The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1889-01-09
REV. DR.. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DIVINES SUN
DAY SERMON.
Subject: "a Bad Boil Cured"


'T.ciH heal thee. And Isaiah said, Take a
jump Of figs. And they took and Lo.d 1t
ION the boil and he recovered. III Kings
IH.-5,7.
Luxurious living is not healthy. The sec.
ond generation of Kings, and Queens, and
:: Lords, and Princes is apt to be brainless and
! invalid. The second crop of grass is almost
ALWAYS short. Royal blood is generally
}scrofulous. You will not be surprised. then,
to hear that King Hezekiah had disorders
which broke out in a carbuncle, virulent and
deathfuL The Lord told him he must die;
J he did not want to die. He turned his face
to the wall, so that his prayer would not
be interrupted, and cried to God for his life.
God heard the prayer and answered 1t, say
ing: Behold, will heal thee" But there
was human instrumentality to be EN-
ployed. This carbuncle needed "cata-
plasm." That is tough word we use to
Show how much we know. If in the pull
pit we always used words the people under
stood, we never should have any reputation
for learning. Well, this carbuncle needed a
''cataplasm," which is poultice. Your old
mother, who doctored her own children in
the time when physicians were not so plenty
as they are now, will tell you that the very
best poultice is fig, and that was what she
used upon the carbuncle of King Hezeklah.
! The power of God, accompanied by this
human ipstrumentality, cured the King
II sickness comes to your household, it will
depend entirely upon ventilation, good diet,
and the skill of the doctors, as to whether
your child gets we'll. The father might pray
all day, and the mother might pray all night
it would not have any effect upon the case
II squills, belladonna, paregoric and cruel do
the work, your child will get well; if not,
not. There is cast iron God seated at the
head of the universe. holding in the cold
grasp OF his metal fingers band of law from
which nothing can break away.
Men and women of God, at this point the
great battle of Christianity is to be fought.
The great foe of Christianity to-day is ration
alism. that comes out from our schools, ano
universities, and magazines and newspapers,
to scoff at Bible truth and caricature the OLD
religion of Jesus. 1t says Jesus is not GOD,
for it is impossible to explain how he can DC
divine and human at the same time. The
Bible is not inspired, for there are things in
It that they don't like. Regeneration is g
farce; there is good enough in u.s. and the only
thing is to bring it out. Development is tho
word-development. The Garden of Eden IS
fairy story and no more to be believed than
the ARABIAN Nights" or "Gnlliver's Trav-
els" or Robinson Crusoe." We all started
as balloons, and are blood relations to that
monkey squirming about on the top OF that
hand organ Lazarus was not dead when
Christ pretended to raise him: he was only
playing dead. The water was not changed
into wine at the wedding, butChrist brought
in some wine that He had found elsewhere to
make up the deficiency. Christ did not walk
on the sea, but on the shore, so near that 1t
seemed as if He really were on the water.
What is still more alarming is, that Chris
tian men dare not meet this ridicule. There
is not one Christian man in five that can, ur-
blanched, stand in the presence Of all this rail-
lery, saving: 81 believe in the whole Bible.
and in every single statement that it makes" "
Christian men try to soften the Bible down
to suit the sSepticS. The skeptics sneer at the
dividing OF the Red Sea; and the Christian
goes to explaining that the wind blew hur-
ricane from one direction good while,
until all the water piled up: and besides, that
it was low water anyhow, and so the Israel
ties went through without any trouble.
Why not be frank and say: II believe the
Lord God Almighty came to the brink OF the
Red Sea, land with His right arm swung back
the billows on the right side. and with His
left arm swung back the billows on the
left side. and the abashed water stood
up hundreds Of feet high, while
through their g;assy wall the sea
monsters gazed with atfrighted eyes on the
passing Israeltes" The nationalist comes
to you saying: How about Jonah and the
whales Do you really believe that fish
story?" There never were so many Nan.
tucket fisherman after one whale as there
have been rationaists flinging harpoons at
the Mediterranean sea monster, and from
that one whale they have got oil enough to
light ten thousand souls to perdition. A
skeptic tells you that Jonah would have been
killed in the process of swallowing, and that
he could not, anyhow, have lived three days
in such close quarters, but would have been
smothered by the poor ventilation. How
the good Christians Immediately 60 to work.
and try to explain the whole thing by natural
laws, so as to please the rationalists, and
say that a whale is an air breath
ing fish; that every little while it
comes to the surface, and that the whale
that swallowed Jonah did the same
Tor the prophet. Why not rather say that
God can do anything; and He could take
Jonah through the whales throat, although
the throat would not have Leen half large
enough ordinarily 10 let him pass, anc could
have kept him alive in the whale five years
made the whale! God. Who made Jonahs
God. Then He could do anything He pleased
with either of them.
The moment you begin to explain away
the miraculous and supernatural you surren-
der the Bible. Take the supernatural out Of
the Bible, and you make it a collection Of
lies and humbugs, in preference to which l
pretend to be-fables. But if, after all that
the Bible declares, Jesus is not God, and
Lazarus was not raised from the dead. and
Che water was not turned into wine, and the
Red Sea was not divided, and in answer TO
prayer Hezekiah's boil did not get well, then
the Bible is the worst fraud ever perpetrated
in Gods universe.
All my friends, have we been mistaken.
Does God hear and answer prayer, or does
He notl Hezekiah was sick unto death; he
prayed for his life; God heard him, and
added fifteen years to that lifetime. The
prayer saved him-the lump of figs applied
being merely the God-appointed human in
strumentality.
sBut," says some one, 81 don't believe the
Bible" All! then we will have to part COM
,pany for four or five minutes for it is useless
to try to argue with any man with whom
you cannot stand upon common ground. In
any argument, If you would be successful,
there must be some common data to start
from 1t is foolish to try to prove to man
that twice three are six, provided he does
not admit the multiplication tables or that
two and two are four, II he does not admit
the addition table.
NV first address. therefore, is to those who
do believe in the Bible. I want to tell YOU
that prayer is the mightiesf Of all remedies,
and that the allopathic and homeopathic
and the electric schools will yet acknowledge
it. Here are two cases of sickness precisely
alike; the same kind Of medicine is given to
both of them. and in the same quantities.
The one patient RECEIVERS, and the other does
not. Why! God blesses the one remedy,
and does not bless the other. Prayer has
helped many laundering doctor through
with a case that would have otherwise become
completely unmanageable There is such
thing as Gospel hygiene, as Christian phar-
macy, as divine materia medica- That
is a foolish man who. in case Of sick
ness. goes only to human resources, when
we have these instances of the Lords
help in the sick room. Before you call
tha doctor Rhila ha is there and after he