Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1886-11-29


| connubial partnership, are Christian.
| You are safe for the skies. Then IL is
| your first duty to secure the eternal safety
| Of your lifetime associate. Is not the
| everlasting welfare of your wife impeni-
tent, or your husband impenitent, of more
| Importance than your church relation
| ship? Is not the residence of your COM
panion for the next quadrillion of years
| mlghtier consideration TO you than the
| qualification of your ecclesiastical taste
| for forty or fifty years? A man or
| woman that would stop half minute to
weigh preferences as TO whether he or she
had better go with the uncovered COM
! panion TO this or that church or denoml-
nation has no religion at all, and
never has had, and fear never
will have. You are loaded
up with what you suppose to be religion,
but you are like Capt. Frobisher, who
brought back from his voyage OF discOv-
cry snipload of what he supposed val
liable minerals, yet, instead OF being sill
yer and gold, were nothing but common
stones of the field. TO be hurled out finally
as useless. Mighty Godl In all Thy
realm Is there one man or woman profess
my religion, yet so sGolid, so untitled, so
far gone unto death that there would be
any hesltancy in surrenderng all prefer
ences before such an opportunity OF SAL
walton and heavenly reunion? If you, a
Christian wife, are an attendant upon
this Brooklyn tabernacle, and your un-
| converted husband does not come here,
because he does not like its preacher, or
it's music, or it's architecture,
or It's uncomfortable crowdinV, anu
goes not TO any house or worship, but
would 20 ii you would accompany him
; where else, change your church re-
latlons. Take your hymn book home with
you to-day. Say good by 10 your friends
him to any one of hundred churches,
till his soul is saved and he joins you in
the march to heaven. More important
than that ring on the third finger of your
left hand, it is, that your Heavenly Fa-
Their command the angel OF mercy con-
corning your husband at his conversion,
as in tae parable of old PUT ring on
his hand"
No letter of more importance ever came
to the great city of Corinth, situated on
what was called the Bridge of the Sea-"
and gllstening with sculpture, and gatei
with a style of brass the magniicence OF
which the following ages have not been
able successfully to initiate, and over
Swallowed by the AcrO-Corinthus. a for
tress of rock two thousand feet high
say no letter ever came to That great city
of more importance than that letter in
which Paul puts the two startling Ques-
tiOns: Nv hat knowest thou, . wife,
whether thou shalt save thy husband? Or
now knowest thou, o man, whether thou
shalt save thy wife:" The dearest sacr-
flee on the part of the one is cheap If 1t
rescue the other. Better 90 to the smallest,
weakest, most insignificant church on
earth, and be co-partners In eternal bliss
than pass your earthly membership in
most generously attractive church while
your companion stays outside of evan
gelical privilege. Better have the drown
ing saved by a scow or sloop than let him
or her 90 down while you sail by in the
gilded cabins of Britannia or a Great
Eastern.
Second remark: If both OF the married
| couple be Christians, but one is so natu-
rally constructed that it is impossible to
enjoy the services OF particular denomi-
nation, and the other is not so sectarian
or punctllious, tlet the one less particular
| 20 with the other who is very particular.
| AS for myself feel as much at home in
| one den omination of evangelical Chris
tians as another, and think must have
been born very near the line. l like the
| solemn roll OF the Episcopal liturgy, and
LIKE the spontaneity of the Methodists,
| and hike The Importance given to the or
dinance of baptism by the Baptists, and
like the freedom of the COngrega-
tionalists, and l like the govern
ment aud the sublime doctrine of the
Presbyterians, and l like many of the
others just as good as any / have men
toned, and | could happily live, and
preach, and die, ard be buried, from any
of them. But others are born with so
stout, and unbending, and memorable a
liking for some denomination, that it is a
positive necessity they have the advan
| tage Of that one. What they were in
tended to be in eccleslasticism, was writ
ten in the sides of their cradle, If the
father aud mother had eyes keen enough
to see it. They would not stop crying
until they had put in their hands as play
thing Yves minister caIechism or the
Tnirty-nine Articles. The whole current
of their temperament, and thought, and
character, runs into one sect OF religion
lists as naturally as the James river into
the Chesapeake. 1t would be torture
to such persons to be anything
outside of that one church. Now,
let the wife or husband who
is not so constructed sacrifice the milder
preference for the one more infexible and
rigorous. Let the grapevine follow the
rugositieS and sinuOsltles oil the oak or
hickory. Abram, the richer in fiocKs OF
Christian grace, should say to Lot. who
is built on a smaller scale: "Let there be
no strife, l pray thee, between me and
thee, and between my herdmen and thy
herdmen. Is not the whole land before
theeY AS you can be edited and happy
|, | any WuSTes EO Win OuI companion 10 luS
church to which he or she must 90 or be
miserable.
Remark the third: II both the married
couple are strong in their sectarIanism,
let them attend the different churches pre-
ferred. 1t is not necessary that you at
tend the same church. Religion is
, between your conscience and your God.
$ Like Abram and Lot, agree to differ.
= When on Sabbath morning you come out
of the door OF your home together, and Que
goes one way and the other the other,
heartily wish each other good sermon
and a time OF profitable devotion, and
when you meet again at the MONDAY re-
, past, let IL be evident, each to each. and
to your children. and TO the hired help,
that you have both been on the Mount of
Transformation, although you went up
by tfeI ent paths, aud that you have both
been fed by the bread OF life, though
kueaded by different hands in different
trays, and baked in dtferent ovens.
"But how about the childrenP / am
often asked by hundreds Of parents. Let
them also make their choice. They will
grow up with reverence for both the de-
nominations represented by father and
mother il you, by holy lives, commend
those denominations, IL the father lives
the better life they Will have the more