Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1873-06-12
Is THIS A NEW DEPARTURE
Sermon,hy the Rev. III. w. Beech
er-poSsiDiIities of Eternal Life.

Sermon.hy the Rev. II. w. Beech
er-poSsioilities of Eternal Lie
Fron Report ofsunday's Sermon
Remarking, with glance through
the windows upon the clear, delightful
brightness OF the first morning OF sum-
iner, that it was a good day to talk
about heaven, when the very tranquil
ity and sereneness of the scene was
symbol of the peace and order that we
shall find in heaven, Mr. Beechcr con-
fined the ideas of his sermon yesterday
morning to the one topic of the future
world, and the people who live there.
Taking his text from the Revelations,
he referred to the belief popular
among SO many that there is an inter-
mediate, probationary state between
existence here and life in what is re-
garded as heaven, and said that his
owa feeling was that after death the
soul rises Immediately into the pres
ence of God, for if there was any inter-
mediate place we should have some
conclusive testimony of it somewhere
in the Bible; and he quoted the pass
age, "When the dead shall rise, all the
living at that time shall go with them,
and be in the presence OF their Faith
err so that it would plainly appear
that there is no intermediate camping
ground where the soul can wait until
it is better prepared to inherit eternal
life. That dying is an entrance at once
into heaven, every person may have a
reasonable presumption for believing.
And this theory of the entrance OF be-
Iieving souls into heaven Immediately
after death does not forego that idea of
an unfolding process, which, though
not probational, is yet gradual and
gradational. On this point positive
ness should be avoided, but there is an
illustration in tn 22d of Matthew which
shows the soundneSS Of the idea. This
was an allusion to the proposition
made to Christ of a woman who was
seven times married, and at last died,
the question occurring as to whose wife
she should be of the seven, Christ says:
aye do err, not knowing the Scriptures
or the power of God, for in the resur-
rection they neither marry nor are
given in marriage, but are as the an
gels of God" which is a condition, ad-
ded Mr.. Beecher, totally different
from that which prevails on the
earth. The passions which continue
the race, hunger and thirst which sup
ply the body with food and drink, and
the combative tendencies which earth
inspires, shall be wanting there. When
we leave this body we leave many
burnt out passions and appetites.-
There is no propagation of race there;
there is no hunger Or thirst; there is
no fighting nor jealousy. Why, then,
should we possess those functions of
the body that we have no need off,
and the preacher cited PauPs declara-
tion that we shall not carry our earthly
bodies through into the other world.
We shall have bodies that will not be
aeeting; and yet which shall not iden-
tify us. We shall there have the affec-
tions and the thoughts OF the mind
which do not belong to brutehood.
Speaking of the point of goodness to
which one must, or rather must not,
necessarily arrive, Mr.. Beecher said:-
II can conceive of men whose work
here is covered all over with faults,
and unfit, when dying, for even the
better part Of society on earth, who can
obtain entrance into heaven, and |
though their place there shall be lowly |
and there is an infinite distance be-
tween the top and bottom degrees Of
spiritual advancement--yet they will
rise with a rapidity not known on
earth into purer latitudes, and the
rude, inchoat nature may thus always
have a starting point in heaven; for
there is room there for the lowest
Like the seed forty feet below the sur
face of the ground, which never
sprouts, when the well is dug and the
earth thrown out into the warmth and
under the showers, they will catch the
impetuous of divine life, and rise to
glorious development"