Connecticut western news., 1890-06-18

kiss How shall I describe the love of d2-the ardor with which he receives a. sinner back again2 Give me plum met with which may fathom this sea. Give me ladder with which I can scale this height Give me words with which I can describe this love. The apostle says in one place, "unsearcha- ble;" in another, ''past finding out. Height overlapping all height; depth plunging beneath all depth; breadth composing all immensity.
 Oh, this love! God so loved the world. He loves you. Don't you be- ieve it9 Has he not done everything to make you think so2 He has given you life, health, friends, home-the use of your hand, the sight ofyour eye, the hearing of your ear. He has strewn your path with mercies. He has fed you, clothed you, sheltered you, defended you, loved you, importuned you all your life long. Don't you believe he loves you2 Why, if now you should start up from the wilderness of your sin he would throw both arms around you. To make you believe that he loves you he stopped to manager and cross and sepulchre. With all the passions of his holy nature reused he stands before you today, and would coax you to hap piness and heaven. Oh, this fathers kiss! There is so much meaning and love and compassion in it; so much pardon in it; so much heaven in it. l proclaim him the Lord God, merciful, gracious and long suffering, abundant in goodness and truth. Lest you would not believe him, he goes up Golgotha, and while the rocks are rending, and the graves are opening, and the mobs are bowling, and the sun is hiding, he dies for you. See him! See him on the Mount of Crucifxion, the sweat on his brow tinged with the blood exuding from his lacerated templesl See his eyes swimming in death! Hear the loud breathing of the sufferer as he pants with the world on his heart! Hark to the fall of the blood from brow and hand and foot on the rocks beneath drop! drop! drop! Look at the nails! How wide the wounds are! Wider do they gape as his body comes down upon them. Oh, this crucifxion agony Tears melting into tears. Blood flow ing into blood Darkness dropping on darkness. Hands of men joined with hands of devils to tear apart the quiver- ing heart of the Son of God!
 Oh, will he never speak again? Will that crimson face never light up again He will speak again; while the blood is suffusing his brow and reckoning his cheek, and gathering on nostril and lip and you think he is exhausted and can not speak, he cries out until all the ages hear him: ''Father, forgive them, they know not what they do!' Is there no emphasis in such a scene as that to make your dry eyes weep and your hard heart break? Will you turn your back upon it, and say by your actions what the Jews said by their words His blood be on us and on our chil- dren2" What does it all mean, my brother, my sister? Why, it means that for our lost race there was fathers kiss Love brought him down. Love opened the gate. Love led to the sacri- fee Love shattered the grave Love lifted him up in resurrection. Sovereign love! Omnipotent love Infinite love! Bleeding love! Everlasting love!
 Oh, for this love let rocks and hills
 Their lasting silence break;
 And all harmonious human tongues
 The Saviour's praises speak.
 Now, will you accept that fathers kiss? The Holy Spirit comes to you with his arousing, melting, alarming, inviting, vivifying influence. Hearer, what creates in thee that unrest2 It is the Holy Ghost. What influence now tells thee that it is time to fly, that to- morrow may be too late; that there is one door, one road, one cross, one sacrifice, one Jesus2 It is the Holy Ghost.
 My most urgent word is to those who, like the young man of my text, are a great way of, and they will start for home, and they will get home They will yet preach the gospel, and on com munion days carry around the conse- crated bread, acceptable to everybody because of their holy life and their con- secrated behavior. The Lord is going to save you. Your home has got to be rebuilt. Your physical health has got to be restored. Your worldly busi- ness has got to be reconstructed. The Church of God is going to rejoice over your discipleship. You are not gospel hardened You have not heard or read many sermons during the last few years. You do not weep, but the shower is not far off. You sigh, and you have noticed that there is always a sigh in the wind before the rain falls.
 There are those who would give any thing if they could find relief in tears. They say; "Oh, my wasted life! Oh, the bitter past! Oh, the graves over which have stumbled! Whither shall I fly? Alas for the futurel Every thing is dark-so dark, so dark. God help me! God pity mel" Thank the Lord for that last utterance. You have begun to pray, and when man begins to petition, that sets all heaven flying this way, and God steps in and beats back the hounds of temptation to their kennel, and around about the poor wounded soul puts the covers of his pardoning mercy. Hark! hear some thing fall. What was that? It is the bars of the fence around the sheepfold. The shepherd lets them down. and the hunted sheep of the mountain bound in; some of them their fleece torn with the brambles, some of them their feet lame with the dogs; but bounding in. Thank God! Saved for time, saved for eternity.
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