The Penn's Grove record., 1893-08-18
RBV. DR.. TALMAGR
The Brooklyn Diyine's
Sunday Sermon.
subject;--"A Pod Challenge"

TE&T:" Who IS lee that C~Onde1nhetht MS
rh"istLhGt died, yea. rather hats risen again.
'7h1 is eUea at the right hand Of God, eho
also mdketh interCessioa for us."-Romans
viii, "a.
This is the last sermon 1 shall ever
prelch,' said Christmas Evans on the 18th
OF June. 1888. Three days afterward he eX-
,'r -. / do not know what his text was,
Sut | know that no mar could choose a bet
ter theme-though he knew it was the last
time he should ever preach-than the subject
found In this text.
Paul flung this challenge of the text to the
feet Of all ecclesiastical and civil authority.
He feared neither swords or lions. earth nor
hell. Diocletinn slew uncounted thousands
under his administration, and the world has
been full OF persecution, but all the perse-
| cutors of the world could not alright Paul.
Was it because he was physically strongP
Oh, no. suppose he was very much weak
ened by exposure and maltreatment. Was
it because he was lacking in sen~sitiveness?
No. You find the most delicate shades of
feeling playing in and out his letters and
sermons. Some of his communications
burst into tears. What was it lifted Paul
into this triumphant mood? The thought of
a Saviour dead, q Saviour risen, a Saviour
exalted, a Saviour interceding.
All the world has sang the praise OF Prin-
cess Alice. One child having died OF n con-
tagious disease, she was in the room where
another was dying, and the court physician
said to her, "You must not braat he the breath
of this child, or you yoursn., wall die" But
seeing the child mourning because of the
Heath of her brother, the mother stopped
down and in sympathy kissed the little one,
caught the disease and persisted. All the
world sang the heroism and the self-sacriace
Of Princess Alice, but I have to tell you that
when our race was dying the Lord Jesus
stopped down and gave US the kiss OF His
everlasting love and persisted that we might
live. st is Christ that died"
Can you tell me how tender hearted Paul
could find anything to rejoice at in the hor-
| rible death scene of Calvary? We weep at
J funerals we are sympathetic when we see a
| stranger die when a murderer steps upon
the scaffold we pray for his departing spirit,
and how could Paul-the great hearted Paul
find anything to be pleased with at the
funeral of q God2 Besides that Christ had
only recently died, and the sorrow was fresh
in the memory Of the world, and how in the
fresh memory of a Saviour's death could Paul
be exultant2
1t was because Paul saw in that death his
own deliverance and the deliverance of a race
from still worse disaster. He saw the gap
into which the race must plunge, and he saw
the bleeding hands of Christ close it. The
glittering steel on the top Of the execution
cr's spear in his sight klndled into a torch to
light men h~eavenward. The prosecutors saw
l oNCI luc I'VE iNO I az
Greek and Latin, but Pau saw over the cross
of Christ only one word-'expiation y He
heard in the dying groan of Christ his own
groan of eternal torture taken by another.
Paul said to himself, "Had 1t not been that
Christ volunteered in my behalf, those would
have been my mauled hands and feet, my
gashed side, my crimson temples"
Men of great physical endurance have
sometimes carried very heavy burdens-900
pounds, 400 pounds-and they have still
said "My strength is not yet tested. Put
On more weight" But after awhile they
we're compelled to cry out "Stop! l can
carry no more" But the burden of Christ
was illimitable. First, there was His own
burden OF hunger and thirst and bereave-
ment and a thousand outrages that have
been heaped upon Him, and on top OF that
burden were the sorrows OF His poor old
mother, and on the top Of those burdens the
crimes Of the rufians who were executing
Him.
"Stop ~ you cry at is enough. Christ
can bear no more" And Christ says, "Roli
on more burdens roll on Me the sins of this
entire nation, and after that roll on Me the
sins of the inhabited earth, and then roll on
Me the sins of the 1000 years past, so far as
those sins have been forgiven" And the
angels of God, seeing the awful pressure,
cry "Stopi He can bear no more" And
the blood rushing to the andl lip seems
to cry out Enough! He can endure no
more" But Christ says: 'Roll on a greater
burden, roll on the sins Of the next 1900
years, roll on Me the sins of the 81 succeeding
ages, roll on Me the agonies of hell, ages on
the tortures." That is what the Bible
means when it says, II bore our sins and
carried our sorrows."
Now" says Paul, ~ am free. That suf-
fering purchased my deliverance. God never
collects a debt twice. I have a receipt, in
full. If God is satisfied with me, then what
do all the threats of earth and hell amount
to? Bring on all your Witnesses says
Paul. 'Showa all your force. Do your worst
against my soul. ! defy you. l dare you.
| l challenge you. Who is he that condeina-
eth2 II is Christ that died" Oh, what a
strong argument that puts in the hand OF eve
cry Christian man! Some day all the past
sins of his life come down on him in a fiery
troop, and they pound away at tho gate or
| his soul, and they say W have come for
four arrest. Any one OF us could overcome
you. We are 10, 900 strong. SURRENDER.
| And you open the door, and sfngle handed
and alone you contend against that troop.
You fling this divine weapon into their midst.
You scatter those sins as quick as you ca
think it
1T is Christ that died." Why, then, brin
up to US the sins Of our past lifeP What hav
we to do with those obsolete things? Yol
know how hard 1t Is for a wrecker to brini
up anything that is lost near the shore OF tn
sea, but suppose something be lost half wa,
between Liverpool and New York. 1t can
not be found 1t cannot be fetched up
SNOW, says God, "your sins have been cas-
into the depths OF the sea-" Mid-Atlantic
All the machinery ever fashioned in foun
dries OF darkness and launched from thu
doors OF eternal death, working for 10, 00l
years, cannot bring up one OF our sin for
given and forgotten and sunken into thu
@-AI "a W.. - a.
1t is gone. 1t Is gone out of the books It Il
gone out OF the memory 1t is gone out Of ex
istence. 'Their sins and their iniquities will
! remember no more"
From other tragedies men have come away
exhausted and nervous and ~sleepless, but
there is one tragedy that soothes and Gains
aad saves. Calvary was.the stage on which
it was enacted, the curtain of the night fall
ing at midnoon was the drop scene, the
thunder OF falling rocks the orchestra, angels
in the galleries and devils In the pit the
spectators, the tragedy q crucihxion. at Il
Christ that died" oh, triumphant thought
If you go through the picture gallery OF
Versailles, YOU will find a great change
there. l said to a friend who had been
through those galleries, "Are they as they
were before the French warp and l wlf
told there was a great change there that q :
that multitude of pictures which represente
Napoleonic triumphs had been taken ava!
and in the frames were other pictures ron.
resentative of German success and victory.
oh, that all the scenes of satanic triumph In
our world might be blotted out, and tina
the whole world might be a picture galler
representing the triumphaIs jesus Dow
with the monarchy Of transgression u
with the monarchy ofour King Hail Jesus.
hall
But 1 must give you the second cause o
Paurs exhilaration. II Christ had staid In
that grave, we never would have gotten out
of 1t. The grave would have been dark and
dismal as the conciergerie during the reign
of terror, where the carts came up only to
take the victims out to the scaffold. / do
not wonder that the a~neients tried by en-
balmment Of the bodyt to resist the dissolution
of death.
Inc grave Is the darkest, deepest, ghastli-
est chasm that was ever opened II there be
no light from the resurrection throne streams
ing into 1t, but Christ staid In the tomb all
Friday night and all Saturday, all Saturday
night and q part Of Sunday morn ng. He
staid so long in the tomb that He might fit It
for US when we 20 there. He tarried two
whole nights in the grave, SO that He saw
how important 1t was TO have plenty Of
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