Abilene weekly reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1888-1935, 1889-02-21
OUR OWN GENERATION.
DR.. Talmage on the Duty Of Caring
For the Present.
fhe Duty of Serving Our Own Generation
Remembering the Poor-The Battle
For Bread-The Importance of
Eoing Right.

mage took for his subject Our Own Gen
| Grafton" and his text was from Acts xiii
86: David, after he had served his own
generation by the will of God, fell on
sleep" He :aid:
That is a text which for long time has
been running Through my mind, but not
until now has it been .ully revealed to me-
Sermons have a time to be born as well as
a time to die, a cradle as well as grave.
David, cowboy and stone singer and
writer and prophet, did his best for the
people of his time and then went and laid
down on the southern hill of Jerusalem in
that sound slumber which nothing but an
archangelic blast can startle. "David,
after he had served his own generation by
the will of God, fell on sleep"
1t was his own generation that he had
served; that is, the people living at the
time he lived. And have you ever thought
that our responsibilities are chiefly with
the people now walking abreast of US.
The fact is that you and 1 will have to
start very soon for our work or it will be
ironical and sarcastic for any one after
our exit to say of us, as it was said of
David, latter he had served his own gen.
GRAFTON by the will of God, he fell on
Sleep"
Well, now, let US look around earnestly,
prayerfully and in a common sense way
and see what we can do for our own gen.
Grafton. First Of all let us see to it that
as far as we can, they have enough to eat.
The human body is so constituted that
three times day the body needs food as
much as lamp needs oil, as much as
locomotive needs fuel. To meet this want
God has girdled the earth with apple or
''nards, orange groves, wheat fields and
oceans full Of fish and prairies full of cat
tie. And notwithstanding this, 1 will I'M
aertake TO say that the vast majority of
the human Family are suffering either
for lack of food or the right kind of food.
Our civilization is all askew on this sub
ject and God can only set it right.
Many of the greatest estates of to-day
have been built out of the blood and bones
OF the unrequited tolers. In olden times,
for the building of forts and towers. the
inhabitants Of Ispahan had to contribute
10000 human skulls and Bagdad $4,000
human skulls and that number of people
were slain so as to furnish the skulls. But
these two contributions added together
made only 100000 skulls, while into the
tower of the worlds wealth and pomp and
magnificence have been wrought the
skeletons of uncounted numbers of the
half fed populations of the earth, millions
of skulls
Don't sit down at your table with five or
six courses of abundant supply and think
nothing of that family in the next street
who would take any one of those five
courses between soup and almond nuts
and feel they were IN Heaven. The lack of
the right kind Of food is the cause of much
of the drunkerhess. After drinking what
many of our grocers call coffee, sweetened
with what many call sugar. and eating
what many of our butchers call meat, and
chewing what many of our bakers call
bread, many of the laboring classes feel so
miserable they are tempted to put into
their nasty pipes what the tobacconist
calls tobacco, or go into the drinking
saloons for what the rum sellers call beer
Good coffee would do much in driving
out bad rum. Adulteration of food has
got to be an evil against which all the
health officers and all the doctors and
all the ministers and all the reformers and
all the Christians need to set themselves
in battle array. How can we serve our
generation with enough to eat? By sit
ting down in embroidered slippers and
LICK III an CHIT, our IuCulQ
puckered up around Havana of the best
brand and through clouds of luxuriant
smoke reading about political economy
and the philosophy of strikes? No! No!
By finding out who in Brooklyn has been
living on gristle and sending them ten
derloin beefsteak. Seek out some family
who through sickness or conjunction of
misfortune have not enough to eat and do
Co. h., yko% Hl1,.a% Il f.,
multitudes for Asia Minor. multiplying
the loaves and fishes. Let US quit the sur
feiting of ourselves until we can not choke
down another crumb of cake and begin
the supply of others necessities.
We often see on small scale reckless
ness about the welfare of others which a
great warrior expressed on a large scale,
when his officers were dissuading him
from certain campaign, saying: 1T
would cost two hundred thousand lives"
replying with diabolism that can never
be. forgotten, what are two hundred
thousand lives to me?"
So far from helping appease the worlds
hunger, there are those whom Isaiah de-
scribes as grinding the faces of the poor.
You have seen farmer OF a mechanic put
a scythe or an axe on grindstone, while
some one was turning it round and round,
and the man holding the axe bore on it
harder while the wafer dropped from the
grindstone, and the edge of the axe from
being round and dull, got keener and
keener, and the mechanic lifted the axe
glistening and sharp and with edge SO
keen he must cautiously run his finger
along lest while examining the implement
he cut his hand to the bone. So have
seen men who were put against the grind
stone of hardship, and while one turned
the crank another would press the un.
fortunate harder down and harder down
until he was ground away thinner and
thinner and thinner, his comforts thinner,
his prospects thinner and his face thinner.
And Isaiah shrieks out: what mean ye
that We grind the faces OF the poor" 1t
is an awful thing to be hungry. 1t is an
easy thing for us to be in a good humor
with all the world when we have 10 lack.
But let hunger take full possession OF US
and we would all turn into barbarians and
cannibals and fiends.
lam glad to know that the time is com.
ing, God hasten ii, when every family in
the round world will sit down at full
table, and it will be only question be-
tween lamb and venison, or between part
ridge and quail on toast, and out of spoons
made out of Nevada silver or California
gold the pastry will drop on tongues
thrilling with thankfulness because they
have full enough. have no idea God is
going to let the human race stay in its
present predicament. II the world winds
up as it now is it will be an awful failure
of world The barren places will be ir-
rigated. The pomologists, helped OF God,
will urge on the fruits. The botanists in
spired of the Lord, will help on the gar
dens The raisers of stock will send