Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1890-12-08

pathy and love and faith said; Broth
er SAUL Brother Saul the Lord, even
Jesus that appeared unto thee in the
way as thou earnest, has sent me that
thou mayst receive thy sight and be.
filled with the Holy Ghost"
Instantly something like scales fell
from the blind mans eyes, and he
arose from that seat the mightiest
evangel of al the ages, a Sir William
Hamilton for metaphysical analysis, a
John Milton for sublimity of thought, a
Whitefield for popular eloquence, a
John Howard for widespread phiIan-
tl1ropy, but more than all of them put
together inspired, tIunderboIted, null
tipotent, apostolic. Did Judas, tire
kind host of this blind man, or Ana
Mas, the visitor, see scales drop from the
sightless eyes2 | think not But Paul
knew they had fallen, and that is all
that happens to any of us when we are
converted. The binding scales drop
from our eyes and we see things differ
emily.
A Christian woman, missionary
among a most degraded tribe, whose
religion was never to wash or improve
personal appearance, was trying to
persuade one of those heather women
not only of need of change of heart,
but change of habits, which would re-
suit in change of appearance; but the
effort failed until the missionary had
placed in her own hallway a looking
glass, and when the barbaric woman,
passing through the hall, saw herself
in the mirror for the first time, she
exclaimed, HCan it be possible | look
like that?" and appalled, at her own
appearance she renowned her old re-
ligiOn and asked to be instructed in the
Christian religion. And so we feel that
we are all right in our sinful and I'M
changed condition until the scales
fall from our eyes and in the looking
glass of Gods word we see ourselves
as we really are until divine grace
transforms us.
MAY THE SCALES FALL FROM ALL EYES !
There are many people in this house
today as blind as Paul was before An
anias touched his eyes. And there are
have already fallen. You see all sub
iects and all things differently-God
and Christ and eternity, and your own
immortal spirit. Sometimes the scales
do not all fall at once When | was a
boy at Mount Pleasant, one Sunday
afternoon reading "DOddrige's Rise and
Progress of Religion in the Soul" that
afternoon some of the scales fell from
my eyes and saw little. After had
been in the ministry about a year, one
Sunday afternoon in the village par
sonage reading the Bible story of the
SyrO-P henician's faith, other scales fell
from my eyes and | saw better
Two Sunday evenings ago, while pre-
pairing for the evening service in New
York, | picked up a book that did
not remember to have seen before, and
after I had read a page about reconse
Grafton to God think the remaining
scales fell from my eyes. Shall not our
visit to Damascus today result, like
Paurs visit, in vision to the blind and
increased vision for those who saw
somewhat before2
| was reading of a painters child
who became blind in infancy. But
after the child was nearly grown a
surgeon removed the blindness. When
told that this could be done, the child's
chief thought, her mother being dead.
was she would be able to see her fa-
ther, who had watched over her with
great tenderness When night came
she was in raDtureS and ran her hands
over her fathers face and shut her eyes
as if to assure herself that this was
really the father whom she had only
known by touch, and now looking
upon him, noble man as he was in
appearance as well as in reality, she
cried out, Just to think that | had
this father SO many years and never
knew him!" As great and greater is
the souls joyful surprise when the
scales fall from the eyes and the long
spiritual darkness is ended. and we
look up into our Fathers face, always
radiant and loving, but now for the
first revealed, and our blindness for
ever gone, we cry abba father!"
To each one of this vast multitude
of auditors | say as Ananias did to
Saul of Tarsus when his sympathetic
fingers touched the closed eyelids
Brother SAUL Brother SAUL the
Lord, even Jesus that appeared unto
thee in the way that thou earnest, hath
sent me that thou mightest receive thy
sight and be filed with the Holy
Ghost!"