Weekly expositor. (Brockway Centre, Mich.) 1882-1894, 1893-02-10

good time 10 make q Splrltual maui.
People in the bright sunshine of pros
peritv are not so easily taken.
But be sure before you start out TO
the Gospel Fisheries TO get the right
kind of bait "But, how" you say,
''am 70 get it?' My answer is, "Dig
for it." Where shall / dig for it?"
I'm the rich Bible grounds" We
boys brought up in the country had to
dig for bait before we started for the
banks of the Raritan. We put the
sharp edge of the spade against the
ground, and then put our foot on the
spade, and with one tremendous
plunge of our strength of body and
will, we drove it in up TO the handle.
and then turned over the sod. We had
never read Walton's Complete
Angler" or Charles Cotton's "Instruc-
tions how to Angle for Graying in
Clear Stream" We knew moth
ing about the modern redhackle,
or the fly of orange-colored mohair,
but we got the right kind of bait.
No use trying to angle for fish or
angle for souls unless you have the
right kind of bait, and there is plenty
of it in the promises, the parallels, the
miracles, the crucifixion, the heaven
of the grand old gospel. Yes, not only
must you dig for bait, but use only
fresh bait You cannot do anything
down at the pond with old angle
worms. New views of truth. New
views of God. New views of the soul
There are all the good books to help
you dig. But make up your mind as
to whether you will take the hint of
Habukkuk and Isaiah and Job and use
hook and line, or take the hint of Mat
thew and Luke and Christ and fish with
a net l think many lose their
time by wanting to fish
with net and they never
get place to swing the net; in other
words they want to do Gospel work on
a big scale or they will not do it at all.
Isee feeble-mindedC Christian men going
around with a Bagster's Bible under
their arm, no 0ing to do the work of an
Evangelist and use the net, while they
night be better content with hook and
inc and take one soul at time. They
ire bad failures as evangelists; they
would be mighty successes as private
Christians. lfyou catch only one soul
tor God that will be enough 10 fill
sour eternity with celebration. All
rail, the fisherman with hook and linel
hdNC bCCu a. man lbllS
roy outfit come back from the woods
oaded down with string of fnny
treasures hung over his shoulder and
MS game bag filed, and dog with
mis- teeth carrying basket filed
With the surplus of an after
Moons angling, and il was all
the result of hook and line; and
IN the eternal world there will be
f,,anu man apd raanu vyornan tho
was never heard of outside Of village
sunday School or a prayer meeting
buried in a church basement, who will
ONE before the throne of God with a
multitude of souls ransorhed through
mis- or her fundamentally and yet the
work all done through personal inter
view one by one, one by one. You do
not know who that one soul may be.
Staupitz helped one soul into the
light, but it was Martin Luther.
Thomas Bilney brought salvation to
me soul, but it was Hugh Latimer.
An edge-tool maker was the means of
saving one soul, but it was John Sum
nerfeld. Our blessed Lord healed one
blind eye at time, one paralvzed arm
At time, one dropsical patient at a
lime, and raised from the dead one
girl at a time, one young man
At a time. Admire the net that
Jakes in a great many at once,
nut do not despise the hook and line.
God help us amid the Gospel fisher
les, whether we employ hook or net,
for the day cometh when we shall see
now much depended on our fidelity:
Christ himself declared. 1.-THE king
iom of heaven is like unto a net that
was cast into the sea and gathered of
very kind, which, when it was full
hey drew to shore and sat down and
gathered the good in the vessels, but
asst the bad away; so shall it be at the
md of the world; the angels shall
tome forth and separate the wicked
from the just" Yes, the fishermen
think it best to keep the useful and
worthless of the haul in the same net
until it is drawn upon the beach, and
hen the division takes place, and IL
1t is on Long Island coast, the moss
ounkers are thrown and the bluefish
md shad preserved, or If it is on the
shore of Galilee. the fish classified as
,iluroids are hurled back into the
water or thrown up the bank as un-
;Iean, while the perch and the carp and
the barbel are put in pals to be car
ried home for use. So in the church
IN earth, the saints and the hypo-
critics, the generous and the mean, the
chaste and the unclean, are kept
in the same membership, but at death
the division will be made and the good
will be gathered into heaven. and the
bad, however many holy coInmunions
they may have celebrated. and how
ever many rhe torical prayers they have
offered, and however many years their
names may have been on the church
rolls, will be cast away. Cod forbid
that any of us should be among the
''cast away" But may we do our
work whether small or great as thor
oughly as did that renowned fisher
man, George w. Bethune, who spent
his summer rest angling in the waters
around THE Thousand Isles" and
beating at their own craft those who
piled it all the year. and who the rest
of his time gloriously preached Christ
in pulpit only fifteen minutes from
where l now stand, and ordering for
his own obsequies: "Put on me my
pulpit gown and bands. with my own
pocket Bible in my right hand. Bury
me with my mother, my father and
my grandmother. Sing also my own
hymn:
"Jesus thou Prince OF Lifei