Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1894-11-22
TABERNACLE PULPIT.
THE SICK GENERAL" AS A
SERMONS SUBJECT.
God Does Not Want This World to BE
Full of Happiness, Lest We Should
Want to Remain Here-The Sorrows
of Every Life.

Win pleurlS1eS or rheumatism or con-
sumption, but with disease worse
than all of these put together A red
mark has come out on the forehead,
precursor of complete Disagreement
and dissolution. / have something
awful to tell you. General Naaman, the
commander in chief of all the Syrian
forces, has the leprosy! 1t is on his
hands, on his face, on his feet, on his
entire person. The leprosy Get out
of the way of the pestilence! Ii its
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 his stirrup or the hostler who
blankets his charger. The news goes
like wildfre all through the realm,
and the people are sympathetic, and
they cry out: rs it possible that our
great hero, who slew Ahab and around
whom we came with such vociferatlon
when he returned from victorious
battle-can it be possible that our
grand and glorious Naaman has the
leprosy?" Yes. Everybody has some
thing he wishes he had not. David, an
Absalom to disgrace him; Paul, a
thorn to sting him; Job, carbuncles to
plague him; Samson, a Delilah to shear
him; Ahab, q Naboth to deny him;
Hannah, MOrdecai to irritate him;
George Washington, childlessness to
affiict him; John Wesley, termagant
wife to poster him; Leah, weak eyes;
Pope, a crooked back; Byron, club
foot; John Milton, blind eyes; Charles
Lamb, an insane sister; and you, and
you, and you, and 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 this pleasant So
ciety. We are only in the vestibule of
grand temple. God does not want us
to stay on the doorstep, and therefore
he sends aches, and annoyances, 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 rea-
son that Edward Payson and Rob-
ert Hall had more rapturous 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 one of
your pictures, it is only to show you Il
brighter one. If he sting your foot
with govt, your brain with neuralgia,
your tongue with an ineXtinguishable
thirst, it is only because he is prepar-
ing to substitute q better 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
General Naaman. something youdo not
want. Seated in his Syrian mansion,
all the walls glittering with the shields
which he had captured in battle; the
corridors crowded with admiring visit
ors, who just wanted to see him once,
music and mirth and banqueting fill
ing all the mansion from tessellated
floor to pictured ceiling, Naaman would
have forgotten that there was anything
better, and would have been glad to
stay there 10000 years. But o, how
the shields dim, and how the visitors
fly the hall, and how the music drops
dead from the string, and how the
Df hc melon clam ShItf with
sepulchral bang as you read the clos
ing words of the eulogium: ''He was
a leper! He was leper,'
There was one person more sympa-
thetic with General Naaman than any
other person. Naaman's wife walks
the floor, wringing her hands, and try
ing to think what she can do to allevi-
ate her husbands suffering. All RENE
dies have failed. The encouragement
and the doctors of the royal staff have
met, and they have shaken their heads,
as much as to say: mo cure; no cure. "
| think that the Office seekers had all
folded up their recommendations and
gone home. Probably most of the en-
ploves of the establishment had
dropped their work and were thinking
of looking for some other situation.
What shall now become of poor Naa-
mans wife? She must have sympathy
somewhere In her despair she goes
to a little Hebrew captive, servant
girl in her house, to whom she tells
the whole story; as sometimes, when
overborne by the sorrows of the world,
and finding no sympathy anywhere
else, you have gone out and found in
the sympathy of some humble domes-
tic-Rose, or Dinah, or Bridget-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! Il know something says
the little captive maid. II know some
thing" as she bounds to her bare feet
''In the land from which l was stolen
there is certain prophet known by
the name of Elisha, who can cure al
most anything, and shouldn't wonder
if he could cure my master. Send fol
him right away" 'Oh. hush!' yor
say. IF the highest medical talent il
all the land can not cure that lepel
there is no need of your listening t.
any talk of servant girl" But dc
not scott, do not sheer. The finger o