The Brookhaven leader., 1891-08-27
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
a Short Discourse on al Exceed
ingly Common Sin.
A Pcrnicious Habit that Robs Us of Our
Equipment to Meet the Real Trials
and Troubles of Every
day Life.

mis- congregation in the Brooklyn tab
crnacle on the subject of borrowing
Trouble" taking for his text:
Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof
Matthew vi. 81.
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 law
of trouble, law OF disaster, a 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 lie hath done to make thee
happy. His sunshine filling 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,
chafiinches to sing, rivers to glitter,
seas to chant and springs to blossom,
and overpOwering all other sounds
with its song, and ovcrarching all other
splendor with its triumph, covering up
all other beauty with its garlands, and
outfashing all other thrones with its
observation-disclosures for lost world
through the Great Redeemer.
discourse of the sin of borrowing
trouble.
First Such a habit of mind and
heart is wrong, because it puts one into
dependency that i'll fits him FOR duty.
/ planted two roSe-bushcS in my gar
den; the one thrived beautifully, the
other pesished. l found the dead one
on the shady side of the house. Our
dispositions, like our plants, need sun
shine. Expectancy of repulse is the
cause OF many secular and religious fail
ures. Fear of bankruptcy has uptorn
many fine business, and sent the man
lodging among the note-shavers. Fear
of SANDER and abuse has often invited
all the long-bealled vultures of scorn
and back biting. Many OF the mis-
fortunes of life, like hycnas, fee If you
courageously meet them.
How poorly pared for religious
duty is Il man who sits down under the
gloom of expected misfortune. IF he
pray, he says: 81 do not think | shall
be answered" If he give. he says: II
expect they will steal the money"
Helen Chalmers told me that her ia
ther, Thomas Chalmers, in the darkest
hour of the history Of ,he 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'Cheyues 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 r"joicings
of Heaven with sobs and wailing.
You will have nothing but misfortune
in the future if you scdulously 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 scrpents? Hunt for bats
and hawks and bats and hawks you
will find. Hunt for robin redbreasts
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 ut home in the darkness, and
the king of the air fell helpless, hut the
morning rose and with it the eagle;
and the owl, and the night haSEil and
the bats came a second time to the COM
bat; now the eagle, in the sunlight,
with stroke of his talons AMI a great
,,11 +1n -,
with torn feathers and splnshed with
blood, tumbldd into the thickets. Ye
arc 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
Uses, you shall renew your youth like
the eagle"
Again: The habit of borrowing
trouble is wrong, because it has
tendency to make us overlook present
blessing. To Stake mans thirst the
rock is cleft, and cool waters leap into
his trimming cup. To feed his hunger
the fields low down with bending
wheat, and the cattle come down with
full uddeG's from the clover pasture to
give him milk, and the orchards yellow
and ripen, casting their juicy fruits into
his lap. Alas! that amid such exuber-
ance of blessing man should growl as
though lie were soldier on half ra-
tons or sailor on short allowance;
that n man should stand neck-deep
harvests looking forwar 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 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
nour hunger into the bread-tray; that
msu fed by Him who owns all the har-
vests should expect to starve; that one
whom God loves and surrounds with
benediction, and attends with angelic
escort, and hovers over with more than
motherly fonduess, should be looking
for heritage of tears! Has God been
hard with thee, that thou shouldst
be foreboding? Has He stinted thy
board? Has lie covered thee with rags?
Has He spread traps for thy feet, and
CALLED thy cup, and rasped thy soul,
and wrecked thee with storm, and
Numbered upon thee with a life full of
txyD Fafh h,.S ba,