The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1886-10-29

of Bethlehem-it sang q Christmas carol
over his birth; the rocks-they beat dirge
at His death.
Behold His victory over the grave! The
hinges Of the family vault become very
rusty, because they are never opened ex-
cept to take another in. There is a knob
| on the outside Of the door of the sepulcher,
| but none on the inside. Here comes the
| conqueror of death. He enters that realm
and says: Daughter of Jarus, sit up;" and
she sits up. To Lazarus: ''Come forth"
and he came forth. To the widows son Re
said: ''Get up from that BIER" and he goes
home with his mother. Then Jesus snatched
up the keys Of death and hung them to His
girdle. and cried until all the graveyards
of the earth heard him: 20 death. l will be
thy plague. o, grave, I will be thy do
struc:ion.n
No man could go through all the obstacles
have described, you say, without having
nature adjoined that was supernatural.
That armand its muscles, and nerves,
and bones, were intertwisted the energies
of omnipotence. In the syllables of that
voice there was the emphasis of the eternal
God. That foot that walked the deck of
the ship in Gennesearet shall stamp king
doms of darkness into demolition. This
poverty-struck Christ owned augustus,
owned the Sanhedrim, owned Tiberias,
owned all the castles on its beach and all
the skies that looked down into its waters;
owned all the earth and all the heavens.
To Him of the plain coat belonged the
robes of celestial royalty. He who walked
the road to Emmaus-the lightniugs were
the fire-shod steeds to HIS chariot
Yet there are those who look on and see
God turn water into wine, and they say:
Sleight of hand. And they see Christ raise
! the dead to life. and they say: Easily ex-
planned; not really dead; playing dead.
And they see Christ giving sight to the
blind man, and they say: Clairvoyant
doctor. o. what shall they do on the day
when Christ rises up in Judgment, and hills
shall rock, and the trumpetS shall call, peal
on peal
In the time of Theodosius the Great there
was a great assault made upon the divinity
of Jesus Christ, and during that time Theo-
dosius the Great called his own son to sit
on the throne with him. and be a co-partner
In the government of the empire; and one
day the old Bishop came and bowed down
before Theodosius the Emperor, and passed
out of the room, and the Emperor was Of
Tended, saying to the old Bishop: "Why
! who shares with me in the government"
| Then the old Bishop turned to the young
man and said: THE Lord bless thee, my
young man." but still paid him no such
honor as he had paid to the Emperor. And
the Emperor was still offended and dis
| pleased. when the Bishop turned to Thes-
| dosius the Great and said to him: .'You
| are offended with me because l don't paw
| the same honor to your son, whom you have
made co-partner in the government of this
empire, the same honor pay to you, and yet
you encourage multitudes of people in your
realm to deny the Son of Gcd equal au-
tnority. equal power with God the Father"
NJ subject also treasures US of the fact
that in all our struggles we have a SYM
pathizer. You can not tell Christ any
| thing new about hardship. do not think
| that wide ages of eternity will take the
scars from His punctured side. and His
lacerated temples. and His sore hands. You
will never have burden weighing SO many
pounds as that burden Christ carried up
the bloody hill. You will never have any
suffering worse than He endured when,
with tongue hot. and cracked and intfamed,
and swollen, Ee moaned: Il thirst" You
Will never be surrounded with worse hos
tility than that which stood around Christ's
feet, foauiny. reviling. ivid with rage,
| bowling down His prayers, and snufling up
the smell of blood. Oh, We faint hearted!
oh. We troubled oh, We prosecuted one! here
is q heart that can syr-pathize with You.
Again. and lastly. learn . m al that
has been said this morning that Christ was
awfully in earnest If it had not been
momentous mission He would have turned
back from it disguised and discouraged
lie saw you in 4 captivity from which Il
was resolved to extricate you though il
cost Him al sweat. I'll tears, al blood. He
cane great way to save you. Ee came
from Bethlehem here, through the place OF
skulls. through the charuel house. through
Punishment. There was not among ali the
ranks of celestiais one being who would &c
as much fer you. lay His crushed heart al
your feet to-day.
Let It not be told in Heaven that you de-
Gberately put your foot on it. While it
Will take all the ages of eternity to cele-
brate Christ's triumph. am here to make
the startling announcement that because OF
the rejection of this mission on the part Of
some of you. all that magnificent work of
garden. and cross, and grave is, so far as
you are concerned. failure. Helena, the
Empress. went to the Holy Land to find the
cross of Christ. Getting 10 the Holy Land
there We're three crosses excavated, and
the question was which of the three crosses
was Christ's cross. They took dead body,
tradition says, and put it upon one of the
crosses, and there was no life: and they
took the dead body and put it upon another
cross. and there was no life. But tradition
says that when the dead body was put up
against the third cross it sprang into life.
The dead man lived again. Oh, that the
life-giving power Of the Son Of God might
start your dead soul into eternal life, be-
ginning this day. Awake thou that sleep
est, and rise from the dead, and Christ shall
give thee Life"