The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1891-07-16
ALL ABOUT RAIN.
DON'T Gruwl and Grumble About
It Is the Admonition OF Dr..
Talmage.
God Is Its Father and Sends
It to Benefit the Human
Race.

Talmage's sermon was on a kind OF
gospel which few people believe. The
weather is a common object of COM
plant and fault-inding, but Dr.. Tai
mage finds a gospel in it, which today
he proclaims from the text: "Hath
the Rain a Father?"-Job xxxviii.,
%.
This DO ok of Job has been the sub
ject OF unbounded theological wrangle.
Men have made it the wiring in which
to display their ecclesiastical pugilism.
Some say that the book of Job is a
true history; others, that it is an al
legory; others that it is an epic
poem; others, that it is a drama.
Some say that Job lived 1 300 years
before Christ, other say he never
lived at all. Some say that the
author of this book was Job; others,
David; others, Solomon. The discus
sion has landed some in blank infdel-
ity. Now, I have no trouble with the
books of Job or Revelation the two
most myterious books in the Bible
because, OF a rule I adopted some
years ago. / wade down into a script
ure passage as long as I can touch
bottom, and when I cannot, then 1
wade out. I used to wade in until it
was over my head, and then I got
drowned. I study passage OF script
ure so long as it is a comfort and can
help my soul, but when it becomes a
p~erplexity and a spiritual u%pturning,
1 quit. In other words, we onght to
wade in up to our hearts but never
wade in until it is over our head. No
man should ever expect to
SWIM ACROSS THIS GREAT OCEAN
of divine truth.
A sermon has come to me to mean
one word OF four letters, "help!" You
all know that the rain is not an
orphan. You know it is not cast out
OF the gates of heaven a founding.
You know it was born of the cloud:
You know it was rocked in the cradle
ofthe wind. You know it was sung to
sleep by the storm. You know that
it is a flying evangel from heaven to
earth. You know that God is it's
father. 49,.
Ii this be true, then, how wicked is
Our murmuriDg about climatic
changes. The first eleven Sabbaths
after l entered the ministry. it storm
ed. Through the week it was clear
weather, but on the Sabbaths the old
country meeting house looked like
Noah's ark before it landed. A few
drenched people sat before drench,
ed pastor, but most Of the farmers
stayed at home and thanked God
that what Vas badfor the church was
good for" the crops. I committed a
good deal OF sin in those days in
denouncing the weather. Ministers of
the gospel sometimes fret about
stormy Sabbaths. They forget the
fact that the same God who ordained
the Sabbath and sent forth his minis
ters to- announce salvation, also
ordained the weather. "Hath the
rain q father?"
Merchants, also, with their stores
titled with new goods and their clerks
hanging around the counters, commit
the same transgression. So a%gricul-
turists commit this sin. There is
nothing more annoying than to have
planted corn rot in the ground be-
cause OF too much moisture, or hay
already for the NOV dashed OF a
shower, Or wheat almost ready for
the sickle spoiled with rust. How
hard it is to bear the agricultural dis
appointments. God has infinite
reasons but I do not think he has
capacity to make weather
TO PLEASE ALL THE FARMERS.
Sometimes it is too hot, or it is too
cold; 1t is too wet; or it is too dry; it
is too early, or it is too late. They
forget that, the God who promised
seed time and harvest, summer and
winter, cold and heat, also ordained
all the climate changes. There is one
question that ought to be written on
every barn, on every fence, on every
haystack, on every farm house, "Hath
the rain a father"
My text also suggests Gods, minute
supervisal. You see the Divine Son
ship IN every drop OF rain. The Jewels
OF the shower are not flung away by
a, spendthrift who knows not how
many he throws or where they fall.
They are all shining princes Of heaven.
They all have an eternallineage. They
are all the children OF a King. Saturn,
Mercury and Jupiter are no more
rounded, and weighed, and swung by
the hand of God than are the globules
on q lilac bush the morning after a
shower. God is no more in m1agni-
tudes than he is in minutia. Ii he has
scales to weigh the mountains, he has
balances delicate enough to weigh the
infinit esimal. You can no more see
him through the telescope than you
can gee him through the microscope;
no more when you look up than when
you look down. Are not the hairs Of
your head allnumbered? Andif Him
alaya has a God, Hath not the rain
a father?"
Again my subject teaches me that
Gods dealings with us are mex.
plicable. That was the orig
inal force Of my text. The rain
WAS A GREAT MYSTERY
to the %ancients. They could not un-
derstand how the water could get in
tO the c1Oud. and gattino there ho,, -