St. Landry democrat. (Opelousas, La.) 1878-1894, 1886-09-11

prayer, ana ESGnefS CONSERVATION duu
Mary's broken heart, and Ruth's loving
and bereft spirit. o choose We between
Chemosh and Jehovah! The one service
is pain and disappointment; the other
service IS brightness and life. l have
tried both. ] choose the service of God be-
cause I was ashamed to do otherwise.
felt it would be imbecile for me to choose
Chemosh above Jehovah.
2. Again, if we want to be Christians,
like Ruth in the text, we must take the
Christians path:
Where thou goest, will go,
cried out the beautiful Moabitess to Naomi,
the mother-in-law. Dangerous promise
that. There were deserts to be crossed.
There were jackals that came down
through the wilderness. There were BAN
dts. There was the Dead Sea. Naomi
says:
ruth, you must go back. You are too
delicate to take this journey. You will
give out in the first five miles. You can
not go. You have not the physical stam-
ina or the moral courage to go with me-"
Ruth responds:
"Mother, am going anyhow. If stay
in this land I will be overborne of the
idolators; if l go along with you / shall
serve God. Give me that bundle. Let me
carry it. I am going with you mother,
anyhow"
And if we want to serve God, we must
do as Ruth did, crying out:
Where thou goest, will go.
Never mind the Dead Sea. Afoot or
horseback. If there be rivers to ford, we
must ford them. If ther be mountains to
scale, we must scale them. If there be
enemies to fight, we must fight them. 1t
requires grit and pluck to get from Moab
to Judah. Oh, how many Christians
there are who can be diverted from the
path by qulver of the lip, indicative of
scorn? They do not surrender to tempta-
ton, but they bend to it. And if in a
company there be those who tell unclean
stories they will go SO far as to tell some-
thing on the margin between the pure and
the impure. And il there be those who
swear in the room and use the rough word
"damn," they will go SO far as the word
"darn," and look over the fence, wishing
they could go farther; but as to any de-
termination like Ruth's 10 go the whole
road of all that is right, they have not the
grace TO do it. They have not in all their
body as much courage as Ruth had in her
little finger. Oh, my friends, let us
start for Heaven and go clear
through! In the river that runs by
the gate of the city we shall wash off all
our bruises.
8. Again I remark: If we want to be-
come Christians, like Ruth in the text, we
must choose the Christians habitation.
Where thou lodgest, will lodge.
cried ruth to Naomi. She knew that
wherever Naomi stopped, whether it were
howell or mansion, there would be Chris
tian home, and she wanted to be in it.
What do mean by Christian home?
mean a home in which the Bible is the
chief book; home in which the family
kneel in prayers; a home in which father
and mother are practical Christians; q
home in which on Sabbath, from sunrise
to sunset, there is profitable converse, and
cheerful song, and suggestions of better
world.
What a grand thing it is to have God
stand guard at that door, and the Lord
Jesus the family physician; and the wings
of angels the canopy over the pillow, and
the Lord of Glory perpetual guest. You
say it is important that the wife and the
mother be a Christian. / say to you it is
just as important that the husband and
father be Christian. Yet how many
clever men there are who say:
"My wife does all the religion of nv
4
confidence in her, and I think she will
bring the whole family up all right"
It will not do, my brother. The fact
that you are not Christian has more in
fuence on your family than the fact that
your wife is Christian. Your children
will say:
"Father's very good man; he is not
Christian, and if he can risk the future, ]
can risk the future"
0 father and husband join your wife
on the road to Heaven, and at night gath
er your family at the altar. Do you say:
81 can't pray. am man of few words
and don't think could put half dozen
sentences together in such prayer?" :
You can pray; you can. If your child
were down with scarlet fever, and the
next hour were to decide it's recovery or
its death, you would pray in sobs, and
groans and paroxysms of earnestness.
Yes, you can pray. When the eternal
life of your household may depend upon
your supplication, let your knees timber
and go down; but if you still insist that
you can not compose prayer, then buy
or borrow prayer-book of the Episcopal
church, and gather your family, and put
your prayer book on a chair, and kneel
down before it, and in the solemn and
hushed presence of God gather up all your
sorrows, and temptations, and sins, and
cry out:
sC1ond Lord deliuer nc ~