Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1889-06-22
CHRISTINE VILLAGE LAD
What Kind Of a Boy Was
CHRISTI
DR.. Talmage DisCourses on the Boy
hood Days OF the Giver Of
All Good-The Bible
Account.

JOLheu III Tue opening uOAOloSy dt DTOOk'
Ign Tabernacle this morning. The pas.
tor, the Rev. r. De Witt Tslmsge, y. D.,
expended the passage in John about the
Hnwritten works OF Christ, which the
world itself could not have contained.
The subject of DR., Talmsge's sermon
was Christ the Village Lad" He took
for his text Luke il, 40; And the child
grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filed
with wisdom; and the grace of God was
upon him" The preacher said;
About Christ az a village lad ! speak.
There is for the most part a silence mere
han eighteen centuries long about Christ
betweeninfancy and manhood. What kind
of q boy was he? Was he a genuine boy
AT all, or did there settle upon him from
the start all the intensities of martyrdomf
We have from this subject only a little
guessing, q few surmises, and here and
there an unimportant perhaps" Con-
corning what bounded that boyhood on
both sides we have whole libraries OF
books and whole galleries Of canvas and
sculpture. Before the infant Christ in
Mary's arms, or taking his first sleep in
the rough clubhouse, all the painters bow,
and we have Paul Veronese's Holy
Family" and P~erugino's Nativity" and
Angelica ds Fiesole's Infant Christ"
and Ruben's Alteration of the Magi"
and Tintoret's Alteration Of the Magi'
and Cnlrlandojo's Alteration Of the
Magi' and Raphsel's Madonna and
O~rcagna's Madonna and Murillo's
Madonna and Msdopnas by all the
shcools Of painting in all lights and shades
and with all styles Of attractive feature
and impressive surroundings, but pen
and pencil and chisel have, with few ex.
ceptlons, passed by Christ the village
lad. Yet by three %conjoined evidences |
think we can come 10 as accurate an idea
of what Christ was as a boy as we can Of
what Christ was as q man.
First, we have the brief Bible account.
Then we have the prolonged account of
what Christ was al 80 years Of age. Now
You have only to minify that account
somewhat and you find what he was at
10 years Of age. Temperaments never
change. A %sanguine temperament never
becomes a pnlegmatic temperament. A
nervous temperament never becomes a
Emphatic temperament. Religion
changes ones affections and ambitions,
but it is the same old temperament acting
in a different direction. AS Christ had
no religious change, he was as a lad what
he was as a man, only not on SO large a
scale. When all tradition and all art and
all history represent him as q blonde with
golden hair I know he was in boyhood a
blonde.
We have, beside, an uninspired book
that was for the first three or four cen
turies after Christ's appearance received
by many az inspired and which gives q
prolonged account Of Christ's Noybood.
Some Of Is may be true, most Of it may
be true, none of it may be true. II may
be partly built on facts, or by the passage
of age some real facts may have been
distorted. But because a book is not di-
vinely inspired we are not therefore 10
conclude that there are not true things in
it. Prescott's Conquest of Mexico
was not inspired, but WI believe il, al
though il may contain mistakes. Macau-
lay History of England was not in
spired. but we believe il, although it may
have been mxrred with many errors.
The so called apocryphsl gospel in which
the boyhood of Christ is dwelt upon ] do
nor believe 10 be dlvinely inspired, and
yet il may present facts worthy Of con.
sideration. Because it represents the
boy Christ as performing miracles
some have overthrown that whole
apocryphal book. But what
right have you to say that
Christ did not perform miracles at 10
years Of age as well as al 3Of He was in
boyhood as certainly divine as in man
hood. Then while 3 lad he must have
had the power TO work miracles, whether
he did or did not work them. When,
having reached manhood, Christ turned
water into wine that was said TO be the
beginning Of miracles. But that may
mean that il was the beginning of that
series of manhood miracles. In q word,
] think that the New Testament is only
q small transcript Of what Jesus did
and said. Indeed, the Bible declares
positively that il all Christ did and said
were written the world would not con.
tanned the Books. 80 we are at liberty
10 believe or reject those parts of the
apocryphal gospel which say that when
the boy Christ with his mother passed a
band Of thieves he told his mother that
two of them, Dunachus and Titus by
name, would be the two thieves who
afterwards would expire on the crosses
beside him. Was that more wonderful
than some of Christ's manhood prophe-
sies2 Or the uninspired story that the
boy Christ made a fountain spring from
the roots Of q sycamore tree SO that his
mother washed his coat in the stream
was that more unbelievable than the
manhood miracle that changed common
water into a marriage beverage? Or the
uninspired story that two sick children
were recovered by bathing in the water
where Christ had washed? Was tina,
more wonderful than the manhood
miracle by which the womsn twelve
years a complete invalid should have
been made straight by touching the
frinQe Of ChristIs coat?
In other words, while do not believe
that any of the so-called apocryphaI
new testament is inspired, l believe much
of it is true; just as | believe I, 900 books,
none of which are divinely inspired,
Much of il was just like Christ. Just as
certain as the mar Christ was the most OF
the time getting men out Of trouble, ]
think tina, the boy Christ was the mos,
of the time getting boys out Of troable.
have declared TO you this day q boys
Christ. And the world wants such a one.
He did not sit around morning over wha,