The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1890-01-23

1HSO the CODWeD, Du6 IL never SHOWS Gn0
by the way out of the cobweb over the
goSsamer bridge. / think that there
were plenty of fast young men to help
the prodigal spend his money; but when
he had wasted his money in riotous iv-
ing they let him go to the swine past
ures, while they betook themselves to
some other newcomer. They who took
Paul out of Fair Ravens will be of no
help to him when he gets into the
breakers of Melita.
l remark again, as a lesson learned
from the text, that it is dangerous to re-
fuse the advice of competent advisers.
Paul told them not to go out with that
ship. They thought he knew nothing
about it. They said: ''IIe is only
minister" They went, and the ship
was destroyed. There are great many
people who now say of ministers: ''They
know nothing about the world. They
can not talk to usl' All, my friends, it
is not necessary to have the Asiatic
cholera before you can give it medical
treatment in others. 1t is not necessary
to have your own arm broken before you
can know how to splinter fracture.
And we who stand in the pulpit and in
the Office of a Christian preacher, know
that there are certain styles of belief
and certain kinds of behavior that will
lead to destruction as certainly as Paul
knew that if that ship went out of Fair
Ravens it would go to destruction. RE
joice, 0 young man, in thy youth; and
let thy heart cheer thee in the days of
thy youth; but know thou that for all
these things God will bring thee into
judgment" We may not know much,
but we know that
Young people refuse the advice of
parents. They say: Gather is over
suspicious, and moth er is getting old"
But those parents have been on the sea
OF life. They know where the storms
sleep, and during their voyage have
seen thousand battered hulks marking
the place where beauty burned, and in
tellect fcundered, and morality sank.
They are old sailors, having answered
many signal of distress, and endured
great stress of weather, and gone scud-
ding under bare poles; and the old folks
Look at that MANN his cheek the
glow of internal fires. His eye flashes
not as once with thought, bat with low
passion. His brain is a sewer through
which impurity floats, and his heart the
trough in which lust wallows and
drinks. Men shudder hs the leper
passes, and parents cry, ''wolf! wolf!'
mi fhn 80 /
his mothers knee, and against that in
iquitous brow once pressed pure moth
er's lip. But he refused her counsel.
Lie went whore euroclydons have their
lair. He foundered on the sea, while
all hell echoed at the roar of the wreck:
Lost Paeifics! Lost Pacifics!
Another lesson from the subject is
that Christians are always safe. There
did not seem to be much chance for Paul
getting out of that shipwreck, did there?
They had not in those days, rockets
with which to throw ropes over founder
ing vessels. Their lifeboats were of but
little worth. And yet, Notwithstanding
all the danger, my text says that Paul
escaped safe to land. And so it will al
ways be with Gods children. They may
be plunged into darkness and trouble,
but by the throne of the eternal God, I
assert it, they shall all escape safe to
land" Sometimes there comes storm
of commercial disaster. The cables
break. The masts fall. The eargoes
are scattered over the sea. Oil what
struggling and leaping on kegs and hogs
heads and corn-bins and store-shelvesl
And yet, though they may have it SO
very hard in commercial circles, the
good, trusting in God, all come safe to
land. Wreckers go out on the oceans
beach and find the hulks of vessels, and
on the streets of our great cities there
is many wreck. Mainsai1 slit with
bankers pen. Hulks abeam's end on
insurance counters. Vast credits sink
ing, having suddenly sprung a leak.
Yet all of them who are Gods children
shall at last, through His goodness and
mercy, escape safe to land. The Scandi-
navian warriors used to drink wine out
of the skulls of the enemies they had
slain. Even SO God will help us, out of
the conquered ills and disasters of life,
to drink sweetness and strength for our
souls.
You have, my friends, had illustra-
lions in your own life of how God de-
livers His people. l have had illustra-
tions in my own life of the same truth.
was once in what on your Mediterra-
mean you call a euroclydon, but what on
the Atlantic we call cyclone, but the
same storm. The steamer Greece, of
the National Line, swung out into the
Mersey at Liverpool. bound for New
York. We had on board seven hundred.
crew and passengers. We came together
angers-Italians, Irishmen, English
men, Swedes, Norwegians, Americans.
Two flags foated from the masts-Brit-
ish and American ensigns We had
new vessel, or one so thoroughly remod-
eled that the voyage had around it all
the uncertainties of trial trip. The
great steamer felt it's way cautiously
out into the sea. The pilot was dis
charged; and, committing ourselves to
the care of Him who holdeth the winds
in His fist, we were fairly started on our
voyage of three thousand miles. Itwas
rough nearly all the way-the sea with
strong buffeting disputing our path.
But one night, at eleven o'clock, after