Fisherman & farmer. [volume] (Edenton, N.C.) 1887-19??, 1895-03-08
REV. DIR. TALMAGE,
SUNDAYS SERMON IN TIE NEW
YORK ACADEMY OF MUSIC
Subject: ga Snowy Day"

TEXT: HE went down aud slew lion in a.
PIT IN snowy day. Chronicles XII. %.
Have you ever heard of him? His name
was Benaiah. He was man Of stout muscle
and OF great avOirdupois. His father was a
nero, and he inherited prOwess, He was
aChletIc, and there was iron in his blood.
and the strongest bone in his BODY was back
bone He Is known for other wonders be-
sides that Of the text. An Egyptian five
chDitS In stature, or about seven feet nine
inches high, was moving around in bragga-
docio and fOurishing great spear. careless
rs to whom he killed, and Denaiah of my text.
with nothing but walking stick, came upon
MIN, snatched the spear from the Egyptian.
ana with ono thrust of its sharp edge put an
end to the blatant bully which makes us
thlhk OF the story In our Greek lesson. too
llhrd Tor as IL the smarter boy on the same
bench had not helped us out with it, in which
Hofatiu5 the Macedonian AID Dioxippus the
Ath2nian fought in the presence Of Alexan-
der. the MacedOnia1 arnpi with shield and
sword and iavelm and the Athenian with
nothing but club. The Macedonian hurled
the laycitn, bat the Athcnian successfully
lodged It, and the Ma .e11niar lifted the
st2t"3 Dnt the Athenjan With the club broke
it, AMI the Macedonian drew the sword but
ff2 Athenien ttipp3d him up before he could
strike with it. and then the Athenian with his
club would have beaten the life out of the
Maredonian, fallen among his useless
weapons, if AleXan Ter had not commanded
"StOr.l StOD!"
But Benaiah Of The text Is about to do
something that vii! eclipse even that. There
Is trouble il all tho neighbOrhOOd. Lambs
are carried of in the night. and children ven
TURNS: only a little way from their fathers
house are found mangled AMI dead. The
taet IS th9 lana was infested with lions, and
lew people dared meet one of these grizzly
baaS:s. much less corner or attack it. As a
good ProTidenr9 would have it, one morning
= fpOtSt9p oI iiDn was tracked in the snow
~ hau lc"1 out on its Gtvouring errani
thr@uSh the darkness, but at last it is found
hE the impression Of the four paws on the
vino" surface Of the ground which Way the
via beast came and which way it had gone
Pc"iI'u5 undertaking. but Donajah the hero
OF -" text, arms himself with such weapons
as those carly days afforded, gunpowder
having been invented in a far subsequent
century by the German monk Bertholdus
SchwarZ. Therefore without gun or any
kind of firearms Benaah of the text no
doubt depended on the sharp steel edge for
his own defense and the slaughter of the
lion as he followed the track through the
snow. II may have been q javelin; 1t may
have be III only a knife. But what Benaah
lacks in weapons he will make up in siren Str
of arm and skill of stroke. But where Is
the lion. We must not get off his track
in the snow. The land has many
ciSt@rn2, or pits. for catching rain, tho
rainfall being very scarce at certain seasons,
audience these ciSternS, or reservoirs, are
digged here and there and yoEder. Lions
have an instinct which seems 70 tell them
when t&ey are pursued. and this dread mon
ster OF which | speak retreats into one OF
these cisterns which happened to be free of
water and is there painting from the long run
and licking its jaws after repast Of human
flesh and after qGaff1ng the red vintage of
human blood.
Benaiah is all alert and comes cautiously
on toward the hiding place of this terror of
the fields. Coming to the verge of the pit, he
looks down at the lion, and the lion looks
up at him. What a moment it was when
their eyes clashed! But while modern Du
Chaillu, Gordon Cumming o. Sir Samuel
Baker or David Livingstone would have
just brought the gun to the shoulder, and
held the eye against the barrel, and
blazed away into the depths, and finished
the beast, Benaiah, with only the old
gets on level with the beast,
and so he jumps into the pit, and the lion,
with shining teeth Of rage and claws lifted to
tear to shreds the last veStige of human life,
springs for the man, while Banaiah springs
for the beast. But the quick stroke of the
steel edge flashed again and again and again
until the snow was no longer white and the
right foot Of triumphant Denaiah is half
covered with the tawny name of the slain
horror of Palestine
Now you see how emphatic and tragic
and tremendous are the words of my text,
He went down and slew lion in pit in a
snowy day" Why put that in the Bible?
Why put it twice in the Bible, once in the
book of Samuel and here in the book CT
| Chronicles? Oh, the practical lessons are so
| many for you aad fer me! What a cheer in
| this subject for all those of you who are in
| conjunction of hostile circumstances. Three
| things were against Benaiah Of my text
| in the moment Of combat, the snow that i'm
| pcded his movement. the pit that envtroned
| him in q small space, and the lion, with open
| Jaws and uplifted paw. And yet I hear the
| shout of Benaiah's victory. Oh, men and
| women of three troubles, you say, II could
stand Orc, and think I could stand two,
| but three are are least one too many"
| There is a man in business perplexity and
| who has sickness in his family, and old age
is coming on. Three troubles-a lion, a pit
| and snowy day. There is a good woman
with failing health and dissipated husband
and wayward boy-three troubles. There
| is n young man, salary cut down, bad
| cough, frowninS future-three troubles.
| There is q maiden with difficult school
| lessons she cannot get, a face that is not
attractive as some of her schOOlmates. a
| prospect that through hard times she must
| quit school before she grsduates-three trOu-
| blcs. There is an author. his manuscript re-
| iected. his power OF Origination in decadence,
| a numbness in forefnger and thumb, which
| threatens paralysis-three troubles. There
| is n reporter of fine taste sent to report a
pugiiism instead of an OratOriO, the copy
| he hands IN rejected because the paper
| is full, a mother to support on small
| income-three troubles. 1 could march
| right off these seats and across this platform,
| if they would come at my call. 500 people
with three troubles This Is the opportunity
| to play the hero or the heroine, not on Il
small stage. with few hundred people to
| clap theiE approval, but with all the galleries
| of heaven filled with sympathetic and ap-
plauding spectators, for we are surrounded
| by great cloud of witnesses" My brother,
M father mother. what
| chance YOU have! While you are in the
| struggle. if you only have the grace of
| Christ to listen, a voice parts the
heavens SAYING my g, grace .i Is Sa sufficient
| eneth - You shall be more than conquerors.'
| And that reminds me of letter on my table
| written by some one whom suppOsetO be at
| this moment present, saying, my dear, dear
| doctor, you will please pardon the writer Tor
asking that at some time when you feel like
| 1t YOU kindly preach from the thirtieth
Psalm fifth verse, Weeping may endure for
| night, but Joy cometh in the morning, and
much oblige downtown business man.
| So to all downtown business men and to
| all uptown business men say: you have
on hand goods that you cannot sell and
! debtors who will not or cannot pay, and you
| are also suffering from uncertainty as to
what the imbecile American Congress Will do
J about the tariff. you have three troubles, and
enough to bring YOU within the range or the
consolation of my text, where you find the
triumph of Benaiah over lion, and pit
| and a snowy day. If you have only one
| trouble cannot spend any time with you
| to-day. You must have at least three,
| and then remember how many have tri-
umphcd over such triad of misfortune.
Paul had three troubles: Sanhedrin de-
nouncing him-that was one great trouble;
| physical inf1rnity, which he called "a thorn
| In the flesh" and although we know not what
| the thorn was. we do know from the figure
| he used that it must have been something
that stuck him-that was the second trouble;
| approaching martyrdom-that made the three :
| tr6ubles. Yet hear what he say, 'If had
only one misfortune, I could stand that, but
| three are two too many?' No. 1misinterpret