Weekly expositor. (Brockway Centre, Mich.) 1882-1894, 1893-06-23
TABERNACLE PULPIT.
DR.. TALMAGE BREACHES ON A
FRUITFUL SUBJECT.
And They Came Unto the Brook of
EschOl and Cut Down From Thence
n Branch with Ono Cluster OF
Grapes.

mage, in selecting n theme Tor to-day's
sermon in the Brooklyn Tabernacle, chose
one peculiarly suitable to the season OF
fruits the tide being Grapes from Canaan"
and the text, Numbers 1923, "And they
came unto the brook of Eschol, and CUT
down from thence a branch with one clus
ter OF grapes, and they bare it between two
upon stall"
The long trudge of the Israelites
across the wilderness was almost
ended. They had come to the borders
of the promised land. OF the six hun
dred thousand adults who started from
Egypt for Canaan, how many do you
suppose got there? Five hundred
thousand? Oh, no. Not two hundred
thousand, not one hundred thousand,
not fifty, nor twenty, nor ten; but only
two men. Oh, it was a ruinous march
that Gods people made; but their
children were living and they were on
the march, and now that they had
come up to the borders of the promised
land, they were very curious to know
what kind of a place it was, and
whether it would be safe to 60 over.
So a scouting party is sent out to re-
connoitre, and they examine the land,
and they come back bringing speci-
mems of its growths. just as you
came back from California, bringing
to your family a basket of pears, or
plums, or apples, to show what mon
strous fruit they have there, so this
scouting party cut off the biggest
bunch of grapes they could find. 1t
was so large that one man could not
carry it, and they thrust a pole.through
the cluster, and there was one man at
either end of the pole, and so the bunch
of grapes was transported. i was,
some time ago, in a luNuriant vine
yard. The vine-dreSser had done his
work. The vine had clambered up
and spread its wealth all over the ar
Dor. The sun and shower had mixed
a cup which the vine drank until with
flushed cheek It lay numbering in the
light, cluster against the cheek of
cluster. The rinds of the grapes seemed
almost bursting with the juice in the
warm lips of the autumnal day, and it
seemed as if all you had to do was to
lift chal ce towards the cluster and
its life blood would begin TO drip
away. But, my friends in these rig
orous climes, we know nothing about
large grapes. Strabo states that in
Bible times and in Bible lands there
were grape-vines so large that it took
two men with outstretched arms TO
reach round them, and he says
there were clusters two cubitS in
length, or twice the length from the
elbow to the tip of the long finger.
And Achaicus, dwelling in those lands,
tells US that during the time he was
smitten with fever one grape would
Stake his thirst for the whole day.
No wonder then, in these Bible times
two men thought Il worth their while
TO put their strength together to carry
down one cluster of grapes from the
promised land.
But this morning / bring you
larger cluster from the heavenly Eschol
"a cluster OF hopes, cluster of pros
poets, a cluster of Christian consola-
ton; and l am expecting that one taste
of it will rouse up your appetite for
the heavenly Canaan. During the past
winter some of this congregation have
gone away never to return. The aged
have put down their staff and taken
up the sceptre. Men in mid-life came
home from office or shop, and did not
go back again. And the dear children,
some of them, have been gathered in
Christs arms. lie found this world
too rough a place for them, and so he
has gathered them in. And oh. how
many wounded souls there are
wounds for which this world offers no
medicament, and unless from the
gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ there
shall come consolation there
will be no consolation ut all. Oh
that the God of all comfort would help
me while preach, and that the God
of all comfort would help you while
you hear.
First / console you with the divine
ly sanctioned idea that your departed
friends are as much yours now as they
ever were. / know you sometimes get
the idea in your mind, when you have
this kind of BILE, that your friends
are cut off from you, and they are no
longer yours; but the desire to have al
our loved ones in the same lot in the
cemetery is a natural desire, a univer-
sal desire, and, therefore, a God-im-
planted desire, and is nightly sugges-
tive of the fact that death has no pow
er TO break up the family relations. If
our loved ones go away from our pos
session, why put fence around our
lot in the cemetery? Why the gath
ering of four or five names on
one family monument? Why the
planting of one cypress-vine so that it
covers all the cluster of gravesP Why
put the husband beside the wife, and
the children at their feet? Why the
bolt on the gate of our lot, and the
charge to the keepers of the ground to
zee that the grass is cut, and the vine
attended to, and the flowers planted?
Why not put our departed friends in
one common field or grave? Oh, il is
because they are ours. That child, o
stricken mother! is as much yours this
morning as in the solemn hour when
God put it against your heart and said
as of old Take this child and nurse
it for me, and i will give thee thy
wages" 1t is no mere within. 1t is a
divinely-planted principle in the soul,
and God certainly would not plant a
liel Abraham would not allow Sarah
to be buried in strangers grounds,
although some very beautiful ground
was offered him free gift; but he
pays four hundred shekels for Mach
pelah, the cave, and the trees over
shadowing IL. The grave has been
we'll kept, and to-day the Christian
traveller stands in thoughtful and adj
miring mood, gazing upon Machpelah,
where Abraham and Sarah are
taking their long sleep of 1900
years. Your father may be slumber-
ing under the tinkling of the bell of
the Scotch kirk. Your brother may