The Brookhaven leader. [volume] (Brookhaven, Miss.) 1883-1891, 1889-05-02

bStduSt lt was NlIeu. Inc du2eAS aTc n
fatiyueless race, and that one could have
shouldered every rock around that tomb
and carried it away and not been be-
sweated. He sat upon it, think, to show
you and 10 show me that we may make
every earthly obstacle a throne Of
triumph. The young men who get
their education easy seldom amount
to much. Those who had to strug-
gle for IL come out atop. There
is no end Of the story of studying by pine
knot lights, and reading while the mules
OF the tow-path were resting, and of GO
ing hungry and patched and barefoot and
submitting to all kinds of privation TO get
scholastic advantages. But the day OF
graduation came and they took the
diplomas with hand nervous from night
study and pale from lack of food and put
their acade mic degrees in the pocket OF a
threadbare coat. Then starting for an
other career OF hardship, they entered
profession or business where they found
plenty of disbursement and no help.
Yet saying: ~ will succeed: q od help
me, for no one else will" they went on
and up until the world was compelled to
acknowledge and admire them.
The fact was that the obstacle between
their discoura ging start and their COM
plcte success was q rock of fifty tons, but
by resolution. nerved and muscularized
aud reinforced by Almighty God, they
threw their arms around the obstacle,
and, with the strength of q supernatural
wrestler, rolled back tn, stone oad, hav-
ing become more th1u couquerors. they
sat upon it. Men aud won IN are good
and great and useful Just in proportion as
they had to overcome obstacles. You can
count upon the fingers ~ your hand all
the great singers great orators, great
poets great patriots and great thri,tilIs,
who never hld stru ycl". That angel
that made a throne OF the bpwldor at
Christ's tomb went back 80 Heaven. and |
warrant that, having been born in Heaven
and always had en- easy time, ~ now
speaks of that wrestlo with the rock as
the most interesting chapter in all his
angelic lifetime.
o men and women with obstacles in the
way, tell You that those obstacles are
only thrones that you may after awhile
sit on. Is the obstacle in your way
sickness? Conquer it BY accomplishing
more for God during your iava!idism than
many accomplish who have never known
an ailmeut. Are you prosecuted? BY
your uprightncss and courage compel the
world to acknowledge your moral hero
ism. Is it poverty? Conquer it by being
happy in the companionShip of your Lord
aud Master, who III all His life owned but
siXty-two cents, and that He got from
fsk's mouth and Immediately paid it all
out in taxes to the Roman assessor, and
who would have been buried in a DOttcr's
field had not Joseph Of Arimathea con-
tributed a place, for He who had
not where to lay His head dur
ing His life had a borrowed pillow
FOR the last s!umber. There IS no throne
that you are sure to keep, except
that which you make ont of yanquished
obstacles. An ungrateful republic at the
ballot-box denied Horace Greeley the
highest place at the National capital, but
could not keep him from rising from the
steps of New York printing Office on
which he sat one chilly morning waiting
for the boss printer to come that he
might get a job, until he mounted the
highest throne Of American journalism.
He rolled back the stone and sat upon it.
A poor orphan boy, picking up chips at
Richmond, Va, acCosted by passing
sea captain and invited to come on board
his vessel, drops the chips and starts
right away and is tossed from port TO
port and homeless and friendlesS, wan
ders one day along fremont street, Bos-
ton, and sees Park Street Church open,
and, speaking of it afterwarl on a great
occasion and using sailors vernacular,
| as was usual with him, he says:
81 put in. up he In, unfurled sail and
made for the gallery and scud under bare
poles to the corner pew. Then l hove to
and came to anchor.
"The old man, DR.. Griffin, was just
naming his text. Pretty soon he unfurled
the mainsail, raised the topsail ran up
the remnants to free breeze, aud tell 70 u
the old Gospel ship never sailed more
prosperously. The salt spray few in
every direc ton, but moro especially did
it run down my checks. Satan had to
strike sail, his guns We're dismDunted or
spiked, his various crafts by which he led
sinners captive were all beached, and the
captain of the Lords hosts rode forth,
conquering and to conquer"
Before that sailor boy was poverty, but
he conquered it; and Orphauace, but he
conquered it; and ignorance, but he con-
quered it: and the scott Of the world, but
he co quered; and he rose in the world
till every sailors bethel in the world
blessed him. and great anniversary plat
forms invited him, and Daniel Webster
and Charles Dickens and Frederika Bre-
mer and poets and orators and Senators
sat electrified at his feet, AMI his gospel
izing influence will go on until the last
jack-tar is converted, and the sea shall
give up its dead. All the obstacles of his
life seemed gathered into one great bowl
der, but Edward T. Taylor, the world
renowned sailors preacher, rolled back
the stone and sat upon it.
Yet do not make the mistake that many
do of sitting on it before it is rolled away.
1t is bound to go if you only tug away at
it. If not before, then | think about
twelve O'Clock noon of resurrection day
you will see something worth seeing.
The general impression is that the resur-
rectiOn will take place in the morning.
The ascent to the skies will hardly occur
Immediately. It will take some hours
to form the procession skyward, and we
will all want to take look at this world
before we leave it forever and see the
surroundings of the couch where our
bodies have long been sleeping. On that
Easter morning the marble, whether it
lay fiat upon your grave or stood up in
monument, will have to be jOstled and
shaken and rolled aside by the angel of
Resurrection and while waiting for
your kindred to gather and the procession
to form, your resurrected body may sit in
holy triumph upon that chiSeled stone
which marked the place of your protract-
ed slumber. On that day what fragile
thing will be Aberdeen granite, and col
umn of basalt, and the mortar which will
rattle out of the wall of vaults that have