Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1891-05-18

Ter OF England With all the mighty affairs
of the kingdom in his hand he took that boy
in MS study and counselled him, and then
kneit down and prayed with him and the
boy was saved. If we all had hearts of
sympathy like that what would be to US i'm
possible. rs it not delightful that can
sing so well?" said Jennie Lind in burst
OF joy that she could help others;
sing so wells And might we not all say in
thanhulkness to God: is it not delight
ful that we can sympathize with others and
encourage others, and help others, and save
others?''
Again, in mending our nets we need, also,
to put IN the threads of faith and tear out
all the
TANGLED MEsHEs OF UNBELIEF.
Our work is successful according to our
faith. The man who believes in only half a
Bible, or the Bible in spots, the man who
thinks he cannot persuade others, the man
who halts, doubling about this and doubt
ing about that, will be failure in Chris
tlan work Show me the man who rather
thinks that the garden of Eden may have
been an allegory, and is not quite certain
but that there may be another chance after
death, and does not know whether or not
the Bible is inspired, and l tell you that
man for soul-Saving is poor stick. Faith
in God and in Jesus Christ and the Holy
Ghost, and the absolute necessity of a re-
generated heart. in order to see God in
peace, is one thread you must have in your
mended net, or you will never be a success
full fisher for men. Why, how can you
doubt? The hundreds of millions of men
and women now standing in the church on
earth, and the hundreds of millions in
heaven, attest the power of this Gospel to
save. With more than the certainty of 4
mathematical demonstration, let US start
out to redeem all nations. The rotteneSt
thread that you are to tear out OF your net
is unbelief, andsthe most important thread
that you are to put in it is faith. Faith in
God, triumphant faith, everlasting faith.
If YOU cannot trust the infinite, the holy
the omnipotent Jehovah, who can you
trusta
Oh, this important work of mending our
netsi If we could get our nets right We
would accomplish more in soul-saving in
the next year than we have in the last
twenty years. But where shall we get
them meuded? Just where old Zebedee and
his two boys mended their nets-where you
are. flames! why don't you put your oar
in Lake Galilee, or hoist your sail and land
at Capernaum or Iiberias, or Gadara, and,
seated on the bank, mend your metz John,
why don't you go ashore and mend your
metz" No. they sat on the guards of the
boat,
or AT TIE PROV OF THE 30 AT,
or in the stern of the boat, and they took
up the thread and the needle. and the ropes
and the wooden blocks, and went 10 work;
sewing. sewing; tying, tying; weaving,
weaving; pounding, pounding; until the
net mended, they push it off in the sea,
and drop paddle, and hoist sail, and the cut
water went through amid the shoals of fish,
some of the descendants of which we had
for breakfast one morning while we We're
cncamped on the beach of beautiful Galilce.
James and John had no time to go ashore.
They We're not fishing for fun, as you and |
do III the summer time. 1t was their liveli-
hood and that of their families. They
mended their nets where they were, in the
ship. "Oh, says some one, Il mean to get
my net mended, and will 20 down to the
public library, and will see what the sci
entlsts say about evolution and about the
survival of the fittest,' and l will read up
what the theologians say about advanced
thought ] will leave the snip awhile, and
will go ashore and stay there till my net
is mended." Do that, my brother, and you
will have no net left. Instead of their
helping you mend your net, they will
steal the pieces that remain. Better stay
IN the gospel boat where you have all the
means for mending your net. What are
they, do you ask! l answer all you need
you have where you are; namely, 4 Bible
and a place to pray. The more you study
advanced thought, the bigger fool
you will be. Stay in the ship
and mind your net That is
where James, the son of Zebedee. and John,
his brother, stayed. That is where all who
get their nets mended stay.
notice that all who leave the Gospel boat
ana go ashore to mend their nets stay there.
Or II they try again to fish
THEY DO NOT CATCH ANYTHING.
Get out of the Gospel boat and go up into
the world to get your net mended, and you
will live to see the day when you will feel
like the man who having forsakpn
Christianity, sighed, II would give thou |
sand pounds to feel as l did in 1S20.' The |
time will come when you would be willing |
TO give thousand pounds to feel as YOU |
did in 1891. These men who have given up
their old religion cannot help you a bit 1t |
is my opinion that the most of those minis |
ters who gave up the old religion, are in |
search of notoriety. They do not succeed |
in attracting much attention. They are
tired of obscurity. They must do some |
thing TO attract attention, so they sit down |
on the beach and go to tearing 10 pieces the |
fishing nets, instead of mending them The |
staid old denomination to which they be- |
long does not pay them enough attention, |
so they attract attention by striking their |
grandmother. They do not get enough at |
tention by standing in the pulpit, so they go |
TO work and break the church windows
These dear brethren of all denominations, |
go to mending nets instead of breaking |
them. Before they break up the old religion !
and try to foist on US a new religion, let |
them go through some great sacrifice for |
God that will prove them worthy for such a |
work, taking the advice of Talleyrand to a |
man who wanted to upset the religion of |
Jesus Christ and start q new one when |
he said: Go and be crucifed |
and then raise yourself from the |
grave the third day!" Those who propose |
to mend their nets by secular and skeptical |
books are like man who has just one week |
for fishing, and six of the days he spends in |
reading ''1saak Walton's Complete Angler"
and Wheatley's Rod and Line and |
"Scott's Fishing in Northern Water" and |
'sPullman's Wade Mecum of Fly Fishing
for Trout and then on Saturday morning, |
his last day out, goes to the river to ply his |
art, but that day the fish will not bite, and |
late on Saturday night he goes home with |
empty basket and a disappointed heart.
Meanwhile man who
NEVER SAW BIG LIBRARY
in all his life has that week caught with an |
old fishing tackle enough to supply his own
table and the table of all his neighbors, and !
enough to salt down in barrels for the long
winter than will soon come in. Alas! alas! |
if when the Saturday night of our life
drops on US it shall be found that we have
spent our time in the libraries of worldly |
philosophy trying to mend our nets and we
have only few souls to report as brought
TO God through our instrumentllity, while
some humble gospel fisherman, his library
made up of Bible and an almanac, shall