Herald and news. [volume] (West Randolph, Vt.) 1878-1943, 1890-07-10

indebtedness So that which was dark
enough before is bright enough now. The
stripes that we deserve are fallen upon Christ.
On His scourged and bleeding shoulders de
carries us up over the mountain of our sins
and the hills OF our iniquities. Christ's good
works accepted are sufficient for us. but they
who reject them, depending upon their own,
must perish. Traits of character that may
make us infuentialon earth will not necessari-
lyopen to us the gate of heaven. The plank that
will be strong enough for a house floor would
not do for a ships hulk. Mere morality
might be enough here, but canno take you
through deaths storm into heavens harbor.
Christ has announced for all ages: II am the
way, the truth and the life; him that cometh
unto Ne l will in no wise cast out" But
pitiable in the day of accounts viii be the
condition of that man, though he may have
given all his estate to benevolent pur-
poses, and passed his life in the visiting OF
the distressed, and done much to excite the
admiration of the good and the great. IL he
nave no intimate relation to Jesus Christ.
There is a prideand a~depravityin his soul that
he has never discovered. A brilliant outside
will be no apology for a dcpraved inside. tits
no theory of mine, but an announcement OF
God, who cannot lie: "By the deeds OF the
law shall no flesh living be justified" Open
the door of heaven and look in. Howard is
there, but he did not secure his entrance by
the dungeons he illumined and the lazzaret-
/ JO5 luJO WHICH uc a Ia
Paul is there, but he did not earn his way in
by the shipwrecks and im~prisonments and
scourgings. On a throne overlapping per-
haps ll others, except Christ's. the old mis-
sionary exclaims: ''By the grace Of God l am
what / am"
Again, exalted social position will DO no
cloak for sin. Men look through the wicket
door of prisons, and seeing the incarcerated
wretches exclaim, "Oh. how much vice there
ts IN fha world - And fbQu mass fhrQuRh fha
degraded streets of a city, and looking into
the doors of novels and the dens Of corrup-
ton they call them God-forsaken abodes.
But you might walk along the avenues
through which the opulent roll in their -four
ishing pomp, and into mansions elegantly
adorned, and find that even in the admired
walks of life Satan works mischief and death.
The first temptation Satan wrought in a gar
den, and he understands yet most thorough y
how to insinnate himself into any door OF
ease and splendor. Men frequently judge
of sin by the places in which it is committed,
but iniquity in satin is to God as loathsome
as iniquity in rags, and In the Day OF Jndg-
ment the sins of Madison avenue and Elm
street will all be driven in one herd. Men
cannot escape at last for being respectfully
sinful. You know Dives was clothed in pur-
pie and fine linen and Jared s~umptuously
every day, but his fine clothes and good din
ners did not save him. He might on earth
have drunk something as rich as champagne
and cognac, but at last he asked for one
drop of water. You cannot trade of
your attractive abodes here for a house
OF many mansions on high, and
your elegant shade groves hero will
not warrant you a seat under the tree OF
life. When God drove Adam and Eve out
of Eden He showed that merely living in a
garden Of delights and comforts win never
a " a man or a woman. By giving you so
much earthly luxury and refinement He in
timated that He would nave you enjoy your
selves but He would not nave you wrap your
self up in them as a cloak to hide your sins.
God now walks in your garden as He did in
Eden, and He stands by your well as He did
by a well In Samaria, and He would make
your comfort on earth a type OF your rapture
in heaven.
Furthermore, mere soundness OF religious
belief will not hide our iniquities. There are
men whose heads are as sound as Jonathan
| Edwards's or John Wesley's, whose hearts
are as rotten as Tom Paine or Charles
Guiteau's. Ii Is important hat we be theo-
retical Christians Ii is utter folly in this
day for a man to have no preference for any
form of faith when it is so easy 70 become
conversant with the faith of the different
sscts. An intoxicated man staggered into
my house one night begging Tor lodging.
He made great pretensions to religion.
asked where he went to church he said:
Nowhere; | belong to liberal Christianity
But there are those who never become
Chr stians because their obstinacy pre-
vents them from ever taking a fair
view Of what religion is. They are
like a brute beast in the fact that
their greatest strength lies in their horns.
They are combatant, and all they are ever
willing to do for their souls is to enter an &c
clesiastical fight. / have met men who
would talk all day upon the ninth chapter OF
Romans, who were thoroughly helpless be
fore the fourteenth chapter OF John. But
there are those who, having escaped from
this condition. are now depending entirely
upon their soundness OF religious theory.
The doctrines Of mans depravity n Christ's
atonement and Gods sovereignty are
theoretically received by them. But, alas
there they stop. 1t Is only the shell OF
Christianity containing no evangelical life
They stand looking over into heaven
and admire its beauty and its song, and
are SO pleased with the looks from the outside
that they cannot be induced to enter. They
could make a better argument for truth
than ten thousand Christians who have m
their hearts received it. II ~syllogisms and
dilemmas and sound propositions and logical
deductions could save their souls they would
be among the best of Christians. They could
correctly define repentance and faith and
the Atonement, while they have never felt
one sorrow for sin nor exercised a moments
confidence in the great sacrifice. They are
almosti mmovable in their position. We can
not present anything about the religion OF
Christ that they do not know. The Saw
Jour described the fate of sue a one IN
His parable: "And that servant which knew
his Lords win and prepared not himself,
neither did according TO His viii, shall be
beaten with many stripes Theories in reii-
4 pion have a beauty of their own, but IL they
result in no warmth in Christian life it Is the
beauty Of hornblende and feldspar. Do not
call such holiness and hardness religion. The
River of Life never freezes over. lcicles
never hang on the caves of heaven. Sound.
ness Of intellectual belief is a beautiful
cloak. well woven and well cut, but in the
hour when God shall demand our souls II
will not of itself be sufficient TO hide our IN
EQUITIES.
NY friends, can it be that l have been un-
!, kind, and torn from o some hope upon
which you were resting for time and eter-
} nityf Verify, 1 would be uukind II, having
taken ava your cloak, l did not offer you
!, something better. Thisi is a cold world and you
/ want something to wrap around your spirit
Christ offers you a robe to-day. He wove Il
Himself, and He will now with His Owl
} hand prepare it just to fit your soul