Abilene weekly reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1888-1935, 1889-01-03

two and two are four, if he does not admit
the addition table.
Ny first address, therefore, is to those
who do believe in the Bible. wantto tell
you that prayer is the mightiest OF all
remedies, and that the aHopathic and
homeopathic, and the eclectic schools Will
vet 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
a laundering doctor through with case
that would otherwise become completely
unmanageable.
There is such a thing as gospel hygiene,
as Chr istian pharmacy, as divine materia
medca. That is foolish man who, in
case of sickness, goes only to human re-
sources when we have these instances OF
the Lords help in the sick room. Before
you call the doctor, while he is there and
after he goes away, look up to Him who
cured Hezekiah. Let the apothecary send
the poultice, but God makes it draw. o! l
to pray. God send salvation to all the
doctors! Sickness would be oftener baked,
death would be Cftener hurled back from
the door-sill if medical men came into the
sick room, like Isaiah of the text. with a
prescription in their hands and the word
of the Lord in their mouths.
John Abercrombie, the most celebrated
physician of Scotland, prayed when he
int 4ha ei,,l- he
more ably about diseases of the brain"
than about ''the philosophy of the moral
feelings" don't know how much of the
medical success of Svdenham and Cooper
and Harvey and Rush depended upon the
fact that they knew how to pray as well
as to prescribe. l don't want a physician
who sees no God in human anatomy to
doctor my broken bones. If God made us
land think He did), and if the Bible is
true land am rather disposed to think it
is), then it is not strange that prayer does
traverse natural cause; ay, that it intro
duces a new cause. When God made the
law He did not make it so strong He could
not break it. If God made our bodies
when they are broken He is the one to
mend them, and it is reasonable that we
should call Him in to do it. If my furnace
so competent to repair it as the manufac-
,turer. If my watch stops there is no one
so competent to set it going as the one who
made it. If the body is disordered call in
the Maker of it.
1t is not all, as these physicians tell us,
matter of ventilation or poisoned air, of
cleanliness or dirt, of nutritious diet or
poor fare. 1 have known people to get
well in rooms where the windows bad been
six weeks down, tight shut, and l have
known them to die right under patent
ventilators. have known children sickly,
who every day had their bath, and have
known children robust, the washing Of
whose faces would make their features I'M
recognizable.
God did not make the law and then run
away from it. What is a law of nature?
1t is only Gods usual way of doing things.
But He has said that if His children ask Him
to do a thing and He can consist silently do
it. He will do it. Go on with your pills and
| plasters, and nostrums, and elixirs, and
your catholicon, but remember that the
mightiest agency in your recovery is
prayer. Prayer to God brought the
Kings cure, the lump of figs being the
God-directed human instrumentality.
other lesson on the subject-that our
prayer must also be accompanied by
means. 1t is an outrage to ask God to do
a thing while we sit indolent. The prayer,
to be acceptable, must come not only from
the heart, but from the hands. We must
work while we pray, devotion and work
going together. Luther came to Melanc-
thon's bedside aud prayed for his recov-
md ncfc fnH Of fhn hot
he should take some warm soup, the soup
being just as important as the prayer. In
the time of the great plague that came to
York of England, the priests prayed all
night and all day for the removal of the
plague, but did not think of cleaning out
the dead dogs and cats that lay in the
cutters, causing the sickness.
We must use means as we'll as supplica-
ton. If man has ''evening PRAYERS"
| asking for health, aud then sits down to a
full supper of indigestibles at eleven
O'Clock at night, his prayer is a mockery.
A farmer has no right to pray for the
safety of his family when he knows there
is no cover on the cistern. The Christian
man, reckless about his health, ought not
to expect the same answer to his prayer as
the Christian man expects who retires reg
his morning bath with the appendix of a
Turkish towel. Paul said to the passen-
gers of the Alexandrian corn ship that
they should get safe ashore, but he told
them they must use means. and that was:
''Stick to the old Ship" God is not weak
needing cur help. but God is strong, and
asks US to cooperate with him that we
may be strong too. Pray, by all means,
l,,A i . a.
That God answers prayers offered in the
right spirit, seconded by our own effort, is
the first and the last lesson of this text,
and it is lesson that this age needs to
learn. If all communication between
Heaven and earth is cut off, let us know it.
If oil the Christian prayers that are going
up toward God never reach Him, then,
say, let silence smite the lips of the afflicted
world, and the nations smother their groans
and die quietly. God does answer prayer
The text shows it. You say: 81 don't be-
lieve the Bible; l think that those things
were merely condolences, which are
often brought as answers to prayer" Do
you say that? Was it mere happen so
that Elijah prayed for rain just as the
rain was going to come anyhow? Did
Daniel pray in the wild beasts den just at
the time when all the lions happened to
have lockjaw? Did Jesus pray at the
grave of Lazarus just at the time when
Lazarus was going to dress himself and
come out anyhow? Did Jesus lose His
place in His sermon and make mistake
when He said: ASK, and it shall be given
you; seek, and We shall find; knock, and it
shall be opened unto you:" And, lest some
were so stupid they could not understand
it, He goes on: "For every one that
asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh
findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall