The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1882-07-20
TALNIAGE.
CONTINUED from 1st Pape.N

NNANA-NN'. --O- 49, - 3D.
crimes and designations. The number
of pockets you picked and the number
of chickens you stole make very poor
prayer-meeting rhetoric. Besides that,
it diseOurages other Christian people
who never got drunk or stole any thing.
| But it is pleasant to know that those
who were farthest down have been
brought highest up. Out of Internal
serfdOm into liberty. Out of darkness
into light. From coal to the solitaire.
THE crystal can not equal it."
But, my friends, the chief transform
ing power of the Gospel will not be
seen in this world, and not until heaven
breaks upon the soul. When that light
falls upon the soul then you will see
the crystals. o, what a magnificent
setting for these jewels of eternity! 1
sometimes hear people representing
heaven in way that is far from at
tractiVe to me. 1t seems almost vul-
gar heaven as they represent it, with
great blOtches of color and bands of
music making a deafening racket. John
represents heaven as eXquisitely beauti-
full. Three crystals. In one place he
says: "Her light was like precious
stone, clear as crystal" In another
place he says: Before the throne there
was sea of glass clear as crystal" In
another place he says: 81 saw pure
river under the throne, clear as crys
| tai" Three crystals. John says crystal
atmosphere. That means health. Balm
of eternal June. What weather after
the worlds east wind! No rack of storm
clouds. One breath of that air will
cure the worst tubercle. Crystal light
on all the leaves. Crystal light SHIN
mering on the topaz of the temples.
| Crystal light tossing in the plumes of
| the equestrians Of Heaven on white
horses. But "the crystal cannot equal
| it," John says crystal river. That
means joy. Deep and ever rolling. Not
one drop of the Thames or the Hudson
or the Rhine to soil it. Not one tear of
human sorrow to embitter it. Crystal
the rain out of which it was made.
Crystal the bed over which it shall roll
and ripple. Crystal its infinite surface.
But 'the crystal can not equal it," John
says crystal sea. That means multitude
nOusly Yast-Vast in rapture. Rapture
vast as the sea, deep as the sea, strong
as the sea, ever-changing as the sea.
BillOws of light. BillOws Of beauty,
blue with skies that were never clOuded
and green with depths that were never
fathOmed. Arctics and antarctics, and
MediterTaneans and Atlantics and Pa
citics in crystalline magniticence. Three
crystals. Crystal light falling on a
crystal river, crystal river rolling into
crystal sea. But "the crystal can not
equal it,"
"Ohw says some one, pulling his hand
over his eyes, 'can it be that l, who have
been in so much sin and trouble, will
| ever come to those crystalsP" Yes, 1t
may bet will be. Heaven we must
| have, whatever else we have or have not,
and we come here to get it. "HOw much
must l pay for it?" you say. You will
pay for it just as much as the coal pays
to become the diamond. In other words,
nothing. The same almighty power
that makes the crystal in the mountain
| will change your heart, which is harder
than stone, for the promise is: II will
| take away your stony heart, and | will
give you heart of flesh" "Oh," says
some one, sit is just the doctrine want.
God is to do everything, and l am to do
nothing" My brother, it is not the doc
trine you want. The coal makes no re-
sistance. 1t hears the resurrection voice
in the mountain, and it comes to crys-
tallizatiOn; but your heart resists. The
trouble with you, my brother, is, the
coal wants to stay coal. do not ask
| you to throw open the door and let
Christ in. l only ask that you stop
bOlting it and barring it. Christ, at
this moment, with his shoulder on the
outside of that dOOr-pOst, presses so hard
against it, that if you would take your
shoulder away from the inside of the
door, Christ would come in this minute.
Oh, my friends, we will have to get
rid of our sins. l will have to get rid
of my sins, and you will have to get rid
| of your sins. What will we do with
our sins among the three crystals? The
crystal atmosphere will display our pol
luton. The crystal river would be be-
fOuled with our touch. The crystal sea
would whelm us with its glistening
surge. Transformation now or no trans
formation at all. Give sin full chance
in your heart and the transformation
will be downward instead of upward.
In the days of Carthage a Christian
girl was condemned to die for her faith,
and boat was bedaubed with tar and
pitch, and filled with cOmbustibles, and
set on fire, and the Christian girl was
placed in the boat, and the wind was off
shore, and the boat flOated away with
its precious treasure. No one can doubt
Sin wants to put you in fiery boat and
shove you off in an opposite direction
off from peace, off from Cob, off from
Heaven, everlastingly off, and the port
towards which you would sail would be
port of darkness, and the guns that
would greet you would be the guns of
despair, and the flags that would wave
at your arrival would be the black flags
of death. o, my brother, you must
either kill sin or sin will kill you. 1t
is no wild exaggeratiOn when l say that
any man or woman that wants to be
saved may be saved. Tremendous choice.
A thousand people are choosing this mo-
ment between salvation and destruction,
between light and darkness, between
heaven and hell, between charTed ruin
glorious cTyStalliZatiOn.