Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1892-04-01
REV. DR.. YALMAGE.
The Eminent Brooklyn Divine's Sun
day Sermon.
Subject: "straining at Gnats and Swallow
ing Cancels"

TEXT: aye blind guides, ,oho strain at I
gnat. and S0Glio,o 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
q river put through a millraca. When Christ
quotes the proverb of the text He means to
set forth the ludicrous behavior of those
who make great buster about small sins
and haveno appreciations Of great ones.
In my text a small insect and large
quadruped are brought into comparison
gnat and 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 1.-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 becomes the gnat as we
recognize it But the insect spoken ofin the
text is in its very smallest shape. and yet it
inhabits 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 a cup of water
he is about to drink there is a grub or the
grandparent OF gnat He goes and gets a
sieve or a strainer. He takes the water and
pours it through the sieve in the broad light.
He says, IL would rather do anything al
most than drink this water until this larva
be extirpated." This water is brought I'M
der inquisition. The experiment is success
full. The 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 60.
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 computations Of conscience. He
suffers from no indigestion. He puts the
lower Jaw under the camel's forefoot and his
upper jaw over the hump of the camers
back, and gives one swallow and the drome-
Diary disappears forever He strained out
gnat, ne 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 tAe hyperbole
Christ practically said to them. THAT is
you.n PunctiliouS about small things; recS-
less about affairs of great magnitude. No
subject over withered under 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 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.
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 es He said, "Ye fools, ye whited
sepulchers, We blind guides which strain
out a gnat and swallow a camel"
There are in our day great many gnats
strained out and great many camels
swallowed, and it is the object OF this SER
mon TO sketch q 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 irradiats with
smiles any intelligent auditory. There are
men like those blind guides of the text who
advocate only those things in religious SER
vice 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 90 to installa-
tons and to pres5yteries 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 a great dormitory, AMI their
somniferous sermons are q cradle and the
drawled out hymns a 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 ami the stupidity
of the speaker.
In old age, or from physical infirmity, o.
from long watches with the sick, drowsiness
will sometimes overpOwer one, but when
minister Of the Gospel looks OF upon an
audience and finds healthy and intelligent
people struggling with drowsiness it is time
Tor him 10 give out the doxology or pro-
nounce the benedction. 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 ether 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 pulpits we need to brighten
up our religious message with sucl Christ
like vivacity as We find in the text.
/ take down from my library the biog-
rapnies OF ministers and writers Of the past
ages, inspired and uniuspired, who have done
the most to bring souls to Jesus Christ, and
find that without a single exception they
consecrated their wit and their humor TO
(thrfet Eli.a n fr,,l,o h., oil ho
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 his self
conceited comforterS "Wisdom will die
with you Christ not only used it in the
text but when he ironically complimentei
the putrefied PhariseeS, saying, THE whole
need not physician" and when by one
word he described the cunning of Hero1,
saying, "Go ye, and tell that fox"
Matthew Henry'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
Progress" who does notremember that while
reading it he smiled as often as he wept.
Chrysostom, George Herbert Robert South,
John Wesley, George Whitefeld, Jeremy
Taylor, Rowland Hill, Nettleton, George G.
Finney and all the men of the past who
greatly advanced the kingdom Of Col con-
secrated their wit and their humor to the
cause of Christ.
So it has been in all the ages and say TO
these young theological students, who clus-
ter in these services Sabbath by Sabbath,
sharpen your wits as keen as scimiter5 and
and then take them into the holy war. 1t is
very short bridge between a smile and
tear, suspension bridge from eye to lip,
and it is soon crossei over, and smile is
sometimes Just as sacred as tear There is
as much religion aud / think little more,
in spring morning than in stariess mid
night.
Religious work without any humor or wit
in it is a banquet with a side Of beef, and
that raw, and no condiments AMI no dessert
succeeding. People will not sit down at such
a banquet. By all means remove all frivoity
and all pathos and all hghtness and ell vu!-
garity--strain them out through the sieve Of
holy discrimination; but, on the other hand,
beware of that monster which overshadows
the Christian church to-day. conventionaly,
coming up from the Great Sahara DeSer5 OF
Ecclesiasticism, having on its back hump
of sanctimonious gloom-aud vehemently re-
fuse TO swallow that camel.
Oh, how particular a great many people
are about the infnitesimas while they ars
quite reckless about the magnitudes. What
did Christ say' Did He not excoriate the
people in His time who were so careful to