The Camden chronicle. (Camden, Tenn.) 1890-current, 1894-12-07
REV. DIR. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DIvINRs SUN
DAY SERMON.
Subject: "The Sick General"

forehead, precursor OF complete disflgure-
ment and dissolution. I have something
awful to tell you. General Naqman, the
commander in chief of all the Syrian forces,
mas the leprosy IT is on his hands on his
race, on his feet. on his entire person. The
Ieprosy! Get out of the way of the pesti
lence! II his breath strike YOU. you are a
dead man. The commander in chief OF all
the forces of Syria And yet he would be
glad TO exchange conditions with the boy at
MS stirrup or the hostler that blankets his
charger. The news goes like wildfre all
through the realm, and the people are SYM
pathetic, and they cry out, els II possible
that our great hero who slew Ahab and
around whom we came with such vocifera-
ton when he returned from victorious bat
tle-can It be possible that our grand and
glorious Naaman has the lepreSy?"
Yes. Everybody has something he wishes
ne had not-David, an Absalom to disgrace
MIN; Paul, thorn to sting him Job, oar
bunches to plague him Samson, a Deilah
70 shear him Ahab, a Naboth to deny him;
Haman, Mordecai to irritate him; George
Washington, childlessness to afiict him;
John Wesley, termagant wife to poster
hlmi Leah, weak eyes; Pope, crooked
back; Byron, club foot John Milton,
blind eyes Charles Lamb, an insane sister,
and you and you ard you something which
you never bargained for and would like to
get rid OF. The reason of this is that God
does not want this world TO be too bright.
| otherwise we would always want to stay and
eat these fruits and lie on these lounges and
shake hands in the pleasant society. We
are only in the vestibule of grand temple.
| God does not want US to stand on the door
step, and therefore He sends aches and annoy
ences and sorrows and bereavements of all
sorts to push us on and push us up toward
! ripper fruits and brighter society and more
radiant properties. God is only whipping
| us ahead. The reason that Edward Payson
and Robert Hall had morerapturous views OF
heaven than other people had was because,
through their aches and pains, God pushed
them nearer up to it. If God dashes out enc
of your pictures, it is only TO show TO you
brighter one. If He sting your foot with
govt, your brain with neuralgia your tongue
with an inextingushable thirst, tits only be-
cause He is preparing to substitute better
body than you ever dreamed Of, when the
mortal shall put on Immortality.
1t is to push you on and to push you up
toward something grander and better that
God sends upon you, as He did upon Gen.
eral Naaman, something you do not want.
Seated in his Syrian mansion. all the walls
glitterlng with the shields which he had cap
iured in battle, the corridors crowded with
admiring visitors who just wanted to see
him once, music and mirth and banqueting
filling all the mansion from tessellated floor
to pictured ceiling Naaman would have for
gotten that there was anything better and
would have been glad TO stay there 900
years. But, oh, how the shields dim, and
how the visitors fly the hall, and how the
music drops dead from the string, and how
the gates of the mansion slam shut with
sepuchral bang as you read the closing
words of the eulogium! "He was leper
He was a lsperw
There was one person more sympathetic
with General Naaman than any other per-
son. Naaman's wife walks the floor, wiring
ing her hands and trying to think what she
can do to alleviate her husbands suffering.
All remedies have failed. The surgeon gem
eral and the doctors of the royal staff have
met and they have shaken their heads, as
much as to say, mo cure, mo cure. | think
that the office seekers had all folded up their
recommendations and gone home. Probably
most of the employees OF the establishment
had dropped their work and were thinking
of looking for some other situation. What
shall now become Of poor Naaman's wife?
She must have sympathy somewhere. In
her despair she goes to little Hebrew cap
tive, a servant girl in her house, to whom
she tells the whole story, as sometimes,
when overborne by the sorrows of theworld
and finding no sympathy anywhere else, you
have gone out and found in the sympathy
OF some humble domestic-Rose or Dinah or
Brldget-a help which the world could not
give you.
What a scene it was-one of the grandest
women in all Syria in cabinet council with a
waiting maid over the declining health OF
the mighty general 81 know something, -
says the little captive maid, II know some
Oh, /,
the land from which was stolen there is a
certain prophet known by the name OF
Elisha, who can cure almost anything, and
/ shouldn't wonder if he could cure my
| master. Send for him right away" son
hush !" you say. "If the highest medical
talent in all the land cannot cure that leper,
there is no need of your listening to any talH
of a servant girl" But do not scott, do no
= sneer. The finger OF that little captive maiC
is pointing in the right direction. She nigh
have said: "This is a judgment upon you
: for stealing me from my native land. Didn'
they snatch me off in the night, breaking m,
fathers and mothers hearts, and many
time have lain and cried all night becaus
l was so homesck" Then. flushing u
) into childish indignation, she might nav
: said: "Good for them. I'm glad Naaman'
got the leprosy. wish all the Syrians haC
the leprosy." No. Forgetting her persona
, sorrows, she sympathizes with the suffering
of her master and commends him to thu
famous Hebrew prophet
+ And how often 1t is that the finger o
childhood has pointed grown persons in tn
right direction! o Christian soul, how lonj
is it since you got rid of the leprosy of sin
You say, LET me see. 1t must be five year
= now" Five years. Who was it that pointed
you to the Divine Physician? ooh, you
t say, ''it was my little Annie or Fred o
@ Charley that clamered up on my knees AM
0 looked into my lace and asked me why
l. didn't become a Christian, and, all tn
. time stroking my cheek, so l coul
not get angry, insisted upon knowing VIII
y didn't have family prayers" There ar
grandparents who have been brought t
, Christ by their little grandchildren. Their
Il are hundreds of Christian mothers who ha
their attention first called to Jesus by the
3 little children. How did you get rid OF th
" leprosy OF sin? How did you find your wa
to the Divine Physician? "0h," you sa!
/, tiny child nv diving child, with wa