Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1893-09-21

lnaJ tnere lS nothing III prayer III may not
come ms we expect it, but as sure as an
honest prayer goes up merciiul answer
will come down
During the blizzard of four or five years
ago you know that many of the telegraph
wires were Frustrated, and telegraphed to
Chicago by the way Of Liverpool, and the
answer after awhile came around by an
other wide circuit, and the prayer we offer
may come back in way we never imag
ined, and if we ask to have our faith in
creased although it may come by widely
different process from that which we eX-
pected, our confidence will surely be aug
mented.
Oh, put it in every prayer you ever make
between your next breath and your last
gasp, lord, increase our faith'-faith in
Christ as our personal ransom from pres
ent guilt and eternal catastrophe; faith
in the omnipotent Holy Ghost faith In the
Bible, the truest volume ever dictated or
written or printed or read; faith in adverse
providences, harmonized for our best vel
fare; faith in n judgment day that will set
all things right which have for ages been
wrong.
Increase our faith, not by fragile addition,
but by an nfnitudc of recuperation. Let
us do it as we saw il done in the country
while we were vet in our teens, at the old
farmhouse, after long drought, and the
well had been dried, and the cattle moaned
with thirst at the bars, and the meadow
brook had ceased to run, and the grass
withered, and the corn was shriveled up,
and one day there was growl of thunder
and then congregation of clouds on the
sky, and then startling fash, and then a
drenching rain, and father and mother put
barrels under every spout at the corners of
the house and set pals and buckets and
tubs and pans and pitchers to catch as much
as they could Of the shower, for in many
of our souls there has been n long drought
of confidence and in many no faith at all.
Let us set out all our affections, all our
hopes, all our contemplations, all our pray
ers to catch n mighty shower. Lord, in
crease our faith"
! like the way that the minister's widow
did in Elisha's time, when, after the family
| being very unfortunate, her two sons were
! about to be sold for debt, and she had moth
ing in the house but pot of oil, and at
Elisha's direction she borrowed from her
neighbors all the vessels she could borrow
and then began to pour out the oil into
those vessels and kept on pouring until
they were all full, and she became an oil
b,
and when she cried, Bring me yet YES
sci" the answer came There is not YES
sci more" SO let Us take what oil of faith
we have and use it until the supply shall
be miraculously multiplied. Bring on your
empty vessels, and by the power of the
Lord God of Elisha they shall be filled until
they can hold no more of jubilant, all in
spring and triumphant faith.
LESSONS or THE STORM
What a frightful time we had few days
ago down on the coast of Long Island
where had been stopping! That archangel
of tempest which, with its awful wings
swept the Atlantic coast from Florida to
Newfoundland did not spare our region
"A few miles away, at southampton, | saw
the bodies Of four mon whom the storm had
slain and the sea had cast up. AS stood
there among the dead bodies l said to my
self, and | said aloud: These men repre-
sent homes. What will mother and father
and wife and children say when they know
this?"
Some of the victims were unknown. Only
the first name Of two of them was found
out-Charley aud William. ! wondered
then and wonder now if they will remain
unknown and ii some kindred far away
may be waiting for their coming and never
hear of the rough way of their going
saw also one Of the three who had come il
alive, but more dead than alive. The shiI
had become helpless six miles out, and Il:
one wave swept the deck and went dowr
the furnaces till they Missed and went out
the cry was, "Oh, my God, we are lost!'
Then the crew put on life preservers, one o
the sailors saying to the other, I'VE vii
meet again on the shore, and if not, well
We must all 60 some time"
OF the % nen who put on the life pre-
servers, only lived to reach the beach
But what Il scene it was as the good anC
Kind people of southampton, led on by DR.
Thomas, the great and good surgeon o
New York, stood watching the sailor
struggling in the breakers. ''Are you still
alive" shouted DR.. Thomas to one of then
out in the breakers, and he signaled ye
and then went into Inconsistencies. VIII,
should do the most for the poor fellow
and how to resuscitate them were tn
questions that ran up and down the beac'
. at Southampton.
How the men and women on the shor
stood wringing their hands impatientl
waiting for the sufferers to come withil
reach, and then they were lifted up ant
carried indoors and waited on with as mucl
kindness and wrapped as warmly as thong
they had beeu the princes of the earth. AR
they alive?' Are they breathingI' ID
you think they will live" What can W
do for them" were the rapid and intens
questions asked, and so much money wa
sent for the clothing and equipment of tn
, unfortunates that DR.. Thomas had to max
, q proclamation that no more money wa
; needed In other words, all that day
was resuScitation.
And that is the appropriate word for u
this morning as we stand and look Off upo
this awful sea of doubt and unbelief o
: which hundreds are this moment bein
! wrecked. Some of them were launched b
: Christian parentaRe on smooth seas an
+ with promise for prosperous voyage, but
Voltaire cyclone struck them on one sid
and Tom Paine cyclone struck them o
! the other side, and a bad habit cycloI
: struck them on all sides and they hay
a foundered far away from shore far ava
a from God, and they have gone down or al
washed ashore with no spiritual life left
n them.
+, But thank God, there are many here t,
p | daV with enough fait IA loft IN aucnuratra 1