The Globe-republican., 1892-08-19

I Johnsthan Edwards preached Christ II
the severest argument ever penned. aud
John Bunyan preached Christ In the sub
limest allezory ever composed. Edward
Payson. sick and exhausted, leaned up
against the side of the pulpit and wep,
out his discourse, while George White
| field, with the manner and the voice and
the start Of an actor, overwhelmed his
auditory. 1t would have been q different
thing If Jonathan Edwards had tried to
| write and dream about the pilgrims
progress to the celestial city or John
Bunyan had attempted an essay on the
human will.
Brighter than the light. fresher than
the fountains. deeper than the seas are
all these Gospel themes Song has no
melody, flowers have no sweetness. SUM-
set sky has no color, compared with these
glorious themes. These harvests OF
grace spring up quicker than We can
sickle them. Kindling pulpits with their
FIRE, producing revolutions with their
power. lighting up dying beds with their
glory, they are the sweetest thoughts tor
the poet and they are the most thrilling
illustration for the orator, and they offer
the most intense scene for the artist. and
they are to the ambassador OF the sky all
enthusiasm. Complete pardon for direst
guilt. Sweetest comfort for ghastiiest
agony. Brightest hope for grimmest
death. Grandest resurrection for dark
est sepulcher.
Oh, what Gospel to preach! Christ
over all in it. His birth, His suffering,
His miracles, His parallels. His sweat,
His tears, His blood. His atonement. His
intercession-what glorious themes! Do
we exercise faith? Christ is its object
Do we have love? It fastens on Jesus.
Have We fondness for the church? II
is because Christ died for it. Have we q
hope of Heaven? 1t Is because Jesus
went aheaL, the herald and the forerun-
ner.
The royal robe of Demetrius was so
costly, so beautiful, that after he had
put it of no one dared to put it on: but
this role of Christ. richer than that, the
poorest, and the wanest, and the worst
may wear. ''Where sin abounded grace
may much more abound:
''Oh, my sins, my SINS" said Martin
Luther to Staupitz: my sins. my sins!"
The fact that the brawny German stu
dent had found Latin Bible that had
made him quake, and nothing else ever
how, through Christ, he was pardoned
and saved, he wrote to q friend, saying:
Come over and join US great and awful
sinners saved by the grace Of God. You
seem to be only slender sinner, and you
don't much extol the mercy OF God; but
we who have teen such very awful SIM
-. 4 -
We have been redeemed"
Can it be that you are so desperately
egotistica3 that you feel yourself In first
rate spiritual trim, and that from the
root of the hair to the tip Of the toe you
are scarless aud immaculate? What YOU
need is looking glass, and here it is in
the Bible. Poor and, wretched and mis-
cradle and blind and naked from the
crown of the head to the sole of the foot,
fail CT wounds and putrefying sores. No
health in US. Add then take the fact
that Christ gathered W ali the notes
against US and then paid then, and then
offered us the receipt.
And how much we need him in our
sorrows! We are independent of circum-
stances if we have His grace. Why, He
n ade Paul sing in the dungeon, and I'M
der that grace st. John from desolate
Patmos heard the blast of the apocalyptic
trumpets. After all other candles have
been snuffed out, this is the light that
gets brighter and brighter unto the per-
feet day. and after, under the hard hoofs
of calamity, all the pools of worldly en-.
jOyment have been trau,pled into deep
mire, at the foot of the eternal rock the
Christian, from cups al granite. lily
trimmed and vine covered, puts out the
thirst Of his soul.
Again. l remark that Christ is above
all in dying alterations. lhave not any
sympathy with the morbidity abroad
ABOUT our demise. The emperor of Con-
stantinOple arranged thIt on the day of
his coronation the stenemason should
come and consult him shout his tomb
stone that after awhile he would need
And there are men who are monOmani-
cal on the subject of departure from this
life by death, and the more they think
OF it the less they are prepared to 20
This is an unmanliness not worthy OF
you, not worthy of me-
Saladin, the greatest eonQueror of his
day, while dying. ordered the tunic be
had on him to be carried after his death
on spear at the head ST his army, and
then the soldier ever Gnd anon should
stop and say: Behold. all that is left
OF Saladin, the emperor and conquerort
OF all the states he conquered, of all the
wealth he accumulated, nothing did he
retain but this shrOud.' / have no SYM
pathy with such behavior. or such
absurd demonstration. or with much that
We hear uttered in regard to departure
from this life to the next. There is .
commonsensical idea on this subject that
you and need to cOnsider-that there
are only two styles Of departure.
A thousand feet underground. by light
OF torch toiling in q miners shaft a
ledge of rock may fall upon US and we
may die miners death Far out at
sea, falling from the slippery ratlines and
broken on the halyarps ~e may die
sailors death. On mission of mercy in
hospital. amid broken bones and reeking
leprosies and raging feyers we may die
death On the field of
battle. serving God and our country. the
gun carriage ray roll over US and we
may die patriots death. But after all
there are only two styles of departure
the death of the righteous aad the death