Grand Rapids herald. [volume] (Grand Rapids, Mich.) 1892-1959, 1892-06-06


how desperate and nasty yea once were.
but do not drive q scayengers cart into
ssseablases III people. lac naosr Of whom
have always been decent and respect
able. Bar have been sometimes IL
great evangelisrie meetings where PEG
pie went into particulars about the sllAs
that they once committed 50 much SO
that felt ike putting my hand On my
poeketbook or calling for the police lest
these reformed men might fall from
grace and 20 az their old business or
theft OF drunkenness or cutthroatery.
II your sins have been forgiven and your
life purified, forget the waywardness oi
the past and allow others 20 forget 1t.
But what | most want IN the hight OF
this text 70 impress upon my hearers
and readers Is that We have a SIN forget
ting God. Suppose that on the last day
called the last day because the sun
will never again rise upon our earth,
the earth itself being flung into fiery de-
molition-supposing that on that last
day . group Of internal spirits should
somehow get near enough the gate or
heaven and challenge our entrance, and
say: How canst thou. the just Lord.
let those souls into the realm of supernal
gladness; Why, they said a great many
things they never ought 10 have said,
and they did a great many things they
ought never 10 have done. Sinners arc
they; sinners all"
And suppose God should deign to an
swer. he might say: Eyes, but did not
my only Son die for their ransom? Did
he not pay the price? Not one drop Of
blood was retained In his arteries, not
ono nero Of his that was not wrung in
the torture He took In his own body
and soul all the suffering that those sim
ners deserve. They pleaded that sac
rifice. They took the full pardon that i
promised to all who, through my Son.
earnestly applied for it, and it passed
out Of my mind that they were offerd-
ers. forgot all about it. Yes, / forgot
all about it. Their sins and their in
EQUITIES do remember no MORE" A
sin-forgetting God! That Is clear be-
yond and far above sin pardoning God.
How often we hear it said, Il can for
give. but l cannot forget" That is
equal to saying, II verbally admit it is
all right, but / will keep the old grudge
good" Human forgiveness is often a
fiimsy affair. 1t does not go deep down.
1t does not reach far up. 1t does not
fix things up. The contestants may
shake hands, or passing each other
on the highway they may speak the
Good morning" or the Good night"
but the old cordially never returns.
The relations always remain strained.
There is something in the demeanor
ever after that seems to say, Il would
not do you harm; indeed, wish you
we'll. but that unfortunate affair can
never pass out Of my mind" There may
no hard words pass between them, but
until death breaks in the same GOODNESS
remains. But God lets our pardoned
offenses go into oblivion. He never
throws them up to Us again. He feels
a. kindly toward us as though we had
been spotless and positively angelic all
along.
AN ANEcDorE.
Many years ago q family, consisting
of tho husband and wife and little girl
of two years, lived far out in cabin on
q western prairie. The husband took q
few cattle to market. Before he started
his little child asked him to buy for her
a doll and he promised. He could after
the sale Of the cattle purchase house
hold necessities, and certainly would not
forget the doll he had promised. In the
village to which he went he sold the
cattle and obtained the groceries for his
household and the doll for his little
darling. He started home along the dis
NAL road at nightfall.
As he went along on horseback q
thunderstorm broke, and in the most
lonely part of the road, and in the
heaviest part of the storm, he heard q
child cry. Robbers had been known to
do some bad work along that road, and
il was known that this herdsman had
money with him, the price Of the cattle
sold. The herdsman first thought it was
q stratagem to have him halt and be de-
| spoiled of his treasures, but the child's
cry became more keen and rending, and
20 he dism0unted and felt around in the
darkness and all in vain, until he
thought Of . hollow that he remember
ed near the road where tho child might
be, and for that he started, and sure
enough found little one tagged out
and drenched of the storm and almost
dead.
He wrapped it up as well as he could
and mounted his horse and resumed his
journey horne. Coming in sight Of his
cabin he saw it all lighted up and sup
posed his wife had kindled ali these
lights so as TO guide her husband through
the darkness. But. no. The house was
full Of excitement and the neighbors
were gathered and stood around the
wife Of the house. who was insensible as
from some great calamity. On inquiry
the returned husband found that the lit
tie child of that cabin was gone. She
had wandered ont 10 meet her father
and get tho present he had promised
and the child was lost. Then the father
uurolied from the blanket the child he
had found in the fields, and 10, il was
bis own child and tho lost one Of the
prairie home. and the cabin quaksd with
| the shout over the lost one found.
now suggestive Oh Lao TACT tnat ono
we were lost in the open fields or anon,
the mourtsin crass, Gods wanderin,
children, and be found US dying in tn
tempest and wrapped us in the nantl
Of his love and fetched us home. glad
oess and congrstulstiou bidding rs vel
come. The fact is that the world doe
not know God. or they would all nocl
10 him. Though their own blindnes
or the fault of aous ro,1sh prearhip,