The Penn's Grove record., 1893-09-22

3lr faith" Some one suggests, 'Do you
really think that prayer amounts to any
shing?" | might as well ask you, is there a
Inc of telegraphic poles from New York to
Washington, is there a line OF Geographic
wires from Manchester to London, from
Cologne to Berlin? All the people who have
tent and received messages on those lines
Know Of their existence. So there are mill
ons of souls who have been in constant com
nuuication with the capital of the universe,
With the throne OF the Almighty, with the
Iraat God Himself, for years and years and
Gears.
There has not been n day when supplica-
ions did not flash up and blessings
lid not fash down. Will some igno-
JANUS. who has never received a telegram or
sent one, come and tell us that there is no
4 al "a thing as telegraphic communication?
VIII some one who has never offered a pray r
lint was heard and answered come and tell
Is that there is nothing in prayer 1t may
lot come as we expect ii, but as sure as an
honest prayer goes up a merciful answer VIII
ZONE down.
During the blizzard of four or five years
lgo, you know that many of the telegraph
Tires were Frustrated, and l telegraphed to
Chicago by way Of Liverpool. andthe answer
after awhile came round by another wide
'ircuit, and so the prayer we offer may come
back in a way we never imagined, and If we
ask to have our faith increased, although it
may come by a widely different process than
hat which we expected, our confidence Will
surely be augmented.
Oh, put 1t in every prayer you ever mako
ontween your next breath and your last gasp,
Lord, increase our faith"-faith in Christ
IS our personal ransom from present guilt
and eternal catastrophe faith in the omnipo-
tent Holy Ghost ; faith in the Bible, thetruest
volume ever dictated or written or PRINT
or read faith in adverse providenrns, mar
nOnized for our best welfare faith in a
Judgment day that will set all things right
. which have for ages been wrong.
Increase our faith. not by a fragile all
lition, but by an infinitude OF cooperation.
Let us do as we saw it done In the country
while we were yet in our teens, at the old
farmhouse after a long drought, and the
well had been dried, and the cattle moaned
with thirst at the bars, and the meadow
brook had ceased to run. and the grass
withered, and the corn was shriyeled up,
and one day there was a growl of thunder,
and then d congregation of clouds on the
sky. and then a startling flash, and then a
irenching rain, and father and mother put
barrels under every spout at the corners of
he house and set pals and buckets n
tubs and pans and pitchers to catch as
much as they could of the shower. For IN
many of our souls there has been a long
brought OF confidence and in many no faith
1t all. Let us set out all our affections. all
our hopes, all our contemplations, all our
prayers, 10 catch a mighty shower. Lord,
Increase our faith
! l like the way that the minister's widow
iil in Elisha's time, when, after the family
being very unfortunate, her two sons were
about to lie sold for debt, and she had moth
ing in the house but a pot of oil, and at
Elisha's direction she borrowed from her
neishbors all the vessels she could borrow,
and then began to pour out the oil into those
vessels and kept on pouring until they were
all full, and she became an oil merchant with
more assets than liabilities, and when she
p ,ried, "Bring me yet a vessel" the answer
same, ''There is not a vessel more" So let
rs take what oil OF faith We have and use it
Until the supply shall be mirad lousy multi
Piled. Bring on you empty We 'els, and by
he power OF the Lord God of elisha they
shall be filed until they can hold o more of
lubllant, all inspiring and triumphant faith.
What q frightful time we had a few days
ago down on the coast of Long Island, where
[ have been stopping. That archangel OF
tempest which, with its awful wings, swept
The Atlantic coast from Florida to Newfound-
land did not spare our region. A few miles
away, Mt Southampton, l saw the bodies OF
four men whom the storm had slain and the
sea had cast up, AS / stood there among the
dead bodies l saidto myself, and said aloud
''These men represent homes. What will
mother and father and wife and children say
when they know this?"
| Some Of the victims were unknown. onlr
the first name of two of them was iounio ot
Charley and William. Iwon Tered then aci
| wonder now II they will remain unknown
md if some kindred far away may be waiting
for their coming and never hear Of the rough
way of their going. l saw also one OF the
three who had come in alive, but more dead
than alive. The ship had become helpless
six miles out, and as one wave swept the
deck and went down on the furnaces till
they Missed and went out the cry was, "Oh,
my God, we are lost y Then the crew pu,
on life preservers, one Of the sailors saying
to the other, 1--WE will meet again on the
shore, and, If not, well, we must all go some
time"
OFT twenty-three men who put on the
life preseryers, onlyt three lived to reach the
beach. But what a scene it was as the good
and kind people of Southampton, led on by
DR.. Thomas, the great and good surgeon OF
New York, stood watching the sailors gtrug-
Cling in the breakers. "Are you still altvef
shouted DR.. Thomas to IL of them out In
the breakers, and he signaled yes and then
went into unconsciousness. Who should do
the most for the poor fellows and how to
resus sitate them were the questions that ran
up and down the beach at Southampton.
How the men and women on the sborestood
! wringing their hands, impatiently waiting
for the sufferers to come within REACH, and
lAlfA bhVJ WNA AAAtPt uR 'Ha
aud waited on with as much kindness and
! wrapped as warmly as though they had been
| the princes of the earth. Are they alive?'
care they ~breathing?" D you think they
| will live?" "What can We do for them?"
! were the rapid and intense questions asked,
| and so much money was sent for tho cloth
Ing and equipment of the uncertainties that
| Dr.. Thomas had 10 makea proclamation that
| no more money was needed. In other words.
all that day it was resuscitation.
And this is the appropriate word for Us
| this morning as we stand and look of upon
| this awful sea Of o and unbelief on which
hundreds are this moment being wrecked.
| Some Of them were launched by Christian
| parcntage on smooth seas and with promise
for prosperous voyage, but II Voltaire cyclone
struck them on one side, and q Tom Paine
| cyclone struck them on this other side, and a
| bal habit cyclone struck them on all sides,
and they have founlered far away from shore,
far away from God, andthey have gone Town
or are washed ashore with no spiritual life
left in them.
But, thank God, there are many here to-
| dav with enough faith LEFT to encourage Us
! in the effort at their resuscitatiou. Ali hands
to the beach! With II confidence in God that
takes no denial, let US lay hold Of them 7!
Fetch them out of the breakers Bring gos-
pei warmth and gospel stimulus and gospel
life to their freezing souls. RasGscitationi
Resuseitation