Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-11-27


chickens 10 Nazareth, and in aftertime
he cries: 80, Jerusalem! Jerusalem!
how often would ] have gathered thee as
u hen eathereth her chickens under her
w.ngs!' He had seen his mother open
the family wardrobe at the close of sum
mer and tue moth millers flying out,
having destroyed the garments, aud i'll
a.:er years he says: Lay not up for
yourselves treasures on earth where
moth doth corrupt. Iu childhood He
had seen mile of flowers, white as the
snow, or red as the flame, or blue as the
sea, or green as the tree tops, and no
wonder In his manhood sermon He said
'CoNsIDER THE LILIEs.''
While one day on a high point where
now stands the tomb of Neby Is,naii,
He had seen winsing past Him so near as
TO furry His hair. the partridge and the
hoopoe, an! the thrush and the osprey.
and the crane, aud the raven, and no
wonder afterwards In HIS manhood SER
mon He said, 'Behold the fowls of the
air. - Nazareth and on the road to it
there are great many camels. | see
them now in memory making their slow
way up the ziz-zag road from the plain
of Esdraelon TO Nazareth. Familiar was
Christ with their appearance, also with
that small insect. the gnar, which He
had seen His mother strain out from her
cup of water or pail of milk, and no
wonder he brings aft-rward the large
quadruped, and the small insect into II is
sermon and while seeing tbs Pharisees
careful about small sins, and reckless
about large ONES, cries out: "Woe unto
you blind guides which strain u. guat
and swallow q camel
He had In boyhood seen the shepherds
get their flocks mixed up, and TO one not
familiar with the habits of shepherds and
their Hooks, hOpelessly mixed up. And
sheep stealer appears on the scene and
dishonesty demands some OF those sheep,
when he owns
NOT ONE OF THEM.
'Well, - say the two honest shep-
herds, ave will soon settle this mat
ter. and one shepherd goes ou: il one
direction and the other shepherd goes
out in the other direction. aud the sheep
s.ealer in another direction, aud each
Que calls. and the fiocks of each of the
honest shepherds rush to their owner,
while the shrep-stealer calls and calls
again, but gets not one OF the flock. No
wonder tina. Christ years after, preach
ing Oh u great occasion and illustrating
his own shepherd Qualities, says:
'When He putteth forth His own sheep
He goeth before them, and the sheep
follow Him for they know His voice,
and the stranger they will not
follow for thev know not the voice of the
stranger. The sides of these hills are
terrared for grapes. The boy Christ had
often stood with great round eyes watch
ing the trimming of the grape vines.
Clip, goes the knife, and off falls
branch. The child Christ says TO the
farmer, ''What do you do that for2''
HOn, - says the farmer, ''that is a dead
branch, and 1t is doing nothing and is
only in the way, so l cut it off. Then
the farmer, with his shap knife, prunes
from living branch this. and that ten
drill and the other tendril. ''But,"
says the child Christ, "these twigs that
you cut off now are not dead; what do
you do that for?'' .'Oh,' says the
farmer, 1--WE prune off these that
THE MAIN BRANCH MAY
have more OF sap, and SO be more fruit
full No wonder in after years Christ
said in HIS sermon: 81 am the true
vine and my Father il the husbandman;
every branch in me that beareth not
fruit He tuketh away, and every branch
that beareth fruit He purgeth it, that it
mag bring forth more fruit Capital?
No one who had not been a country boy
would have said that.
Streaks of nature all through Christi
sermons and conversations! When q
pigeon descended on Christ's head at
His baptism in the Jordan it was not the
first pigeon He had seen. And then He
has such wide sweep Of discourse as you
may Imagine from one who has stood on 4
as l understand, Christ visited the Medi-
terraneun Sea only once, but any clear
morning He could run up on hill near
Nazareth and look off to the ives: and
see the Mediterranean, while there In
the north Is snowy Mount Lebanon, clad
as in white robe of ascension, and Wonder
on the east and southeast Mount Gilboa,
Mount Tabor and Mount Gilead, and
yonder In the south is the plain of Es-
draeIon over which We rode yesterday on
our way to Nazareth. Those mountains
of His boyh hood in His memory, do sou
that Christ when he wanted a
good pulpit, ma :e it out OF a mountain
- seeing the multitudes He went up into
the mountain. And when he wanted
especial communion with God, He took
James and John aud Peter into
"a MOUNTAIN APART. ~
Oh, this country boy of Nazareth, |
come forth 10 atone for the sins of the
world, and to correct the folles of the
world, and to stamp out the cruelties of
the world and TO illumine the darkness of !
the world and to transtigure the hemi- |
spheres! So it has been the mission of !
the country boys in all ages to transform |
and inspire and rescue They come into |
our merchandise and our courtrooms and |
our healing art and our studios aud our
theology. They lived in Nazareth before |
they entered Jerusalem. And but for |
that annual Influx our cities ould have !
and sickened and slain the !
race. Late hours and hurtfui apparel |
and overtaxed digestive organs aud |
environments of city life would |
have halted the world. but the valleys |
aud mountains of Nazareth have given |
fresh supply of health and moral invis-
uratiou 10 Jerusalem, and the country
saves the town. From the hills of New |
Hampshire and the hills of Virginia and |
The hills of Georgia come into our ma
tional eloqueuce the Websters and the
Gays and the Henry W. Gradys. From
The plain homes of Massachusetts and |
Maryland come into our national chari-