Dodge City times., 1889-06-13

want to be saved forever" No sense of
danger, no application for rescue.
oh. that Gods eternal spirit would
fash 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 trifling thing? Sin
is a 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? 1t is grand
larceny against the Almighty, for the
Bible ask the question: will a man
rob God?" answering it in the affirmative.
This Gospel is a writ of replevin to re-
coverproperty unlawfully detained from
God.
In the Shetland Islands there is a man
with leprosy. The hollow of the foot
has swollen until it is fiat on the ground.
The joints begin to fall away. The
ankle thickens until it looks like the
foot of wild beast. A stare unnatural
comes to the eye. The nostril is con-
stricted. The voice drops to an almost
inaudible hoarseness. Tubercles blotch
the whole body, and from them there
comes an exudation that is unbearable
to the beholder. That is leprosy, and
We have all got it unless cleansed by
the grace of God. See Leviticus. See
ii. Kings. See Mark. See Luke. See
fifty Bible allusions and combinations.
The Bible is not complimentary in its
language. 1t does not speak mincingly
about our sins. 1t does not talk apollo
getically. There is no vermillion in its
style. 1t does not cover up our trans
gressions with blooming metaphor. 1t
does not sing about them in weak
falsetto; but if thunders out: The I'M
agination of mans heart is evil from his
youth. Every one has gone back. He
has altogether become filthy. He is
abominable and filthy, and drinketh in
iniquity like wate-" Andthen the Lord
Jesus Christ filings down at our feet this
humiliating catalogue: -Out of the
heart of men proceed evil thoughts,
adulteries, fOrnication, murders, thefts,
blasphemy.' There is :. text for your
rationalists to preach from. Oh, the
dignity of human nature. There is an
element of your science of man that the
anthropOlogist never has had the cour-
age yet to touch; and the Bible, in all
the ms and outs of the most forceful
style, sets forth our natural pollution.
and represents iniquity as a frightful
thing, as an exhausting thing, as
loathsome thing. 1t is not a mere be-
miring of the feet, it is not a more be-
fouling of the hands; it is going down,
head and ears under, in ditch, until
our clothes abhor us.
My brethren, shall We stay down where
sin thrusts us? l shall not if you do.
We caunot afford to. 1 have to-day to
tell you that there is something purer
than snow water, something more pun
gent than alkali, and that is the blood
of Jesus Christ that cleanseth from all
sin. Ay, the river of salvation, bright,
crystalline and Heaven born, rushes
through this audience with billowy tide
strong enough to wash your sins COM
pletely and forever away. o Jesus, let
the dam that holds it back now break,
and the floods of salvation roll over US.
Let the water and the blood
From thy side healing flood,
Be of sin the double cure,
Save from wrath and make me pure.
Let us get down on both knees and
bathe in that flood of mercy. Ay, strike
out with both hands and try to swim to
the other shore of this river of Gods
grace. To you is the word of this sal
vation sent. Take this largess of the
divine bounty. Though you have gone
down in the deepest ditch of libidinous
desire and corrupt behavior, though you
have sworn all blasphemies until there
is not one sinful word left for you to
speak, though you have been submerged
by the transgressions of 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 max
ing you whiterthan snow, and then raising
you to glories that never die. Billy"
said Christian boot black to another,
when We come up to Heaven it won't
make any difference that we've been
boot blacks here, for We shall get in,
not somehow or other, but, Billy, We
shall get straight through the gate"
Oh, 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 exception; and if all the doors of
this house were locked save one, and
you were compelled to make egress by
only one door, and l stood there and
questioned you, and the Gospel of
Christ had made the right impression
upon your heart to-day, you would
answer me as you went out, one and all:
Jesus is mine, and l am his!" Oh,
that this might be the hour
when you would receive him.
1t is not Gospel merely for
footpads and vagrants and buccaneers;
it is for the highly polished and the
educated and refined as we'll. Except
a man be born again, he cannot see the
kingdom of God Whatever may be
your associations, and whatever your
worldly refinements, must tell you, as
before God l expect to answer in the |
last day, that if you are not changed by |
the grace of God, you are still down in |
the ditch of sin. in the ditch of sorrow,
in the ditch of condemnation; a ditch |
hat empties into a deeper ditch, the |
hitch of the lost. But blessed be God |
for the lifting, cleansing. lustrating
power of His Gospel.
The voice of free grace cries, Escape to the |
mountain;
For all that believe, Christ has opened foun-
tain.
Hallelujah! to the Lamb who has brought us |
our pardon;
Wen praise him again when We pass over Jor