Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1888-12-17
SERMON.
The Transition of the lsraelites
From Egyptian Slavery.
One Of DaYid's Sublime Smiles Fur
niShes the Text for a Substituting
Discourse by the Famous Divine.
Though Ye Have Lain Among the Pots, Yet
Shall Ye Be As the Wings of a Dove
Prophecy Fulfilled.
Special to the Gazette.

was entitled, Gifted from the Brick
kilns.'' His text was: ''Though ye
have lain among the pots, yet shall ye be
as the wings OF a dove covered with sill
yer, and her feathers with yellow gold. -
Psalms xviii, 10. He said:
suppose you know what the 1sraelites
did down in Egyptian slavery. They
made bricks. Amid the utensils of the
bricli-kiln there were also other utensils
of cookery-the kettles, the pots, the
pans, with which they prepared their
daily food--and when these poor slaves,
tired of the day : work lay down to rest
they lay down amid the implements of
cookery and the implements of hard
work. When they arose in the morning
they found their garments covered with
the clay and the smoke and the dust,
and besmrchcd and begrimmed with the
utensils of cookery. But after
while the Lord broke up that slavery,
and He took these poor slaves into a land
where they had better garb, bright and
clean and beautiful apparel. No more
bricks for them to make. Let Pharaoh
make his own bricks. When David i'll
my text comes to describe the transition
age amid the bricli-kilns into the glorious
emancipation for which God had pre-
pared them, he says: Though We have
lain among the pots, yet shall ye be as
the wings of a dove covered with silver,
and her feathers with yellow gold. -
Miss Whately, the author of cele-
brated book, Life in Egypt, - said she
sometimes saw people in the east cook
ing their food on the tops of
houses, and that she had often seen, just
before shutdown, pigeons, doves, which
had during Ike heat of day
been hiding among the kettles
and the pans with which the
food was prepared, picking up the crumbs
that they might find-just about the hour
OF sunset would spread their wings and
fy heavenward, entirely unsoiled by the
region in which they had moved, for the
pigeon IS
VERY CLEARLY BIRD.
And as the pigeons fiew away the set
ting sun would throw silver on their
wings and gold on their breast. So you
see it was not far-fetched simile, or an
unnatural comparison, when David in
my text says to these emancipated Israel
ties, and says 10 all those who are brought
out of any kind of trouble into any kind
of spiritual joy: Though We have lain
among the pots, yet shall We be as the
WINES of dove covered with silver, and
her feathers with yellow gold. -
1WSin is the hardest Of all taskmasters.
Worse than Pharaoh, it keeps us trudging,
tTudging in a most degrading service;
but after awhile Christ comes. and he
says: ''Let My people go, - and we pass
ont from among the brick-lSilns of sin
into the glorious liberty of the Gospel;
we put on the clean robes of a Christian
profession, and when at last we soar
away to the warm nest which God has
provided for us i'll heaven we shall go
fairer than a dove, its wings covered
with silver and It's feathers covered with
yellow gold.
am going to preach something which
some of you do not believe, and that is,
that the @ruudest possible alornment is
the religion OF Jesus Christ. There are
great many people who suppose that re-
lia:uu Is Il very different thing from what
il really is The reason men condemn
the Bible is because they do not under
stand the Bible; they have not prop
erIy examined ii. Dr.. Johnson said
that Hume told a minister in the bishop
RE of Durham that he had never paTticu-
larly examined the new testament, yet
all his life warning against ii. HALEY,
the astronomer, announced his skeptiv-
ism TO Sir Isaac Newton, and Sir Isaac
Newton said: Now sir, l have exam
ined the subject and You have not, and I
am ashamed that yOu, protesting to be Il
philosopher, consent to condemn Il thing
Won never examined - And so men re-
jcct the religion OF Jesus Christ because
they really have never investigated it.
They think it something Impractical,
SOMETHING THAT WILL NOT WORK,
something Pecksniftian, something hypo-
critical, something repulsive, when il is
So bright and so beautiful you might
compare it 10 n chaGiueh you might COM
pare it to a robin redbreast, you might
compare it to Il dove, its wings covered
With silver, and its feathers with yellow
gold.
But how is it II young man becomes a
Christian? All through the club-ro0ms
where he associates, all through the bust
ness circles where he is known. there is
commiseration They say: ''What a
pity that Il young man who had such
bright prospects should so have been
de ,poiled Iy those Christians, giving up
sill his worldly prospects for something
which is of no particular present wOrth!''
Here is young woman who becomes a
Christian, her voice, her face, her man
ners the charm OF the drawing-room
Now all through the fashionable circles
the whisper goes: ''What pity that
such n bright light should have been ex-
tinguished, that such Il graceful gait
should be crippled, that such worldly
prospects should be obliterated.' All,
nv friends, it can be shown that re-
ligion s ways are ways of pleasantness
and that all her paths are peace; that
religion, instead of being dark,
and doleful, and lachrymose, and repul-
siye, is bright and beautiful, fairer than
a dove, its wings covered with silver and
its feathers with yellow gold.
See, III the first place, what religion
will do for a man s heart. l care not
how cheerful a man may naturally be be-
fore conversion, conversion brings him
up to higher standard of cheerfulness.
/ do not say he Will laugh any louder, L
do not say, but he may stand back
from some forms of hilarity in which he
once INDUCED: but there comes into his |
soul
AN IMMENSE SATISFACTION.
A young man, not Christian, depends |
upon worldly successes to keep his spirits |
up. Now he is prospered, now he has |
large salary now he has a beautiful war
drobe, now he has pleasant friends, now |
be has more money than he knows how TO
jRnd, everything goes bright and well !