The intelligencer. [volume] (Lexington, Mo.) 1887-1891, 1891-01-10
feklp gntelliqenter.
osfIClAL COUNTY PAPER.
TIME FOR ACTION.
ID. Talmage Urges a Grand Amer
lean Revival.
ihe f.nemy's Forces Being Massed and the
christian Army Must Prepare For the
"reat Conflct-An Appeal to
Minister'S.

Nhr'stian Army Must Prepare For the
"reat Conhlct-An Appeal to
Ministers.
In his first sermon of the New Year
at Brooklyn Rev. T. Dewitt Talmage
too his text from Luke xiv. 49, larry
ye In the city of Jerusalem until We be
endued with power from on high" He
said:
o a few months, in the providence
OF God, | have two pulpits, one in
brooklyn and the other in New York,
hud through the kindness of the print
ing press an ever widening opportunity.
10 ali such hearers and readers | come
with an especial message. The time
has arrived for a forward movement
such as the church and world have never
seen. That there is a need for such a
reng,ous movement is evident from the
tacttnat never since our worldhas swung
out among the planets, has there been
such an organized and determined effort
70 ovsrthrow Righteousness and make the
. commandments obsolete and the
whole Bible a derision. Meanwhile al.
cohotism is taking down its victims by
the hundreds of thousands and the
political parties get down on their
knees. practically saying: 80, thou
almighty Rum jug, we bow down be-
fore thee. Give us the offices, city,
state and National. o, give us the Of
fees and we will worship thee forever
ard ever. Amen" The Christian Sab
bath meanwhile, appointed for physical,
Tnanrul md ppi,.;t,,,l ,..A =. l-
larized and abolished. As if the bad
publishing houses of our own country
had exhausted their literary filth, the
French and Russian sewers have been
invited to pour their scurrility and
moral slush into the trough where our
American swine are now wallowing.
Meanwhile there are enough houses of
infaIny in all our cities, open and I'M
nolested of the law, to invoke the ON
nipotsnt wrath which buried Sodom
under n deluge of birthstone.
The pandemoniac world, l think, has
tnassed its troops and they are this mo-
ment plying their batteries upon family
circles, church circles, political circles
and national circles. Apollyon is in the
saddle and riding ut the head of his
s9uadrons would capture this world for
darkness and woe. That is one side of
the conflict now raging. On the other
eide we have the most magnificent Cos.
pei machinery hat the world ever saw or
Heaven ever invented. In the first place,
10 tais country are more than eighty
thousand ministers Of religion, and,
seke them as a class, more consecrated,
boiler, more consistent, more self-deny-
ing, more faithful men never lived. l
iSnow them by the thousands. | have
met them in every city. l am told,
not by them, but by people out
side our profession, people engaged
In Christian and reformatory work,
that the clergy of America are
ht the head of all good enterprises, and,
whoever else fail, they may be depended
GA. The truth of this Is demonstrated
ny the fact that when Il minister of re-
ligion falls, it is so exceptional that the
wspapers report it as something
ztart1ing, while u hundred men in other
Ceilings may go down without the mat
ter being considered as especially worth
mentioning. In the neX place on our
side Of the conflict we nave the grand
cit churches of all time and higher
style of membership, and more of them,
and d host without number of splendid
men and women who are doing their
best To have this world purified, elevated,
gospeliZed. But we all feel that some
thing is wanting.
But look at some of the startling
facts. 1t is nearly 1000 years since
Jesus Christ came by the way of Beth
ieheul to saw this world.
vet the most of the world has been no
more touched by this most stupeudous
fact OF all eternity than if on the first
christmas night the beasts of the stall
amid the bleatings of their own young
had not heard the bleating of the Lamb
that was to be slain. Out of the 800,
etpe, oDee OF the human race, 1,400, 000, 900
are without God and without hope in
the world, the camel driver of Arabia,
Mahomet, with his nine wives, having
half as many disciples as our blessed
Christ, and more people are w~orshiping
chunks of painted wood and carved
stone than are worshiping the living
and eternal God.
What is the matter? NV text let's out
the secret. We all sneed more of the
power from on high. Not muscular
power, not logical power, not scientific
al power, not social power, not fnan'
cial owe not brain power, but power
from on high. With it we could ac-
compiish more in one week than with
nut It in 100 years.
But power from on the level is not
sufficient. Power from on high is what
ou1 90 toLa poecaaSinn ~ M Power
straight from God. Supernatural power
cfnpipotent power, all c~onquerine
power. No more than one out of {
tIlousnnd of the ministers have it con
t~inuohsly. Not more than one out OF
ten thousand Christians have it all the
time. Given in abundance these last
Tan years of the nineteenth century
would accomplish more for God M
the church and the world than the previ
Gus ninety years of this century. A few
.pen and women in each & of the
world have possessed it. Caroline Fry
the immortal Quakeress, had IL, and 30I
OF the depraved and suffering of New
rate prison under her exhortation re
p4snted and believed. Jonathan
Edwards had 1t, Samuel Budget
che Christian merchant, had i
end his b~enefactjons showereC
.he world. John Newton hadit Bish
op Iaatimer had it: Isabella Graham
had 1t. Andrew Fuller had 1t. The
great evangelists, Daniel Baker anc
Doctor Nettleton and Truman Osborn
and Charles g.. Finney had it.
Several times in the history of the
church and the world has this power
from. ON high been demonstrated. IL
the seventeenth century, after a grea
aeason of moral depression, this powe'
from on high came down upon Tillot
SON and Owen and Flavel and Baxter
and Bunyan, and there was a deluge q
mercy higher than the top of the highes
mountains of sin. In the eighteent
century, in England and America, re
liOien was at low water mark. WI
liam Cowper, writing of the clergy O
those days, said:
Except a few with EIPs spirit blest
Hop;aI and Phineas may describe the rest.
Tho infdel writings of Staftesbur
and Hobbies and Chubb had done thei
WORK. But power from on high cam
uoon both the Wesleys and Lady Hum
ington, on the other side OF the Atlanti'
and upon William Tenant and GiloeI
Tenant and David Brainerd on thi
side of the Atlantic, and both hemii
nhere felt the tread of a pardoning Coo
Coming to a later date there may b
here and there in this audience an age
maj or woman who can remember NeN
YorE in 1881, when this power from o
high descended most w~ondrously. ]