Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1892-04-07
AT THE TABERNACLE.
Or TALMAeE SCORES HYPocHTEs
! AND DISHONEST TRADERS.

I -~~~t 80 ~ 0C1Cs - S0EAc 9@-AAAo0 -
Church Then as Now-various Forms
Of Inconsistency.
BROOKLYN. March 27.-The tendency to
Journalism in religion and TO hypocritical
pretense in society received a severe casti-
cation from the pulpit of the Brooklyn
Tabernacle this morning. DR.. Talmage
made a vigorous onslaught upon it, basing
his remarks on the text, Matthew xiii, o.
"Ye blind guides, who strain at a gnat
and swallow camel"
A proverb is compact wisdom, knowl-
edge in chunks, a library in sentence, the
electricity of many clouds discharged in
one bolt, river put through a millrace
When Christ quotes the proverb of the
text he means to set forth the ludicrous
behavior of those who make a great blus-
ter about small sins and have no apprecia-
tion Of great ones.
In my text a small insect and large
quadruped are brought into comparison
gnat and a camel. You have in museum
or on the desert seen the latter, great
awkward, sprawling creature, with back
two stories high and stomach having a
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 few weeks becomes a
chrysalis and then after a few days be-
comes the gnat as we recognize it. But
the insect spoken of in the text is in its
very smallest shape and it yet inhabits the
water-for my text is misprint and ought
to read "strain out gnat."
sTRAINING OUT THE GNAT.
Ny text shows you the prince of incon-
sistencies. A man after long observation
has formed the suspicion that in cup of
water he is about to drink there is grub
or 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, 81 would
rather do anything almost than drink this
water until this larva be eXtirpated." !"
This water is brought under inquisition.
The experiment is successful. The water
rushes through the sieve and leaves against
the side of the sieve the grub or gnat.
Then the man carefully removes the in
sect and drinks the water in placidity. But
going out one day and hungry, he devours
a "ship of the desert" the camel, which
the Jews were forbidden to eat. The gas
tronomer has no compunctions of con-
science. He suffers from no indigestion.
He puts the lower jaw under the camel's
forefoot and his upper jaw over the hump
of the camel's back, and gives one swallow
and the dromedary disappears forever. He
strained out gnat, he swallowed a camel.
While Christ's audience were yet smil-
ing at the appositeness and wit of his illus
tration-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; reckless about affairs of
great magnitude. No subject ever with
cred under a surgeons knife more bitterly
than did the Pharisees under Christ's
.scalpel of truth.
AS an anatomist will take human body
to pieces and put them under a microscope
for examination, so Christ finds his way to
the heart of the dead Pharisee and cuts it
out and puts it under the glass of inspec-
tion for all generations to examine. Those
Pharisees thought that Christ would fat
ter them and compliment them, and how
they must have writhed under the red hot
words as he said, aye fools, ye whited
sepulChers, ye blind guides which strain
out gnat and swallow 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.
EXTREMELY FORMAL PREACHERS.
First, remark, that all those ministers
of the Gospel are photographed in the text
who are very scrupulous about the conven-
tienalties 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 bland guides of the text
who advocate only those things in religious
service which draw the corners of the
mouth down, and denounce all those things
which have a tendency to draw the
corners of the mouth up, and these men
will go to installations and to presbyteres
and to conferences and to associations,
their pockets full of fine sieves to strain
out the gnats, while in their own churches
at home every Sunday there are fifty peo-
pie sound asleep. They make their
churches great dormitory, and their
somniferous 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 approxi-
mate. 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 hear
ers and the stupidity of the speaker.
In old age, or from physical infrmity, or
from long watching with the sick, drowsi-
ness will sometimes overpower one, but
when minister of the Gospel looks off
upon an audience and finds healthy and in
telligent people struggling with drowsi-
ness it is time for him to give out the dox-
ology or pronounce the benediction. The
great fault of church services today is not
too much vivacity, but too much SOM
fiolence. The one Is an irritating gnat that
may be easily strained out; the other is a
great, sprawling and sleepy eyed camel of
the dry desert. In all our Sabbath schools,
in all our Bible classes, in all our palpits
we need to brighten up our religious mes
sage with such Christlike vivacity as we
find in the text.
NEARLY ALL GREAT PREACHERS WITTY.
take down from my library the biog-
raphies of ministers and writers Of the past
ages, inspired and uninspired, who have
done the most to bring souls to Jesus
Christ, and find that without single ex-
ception they consecrated their wit and
their humor to Christ. Elijah 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-hunting Job used it when
he said to his self conceited comforters,
"Wisdom will die with you" Christ
not only used it in the text, but when he
ironically complimented the putrefied
Pharisees, saying, "The whole need not a
-, soso o,~I x.yt,x kx, L.