Is a Sunday School Picnic a Means of Grace?

QUESTION: Is a Sunday school excursion and picnic a means of grace?

ANSWER: Yes, to the teachers and officers it is a means of the grace of patience and watchfulness against physical and moral harm to the children entrusted to their care. To the children themselves, especially to those shut up in cities, the picnic is a healthful change, affording a glimpse of nature in the grove, on the mountain top, or by the seaside. It is not exactly a religions institution, but is a proper device for holding the children and youths to a religious institution, just as the tailor's basting thread is necessary to hold the parts of his work together till he can put in the permanent stitches. When D. L. Moody began his Sunday school in the slums of Chicago, he used cakes and maple sugar with which to attach his scholars to his school, while he was endeavoring to attach them to Christ with an everlasting tie.

— Steele's Answers p. 103.

The Portrait of a Holiness Fanatic

There are two enemies to the fullness of the Spirit — baptized worldliness, and fanaticism run mad on the subject of holiness. Let us consider the latter.

As religion is an exciting and absorbing theme, so there is especial danger of running into unwarrantable enthusiasm. Religious fanaticism has deluged the world with bloodshed, instituted inquisitions, and invented thumbscrews. Sanctification fanaticism is a milder species of this genus, yet it is none the less mischievous. It brings into reproach the most glorious doctrine of the Gospel — the office of the Sanctifier; it brings into ridicule the crowning blessing — the most precious experience of our holy Christianity.

Here is the portrait of a holiness fanatic, or perfectionist.