Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1890-04-24

tion OF all the surgeons of all the cen
turies, their combined skill could not
cure that body so drawn out of shape.
Perhaps they might stop it from get
ting any worse. perhaps they might con-
trive braces by which she might be
made more comfortable, but il Is, hu-
manly speaking, incurable. Yet this di-
vine Surgeon put both his hands on her,
and from that doubled up posture she
began to rise, and the empurpled face
began to take on healthier hue, and
the muscles began to relax from their
rigidity, and the spinal column began to
adjust itself, and the cords of the neck
began to be more supple, and the eyes
that could see only the ground before
now looked into the face of Christ with
gratitude and up toward heaven in
transport. Straight After eighteen
weary and exhaustive years, straight
The poise, the gracefulness, the beauty
of healthy womanhood reinstated.
The thirty -eight years case was q
man who lay on a mattress near the
mineral baths at Jerusalem. There
were five apartments where lame peo-
pie were brought, SO that they could
get the advantage of these mineral
baths. The stone basin of the bath is
still visible, although the waters have
disappeared, probably through some
convulsion of nature, the bath 100 feet
long, forty feet wide and eight feet deep.
All, poor man; if you, have been lame
and helpless thirty-eight years, that
mineral hath cannot restore you. Why,
thirty eight years is more than the,
average of human lifel Nothing but
the grave will cure you. But Christ the
Surgeon walks along these baths, and
I have no doubt passes by some patients
who have been only six months disor-
dered, or year, or five years, and comes
to the mattress of the man who has been
nearly four decades helpless, and to
this thirty -eight years invalid said:
Wilt thou be made whole?"
The question asked, not because the
Surgeon did not understand the pro-
tractedness, the desperateness of the
cage, but to evoke the mans pathetic
narrative. lit thou be made whole?"
Would you like to get wellp" @0h yes"
says the man, "that is what / came to
these mineral baths for; have tried
everything. All the surgeons have
failed, and all the prescriptions have
proved valueless, and have got worse
and worse, and can neither move hand
or foot or head. Oh, if could only be
free from this pain of thirty -eight
yearsl' Christ the Surgeon could not
stand that Bending over the man on
the mattress, and in voice tender with
all sympathy, but strong with all om-
impotence, he says, "Risel" And the
invalid instantly scramblesto his knees,
and then put out his right foot, then
his left FOOT, and then stood upright as
though he had been prostrated. While
he stands looking at the doctor with
joy too much to hold, the doctor says:
Shoulder this mattress! for you are
not only we'll enough to walk, but
we'll enough to work, and start out from
these mineral baths. Take up thy bed
and walk!" Oh what Surgeon for
chronic cases then, and for chronic
cases now!
This is not applicable so much to
those who are only little hurt of sin,
and only for short time, but to those
prostrated of sin twelve years. eighteen
years, thirty eight years. Here is
Surgeon able to give immortal health.
"Oh, you say, am SO completely over
thrown and trampled down of sin that
cannot RISE" Are you fatter down than
this patient at the mineral baths? No.
Then rise. In the name of Jesus of
Nazareth, the Surgeon who offers you
His right hand of help, / bid thee rise.
Not cases of acute sin, but of chronic
sim those who have not prayed for
thirty eight years, those who have not
been to church for thirty eight years,
those who have been gamblers, or lib
ertines, or thieves, or outlaws, or BIAS
phemers, or infidels, or atheists, or all
these together, for thirty eight years.
A Christ for exigenciesl A Christ for
dead lift! A Surgeon who never loses
case!
I Ispeaking Of Christ as surgeon, /
must consider Him as an oculist, or eye
doctor, and an aurist, or ear doctor.
Was there ever such another ocufist?
That He was particularly sorry for the
blind folks, take from the fact that
the most of his works was with the dis
eased optic nerves. have not time to
count MP the number of blind people
mentioned who got His cure. Two blind
men in one house, also one who was
born blind; so that it was not removal
of visual obstruction, but the creation
of the cornea, and ciliary muscle, and
crystalline lens, and fetina, and optic
nerve, and tear gland; also the blind
man of Bethsaida, cured by the saliva
which the Surgeon took from the tip Of
his own tongue and put upon the eye
lids; also two blind men who sat by the
wayside. In our civilized lands we have
blindness enough, the ratio fearfully
increasing, according to the statement OF
Boston and New York and Philadelphia
oculists, because of the reading of morn
ing and evening newspapers on the
jolting cars by the multitudes who live
out of the city and come in to business.
But in the lands where this Divine
Surgeon operated the cases of blind.
ness were multiplied beyond everything
by the PARTICLES of sand floating in the
air, and the night dews falling on the
eyelids of those who slept on the top of
their houses; and in some of these lands
it is estimated that twenty out of hun
dred people are totally blind. Amid all
that crowd of visionless people, what
work for an oculist! And ! do not be-
lieve that more than one out of hum
dred of that Surgeons cures were re-
ported. He went up and down among
these people who were feeling slowly
their way by staff, or led by the hand Of
man or rope of dog, and introducing
them to the faces of their own house,
hold. to the sunrise and the sunset, and
the evening star. He just ran His hand
over the expressionless face, and the
shutters of both windows were swung
open, and the restored went home, cry
ing. seel I seel Thank God, see!".
That is the oculist we all need. Till
He touches our eyes we are blind. Yea,
we were born blind. By nature we see
things wrong if we see them at all. Our