The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-02-01
A HALF HOURIN HEAVEN.
rALMAGB CALLS s 1T THE BUSIEST
PLACE IN TaB UNIVERSE.

mage nhs OF lato Deen preaching on LeAtS Ok
scripture that seem to have been neglected,
and here is sermon on a beautiful tex5
which probably was never before selected
for discourse: Revelation viii. Il: There
was silence Ia heaven about the space OF
half an hourn
The busiest place in the universe is
| heaven. IL is the center from which oil
! good influences start, II is the goal at which
| good results arrive. The Bible represents
! iu as active with wheels and wings and
| orchestras and professions mounted or
! charioted. But my text describes q space
when the wheels ceased to roll and the
trumpets to sound and the voices to chant.
| The riders on the white horses rained in
their chargers. The doxologies were hushed
and the procession halted. The hand OF
arrest was put upon all the splendors.
"Stop, hea ven ~ cried an omnipotent voice.
and it stopped. For thirty minutes every
! thing celestial stood still. There was silence
sn aven for the space of half an hour"
| From all we can learn it is the only time
heaven ever stopped. 1t does not stop as
other cities for the night, for there is no
| night there. IL does not stop for plague.
! for the Inhabitants never says: II am sick"
IL does not stop for bankruptcies, for its Ing
| habitants never fail. 1t does not stop for
impossible streets, for there are no fallen
SHOWS nor sweeping freshets. What, then.
| stopped it for thirty minutess Grotius and
| Prof. Stuart think it was at the time Of the
destruction Of Jerusalem. Mr. Lord thinks
it was in the year 31l, between the
close of the Diocletian persecution and the
! beginning of the wars by which Constan-
tine gained the throne. But that was all q
| guess, though learned and brilliant guess
do not know when it was and do not
care when it was but of the fact that such
an interregnum of sound took place, am
certain. There was silence in heaven for
the space of half an hour"
And, first of all. we may learn that God
| and oil heaven then honOred silence. The
longest and widest dominion that ever ex4
isted is that over which stiffness was queen.
For an eternity there had not been a sound.
| World making was a later day occupation.
For unimaginable ages it was mute ufi-
verse. God was the only being aud as
there was no Que to speak to there was no
utterance. But that silence has been all
broken up into worlds, and it has become q
noisy universe. Worlds in upheaval, worlds
in conRelation, worlds in conilagration,
worlds in revolution. II geologists are right
and believe they are) there has not been
q moment of silence since this world began
It's travels and the orashings and the split
tings and the uproar and the hubbub are
Swgro Sveq in Tho progress. snes,o.,. But o, when
cried. Hush !" and for half an hour heaven
was still, silence was honored. The full
power OF silence many Of us have yet to
learn. We are told that when Christ was
arraigned "He answered not a wordn
That silence was louder than any thunder
that ever shook the world Ofttimes when
we are assailed and misrepresented, the
mightiest thing to say is to say nothing,
and the mightest thing 10 do is to do moth.
ing. Those people who are always rushing
into print to get themselves set right ac-
complish nothing but their own chagrin
Sience Do right and leave the results
with God. Among the grandest lessons the
world has ever learned are the lessons
Of patience taught by those who en-
dured uncomplainingly personal os
domestic or social political injustice.
Stronger than any bitter OF sarcastic or
revengeful answer was the patient silence.
The famous Dr. Morrison of Chelsea accom-
plished as much in his silent patience as hY
his pen and tongue. He had asthma that
for twenty-five years brought him out Of
his couch at two O'Clock each morning. His
four sons and daughters dead. The remain.
ing child by sunstroke made insane. The
afflicted man said: "At this moment there
is not an inch OF my body that is not filed
with agony" Yet he was cheerful, tri.
umphant silent. Those who were in his
presence said they felt as though they wera
In the gates OF heaven. o, the poweI
OF patient silencel Eschylus. the immortal
poet, was condemned Co death for writing
something that offended the people, All the
pleas in his behalf were OF no avail until
his brother uncovered the arm of the prls-
oner and showed that his hand had been
shot off at Salamis. That silent plea liber-
ated him. The loudest thing on earth ia
silence, IL IL be Of the right kind and at the
right time. There was quaint old hymn
spelled in the old style, and once sung in
the churches:
The race is not forever got
BY him who fastest runs,
Nor the Batte by those peopell
That shoot with the longest guns,
My friends, the tossing sea OF Galilee
seemed most to offend Christ by the amount
OF noise 1t made, for he said to It, "Be
still" Heaven has been crowning kings
and queens unto God for many centuries,
yet heaven never stopped moment for
any such occurrence, but il stopped thirty
minutes for the coronation OF Silence.
"There was silence in heaven for the spaoe
Of half an hourn
Learn also from my text that heaven
must be an eventful and active place, from
the fact that 1t could afford only thirty
minutes Of recess. There have been events
on earth and In heaven that seemed to de-
mand a whole day or whole week or whole
year for celestial consideration. II GrotiuS
was right and this silence occurred at the
time OF the destruction OF Jerusalem, that
scene was 50 awfnl and SO prolonged that
the inhabitants of heaven could not have
done justice to il In many weeks After
fearful besiegement OF the two fortesses OF
Jerusalem-Antonio and Hippicus-
had been going on for long
while, Roman soldier mounted on
the shoulder of another SOL
dier hurled into the window of the temple a
frebrand, and the temple was all ahame,
and after covering many sacrifices to the
holiness Of God, the building itself became
asacritice to the rage Of man. The hunger
OF the people in that city during the be-
siegement was so great that as some outlaws
were passing a doorway and inhaled the
odors OF food, they burst open the door,
threatening the mother OF the household
with death unless she gave them some food,
and she TOOK them aside and showed them
that it was her own child she was cook
ing for the ghasLly repast. Six hundred
priests were destroyed on Mount Zion be-
cause the temple being gone there was
nothing for them to do Six thousand peo-
pie in one closter were consumed. There
were one million one hundred thousand
dead, according to Josephus. Grotius
thinks that this was the cause of silence in
heaven for half an hour. III Mr.. Lord was
right and this silence was during the Dio-
cletian prosecutions, by which eight hun
dred and forty-four thousand Christians
suffered death from sword and fire aud
banishment and exposure, why did not
heaven listen throughout at least one OF
those awful yearsi Mol Thirty minutasi
The fact Is that the CELESTIAL rrocr,a r,,r,s, ;s