The essays written by Benjamin L. Sommer where originally published by Apostolic Christian Publishing Company, Peoria, Illinois 1929, in a book titled "The Fascination of the Race and Other Essays". This book may be purchased here.

It is assumed that Ben was a part of the Apostolic Christian Church Nazarean and perhaps lived in central Illinois. We are interested if any additional information about this author is available.

Forward from the book:

These essays, nearly all of which originally appeared in “The Visitor,” (a Nazarean periodical) have been collected and issued in one volume, to be distributed to the friends of the author and to those who seek the salvation in Jesus Christ.

There was no greater desire in the heart of “B. L.,” as he was known to many business friends, or “Uncle Ben,” as others named him, than that his friends should know the source of his strength and the power and joy that come through faith in Jesus Christ. He was convinced that no one is able to follow in the footsteps of Christ because of any superior quality inherent in himself. He knew it is necessary to experience that which he had experienced in order to attain that newness of life, the regeneration of which he wrote in “Ye Must Be Born Again.”

It was evident, especially in the last days of his life, that he withdrew more and more from his business and threw his energy the more into that supreme contest of which he wrote in “The Fascination of the Race.” He found the necessity to strain every fiber in the effort to attain the goal, and most earnestly encouraged others to join him in whole-heartedly pressing forward on the way that leads to eternal life.

This booklet is being published to give expression to the desire that he had—that his friends, and indeed all men, might know that faith which alone makes life worthwhile and which carries with it an unshakeable assurance of life beyond the grave, where “God will dwell with men; where there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, nor parting, nor any more pain; where he that overcometh shall inherit all things as a child of the Almighty Father.”

-C. S. S.