noon
I remember a few years ago I got discouraged , and could not see much fruit of my work ; and one morning , as I was in my study , cast down , one of my Sabbath-school teachers came in and wanted to know what I was discouraged about , and I told him because I could see no result from my work ; and speaking about Noah , he said : `` By the way , did you ever study up the character of Noah ? '' I felt that I knew all about that , and told him that I was familiar with it , and he said , `` Now , if you never studied that carefully , you ought to do it , for I can not tell you what a blessing it has been to me . '' When he went out I took down my Bible and commenced to read about Noah , and the thought came stealing over me , `` Here is a man that toiled and worked a hundred years and did n't get discouraged ; if he did , the Holy Ghost did n't put it on record , '' and the clouds lifted , and I got up and said , if the Lord wants me to work without any fruit I will work on . I went down to the noon prayer-meeting , and when I saw the people coming to pray I said to myself , `` Noah worked a hundred years and he never saw a prayer-meeting outside of his own family . '' Pretty soon a man got up right across the aisle where I was sitting , and said he had come from a little town where there had been a hundred uniting with the Church of God the year before . And I thought to myself , `` What if Noah had heard that ! He preached so many , many years , and did n't get a convert , yet he was not discouraged . ''