The Brookhaven leader., 1890-07-31
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
The Doorway of Heaven Stands
Always Open.
The Vision of st. John on the Island of
Patmos-A Way of Entrance for
Prayers and OF Egress
for Blessings.

Rev. T. De Witt Talmage at Brooklyn
Tabernacle, from the following text:
And behold, door was opened in Heaven.
REV. Iv.,l
John had been the pastor of a church
in Ephesus. He has been driven from
his position in that city by an indig-
nant populace. The preaching of pure
and earnest gospel had made an excite
ment dangerous to every form of ini-
guilty. This will often be the result of
pointed preaching. Men will finch
under the sword strokes of truth. You
ought not to be surprised that the blind
man makes an outcry of pain when the
surgeon removes the cataract from his
eye. 1t is a good sign when you see
men uneasy in the church pew and ex-
hibiting impatience at some plain ut
terance of truth which smites a pet sia
that they are hugging to their hearts.
After the patient has been so low that
for weeks he said nothing and noticed
nothing, it is thought to be sign when
he begins to be little cross. And SO l
noticed that spiritual invalids are in a
fair way for recovery when they be-
come somewhat irrascible and choleric
under the treatment of the truth. But
John had so nightly inculpated pub
lie iniquity that he had been banished
from his church and sent to Patmos, a
desolate island, only mile in breadth,
against whose rocky coasts the sea
rose and mingled its voice with prayers
and hymnings of the heroic exile.
You can not but contrast the condi-
ton of this banished apostle with that
of another famous exile. Look at the
apostle on Patmos and tho great French
man on st. Helena. Both were suffering
amongdesolation and barrenness because
OF offenses committed. Both had passed
through lives eventful and thrilling.
Both had been honored and despised.
Both were imperial natures. Both had
been turned off to die. Yet mark the
infinite difference-one had fought for
the perishable crown of worldly author
ity, tho other for one eternally lustrous.
The one had marked his path with the
bleached skulls of his followers, the
other had introduced peace and good
will among men. The one had lived
chiefly for self-aggrandizement and
the other for the glory of
Christ The successes of the one
were achieved amid the breaking of
thousands of hearts and the acute,
heaven-rending cry of orphanage and
wiIowhood, while the triumphs of the
other made joy in Heaven among the
angels of God.
The heart of one exile was filled with
remorse and despair, while the other
was lighted up with thanksgiving and
inextinguishable hope. Over st. Hell
ena gathered tho blackness of darkness
clouds lighted up by no sunrising but
rent and fringed and heaving with the
lightnings of q wrathful God, and the
spray flung over the rocks seemed to
hiss with the condemnation: 1.-THE
way of the ungodly shall perish" But
over Patmos the heavens were opened,
and the stormy sea beneath was for
gotten in the roll and CLEAN of waters
from under the throne-like crystal, and
the barrenness of the ground under the
apostle was forgotten as above him he
saw tho trees of life all bending under
the rich glow of heavenly fruitage,
while the hoarse blast of contending
clements around his suffering body was
drowned in the trumpeting of trumpets
and the harping of harps, the victorious
cry of multitudes like the voice of many
waters and the hosanna Of hosts in
number like the stars.
AS we take our stand upon some high
point, single objects dwindle into such
insignificance that we cease to see
them in the minutia, and we behold
only the grand points Of the scenery.
But not so with God. Although stand
ing far up in the very tower of Heaven,
nothing by reason of it's smallnes es-
capes his vision. Every lily of the field,
every violet under the grass, the TIM
est heliotrope, aster and gentian are as
plainly seen by him as the proudest
magnolia, and not one vein of color in
their leaf decpens or fades without His
notice. From this door in Heaven God
sees all human conduct and the worlds
moral changes. Not one tear of sorrow
falls in hospital or workshop or dun
geon but He sees it and in high Heaven
makes record of its fall. The worlds
iniquities in all their ghastliness
glover under his vision. Wars and
tumults and the desolations of famine
and earthquake, whirlwind and ship
wreck, spread out before Him. If there
were no being in all the universe but
God, He could be happy with such an
outlook as the door of Heaven. But
! there He stands, no moro disturbed by
the fall of a kingdom than the dropping
of leaf no more excited by the rising of
throne than the bursting of bud, the
falling of deluge than the trickling
of raindrop. Earthly royalty clutches
nervously its scepter and waits in sus-
pense the will of inflamed subjects, and
the crown is tossed from one family to
another. But above all earthly vicissi-
tude and the assault of human passions,
in mistaken security stands the King
of kings, watching all the affairs of His
empire from the introduction of an era
to the counting of the hairs of your
head.
Again: I learn from the fact that a
door in Heaven is opened, that there is
way of entrance for Cur prayers and
of egress for divine blessings. 1t does
not seem that our weak voice has
strength enough to climb up to Gods
ear. Shall our prayers be lost in the
clouds? Have words wings? The truth
is plain. Heavens door is wide open to
receive every prayer. Must it not be
loud? Ought it not to ring up with the
strength of stout lungs? Must it not