Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1890-08-23


have some standard to guile us. 1t is red
standard that God has set at the other end
OF the field. It IS the cross. Keeping your
eye on that you will make straight furrow.
Losing sight of it you will make crooked
furrow. Plow up to the cross Aim not at
either end OF the horizontal piece OF the cross
but at the upright piece, at the centre OF it
the heart of the Son of God, who bore your
sins and made satisfaction. Crying and
weeping win not bring you through. Him
hath God exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour
to give repentance" Oh, plow up to the
crossl
Again remark, in grace as in the field
there must be sowing. In the autumn
weather you find the farmer going across
the field at a stride Of about twenty three
inches and at every stride he puts his hand
into the sack of grain and he sprinkles the
seed corn over the field 1t looks silly to a
man who does not know what he is doing.
He is doing a very important work. He is
scattering the winter grain, and though the
snow may come, the next year there will be
great crop Now, that is what we are
doing when we are preaching the Gospel
we are scattering the seel. 1t is the foolish
ness of preaching, but it is the winter grain
and though the snow of worldliness may
come upon it, it will yield after a while
glorious harvest. Let us be sure we SOW the
right kind of see1 Sow mullen stalk and
mullen stalk will come up Sow Canada
thistles and Canada thistles will come up.
Sow wheat and wheat will come up. Let us
distinguish between truth and error. Let us
know the difference between wheat and he'll
lebore, oats and henbane.
The largest denomination in this country
is the denomination of Nothiugarians. Their
religion is a system Of negations. You say
to one of them. "Nhat do you believer
"Well, l don't believe in infant baptism
''What do you believer swell, | don't be-
lieye in the perseverance of the saints"
"Weli, now tell me what you do believer
"Well, don't believe in the eternal punish
ment of the wicked" So their religion is
row of cyphers. Believe something and
teach it; Or, to resume the figure of my text,
scatter abroad the right kind of seed.
A minister In New York preached a ser
mon calculated to set the denominations of
Christians quarreling. He was sowing net
ties. A minister in Boston advertised that
he would preach a sermon on the superiority
of tfanscendental and organized forces to I'M
transcendental and unorganized forces.
What was he sowing? The Lord Jesus Christ
nineteen centuries ago planted the divine
seed of doctrine. 1t sprang up On one side
of the stalk are all the churches of Chrsten-
dom. On the other side of the stalk are all
the free Governments of the earth, aud on
the top there shall be a Towering milen
MUM after while. All from the Gospel seel
of doctrine. Every word that parent, or
Sabbath school teacher, or city missionary,
or other Christian worker speaks for Christ
comes up. Yea, it comes up with compound
interest-you saving one soul, that one saw
ing ten, the ten a hundred, the hundred
thousand, the thousand ten thousand, the ten
thousand one hundred thousand--on, on for
ever
in nc in thu farm
there must be narrowing, Irefer now not
to harrow that goes over the field in order
to prepare the ground for the seed, but har-
row which goes over after the seed is sown,
lest the birds pick up the seed, sinking it down
into the earth so that it can take root. There
are new kinds of harrow, but the harrow as
| remember it was made of bars of wood
nailed across each other, and the under side
of each bar was furnished with sharp teeth,
and when the horses were hitched to it it went
tearing and leaping across the field, driving
the seed down into the earth until it sprung
up in the harvest. Bereavement, sorrow,
persecution are the Lords harrows to sink
the Gospel truth into your heart. There were
truths that you heard thirty years ago that
have not affected you until recently. Soma
great trouble came over YOU, and the truth
was narrowed in, and it has come up What
did God mean in this country in 1857? For
century there was the Gospel preached, but
a great deal of it produced no result. Then
God harnessed a wild panic to harrow of
commercial disaster, and that harrow went
down Wall street and up Wall street, down
Third street and up Third street. down State
street and up State street, until the whole
land was torn to pieces as it never had been
before. What followed the harrow? A
great awakening in which there were 500, 001
souls brought into the kingdom of our Lord.
No harrow, no crop.
Again I remark, in grace as in the farm
there must be reaping. Many Christians
speak of religion as though it were a
matter of economies or insurance. They
expect to reap in the next world. Oh, moi
Now is the time to reap. Gather up the
joy of the Christian religion this morning.
this afternoon, this night. II you have not
thank God for what you have, and pray
for more. You are no worse enslaved than
Joseph, no worse troubled than was David,
no worse scourged than was Paul. Yet,
amid the rafting of fetters, and amid
the gloom of dungeons, and amid the
horror Of sbipwreck, they triumphed in
the grace of God The weakest man
here has 500 acres of spiritual joy all ripe.
Why do you not go and reapit? You have
been groaning over your inirmities for
thirty years. Now give one round shout over
your emancipation. You say you have it so
hard; you might have it worse. You wonder
why this great cold trouble keeps revolving
through your soul, turning and turning, with
a black hand on the crank. All, that trouble
Is the grindstone on which you are to sharpen
your sickle. To the fields! Wake up! Take
off your green spectacles, your blue specte-
cles your black spectacles. Pull up the cor
ners of your mouth as far as you pull them
down. To the fields Reap reapt
Again L remark, in grace as in farming
there is time for threshiug. l tell you
bluntly that is death just as farmer beats
the wheat out OF the straw so death beats the
soul out of the body Every sickness is a
stroke of the fail and the sickbed is the
threS ing floor What, say you, is death to
a good man only taking the wheat out of the
straw That is ALL An aged man has fallen
asleep. Only yesterday you saw him in the
sunny porch playing with his grandchildren,
Calmly he received the message to leave this
world, He babe pleasant good-by to his old
friends. The telegraph carries the tidings
and on swift rail trains the kindred come
wanting once more to look on the face of
dear old grandfather Brush back the gray
hairs IRON his brow; it will never ache again
Put him away in the slumber of the tomb
He will not be afraid OF that night Grand
father was never afraid OF anything. He
will rise in the morning of the resurrection
Grandfather was always the first to rise
His voice has already mingled in the doxol-
ogy of heaven. Grandfather always did
sing in urch Anything CHASTITY in that?
No. The threshing Of the wheat out of the
straw. That is all
The Saviour folds a lamb in His bosom.
The little child fille1 all the house with her
music, and her toys are scattered all up and
down the stairs just as she left them What
it the hand that plucked four o'clocks out of
the meadow is still? 1t will wave the eternal
triumph. What if the voice that made nut
sic in the home is still? 1t will sing the
eternal hoSauna. Put white rose in one
han1 and a red rose in the other hand, and
wreath of orange blossoms on the brow;
the white flower for the victory, the rel
flower for the Saviour's sacrifice, the orange
blossoms for her marriage day. Anything
CHASTITY about that? Oh, no. The sun went
down and the flower shut. The wheat
threshed out of the straw. ''Dear Lord.
give me sleep" said dying boy the son Of
one of my elders; Dear Lord give me
sleep" And he closed his eyes and awoke in
glory. Henry W Longfellow, writing let
ter of coincidence to those parents, said:
Those last words were be lutifully poetic:
DE Lord, give me Sleep"
Twas not in cruelty, not in wrath
That the reaper came that day.
Twas an angel that visited the earth
And took the flower away.
So 1t may be with us when our work is all
done. Dear Lord, give me sleep"
have one more thought to present. l
hav crNnIaY af{ I,o ,,fo,.-t.,e.