Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1891-06-29
ESTRAYS.
An Evangelical Sermon by-Rev.
Or. Talmage at Brooklyn.
IN THE PATHS OF ORTHODOXY.
His Text Excerpts No one-lt Embraces the
Pulpit and the Home Circle.
The Narrow Pathway to Eternal Torment
and the Bright Highway to Ever
lasting Life Biazed for
All to See.
IN THE PATHS OF ORTHODOXY.
AsrRAr, BIT RECOVERED.

/ ASTRAL, BIT EECONE
Special to the Gazette.
| BROOKLYN, June 2S-Dr Talmage's SER
mon to-day is OF so decidedly evangelical a
! character as to prove conclusively. that
| while so many eminent preachers of the
day are drifting AWAY from the old-fash.
| Toned Gospel, he remains firm in the paths
of orthodoxy. His subject is, 'iAstray, but
Recovered, and his text. Isaiah, lii, 6
'tAll we, like sheep, have gone astray:
and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity
| of US all
| Within ninety years at the longest all
| who hear or read this sermon will be in
| eternity. During the next fifty years you
| VIII nearly all be gone. The next ten years
4 Will cut wide swath among the people.
4 The year 1891 will to some be the finality.
Such considerations make this occasion alb
| sofb1ng and momentous. The first half OF
| my text is an Indictment: 'tAll we, like
| sheep, have gone astray'' Some one says
| Can you not drop the first wordl That is
TOO general; that sweeps too great circle. y
| Some man rises in the audience and he
| looks over on the opposite side of the house,
and he says: There is a blasphemer, and
| | understand how he has gone astray. And
| there IN another part OF the house is a de-
| 1fauder, and he has gone Gstray. And there
| IS an impure person, and he has gone
| astray." Sit down, my brother, and look
| at home.
MY TEXT TAKES Us ALL IN.
| 1t starts behind the pulpit. sweeps the cir
| cult of the room and comes back to the
| point where it started, when it says: Cali
\ we, like sheep, have gone astray." ] can
| very easily understand why Martin Luther
| threw up his hands after he had found the
| Bible and cried out: 90. my sins, my
Sins" and why the publican, according to
| the custom to this day in the East, when
they have any great grief began to beat
| himself and Cry as he smote upon his
| breast: ''GOd be- merciful to me- a sinner -
l was, like many of you, brought up in
the country, and know some of the habits
| of sheep, and how they get astray, and
what my text means when it says, ''All we,
like sheep, have gone astray." Sheep get
astray in two ways: either by trying to get
into another pasture, or from being scared
by the dogs. In the former way some of US
got astray. We thought the religion of
Jesus Christ short commons. We thought
there was better pasturage somewhere else
We thought if we could only lie down on
the banks of distant streams, or under
great oaks on the other side of some hill,
we might be better fed. We wanted other
pasturage than that which God Though
Jesus Christ gave our soul, and we wan
dered on, and we wandered on, and we We're
lost We wanted bread and
WE FOUND GARBAGE.
,JAe further we wandered, instead of find
Eit&I1ch pasturage, we found blasted heath
and sharper rocks and more singing net
ties. No pasture. How was it in the
worldly groups when you lost your child!
Did they come around and console you very
much! Did not the plain Christian man who
came into your house and sat up with your
darling child, give you more comfort than
all worldly associations. Did all the con-
vivial songs you ever heard comfort you in
that day of bereavement so much as the
song they sang to you, perhaps the very
song that was sung by your little child the
last Sabbath afternoon of her life?
There is happy land, far, far away,
Where saints immortal reign, bright, bright as
day.
Did your business associates in that day
of darkness and trouble give you any es-
pecial coincidence, Business eXaSperated
you, business wore you out, business left
you limp as rag, business made you mad
You got dollars, but you got no peace. God
have mercy on the man who has nothing
but business to comfort him. The world
afforded you no luxuriant pasturage. A
famous English actor stood on the stage
impersonating, and thunders of applause
came down from the galleries, and many
thought it was the proudest moment of all
Ills life; but there was a man asleep Just in
front of him and the fact that that man was
Indifferent and somnolent spoiled all the
wake up!" So one little annoyance in life
has been more pervading to your mind than
all the brilliant congratulations and sue
cesseS. Poor pasturage for your soul you
found in this world. The world has cheated
you. the world has belied you. the world
has misinterpreted YOU, the world has per-
secuted you.
IT NEVER CONFoRTED YoU.
o this world is a good rack from which
horse may pick his hay it is a good trough
from which the swine may crunch their
mess, but it gives but little food to a soul
'blood-bought and immortal. What is
soul2 1t is a hope high as the throne of
God What is man. You say: 1T is
,anly man. It is only man gone over
i66ard in sin. 1t is only a man gone over
board in business life. What is MANI
The battle-ground of three worlds, with his
hands taking hold of destinies of light or
darkness A man! No line can measure
him. No limit can bound him. The
archangel before the throne cannot outlive
him. The stars shall die, but he will watch.
their extinguishment. The world will
burn, but he will gaze on the confiagration.
Endless ages will march on, ne will watch
the procession. A man! The masterpiece
of God Almighty. Yet you say, 1T is only
Il man." Can nature like that be fed on
husks of the wilderness2
Substantial comfort will not grow
On natures barren soil;
Ali We can boast till Christ we know
- Is vanity and toll.
Some of you got astray by looking for
better pasturage: others by being scared of
the dogs. The hound gets over into the
pasture field. The poor things fly in every
direction. In few moments they are torn
of the hedges and they are FLASHED of the
ditch, and the lost sheep never gets home
unless the farmer goes after it. There is
nothing so thoroughly lost as a lost sheep.
1t may have been in 1857, during the
financial panic or during the financial
stress in the fall of 1873, when you got
astray. You almost became an atheist.
You said: Where is God, that honest
men go down and thieves prosper?p You
were logged of creditors, you were dogged
of the banks. You were logged of worldly
disaster. and some of you went into mis-
anthropy, and some of you took to strong
drink, and others of you fed out of Christ |
ian association, and you got astray OH |
man, that was the last time when you ought |
TO have forsaken God. Standing amid the
laundering Of your earthly fortunes, how |
could you get along without God to COM
fort YOU, and a God to deliver YOU, and a |
God 10 help you, and God to save YOU. |
You tell me you have been through enough |
business trouble almost TO kill you
1 KNOW 1T.
/ can not understand how the boat could |
live one hour in that chopped sea. But do |
not know by what process YOU got astray; |
some in one way, and some in another, and |
if you could really see the position some of /
you occupy before God this morning, your |
soul would burst into an agony of tears and |
You would pelt the heavens with the cry: