Grand Rapids herald. [volume] (Grand Rapids, Mich.) 1892-1959, 1893-01-09

sCuMUxOW no - = x1~k1 &kx1<&<
accounting for his sudden sfnasnre' ne
has not yet failed often enough 70 o.
come wealthy. No one pretends TO &c.
count for his princely wardrobe, or the
chased silver. or the full curbed steeds i
that rear and neigh ike bucephaius In I
the grasp Of his ooschman- Did re come
10 q sudden inheritance? No. Did he /
make = fortune on purchase ald sale! /
No. Everybody asks where did that par
fridge hatch. The devil suddenly threw
him up. and the devil viii suddmly let l
him come down. Tilat hidden scheme /
God saw from the first conception of the
plot. That partridge. swift disaster win /
shoot it down. and the higher IT ties the /
harder it falls. The prophet saw. as You |
and have often seen, the awful mistake
Of cartridges.
But from the top Of Bible FL tree
hear the shrill cry Of the stork Job.
Ezekiel, Jeremiah, speak Of it. David
cries out, As for the stork. the ir tree
Is her house" This large white Bible
bird is supposed without alighting fone-
times to wing its way from the region OF
the Rhine 10 Africa. As winter comes
all the storks fly to warmer climesand
the last one Of their number that arrives
at the spot to which they migrate 10
killed by them. What havoc it would
make in our species if those men wsre
killed who are always behindi In orien-
tai cities the stork is domesticated ald
walks about ON the street and will follow
its keeper.
In the city Of Ephesus ! saw long
row of pillars. ON the top Of each pillar
a sfork's nest. But the word ''stork"
ordinarily means mercy and affection.
from the fact that this bird was distin-
guished for its great love for its parents.
1t never forsakes them, and even after
they become feeble protects and provides
for them. In migrating the old storks
lean their necks on the young storks,
and when the old ones give out the
young ones carry them ON their backs.
God forbid that a dumb stcrk should
have more heart than we. Blessed is
that table at which an old father and
mother sit: blessed that altar at which
an old father and mother kneel!
What it is to have "a mother they know
best who have lost her. God only knows
the agony she suffered for Us, the times
she wept over our cradle and the anxious
signs her bosom heaved as we lay upon
it, the sick nights when she watched US
long after every one was tired out but
God and herself. Her likelihood beats
in our heart, and her image lives in our
face. That man is graceless as canni-
bal who i'll treats his parents. and he
who begrudges them daily bread and
clothes them but shabbily, may God
have patience with him: cannot. /
heard a man once say, II now have my
old mother on my hands," Ye storks
on your way with food to your aged
parents. shame him!
THE PROSECUTED CHURCH.
But yonder in this Bible sky flies a
bird that is speck]ed. The prophet de-
scribing the church cries out, mime
heritage is unto me as q speckled bird;
the birds round about are against her.
So it was then: so it is now. Holiness
picked at. Conservation picked at. Be-
nevolence picked at. Usefulness picked
at. A speclIled bird is peculiar bird;
and that arouses the antipathy of all the
beaks of the forest.
The church Of God is a peculiar insti.
tuition, and that is enough to evoke at
tack of the world, for it is a speckled
bird to be picked at. The Inconsistent
cies of Christians are banquet on which
multitudes get fat. They ascribe every
thing you do to wrong motives. Put q
dollar in the poor box and they will say
that you dropped it there only that you
might hear it ring. Invite them te
Christ, and they will call you . fanatic
Let there be contention among Chris
tians, and they win say: "Hurrahl The
church is in decadence."
Christ intended that his church should
always remain speckled bird. LIE,
birds Of another feather pick at her, but
they cannot rob her Of a single plume
Like tho albatross, she can sleep on TIT
bosom of o tempest. She has gone
through the fires of Nebuchadnezzar'
furnace and not got burned; through thu
waters of the Red sea and not beer
drowned; through the shipwreck on thu
breakers of Melita and not been foun
dered. Let all earth and hell try to hum
down this speckled bird, but far sbov'
human scorn and internal assault it shall
sing over every mountain top and Fl,
over every nation, and her triumphan
song shall be: THE church Of God
The pillar and ground of the truth
The gates Of he'll shall not prevail agains
her"
But we cannot stop here. From
tall cliff hanging over the sea hear tn
eagle calling unto the tempest and lift
ing its wing to smite the whirlwind
Moses, Jeremiah, Hosea and Habakkul
at times in their writings take their pei
from the eagles wing. 1t is bird witt
fierceness in its eye, its feet armed wit
claws Of iron and its head with dread
full beak. Two or three of them can fiji
the heavens with clangor. But gener
ally this monster Of the air is alone an,
unaccompanied, for the reason that it
habits are so prcdaceous it requires fv
or ten miles Of aerial or earthly donin
ion all for itself.
The black brown Of its back. and tn
white of its lower feathers, and the fir
of its eye. and the long flap of its win
make one glimpse of it as il swing
down into the valley to pick up rabbit
or lamb, or child and thon swing
back 10 its throne on the rock some
thing never TO he forgotten. Scst.ere
about its eyre Of altitudinous solitrd
are the bones Of its conquests. Bu
while the beaS and the claws Of th
eagle are the terror Of all the traveller
az the air The yoofher eat,ie Ia mos. hin