Fisherman & farmer. [volume] (Edenton, N.C.) 1887-19??, 1890-05-02

H.
more supple and the eyes, that could see onIy
the ground before, now looked into the lace
Of Christ with gratitude, and up o"aru
heaven in transport. Straight. AFTER ei8hI.,
cen weary and exhaustive year,, straight.
The poise, the gracatulneSs. the beauty Oh
healthy wOmanhCOd relnstated-
The thirty-elght years case vas man
who lay on a mattress near the mineral OaVh>
at Jerusalem. There were five apartments
where lame people were brought :" tnaI
they could get the advantage OF these MN
eraI baths The stone basin Of the bath Is
still visible. although the waters nave dls-
appeared probably through some CONFUSION
Of nature the bath one hundred and twenty
feet long, forty feet wide and elgnI IeeC
deep All poor man. If you have been lame
and HELPLESS thirCv- eight years that mineral
bath cannot restore you. W ny. thIrty-elght
wears is more than tie average OF
human life! Nothing but the grave
will cure YOU. But Christ the Surgeon
walks along these baths, and have
no doubt passes by some patients who have
been only six months disOrdered. or year,
or five wears and comes to the mattress OF
the mau who had been nearly four decades
helpless, and to this thirty eight years IN.
valid said: wilt thou be made whOle}
The question asked. not because the Surgeon
did not understand the protractedness, the
desperateness of the case, but 10 evoke the
mans pathetic narrative wilt thou be
made whOle%' Would you like to get well?'
I'm, yes says the man. CnaL Is "ndC L
came to these mineral baths for; [ have
tried everything. All the surgeons have
failed, and all the prescriptions have proved
valuneless, and have got worse and worse,
and l neither move hand or
foot or head. Oh, if | could only
be free from this pain OF thirty eight years"
Christ the Surgeon could not stand tlat.
Bending over the man on the mattress, and
in voice tender with all sympathy, but
strong with all OmnipOtence He says, Rise"
And the invalid instantly scrambleS to his
knees, and then puts out his right foot, then
his left foot, and then stood upright as though
he had never been FRUSTRATED While he
stands looking at the Doctor with a Joy too
much to hold, the Doctor says: shoulder
this mattress. for you are not only well
enough to walk, but well enough to work,
and start out from these miner al baths. Take
upthy bed and walkr' 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 a
short time, but to those Frustrated of sin
twelve years, eighteen years thirty-eight
years. Here is Surgeon able to give i'm
mortal health. 'Oh," you say, Il am so
completely OverthrOwn and trampled down
of sin that | cannot rise" Are you 1atter
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. No cases
of acute sin, but of chronic sin-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
hbertines, or thieves or outlaws or bias
phemers, or infidels, or atheists, or all these
together, for thirty-eight years. A Christ
for exigencies! A Christ for dead lift A
Surgeon who never loses a easel
In speaking of Christ as surgeon, I must
Tln~I u
an aurist or ear doctor. Was there ever such
another oculIst? 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
up 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 retina,
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 eyelids also
two blind men who sat by the waySde. 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 morning 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 blindness were multi
piled beyond everything by the particles of
sand floating in the air, and the night deTS
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
hundred people are totally blind. Amid all
that crowd Of visiOnlesS people, what work
Tor an oculist! And do not believe that
more than one out of hundred of that Sur
geon's cures were reported He went up and
down among those people who were feeling
slowly their way by staff, or le1b by the hand
Of man or rope of dog, and introducing them
to the faces of their own household 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,
crying: 81 see! [ see! Thank God ! seen'
That is the Oculist 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 best eternal inter
estS are put before us, and we cannot see
them. The gloriss Of loving and pardOning
Christ are projected and we do not behold
them Or we have a defective sight which
makes the things of this world larger than
the things of the futurs, time bigger than
eternity. Or we are color blind and cannot
see the difference between the blackness of
dar kneSS forever and the rOseate morning of
an everlasting day. But Christ the Surgeon
comes III, and though we shrink back, afraid
to have Him touch us, vet He puts
His fingers on the closed eyelids of the soul,
and midnight becomes mid-noon; and we
understand something of the JOY Of the young
man of the Bible, who, though he had never
before been able to see his hand before his
face. now, by the touch of Christ had two
headlights kindled under his brow, cried out
in language that confOunded the jeering
crowd who were deriding the Christ that
had effected the cure, and wanted to make
II D.1