The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-01-19

what they have to offer to humanity in the place
of Christianity, and they answer Reason. They
all blow out the sun that they may introduce
gaslight; they all snatch the crown Of divinity
from the brow of Christ that they may crown
themselves 1t takes away the Bible. which bears
the finger marks of more than 3 900 years, and
which has been believed with the tears Of penitenC
believing souls in all generations past. Can you
imagine the results of the supremacy of all this
antagonism to the religion of the Biblel Sweep
away the doctrine of the supernatural pronounce
the Bible human book Jesus Christ only man,
Christianity one OF the great natural religions,
pronounce miracles and prophesies impossible,
prayer an Illusion, regeneration simply human
change, and the religious life an idealization
and worship of self; materalZe the soul and all
its longngs and aspirations call eternity remote
contingency and Immortality dream, and you
have swept out of human life everything that
gives it sweetness, dignity, nobility brightness
and joy, and you have Frustrated the race in alb
ject devotion before the altar of self, and made
human society hell of contending desires and
lusts-dark dreadful, ruinous, damnabe. But
must you fly from this materialistic, destructive
naturalism and degrading animalism of the
world to the church to find architecture, art,
culture, morality, formaity and worldly mind
edness-the absence of all vitality and sprituali-
tys lnhdellty has never been match for a splr-
itual church; infdelity is more than match for
any other kind. There is a higher logic than
that of the schools, logic more stable than the
pyramids of Egypt-the logic of a
pure life, the logic of prayer,
the the 81 logic g4 of an all conquering faith h
praying with such mighty faith that
the cloud of mercy will appear and
showers of blessings descend. We can
best answer objections to Christ's divinity by
being made the partakers of His divine nature
ourselves. We can best prove the falsity of the
argument against miracles by becoming, under
grace, the personal evidence and living illustra-
ton OF that greatest of all miracles, the con-
version of a. soul to God We can most
effectually silence inidelity by that enduement
of power that will bring a pentecost to any
church in Christendom. By common consent
II not by actual demonstration, it is affirmed OF
all things material that they will perish From
the great gardens of Babylon to the hut of the
peasant from the marble palace to the delicate
beauty OF the lily, and to the rosy cheek of
youth, all will fade and become dust So perfect
is this desolation that even the heavens shall
pass away as a scroll and the elements
melt with fervent heat. Along with
this perishable organic world will follow
all the mental actions and emotions that were
based wholly upon it. Appetite, passion, ambi-
ton, all the states of mind that grow up from
the material EARTH point downward toward
that whence they came, and here the ''sword
and the sceptre rust" and along with them will
perish the passion that drew the sword, and
the tyranny that swayed the sceptre. On the
other hand, by common consent, the world
cepts spiritual realm which is the antithesis
OF the great dust-seeking kingdom--a world
where all the sentiments, actions, aspirations
and ideas are tending away from the grave, and
reaching up toward the habitatone of God and
the land of immortal life. And this is revela-
ton. Christianity teaches that love. peace joy,
long suffering, gentleness, goodness faith, meek
ness, temperance are the fruit of the spirit,
and belong to certain higher life, called the
life of the spirit. What the church of God
wants to-day is a baptism of the Holy Ghost into
this spiritual life, that it may discern the spin
things which
icated and upon which its aggressive power de-
ponds.