The Covington leader. (Covington, Tenn.) 18??-current, 1888-12-14

q TAPER 20 cheer HIS 0y1nS 0OGESs EVEN
the candle of the sun snuffed out. Oh, res
it not all eloes? All our sins, sorrows,
bereavements, losses, and all the agonies
of earth and hell picked UP as ~ one clus-
ter and squeezed into one cup, aid that
pressed to His lips until the acrid, nauseats
ing bitter draught was swallowed with
q distBFted eolntenance, and q shudder
from head 20 foot, and a gurgling
strangulation. Aloes 51oesl nothing but
aloes. All this for Himself7 All this to
get the fame IN the world OF b eiHe d
martyr? All this in spirit eff stubborn
ness because He did not like Cass6r? No!
no! Ali this because He wanted to pluck
you and ME from hell. Because He want
ed to- raise you and ME to Heaven. Be
cause we were lost and He wanted us
found. Because we were blind and He
wanted us to see. Because we were serfs
and He wanted US manumitted. Oh, ye IN
whose cup of life the saccharine haS pre-
Dominated; oh, We who have bad bright
and sparklifig beverages, how do you feel
toward Him Who IN your stead, and to
purchase your observation-disclosures; took the
aloes, the unsavory aloes, the bitter aloes?
Your third. curiosity is to know why
these GARMENTS Of Christ are odorous with
cassia. This was plant that grew in In
dia and the adjoining islands. TcJ DO not
care to hear what kind of a flower it mad
or what kind of stalk. IT is enough for
me to tell you that it was used medicinal
ly. In that land and in that age, where
they knew little about plsarHacy, cassia
was used to arrest many forms OF disease.
SO, when in my text we find Christ coming
with garments that smell of cassia, it sug-
gests TO me She healing and curative power
gf the Son Off God. ''Ch," you say, NOW
you have sJpeffuous idea. We are not
sick. Why do We want cassia? We are
athletic. Our respiration Is perfect,
Our limbs are 1.-the, and in these
cool days we feel that we could
bound like the roe.' beg
to differ, my brother, from you: None
Of ycu can be. better in physical health
than l am, and yet must, Say we are all
sick. have taken the diagnCsfs of your
case, and have examined all the best au-
thorities on the subject, and 1 have come
now to tell you that you are full of wounds,
Ynd bruises, and putrefying sores which
have not yet been bound mp, or Modified
with ointment: The niafasnilts If Sin is
on us-the palsy; the dropsy, the 1eprosY.
The man that is expiring to-1igrt On Full
ton street.-the allopathic and honfG9-
pathic doctors having given him up, and
his friends now standing around to take
his last words-is no more certainly dying
as to his body than you are dying, unless
we have taken the medicine from Gods
apotheGafy. 81 the leaves of this Bible
are only so many prescriptions from the
Divine physician, written, not in Latin,
like the prescriptions of earthly physi-
clans; but written in plain English, so
that a man, though a fool, may not err
therein. Thank God that the Saviour's gar
ments smell of cassia:
Suppose a man were sick, and there was q
phia1 on his mantelpiece with medicine he
knew would cure him, and he refused to
take it, what would you say to him? He
is suicide. And what do you say of him
who, sick in sin, has the healing medfs
cine Of Gods grace offered to him, and re-
fuses to talks It? If he dies he is suicide.
People talk as though God took a man and
led him out to darkness and death-a5
though He brought him up to the cliffs
and then pushed him off. Oh, no. When
man is lost it is not because God pushes
him off, it is because he jumps off. In
the olden times a suicide was buried at
the crossroads, and the people were ac-
ctstomed to throw stones upon his grave.
So it seems to me, there may be in this
house a man who is destroying his own
soul, and as though the angels of God
were here to bury him at the point where
the roads of life and death cross each
hther. throwing upon the grave the broken
law and great pile ef ts1isapproyed priv
ilege; so that those going may 16ek at the
fearful mound, and learn WIfat d suicide
it Sss when an immortal soul, for which
Jesus died, puts itself out of the way.
When Christ trod this planet with foot
Of flesh, the people rushed after Him
people who were sick; and those who,
being so sick they could not walk, were
brought by their friends. Here I see a
mother holding up her little child, and
saying: "Cure this Group, Lord Jesus;
cure this scarlet fever" And others say
ing: ''Cure this ophthalmia. Give 6ass
and rest to this spinal distress. Straighten
this club-foot." Christ made every house
where He stopped dispensary. 1 do not
believe that in the nineteen centuries that
have gone by since His heart has got
hard: / feel that we can come now with
all our wounds of soul and get His
benedicti0n. . Jesus, here we are. We
want healing. We want sight. We want
health. We want life. The whole need
not physician, but they that are sick.
Blessed be God that Jesus Christ comes
through this assemblage now, His SCAR
ments smelling of myrrh"-that means
fragance-'and aloes''-they mean bitter
sacrifcia1 memories-"and cassia''a-tbat
means medicine and cure; and according
to my text, He comes "out of the ivory
palaces"
You know, or if you do not know will
tell you now, that some of the palaces of
the olden time were adorned with ivory.
Ahab and Solomon had their homes fur
nished with it. The tusks of African and
Asiatic elephants were twisted into all
manners of shapes, and there were stairs
of ivory and chairs of ivory and tables of
ivory and floors of ivory and pillars of
ivory and windows of ivory, and fountains
that dropped into basins of ivory, and
rooms that had ceilings of ivory. Oh,
white and overmastering beauty! Green
tree branches sweeping the white curos.
Tapestry trailing the snowy floors. Brack-
cts of light flashing on the lustrous sur
roundings. Silvery music ripping to the
beach of the arches. The mere thought
of it almost stuns my brain, and you say:
ooh, if could only have walked over
such floors! If could have thrown N.Y.
self in such chair! If 1 could have heard
the drip and dash of those fountains 20
You shall have something better than
that if you only let Christ introduce you.
From that place He came, and to that
place He proposes to transport you, for
His garments smell of niyrrh and aloes
and cassia out of ivory palaces.''
Oh, what place Heaven must bel The
Tuileries of the French, the Windsor
Castle of the English, the Spanish AIham-
bra, the Russian Kremlin, dungeons COM
pared with It'll Not so many castles on
either side the Rhine as on both sides of
the river of God, the ivory palaces. One
for the angels, insufferably bright, wing
ed, fire-eyed; tempest-charioted one for
the martyrs, with blood-red robes, from
under the altar; one for the King, the
steps of His palace, the crowns of the
church militant; one for the singers, who
lead the one hundred and forty and four
thousand; one for you ransomed from
sin; one for me, plucked from the burn
inO Oh the ivory nalaaesi