The Banner-Democrat. [volume] (Lake Providence, East Carroll Parish, La.) 1892-current, 1893-10-28
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
Ths Sunday Christian and the
Weekday Sinner.
More Religion Needed In Our Every Day
tife-Refigion In Our Conversation
and IN Our Daily En-
ployment.

Rev. T. Dewitt Talmage took for hi
subject on recent Sunday ''Weel
Day Religion" taking for his text:
In all thy ways acknowledge Him.-Proverb
| iii. g.
There has been a tendency in al
lands and ages to set apart certain
days, places and occasions for especia
| religious service, and to think tina
they formed the realm in which re
ligion was chiefly to act. Now, Will,
holy days and holy places have thei
use. they can never be substitute fol
| continuous exercise of faith and prayer
| In other words, a man can not be 81
| good Christian on Sabbath that hi
| can afford to be a wording all the
week. If steamer start for South
ampton, and sail one day in that di
| rection, and the other six days sail Ii
other directions, how long before the
steamer will get to Southampton:
Just as soon as man will get t.
Heaven who sails on the Sabbath day
toward that which is good. and the
other six days of the week sails toward
the world, the flesh and the devil.
You can not eat SO much at the Sab.
bath banquet that you can afford re-
ligious abstinence the rest of the week.
Genuine religion is not spasmodic,
does not go by fits and starts, is not an
attack of chills and fever-now cold
until your teeth chatter, now hot until
your bones ache. Genuine religion
marches on steadily, up steep hills, and
along dan gerous declivities, its eye
ever on the everlasting hills crowned
with the castles of the blessed.
propose, so far as God may help me,
to show you how we may bring our re-
ligion into life, and practice it in com.
mon things-yesterday, to-day, to-mor-
row.
And in the first place I remark: We
ought to bring religion into our ordi-
nary conversation. A dam breaks and
two or three villages are submerged; a
South American earthquake swallows
a city, and people begin to talk about
the uncertainty of human life, and in
that conversation think they are en-
gaging in religious service, when there
may be no religion at all. / have mo-
ticed that in proportion as Christian
experience is shallow men talk about
funerals, and death-beds, and hearscs,
and tombstones, and epitaphs. If
man have the religion of the Gospel in
its full power in his soul he will talk
chiefly about this world and the eter-
nal world, and very little comparative
ly about the magnificent pass between
this and that. Yet how seldom It is that
the religion of Christ is welcome
theme! If a man full of the Gospel of
Christ gets into religious circle, and
begins to talk about sacred things, all
the conversation is hushed. and things
become exceedingly awkward. As on
a summer day, the forests full of
song, and chirp, and carol, mighty
chorus of bird harmonies, every
branch an orchestra-if a hawk APP
pears in the sky, all the voices are
hushed, SO have sometimes seen
social circle that professed to be Chris
tian, silence by the appearance of the
great theme of God and religion. Now,
my friends, If we have the religion of
Christ in our soul, we will talk about it
n an exhilarant mood. 1t is more re-
'reshing than the waters, it gives a
nan joy here, and prepares him for
happiness before the throne
If God. And yet, if the theme of re-
igion be introduced into circle,
everything is silenced-silenced unless,
an aged Christian man in the |
corner of the room, feeling that some |
hing ought to be said, puts one foot |
,ver the other and signs heavily and
avs: ''Oh. yes; that's so!' My |
riends! the religion of Jesus Christ is |
lot something to be groaned about
'ut something to talk about and sing |
bout, your face irradiated. The |
rouble is that men processing the
aith of the Gospel are often so incon-
istent that they are afraid their con-
'ersation will not harmonic with
heir life. We can not talk the Gospel
Mess we live the Gospel. You will
ften find man whose entire life is
NIL of Inconsistencies filing his con-
ersation with such expressions as, 1--WE
re miserable Sinners" "the Lord help
S. ''the Lord bless you," interlarding
heir conversation with such phrases.
'hich are mere canting, and canting
J the worst kind of hypocrisy. If
ian have the grace of God in his heart
ominant, he can talk religion and it
ill seem natural, and men, instead of
eing repulsed by it, will be attracted
Y it. Do you not know that when two
hristian people talk as they ought
bout the things of Christ and Heaven,
cd gives special attention, and He
rites it all down. Malachi ill.,, 10:
Then they that feared the Lord talked
lie to the other. and the Lord heark-
led and heard, and book of remem-
'ance was written"
Ny brother, you can not be called to
} anything SO insignificant but God
i'll help you in it. If you are fish, i
man, Christ will stand by you as He
d by Simon when he dragged Gennes- !
ct. Are You a drawer of water? I
e will be with you at the well curb,
hen talking with the Samaritan !
oman. Are you a custom house Of S
'er? Christ viii call you as He did
atthew at the receipt of custom. The |
an who has only days wages in his I
'cket as certainly needs religion as i
) who rattles the keys of a bank and {
'uld abscond with hundred thou a
nd hard dollars. And yet there are a
en- who profess the religion of Jesus Q
irist who do not bring the religion of
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