MR ARCHIBALD MACCOLL was born at Tarbert, in the Island of Jura, Argyllshire, on the 25th September 1839. He had the great benefit and blessing of being brought up at the family altar by pious parents. Eternity and the Great Day will reveal fully the beneficial results of a godly upbringing, also the deplorable results of ungodly teaching and example upon children by careless and godless parents. However careful such parents may be of the bodily comforts and secular education of their children, while they neglect to teach them God’s Word, they are cruel like the ostrich to their own offspring. God commands—”Train up a child in the way he should go; and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” This is a promise that has been often fulfilled to parents in the past, and has the same blessing in it still to such as will endeavour faithfully to obey it. It was certainly fruitful in the case of the subject of this obituary.
At what age Archibald MacColl underwent the saving change the writer is not able to say, for he was reticent and modest about everything pertaining to himself; but that he was truly a God-fearing and upright man could not be doubted by any person who was competent to judge, or had the privilege of knowing him.
Mr MacColl came to reside in Glasgow in the year 1861, and was ordained an elder in the Argyll Free Church in 1867. In the year 1877 he went to the Hope Street Free Church. He remained as an elder in this congregation till 1893. The Rev. Mr Urquhart was then the minister of Hope Street Church. He was a worker that needed not to be ashamed, dividing the Word of God aright, giving his portion to the righteous and to the wicked, and consequently his labours were blest to many who are now with him in glory. Some of these the writer became acquainted with after he came to Glasgow in 1892. Mr MacColl, as might be expected, held this servant of God in much esteem. Mr Urquhart was called to his everlasting rest about the year 1886.
At a meeting of the Kirk-Session of Hope Street in the summer of 1893, Mr MacColl made known his conviction, that the only way to maintain an upright adherence to the Bible as being God’s inspired Word throughout, and to the Westminster Confession of Faith in all its articles, was to separate from the Free Church, which had changed her relation to both—God’s Word and the Confession—by the passing of the Declaratory Act in 1892 into a binding law and constitution in that Church, and by refusing at her last General Assembly, by an overwhelming majority, to take steps for its repeal. He was advised to delay taking that step, because such as had separated already would die out in less than two years. His reply to this unfulfilled prophecy was, that his conscience and God’s Word demanded of him to separate from a Church which, by her own deliberate action, ceased to be the Free Church of Scotland, as he could not fulfil his ordination vows now by remaining in fellowship with her. The following Sabbath he appeared in St Jude’s congregation with all his family. In after days he repeatedly expressed his thankfulness to the Lord for guiding him to maintain his adherence then to God’s Word in face of all the opprobrium to which that step exposed himself and all who had separated. Some of the terms by which the Free Presbyterian Church was designated were—Schismatics, unlearned men, idiots, and many such abusive terms. This treatment of men for adhering to God’s truth was nothing new, and Mr MacColl was not a weakling that could be swayed by such windy noise. He was not so deluded as to follow any body of men who had publicly forsaken the creed and constitution of the Church of Christ in Scotland.
Mr MacColl was one of the five elders which constituted the first Session of St Jude’s. He was appointed Session-Clerk at that meeting. A few years after that he was appointed congregational treasurer. He fulfilled all the duties of these two offices with the utmost integrity, and with ability which proved his suitableness for the duties involved. In the year 1910 failing health caused him to resign both offices. The Kirk-Session at that time recorded an expression of their appreciation of his Christian character as an elder, and as session-clerk and treasurer, and of the faithfulness with which he attended to all the duties devolving on him in the Session and congregation. The Deacons’ Court concurred in this statement. His courteous and affable behaviour towards all the office-bearers caused that he was beloved and very much respected by each one of them. This became very manifest the night he gave in his resignation. The expression of sorrow by all present was evidently deep and sincere. Each one expressed deepest sympathy with him, and the hope that the Lord would spare him for many years an elder in St Jude’s Session. The Lord did beyond expectation restore him to such a measure of health and strength that he was able to attend the means of grace, and appeared several times at meetings of Session, to the great consolation of his fellow-elders. He was highly respected also in the congregation. If he should be absent from church on Sabbath, the first question asked the writer by the people would be—”How is Mr MacColl? I missed him from church last Sabbath.”
Mr MacColl was a man possessed of a strong personality and of strong convictions. He possessed wisdom and understanding of no mean order in dealing with matters pertaining to the cause of Christ. God’s Word was his guide in the affairs of His Church, and also in his own temporal and spiritual concerns. His knowledge of the creed and principles of the Church of the Reformation in Scotland, and of the rules for the practice of her Church courts was above the ordinary.
He was a warm-hearted and steadfast friend. This was true in a very special manner as regards the Lord’s people. It appeared conspicuously towards such as manifested faithful adherence to God’s truth and cause in the world. His civility towards all men was one of his characteristics; but he made evident, like Ruth of old, that the God of Israel was his God, and that the Lord’s people were his people. He was truly a lover of the Lord’s people, and of the Lord’s Day and worship, also of everything pertaining to the glory of God in the world. It could be said of him truthfully that he, like David, “desired one thing of the Lord . . . that he might dwell in the House of the Lord all the days of his life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to enquire in His temple.” The mad boldness with which this sinful and adulterous generation profane the Lord’s Day, and mix their form of godliness with the world and the flesh, still calling such sacrilege Christianity, caused him much grief and pain. He was often afraid that the wrath of God would be poured forth against such heaven-defying practices. But he was taken away without seeing the evil which is bound to come if repentance and turning from these sins unto God prevent it not. For he knew that “God is not mocked.”
During his last illness he had several sore temptations from the Adversary, but the Lord always gave him the victory through His Word, which Satan cannot withstand. He told the writer that, on one of these occasions, being sorely tried on account of the corruption of his heart and mind, and Satan forcing on him the conclusion that he was never born again, the words—”Is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?” gave him a timely relief. On another occasion, when under great distress of soul, the words—”Get thee behind me, Satan,” gave immediate relief. His face beamed with joy when he rehearsed, with admiration, the goodness and mercy of God towards such an unworthy creature as he realised himself to be. He drew much comfort, as many of the true people of God did since the Apostle wrote them under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, from the words—”For that which I do, I allow not; for what I would, that I do not; but what I hate, that do I. If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good. Now, then, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing; for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. For the good that I would I do not; but the evil which I would not, that do I. . . . O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord.” These were the real experiences of his soul, and finding that they were also that of the great and saintly Paul the Apostle, they gave him much comfort. They were not the foundation of his faith: that was firmly built upon the sure foundation, Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
A few days before the change came, he was very weak, and consequently spoke very little. But his anchor was firmly fastened within the veil, and that being so, all was safe for an endless eternity. He got the victory through the blood of the Lamb and the Word of His testimony.
The writer would express his sincere sympathy with his son, two daughters, and all their family relations; also to his niece, who so devotedly attended to him during his illness. Mrs MacColl predeceased him by several years, after they had been married fifty years. May the Lord God of their father make the son and daughters and their households partakers of the grace which made him a partaker of the glory that is to follow.—N. C.
Anything that appears like fantastic dress, either in man or woman, is a sure indication, not only of the weakness of the head, but also of the depravity of the heart.—Rowland Hill.
A conformity to the world, in all ages, has been the ruin of the Church.—Rowland Hill.