The Penn's Grove record., 1889-09-07
DIR TALMAGE'S SERMON:
The Strong

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his hands, lisa. %: ii.
Ar this season Of the year multitudes
of the people wade into the ponds and
lakes and rivers and seas. At first put
ting out cautiously from the shore, but
having learned the right stroke of arm
and foot, they let the waters roll over
them, and in wild glee dive or float or
swim. So the text will be very sugges-
tive; she shall spread forth His hands
in the midst Of them, as he that swim
meth spreadeth forth his hands to
SWIM"
The fisherman seeks out ~unfrequent-
ed hooks. You stand all day on the
bank OF q river in the broiling sun, and
fling out your line, and catch nothing,
while
AN EXPERT ANGLER
breaks through the jungle and goes by
the shadow of the solitary rock, and in
a place where no fisherman has been for
| ten years, throws out his line and comes
home at night his face shining and his
basket full. 1 do not know why we
ministers Of the gospel need always be
| fishing in the same stream, and preach
ing from the same text that other people
preach from. l cannot understand the
policy of the minister who, in Black
friars, London, Eng, every week for
thirty years preached from the Epistle
to the Hebrews, 1t is an exhilaratlon
| to me when I come across q theme
which l feel 40 one else has treated;
and my text Is one Of that kind. There
are paths in Gods Word that are well
beaten by Christian feet, When men
want to quote Scripture, they quote the
| old passages that every one has heard.
When they want a chapter read, they
| read a chapter that all the other people
have been reading, so that the church
today is
IGNORANT OF THREE:FouRTHs OF H
BIBLE.
| You go into the Louvre at Paris. You
confine yourself to one corridor of that
~opulent gallery Of paintings, As you
come out, your friend saysto you, "Did
You see that Rembrandt" "No," "Did
you see that Rubens2' nNo." "Did
you see that Titan?" "No." "Did
you see that Raphael?' ''No." "Well,"
says your friend, ''then you did not see
the Louvre" Now, my friends, l think
we are too much apt to %confine oursel-
yes to one of the great corridors of
| Scripture truth, and so much SO that
there is not one person out of a million
| who has ever noticed the all suggestive
and powerful picture in the words of
my text.
This text represents God as a strong
swimmer, striking out to push down
iniquity and save the souls ofmen. HE
| shall spread forth His hands in the
midst Of them, us he that swimmeth
| spreadeth forth his hands to swim"
The figure is bold and many sided. Most
| of you know
HOW TO SWIM.
Some of you learned1t in the city school,
where this art is taught; some of you in
boyhood, in the river near your fathers
house; some of you since you came to
manhood or womanhood, while summer
ing on the beach of the sea. You step
down in the wave, you throw your head
back, you bring your elbows to the
chest, you put the palms of your hands
downward and the souls of your feet
outward, and You push through the
water as though you had been born
Aquatic. 1t is a grand thing to know
how to swim, not only for yourself, but
because you will after a while, perhaps,
have to help others.
/ do not know anything more stirring
or sublime than to see some man like
Norman Mckenzie leaping from the ship
Madras into the sea to N Charles
Turner, who had dropped from the
royal yard while trying to loosen the
sail, bringing him back on deck amid
the 'huzzas Of the passengers and crew.
If a man has not enthusiasm enough to
cheer in such circumstances, he deser-
YES himself to be dropped into the sea
and have no one help him. The Royal
Humane Society of England was estab-
lished in 1774, its object to applaud and
reward those who should pluck up life
from the deep. Any one who has per-
formed such a deed of daring has allthe
particulars of that bravery recorded in
q public record, and on his breast a
medal done in blue and gold and bronze,
anchor and monogram and inscription,
telling to future gen~erationsthe bravery
of the man or woman who saved some
one from drowning. But, my friends,
if it is such a worthy thing to a a
body from the deep, | ask you if it is
not a worthier thing to a an immor-
tai soul? And you shall see, this hour,
the Son of God step forth for this ach-
ievement. she shall spread forth His
hands in the midst of them, as be that
swimmeth spreadeth forth his hands to
swim"
In order to understand the full force
of this figure, you need to realize thai
our race il
IN A SINKING CONDITION.
You sometimes hear people talking OF
what they consider the most beautiful
words in our language, some man says
it is sthome," another man says it is the
word ssmother," another says it is the
word "Jesus," hat / will tell you the
bitterest word in all our language, the
word most angry and baleful, the word
saturated with the most trouble, the
word that accounts for all the loath'
someness and the gang and the outrage
and the narrowing; and that word If
Hsin," You spell it with three letters
and yet those three letters describe the
circumference and pierce the diameter
of everything bad in the universe. Sin
it is a sibilant word. You cannot pro
nounce it without giving the siss of the
flame or the hiss of the serpent. Sin
and then if you add three letters to thai
word it describes every one OF us by
nature-sinner. We have outraged the
law of God, not occasionally, or nov
and then, but perpetually. The Biblt
declares it. Hank! 1t thunders two
Chaps: 1.-The heart is deceitfulaboye al
things, and desperately wicked" Wha
the Bible says, our own conscience
afirms, After Judge Morgan had sen
fenced Lady Jane Grey to death, hi
conscience troubled him so much for tht
deed that he became insane, and al
through his insanity he kept saying
"Take her away from me! Lady Jant
Grey Take her awayl Lady Jan'
Greyl" II vas
THE VOICE OF CONSCIENCE.
And no man ever does anything wrong
lhowever great or small, but his consci
ence brings that matter before him, ant
Dat every step of his m~isbehayior it says
Wrong, wrongi" Sin is a leprosy, sii
is a paralysis, sin is a consumption, sil
is pollution. sin is death. Give it a fan
chance, and it will swamp you, body
mind and soul, forever. In this worl'
it only gives a faint intimation OF it
virulence. You see apatient II