The Forrest City times., 1892-02-26
DIR. TALMAGE IN IOWA.
HE prscOURsEs ON HEAVEN
 " CONGRATULATIONS"
A Striking anI Earnest Appeal for Us to Repent and Lead Better Lives, for There Will Be Joy in
 Heaven.

"c1f'"
 OsKALoosA Ia, Feb. 2l.-Dr. Talmage preached here Sunday 10 an enormous congregation. The subject Of his sermon was '.Heavenly Congratula- tions." His text was taken from Luke b; [: Likewise joy shall be in heaven over ons sinner that repentcth, more than ninety and nine just persons who need no repentance"
 A lost sheepl Nothing can be more thor oughly lost. look through the window of shepherds house at night. The candles are lighted. The shepherd has just placed his staff against the mantel. He has taken off his coat shaken out of it the dust and hung it up. sec by the candle light that there are neighbors who have come in The shepherd, Jagged out with the long tramp, sits down on a bench, and the wife and the children and the neigh bors say to him: Come now, tell us how you found the poor thing" Well" he says, this morning I went out to the yard to look at the flock No sooner had looked over the fence than l saw something wrong. The fact was they did not count right. Ninety-fve, ninety-six. ninety seven, ninety-eight ninty-nine-oniy nine- ty-nine. M'Donald, you know we had a. hundred. And l wondered which one was gone, and I began again. and l counted ninety-five ninety-six, ninety-seven, nine- ty-eight, ninety-nine. Well I wbistled up the dogs, and started on the fields and across the bridges, and tracked the moors, and leaped the gullies, but no bleating of the poor thing did hear, said to myself: The lamb must have fallen into ditch, or pack of wolves from the noun tains must have torn it to pieces and sucked its life out But I could not give 1t up. You see it was a pet lamb It was that one with the black spot on tho right shoulder that used to come and lick my hand as 1 crossed the field, and somehow could not give it up. So went on and on and on until after awhile heard the dogs bark, and said: Whats thate Then I hastened to the top of the hill, and looked down, and there saw the poor lamb. It had fallen into the ditch and as I came where it was and bent over the ditch. and stopped down to lift the poor thing out, wish you could | have seen the loving and imploring and tender way it looked at me. l lifted l 1t out and it was all covered with | the slush and the mud It was an awful thing to do, but lifted it out, and l it was so fame and so weak it could not walk alone, so threw it over my should
 CTS, and started homeward; and the con- | dition of that lamb. you may judge of | from the coat which have just hung up. but tramped on and on until it is safe in
 the yard, poor thing Thank God, thank Godp' Then the shepherds wife spread the table and brought out the best fare | elx.es sl. lx T | up very late that night, and they talked and they laughed, and they sang and they ate and they drank. and they danced. and | told over and over and over again the | story of the lost sheep that was found.
 With such tenderness and rusticity of 1 illustration does Christ represent the souls going of and the souls coming back when he says: 'Likewiso there is | joy in heaven among the angels of God 1 over one sinner that repenteth more than over ninety and nine just persons that need no repentance. To repent is to | feel that you are bad and to be sorry about it. and to turn over a new leaf, and to pray for forgiveness and help. 1 Just as soon as a man does that, they hear right away of it in heaven. There are no gossips in glory going around to | tlere are many souls in glory who arc glad to run about and tell it when a man is | saved. The news goes very quick from | gate to gate, and from north wall to south wall, and from cast wall to west wall, aud 1 in three minutes every citizen of heaven has heard of it; for ''there is joy in heaven that repenteth." I can very easily under | cta m har ch ha iay in haa nr over a Pentecost with three thousand souls saved in one day-no mystery about that; I can understand how there should be joy in heaven over the Parish of Schotts, when four hundred souls were saved under one sermon Of Mir
 Livingston; can understand how there l should be joy in heaven over the great awakening in the time of Harland Page,
 when in one year four hundred and | seventy three thousand souls were brought to God in the United States can under. stand very easily how there should be joy in heaven over five hundred thousand l souls converted in 1857, in this country
 but mark you my text announces there Is joy in heaven among the angels Of Goo over one, just one sinner that repenteth
 Some cathedrais have one tower: som,
 cathedrals have two, three, four towers
 Did you ever hear them all ring at once am told that the bell in the cathedral ,
 St. Paul rings only on rare occasions, fol
 instance, at the death or the birth of
 king. Have you seen a cathedral witt
 four towersf and have you heard then
 all strike into one great chime of glad
 nesss Here is a man who is moral. Fl,
 is an example to great many profes
 sors of religion in some things; he neve
 did mean thing in his life; he pays al
 his debts, and is good citizen and a gooC
 neghbor, but he says he is not {
 christian. Some day tpe Holy Spri
 comes into his heart and he sees that h,
 cannot depend upon his mortality for sal
 vation He says; 70 Lord God, hav'
 been depending upon my good works,
 find am sinner, and l want thy saliva
 tion. Lord for Jesus sake, have mere,
 on me-" And God pardons him, and tn
 mediately one of the towers of hclvel
 strikes silvery chime, for there are fou
 towers to the heavenly temple. Here IS
 man who is bad he knows he is bad, an'
 every body else knows he is bad but h. is not an outcast far from being al
 outcast He moves in respectable circles
 But one day, by the power of the Hol.
 Ghost, he rouses up to see his sinfulnes
 and he says: 70 Lord. have mercy, 1 all
 wanderer.. and without Thee perish
 Have mercy" God hears him, and imme | diately two of the towers of heaven strik | A silyery chime But here is an outcast