The herald., 1895-05-06
Powerful Sermon Read Yester-
day by Rev. Heron
BRILLIANTLY EPIGRAMMATIC
Logical and Full of New Thoughts Well
and Clearly Put
In the Divine Sense of the Term Jesus
Christ Was Man of
the World

pOWcT1ul Ndo tSCAiiAS WIN
epigrams yesterday morning before the
First Presbyterian church congregation
in Illinois hail. Every seat was filed and
the same answering and interested at
tention that his lectures last week were
accorded was again his yesterday morn
ing. Mr. Heron calls his sermon The
Revelation of Life. and his text was Mat
thew Sd, 18th to 18th verses:
Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to
to the Jordan unto John to be baptized
Of him. But John would have hindered
him, saying: | have need TO be baptized
of thee, and comest thou to me? But
Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer it
now, for thus it becometh us TO fulfill all
righteousness. Then he suffered him.
And Jesus, when he was baptized, went
up straghtway from the water. and To-
the heavens were opened unto him. and
he saw the spirit OF God descending as
dove, and coming upon him, and 10. a
voice out of the heavens saying, This is
my beloved son in whom | am well
pleased"
Mr.. Heron opened his sermon by say
ing that Jesus came down to the Jordan
TO be baptized OF John i'll obedience to an
overpowering impulse 10 righteousness.
Although he had felt the burning of di
vine fires in his soul; while his heart
shook with matchess purposes he did
not know himself to be the Christ of
God. Without the haste that springs
from fear. never taking his life into his
own hands, he faithfully followed his dI
vine instincts. His knowledge grew and
his life enlarged by his always being
true to the best he knew.
Jesus habit of mind might be truly
called scientific. He certainly appealed
frosn phenomena to reality; from appar
ent to observable facts, to facts seen
and substantial. His moral ntellig ligence
told him that the reformation of the bap
tism was from God. While walking the
path of duty, by opening his life to all
the good he saw and knew. by unques-
tioning obedience to his divine impulses.
he made his way through tradition to the
hidden sources OF life in God.
By living out all the life there was in
him. refusing to be subject to usurp.ng
customs and unvital opinions or crushed
by the unbelief of the church ~ the
moral ignorance of the politics uf his
nation. his finite life passed over into the
infinite. and he knew himself to be the
Son of God and the Savior of man. The
revelation of his life, the discovery of his
exhaustless spiritual resources, the knowl-
edge of his world mission, came upon
him through his surrender to the full
measure of all known truth.
Through perfect obedience the divinity
of his nature unfolded and he entered the
upon himself the power of a faultless
faith. Apart from this obedience Jesus
would not have known himself, and
could not have been the Christ. He be-
came the Christ because he fulfilled all
righteousness.
The revelation of life is always through
obedience to the best one knows. No
man knows for how much he is good
until he has opened his life to be filed
full OF righteousness. Until the reincar-
nr ca1f tGo o,f+ /,
for the love of man, has been completed
one knows little of the possibilities of his
nature.
The penalty of disobedience is spiritual
blindness. The greatness of a human
life, its vision of God and its grasp upon
eternal realities. will be according to the
measure of its surrender to the commands
Of the word of God that dwells and speaks
within.
The realities of our humanity even in
the flesh are yet unknown deep hidden
beneath our seltishness, undOne by di be-
dience, overloaded by unbelief
The development of the race. the un-
folding of its intellectual possibilities, it's
physical redemption and perfection. the
discovery of it's exhaustless moral re-
sources. can proceed upon no other
ground than obedience to the will OF
God. Even the material development of
the earth waiting for one revelation
OF the divinity of our human nature.
Material resources are yet largely un-
known and crudely used. The face of
nature changes with the moral progress
of man. The discoveries of science are
de endent on spiritual faith. The
achievements of the intellect are the tri-
umphs of moral impulses. Our eternal
life struggle without rest to get free from
its wrappings of sense, time and fear.
There are unlived lives of greatness in
every man. Dsobeved divine impulses
still strive with our weakness and fear.
Eternal voices bid us no more suppress.
but live out the life within us. Scorned
nobilGies and shamed purities struggle
to put forth their beauty and power. We
shall not be satisfied un il we awake from
moral childhood, from all spiritual dark
ness, into the likeness or the Christ who
is the revelation of our yet unmanifested
life.
The revelation of life is by the spirit.
Life is spirit, and spirit is life. God is
spirit and man is spirit In so far as one
existence and activity are not spiritual,
they are not life.
1t is through the unity of man with
God the oneness of his will with the will
of righteousness that his human po wers
discover their source IN God and leap
forth to do the work of God.
The speaker here referred to those un-
lettered fishermen, the apostles. and the
effect upon them of the Holy Ghost; ard
to the Gospel of John, one OF those fisher
men, as the greatest work of art in the
worlds literature.
Religion is the entire man alive in God
our life, which is the Christ within us,
is realized by opening all its approaches
and senses to the life of God. The
purpose of creation. the work of redemp- |
tion, the end of all life, is the abode OF
God In every SOUL Christ, Himself, is
the revelation of one human life. Jesus |
Christ was the absolute man-God' S eter- |
nal ideal of manhood.
In the divine sense of the term He was |
above all men, man of the world. |
complete human manhood was His. He |
was not a religious sentmentalist !
pietlstic dreamer; III was the leader of |
Others because He was perfect m master of |
Himself He was the revelation of the
man that is being made out of mne in
their experience of failure and triumph,
sorrow and Joy.
The Christ life in man is the hidden
mystery that is being brought to light by
the crises of time. The changes and
epochs of history are bu. the processes
by which man is being Christ-made-n
i'll any individual freedom. but in the
Unity of the race with Christ as it's head !
in the future of one race.
The revelation OF our life is in awaken
ing to the consciousness of one sonship
in God. To come to the knowledge that
we are sons of God. ana to abide in the
light and strength of that knowledge. is
to pass from the finite to the infinite.