Fisherman & farmer. [volume] (Edenton, N.C.) 1887-19??, 1892-04-08
REV. DIR. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DIVINE'S sun.
DAY SERMON.
Subject: "Straining at Gnats and
Swallowing Camels."


qnat, and S,0altoUo camel. Matthew
xiii. "a
A proverb is compact wisdom, knowledge
in chunks, library in a sentence, the cleo.
tricity of many clouds discharged in one bolt,
river put through millrace. When Christ
quotes the proverb of the text He means to
set forth the ludicrous behavior of those
who make a great buster about small sins
and haven appropriations of great ones
In my text small insect and a large
quadruped are brought into comparison-a
gnat and a camel. You have in museum or
on the desert seen the latter, a great awk-
ward, sprawling creature, with back two
stories high and stomach having collection
of reservoirs for desert travel an animal
forbidden to the Jews as food, and in many
literatures entitled the ship of the desert"
The gnat spoken of in the text is in the
grub form. 1t is born in pool or pond, after
a few weeks becomes chrysalis, and then
after few days becomes the gnat as we
recognize it. But the insect spoken ofin the
text is in its very smallest shape and yet it
inhablts the water-fOr my text is miSprint
and ought to read 'strain out gnat."
My text shows you the prince Of inconsis-
tencies. A man after long observation has
formed the suspicion that in cup of water
he is about to drink there is a grub the
grandparent of gnat. He goes and gets
sieve or a strainer. He takes the water and
pours it through the sieve in the broad light.
he says, Il WOuI1 rdCn6r 90 anything al
most than drink this water until this larva
be extirpated." This water is brought I'M
der inqu ;sitlon. The experiment is success
full. Inc water rushes through the sieve and
leaves against the side of the sieve the grub
or gnat.
Then the man carefully removes the insect
and drinks the water in placidity. But GO
ing out one day and hungry he devOurs a
ship of the desert" the camel, which the
Jews were forbidden to eat. The gastrono-
mer has no cOmpunctlOns of conscience. He
suffers from no Indigestion. He puts tt
lower jaw under the camel's forefoot and L
upper jaw over the hump Of the camePs
back, and gives one swallow and the drome-
Diary disappears forever. He strained out a
gnat he swallowed a camel.
While Christ's audience were yet smiling
at the Oppositeness and wit of His illustration
for smile they did in church. unless they
were too stupid to understand the hyperbole
Christ practically said to them. That is
you" Punctilious about small things; reck-
less about affairs of great magnitude. No
subject over withered under a surgeons
knife more bitterly than did the Pharisees
under Christs scalpel of truth.
As an anatOnist will take human body
to pieces and put them under microscope
for examination, SO Christ finds His way 10
the heart OF the dead Pharlsee and cuts it
out and puts it under the glass of inspec.
ton for all generations to examine. Those
Pharisees thought that Christ would fiat
ter them and compliment them. and how
they must have writhed under the red hot
words as He said, Eye fools, ye whited
sepulchers, We blind guides which strain
out gnat and swallow a camel"
There are in our day great many gnats
strained out and a great many camels
swallowed, and it is the object of this SER
mon to sketch a few persons who are ex-
tensively engaged in that business.
First remark, that all those ministers
of the Gospel are photographed in the text
who are very scrupulOus about the conven-
tionalities OF religion, but put no particular
stress upon matters of vast Importance.
Church services ought to be grave and
solemn. There is no room for frivolity in
religious convocation. But there are illus
trations. and there are hyperboles like that
of Christ in the text that will irradiate with
smiles any intelligent auditory. There are
men like those blind guides Of the text who
advocate on y those things in religious SER
vice which draw the corners OF the mouth
down, and denounce all those things which
have tendency to draw the corners of the
mouth up, and these men will go to installa-
lions and to presbyteries and to conferences
and to associations, their pockets full of fine
sleeves to strain out the gnats while in their
own churches at home every Sunday there
are fifty people sound asleep. They make
their churches great dormitory, and their
sOmnlferOus sermons are a cradle and the
drawled out hymns lullaby. while some
Wakeful soul in pew with her fan keeps the
flies off unconscious persons approximate
Now, say it is worse to sleep in church than
to smile in church, for the latter implies at
least attention. while the former implies the
Indifference of the hearers and the stupidity
Of the speaker.
In old age, from physical infirmty, or
rom long watches with the sick, drowsiness
will sometimes Overpower one, but when a
minister of the Gospel looks off upon an
audience and finds healthy and intelligent
people struggling with drowsiness it is time
for him to give out the doxology or pro-
nouEce the benediction. The great fault of
church services to-day is not too much viva.
city, but too much somnolence. The one is
an Irritating gnat that may be easily
strained out; the other is a great, sprawIing
and sleepy-eyed camel of the dry desert. In
all our Sabbath schools in all our Bible
classes, in all our puipits we need to brighten
up our religious message with such Christ
like vivacity as we find in the text
take down from my library the bioe-
raphies of ministers and writers of the past
ages, inspired and uninspired, who have done
the most to bring souls to Jesus Christ, and
L IND that without a single exception they
consecrated their wit and their humor to
Christ. Eli ah used it when he advised the
Baalites, as they could not make their God
respond, telling them to call louder as their
god might be sound asleep or gone a-hunt
ing. Job used it when he said to MS self
concelted comforters, Wisdom will die
with you" Christ not only used it in the
text, but when He ironically complimented
the putrefed Pharisees, saying, THE whole
need not physician" and when by one
word He described the cunning of Herod,
saying, 'Go We, and tell that fox"
Matthew Renrv's Commentaries from the
first page to the last coruscated with humor
as summer clouds with heat lightning. John
Bunyan's writings are as full of humor as
they are of saving truth, and there is not an
aged man here who has ever read "Pilgrim's