The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1888-10-26


your Lord and King. Do not live In q
parlor and put your Christ In kitchen
These seven candlesticks of which speal
were not made out Of pewter or iron
they were golden candlesticks, and gold
is not only valuable but q bright metal.
Have everything about your church
bright--your ushers with smiling faces,
your music jubilant, your hand shaking
cordial, your entire service attractive.
Many people feel that in church they
must look dull in order to 10 rever-
entail, and many whose faces in other
kinds of assemblage show all the differ
emit phases Of emotion, have in church NO
more expression than the back wheel OF
a hearse. Brighten up and be respon-
sive. II you feel like weeping, weep.
II you feel like smiling, smile. If you
feel indignant at some wrong assailed
from the pulpit, frown. DO not leave
your naturalness and resiliency home be-
cause it is Sunday morning. If as
officers Of church you meet people at
the church door with black look, and
have the music black, and the minister
in black preach black sermon, and
from invocation to benediction have the
impression black, few will come, and
those who do come will wish they had not
come at all.
Golden candlesticks! Scour up the six
lilies on each branch and know that the
more lovely and bright they are, the
more fit they are to hold the light. But
Christless church is damage to the
world rather than good. Cromwell
stabbed his cavalry horses in St. Paul's
Cathedral, and many now use the church
Is a place in which to stable their vani-
lies and worldliness. A worldly church
Is candlestick without a candle, and it
had its prototype in St. Sophia, in Con-
,tantinople, built to the glory of God by
Constantine, but transformed to base
uses by Mohammed the Second. Built
out of colored marble; a cupola with
twenty-four windows soaring to the
height of 1870 feet; the ceiling one
great bewilderment of mosaic; gal
leries supported by eight columns of
porphyry and sixty-seven columns of
green jasper; nine bronze doors with alto
relievo-work fascinating to the eye Of
any artist; vases and vestments encrusted
with all manner Of precious stones. -Four
walls on fire with indescribable splendor.
Though labor was cheap the building
cost one million five hundred thousand
dollars. Ecclesiastical structure almost
supernatural in pomp and majesty. But
NJ hammedanism tore down from the
walls of that building all the sanity and
christly images, and high up in the dome
the figure Of the cross was rubbed out
that the crescent of the barbarous Turk
might be substituted. A great church
but no Christ! A gorgeous candlestick
but no candle Ten thousand such
churches would not give the world
as much light as one home made
tallow candle by which last night
put on her glasses and read the Psalms
Of David in large type. Up with the
churches, by all means! Hundreds of
them, thousands Of them, and the more
the better. But let each one be blaze
Of heavenly light making the world
brighter and brighter till the last shadow
has disappeared, and the last of the suf-
fering children of God shall have reached
the land where they have no need of
or 'of candle, neither light
Of the sun, for the Lord God giveth them
light and they shall reign forever and
ever" Seven candlesticks, the complete
number of lights! "Let your light so
shine before men that they seeing your
goods works may glorify your Father
which is in heaven"
Turn now in your Bible to
THE SEVEN STARS,
We are distinctly told that they are
the ministers IF religion. Some of them
are large stars, some of them small stars,
some of them sweep wide circuit and
some of them small circuit, but SO far
as they are genuine they get their light
from the great central sun around whom
they make revolution. Let each one
keep in his own sphere The solar sys-
tenn would soon be wrecked if the stars
instead of keeping their own orbit should
go to hunting down other stars Minis
tiers of religion should never clash. But
in all the centuries of the Christian church
some of these stars have been hunting an
Irving or Horace Bushnell or an
Albert Barnes, and the stars that were in
pursuit of the other stars lost their own
VI INV etliu oOA1lC VI Clcu COlllu never
again find it. Alas for the heresy hunt
ers! The best way to destroy error is to
preach the truth. The best way to scat
ter darkness is to strike light. There
is in immensely room enough for all the
stars, and in the church room enough
for all the ministers. The ministers who
give up righteousness and the truth will
get punishment enough anyhow, for they
are ''the wandering stars for whom is
reserved the blackness of darkness for
ever" But should like as a minister,
when am dying, to be able truthfully
TO say what a captain of the English
army, fallen at the head of his COL
nmn and dying on the Egyptian battle
field, said to Gen. Wolseley, who came to
,ondole with him: II led them straight;
1idn't I lead them straight, general9"
God has put us ministers as captains in
his battlefield Of truth against error.
Great at last will be our chagrin if we
all leading the people the wrong way;
put great will be our gladness if when
he battle is over we can hand our sword
,ack to our great Commander, saying:
Lord Jesus! We led the people straight;
lidn't we lead them straight" Those