Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1882-04-03
RELIGIOUS ANxIETIES.
"Sirs, What Shall ! Do to Be
Saved?"
A Reply to Ingersolps Question: Practical
Request-The Scene in the Jail and
the Scene in Steinway Hall-The
Different Phase Of the Question
81. and Its importance.
THE 0NlYHELP P

IMMtUIA SHlfHI IUN nC UNl nClI
BROOKLYN. April .2-During the past few
weeks revival has been in progress, in
which over three hundred persons have
been converted, one hundred and sixty OF
whom have already joined the Brooklyn
Tabernacle The house was packed this
morning when Dr. Talmage rose and gave
out the hymn:
"Oh, could speak the matche>> worth.
Oh, could ! sound the glories forth,
That in my Savior shine"
The reverend gentleman then announced
his text: Acts xvi. 3O-"Sirs, what shall |
do to he saved" and continued:
The last week the board fences, the stone
walls, the street cars OF Brooklyn and New
York have had displayed on them the sub
ject of Mr.. Ingersolrs lecture: what must
| do to be saved" The celebrated infidel
has asked the question, and he has an
svered it in his own way. OF course the
allusion OF the lecture was to the scene OF
my text. hut warrant the facetious lectur-
er asked the question i'll different mood
from that in which il was originally pro-
pounded, and the audience who heard the
question last week was very different from
the one in which the first heard it. The
audience who heard it last Tuesday and
Wednesday nights in Steinway Hall and
the Academy Of Music were comfortable
in elegant buildings to which audience
room they had been admitted after they
had paid fifty or scventy-iive cents to hear
the religion Of our Lord Jesus Christ de-
famed and rdiCucd | would rather pay
fifty cents for almost anything than to hear
Christ insulted would rather pay fifty
cents to hear my dead brother. or sister or
father, or mother DETAINED, than pay fifty
cents TO hear the religion Of Jesus Christ
defamed. Fifty cents are not much, but
would feel that such an entertainment was
costing me 100 much. There was al unim-
aginable difference between the scene at
the StcinNay Hall and the scene Of the text.
In tie cell ui Il Philippian dungeon,
place
Gold. Dark. .HEideOus,
uniilumcd save by the torches OF an Oifi-
Cial who comes to see II they are alive yet,
are the ministers of the gospel, their feet
fast in an instrument of torture, their
shoulders dripping from the stroke OF
leathern thongs, their mouths hot with
inflammation of thirst, their heads faint be-
cause they may not lie down. All the cor
rdors of the prison are silent IN the dark
ness, save aS some murderer struggles with
his dream, or some rulian turns over an
his chains or you hear the cough OF some
diving cOnsumptive In the same build
ing, but on a comfortable couch, sleeps
paid officer OF the government, whose
business it is to supervise the prisons. l
take it that the man was respectable, or he
would not have been entrusted with such
responsibility. In the darkness God lays
his hand on that stout built penitentiary.
At midnight crash goes the prison wall,
and Paul and SilaS, the incarcerated clergy
men, are freed. The supervisor, though
for long while accustomed to the dark
ness and horrors that hover around dun
geOns, is startled beyond bounds, and
ruShes in, tlambeau in hand, amid the
falling walls. and throws himself down be-
fore the Christian prisoners. crying,
what Must DO 10 be Saved:''
There must be hundreds of Christian
men and women in this house with more
or less earncStnesS asking the same ques-
ton ] meet you in the tremendous crisis
with a message from heaven. There may
he some here who could Surpass me in
strength of argument many who could
draw upon larger resources of knowledge
and dive in deeper profOundS of science.
There are many before me before whom |
would be willing to bow as the inferior
to the superior. but i'll one thing !
Weld 10 none who are before me,
and that is the desire to have your souls re-
deemed by the power OF the Omnipitent
Gospel, aud with an all.cOnquering desire
that sometimes wCll-nigh takes away my
utteranCe. stand here To beg your accept
ance OF life eternal. | proceed to charar'
terize the question Uf the agitated jail
keeper. First | remark, il was COurte
GUS question. lie did not rush and say TO
Paul and Silas "Here, you vagabOndS,
what are you doing with my prison? Go
back to your places, you deSperadOcS. |
have had enough trouble with YOU. After
VAstrOying the peace OF our city with your
Infamous doctrines you are now trying to
brcak5sS" No such words did he utter
That w four letters, ''Sirs, was equiv
alent to lords. 1t recognizes their man
hood and the honor of their mission. II
we come with a captious spirit 10 inquire
the way to heaven we can expect no light.
If we begin by saying the professors OF re-
ligiOn are hypocrites and
The Church IL IL Fraud.
and hy making irritable inquiries about the
mysterious and inSCrutable, saying: Come,
my wise man. explain this and explain
that" We might better make no inquiries
at all II was decent. and gcntlCmanly,
and defcrcntial mode Of address when the
iail-krcPrr cried out to his apostolic pris-
OuerS. "SrS
Again it was a practical question. lie
might have asked his distinguished pris-
OnCrS why God let sin come into the world
or how ii VA, possible for the Jesus ut
whom they preached tn be- God and man.
or what they meant by the DEGREES or who !
Cain married, or what was the cause OF
Earthquakes. No. He hurs one question,
hot from the heart into the car of the
apostles. and that an inquiry OF present
md everlasting safety. Multitudes Of men
yant to be Christians, but they have !, 900
questions to ask about the nOn.e>sentalS.
hey search the Bible for queer things aud =
fr contested things. They have all their
Ives been
Fishing For Swapping. Turtles.
Wat if man should have SO many ques-
tiUn> 10 ask about light and heat that he
ShCuld sit in dark room all his life in
| stead OF going ont To see and feel the other.
Netthcre are rseR in such undeCidedness
| aboSt the chemistry of the gospel. that
| yearafter year they shut themselves in the
| dungeon of their unbel.ef. when God is all
| the tine calling them TO come cat with the
! nConide light ami warmth % the Sun OF
| ri i8htpusness. The question you are most
! Interested m is nOt whether Calvin or
! -Grmi1uS Sas right, not whether in holy
! 8TdinSnCe handful OF water or a haptiStry
! Is the letSer, not whether foreor,hnation
and fee agency can b. rccouciled, tsrt
wher We You gong TO spend eternity.
. Furter. | Ckaracterzq the quesIi,2, ut
! jail-kesrer as personal to himself; sup.
I pose hi had hundreds OF friends, some
/ of them good some bad. He did not
ask aboIt theE. ! suppose there were men
/ in the va Is OF that prison unfit IA lie, AMI
! ii the wal, during the earthquake, should
! fail on item their acts would he desperatr.
! But the vsight of his question hinged on
I his own CeliveranCe-what shall do to be
! saved? y soon as man is safe himself
4 he begins % be anxious after others, hut
| the first ting with every man ought 20 ne
his own sou What is my condition? What
! is to beconsoi mes What shall do? The