Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1895-09-11
REV. DIR. TAIMAGE.
SUNDAYS DISCOURSE BY .THF
NOTED DIVINE.
Subject: "The Chieftain."

TEXT. "The chiefest among ten thou.
sand. ."-Canticles ", 10.
The most conspicuous character of histor.
steps out upon the platform. The finger
which, diamond with light, pointed down tc
Him from the Bethlehem skv was only rati.
fication of the finger of prophecy, the finger
of genealogy, the finger of chronology, the
finger of events-all five fingers pointing in
one direction. Christ is the overtoppine
figure of all time. He is the ''vox humana"
In all music, the gracefulest line in all
sculpture, the most exquisite minglinc OF
lights and shades in all painting. the acme
of all clmaxes. the dome of all cathedraled
grandeur and the peroration of all language.
The Greek alphabet is made up of twenty
four letters. and when Christ compared Him
self to the first letter and the last letter the Al
pha andthe Omega. He appropriated to Him
self all the splendors that you can spell out
either with those two letters or all the let
tiers between them. 81 am the Alpha and
the Omega, the beginning and the end"
What does that Scripture mean which says
of Christ. ''He that cometh from above is
above alp 1t means that after you have piled
up all Alpine and Himalayan attitudes, the
glory of Christ would have TO spread its
wings and descend a thousand leagues to
touch those SUBMITS. Pelion. a high noun
tain of Thessaly: Ossa. a high mountain,
and Olympus. high mountain; but mythol-
the gods they piled up those three noun
tains, and from the top of them proposed to
scale the heavens; but the height was not
great enough. and there was n complete fail
ure. And after all tine giants-Isaiah and
Paul, prophetic and apostolic giants; Raph-
ael and Michael Angelo. artistic giants;
cherubim and seraphim and archangel. ce-
lestial giants-have failed to climb to the top
Of Chrst's glory they might all well unite in
the words of Paul. and cry out, "Above
air. "Above air. But Solomon in nv
text prefers to call Christ "the Chieftain,"
and so today hail Him.
First, Christ must be chief in our preach
ing. There are many books on homiie-
lies scattered through the country that all
iaymen, as well as all clergymen, have made
up their minds what sermons ought to be.
That sermon is the most effectual which
most pointedly puts forth Christ as the par
don of all sin and the correction of all evil
individual. social. political. national. There
is no reason why we should ring the
endless changes on few phrases.
There are those who think that if an eXhor-
iation or a discourse have frequent mention
Of justification. sanctificatiOn. covenant of
works and covenant of grace. therefore it
must he profoundly evangelical. while they
are suspicious of discourse which presents
the same truth. but under different phrase
ology. Now l say there is nothing in all
the Opulent realm of Auglo-SayOnism; of all
the word treasures that we inherited from
the Latin and the Greek and the Indo-Euro-
pean, but we have n right to marshal it in
.eligious discussion. Christ sets the exam
pie. His illustrations We're from the grass
he flowers. the barnyard fowl. the crystals
# salt as well as from the seas and the stars;
and we do not propose in our Sunday-schoOl
:eaching and in our pulpit address to be put
IN the limits.
] know that there is great deal said in
lay against words tnDuvh thpy
lothing. They may be misused. but they
have an imperial power. They are the
bridge between soul and soul. between
Almighty God and the human race. What
did God write upon the tables of stone?
Words. What did Christ utter on Mount
0livet? Words. Out of what did Christ
| strike the spark for the illumination of the
universe? Out of words. Let there be
light" and licht was. OF course thought
| Is the cargo and words are only the
| ship. but how fast would your cargo get
| on without the ship? What you need my
| friends. in all your work. in your Sab
| bath-school class. i'll your refOrmatory insti-
tutions. and what we all need, is to enlarge
| our vocabulary when we come to speak
| about God and Christ and heaven. We ride
| 4 few old words to death. when there is such
| IlimtabIe resource. Shakespeare employed
| l5 900 different words for dramatic purposes
| Milton employed 5000 different words for
| poetic purposes: Rufus Choate employed
| over H. 900 different words for legal pur-
| poses. but the most of us have less than a
thousand words that we can manage, and
| that makes us so stupid
When we come to set forth the love o,
| Christ. we are going TO take the tenderes'
| phraseology whereyer we find it. and if il
| has never been used in that direction before
| NIL the more stall useit. When we come
to speak of the glory of Christ the conquer
or, we are going to draw our SMILES from
| Itriumphal arch and oratorio and everything
grand and stupendous. The French navy
have eighteen flags by which they give sig,
nal, but those eighteen flags they can pu
i into ct 900 different combinations. And
| have to tell you that these standards of the
| cross may he lifted into combinations infinite
| and varieties everlasting. And let me say Il
| he young men who come from the theologi
| .a seminaries into our services, and are afte
| awhile going to preach Jesus Christ, you vii
| lave the largest liberty and unlimited re
| ,ource. You only have to present Christ il
| Iour own way.
Brighter than the light, fresher than th'
fountains, deeper than the seas, are all thes
/ gospel themes. Song has no melody, flow
ers no sweetness. sunset sky no color com
pared with these glorious themes. Thes
harvests of grace spring up quicker than w
can sickle them. Kinding pulpits will
their fire, and producing revolutions Will
their power, lighting up dying beds will
thelr glory, tney are IHt SWetltSt
for the poet and they are the most thrillin;
ILLUSTRATION for the orator. and they offer tn
most intense scene for the artist, and the,
are to the ambassador of the sky all enthu
siasm. Complete pardon for direst guilt
lSweetest comfort for ghastliest agony
brightest hope for grimmest death. Grand
est resurrection for darkest sepuIcher. Oh
what Il gospel to preach! Christ tn
IChief. His birth, His suffering, His mir
IHcles. His parallels, His sweat. HIS tears. Hi
blood, His atonement. His sintercession-wha
GLORIOUS themesl Do we exercise faith
Christ is its object. Do we love? 1t fasten
lon Jesus Have we fon6ness for tn
church? 1t is because Christ died for il
Have we a hope of heaven? 1t Is becaus
Jesus went there, the herald and the fore
Irunner. The royal robe of Demetrius wa
so costly so beautiful, that after he had pu
it off no one ever dared to put it on, but thi
robe of Christ, richer than that, the poores
and the weakest, and the worst may wear
I"Where sin abounded, grace may nue.
more abound"
..Oh, my SINS my sinsv' said Martin Luthe
20 StaupitZ, my sins. my sins!' The fact
that the brawny German student had foun
a Latin Bible that made him quake, an
nothing else ever did make him quake, an
| when he found how, through Christ, he wa
| pardoned and saved he wrote to u frien,
| saving. "Come over and join us great an
| awful sinners saved by the grace of Go,
You seem to be only slender sinner, an
you don't much extol the mercy Of God, bi
we that have been such very awful slime
praise His Grace the more now that v
have been redeemed" Can it be that yo
are so desperately egotistical that yo
feel yourself in first rate spiritual trir
and that from the root of the hair to Il
tip of the toe you are scarless and II
. maculate? What you need is a lookir
glass, and here it is in the Bible. Po
and wretched and miserable and blind an
naked from the crown Of the head to t
| sole of the foot, full of wounds and putref
ing sores. No health in us. And then ia
the fact that Christ gathered up all t
notes against us and paid them and then {
tered us the receipt! And how much
aeed Him in OUR sorrows! We are fndepe
dent of circumstances if we have His graz
Why, He made Paul sing in the dun2et
and under that grace st. John from desols
Patmos heard the blast of the apocaly
! trumpets. After all other candles ha
- been snuffed out, this is the light that g
brighter and brighter unto the perfect dt
and after, under the hard hoofs OF caiami
, l oil the nooIs of worldly endowment ha