The Pickens sentinel. [volume] (Pickens, S.C.) 1871-1903, 1892-01-21


But while looking at this supdial of
AnaH ana see the shadow of il move,
L hoClce that 1T went back toward the
sunrise instead of forward toward the
sunset-toWard the morning instead Of
toward the night. That thing the
worlds willing now to do, and in many
cases has done. There have a great
many things been written and spoken
about the sunset of life. l have said
some of them myself. But my text
suggests a better idea. The Lord who
turned back that day from going toward
sundoWn and started it toward sunrise
is willing to do the same think for all
of u.s.. The theologians who stick to
old religious technicalities until they
become soporilics would not call it any.
thing bat conversion. l call it change
from going toward sundown to going
toward sunrise. That man who never
tries to unbuckle the clasp of evil habit
and who keeps all the sins Of the past
and the present freighting him and who
Ignores the one redemption made by
the only one who could redeem, if that
man VIII examine the sundial lie will
lind that the sha low is going forward
and he is on this way to sundown. His
day i3 on the road to might. All the
watches that tick, all the clocks that
strike, all the sand glasses that empty
themselves, all the shadows that move
on all the sundials indicate the approach
OF darkness. But now, in answer to
prayer, as In my text the change was in
answer to prayer, the pardoning Lord
reverses things and the man starts to-
ward sunrise instead of sunset. lie
turns The other way. The captain of
salvation gives him the military com
mand, "Attention! Right abou. facet"
lie was marching toward indifference.
marching toward hardness of heart,
marching toward prayerlessness, march,
ing toWad sin, marching toward gloom.
marching toward death. Now he turns
anu marches toward peace, marches to-
Ward light and marches toward com
1ort and marches toward high hopc and
marches toward a triumph sturendous
ana everlasting, ,{toWard hosanuas that
ever hoist and hallelujahs that ever roll
Now ii that is not ihe turning of the
shadow on the dial of AhaZ from going
toward sundown to going toward sun
rise, what is it?
-, have seen day break over Mount
Blanc and the Matterhorn, over the
heights OF Lebanon, oyer Mount Wash
lngton, over Sierra Nevadas, ana mid
Atlantic, the morning after departed
storm when the pillows were LIQUID
Alps and liquid Sierra Nevadas, but
the sunrise of the soul is more eifu!gent
and more transE' 'iting. 1t bathes all
Ine heights OF 50 soul, and illunincs
an the depths II The soul, aud whelms
al the faculties, all the aspirations, all
the ambitions, all the hopes with a
light that sickness cannot eclipse or
death extlnguish, or eternity do any
tnlng. hut augment and magnify. |
preach the sunrise. AS look at that
reCrograde movement of the shadow on
AhaZs dial, l remember that it was a
sign that 11eZekiah was going to get
we'll and he got well. So have to tell
all you who are by he grace of God hay
ing your day turned from decline to.
| ward night to assent toward morning
Inat you are going to get well, we'll of
all or your sins, we'll of all your sorrows,
we'll OF all your earthly dislresses..
But, says, some one, all that you say
may be true but that does not hinder
| the horrors Of dissolution. WHY, Won
| who are the Lords are not going to
Ole. All that the grave gets of YOU as
pared with your chief, your i'm
mortal nature, Is as the clippings Of
your hnger nails as compared with your
whole body. AS you run the scissors
along the edge of your thumb nail and
cut OIL that which is of no use but
raLher hlnderance, you do not mourn
over the departure of that fragment
which lilies away. Death will be only
the scissorsing off of that which could
De or no use, and the soul has no funer-
al over that which would be an aw full
nuisance II we could not get rid of it..
Inns DodJ as 1T now is, what a failure 1t
Woulo make OF heaven if our departing
soul had to be burdened with II in the
| next world. While Others there 90 ten
| thousand miles minute we would take
about an hour to walk four miles, and
whlle our neighbor immortals could sec
nundred miles we could see only ten
miles, and the ileetest and the health
leSC or our bodies if seen there would
make 1t necessary to open in heaven an
asylum for cripples. No, no; one of
the pest possible things that will hap
pen TO us will be the sloughing Off of
This body when we have no more use
1or 1t IN its present state. When it
Snail come up in it's resurrectcd form
we Will be very glad to get it back
again, but not as it is now with its linn
ltatlons and bedwarfments innumer-
able. Sunrise!
There Shall bathe NV weary souI
In seas of heavenly rest,
And not wave Of trouble roll
Across my peaceful breast.
Sunrise! But not like one OF those
mornings after you had gone to bed late
or did not sleep well, and you get up
chilled and yawning and the norning
bath is q repulsion and you feel like
saying to the morning sun shining into
your window, 81 do not see what you
find to smile about; your brightness is
to me mockery." But the thrush of
the next world will be a morning after
a sound sleep, a sleep that nothing can
disturb, and you will rise, the sunshine
In your faces; and in your first morn
ing In heaven you will wade into the
sea of glass mingled with fire, the foam
on fire with a splendOr you never saw
on earth, and the rolling waves are
doxologies, and the rocks of that shore
are golden and the pebbles OF that beach
are pearl, and the skies that arch the
scene are a cOmmingllng Of all the col
Ors that st. John saw on the wall of
heaven-the crimson, and the blue, and
the saffron, and the orange, and the
purple, and the gold, and the green
wrought on those skies in shape of gar
lands, of banners, Of ladders, of chariots,
~ nEN WRN1 xNF l. /