The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-01-11


the mizhtiest work for God has been done
By ssutugenarIsns and octogenarians and
nonogenarians. Indeed, there is work which
none but such can do. They preserve the
equip1lse OF seuates, OF religious dsnomina-
tons, OF reformstOrv movements. Young
men for action oil men for counsel Instead
Of any of you beginning TO fold up your
energies arouse anew your energies. With
the experience you have obtained and the
opportunities Of observation you have had
during a long life, you ought TO be able to
do in one year now more than you did
in ten years right after you had passed
out Of your teens. Physical power less,
your spiritual power ought to be more. Up
% the last hour OF their lives what power
for good old DR.. Archibald Alexander. old
Dr.. Woods, old DR.. Halves, old Or. Minor,
old Dr.. McIlvGine, old DR.. Tying, old DR..
Candlish, old DR.. Chalmers! What have
been Bismarck 70 Germany, and Gladstone
TO England, and Oliver Wendell Holmes 10
America in the time OF an advanced agel
Let me say TO those in the afternoon Of life:
Don't bs putting off the harness; when God
wants IL of he will take il Off Don't be
frightened out OF life by the grip as many
are. At the first sneeze of an III
fluenza many give up all as lost. No
new terror has come on the earth.
The microbes as the cause of disease were
described in the Talmud seventeen hun
dred years ago as invisible legions Of
dangerous ones" Don't he scared out Of
life by all this talk about heart failure.
That trouble has always been in the world.
That is what all the people that ever passed
out Of this life have died of-heart failure.
Adam had it and all Of his descendants
have had it or will have it. Do not be
watching for symptoms. or you will have
sym ptoms Of everything Some of you will
yet die of symptoms. Symptoms are often
only what we sometimes see in the country ,
a dead owl nailed on a barn door TO scare
living owls. Put your trust III God, 60 TO
bed at ten o'clock, have the window open
six inches to let in the fresh air, sleep on
your rig1t side. and fear nothing. The old
maxim was right: Get thy spindle aud
distaR ready, aud God will send thee flaxW
But VIII le looking at this sun dial of Abaz
and | see the shadow of it move l notice
that it went back toward the sunrise in-
stead OF forward toward the sunset-toward
the morning instead Of toward the night.
That thing the world is now willing to do,
aud in many GASES has done. There have a
great many tnings been written and spoken
about the sunset OF life. | have said some
of them myself. But my text suggests a
better idea. The Lord who turned back that
day from going toward shutdown and 8 arted
it toward sunrise is willing to do the sans
thing for all of u.s. The theologians who
stick to old religious technicalities until
they become soporifcs would not call
it anything but conversion.
call it change from going
toward shutdown TO going toward SUNRISE
That man who never tries to unbuckle the
clasp of evil habit and who kesps all the
sins Of the past aud the present frelghting
him and who ignores the one redemption
made by the only one who could redeem
il that man will examine the sun dial he
will find that the shadow is going forward
and he is on the way to shutdown. His day
is on the road to night. All the watches
that tick, all the clocks that strike, all the
sand glasses that empty themselves. all the
shadows that move on all the sun dials in
dictate the approach Of darkness. But now
in answer to prayer as in my text, the
change was in answer to prayer,
the pardoning Lord reverses things and
the man starts toward sunrise instead OF
sunset. He turns the other way. The
Captain of Salvation gives him the military
command Attention. Right about face ~
He was marching toward indifference.
marching toward hardness of heart, march
ing toward prayerlessness, marching to-
ward sin, marching toward gloom, march,
ing toward death. Now he turns and
marches toward peace, marches toward
light aud marches toward comfort and
marches toward high hope and marches to-
ward triumph stupendOus and everlast-
ing, toward hosannas that ever hoist and
hsllelujahs that ever roll. Now if that is
not the turning of the shadow on the dial OF
Ahaz from going toward shutdown to going
toward sunrise, what is it!
/ have sesn day break over Mont Blanc
and the Matberhorn, over the nights OF
Lebanon, over Mount Washington over the
Sierra Nevadas, and mid-Atlantic, the
morning after departed storm when the
pillows were liquid Alps and liquid Sierra
Nevadas, but the sunrise OF the soul is
moro effulgent and more transporting. II
battles all the nights of the soul and Hum
ines all the depths of the soul aud whelms
all the faculties, ali the aspirations, all the
ambitions, all the hopes with light that
| sickness cannot eclipse or death extin-
guish or eternity do anything but augment
aud magnify. preach the sunrise As
| look at that retrogrAde movement of the
shadow on Ahaz's dial, / remember that il
was a sign that Hezekieh was going to gel
well, and hegot well. SO | have TO tell al
| you who ere by the grace of God having
| your day turned from decline toward nigh
TO ascent toward morning, that you are
going to get we'll, we'll of all your sins, wei
| of all your sorrows, well OF all your earthly
| distresses. Sunrisel
But, says SOME one, all that you say NAV
be true, but that does not hinder the hor
| rors or dissolution. Why, you who are the
Lords are not going to die. All that the
grave gets of you as compared with YOU
chief, your immortal nature, is as the clip
pings of your finger nails as compared with
your whole body. As you run the scissors
along the edge OF your thumb nail and vol
| cut of that which is of no use but rather q
hindrence, you do not mourn over the de
parture of that fragment which flies away
Death will be only the scissoring-off of
that which could be Of no use and the SOU
has no funeral over that which would b,
an awful nuisance IL we could not get rio
of it. This body as it now is, what q
failure It would make of heaven if our de
parting soul had to be burdened with it il
the next world. While others there go ter
| thousand miles a minute we would tax
about an hour TO walk four miles, and whil
| our neighbor immOrtals could see a hundre
| miles we could see only ten miles, and tn
| tieetest and healthiest of our bodies if seeI
there would make it necessary to open il
heaven an asylum for cripples. No. no; on,
OF the best possible things that will happe,
to us will be the sloughing Off OF this bod
when we have no more use for il in it,
present state. When iG shall come I'D i
its resurrection form we will be very gla
to get it back again, but not as it Is nov
with its limitations and bedwarfmsnts In
Vulnerable. Sunrisel
There shall battle my weary soul
In seas OF heavenly rest,
And not wave of trouble roll
Across my peaceful breast.
Sunrise! But not like one of those morn
ings after you had gone TO bed late, or diC
not sleep well, and you get up chilled an,
yawning, and the morning bath is a repul
sion, and you feel like saving TO the morn