Cherokee scout. [volume] (Murphy, N.C.) 188?-1961, 1895-09-10
REV. DIR. TALMAGE.
THE NOTED DIVINE's SUNDAY
DISCOURSE.
Subject: ..rhe chieftain."


Him from the Bethlehem sky was only rati.
hcation OF the finger of prophecy, the finger
OF genealogys the finger of chronology. the
finger OF eyents-alI five fingers pointing in
one direction. Christ is the oyertoppino
ftgure'of all time. He is the 'tvox humarla"
in all music, the graeefulest line in all
sculpture, the most exquisite mingIiDg OF
lights and shades in all painting, the acme
of all climaxes. 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 10 the first letter and the Iastietter the AL
pba- and the Omega. He appropriated to Him.
5 self all the splendors that you can spell out
either with those two letters or all the let
ters 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 It means that after You have piled
up all Alpine and Hiinalayan attitudes. the
glory of Christ would have to spread IFS
wings and descend thousand leagues to
touch those SUBMITS. Pelion. a high inoup-
tain of Thessaly: 0ssa. n high mountain,
and Olympus. a high mountain; but mythoI-
ogy tells usgwhen the giants warred against
the gods they piled up those three noun
tains, and from the top of them proposed to
scale the heavens; hat the height was not
greatenougb, and there was complete fail
ure. And after all the giants-IsaiaS and
Paul; prophetic and apostolic giants; Raj PHI
ael and Michael Angelo. artistic giants;
cherubfm and seraphim and hrchangeI. ce.
lestial giants-have failed to climb to thetop
of Christ's glory they might all we'll unite In
the words of Paul. and cry out, "Above
all!'' "Above alTl'' But Solomon in nv
text prefers to call Christ "the Chieftain,''
and so to-day hail Him.
First. Christ must be chief in our preach
ing. There are so many books on homiIe-
tics scattered through the country that all
laymen, as we'll as all clergymen, have made
uD their minds what sermons ought to be.
That sermon is the most -effectual which
most pointediy 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 exhor4
tation or discourse have frequent mention
of justification, sanctification, covenant of
works and covenant of grace, therefore it
must be profoundly evangelical. while they
are suspicious of a discourse which presents
the same truth, but under different phrase
| ology. Now, say there is nothing in all
the orulent realm of Anglo-Saxonism of all
the word treasures that we inherited from
the Latin and the Greek and the Indo-Euro-
pean, but we have a right to marshal It In
religious discussion. Christ sets the exam
pie. His illustrations were from the grass,
the flowers, the barnyard fowl. the crystals
OF salt, as we'll as from the seas and the stars:
and we do not propose in our Sunday-schoel
teaching and in our pulpit address to be put
on the limits.
know that there is great deaf said in
| our day against words, as though they were
| nothing. 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 stonH?
| Words. What did Christ utter on Mount
| Olivet? Words. Out of what did Christ
\ no fho iuo OFF off Io
| universe? Out of words. 'Let there be
| light" and light 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, in your refornatory 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
| a few old words to death, When there is such
! illimitable resource. Shakespeare employed
| 1900 different words for dramatic purposes;
i Milton Employed 1000 different words for
1 poetic s8Nrposes; Rufus Choate employed
| over Il 600 different words for legal pur.
| loses, 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 oil
Christ, we are going to take the tenderest
| phraseology wherever we find it, and If il
| haSnever been used in that direction before
| all the more shall we useit. When we come
to speak of the glory.of Christ the conquer
i or, we are going to draw our SMILES from
triumphal arch and oratorio and everything
grand and stupendeus. The French navy
have eighteen flags by which they give sig
nal, but those eighteen flags they can put
into &C, 600 different combinations. And
have to tell YOU that these standards of the
cross may be, lifted into combinations infinite
and varietiSseverlasti And let me say t.
the young men who come from the theologi
/ cal seIninarieS into our services, and are afte
| awhile going to preach Jesus Christ, you will
have the largest liberty and unlimited re
source. You only have to present Christ il
Il your-own way.
Brighter than the light, fresher than tn
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. Kindling pulpits witt
their fire, and producing revolutions will
their power, lighting up dying beds wit
their glory, they. are the sweetest though
for the poet. and they are the most thrilling
Illustration for the orator, an they offer tn
most intense scene for the artist, and the.
are to the ambassador of the sky all enthu
siasn. Complete pardon for direst guilt
Sweetest comfort for ghasttiest agony
Brightest hope for grimmest death. Grand
est Resurrection for darkest sepulcher. Oh
what gospel to preach! Christ tn
Chief. His birth, His suffering, His mir
acles. His parallels. His sweat, His tears, Hi
blood, His atonement. His intercession-
glorious themes! Do we exercise faith
Christ is its, object. Do we love2 1t fasten!
on Jesus. Have we d fondness for thu
| church? 1t is because Christ die1 for it
Have we hope OF heaven? 1t Is because
Jesus went there, the herald and the fore
runner. The royal robe of Demetrius wa
so costly, so beautiful that after he had pu
u hnf
4 robe OF Christ, richer than that, the peares
and the weakest, and the worst may wear
where sin abounded, grace may much
more abound.
.sOh, my sins, my sinsr' said Martin Luthe
to Staupitz, my sins. my SINS" The fact
that the brawny German student had foun
| Latin Bible that made him quake, an
4 nothing else ever did make him quake, an
when he found how, through Christ, he wa
pardoGed and saved he wrote to a friend
saying. "Come over and join us great an
awful sinners saved by the grace of Cos
| You seem TO he only slender sinner. an
you don't much extol the mercy OF God, bl
we that have been such very awful sinner
have been redeemed. Can it be that 70
are SO desperately egotistical that yo
feel yourself in first rate spiritual trim
and that from the root OF the hair to til
| tip of the toe you are scarlesS and IN
maculate? What you need is lookin
glass, and here it is in the Bible. POI
ard wretched and miserable AMI blind an
naked from the crown of the head to tt
sole OF the foot. full of wounds and putrefy
ing sores. No health in us. AMI then TAX
the fact that Christ gathered up all tn
i notes against us and paid them and then o
fered us the receipt! And how much "
need Him in our sorrows We are tndeper
Il dent OF circa;nss ances Il we have His graef
Why. He mada Paul sing in the dungeon
aud unsler that grace st. John from desolat
Patmes heard the blast OF the apocalyti
/ trumpets After all other can1Ies hay
been snuffed out, this is the light thai get