The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1891-08-07

and with so few hours in which to reap
So. that I state il as "a simple fact that
all the time that the vast majority OF
you viii have for the exclusive service
of God viii be less than one yearl
"Bnt," says some man, II literally
support the Gospel, and the church is
open and the Gospel preached; all the
spiritual advantages are spread before
men, and if they want to be saved let
them come to be saved; 1 have dis
charged my responsibility" Ali is
that the Masters Spirit? Is there not
an old book somewhere that commands
us to go out into the highways and the
hedges and compel the people to come
in? What would have become of you
and me If Christ had not come down of
the hills of Heaven, and If He had not
come through the door of Bethlehem
caravansary, and If He had not with
the crushed hand of the crucifixion
knocked at the iron gate of the sepul-
cher of our spiritual death, saying:
Lazarus, come forth?'' Oh, my
Christian friends, this is no time for
inertia, when all the forces of dark
ness seem to be in full blast; when
DIGdAA P1CSSG0 dAG P4DAAoAAAAS Ia
fdel tracts; when express railroad
trains are carrying passengers of sin;
when fast clippers are laden with opium
and rum; when the night air of Gus
cities is polluted with the laughter that
breaks up from the ten thousand sa-
looms of dissipation and abandonment;
when the fires of the second death al
ready are kindled in the cheeks of some
who. only a little while ago, were in
corrupt. Never since the curse fell
upon the earth has there been a time
when it was such an unwise, such an
awful thing for the church to sleepi
The great audiences are not gathered
in the Christian churches, the great au-
diences are gathered in temples of sin
tears of unutterable woe their bap-
tism, the blood of crushed hearts the
awful wine of their sacrament, bias
phemies their litany, and the groans of
the lost world the organ dirge of their
worship.
Again, if you want to be qualified to
meet the duties which this age demands
of you, you must on the one hand avoid
reckless ~iconoclasm, and on the other
hand not stick too much to things be-
cause they are Did. The air is too full
of new plans, new projects, theories of
government new theologies. and l am
amazed to see how so many Christians
want only novelty in order to recon-
mend a thing to their confidence; and
so vacillate and swing to and fro and
they are useless, and they are unhappy.
New plans-secular, ethical, philo-
sophical, religious, cisatlantic, transat-
lantic. All, my brother, do not adopt
a thing merely because it is new. Try
it by the realities of a Judgment Day.
But, on the other hand, do not adj
here to anything merely because it is
Did. There is not a single enterprise of
the Church or the world but has some
times been scoffed at. There was a
time when men derided even Bible So
c~ieties; and when afew young men met
near a haystack in Massachusetts, and
organized the first missionary society
ever organized in this country, there
went laughter and ridicule all around
the Christian church. They said the
undertaking was preposterous. And so,
also, the work of Jesus Christ was as
sailed. People cried out: ''Whoever
heard of such theories and ethics
and government? Who ever noticed
such a style of preaching as Je-
sus has?" Ezekiel had talked
Of mysterious wings and wheels. Here
came a man from Capernaum and Gen
n~esaret, and He drew His illustrations
from the lakes, from the sand, from the
~ravine, from the lilies, from the corn
stalks. How the Pharisees scoffed!
How Herod deridedi How Caiaphas
hissedl And this Jesus they plucked by
the beard, and they spat in His face,
and they called Him this fellowI" All
the great enterprises in and out of the
church have at times been scoffed at,
and there have been a great multitude
who have thought that the chariot of
Gods truth would fall to pieces if it
once got out of the old. rut-
And so there are those who have no
patience with anything like improve
ment in church architecture, or with
anything like good, hearty, earnest
church singing, and they deride any
form of religious discussion which goes
down walking among everyday men
rather than that which makes an ex-
cursion on rhetorical stills. Oh, that
the Church of God would wake up to
an a~daptability of work. We must adj
NIT the simple fact that the churches
of Jesus Christ in this day do not reach
the great masses. There are fifty thou
sand people in Edinburg who never
hear the Gospel. There are one million
people in London who never hear the
Gospel. There are at least three hum
dred souls in the city of Brooklyn who
come not under the immediate minis
trations of Christ's church; and the
Church of God in this day, instead of
being a place full of living epistles,
read and known of all men. is more
like a "dead-letter'' post Office.
"But," say the people, 1.-THE world is
going to be converted; you must be pa
tient; the kingdoms of this world are to
become the Kingdoms of Christ" Never,
unless the church of Christ puts on
more speed and energy. Instead of the
church converting the world the world
is converting the church. Here is a.
great fortress How shall it be taken?
An army comes and sits around about
it, cuts off the supplies and says:
Now we will just wait until from
exhaustion and starvation they will
have to give up" Weeks and
months, and perhaps a year, pass along,
and finally the fortress surrenders
through hat starvation and exhaus-
ton. But, my friends, the fortresses