News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1892-06-16
RAW RECRUITS.
DR.. TALMAGE'S SERMON AT THE
BROOKLYN TABERNACLE.

A Man Cannot Become Christian with
out a Struggle Nor Conquer Temptation
without struggle-The Fortress OF
Darkness Must Be Carried by Assault.
BROOKLYN, June 12.-Dr. Talmage
prefaced his sermon this morning with
a statement to the effect that he would
sail on Wednesday next for Europe and
might be able to be present at the dis
tribution in the famine stricken districts
of Russia of The Christian Herald relief
cargo, consisting of three million pounds
of flour and other supplies, which goes
out this week on the steamship Leo,
chartered for the purpose. He congratu-
lated the American people on the gener-
GUS spirit evinced by this magnificent
gift to the starving people. His sermon
was from the text, Ephesians vi, II, ''Put
on the whole armor of God"
There is in this text a great rattle of
shields and helmets and swords. Sol
diers are getting ready for battle. We
have had recently in this church new en-
hstments, and 1 shall address myself to
those in this and other chuehes who are
putting Oh Iue dIL1OI VI COO, c1u VIII
may feel themselves to be as yet only
raw recruits. Mastery retreat is a
term often used in military circles, but
in religion there is no such thing. 1t is
either glorious advance or disgraceful
and ignominious falling back. 1t would
be a strange thing if all our anxiety
about men ceased the moment they were
converted.
You would almost doubt the sanity of
that farmer who, having planted the
corn and seen it just sprout above
ground, should say: MY work is all
done. | have no more anxiety for the
field" No. There is work for the pillow
and the hoe, and there must be careful
keeping up of the fences, and there must
be frightening away of the birds that
would pillage the field. And l say the
entrance upon Christian life is only the
implantation of grace in the heart. There
is earnest, hard work yet to be done and
perhaps many years of anxiety before
there shall be heard the glorious shout
of Harvest home"
The beginning to be Christian is only
putting down the foundation; but after
that there are years of hammering, pol
ishing, carving, lifting, before the struc
ture is completed. It takes five years to
make a Christian character; it takes
twenty years, it takes forty years, it
takes seventy years, if a man shall live
SO long. In other words, a man dying
after half a century of Christian expert
ence feels that he has only learned the
"a B C's" of a glorious alphabet. The |
next year will decide a great deal in
your history, young Christian man. 1t |
will decide whether you are to be a burn |
ing and shining light of the church, or a |
spark of grace covered up in barrel of /
ashes. 1t viii decide whether you are
to be strong man in Christ Jesus, with
gigantic blows striking the iron mail of
darkness, or a bedwarfed, whining,
grumbling soldier, that ought to be
drummed out of the Lords camp with
the "Rogues' March," You have only
just been launched; the voyage is to be
made. Earth and heaven and hell are
watching to see how fast you will sail,
how well you will weather the tempest,
and whether at last, amid the shouting
of angels, you shall come into the right
harbor. May God help me this morning
to give you three or four words of Chris
tian counsel, as l address myself more
especially to those who have Just now |
entered the Christian life.
HOLD CHRIST AS PATTERN.
My first word of counsel is, hold be-
fore your soul very high model. Do
not say, Il wish l could pray like that
man. or speak like this man, or have the
conservation of this one" Say: Here
is the Lord Jesus Christ, perfect pat
tern. By that I mean, with Gods grace,
to shape all my life." In other words,
you will never be any more Christian
than you strive. to be. If you build a
foundation twenty by thirty feet you
viii only have small house. If you
build foundation one hundred by one
hundred feet you will have large house.
If you resolve to be only middling
Christian you will only be middling
Christian. If you have no high aspira-
ton in worldly direction you will never |
succeed in business. If you have no |
high aspiration in religious things you
will never succeed in religion.
You have right to aspire to the very
highest style of Christian character. |
From your feet there reaches out path |
of Christian attainment which you may |
take, and deliberately say that you may |
be better man than was Paul or David |
or Summerfe1d or Doddridge-a better
woman than Hannah More or Charlotte !
Elizabeth. Why not? Did they have
monopoly of Christian grace? Did they /
have private key to the storehouse Of |
Gods mercy? Does God shut you out |
from the gladness and goodness to which |
they were introduced? Oh, no. You |
have just the same promises, just the |
same Christ, just the same Holy Ghost, |
Just the same offers of present and ever
lasting love, and if you fall short of what |
they were-aye, if you do not come up |
to the point which they reached and go |
beyond tit is not because Christ has |
shut you out from any point of moral
and spiritual elevation, but because you
deliberately refused to take it. l admit
that man cannot become a Christian |
like that without struggle; but what |
do you get without fighting for it? The
fortresses of darkness are to be taken by |
storm. You may by acute strategy |
flank the hosts of temptation, but there |
are temptations, there are evils in the [
way that you will have to meet face to |
face, and it will be shot for shot, gun FOR |
gun. grip FOR grip, slaughter for slaugh |
FER The apostle Paul over and over
hgain represents enc Christian life as a /
combat.
When the war vessel of Christ's church |
comes into glory bringing its crew and |
hts passengers it will not come in like a |
North river yacht, beautifully painted |
and adorned, swinging into the boat |
house after pleasure excursion. Oh, |
no; it will be like a vessel coming with |
a heavy cargo from China or India, the |
marks of the wave and the hurricane |
upon it-sails rent, rigging spliced, |
pumps all working to keep her ahoat, |
bulwarks knocked away. / see such a
vessel coming and get out my small boat |
and push toward her, and l shout:
'Ahoy, captainl What are you going
to do with those shivered timbers? That |
was beautiful ship when you went out,
but you have ruined it, ooh" saws
the captain, 81 have fine cargo on
Ioard, and by this round trip l have
llade ten fortunes"
So | believe it viii be when the
Christian soul at last comes into the
harbor of heaven. 1t will come bearing
upon it the marks of a great stress of
weather. You can see by the very looks
of that soul as it comes into glory that
it was driven by a storm and dashed in
the hurricane, but by SO much as the
voyage is rough, will the harbor be
blessed. eff ye suffered with him