The free press. (Poplarville, Miss.) 1890-19??, 1892-06-16
REV. DIR. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DIVINE'S sun
DAY SERMON.
subtect-"The Secret Place of ThMn-
der"

TEXT: 81 ansrcered thee in The sscre
! place of tbunde, Psalms XXI, Z.
1t is past midnight, and two o'clock in tbs
morning, far enough from sunset ana sun
rise to make the darkness very thick, and the
| Egyptian army in pursuit of the escaping
| Israelites are on the bottom Of the Fed Sea
| its waters having been set up on either side
! in mesonry of sapphire, for God can make 9
wall as solid out of water as out of granite
| and the trowels with which these two walls
| were built were none the less powerful be
cause invisible, Such walls had never before
| been lifted. -
| When saw the waters Of the Red Sea roll
ing through the Suez Canal they were blue
| and beautiful and flowing like other waterA
| but tonight, as the Egyptians look up tc
them built into walls, now on one side and
now on the other, they must have been
| frowning waters, for it was probable that
| the same power that lifted them up might
suddenly fling them PROSTATE. great Ian
| tern of cloud hung over this chasm between
the two walls. The door of that lantern was
| opened toward the Israelites ahead, giving
| them light and the back OF the lantern was
toward the Egyptians, and it growied and
| runbled and Jared with thunder, not thun'
| der like that which cheers the earth after a
| drought, promising the refreshing shower.
| but charged and surcharged with threats OF
| doom.
The Egyptian captains lost their presence
of mind and the horses reared and snorted
! and would not answer to their bits, ana the
1 chariot wheels got intetlocked and torn or,
| and the characters were hurled headiong,
| and the Red Sea fell on all the host. The
| confusing and confounding thunder was IN
| answer to the prayer of the Israelites. With
! their backs cut by the lash, and their feet
| bleeding, and their bodies decrepit with the
! suffering OF whole generations, they had
asked Almighty God to ensepulcher their
| Egyptian pursuers in one great sarcophagus.
| and the splash and the roar OF the Red sea
as it dropped to its natural bed were only
the shutting Of the sarcophagus on dead
host. That is the meaning OF the text when
God SAYS, II answered thee in the secret
place of thunder"
Ncw thunder, all up and down the Bible,
is the symbol of power The Egyptian
plague OF hail was accompanied with this
full diapsson of the heavens. While sam
uel and his men were making burnt OTTER
ing of lamb, and the Philie+'res were about
to attack them, it was by s;r.orlzna, thun-
der they were discounted. Job, who was
| combination of the Dantesque and the Mil
tonic. was solomnized on this reverberation
of the heavens, and cried, 1.-THE thunder OF
His power, who can understand" and he
challenges the universe by saying, "Canst
| thou thunder with voice like Himf" ana ne
throws Rosa Bonheur's Horse FAIR into
the shade by the Bible photograph OF war
horse, when he describes his neck as ''clothed
with thunder" Because OF the power OF
James and John, they were called 1.-THE sons
of thunderp The law given Cd the basaltlc
crags of Mount Sinai was emphasized with
this cloudy ebullition. The skies all around
about st. John at Patmos were full or the
thunder of war, and the thunder of Christly
triumph, and the thunder OF resurrection,
end the thunder OF eternity.
But when my text says, II answered thee
in the secret place of thunder it suggest
there is some mystery about the thunder.
To the ancients the cause of this lombard
ing the earth with loud sound must have
been more of a mystery than it Is to us. The,
lightnings, which were to them wild mon
sters ranging through the skies, in our time
have been domesticated. We harness eiec-
tricity to vehicles and we cage it in lamps,
and every schoolboy knows something about
the fact that it is the passage of electricity
from cloud to cloud that makes the heavenly
racket which we call thunder. But, after
all that chemistry has taught the world,
there are mysteries about the skyey reson-
ance and my text, true In the time OF tne
Psalmist is true now and always Will be
true, that there is some secret ABOUT the
place of thunder.
To one thing known about the thunder
there are hundred things not known.
After all the scientific batteries have been
doing their work for a thousand years to
come and learned men have discoursed to
the utmost about atmospheric electricity and
magnetic electricity and galvanic electricity
and thermotic electricity and FRACTIONAL
electricity and positive electricity and mega
tive electricity my text will be as suggestive
as it is to-day, when it speaks of the secret
place of thunder.
Now right along by natural law there
IS always a spiritual law, as there is a
secret place of moral thunder, In other
words. the religious power that you see
abroad in the church in the world has hid
ing place, and in many cases it is never dis
covered at ALL | will use a similitude. |
can give only dim outline of particular
case, for many of the remarkable circum-
stances l have forgotten. Many years ago
there was a large church. 1t was character
lied by strange and unaccountable CONVEX
sions. There were no great revivals, but
individual cases Of spiritual arrest and trans
formation.
A young man sat in one of the front pews.
He was graduate of Yale, brilliant as the
north star and VIGOROUSLY dissolute Every
body knew him and liked him for his geni-
atty, but deplored his moral errantry. 10
please his parents he was every Sabbath
morning in church. One day there was a
ringing of the door-bell of the pastor of that
church, and that young man, whelmed with
repentance, implored prayer and advice, and
passed into complete reformation of heart
and life Ali the neighborhood was aston
ished crd asked, "Why was this?" His
father and mother had said nothing to him
about lis sopPs welfare.
On a.otker asia of the same church sat
an cid g1iser. He paid his pew rent, but
was hard ca the poor, and had no interest in
any philanthropy. Piles of money! And
people said, "What a struggle he will have
when he quits this ifeto part with his bonds
and mortgages" One day he wrote to his
minister: PLEASE to call Immediately.
have matter of great Importance about
which want to see you" When the pastor
came in the man could not speak for emo
ton, but after awhile he gathered self con-
troll enough to say: II have lived for this
world too long. l want to know il you
think can be saved, and, if so, l wish you
would tell me how Upon his soul the
light soon dawned, and the old miser, not
only revolutionized in heart but in life be-
gan to scatter benefactions and toward all
the great charities of the day he became a
cheerful and bountful almoner. What was
the cause of this change? everybody asked,
and no one was capable OF giving an intelli.
| gent answer.
In another part of the church sat, Sabbath
by Sabbath, a beautiful and talented woman
who was great society leader. She wen
| to church because that was a respecta blt
thing m do and in tha uaiu hhorhond wharf