Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-03-23

on it, while the Presbyterian Is
never perfectly certain that he has the
| religion, and Is forever working like
| sixty TO get ii and make sure of it. God
| keeps US in that condition OF mind all
the time in order to keep US employed
| in the good cause. If was
dead sure had got religion
and could not by any means ever lose 1t
you could not get me to do anything. 1
would quit. would say 'Shucks! !
have got the deadwood on this thing
You cam get anything out of me-.
Choose, brethren. and choose what
sort you will be. When I see a man
choose to be good Christian. know
that man means business, and there
ism 9 recourse at the command of God
that is not his. There are thousands of
us professed Christians who never meant
to be Christians since We joined the
church. You get after these unchris =
tian Christians, and they will say to you +,
| L don It want to he a Pharisee'. Why
man, you never saw a Pharlsee in all
| your life. would like to see one myself.
| l wish we had some of them in
| the church--giving their tithes each
year. We would soon build up our
finances If we had them in the Methodist
| church. We would place them in fore
most place in the Management of the
| finances. You never. was in a
thousand miles of one in your
life. The only complaint you
! have to make Of your piety is that you
! come to church each Sunday morning
and place your mite in the collection box +,
and to prayer meetings on Wednesday
night if you don t get headache, or a
fever, or the sweeney, or something OF
| that sort.
''There are some Christians who start
| in undecided. You started in and there
was something in it that you didn t like,
and you quit. If there is anything
| don t like it is these cutters. If anyone
| gets after one Of them for some piece of
| devilment he will quit. He is q
! contemplate old gutter. There is
one kind of Christian that acts
as sort Of featherbed for cutters to fall
! into. They stand around, and when
| they see some one dissatisfied with an
other church they say to him, If you
don like the religion over there, come
| over TO us. We will treat you all right.
Do you know what that is? 1t Is making
cut rate to glory!
tSlnce have been converted l have
honestly lived up to my principles of
honor and manhood and what ! thought
to be right, aud [ wouldn't do other
wise. These cutters are like the farmer,
who, after he has been trading on credit
at a store for year, and when the ac-
count is due and of long standing
comes to the merchant and says:
Scratch my name off your books
But you owe US a large sum of
money
Don't care if do. Scratch my
name off.
But when are you going to pay what
you owe me?'
81 don know. l am going to pull up
stakes and go back to Georgia. -
'Then the merchant says, you can
go to Georgia or go to perdition, but yOu
are dirty thief until you pay me what
you owe me-.
1.-The gutter is like dog. But sup
pose you never felt like dog. eh? Well,
maybe you never did, but if some of you
say you never did / tell you you. never
felt natural in your life. Going to quit?
CThis with infinite scoru).
''Chooss how long you will be a
Chaisiian. The human will is the eff
fective power. The human will is what
takes hold on God. Nothing can sep
arate man from his God as long as he
clings with his will.
fWhat sort of Christian are you?
and you? and yon? Straight business,
now-getting right down to hard facts
what kino of Christian are you? Amt
you just the sort of one you choose to be?
Don't you know God leaves it to YOUR
self whether you will be better or worse?
'YOu have recently had a great com
motion in this town about that dancing
business. If you stick to me while l ON
hers you will see the fur flY along this
same line. put you on notice. Au-
other thing: 1 will offer right now a
check tor $500 to any man in this city
who will face me on this stand for twenty
five minutes in an argument on dancing
and defend it, if have the last talk.
Who will defend the wine rooms in this
town. listen! The bar room is after
the boys, and the ball room is after the
girls. Before l became member of the
church l danced, and 1 defended
the practice too. l didn't blame any
person out of the church to defend 1t. 1t
is part of his programme. But no church
member can defend it, because nearly
all the churches have denounced it in
every form. / am prepared to show
how they have all thuudered against
this practice that is rninng SO many of
US. The little one-horse church you be-
long to may not have said anything
against it; but If 1 belonged to that
little church l would run out of it bare
headed. Why don't you preachers say
amen to that? Brethren, if 1 had
charge of a church and another minister
came to town to do my cleaning up and
ditching, l would say amen ii 1 didn It do
anything else.
''I had better bring the sermon to a
close, now But think some of you are
saying, why, l never knew a
revival meeting befor where they
didn't ask the sinners to stand up and
come forward. Never you mind about
the sinners. / will attend to them. Bnt
l never kill my hogs before the water is
hot. -
Biographical.
Among the many religious revivalists
no one is attracting more attention than
the Rev. "Sam" Jones. Samuel P.
Jones was born in Gainesville, Ga. in
1919. His father was a lawyer, but sew
nj of