The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1889-03-01
WROTE ON THE GROUND.
Dr.. Talmage on the Literature of
the Dust
The Erring Woman snd the Ssviour's
Wonderful Judgment-The Only Writ
Ing Of Our Lord-Ihe Whole
World Parable.


World Parable.
De Witt 1almage preached on the subject
THE Literature OF the Dust" His text
was from John viii. 6: 'Jesus stopped
down and wrote on the ground" He said:
A Mohammedan mosque stands now
where once stood Herod's temple, the
scene of my text Solomon's temple had
stood there, but Nehucaadnezzar thun-
dered it down. Zorobabel's temple had
stood there, but that had been Frustrated.
Now we take our places in temple that
Herod built because he was fond OF great
architecture and he wanted the preceding
temples to seem Insignificant. Put eight
or ten modern cathedrals together and
they would not equal that structure. 1t
covered nineteen acres. There were mar
bic pillars supporting roofs of cedar and
silver tables on which stood golden cups,
and there were carvings exquisite and in
scriptions resplendeht, glittering balus.
trades and ornamental gateways. The
building of this temple kept ten thousand
workmen busy for forty-s years. In
that stupendous pile of pomp and magnifi-
cence sat Christ, and a listening throng
stood about him, then a wild disturbance
took place. A group of men are pulling
and pushing along a woman who had
committed the worst crime against So
ciety. When they have brought her in
front Of Christ they ask that he sentence
her to death by stoning They are a crit
ical, merciless, disingenuous crowd. They
want to get Christ into controversy and
public apprehension. If he say Let her
die" they will charge him with cruelty. II
he let her go they will charge him with
being in completely with wickedness.
Whichever way he does they would howl
at him.
Then occurs a scene which has not been
sufficiently regarded. He leaves the
lounge or bench on which he was sitting
and goes down on one knee or both knees,
and with the forefinger of his right hand
he begins to write in the dust of the floor,
word after word. But they were not to be
diverted or hindered. They kept on de-
handing that he settle this case of trans
gression until he looked up and told them
that they might themselves begin the
woman's assassination, il the complain
ant who had never done any thing wrong
himself would open the fire. Go ahead,
but be sure the man who filings the first
missile is immaculate" Then he resumed
writing with his finger in the dust of the
floor, word after word. Instead Of look.
ing over his shoulder to see what he had
written the scoundrels skulked away. FL
nally, the whole place is clear of pursuers,
antagonists and plaintiffs, and when
Christ had finished this strange chirog.
raphy IN the dust, he looks up and finds
the woman all alone. The prisoner is the
only one of the court room left, the judges,
the police, the prosecuting attorneys hav.
ing cleared out. Christ is victor, and he
says to the woman: ''Where are the pros.
ecutors in this case: Are they all gone:
Then l discharge you; go and sin no
more.
l have always wondered what Christ
wrote on the ground. For do you realize
that is the only time he ever wrote at all?
| know that Eusebius says that Christ
once wrote a letter to Abgarus, the King
of Odessa, but there is no good
evidence of such correspondence.
The wisest being the world ever saw
and the one who had more to say
than any one who ever lived never writing
a book, or a chapter, or page, or para
graph, or a word on parchment. Nothing
but this literature of the dust and one
sweep of n brush or one breath of a wind
obliterated that forever Among all the
rolls of the volumes of the first library
founded at Thebes there was not one scroll
Of Christ. Among the 600 books of the
library, which by the in
famous decree of Caliph Omar were used
as fuel to heat the 400 baths of the city,
not one sentence had Christ penned
Among all the infinitude of volumes now
in the libraries of Edinburgh,
the British museum. or Berlin or Vienna
Or the learned repositories of all nations,
not one word written directly by the
finger of Christ. All he wrote he wrote in
lust uncertain, shifting, vanishing dust.
My text says he stopped down and wrote
on the ground. Standing straight up a
man might write on the ground with a
staff, but if with his fingers he would |
write in the dust he must bend clear over. |
Aye, he must get at least on one knee or |
he can not write on the ground. Be not
that he stopped down. Stoop-
ing down from cattle to barn. STOPPING |
Town from celestial homage to mobocratic |
jeer. From residence above the stars to |
where a star haG to fall to designate his |
anding place. Prom Heavens front door |
% the worlds back gate. From writing in |
round and silvered letters of constellation |
and galaxy on the blue scroll of Heaven |
% writing on the ground in the dust which |
he feet of the crowd had left in Herod's |
emple. If in January you have ever |
stepped out of a Princes conservatory |
hat had Mexican cactus and magnolias |
N full bloom into the outside air ten de- |
yrees below zero you may get some idea |
IF Christ's change OF atmosphere from |
celestial to terrestrial. How many |
Heavens there are know not but there |
ire at least three, for Paul was ''caughtup |
INTO the third Heaven" Christ came down |
rom the highest Heaven to the Sec |
md Heaven, and down from second |
Heaven to first Heaven, down swifter than |
neteors fell, down amidst stellar splendors |
hat himself eclipsed. down through |
clouds, through atmospheres, through APP |
Daliing space, down to where there was no |
over depth. From being waited on at the |
lanquet of the skies to the broiling of fish |
or his own breakfast on the banks of the |
axe. From emblazoned chariois of eter- |
lity to the saddle of a mules back. The |
homage cherubic, seraphic, archangelic, |
o the paying of ga cents of tax to Cesar. |
from the deathless country to a tomb |
quilt to hide huTen dissolution. The up
fitted wave of (ialilee was high, but He |
lad to come down before with His feet He |
could touch it. and the whirlwind that |
'ose above the pillows higher yet, but He /
lad to come down before with His lip He |
,ould kiss it into quiet Bethlehem a
tooping down. Nazareth a STOPPING |
hrrOInrs n 4
stopping down. Yes, it was in consonance
With humiliations that had gone before
md with abnegations that came after |
when on that memorable day in Herod's
emple He stopped and wrote on the