Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1889-06-20

suffered. InrOugn STUDYING the SKY between
the hills Christ had noticed the weather
Signs and that crimson sky at night meant
dry weather next day, and that a crimson sky
in the morning meant wet weather before
night. And how beautifully he made use of
It in after years as He drove down upon the
pestiferous Pharisee and Sadducee by CRYING
out: "When it is evening ye say it will be
fair weather, for the sky Is red, and In the
morning it will be foul weather to-day, for
the sky is red and lowering. Q, We hypo-
critics, ye can discern the face of the sky, but
can We not discern the signs of the times. y
By day, as every boy has done, He watched the
barnyard fowl at sight Of over-swinging hawk
cluck her chickens under wing and In after
years He said 90 Jerusalem, Jerusalem /
How - often would 1 have gath
ered thee as a hen gathereth her chickens
under her wingp By night He had noticed
His mother by the plain candle light which,
as ever and anon it was snuffed and the re-
moved wick put down on the candlestick,
beamed brightly through all the family
sitting room as His mother was mending His
garments that had been torn during the days
wanderings among the rocks or bushes, and
years afterward it all came out In the
simile of the greatest sermon ever preached:
Neither do men light candle and put IL
under bushel but in candlestick and it
giveth light to all who are in the house.
His mother in the autumn took out the clothes
that had been put away for the summer He
noticed how the moth miller few out and the
coat dropped apart ruined and useless, and so
twenty years after He enjoined: Lay I'D for
yourselves treasures in heaven where neither
moth nor rust can corrupt" His boyhood
spent among birds and flowers they
all caroled and bloomed again fifteen
years after as He cries out: "Behold the
fowls of the air." "Consider the lilies" A
great storm one day during Christ's boyhood
blackened the heavens and angered the
rivers Perhaps standing in the door of the
carpenters shop He watched it gathering
louder ane wilder until two cyclones, one
sweeping down from Mount Tabor and the
other from Mount Carmel, met in the valley
Of Esdraelon and two houses are caught N the
fury and crash goes the one and triumphant
stands the other, and He noticed that one had
shifting sand for foundation and the other
an eternal rock for basis; and twenty
years after He built the whole scene into a
Daroration of food and whirlwind that seized
His audience and lifted them into the heights
OF subiimity with the two great arms of pa
thos and terror, which sublime words I
render, asking you as far as possible to for.
get that you ever heard them before: "Who-
soever heareth these sayings of Mine, and
doeth them, l will hken him unto
wise man, which built his house
upon rock; and the rain descended, and
the floods came, and the winds blew and
beat upon that house; and it fell not; for il
was founded upon a rock. And every one
that heareth these sayings of Mine, and doeth
them not, shall be ikened unto q foolish
man, which built his house upon the sand; and
the rain descended, and the foods came,
and the winds blew, and beat upon that
house; and it fell; and great was the fall
of it,"
Yes, from the naturalness, the simplicity,
the freshness of His parallels and SMILES and
metaphors in manhood discourse know that
He hid been boy of the fields and had bathed
In the streams and heard the nightingale
call and broken through the. fowerX hedge
and looked out OF the embrasures OF the for
tress, and drank from the wells and chased
the butterflies which travellers say have al.
ways been one of the fitting beauties of that
landscape, and talyed with the strange peo-
pie from Damascus and Egypt and Sapphoris
and Syria, who in caravans or on
foot passed through His neighborhood,
proach at shutdown. As afterward He wasa
perfect man, in the time of which speak He
was perfect boy, with the spring Of boys
foot, the sparkle of boys eye, the rebound
Of boys life and just the opposite of those
juveniles who sit around morbid and un-
elastic, old men at ten. I warrant He was
able to take His own part and to take the part
of others. In that village of Nazareth I am
certain there was what is found in all the
neighborhoods of the earth, that terror of
children, the bully, who seems born. to strike
to punch, to bruise, to overpower the less
muscular and robust The Christ who after
ward in no limited terms denounced hypo-
crite and Pharisee, warrant, never let such
juvenile villain impose upon less vigorous
childhood and yet go unscathed and unde-
Tended. AT ten years He was in sympathy
with the underlngs as He was at thirty and
thirty-three want no further inspired or
unlnsplred information to persuade me that
He was a splendid boy. a radiant boy. the
grandest, hottest, mightest boy of all the ages.
Hence I commend Him as a boys Christ.
What multitudes between ten and fifteen
years have found Him out as the one just
suited by His own personal experience to help
any boy.
But having shown you the divine lad in the
fields, must show you Him in the mechanics
shop. Joseph, His father, died very early,
after the famous trip to the
Temple, and this lad not only to support Him
self but support His mother, and what that is
some of you know. There is a royal race of
boys on earth now doing the same thing.
They wear no crown. They have no purple
tOUO luelE 1u6 ptdlu
chair on which they sit is as much unlike
throne as anything you can imagine. But
God knows what they are doing and through
what sacrifices they go, and through all
eternity God will keep paying them for their
filial behavior. They shall get full measure
OF reward, the measure pressed down, shaken
together and running over. They have their
example in this boy Christ taking care of His
mother. He had been taught the car
Penter's trade by His father. The boy
had Gone the palmer work at the shop
while His father had put on the finish
ing touches of the work. The boy also
cleared away the chips and blocks and
shavings. He helped hold the different
pieces Of work while the father Joined them.
In our day we have all kinds of mechanics
and the work is divided up among them.
But to be carpenter in Christ's boyhood
days meant to make plows, yokes, shovels,
wagons, tables, chairs, sofas, houses, and al
most everything that was made. Fortunate
for, when the head of the family dies,
it is grand thing to have the child
able to take care of himself and help take
care of others. Now that Joseph, His father,
is dead and the responsibility of family sup
port comes down on this boy, 1 hear from
morning to night His hammer pounding, His
saw vacillating. His axe descending His gim-
let's boring, and standing amid the dust and
debris of the shop I find the perspiration
gathering on His temples and notice the fa-
tigue of His arm, and as He stops amoment to
rest see Him painting, His hand on His side,
from the exhaustion. Now He goes forth
in the morning loaded with implements
Of work heavier than any modern kit of
tools. Under the tropical sun He swelters
Lifting, pulling, adjusting, cleaving, splitting
all day long. At nightfall He goes home
to the plain supper provided by His mother
and sits down too tired to talk. Work.
work. work! You cannot tell Christ any,
thing NOW about hlistarad hands OR aching