Audubon County Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Audubon Co., Iowa) 1885-1894, 1891-08-06
THE STORY OF RUTH.
FOLD IN THE WESTERN HAIR.
VEST FIELDS.
DR.. Talmage breaches i'm GlenYOOd,
COL, to Large Congreg alton
OratOricaI Thunder ResOunls
Through the Valley.

! that DIR. Ialmage has found in the
scenes through which he has been
travelling and in his present surround
ings, suggestions of Gospel lessons.
His text is taken from Ruth 2:3: "And
she went and came and CLEANED in the
field after the reapers: and her hap was
to light on part of the field belonging
unto Boaz who was of the kindred of
Elimelch.n
Within few weeks | have been in
| North Carolina, Virginia, Pennsyl-
vania, New York, Ohio, Michigan,
Canada, Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky,
Missouri, and they are one great har-
yeSt-held, and no season can be more
enchanting in any country than the
season of harvest.
The time that Ruth and Naomi ar
rive at Bethlehem is harvest time.
Boaz owns a large farm, and he goes
out to see the reapers gather in the
grain. Coming there, right behind the
swarthy, sun Drowned reapers. he be-
| holds a beautiful woman gleaning-a
woman more fit to bend to harp or
sit upon IL throne than to stoop among
the sheaves. All, that was an eventful
day!
1t was love at first sight. Boaz forms
an attachment for the womanly CLEANER
an attachment full of undying inter-
est to the Church of God in all ages;
while Ruth, with an ephah, or nearly
bushel of barley, goes home to
Naomi to tell her the successes and adj
ventures of the day That Ruth, who
left her native land of Moab in dark
ness, and journeyed through an indy
ing affection FOR her mother-in-law, is
in the harvest-feld of Boaa, is affianced
to one of the best families in Judah,
and becomes In after-time the ancest-
ress of Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory!
Out of SO dark night did there even
dawn SO bright morning?
l learn in the first place, from this
subject how trouble develops charac-
ter 1t was bereavement poverty and
exile that developed, illustrated and
announced to all ages the sublimity of
Ruths character. That is very I'M
fortunate man who has no trouble. 1t
was sorrow that made John Bunyan
the better dreamer, and Dir. Young the
better poet, and O'Connell the better
orator, and Bishop Hall the better
preacher and Havelock the better sol
der, and Kite the better encyclope-
dist, and Ruth the better daughter-in-
law.
Grecian mythology said that the
fountain of Hippocrene was struck out
by the foot of the winged horse,
Pegasus. / have often noticed in life
that the brightest and most beautiful
fountains of Christian comfort and
| spiritual life have been struck out by
the iron-shod hoof of disaster and
calamity.
| Again, see in my text the beauty of
unfaltering friendship. / suppose there
were plenty of friends for Naomi while
| she was in prosperity; but of all her
acquaintance how many were willing
to trudge off with her toward Judaa,
when she had to make that lonely
! journey? One-the heroine of my text.
one absolutely one. | suppose when
| Naomi's husband was living, and they
had plenty of money, and all things
went well, they had a great many
callers; but suppose that after her
husband died, and her property went,
and she got old and poor, She was not
troubled very much with callers. All
the birds that sang in the bower while
the sun shone have gone to their nests,
now the night has fallen.
Life often seems to be mere game,
/ where the successful player pulls down
all the other men into his own lap.
Let suspicious arise about mans
! character, and he becomes like a bank
in a panic, and all the imputations
rush on him and break down in q day
that character which in due time
would have had strength to defend it.
self. There are regulations that have
been half a century in building, which
| go down under some moral exposure,
as vast temple is consumed by the
touch of sulphurous match. 4 hog
can uproot a century plant.
Again, learn from this subject that
! paths which open in hardship and dark
ness often come ont in places of joy.
When Ruth started from Moab toward
! Jerusalem, to go along with her
mother-inlaw, l suppose the people
said: ''Oh, what foolish creature, to
! go away from her fathers house, to
go off with poor old woman toward
the land of Judea! They won't live
to get across the desert They
will be drowned in the sea, or the
| jackals of the wilderness will destroy
them" 1t was very dark morning
when Ruth started off with Naomi;
but behold her in my text in the
harvest-field of Boaz, to be affianced to
one of the lords of the land, and be-
come one of the grandmothers of Jesus
Christ the Lord of glory. And 80 it
often is that a path which starts very
darkly ends very brightly.
When you started out for heaven, oh,
how dark was the hour of conviction
how Sinai Numbered, and devils tor
mented, and the darkness thickened
All the sins of your life bounced upon
! you, and it was the darkest
hour you ever saw when you
first found out your sins. After
awhile you went into the harvest-field
of Gods mercy; you began to CLEAN in
the fields of divine promise, and you
had more sheaves than you could carry,
as the voice of God addressed you, say
ing: blessed is the man whose trans
gressions are forgiven and whose sins
arc covered" A very dark starting in
conviction, very bright ending in the
pardon and the hope and the triumph
of the Gospel!
1t was very hard for Noah to endure
the soothing of the people in his day,
while he was trying to build the ark,
and was every morning quizzed about
his old boat that would never be of
any practical use; but when the deluge
came, and the tops of the mountains
/ disappeared ike the DackS OF sea mon
sters, and the elements, dashed up in
fury, clapped their hands over a
drowned world, then Noah in the ark
rejoiced in his own safety and in the
safety of his family, and looked CD on
the wreck of ruined earth.
Christ, bounded of prosecutors, de-
MED "a pillow, worse maltreated than
the thieves on either side of the cross,
human hate smacking its lips in salts
faction, after it had been draining his
last drop of blood, the shected dead
bursting from the sephulchres at his
crucifixion. Tell me, o Gethsemane
and Golgotha. were there ever darker
times than those? Like the booming
of the midnight sea against the rock,
the surges of Christ's anguish
beat against the gates of
eternity, to be echoed back by all
the thrones of heaven and all
the dungeons of hell. But the day of
reward comes for Christ; all the pomp
and dominion of this world are to be