Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1890-05-15

patny Win tnose VINO are still In the strug-
glel Aseended scars, face scars, head
scars. feet scars. shoulder scarsl
That viii keep Him in accord with all the
suffering. with all the weary. with all the
imposed upon No more Is He a spirit now
than body, no more of Heaven than earth.
Those OF the celestial inhabitants who
never saw our world. now walk around
Him and learn from His physical contour
something OF what our race will be when,
in the resurrection. Heaven viii have un-
counted bodies as well as uncounted
spirits. On Ascension Day He lifted Him.
self through the atmosphere OF Palestine
until. amid the immensities, He disap-
peared- He was the only being the world
ever saw who could lift HIMSELF Surely II
He could lift Himself He can do the lesser
deed OF lifting as.
No star goes down but climbs another sky,
No sun sets here except to rise ON high.
Christ leads us all the way; through the
birth hour. for He was born in Bethlehem; I;
through boyhood. for He passed it in
Nazareth; through injustices, for He en-
dured the outrages OF Pilates courtroom; I;
through death. for He suffered it on Cal
vary; through the sepulcher. for He lay
three days within its darkened walls;
through resurrection, for the solid masonry
gave way on the first Easter morning;
through ascension, for Mount olivet
watched Him as He climbed the skies;
them amid magnificent acclaim. And here
Is gratifying situation that you never
thought Of: We will see our Lord Just as
He looked on earth. As He arose from the
tomb He aseended from Mount olivet. We
shall see Him as He looked on the road to
Emmaus. as He appeared in the upper room
in Jerusalem, as He was that day of vale
dictory on the ridge from which He swung
into the skies. How much we will want to
see Himl
I am so glad that Christ broke the natural
law of gravitation when He shook off from
His feet the clutch Of Mount Olivet. People
talk as though cold, iron, unsympathetic,
natural law controlled everything. The
reign OF law is a majestic thing. but the
God who made it has a right to break it,
and again and again has broken 1t, and
again and again will break it. law is
only Gods way of doing things. and if He
chooses to do them some other way He has
a right to do so. Alaw is not strong enough
to shackle the Almighty.
Christ broke botanical law when, on
one Monday morning in March. on the way
from Bethany to Jerusalem. by few words
he turned full leaved fig tree into lifeess
stick. He broke ichthyological law when,
without any natural inducement, he swung
great school of fish into part of Lake IT.
berias. where the fishermen had cast their
nets for eight or ten hours without the cap
lure of minnow; and by making fish help
pay the tax by yielding from its mouth
Roman slater. Christ broke the law of
storms by compelling. with a word. the an
gered sea to hush its frenzy, and the winds
to quit their believing. He broke zoologi-
cal law when He made the devils possess
the swine of Gadara. He broke the law of
economics when he made enough bread for
five thousand people out of five biscuits
that would not ordinarily have been enough
for ten of the hungry. He broke intellectual
law when. by word, he silenced maniac
into placiditv
He broke physiological law when. by a
touch. he Strengthened woman who, for
eighteen years, had been bent almost double,
wnen he put spring into the inhumated foot
OF Lazarus, and when, without medicine,
he gave the dying girl back in health to the
Syro-P -Ph9nicain mother. and when he
made the palatial home of the nobleman re-
sound again with the laughter of his re-
stored boy, and when. without knife or bat
terry, he set cataracted eyes to see again.
and the drum of the deaf ears to vibrate
again, and the nerves Of paralyzed arms to
thrilling again. and then when in leaving
the earth he defled all atmospheric law and
physiological law, and that law which has
in it withes and cables and girders enough
to hold the universe-the law Of gravitation.
The Christ who proved himself on so many
occasions, and especially the last, superior
to law, still lives; and every day. in answer
to prayer for the good of the world, He is
overriding the law. Blessed be God that we
are not the subjects of blind fatality, but of
a sympathizing divinity. Have you never
seen typhoid fever break, or a storm sud-
denly quiet, or ship a-beam's end right
itself, or fog lift, or parched sky break in
showers, or perplexity disentangled. or
the ineonsoable take solace. or the way
ward reform at the call of prayer? Ihave
seen it; multitudes have seen it. You have,
If you have been willing to see it. Deride
not the faith cure. Because impostors at
tempt it, is nothing against good men whom
God hath honored with marvellous restora-
tions. Pronounce nothing impossible to
prayer and trust. Because you and can
not effect it is no reason why others may
not.
By the same ar rgument could prove that
Raphael never nainted u Madonna and that
Mendelssohn never wrote an oratorio, and
that Phidias never chiSeled statue. Be-
cause we cannot accomplish it ourselves,
we are not to conclude that others may not.
There are in immenslty great ranges of mists
which have proved. under closer telescope
scrutiny, to be the storehouSe of worlds,
and do not know but from that passage in
James. which, to some of us is yet misty and
dim. there may roll out new Heaven and q
new earth, "The prayer of faith shall save
the sick" The faith curists may. in this
war against disease, be only skirmishing
before general engagement, in which all
the maladies of the earth shall be routed.
Surely. allopathy and homeopathy and
hydropathy and eclecticism need reinforce
ment from somewhere. Why not from the
faith and prayer of the consecrated2
The mightiest school of medicine may
yet be the school of Christ. I do not know
but that disease. now by all schools pro-
nounced incurable, may give way under the
gospel bombardment. / do not know but
that the day may come when faith and
prayer shall raise the dead, Strauss and
Woolston and Spinoza and Hume and
Schleiermacher rejected the miracles of our
past. do not propose to be like them, and
reject the miracles Of the far future. This
know. the Christ Of the Ascension day is
mightier than any natural laws, for on the
day Of which speak He trampled down the
strongest of them all. Law lis mighty, but
He who made it is mightier. Drive out IA
talism from your theology and give grace
the throne.
Standing to-day on the ascension peak Of
Mount Olivet am also gladdened at the
closing gesture, the last gesture Christ ever
made. HE lifted up His hands and blessed
them" says the inspired account Of our
Lords departure. am 80 glad He lifted
up His hands. Gestures are often more sig
nifcant than words. attitudes than argu-
ments. Christ had made q gesture Of con-
tempt when with his finger He wrote on the
ground; gesture Of repulsion when He said.
Get thee behind me, Satan" gesture of
condemnation when He said, Woe unto
you. Pharisees and hypocrites." But His
last gesture, His Olivetic gesture, is ges-
ture of benediction. He lifted up His hands
and blessed them. His arms are extended.
and the palms Of His hands turned down.
ward. and SO He dropped benediction upon
Olivet. benediction upon Palestine, bene-
diction upon all the earth.
. The cruel world took Him in at the start