The Penn's Grove record., 1893-12-15

ing in the pride Of our soul. No, we will
never get into heaven that way. We mus
dismount.
There is no knight e~rrantry in religion, no
fringed trappings of repentance, but an
utter prostitution before God. a going down
in tho dust, with the cry, "Uncle8n, UNI
clean pa bewailing Of the soul, like David
from the belly Of hell-a going down in the
dust until Christ shall by His grace lift US Ut
ms He lifted Paul. Oh, proud hearted
%rnHrer, you must get OF that horsei May q
light from the throne of God brighter thau
the sun throw you'll Com down into tas
dust and cry for pardon and lie and heaven.
Again, I learn from this scene Of The text
that the grace of God can overcome the per-
%secutor. Christ and Faul were boys at the
same time in different villages, and paul's
ahtipathy to Christ was increasing. He
hated everything about Christ. He was GO
ing down then with writs in his pockets to
have Christ's disciples arrested. lie was not
going as a sheriff goes to arrest a man against
whom he had no spite, but Paul was going
down to arrest those people because he was
glad to arrest them.
The Bible says, "He breathel out slaugh-
ter" He wanted them captured, and he
wanted them butchered. l hear the click,
and clash and clatter of the hoofs of the gal
looping steedS on the way to Damascus. Oh,
do you think that proud man on horseback
can ever become a Christian? Yes! There
is a voice from heaven like a thunderciap
uttering two words, the seconl word the
same as the first, but uttered VITA more en-
phasis, so that the proud eIl 'sIrian may have
no doubt asto whom Is meant ''Saul ] Saul 7
That man was saved, and he was q persecu-
tor, and so God can, by His grace, overcome
any prosecutor.
The days of sword and fire for Christians
i ..nn~ e Ra,,n nRnz Hv .1NhA haNnnnfa nf
Napoleon I. pried open the 'inqutsltion'
and let the rotting wretches out. TIL,
ancient dungeons around Rome are to-day
mere curlosities for the travellers. The
Coliseum, where wild BEASTS used to suck
up the life OF the martyrs while the emperor
watched and Lola ,Paulina sat with emerald
adornments worth 60. 000, 900 sesterces, clap.
ing her hands as the Christians died under
the paw and the tooth of the lion-that Col
tseum is a ruin now. The scene Of the
Smithfleld fires is a haymarket. The day OF
fire and sword for Christians seems to have
gone by. But has the day of persecution
ceased? Nc. Are o not carlcatured for
your religion? In proportion as you try to
serve God and be faithful to Him, are you
not sometimes maltreated?
That woman finds it hard to bea Christian
as her husband talks and ieers while she is
trying to say her prayers or read the Bible.
That daughter finds 1t hard to be Christian
with the whole family arrayed against her
father, mother, brother and sister making
her the target of ridicule. That young man
finds it hard to be a Christian In the shop or
factory or store when his comrades jeer at
| him because he will not go to the gambling
hell or other places of iniquity.
Oh, no, the days of persecution have not
ceased and will not until the end of the
world. But oh, you prosecuted ones, is It not
time that you began to pray for your perse-
cutors! They are no prouder, no f~iercer, no
more set in their way than was this perse-
cutor Of the text. He fell. They will fall il
Christ from the heavens grandly and glori-
ously looks out on them. God can by His
grace make a Renan believe in the divinity of
Jesus and a Tyndall inthe worth of prayer.
Robert Newton stamped the ships deck in
derisive indignation at Christianity only n
little while before he became n Christian,
''out of my house." said a father to his
daughter, ''lf you will keep praying" Yet
before many months passed the father knelt
at the same altar with the child. And the
Lord Jesus Christ is willing to look out from
heaven upon that derlslve opponent of the
Christian religion and address him. not in
glittering generalities, but calling him by
name "John! George! Henry Saul,
Saul, why p~ersecutest thou Mel ~
Again, 1 learn from this subject that there
is hope for the worst offenders. 1t was par
ticularly outrageous that Saul should have
gone 10 Damascus on hat errand. Jesus
Christ had been dead only three years, and
the story of his kindness and his generosity,
and his love filled all the air. 1t was not an
old story, as it is now. 1t was a new story.
Jesus had only three summers g been in
these very places, and Saul every day in
Jerusalem must have met people who knew
Christ, people with good eyesight whom
Jesus had cured of blindness, people who
had been dead and who had been resurrected
by the Savior, and the people who couldtell
Paul all the particulars OF the cruciixion-
just how Jesus looked in the last hour, just
how the heavens grew black in the face at
the torture.
He heard that recited every day by people
who were acquainted with all the cireum-
stances, and yet in the fresh memory Of that
scene he goes TO prosecute Christ's disciples,
impatient at the time 1t takes to feed the
horses at this inn, not pulling at the snaffie,
but riding with loose rein faster and faster,
Oh, he was the chief Of sinners No outbreak
of modesty when he said that. He was a
murderer. He stood by when Stephen died
and helped in the execution of that good
man.
When the rabble wanted to be unimpeded
In their work of destroying Stephen n
wanted to take off their coats, but did not
dare to lay them down lest they be stolen,
Paul said, "In take care Of the coats" and
they put them down at the feet OF Paul, and
he watched the coats, and he watched the
horrid mangling Of glorious Stephen. Is it
q wonder that when he fell from the horse he
did not break his neck-that his foot did not
catch somewhere In the trappings of the
saddle, and he was not dragged and kicked
to death2 He deserved to die miserably,
wretchedly and forever, Notwithstanding oil
his metaphysics, and his eioquence and his
logic.
was true when he said that. And yet the
grace Of God saved him, and so 1t will you.
II there is any man In this house who thinks
he Is too bad to be saved and says, 81 have
wardered very ~grievous!y from God /; I do
not believe there is any hope for meg tell
you the story of this man in thetext who was
brought 10 Jesus Chris. in spite of his sins
and opposition. There may be some here
Who are as atoatly opposed to Christ as Paul
WAS. There may be some here who are cap.
tive OF their sins rs much so as the Young
man who sail in regard to his dissipating
habits: 81 Will keep on with them. fknow
| am breaking my mothers heart, and I
know | am killing myself, and 1 know that
when die l shall so to he'll, but it is now
too late TO stop"
The stead on which you ride NAV be
sw,iter and stronger and higher melted than
that on which the Cilician prosecutor rode,
Int Christ can catch it by the bride and hurl
it back and hurl it down. There Is mercy
for you who say You are too bad to be saved.
1ou say yon have pu. of the matter so long
Paul ha neglected it n great while. You
say that the siu you have committed has
been among the most aggravating circum-
stances that WAS so with Pauls.
You say you have eXAsperated Christ an |
eoaxed your own ruin so did Paul. And
yet he sits to-day on ono of the highest OF
the heavenly thrones. ami there is mercy
for you, and goot days for you, and glad
ness for you, If you will only take the same
Christ which first I rev him down and then
raised him up. 1t seems 10 me as If l can
see Paul to-day rising up from the highway
TO Damascus, and brushing of the dust from
his cloak, aud wiplng the sweat OF excite
ment from his brow. as he turns to ns and
all the ages, saying, This is u faithful say
ing, and worthy OF all acceptation, that Christ
Jesus came into the world to save sinners, OF
whom / am chief"
once more, l learn from this subject that
there is a tremendous reality in religion. II
it had been y mere optical delusion on tho
road to Damascus, was not Paul Just the
man to find II out? III had been a sham
and pretense, would he not have priokedthe
bubble7 He was a man Of facts and argu- |
ments, of the most gigantic Intellectual ma
ture, and not a man of Authorizations. And
when l sec him fall from the saddle, blinded
and overwhelmed, / say there must have
been something in it, AMI, my dear brother,