The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1888-11-01

scripture eJacuiauOnS: Joy COM
eth in the morning." "My soul
waitheth for Thee more than they that
watch for the morning." "If 1 take the
wing of the morning." sThe eyelids of
the morning." .The morning cometh, -
'sWho is she that looketh forth as the
morning." 'His going forth is prepared
as the morning" "As the morning spread
on the mountains" THAT thou shouldst
visit Him every morning" What a
mighty thing the King throws from
His chariot when He throws US the
morning!
But the Bible tells US that our King
also has black chariot. Clouds and
darkness. i" we are told, ''are round about
Him." That chariot is cloven of night
and that night is trouble. When He
rides forth in that black chariot pesti :
lence and earthquake and famine and
hurricane and woe attend Him. Then LET
the earth tremble. Then let nations pray.
Again and again He has ridden forth in
that chariot of black clouds, across
England and France and Italy aud
Russia and America and over all
nations. That which men took for the
sound of cannonading at Sebastopol. at
Sedan, at Gettysburg, at Tel-el- Kebir, at
Bunker Hill. were only the rumblings
of the black chariot of the Almighty.
Aye, it is the chariot of storm
cloud armed with thunderbolts, and
neither man nor angel nor devil nor
earth nor hell nor Heaven can resist Him.
On those boulevards of blue this chariot
never turns out for any thing. Aye, no
one else drives there. Under one wheel
of that chariot Babylon was crushed and
Baalbeck fell dead and the Roman EN-
pire was Frustrated, and Atlantis, whole
continent that once connected Europe with
America, sank clear out of sight so that
the longest anchor OF ocean steamer can
not reach the top of its highest mount
aims. The throne of the Caesars was less
than the pebble under the right wheel of
this chariot and the Austrian despotism
less than a snowflake under the left
wheel. And over destroyed worlds on
worlds that chariot has rolled without a
jar or jolt.
This black chariot of war cloud rolled
up to the Northwestern Europe in 1912, and
four hundred thousand men marched to
take Moscow, but that chariot of clouds
rolled back, and only twenty-five thou
sand out of the four hundred thousand
troops lived to return. No great snow
storm like that had ever before, or has
ever, since, visited Russia. Aye, the
chariot of the Lord is irresistible. There
is only one thing that can halt or turn
any of His chariots, and that is PRAYER.
Again and again it has stopped it, wheel
ed 1t around, and the chariots of black
clouds under that sanctified human breath
has blossomed into such brightness and
color that men and angels have to vail
their faces from its brightness.
Mark you, the ancient chariot which
David uses as symbol in my text had
only two wheels, and that was that they
might turn quickly, two wheels taking
less than half the time to turn that four
wheels would have taken. And our
Lords chariot has only two wheels. and
means instant reversal, and instant help,
and instant deliverance. While the COM
bined forces of the universe in battle
array could not stop His black chariot
second or diverge it an inch, the driver of
that chariot says: "CalI upon Me in the
day of trouble and I will deliver thee;n
while they are yet speaking / will
hear" Two-wheeled chariot, one wheel
justice, and the other wheel mercy. Ave.
they are swift wheels. A cloud, whether it
belongs to the CIRCUS, the clouds that float
the highest; or belongs to the stratus, the
central ranges; or to the cumulus, the
lowest ranges, seems to move SLOWLY
along the sky, If it moves at all. But
many OF the clouds go at speed that
would seem lethargic to vestibule linn
tied lightning express train, so swift is
the chariot of our God; yea, swiftsr than
the storm, swifter than the light. Yet a
child ten years old has been known to
reach up, and with the hand of prayer
take the courser of that chariot by the bit
and slow it up. or stop it, or turn it aside.
or turn 1t back. The boy Samuel stopped
it Elijah stopped it. Hezekiah stopped
it. Daniel stopped it. Joshua stopped
1t. Esther stopped it. Ruth stopped it.
Ham all stopped it. Mary stopped it. My
father stopped it. My mother stopped it.
My sister stopped it. We have in our
Sabbath schools children who again, and
again, and again have stopped it.
Notice that these old-time char lots,
which my text uses for symbol, had W hat
we would call high dash aboard at the
front, but were open behind. And the
King would stand at the dashboard and
drive with his own hands. And | am
glad that He whose chariots the clouds are
drives Himself. He does not let natural
law drive, for natural law is deaf He
does not let fate drive, for fate is merci-
less. But our Father King drives Him
self, aud He puts His loving hand on the
reIns OF the flying coursers, and He has a
loving ear open to the cry OF all who want
to catch His attention. Oh, am so glad
that my Father drives, and never drives
too fast, and never drives too slow. and
never drives off the precipice, and that
He controls by bit that never breaks.
the widest and most raging circum-
stances.
l heard Of q ship captain who put out
with his vessel, with large number of
passengers, from Buffalo, on Lake Erie.
very early in the season, and while there
was much ice. When they were well out
the captain saw, to his horror, that the
Ice was closing in on him from all sides
and he saw no way out from destruction
aud death. He called into the cabin the
passengers and all the crew that could be
spared from their posts, and told them
that the ship must be lost unless God in
terposed, and although he was not a
Christian man he said .tLet us pray.n
and they all knelt, asking God to come for
their deliverance. They went back to the
deck, and the man at the wheel shouted:
sAii right caf,n.