Fisherman & farmer. [volume] (Edenton, N.C.) 1887-19??, 1893-03-31
REV. DIR. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DIVINE7S SUN
DAY DISCOURSE.
Subject: "ReliGion at Home" lis
sued at Chicago, ILL.,


Absurd. Joshua You will have no time
for family religion; you are a military
character. AMI your time will be taken up
with affairs connected with the army; YOU
are a statesman, and your time will be
taken up with public affairs; you are the
Washington. the Wellington. the McMahon
of the Israelitish host; you will have great
many questions to settle; you will have no
time tor religion. But Joshua, with the
same voice with which he commanded the
sun and moon TO halt and stack arms OF
light on the parade ground OF thu heavenS
says, "As for me and my house, we will
serve the Lord"
Before we adopt the resolution Of this old
soldier we want to be certain It Is wise
resolution. Ii religion is going to put my
piano OUT OF tune. and clog the feet OF the
children racing through the hall, and sour
the bread, and put Grape on the doorbel,
do not want it in my house. once gave 80
to hear Jenny Lind MARBLE. L have never
given a cent % hear any one groan. VIII
this religion spoken of in my text do any
thing for the dining hall, for the nursery
for the par.Or for the sleeping apartment!
1t is a great deal easier to invite dis
agreeable guest than to get rid or MIN. IL
YOU do not want religion, you had better not
ask it to come. for after coming 1t may stay
a great while. Isaac Watts went to visit
ST Thomas and Lady Abney at their place
in TheobaId and was to stay week and stald
thirty-fve years, and If religion onca gets
STAY there forever.
Now, the question I want to discuss is,
What will religion do for the household?
Question the first: What did it do for your
fathers house if you were brought up IN
Christian home2
That whole scene has vanished, but it
comes back to- av. The hour for morning
prayers came. You were invited In. Some
what fidgetv you sat and listened. Your
father made no pretentiOn to rhetorical
1iFCr nd hn iI1Cf fhrOI1Oh the
ter in a plain, raightforWard way. Then
you all knelt. 1t was about the same prayer
morning by morning and night by night,
for he had the same sins to ask pardon Tor,
and he had the same blessings, for which TO
be grateful day after day and year after
year.
The PRAYER was longer than you would
like to have had it, for the game at ball was
waiting, or the skates were lying under the
shed, or the schoolbooks needed one or two
more looking at the lessons. Your parents,
somewhat rheumatic and stiffened with age,
found it difficult to rise from their kneellng.
The chair at which they kneit is gone. the
Bible out OF which they read has perhaps
fallen to pieces, the parents are gone, the
children scattered north, east, south and
west, but that whole scene flashes upon your
memory to-day.
Was that morning and evening exercise in
your fathers house debasing or elevating?
Is it not among the most sacred reminis-
of the older members of your fathers house
who were kneeling with you at the time, and
you did not bow your head as closely as they
did, and you looked around and you saw
just the posture your father and mother
assumed while they were kneeling on the
floor. The whole scene is so photographed
on your memory that il you were artist
you could draw it now just they knelt.
For how much would you have that scene
obliterated from your memory? 1t all comes
TO-DAY hOmQSfnQN
again. Father is there, mother is there, all
of you children are there. 1t is the same old
prayer, opening with the same petition,
closing with the same thanksgiving. The
family prayers of 1S40-50 as fresh in your
memory as though they were uttered yester-
day. The tear that starts from your eye
melts all that scene. Gone, is 1T? Why,
many a time it has held you steady in the
struggle of life. You once started for
place AMI that memory jerke1 you back,
and you could not enter.
The broken prayer of your father has had
more ff3ct on you than all you ever read in
Shakespeare and Milton and Tennyson and
Dante. You have gone over mountains and
across seas. You never for a moment got
out of sight Of that domestic altar. Oh, my
friends is it your opinion this morning that
the 10 or Is minutes substracted from
each day for family devotion was an econ
Omy or a waste of time in your fathers
household? | think some of us are coming
was in our fathers house would be a very
appropriate religion for our homes. Iffam-
lily prayers did not damage that household,
there is no probability that they will damage
our household.
rs God dead?" said a child to her father.
mo, he replied ''Why do you ask thatw
"W eIl," she said, when mother was living,
we used TO nave prayers, but since her death
we haven't had family prayers, and didn't
know but that Goa dead toO.'' A family
that is launched III the morning with family
prayers is well launched. Breakfast over
the family scatter, some to school, some to
household duties, some to business. During
the day there will be a thousand periis
abroad-perils Of the street car of the scat
folding, OF the ung0verned horse, of the mis-
step, of the aroused temper, of multitudin
Gus temptations TO do wrong.
Somewhere between o'clock in the morn.
ing and 10 clock at night there may be a
moment when you will be in urgent need of
God. Besides that, family prayers will be
secular advantage. A father went into the
war to serve his country His children
stayed and cultivated the farm. His wife
prayed. One of the sons said afterward,
Father is lighting, and we are digging and
mother is praying" All" said some one,
praying and digging and lighting will
bring US out of our national troubles.
We may pray in the morning, ''Give us
this day our daily bread" and sit down in
ldlenesS and starve to death; but prayer
and hard work will give livelihood to any
family. Family religion pays for both
worlds. Let us nave an altar in each one of
our households. You may not be able to
formulate prayer. Then there are Philip
Henry's prayers, and there are McDufrs
prayers, anu there are Philip Doddridge's
prayers, and there are the Episcopal church
prayers, and there are scores of books with
suppilcations just suited to the domestic