The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1890-05-01


OF sin that cannot rise" Are you hatter
down than this patient at the mineral bathsl
No. Then rise. In the name OF Jesus OF
Nazareth, the Surgeon who Oilers You His
right hand of help, bid thes rise, No cases
OF acute sin but OF chroaic sln-thoss wac
have not prayed for thlrty-eigat years tlos,
who have lot besn 10 churca Tor thirty-sight
years, those who have been gamblers or
libertlnes, or thieves, o. outlaws, or bias
phemers, or inhdsls, or atheists, or all thess
together for thirsy-eigdt years A Christ
for exigenciesl A Christ for a dead liftl A
Surgeon who never loses cass
In speaking OF Christ as a surgeon, ! must
consider Him as an oculist or eye doctor, aud
an aurist or ear do,sor. Was thsre ever such
another oeulistp Taat He was particularly
sorry for the blind folks, take from the fact
that the most of His works was with the dis
eased optic nerves. have not time to count
up the number of blind people mentioned
who got His cure. Two blind men in ona
house, also one who was born blind; so that
1t was not removal OF visual obstruction,
but the creation OF the cornea and ciliary
muscle, and crystalline lens, and retina,
and optic nerve, and tear gland; also the
blind man of Bethsaida, cured by tae saliva
which the Surgeon took from tho tip Of His
own tongue AMI put upon the eyelids also
two blind men who sat by the wayside. In
our civilized lands we have blindness enough
the ratio fearfully increasing. according t.
the statsment of Boston and New York and
Philadelphia oculists, because of the reading
of morning and evening newspapers on the
jolting cars by the multitu les who live ont OF
the city and come in to business.
But in the lands where this Divine Surgeon
operated, tn eases OF bin lness wers multi
piled beyond everything by thu particles OF
saul floating in the air, aad the nigat dews
falling on the eyeids of those who slept on
the top of their houses: and in some of thess
lands it is estimated that twenty out of
hundred people are totally blind. Amid all
tlat crowd OF visioaless people, what work
for All oculist! And do not believe that
mora than one out of a hundred OF that Sur
geon's cures were reported. He woutup and
down among those people WHO were feeling
slowly their way by staff, o. le1bJ the hand
Of man or rope of dog, and introducing them
to the faces of their own household, to the
sunrise and the sunset, and the evening star.
He just ran His hand over the expressonless
face, and the shutters of both windows vera
swung open, and the restored went home
crying: ~ see! | see Thank God, seem
That is the oculist we all need. Till He
touches our eyes we are blind Yea, we were
born blind. By nature we see things wrong
If we see them at ALL Our best eternal inter-
ests are pat before us, AMI we cannot seq
them, The glori:s of loving and pardoning
Christ are projected, and we do not behold
them. Or we have defective sight which
makes the things of this world larger than
the things of the futurs, time bigger than
eternity. Or we are color blind and cannot
see the difference between thu blackness of
darkness forever and the roseate morning OF
an everlasting day. But Christ the Surgeon
comes in and though We shrink back, afraid
to have Him toach us, yet He puts
His fingers on the closed eyelids of the soul,
and midnight becomes mid-noon; and we
understand something of the joy OF the young
man Of the Bible, who, taouga he had never
before been able to see his hand before his
face, now, by the touch OF Christ, had two
headlights kindlei unde:. his brow. cried out
in language that confouniei the jeering
crowd who were deridny the Christ that
had effected the cure, and wanted to make
Him out bad man: whether He be sinner
or no, l know not one thing | know that
whereas | was blind, now / see."
But this Surgeon was just as wonderful as
an aurst. Very few people have two good
ears. Nine out of ten people are particular
to get on this or that side of You when they
sit or walk or ride with you. because they
have one disabled ear Many have both ears
damaged and what with the constant rack
ct OF our great cities, and the catarrhal
troubles that sweep through the land, it is
remarkable that there are any good ears at
all. Most wonderful instrument is the hu-
and telephone and whispering gallery all in
one. So delicate and won lrous is its con-
struction that the most difficult Of all things
to reconstruct is the auditory apparatus.
The mightiest of scientists have put their
skill to its returning and sometimes they stop
the progress of its decadence or remove
temporary distractions, but not more than
one really deaf ear out of hundred tnoa-
sand is ever cured 1t TOOK God to make
the ear, and it takes a God to mendit. That
makes ne curious to see how Christ the Sur
geon succeeds as an aurist.
We are told of only two cases He operated
on as an ear surgeon. His friend Peter. e~A
urally high tempered, saw Christ insutted by
man by the name of Malchus, and Peter
let his sword fly aiming at the mans head,
but the sword slipped and hewed of the out
side ear, and our Surgeon touched the lacera-
ton and another ear doomed in the place of
the one that Lad been sle.shei away. But it
is not the outside ear that hears. That is
only funnel for gathering sound and pour
ing it into the hidden and more elaborate
ear. On the beach of Lake Galilee our sur
geon found a man deaf and dumb. The pa
tient dwet in perpetual silence, and was
speechless. He could not hear a note OF mu.
sic or clap Of thunder. He could not call
father OF lno.ner OF vic Oh children by uane.
What power can waken that dull tympanum
or reach that caain Of small bones or revive
that auditory nerve or open the gate between
the brain and the outside world? The Sur
eeon put His fingers in the deaf ears and agi.
tated them, and kept on agitating them until
the vibration gave vital energy to all tae
dead parts, and they responded and when
our Surgeon withdrew His fingers from the
ears, the two tunnels Of sound were clear for
all sweet voices of music and friendship. For
the first time in his life he heard the dash OF
the waves of Galilee Through the desert Of
painful silence had been built a kings high
way of resonance and acclamation.t Butyet
he was dumb. No word had ever leaped over
his lip. Speech was chained under his tongue.
| Vocalization and accumulation were to him
| an impossibility. He could express neither
| love nor Indignation nor worship. Our Sur
| geon, having unbarred his ear, will now mel,
| the shackle of his tongue. The Surgeon vii
| use the same liniment or salve that he usec
on two occasions for the cure of blind people
namely. the moisture of His own mouth Tbs
application is made. And 10, the rightly OF
the dumb tongue is relaxed, and between the
tongue and teeth were born whole vocaou-
larry and words flew into expression. he not
| only heard but he talked. One gate OF his
| body swung in to let sound enter, and the
other gate swung out to let sound depart;
| WHY IS it that while other surgeons used
knives and forceps and probes and spectre
scopes. this rgeon used only the ointment
of His own lipss To show that all the cura-
] tive power we ever feel comes straight from
| Christ. And if He touches us not, we shall be
deaf as a rock and dumb as a tomb. On,
thou greatest of all aurists, compel us to hear
and help us to speak! =,
But what were the Surgeons fees for all
these cures of eyes and ears and tongues and
withered hands and crooked backs? The skill
and the painlessness OF the operations were
worth hundreds and thousands Of dollars. DO
rot think that the cases He took were all
moneyless. Did He not treat the nobieman's
son? Did He not doctor the rulers daughter!
Did He not effect cure in the house OF
centurion of great wealth, who had out OF
mis- own pocket built a synagogue They
would have paid Him large fees il He had de,
manded them, and there were hundreds OF
wealthy people in Jerusalem. and among the
merchant castles along Lake Tiberias, who
would have given this Surgeon houses and
lands and all they had for such cures as He
could effect For critical cases in or time
great surgeons have received a thousand dol.
lars five thousand dollars, and, in one case
know of, fifty thousand dollars, but the Sur
geon of whom speak received not shekel
not penny, not a farthing.
In His whole earthly life we know of His