The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1894-05-04

whole choirs Of music along the silent
galleries of a deaf ear; and giving
healthful nervous system to catalepticsl
Sympathy! he did not give them
stoieal advice, or philosophise about
the science Of grief. He sat down and
cried with them.
It is spoken of as the shortest verse
in the Bible, but to me it is about the
longest and grandest-''Jesus wept T"
Ahl many of us know the meaning OF
that. When we were in great trouble,
some one came in with voluble conso.
lation and quoted the Scripture in a
sort of heartless way, and did not help
us at all. But after awhile some one
else came in, and without saving a
word sat down and burst into food
of tears at the sight of our woe, and
somehow it helped us right away.
"Jesus wept" ''You see, it was a
deeply y-attached household, that Of
Mary, and Martha, and Lazarus. The
father and mother were dead, and the
girls depended on their brother. Lag
arus had said to them: "Now Mary,
now Martha, stop your worrying.
will take care of you. / will be to you
both father and mother. My arm is
| strong. Girls, you can depend on mel"
But now Lazarus was sick; yea,
Lazarus was dead. All broken up, the
sisters disconsolate, and there is a
knock at the door. "Corle In" says
Martha. "Come in" says Mary. Christ
entered, and lie just broke down. 1t
was too much for Him. He had been
so often and so kindly entertained in
that home, before sickness and death
| devastated it, that He choked up and
sobbed aloud, and the tears triekled
down the sad face of the sympathetic
Christ. "Jesus wept." Why do you
not try that mode of helping? You
say: II am a man of few words" or
81 am a woman of few words" Why,
you dear soul, words are not necessary.
Initiate your Lord, and go to those af.
fiicted homes and cry with them.
Do you wonder that the story of His
selt-sacrifice has led hundreds of thou
sands to die for Him? In one series of
prosecutions over two hundred thou
sand were put to death for Christ's
sake. For Him Blandina was tied to a
post and wild beasts were let out upon
her, and when life continued after the
attack of tooth and paw, she was put
in a net, and that net containing
her was thrown to a wild bull,
that tossed her with its horns
till life was extinct. All for Christi
Huguenots dying for Christ! Al
bigenses dying for Christi The Vau-
dois dying for Christi Smithfield fires
endured for Christ! The bones of mar
tyrs, if disturbed. would make a path
of moldering life all around the earth.
The loveliness of the Saviour's sacrifice
has inspired all the heroisms, and all
the martyrdoms OF subsequent CEN
turies. Christ has had more men and
women die for Him than all the other
inhabitants of all the ages have had
die for them.
Furthermore, He was lovely in His
sermons. He knew when to begin,
when to stop, and just what to say.
The longest sermon He ever preached,
so far as the Bible reports Him, name
ly, the Sermon on the Mount, was
about sixteen minutes in delivery at
the ordinary rate of speech. His
longest prayer reported, commonly
called "The Lords Prayer" was about
half minute. Time them by your
own watch and you will find my esti-
mate accurate. BY which do not mean
TO say that sermons ought to be only
sixteen minutes long and prayers only
balf a minute long. Christ had such
infinite power of compression that He
put enough into His ssixteen-minute SER
mon and His half-minute prayer to keep
all the following ages busy in thought
and action. No one but Christ could
afford to pray or preach as short as
that, but He meant to teach us com
preston.
Oh, that we might all have some
thing of the great German reformer's
love for this Christ, which led him to
say: eff anyone knocks at the door of
my breast and says, who lives there?'
my reply is, Jesus Christ lives here,
not Martin Luther" Will it not
be grand if when we get through this
short and rugged road of life we can
go right up into His presence and live
with Him world without end? And
if, entering the gate of that heavenly
city we should be so overwhelmed
with our unworthiness on the one side
and the supernal spendor on the other
side, we get little bewildered and
should for few moments be lost on
the streets of gold and among the
FURNISHED temples, and the sap
phire thrones, there would be
plenty to show US the way, and
take us out of our joyful be-
wilderment; and perhaps the woman
of Main would say: Come, let me take
you to the Christ that raised my only
boy to life.'' And Martha would say:
"Come, let me take you to the Christ
who brought up my brother Laz-
arus from the tomb" And one
of the disciples would say: 'Come,
let me take you to the Christ
who saved our sinking ship in
the hurricane on Gennesaret." And
Paul would say: "Come, and let me
lead you to the Christ for whom I died
on the road to Ostia." And whole
groups of martyrs would say: "Come,
let us show you the Christ for whom we
ratified the chains, and waded the floods,
and dared the fires" And our own
glorifed kindred would flock around
US. saying: I'VE have been waiting a
good while for you, but before we talk
over old times, and we tell you of-what
we have enjoyed since we have been
here, and you tell us of what
you have suffered since we part
ed. come, come, and let as
show you the greatest sight in all
the place, the most resplendent throne,
and upon it the mightiest Conqueror,
the Exaltation of Heaven, the Theme
of the immortals, the Altogether
great, the Altogether-good, the Alto
gether-fair. the Altogether-iovelyl