Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1889-06-05

Ills pleasure tD our ears,
A sovereign balm for every wound,
A cordial TO orr fears.
The text was: eff l wash myself with
snow water, and should | cleanse my hands
in alkali, vet shalt thou plunge me in the
ditch, and mine own clothes shall abhor
me.'-Job ix., 80, 81. The eloquent preach
or said:
Albert Barnes-liunore be this name on
earth and in heaveu-went straight back to
the original writing Of my text, and traEs-
lated it as have now quoted it. giving SUBJ
stantial reasons for so doing. Although we
know better, the ancients had an idea that
in snow water there was special power to
cleanse, and that garment washed and
rinsed in it would ba as clean as clean could
be; but if the plain suow water failed to do
its work, then they would take lye or aikal
and mix it with Gil and under that prepara-
tion they felt that the last impurity would
certainly be gone. Job, in my text, in most
fcrceful figure sets forth the idea that all
his attempts to mako himself pure before
God were dead failure, and that unless we
are abluted by something better than earth
ly liquids and chemical preparations we are
loathsome ana in the ditch. 'If l wash
myself with snow water and should cleanse
my hands in alkali, yet shalt thou plunge
me in the ditch, and mine own clothes shall
abhor me-"
You are now sitting for your picture. l
turn the camera obscura of Gods word full
upon you, and pray that the sunshine fall.
ing through the skylight may enable me to
take you just as you are. Shall it be fiat
tering picture, or shall it be true one
You say: "Let it be true one." The first
profile that was ever taken was taken three
hundred AID thirty years before Christ, of
Antigonus. He had blind eve, aud be
compelled the artist 10 take his profile SO as
to hide the defect in his vision. But since
that invention, thr, hundred and thirty
years before Christ, there have been great
many profles. Shall to-day give you a
one sided view of yourselves, a profile, Or
shall it be full-leugth portrait, showing
you just what you are? If God will help
ne by his almighty grace, shall give you
that last kind of a picture.
When first entered the ministry I used
to write my sermons all out and read them,
and run my hand along the lines lest |
should lose my place. l have hundreds of
those manuscripts. Shall l ever preach
them? Never; for in those days was some
how overmastered with the idea l heard
talked all around about, of the dignity OF
human nature, and l adopted the idea, and
| evolved it and illustrated it, and a1gu-
ed it; but coming on in life, and having seen
more of the world, and studied better my
Bible, find that that early teaching was
faulty, and that there is no dignity in hui
man nature, until il is reconstructed by the
grace of God. Talk about vessels going to
pieces on The Skerries, off Ireland There
never was such sbip-wreck as in the Gihor
and the Hiddekel, rivers of Eden, where Out
first parents founGered. Talk of steamer
going down with five hundred passengers
on board What is that to the shipwreck
of fourteen hundred million souls? We are
by nature mass of uucleanness and putre-
faction, from which it takes all the omnipo.
tence and ininitude Of Gods grace to ex
tricate US. eff l wash myself with SNOW
water, and should / cleanse my hands il
alkali, yet shall thou plunge me in the
ditch, and my own clothes shall abhor me- y
. l remark, in the first place, that somt
people try to cleanse their soul of sin in the
snow water Of fine apologies. Here is ons
man who says: 81 am a sinner; l confess
that; but inherited This. My father was
sinner, my grandfather, my great-great
grandfather, and all the way back to Adam
and couldn't help myself" My brother,
have you not, every day in your life, added
|
was bequeathed to you! Are you not brave
enough to confess that you have sometimes
surrendered to sin, which you ought to have
conquered? l ask you whether it is fail
play to put upon our ancestry things fol
which we ourselves are personally resporsi-
BILE? If your nature was askew when yor
got it, have you not sometimes given it al
additional twist? Will all the tombstone:
of those who have preceded us make a bar
ricade high enough for eternal defences?
know devout man who had blasphemOu'
parentage. know an honest man whose
father was thief. I know a pure mai
whose mother was vail of the street. Tht
hereditary tide may be very strong. bu
there is such thing as stemming it. TIL
fact that have corrupt nature is no rea
son why I should yield to it. The deeI
stains of our soul eau never be washed OF
by the snow water of such insufficient apol
Ogy.
Still further, says some one: "If l hav
gone into sin, it has been through my com
panions, my comrades and associates; the
rnined me. They taught me to drink. The
took me to the gambling hell. They plnng
, ed me into the house of sin. They ruine
my SOUL" DO not believe it. God CAV
to no one the power TO destroy you or me
If a man is destroy ed he is self-destroyeo
and that is always SO Why did you nc
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