The Nevada picayune., 1885-02-19

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 SERMON, MONDAY NIGHT, FEB. ,.
 I have been asked to postpone the sermon l ad'snnoanced for to- night on "The Unpardonable Sin until tomorrow night, and will talk about. the baptism ofthe Holy,Spir' it and of ire,' We talk great deal about baptism, and the reason we do IS because other churches will not, and they do not because they cannot. This baptism of fire and spirit is the cause great deal Of false theory, and we have to correct this, (Matt. 8 chap the words of John the Baptist: II inGeed bap- tise you with water unto repent ance but He that cometh after me shall baptise you with fire and with the Holy Ghost" now, do not stop here at a semi colon, but read to the period always, "Whose fan Is Tn his hand and He will thoroughly purge his floor and gather his wheat into his garner, but he will burn up the chatf with unquencha- ble fra.' Now we have period, and have come to the word fire again. Furthermore he said: Be hold the ax is laid unto the root of the trees" (meaning the words he was then speaking was bringing | ght to their mnds.) "Every tree that brinseth not forth good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fre." That..is the baptism of fire. The meaning of the word baptism from the Greek is to immorse, to dip, to plunge. Now, there is only one baptism that can be performed by man, that is of water. Christ never baptised with :. water as we know, ond go man ever baptlsed with the Holy Ghost. That Is Christ's work alone. Now, If yon are baptiscd with water, you need not concern yourself about the bap tism of the IIolyGhost, for the Lord will do his work all right. But 1t vou will not go into the water when all your powers ofreason and good sense and loyalty to duty lmpel you, that it is right, ifyon will not be immersed in water, the Bible, not l, tells you that at last you vii! % into the fire. The chatf, and the trees that bring not forth good fruit shall be cast into the fire. Two kinds of baptism for two classes of persons; of water, for the repent ant sinner when he may recleve the Holy Ghost, and of fire, for the willful sinner, who hardens his heart against the word of God. l might tell you that the Holy Ghost would come to you, and in some In- expected way you would be con- verted. To some minds 1t might seem very important, and smart in me to talk about something that nobody knew anything about, nor understand. But l give you the word of God and try to explain, in a simple way, that will not cause your minds my mental strain. God is not an unnatural God, He gives us illustrations that we can all un- derstand. If you had tree in your garden that bore no fruit and whose shadow kept other trees from bear ing would yon not destroy it? A man never goes to Heaven but grows to heaven, and you must be- gin to grow before you bear lrm- ! God will not contradict his own word, the Bible, the infalible book, and when you have followed out His plan of salvation to the best of your knowledge and ability, you can be as sure of your sal yation as you are of your ident- ty. Just depend upon that, and add to your faith, courage, and keep right on. God shows TO partlality as is expressed in that sad hymn, Pass me not oh gentle savior. v Oh the error and tbe harm that IS done by such sentiments! The Tc- man wrote that, must havethought that Gods spirit would walk down the aises of the church and touch the heart of this man and skip that one. and SO on. If God was that kind of God, and had that kind of a heaven, I wOald not want to go there. God is not full of notions as we are. He is unchangeable- "the same yesterday to day and for ever" Man may he the very pie ture of despair and degradation, and Gods love IS the same nan