The Russellville Democrat. [volume] (Russellville, Ark.) 1875-1898, 1888-05-31


from following after thee; for whittier thou
goest will go: and whore thou lodgest, viii
lodge; thy people shall be my people and thy
God my God; when thou diest will die, ana
there will be buried. the Lord do so 70 me.
and more also, IL aught but death part thee and
me.
Again | learn from this subject that
paths which open in hardship and dark
ness often come out In places OF JOY.
When Ruth started from Moab toward
Jerusalem, to go along with he mother
law, suppose the people 50 4;
"Oh what foolish creature to 70 away
from her fathers house, to 60 off with o
poor old woman toward the land of Judeal
They won't live to get across the desert.
They will be drowned in tbs sea, or the
jackals Of the wilderness will destroy
them.n
1t was very dark morning when Ruth
started off with Naomi; but behold her in
my text in the harvest field OF Boaz, to be
af1ianced to one Of tho lords of the land,
and become one of the grandnothers of
Jesus Christ, the Lord of Glory. And so
it often is that path which starts very
darkly ends very brightly.
When you started out for Heaven, oh,
how dark was the hour of conyiction-how
Sinai Numbered, and devils tormented,
and the darkness thickened. All the sins
OF your life pounced upon you, and it was
the darkest hour you ever saw when You
first found out your sins. After awhile
you went into the harvest field of Gods
mercy; you began to CLEAN in the fields
of divine promise, and you had more
sheaves than you could carry, as the voice
of God addressed you. saying:
Blessed is the man whose transgressions are
forgiven and whose sins are covered.
A very dark starting in conviction, a
very bright ending in the pardon and the
hope and the triumph of the Gospel.
So, very often in our worldly business
or in our spiritual career we start off on
a very dark path We must go. The flesh
may shrink back, but there is voice
within, or voice from above, saving:
"You must 60" and we have to drink the
gall, and we have to carry the cross, and
we have to traverse the desert, and we are
pounded and failed Of misrepresentation
and abuse, and we have to urge our way
through ten thorsand obstacles that must
be slain by our ON right arm. We have
to ford the river, we have to climb the
mountain, we have to storm the castle;
but, blessed be God, the day OF rest and
reward will come. On the tip top of the
captured battlements we will shout the
victory; If not in this world, then in that
world where there is no gall to drink, no
burdens TO carry, no battles TO fight. How
do I know it? Know it! / know it be-
cause God says so:
They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any
more, neither shall the sun light on them, nor
be Ja,., IA vvbi oh &c in NJ
the throne shall lead them TO living fountains
OF water. and God shall wipe all tears from
their eyes.
It was very hard for Noah to endure the
scoffing of the people in his day, while he
was trying to build the ark. and was every
morning quizzed about his old boat that
would never be of any practical use; but
when the deluge came, and the tops of the
mountains disappeared like the backs of
sea-monsters, and the elements, dashed up
in fury, clapped their hands over a
drowned world, then Noah in the ark re-
joiced in his own safety and in the safety
of his family, and looked out on the wreck
of a ruined earth.
Christ, bounded of prosecutors, denied a
pillow, worse maltreated than the thieves
on either side of the cross, human hate
smacking its lips in satisfaction after il
had been draining His last drop OF blood,
the sheeted dead bursting from the sepul-
cheers at His crucifxion. Tell me, 0 Geth-
semane and Golgotha were there ever
darker times than those? Like the BOOM
ing OF the midnight sea against the rock,
the surges of Christ's anguish beat against
the gates of eternity, to be echoed back by
all the thrones of Heaven and all the dun
geons of hell. But the day of reward
comes for Christ; all the pomp and do
minion of this worl-, are to be hung on His
throne, uncrowned heads are TO bow before
Him on whose head are many crowns,
and all the celestial worship is to come up
at His feet like the humming of the forest,
like the rushing of the waters, like the
laundering of the seas, while all Heaven
rising on their thrones beat time with
their scepters: "Hallelujah, for the Lord
God omnipotent reignethl Hallelujah,
the kingdoms of this world have become
the kingdoms OF our Lord Jesus Christ r'
That song Of love, now low and far,
Ere long shall swell from star to star;
That light, the breaking day which tips
The golden-spired Apocalypse.
Again: / learn from my subject that
events which seem to be most insig-
nificant may be momentous. Can you
imagine any thing more unimportant than
the coming of poor woman from Moab
to Judea? Can You imagine any thing
more trivial than the fact that this Ruth
Just happened to alight-as they say-iust
happened to alight on this field of Boazs
Yet all ages, all generations, have an in
terest in the fact that she was to become
an ancestor Of the Lord jesus Christ, and
all nations and Kingdoms must look at
that one little incident with thrill of I'M
speakable and eternal satisfaction. So ii
is in your history and in mine; events
that You thought of no Importance at all
have been of very great moment. That
casual conversation, that incidental meet
ing-you did not think of 1t again for a
long while; but how it changed all the
phase OF your life!
1t seems to be of no Importance that
Jubal invented rude instruments of music,
calling them harp and organ, but they
were the Introduction of all the worlds
minstrelsy; and as you hear the vibration
of "a stringed instrument, even after the
fingers have been taken away from it,
so all music now of lutte and drum and
cornet is only the long continued strains
of Jubal's harp and Jubal's organ. 1t
seemed to be matter of very little i'm
portance that Tubal Cain learned the use
of copper and iron, but that rude foundry
of ancient days has its echo in the rattle
of Birmingham machinery and the roar
and bang of factories on the Merrimac.
II seemed TO be a matter of no impor-
lance that Luther found Bible in a
monastery; but as he opened that Bible,
and the brass bound lids fell back, they
Jared every thing, from the Vatican to
the furthest convent in Germany, and the
rustling OF the wormed leaves was the
sound OF the wings of the angel of the Re-
formation. 1t seemed to be a matter of
no importance that a woman, whose name
has been forgotten, dropped tract in the
way Of very bad man by the name of
Richard Baxter. He picked up the tract
and read it, and it was the means of his
salvation.
In after-days that man wrote a book
called "The Call to the Unconverted, /"
that was the means of bringing a multi
tude TO God, among others Philip Dodd-
ridge. Philip Doddridge wrote book