The Russellville Democrat., 1890-01-30


 won't out and in his own garden dug his grave, and then came back and said: T am readys" but they were shocked at the idea of taking the life of their host He said: Ut Is the will Of God that should die" and he stood on the margin of his own grave and they beheaded him. You say it is mania, foolhardiness, a fanaticism. Rather would call 1t a glorious self-abnegation, the thrill of eternal satisfaction, the plucking of Josiah from death, and raising him to coronation.
 The third thought hand to you from my text is that the church of God is a good hiding place. When Jehosheba rushes into the nursery of the King and picks up Joasb, what shall she do with him? Shall she take him to some room in the palace? No; for the official desperadoes will hunt through every nook and corner of that building. Shall she take him to the residence of some wealthy citizen? No; that citizen would not dare to harbor the fugitive. But she has to take him somewhere. She hears tho cry of the mob in the streets; she hears the shriek of tho dying nobil- ity; so she rushes with Joash unto the room e tue temple, into the house 0f God, and thes she puts him down. She knows that Athaliah and her wicked I assassins will not bother the temple a great deal; they are not apt to go very much to church, and so she sets down Joash in tho temple. There he will be I hearing the songs of the worshipers l year after year; there he will breathe the odor of the golden censers; in that sacred spot he will tarry, secreted until l the six years have passed, and he come to enthronement
 l Would God that we were as wise as Jehosheba, and knew that the church of God is the best hiding place. Perhaps our parents took us there in early days; they snatched us away from the world and hid us behind the baptismal fonts and amid the Bibles and the psalm books o, glorious inclosurei We have been breathing his breath of the golde n censers all the time, and we have seen l the lamb on the altar and we have 1 handled the plants which are the pray CTS of all saints, and we have dwelt un- der the wings of the cherubiin. Glori- ous inclosurel When my father and mother died, and the property was set tied up, there was hardly any thing left; but they endowed us with property worth more than any earthly possession, because they hid us in the temple. And when days of temptation have come upon my soul have gone there for shell | ter; and when assaulted of sorrows l have gone there for comfort and there I mean to live. I want, like Joash, to stay there until coronation. I mean tc | be buried out of the house of God.
 tell you there is not moro than one man out of thousand that appreciates what the church is. Where are the souls that put aside one-tenth for Chris tian titutions-one-tenth of their in come? Where are those who, having put | aside that one-tenth, draw upon it cheer | fully? Why, it is pull, and drag, and hold on, and grab, and clutch; and giv- l ing is an affiiction to most people when l it ought to be an exhilaration and a rapture Oh, that God would remodel our souls on this subject, and that we might appreciate the house of God as the great refuge. If your children are to come up to lives of virtue and happi- ness, they will come up under the shadow of the church. If the church does not get them the world will.
 1 An, when you pass away-and it will not be long before you do-when you pass away it will be satisfaction to see your children in Christian society. | You want to have them sitting at the holy sacraments. You want them min gling in Christian associations. You would like to have them die in the sa- cred precincts. When you are on your dying bed, and your little ones come ur to take your last word, and you loolo,in. to their bewildered faces, you will want to leave them under the church's bene- diction. 1 don't care how hard you are, that is so. I said to man of the world: "Your son and daughter are going to join our Church next Sunday. Have you any objections?" Bless you, he said, lob jections? I wish all my children be- longed to the Church. I don't attend to those matters myself-I know I am very wicked-but l am very glad they are going, and I shall be there to see them. am very glad, sir; l am very glad. l want them there" And so, though you may have been wanderers from God, and though you may have sometimes csricatured the church of Jesus, it is your great desire that your sons and daughters should be standing all their lives within this sacred inclos- ure.
 More than that you yourself will want the church for a hiding place when the mortgage is foreclosed, when your daughter, just blooming into woman hood, suddenly clasps her hands in a slumber that knows no waking, when gaunt trouble walks through the parlor, and the sitting-room, and the dining hall, and the nursery, you will want some shelter from the tempest An, some of you have been run upon by mis- fortune and trial; why do you not come into the shelter? I said to a widowed mother after she had buried her only son-months after said to her:
 How do you get along nowadays2"
 'Oh," she replied, "I get along toler- ably well, except when the sun shines.
 I said: What do you mean by thss?" when she said
 e'I can't bear to see the sun shine; my heart is so dark that all the brightness of the natural world seems a mockery to me-" o, darkened soul o, broken hearted man, broken-hearted woman, why do you not come into the shclter2 swing the door wido open. l swing it from wall to wall Come inl Come inl You want a place where your troubles shall be interpreted, where your bur dens shall be unstrapped, where your tears shall be wiped away.
 Church of God, be hiding place to all these people. Give them a seat where they can rest their weary souls. Flash some light from your chandeliers upon their darkness. With some sooth. ing hymn hush their griefs. O, Church of f1od safa of Haavau lat ITO