiar proverb: “There’s nobody out to-day but crows and Methodist preachers.”

Of course the Methodists were not the only Christians to inspire itinerate evangelists; Baptists, Congregationalists, Adventists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians and even Quaker George Fox (in England a bit earlier), urged by God’s Spirit, did all possible to bring about the religious movement which history books call the Great Awakening and the Second Great Awakening

While William Short’s role was that of a teacher and he was not exactly a circuit rider, yet he contributed to the mind set of his day in promoting daily, deep dedication to Christ out of a grateful heart.

That’s one of the things that attracted me to his diary.

I feel my own heart so cold. Weariness overwhelms me and a spirit of apathy guides my activities. Therefore, this man’s words speak to my condition.

Yesterday, my friend Wes called. He invited me to go with him to breakfast and to visit our friend Barbara at her retirement home. She is off chemotherapy this week and feels well enough to have visitors.

I chose to pass.

That may have been a mistake—people are more important than projects—but I feel time constraints to finish editing Short’s diary before I’m whisked away for jury duty.

In another marathon yesterday, I worked 20 hours editing the text. Now, with another such session, all I have to do is format, set headers and footers, insert illustrations (making sure they are public domain), set gutters, pagination, addendum, proof again, design covers, make pdf files, and submit to the printer for proof pages to correct.

Is all this stuff worth doing?

Commercially, no.

I doubt if this publication will make anybody’s best seller list.

On a commercial level, I’ve been wasting my time.

However, on a personal level, engaging in this project, seeing Short’s problems with decision making, watching him try, fail, and try again—all this encourages me in my own Christian life.

Or, at least, as Ginny says, it keeps me off the streets.

I found this diary which has been hidden away for 155 years, and I rush and push and labor to get it published as though it were hot news—that’s odd.

I’ve often hoped that someday some kid blundering around in a dust attic will chance across a copy of my own diary and be inspired to follow Christ fully. I wonder if that sort of hope ever crossed Mr. Short’s mind? I see no indication of it in his diary.

Yet whether he intended it or not, William Short proved an inspiration and encouragement to me…

As the Scripture says of Able, “He being dead yet speaketh”.