Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1882-09-25
PRODlGALS.
The Children of Men Who Have
Wandered From Home.
A Father Who Pleads That His Household
May be Returned Unto Aim-Wheu
VIII the Wanderers Seek
Rest and Peace.
SERMON BY REV. 7. DE VIII TALHAGE

New York, September 2i'-Rev. Talmage
preached in the Brooklyn tabernacle this
morning as follows:
Subject: "HOmesiekness.'
Text-Luke Nv. IS. 81 Will arise and go to
my father"
When a man is thoroughly hungry his
energy IS all gone. He can toll with neither
brain nor hand. Many an army has been
defeated not through lack of ammunition,
but through lack Oi bread. 1t was this that
tanned the high spirit Of the young man
mentioned in my text He could have got
along with a rough blanket for a covering
and the night sky for a roof, and might
have dropped his thirst in public we'll.
But he must have something to eat within
q few hours or die. The traveller in Asia
Minor to-day will tell you that there are
trees that bear long beans, or ''carols," as
they are sometimes called, or bushes, as
they are sometimes translated. These long
beans are often eaten by the poorer popu-
latiOn, but more often they are thrown to
the swine that crunch them with great
ayidity. The young man in the text wants
some of these beans, or carobS, but cannot
get them without stealing them Seated
amid the swine troughS perfectly wretched,
an ida flashed across him.
IL viii go Home.
These are no clothes for a rich mans son
to wear What business is this for Jew
feeding swine? can stand it no longer.
will arise and go to my father" Not
waiting TO patch up his poor clothes or i'm
prove his personal appearance, away he
flies. HomesickneSS gives him fleet foot.
hin, Tho yUhn had hnnD nH
q good while, now as on his homeward
tramp. Are we, my friends, ready to fol-
low him. NOvelists have thrown around
sir romance and fascination, but my text
tears off the disguise. Notwithstanding all
that Lord Byron and George Sand have said,
sin is a low, mean, contemplate business,
and filling the trOughS fer the herd of in
iquities that root and wallow in the soul is
no occupation for men and women intend
ed to he sons and daughters to the Lord
Almighty. Oh, the wisest thing that that
young man did was to
Resolve 10 60 Back.
His circumstances would never get any
better there. He could not sew up the rags.
He could not appease hunger His business
would never become any more respectable
than it was. Go home, you poor boy. am
glad TO see you get up with such good reso-
luton, and the only safe step for us to take
Is III lllG SdlllC las %
many herds of iniquity, and he says he will
give us large wages if we will only watch
them. Liar, Down with thee into the pit!
The wages of siR is DEATH" Satan covers
his employees with rags; he pinches them
with eternal hunger, and when they are
weary of the business and try to get away
| he chaSes them with all the blOOdhounds
! OF perditiOn. Oh, was il not q sensible thing
| for this young man when he found himself
| in the destitution and suffering of the will
! derneSS TO say: 81 will arise and go TO my
! father"
In the time Of Mary the Queen, amid the
| great prosecutions, a prosecutor came TO the
house of an old Christian woman and de-
manded what he called hereto that was
! hidden in the house. The old Christian
| woman said:
"Open that Trunk
| and you will lind him The prosecutor
| opened the trunk and on the top OF some
| linen lay looking-glaSs, and the persecu-
tor looked in it and said: Where is the
hereto / am looking fOr?' and the old
| Christian woman said: Don't you see him
| in the glass AS to-day We take up the
! glass OF Gods word | would that instead Of
/ seeing the prodigal, we might see our own
| lost condition by reason of our sin, and be
| so impressed with it that We should cry out
| nightly TO the Lord God for his mercy.
| | have, in the first place, to remark that
| this resolution of the prOdigal was made in
! disgust at his present condition. II his
| employer had set him to tending flowers, or
| to tending vines over the arbOr. or to keep
| ing an account of the pork market, or to
overseeing the other labOrers, that young
| man would never have gone home 10 his
| fathers house If he had had salary enough
| he would have said: II can get along with
| out these splendid things. can rough 1t
| Just as 4 great many other youngtmen nave
| roughed it." Ii he had had money IN his
pocket he never would have started home.
| He would have said: What do l want
with father, with fifty, a hundred, thou
sand dollars in my pocket.
What DO I Want TO Go Home For:
will never apologize to the old man.
| Besides that have one-third OF the proper
ty coming TO me any how. Besides If L
| went home know father would put me on
the limits. He would not allow such go
ings-on in the old place as like to indulge
in. Come, my boys, fill high and let's
drink again to the good time that's COM
ing" All it was his utter destruction and
pauperism; il was the fact that they be
grudged him the beans ami the Caroles. 1t
was because he had come down to destltu-
ton, beneath which there was no lower
depth that he resolved to go to his father.
Let me here say that no man ever starts
for God until he is persuaded of his fam
| ine-struck condition. People say to min.
| listers: why do you stand and talk ab-ut
the lost state of man." For the reason
that unless men are persuaded OF 1t they
do not want the Gospel. If | come into
YOUR house and you are well and l talk
about powerful medicines and physl clans,
you say:
/ have no cough, no neuralgia no rheuma-
tlSm. Why do you talk to me about medl-
cine?" But if come into your house and
feel that YOU are desperately sick, and un-
less YOU get help very soon you must die.
As soon as begin to talk about medicine
or a doctor, you say: Bring them quickly
or / shall die" Now, if | can convince
Won that in your natural condition you are
lost, that you are sick and diseased by rea-
son Of sin from the crown OF your head 10
the souls OF your feet, then you are ready
TO hear me while speak OF Jesus Christ,
the great physician, and Of the balm that
will heal an our wounds. And you say,
"How are you going to prove III? Wen, l
could prove it by the assertion OF men, or
/ could prove il by giving Gods statement.
Which shall it ber Gods statement, every
man saws. You shall have it Jeremiah
saws: The heart is deceitful above all
things and desperately wicked. JOB;
"Who is man that he should be clean, ana
he which is born OF woman that ne shoutu
be righteous?" Job XIV. l6: How much
more abominable and filthy is man which
drinketh iniquity like water" Go further
and read: There is none that doeth good.
No, Net One
"As by one man sin entered into the
world. and death by sin, so death hath
psssed upon all men, for that all have
sinned." By every possible smile the
Bible sets forth the truth that We are gull
tv. and that there is no help for US so Tar as
human nedicament is concerned. SIN IS
red-hot plowShare that turned up Eden, and
il has Frustrated the whole earth with the
exhaustion of death, and unless man
0uits his sin and comes TO God for saliva
tfon he cannot be saved. Prove 1t? vii
prove it: Except man be born again he
cannot see the kingdom of God" There
is but one name given among men whereby
we can be saved, end that is the name
Jesus" Do not some Of you begin TO lee
like that yeung man of the text, weary
your sins? Do you not feel like coming To
the wardrobe of Gods mercy and asking
for a garment of pardoning love? Would
won not like to sit down at the great ban
6uetting table of Gods mercy? Are there
1lot sops here who would like to be Chris