The Bossier banner., 1891-10-22
BORROWING TROUBLE.
Sermon by Rev. T. Dewitt Ta' image
on a Pernicious Habit.
It Destroys AH the Pleasure of Life to
be Drawing on the Future for
that which May Never
be Realized.

The following discourse upon a Pc
euliarly besetting sin was delivered by
Rev, 7. Dewitt Talmage in the Brook
tyn tabernacle on his return from his
western trip. His text was:
Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof
Matthew VII, "a.
The life of every man, woman and
child is as closely under the Divine care
as though such person were the only
man, woman or child. There are no
accidents. AS there is law of storms
in the natural world, so there is a law
of trouble, law of disaster, law of
misfortune; but the majority of the
troubles of life are imaginary, and
the most of those anticipated never
come. At any rate, there is no cause
for complaint against God. See how
much He hath done to make thee
happy. His sunshine filing the earth
with glory, making rainbow for the
storm and halo for the mountain,
greenness for the moss, saffron for the
cloud and crystal for the billow, and
procession of hammered flame through
the opening gates of the morning,
chaffinches to sing, rivers to glitter,
seas to chant and springs to blossom,
and overpowering all other sounds
with its song, and overarching all other
splendor with its triumph, covering up
all other beauty with its garlands, and
outhashing all other thrones with its
domiDion-d -deliyerance for a lost world
through the Great Redeemer.
7 fNf al, Nf
trouble.
First. Such a habit of mind and
heart is wrong, because it puts one into
despOndency that i'll fits him for duty.
l planted two rose-bushes in my gar
den; the one thrived beautifully, the
other pesished. I-found the dead one
on the shady side of the house. Our
dispositions, like our plants, need sun
shine. Expectancy sof repulse is the
cause of many secular and religious fail
ures Fear of bankruptc" has uptorn
many fine business, and sent the man
lodging among the note-shavers. Fear
of SANDER and abuse h as often invited
all the long beaked vultures of seorn
and back-biting. Many of the mis-
fortunes of life, like hyenas, flee if you
courageously meet them.
How poorly prepared for religious
duty is a man who sits down under the
gloom of expected misfortune! If he
pray, he says: Il do not think l shall
be answered." If he give, he says: II
expect they will steal the money!"
Helen Chalmers told me that her fa-
ther, Thomas Chalmers, in the darkest
hour of the history of the Free Church
of Scotland, and when the woes of the
land seemed to weigh upon his heart,
said to the children: Come, let us go
out and play ball or fly kite" and the
only difficulty in the play was that the
children could not keep up with their
father. The M'Cheynes and the Sum
merfelds of the church who did the
most good, cultivated sunlight. Away
with the horrors! They distill poison;
they dig graves; and if they climb so
high, they would drown the rejoicings
of Heaven with sobs and wailing.
You will have nothing but misfortune
in the future if you sedulously watch
for it. How shall a man catch the
right kind of fish if he arranges his
line, and hook, and bait to catch lizards
and water serpents? Hunt for bats
and hawks and bats and hawks you
q will find. Hunt for robin ,redbreasts
y you will find robin redbreasts One
night an eagle and an owl got into
fierce battle; the eagle unused to the
night was no match for an owl, which
is most at home in the darkness, and
the king of the air fell helpless, but the
morning rose and with it the eagle;
and the owl, and the night hawks, and
the bats came a second time to the com
bat; now the eagle, in the sunlight,
with stroke of his talons and a great
cry, cleared the air, and his enemies,
with torn feathers and splashed with
blood, tumbldd into the thickets. Ye
are the children of light. In the night
of dependency you will have no chance
against your enemies that flock up
from beneath, but, trusting in God and
standing in the sunshine of the prom
ises, you shall ''renew your youth like
the eagle.
Again: The habit of borrowing
trouble is wrong, because it has a
tendency to make us overlook present
blessing. To slake mans thirst the
rock is cleft, and cool waters leap into
his brimming cup. To feed his hunger
the fields bow down with bending
wheat, and the cattle come down with
full udders from the clover pasture to
give him milk, and the orchards yellow
and ripen, casting their juicy fruits into
his lap. Alasi that amid such exuber.
ance of blessing man should growl as
though he were a soldier on half ra-
tions or sailor on short allowance
that man should stand neck-deer
n harvests looking forwar d to famine;
that one should feel the strong pulses
of health marching with regular
tread through all the avenues OF
life, and yet tremble at the expected
assault of sickness; that a man should
sit in his pleasant home fearful that
ruthless want will some day rattle the
broken window-sash with tempest, and
sweep the Goals from the hearth. and
pour hunger into the bread-tray: that a
man fed by Him who owns all the har-
vests should expect to starve; that one
whom God loves and surrounds with