The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1892-03-11

If 1 gave you an opportunity in the
midst of this assemblage, you would
speak out and say in regard to the dis
coveries you have made of the mercy
and the grace and the goodness of God:
''The half-the half was not told meI'
When we hear great deal about the
good time that is coming to this world,
when it is to be girded with salvation.
Holiness on the bells of horses. The
lions name patted by the hand of a
babe. Ships of Tarshish bringing car
goes for Jesus, and the hard, dry, bar
rem winter -bleached, storm-scarred,
thunder-split rock breaking into floods
of bright water. Deserts into which
dromedaries thrust their nostrils be-
cause they were afraid of the SIMEON
deserts blooming into carnation and
silver tipped lilies. 1t is the old story.
Every ybody tells it Isaiah told it, John
told it, Paul told it, Ezekiel told it,
Luther told it Calvin told it. John Mil
ton told it-every body tells it; and yet
and yet when the midnight shall fly the
hills, and Christ shall marshal his great
army, and China, dashing her idols into
the dust shall hear the voice of God and
wheel into line, and India, destroying
her juggernaut and snatching up her
little children from the Ganges, shall
hear the voice of God and wheel into
line, and vine covered Italy and all the
nations of the earth shall hear the
voice of God and fall into line, then the
church, which has been toiling and
struggling through the centuries, robed
and garlanded like bride adorned for
her husband, shall put aside her veil
and look up into the face of her Lord
and King and say: THE half-the
half was not told me-"
Well, there is coming a greater sur
prise to every Christian-a greater sur
prise than anything 1 have depicted.
Heaven is an old story. Everybody
talks about it. There is hardly a
hymn in the hymn book that does not
refer to it. Children read about it in
their Sunday school books. Aged men
put on their spectacles to study it We
say it is harbor from the storm. We
call it our home. We say it is the
house of many mansions
We weave together all sweet, beauti-
full, delicate, exhilarant words; we
weave them into letters, and then we
spell it ont in rose and lily and anna
ranth. And yet that place is going to
be a surprise to the most intelligent
Christian. Like the queen of She
the report has come to US from the far
country. and many of us have started.
1t is a desert march, but we urge on
the camels. What though our feet be
blistered by the way? We are hasten
ing to the palace. We take all our
loves and hopes and Christian ambi-
tions, as fraRincense and mYrrh and
cassia to the Great King. We must not
rest. We must not halt The night is
coming on aud it is not safe out here in
the desert Urge on the camels. see
the domes against the sky, and the
house of Lebanon, and the temples and
the gardens. See the fountains dance
in the sun, and the gates flash as they
open to let in the poor pilgrims.
Send the word up to the palace that
we are coming and that we are weary
of the march of the desert The king
will come out and say: WELCOME to
the palace; bathe in these waters; re-
cline on these banks. Take this cinna-
mon, and frankincense, and myrrh, and
put it upon a censor and swing it be-
fore the altar" And yet, my friends,
when Heaven bursts upon US it will be
a greater surprise than that-Jesus on
| the throne, and we made like Him! All
our Christian friends surrounding US in
| glory! All our sorrows and tears and
sins gone by forever! The thousands
of thousands, the one hundred and for
ty-and-four thousands, the great multi
tudes that no man can number, will
! cry, world without end: "The half-the
half was not told us,''