The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1889-06-19
MANNING CLARENDON COUNTY c. WEDNESDAY,
man going on in his sin feels that all is well,

man going on in his sin feels that all is well,
| that he is coming out at a beautiful port,
and has all sail set, he wants 20 Christ, he
wants no help, he wants NO rescue; but II
under the flash of Gods convicting spirit
he shall see that by reason OF sin heis dis
masted and waterlogged, and going down
into the trough OF the sea where he can not
live, how soon he puts the sea glass to his
eye and sweeps the horizon, and at the first
sign Of help cries out: 'Iwant to be saved.
want to be saved now. Iwant to be saved
forever" No sense of danger, no applca-
| ton for rescue.
o, that Gods eternal spirit would flash
upon US a sense of our sinfulness! The Bible
| tells the story in letters Of fire, but we get
used to it. We joke about sin. We make
merry over it. What is sin! Is it triiing
thing? Sin is vampire that IS sucking out
the life blood of your immortal nature. Sin?
It is Bastile that no earthly key ever un-
| locked Sin? 1t is expatriation from God
and Heaven Sin? It is grand larceny
against the Almighty, for the Bible asks the
question; s'Will man rob God?' answer
ing it in the affirmative. This gospel is a
writ Of replevin to recover property unlaw
fully detained from God.
In the Shetland Islands there is a man
with the leprosy. The hollow of the foot has
swollen until it is fiat on the ground. The
Joints begin to fall away. The ankle thick
ems until it looks like the foot of a wild
beast A stare unnatural comes to the eye.
The nostril is CONSTRUCTED. The voice drops
to an almost inaudible hoarseness. Tuber-
cles blotch the whole body, and from them
there comes an exudation that is unbeara-
BILE to the beholder That is leprosy, and
we have all got it unless cieansed by the
grace of God. See Leviticus. See II. Kings.
See Mark See Luke. See fifty Bible al
lusions and confrmations.
The Bible is not complimentary in its Ian
guage. 1t does not speak mincingly about
our sins. 1t does not talk apologctically.
There is no vermillion in its style. 1t does not
cover up our transgressions with blooming
metaphor. 1t does not sing about them in
weak falSetto; but it thunders out: The
imagination of mans heart is evil from his
youth" Every one has gone back. He has
altogether become filthy. He is abomlnable
and filthy, and drinketh in iniquity like
water.' And then the Lord Jesus Christ
filings down at our feet this humiliat-
ing catalogue: "Out of the heart of mon
proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornica-
ton, murders, thefts. blaspheny." There
is a text for your rationalists to preach
from. 0, the dignity Of human nature!
There is an element Of your science Of man
that the anthropologist never has had the
courage vet to touch; and the Bible, in all
the ms and outs of the most forceful style,
sets forth our natural pollution, and repre-
sents iniouity as frightful thing, as an eX-
haustiug thing, as loathsome thing. us
not a mere bemiring of the feet, 1t is not
mere befouling Of the hands; 1t IS going
down, head and ears under, in ditch, until
our clothes abhor US.
My brethren, shall we stay down where
sin thrusts Us! Ishall not if you do Wecan
not afford to. have to-day to tell you that
there is something purer than snow water,
something more pungent than alkall, and
that is the blood Of Jeaus Christ that cleans
eth from all sin. Ay, theriver Of salvation,
bright, crystalline, ird
through this audience with billowy tide
strong enough to wash your completely and
forever away. o, Jesus, let the dam that
holds it back now break, and the foods OF
salvation roll over US.
Let the water and the blood,
From Thy side a healing food,
Be Of sin the double cure,
Save from wrath and make me l.urc.
Let US get down on both knees and, bathe
II that food of mercy Ay, strike out with
both hauss and try tc swing to the other
shore of this river OF Gods grace. TeSau is
sgcsS>pf this salxeasttttoonsSsaS--I this
largess q the 7divine bounty. Though you
have gone down into the deepest ditch OF
libidinous desire and corrupt behavior,
though you have sworn all blasphemies un-
til there is not sinful word left for you 10
speak, though you have been submerged by
the transgressions IF lifetime, though you
are so far down in your sin that no earthly
help can touch your case-the Lord Jesus
Christ bends over you to-day, and offers you
His right hand, proposing to lift you up, first
making you winter than snow, and then
raising you to glories that never die.
eBilly," said Christian bootblack to
another, s'when we come up to Heaven
it won't make any difference that
we've been bootblacks here, for we
shall get in, not somehow or other, but
Billy, we shall getstraight through the gate"
O, if YOU only knew how full and free and
tender is the offer of Christ, this day, you
would all take Him without one single eX-
ception; and if all the doors of this house
were locked save one and you were COM
PEELED to make egress by only one door, and
I stood there and questioned you, and the
gospel of Christ had made the right impress
sion upon your heart today, you would an
SWer me as YOU went out, onea ana all: Jesus
is mine, aod am His!n o. that this might
be the hour when you would receive Him!
1t is not gospel merely for footpads, and
vaerants and buccaneers; 1t is for the highly
polished, and the educated and the re-
fined as well Except man be born again,
he can not see the kingdom Of God" What
ever may be your associations, and what
ever your worldly refinement, must tell
YOU. as before God expect to answer in the
last day, that if you are not changed by tue
grace Of God you are still down in the ditch
of sin, in the ditch of sorrow, in the ditch Of
condemnation. ditch that empties into
deeper ditch, the ditch of the lost. But
blessed be God for the lifting, cleansing,
Illustrating power Of his Gospel.
The voice OF free grace cries: Escape to the
mountain;
For all that believe. Christ has opened toun-
tain.
Halelujah. to the Lamb who has bought US our
pardon:
EoIl praise him again when We pass over
Jordan