Connecticut western news., 1890-01-01

fact that glorious endtngs sometimes have very humble beginnings. The straw pallet was the starting point, but the shout in the midnight sky revealed what would be the lap, Christ on the throne of universal domin- ion-what an humble starting! What a glorious ending! Grace begins on 8 small scale in the heart. You see only men as trees walking. The grace of god in the heart is a feeble sparkle and Christ has to keep both humble beginning! But look at that same man when he has entered heaven. No crown able to express his royalty. No palace able to express his wealth. No scepter able to express his power and his domain. Drink ing from the fountain that drips from the everlasting rock. Among the harpers harp ing with their harps. On sea of glass mingled with fire. Before the throne of God, to go no more out forever.
 The spark of grace that Christ had to keep both hands over lest it come to extinction, having famed up into honor and glory and immortality. What humble starting. What glorious consummation.
 The New Testament church was on a small scale. Fishermen watched it. Against the uprising walls crashed internal enginery The world said anathema. Ten thousand people rejoiced at ever seeming defeat, and Martyrs on fire cried: "How long, U Lord, how long?" Very humble starting, but see the difference at the consummation, when Christ with his almighty arm has struck off the last chain of human bondage, and Hima- lava shall be Mt. Zion; and Pyrenees, Morah trod the wave cliffs of stormed Tiberias, and island shall call to island, sea to sea, cont- nent to continent, and, the song of the worlds redemption rising, the heavens, like great sounding board, shall strike back the shout of salvation to the earth until it re- hny n1o oi., fn fho nf GnI all heaven, rising on their thrones, beat time with their sceptres. Oh, what an humble beginning! What glorious ending! Throne linked to manager, heavenly mansions to a stable.
 My subject also impresses me with the ef- feet of Christ's mission upward and down. ward. Glory to God, peace to man. When God sent his son into the world angels dis covered something new in God, something they had never seen before. Not power, not wisdom, not love. They knew all that be- fore. But when God sent his son into this world then the angels saw the spirit of self denial in God, the spirit of self-sacriice in God. It is easier to love an angel on his throne than thief on the cross, seraph in his worship, than an adulteress in her crime. When the angels saw God-the God who would not allow the most insignificant angel in heaven to be hurt-gave up his son, his son, his only, only son, they saw something that they had never thought of before, and do not wonder that when Christ started out on that pilgrimage the angels in heaven clapped their wings in triumph and called on all the hosts of heaven to help them celebrate it, and sang so loud that the Bethlehem shep- herds heard it: ''Glory to God in the high est.''
 But it was also to be mission of peace to man. Infinite holiness-accumulated deprav- The gospel bridges over the distance. Ii brings God to us. It takes us to God. God in us and we in God. Atonement! Atone ment! Justice satisfied, sins forgiven, eter- nal life secured, heaven built on manager. .
 But it was also to be the pacifcatfOn of all individual and international animOsities What Il sound this word of peace had in the Roman empire that boasted of the number o1 people it had massacred, that prided itself on the number of the slain, that rejoiced at the trembling provinces. Sicily and Corsica and Sardinia and Macedonia and Egypt had of her war eagles. She gave her chief honor to Scipio and Fabius and Casar-all men o1 blood. What contempt they must have had there for the penniless, unarmed Christ in the garb of a Nazarene, starting out to con qucr all nations.
 There never was place on earth where that word peace sounded so extensively to the ears of the multitude as in the Roman empire They did not want peace. The greatest music they ever heard was the changing chains of their captives. If all the blood that has been shed in battle could be gathered to- gether it would upbcar navy. The clul that struck Able to the earth has its echo in the butcheries of all ages. Edmund Burke, who gave no wild statistics, said that there had been spent in slaughter $35 ,00O, ,OO0 ,OOO or what would be equal to that; but he had not seen into our times, when in our own day, in America, we expended $3,OO0,OOO, ,O0C in civil war.
 Oh, if we could now take our position on some high point and see the worlds armies march past! What a spectacle it would be There go the hosts of Israel through n score of Red seas-one of water, the rest of blood There go Cyrus and his army, with infuriate yell, rejoicing over the fall of the gates o1 Babylon. There goes Alexander, leading forth his hosts, and conquering all the world but himself, the earth reeling with the battle gash of Arbela and Persepolis. There goei Ferdinand Cortes. leaving his butchered enc vanilla and covered over with groves o1
 Towering cacao. There goes the great Frenchman, leading his army down through Egypt like one of it's plagues. and up through Russia like one of it's own icy blasts. Yon der is the grave trench under the shadow o1 Sebastopol. There are the ruins of Delh and Allahabad, and yonder are the inhumar Sepoys and the brave regiments under Have lock, averaging the insulted flag of Britain
 while cut right through the heart of my naClNe ldnU IS CTeuCu III WHICH LucTe llt 1 ,000 ,O00 northern and southern dead.
 Oh, the tears Oh, the blood! Oh, the long marches! Oh, the hospital wounds! Oh, thu mnrtyrdom! Oh, the death! But brighter than the light which flashed on all these swords and shields and musketry is the ligh that fell on Bethlehem, and louder than tho bray of the trumpets and the neighing of tho chargers and the crash of the walls and tho
 grooming of the dying armies, is the song tha
 unrolls this moment from the sky, sweet al though all the bells of heaven rung jubilee
 "Peace on earth, good will toward men," Oh l when will the day come-God hasten it!-
 when the swords shall be turned into blow
 shares and the fortresses shall be remodellet into churches, and the men of blood battling for renown shall become good soldiers o
 Jesus Christ, and the cannon now striking down whole columns of death shall thunder the victories of the truth.
 When we think of the whole world saved we are apt to think of the few people tha 1 now inhabit it. Only very few, compared 1 with the populations to come, and what !
 small part cultivated. Do you know it hal been authentically estimated that three that nine hundred and ninety-one one-thou | sandth part of the entire globe is unculti.
 vated? This is all to be cultivated, all inhab ited and all gospelized. Oh, what tears c: Oh, what supplications when continents be gin to pray! Oh, what rejoicing when hem | ispheres begin to sing! Churches will worship
 on the places where this very hour smoke.
 the blood of human sacrifice, and wandering | through the snake infested junges of Africa Christ's heel will bruise the serpent's head. Oh, when the trumpet of salvation shall b, l sounded everywhere, and the nations ar'
 redeemed, a light will fall upon every towl
 brighter than that which fell upon Bethlehem
 and more overwhelming than the song tha | fell on the pasture fields where the flocks fed
 there will be song louder than the voice ol
 the storm-lifted oceans, "Glory to God i'll tn,
 highest" and from all nations, and kindred
 and people, and tongues will come the re
 sponse: "And on earth peace, good will
 toward men," On this Christmas eve brin,
 you good tidings of great joy. Pardon fo 1 all sin comfort for all trouble and life fn