GIPSY SMITH.

Hokitika Guardian, 4 August 1926, Page 4

GIPSY SMITH.

Gipsy Smith, the great evangelist, is now tourng Australia and is at present at Sydney. At a public reception given him at the Hippodrome, he spoke characteristically.

Gipsy Smith, when he advanced to the platform, was received with applause. He called the choir to sing a verso of the hymn: “'Wonderful Jesus,” after which ho admonished ‘hem regarding their conduct during the mission, and turned his attention <o the personal workers and the ushcis,

interspersing his remarks with quips which greatly delighted the audience. He began his address in a voice pitched low, hut audible in every part of the auditorium. By his manner and choice of words, he created an impression of familiarity as though each member of the audience was his personal friend. In a remarkable manner he mingled jests and impassioned harangues with tenderly spoken anecdotes of his young Gipsy‘days, or of men and women who had turned to live better-lives through their conversion to a true love of Jesus Christ. He often waited for the audience to reply to a question of his, and was never satisfied until practically the whole crowd shouted it back at him. He concluded his address by appealing to them all to attend the services to he held.

MILLIONS CLUB LUNCHEON. Gipsy Smith was entertained at luncheon by the Millions Club. Sir Albert Gould, who presided, said the evangelist had risen from a .Gipsy tent to be a world power. Gipsy Smith, addressing the gathering. said that next June he would have completed his fiftieth year as a world evangelist,, and ho., had spoken to more people than any man, living. He thanked them for their kindly welcome, and said lie knew the art of making himself at home—an art. inherent in all Gipsies. He himself had never slept in a house until he was 17 years old.

“No missionaries came to me,” he continued, “a poor, ignorant Gipsy boy, but God came to me and I was converted, and that is why I am here now, a niissioner in your great city. My first book was the Bible, and my second a dictionary, and I began preitching the morning after I was converted—to • the women who came, to buy the clothes pegs which my father made, and which I took from house to house. 1 come here as your gu?st, and I appeal to you for your earnest help and co-operation in this great work. “You make money, but that has to be left behind ; you make a great reputation, but that may he forgotten. But that one, who helps a man or woman to rise from a warped, unhappy life to a nobler life, will have done something to deck some day the brow of Emmanuel. I come to you in the same spirit as I went to the war. There, in the mud and the blood, wo didn’t ask of what creed a man was. Ido not know vour creeds; I know God, and you must know Him too if you are to he the men and women you should he. You need your food, your clothes, your comforts of life, your motor cars, and vour entertainment, but your souls need God. Let the jasws, the noise, and the hum of the big city fade from your ears for u moment, and listen to the voice of God. Give your souls a chance—-give God a chance.”