The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-06-10

best Sometimes they had q form of hero-
worship, taking for it tho man they considered
the highest type of manhood and endeavored
to initiate him in their lives.
1t was Diderot who said that it seemed that
instead or man being made in the image of his
God, he YVES worshiping God in the image OF
himself That he reversed the Hindu's transmit
grafton of soul-the soul of the animal going into
the body of the man. Instead of worshiping the
soul of the animal out yonder, he worshiped the
animal in here. In that we get the form of mod
ern idolatry, most dcspicable, most prevalent.
and most Observation-Disclosures
the instincts Of his own nature, making of him-
self god instead of worshiping his Creator, who
is adorable forever.
good many people have the idea that the
commandment of God against idolatry Is obso.
lete, except for the Chinese and heather people
over yonder There are men in the present day,
perhaps in this very city, perhaps in this very
audience, who think that is Of no value in this
day; that there is no necessity for preaching
against idolatry in pulpit in this land Yet
there are men worshiping the eagle to-day-the
eagle on the twenty-dollar gold piece-with more
love than the eagle was worsbiped in the days Of
Rome Some worship the eagle on the silver
dollar. Covetousness is idolatry. The
word OF God says so, and to ba
covetous in this day and generation is to bs
as idolatrous as the men and women the
banks of the Ganges. And did You ever hear
anybody get up in prayer meeting and confess
that he was covetous and avaricious9 man
will confess almost everything else. Nobody
gets up and says Il want you to pray for me,
for think my avarice is about to damn me-
No. they never do that. think il some brother
would get up in one of our prayer-meetings and
say that he would scare all OF them out of the
building. They would think he was going crazy.
There is such thing as getting very re-
ligious We always get very religious when we
have more of it on the outside than on the ia.
side. am amazed sometimes at the express
sions used in the newspapers. In one of your
city papers, this morning, there was para;
graph about IAN iron jawed workingman.s
Some of religious people are pretty much
the same-all the religion they have is in thelf
mouth They are very religious in their talk,
in forms and ceremonies, IL the way they get
themselves up for their religious duty There Ia
too much of this Sunday morning, IL o'clock
dress parade religion belong to church; got
my name on roll; claim to be d Christian; tell
everybody wherever GO, and yet am never
seen at the church, except at III o'clock
Sunday morning, and l go there from pure de.
cency and responsibility. believe it is'as true as
anything in the Bible, that the man who has but
little time to worship God is putting in the rest
of the time worshiping himself or something be-
longing to himself. Is man worshpng God
who gets up, morning after morning, year in and
year out and never calls his family together to
ask Gods blessing on them for the dayg What
is the matter2 Is it lack of time or does he think
he has all of his time apportioned out properly to
give God between IL and IL o'clock on Sunday
morningl Who is that man worshipinga He
sits down to his table, laden with bounties. threa
times day, eats like a hog and never thanks
God for it. Who is that man worshiping who
goes all the hours of the daylight urging himself
ahead in pursuit of the almighty dollar, and goes
home at night lies down to sleep like log with
out thanking God for the benefits of the day. I
believe that man is better off who, when the sun
rises aud SETS prostrates himself toward Mecca
and worships Mahomet as the prophet of God,
than the man in the United States who claims
to be a Christian and yet neglects
the duties that Christianity imposes.
man is presumed to worship
God, and give his alteration to Him and do the
things whereto he is moved by the Holy Spirit.
and he cannot get off with discharging that duty
one hour out of seven days No wonder preach
are discouraged, whan they have to 60 and
hold services day in and day out and number
of men and women on the rolls of the church,
those who proclaim themselves loudest and long
est, never come near their pastor except on Sum
day morning, when they come that their absence
may not be a cause of comment. Processing
themselves to be religious, they are idolators;
protesting to be servants of Christ, they make
Christ their servant, and make his name sane
tuary ministering to their respectabity.
Here is a man who goes out on the street and
takes the name of God in vain-swears till the
air is blue and sulphurous with the smoke of his
imprecations. He comes into the church, and
because he hears preacher talk about men
making fools and liars Of themselves
he is horribly shocked He talks about
slang in the pulpit. He wants to be
called gentleman, and yet uses the vilest terms
preacher who uses the plain, United States terms
about him. He doesn't get mad if you call him
blasphemer, but if you call him hnzxard.
then he does get mad. Yet he uses the name OF
God daily carron -buzzs-ss sailing around
him, when it 90. ,rirnin hundred yards of him
would just say "Phew!" and leave him. You
might call him hoopoo He wouldn't know
what that means. John Smith, p. r. the adj
dition might please him-P. H.. principal hoo.
poo of indianapolis. He would be proud of the
term, but translate it into United States, and
John Smith. principal buzzard (of Indianapolisl,
and ne would get mad.
There is nothing in ali animated nature that
liar will remind you of as much as q chameleon,
which changes to any color it is placed on. So
with liar. Put him anywhere it is his inter.
est to be like and he will be like it at And
he won't Ike to be called liar. But call him
one of your chameeon-like fellow creatures. aud
he would think you were giving him an agree
able title.
that exhibit the quality of ingratitudo.
These are serpent and human being. You
take some of these selfish people who want
every thing they see. If they don't get it all and
gorge themselves on it all. they are swapping and
snarling on all sides. They are doing nothing
except worshiping the dog that is in them.
The object of all preaching in the world Is to
contradistinguish those forms of allegiance and
worship which tend on one hand to idolatry and
en- the other to the true God. The object of
preaching is to secure the allegiance of man to
God and make Him the only, the su.
preme, object of their worship. Men mag
differ in their methods, but if they are
truly and sincerely preaching the gospeE
of Jesus Christ, they will preach to you whether
in refined or uncultured language, it will always
be the truth of God. and there will be truth
enough in every sermon if you will but search
for it and reject the husk that is about it. The
desire of the Holy Spirit is to have you lay hold
of the truth and apply it in your lives There is
nothing but falsty, error, the pervertine of the
best qualities of our soul, in any form of wor-
ship that leads to idolatry, and preacher in
the world is attempting to misead people into
anv form OF worship that will land
them in idolatry. If we present the truth
in one guise and sometimes another. it is that
it may happily be that somewhere along the line