The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1889-05-01


nor Micah, nor Malachi, nor jeremiah, nor
hinder US second. Suppose the
Bible had announced the millennium to
begin the year 1889, that would be no him
6rance. In one sense God never changes his
mind, being the same yesterday, today and
forever But in another sense He does
change his mind and times without number
every day, and that is when his people pray.
Didn't He Change His mind about Ninevehl
By Gods command Jonah, at the top OF his
voice, while standing on the steps of the
merchants exchange and the palatial resi-
dences Of that city, cried out. "Yet forty
days and Nineyeh shall be overthrown.
Was it overthrown in forty daysa No. Tbs
people gave up their sins and cried for
mercy, and though Jonah got mad because
his whole course OF sermons had been
spoiled and went into disgraceful pouting.
we have the record so sublime I can
not read it without feeling nervous chill
running through me. "God saw their works
that they turned from their evil way and
God repented OF the evil that He had said
He would do unto them, and he did 1t not"
GOO is a father, and some Of US know what
that means, and some time when we have
promised chastisement aud the child de-
served it, the little darling has put her
arms around our neck and expressed such
sorrow and such promises OF doing better
that her tears landed on the lips of our
kiss, and we held her half hour after
on our knee and would as soon think OF
siapping an angel in the face as Of even
striking her with the weight Of our little
finger. God is father, and while He has
promised this world scourginSs, though
they were to be for thousand years or
five Thousand years. He would, II the
world repented, substitute beneiiction and
divine caress. God changed His mind about
Sodom six times He had determined on its
destruction. Abraham asked Him if He
would ISt spare it if fifty righteous people
were found there, and, narrowing down the
number, if forty-6ve people ware found
there, if forty people. if thirty people, if
twenty people, II ten people were found
there. And each Of the six times the Lord
answered yes o. why didn't Abraham 90
on just two steps further, and say if five be
found there and if one be found there, for
then for the sake Of Lot, its one goN citizen,
I think So6om would have been spared.
GlSuI IlSlCS OOCS Vic AAOAS soy ehAaS WV -
pented when He had promised punishments,
and withheld the stroke. Was 1t slip OF
Pauls pen when he spoke Of Gods cutting
short the work in righteousness? No, PauFs
pen never slipped. There is nothing in the
way of prophecy to hinder the crusade have
proposed for the last decade Of the nine
teenth century.
The whole trouble il that we put OF the
completion of the worlds redemption to
such long and indefinite distances. The old
proverb that 'twhat is everybody's business
isnobody's business" might be changed
little and be made truthfully to say what is
the gospel business Of all the ages is the gos-
pei business of no age. We are SC consciru-
ted we can not get up much enthusiasm
about something five hundred years from
now or thousand years from now. We are
fighting at too long range. That gun called
the Swamp Angelo was nuisance. 1t shot
SIX miles, but it hardly ever hit any thing.
It did its chief destructive work when it
burst and killed those who were setting 1t
of. Short range is the effective kind OF
work, whether it be for worldly or religious
purpose. Some man with his eyes half shut
drones out to me the Bible Quotation: "a
thous sand years are as one day." that is, ten
centuries are not long for the Lord. But why
do YOU not quote the previous sentence,
which says that one day is with the Lord as
q thousand years! That Is, He could do the
work Of ten centuries IN twenty-four hours.
The mightiest obstacle to Christian work is
the impression that the worlds evangeliZa-
ton is away of. And we take the telescope
and look on and on through centuries until
we see two objects near each other and we
strain our vision and guess what they are
and we call great conventions to guess whist
they are, and we get down our heaviest theo-
logical works and balance our telescope on
the lid and look and look and finally conclude
that they are two beas's that we see, ana the
one has hair and the other has wool and we
guess it must be the lion and the lamb lying
down together. In that great cradle Of post
pouemenr and sonnolencs We rock the
church as though it were All impatient child
and say, Hush, my dear. don't be impatient!
Don't get excited by revivals! Don't cry!
Your Fathers coming! Don't get uneasy!
He will be here in two or three or ten or
twenty thousand years" And we act ss
though we thought that when Macaulav's
famous New ZealanGer in the far distance
is seated on broken arch Of London bridge
sketchiug the ruins of st. Paul's, his grand
child might break in and jolt his pencil by
asking him if he thought the millennium
ever would appear. Men and women Of the
eternal God! Sons and daughters Of the
Lord Almighty. We may have it start in
the decade that is soon to commence, and 1t
will be done il we can persuade the people
Nav IN DIV nr q
work
What makes me think it can be done:
First, because God is ready. He needs no
long persuasion to do His work, for if He 10
not willing that any should perish, He is not
willing that any of the people Of the next
decade shall perish; and the whole Bible is
chime Of bells ringing out Come, come,
come" and you need not go round the
earth to 6rd out how much He wants the
world to come. but just to walk around one
stripped and bare and lea6ess tree with two
branches, rot arched, but horizontal.
But BE is waiting, as He said He would,
for the cooperation Of the church. When
we are ready God is ready. And he
certainly has ali the weaponry ready
to capture this world for the truth
all the weapons Of kindness or devastation.
On the one hand Gospel and sunshine and
power to orchardize and garienize the
earth, and fountains swinging in rainbow
and Chatsworthian verdure and aromas
poured out of the vials Of heaven, while on
the other hand he has the weaponry Of de-
vastation, thunderbolt and confagratlon
and forces planetary, solar, lunar, stellar,
or meteoric. that with loose rein thrown on
the neck for sec nd would leave conctel]a-
tions and galaxies so many split and shiT.
cred wheels on the boulevards Of heaven.
And that God is on our side, all on our side.
r>,,,..d bo b;o ,,Io,.;ors rarnet Blessed was