The Brookhaven leader., 1889-11-07
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
Why God Sends Trouble and How
It Does Good.
The Uses of Adversely IIlustrated-It Comes
as q Christening Influence to Bring
Us Nearer to CODA Model
Comforter.

Rev. T. Dewitt Talmage delivered the
following sermon in the Brooklyn Acad-
envy of Music. His subject was
Trouble" and his text:
God shall wipe away all tears from their
eycs.-Rev. vii.
He said: Riding across Western
prairie, wild flowers up to the hub of
the carriage wheel, and while a long
distance from any shelter, there came
sudden shower, and while the rain was
falling in torrents, the sun was shining
as brightly as | ever saw it shine, and
thought what beautiful spectacle this
is! So the tears of the Bible are not
midnight storm, but rain on pansied
prairies in Gods sweet and golden sun
light. You remember that bottle which
David labeled as containing tears, and
Mary's tears, and Pauls tears, and
Christ's tears, and the harvest of JOY
that is to spring from the sowing of
tears. God mixes them. God rounds
them. God shows them where to fall.
God exhales them. A census is taken
of them, and there is a record as to the
moment when they are born and as to
the place of their grave. Tears of bad
men are not kept. Alexander, in his
sorrow, had the hair clipped from his
horses and mules, and made great
ado about his grief; but in all the vases
of Heaven there is not one of Alexan-
der's tears. / speak of the tears of the
good. Alas. me! they are falling all
the time. In summer you sometimes
hear the growing thunder, and you see
there is a storm miles away; but you
know from the drift Of the clouds that it
will not come anywhere near you. So,
though it may be all bright around
about us, there is a shower of trouble
somewhere all the time. Tears! Tears.
What is the use of them, anyhow?
Why not substitute laughter? Why not
make this a world where all the people
are well and eternal strangers to pain
and aches? What is the use of an east
ern storm when we might have
perpetual nor'wester? Why, when
family is put together, not have them
all stay, or, if they must be transplanted
to make other homes, then have them
all live? the family record telling story
of marriages and births, but of no
deaths. Why not have the harvests
chase each other without fatiguing
toll? Why the hard pillow, the hard
crust, the hard struggle? 1t is easy
enough to explain a smile, or success,
or congratulation; but, come now, and
bring all your dictionaries and all your
PHILOSOPHERS and all your religions, and
help me explain a tear. A chemist will
tell you that it is made up of salt and
lime and other component parts; but he
misses the chief ingredients-the acid
of a soured life, the viperine sting of
bitter memory, the fragments of
broken heart. l will tell you what
tear is: it is agony in solution.
Hear me, then, while l discourse to
YOU of the uses of trouble.
First. 1t is the design of trouble to
keep this world from being too attract
i've. Something must be done to make
us willing to quit this existence. If it
were not for trouble this world would be
a good enough heaven for me. You and
/ would be willing to take lease of
this life for hundred million years if
there were no trouble. The earth cush
toned and upholstered and pillared and
chandeliered with such expense, no
story of other worlds could enchant us.
We would say:
LET well enough alone. If you want
to die and have your body disintegrated
in the dust, and your soul go out on a
celestial adventure, then you can go;
but this world is good enough for me"
You might as well go to a man who has
just entered the Louvre at Paris and
tell him to hasten off to the picture gal
leries of Venice and Florence. ''Why,"
he would say, what is the use of my
going there? There are Rembrandts
and Rubens and Raphaels here that l
haven't looked at yet"
No man wants to 60 out of this world,
or out of any house, until he has bet
ter house. To cure this wish to stay
here, God must somehow create a dis
gust for our surroundings. How shall
lie do it? He can not afford to deface
His horizon, or to tear off a fiery panel
from the sunset, or to subtract an anther
from the water lily, or to Danish the
pungent aroma from the mignonette, or
to drag the robes of the morning in
mire. You can not expect Christopher
Wren to mar his own st. Pauls Cathe-
dral, or Michael Angelo to dash out
his own LAST Judgment" or a Handel
to discord his "Israel in Egypt" and
YOU can not expect God to spoil the
architecture and music Of His own
world. How, then, are we to be made
willing to leave? Here is where trouble
comes in. After a man has had good
deal of trouble, he says:
''Well, l am ready to 60. If there is
a house somewhere whose roof doesn't
leak, I would like to live there. If there
is an atmosphere somewhere that does
not distress the lungs, would like to
breathe it. If there is society some
where where there is no tittle-tattle, l
would like to live there. If there is
a home circle somewhere where / can
find my lostfriends, would like to go
there"
He used to read the first part of the
Bible chiefly, now he reads the last part
of the Bible chiefly. Why has he
changed Genesis for Revelation? All!
he used to be anxious chiefly to know
how this world was made, and all about
its geological construction. Now he is
chiefly anxious to know how it looks,
and who live there, and how they dress.
He reads Revelation ten times now
where he reads Genesis once. The old
story: I'm the beginning God created
the heavens and EARTH" does not thrill
him half as much as the other story:
~ saw a new Heaven and new earth"