The Bossier banner., 1893-11-23

boat and let her fall off, notice the poor
equipment. Only one lifeboat. Two
hundred and seventy-six passengers, as
Paul counted them, and only one life
boat. My text uses the singular and
not the plural. ''Cut off the ropes of
the boat" | do not suppose it would
have held more than thirty people,
though loaded to the waters edge. l
think by marine law all our modern
vessels have enough lifeboats to hold
all the crew and all the passengers in
case of emergency, but the marines of
my text were standing by the only
boat, and that small boat, and
and yet two hundred and seventy-six
passengers. But what thrills me
through and through is the fact that
though we are wrecked by sin and
trouble, and there is only one lifeboat,
that boat is large enough to hold all
who are willing to get into it. The
Gospel hymn expresses it:
All may come, whoever will,
This Man receives poor sinners still.
But must haul in that statement a
little. Room for all in that lifeboat
with just one exception. Not you; l
do not mean you, but there is one ex-
ception. q There have been cases where
ships were in trouble and the captain
got all the passengers and crew into
the lifeboats, but there was not room
for the captain. He, through the sea-
trumpet, shouted: "Shove off now and
pull for the beach. Good-by," and
then the captain, with pathetic and
sublime self-sacrifice, went down with
the ship. So the captain of our
Salvation, Christ the Lord, launches
the Gospel lifeboat and tells us
all to get in, but he perishes.
st behooved Christ to suffer-"
was it not so, We who witnessed his
agonizing expiration? Simon of Cyrene,
was it not SO? Cavalry troops, whose
horses paved the dust at the cruci-
fiXion was it not so? Ye Marys who
swooned away with the sun of the mid
day heavens, was it not so? "By his
stripes we are healed" BY his death
we live. BY his sinking in the deep
sea of suffering we get off in a safe
lifeboat Yes, we must put into this
story u little of our own personality.
We had a ride in that very ifeboat from
foundered craft to solid shore,
Once on the raging seas rowed,
The storm was loud, the night was dark,
The ocean yawned and rudely blowd
The wind that tossed my laundering bark.
But got into the Gospel lifeboat and
l got ashore. No religious speculation
fn,. rT1nca l. -In, fo11
do not bother me a bit. You may ask
me fifty questions about the sea and
about the land and about the lifeboat
that l can not answer, but one thing I
know; l am ashore and | am going to
stay ashore, if the Lord by His grace will
help me. | feel under me something
SO firm that l will try it with my right
foot, and try it with my left foot, and
then l try it with both feet, and it is
so solid that l think it must be what
the o Id folks used to call the Rock of
Ages. And be my remaining days on
earth many or few, 1 am going to
spend my time recommending the life
boat which fetched me here, n poor
sinner saved by grace, and in swinging
the cutlasses to sever the ropes of any
unsafe lifeboat and let her fall off.
Ny hearer, without asking any ques-
tions, get into the Gospel lifeboat.
Room! and yet there is room! The
biggest boat on earth is the Gospel
lifeboat' You must remember the pro-
portion of things, and that the ship
wrecked craft is the whole earth, and
the lifeboat must be in proportion.
You talk about your Campanias, and
your City of New Yorks, but all of them
put together are smaller than an In
dians canoe on Schroon lake COM
pared with this Gospel lifeboat,
that is large enough to take in all ma
tions. Room for one and room for all.
Get in! ''How? Howe" you ask. Well,
know how you feel, for summer be-
fore last, on the sea of Finland, 1 had
the same experience. The ship in which
we sailed could not venture nearer than
a mile from shore, where stood the Rus
sian palace of Peterhof, and we had to
get into small boat and be rowed
ashore. The water was rough, and as we
went down the ladder at the side of the
ship we held firmly on to the railing,
but in order to get into the boat we
had at last to let go. How did 1 know
that the boat was good and that the
oarsmen were sufficient? How did l
know that the Finland sea would not
swallow us with one opening of it's
crystal jaws? We had to trust, and we
did trust, and our trust was well re-
warded. In the same way get into this
Gospel lifeboat. Let go! AS long as
you hold on to any other hope you
are imperiled and you get no advant-
age from the lifeboat. Let go! Does
some one here say: Il guess will hold
on little to my good works, or to a
pious parentage, or to something l can
do in the way of achieving my own sal
vation. 'No, no, let go! Trust the
Captain, who would not put you into a
rickety or uncertain craft.
RattIesnake Weed,