The Norfolk Virginian. [volume] (Norfolk, Va.) 186?-189?, 1896-05-24

fs,fee'.sermons comprising Symposium
OF immortality" to be followed from time
itte time by other short symposiums up
&on practical themes OF everyday reli-
gson. Next weeks sermon, The Prac-
n tical Everyday Value OF a Belief in Inn
3 mortality Will be by Rev. George l..
: Perrin. ID. D.. OF Boston.
!. by EDWARD EVERETT HALE, u. d.
d fPastor South Congregational Church.
Boston.)
II am come that they might have life,
and that they might have 1t more album
dainty John X, 10.
When we speak of the Saviour as the
\ lord of Life. people are apt to think OF
4 him as the lord of n heavenly life, after
4 these bodies have been cast away. But
y the truth Is that he was not only re-
4 vealing life after death-his hope and
q EFFORT were to enlarge the life OF men
3 IN this world to-day.
It is quite worth the readers while to
y take down his Testament and read the
remarkable series of parallels which he
y sdevoted to this single subject. to the
sSyalue of life. And any one who cares
4 TO study the motive power in the world
: to-day will find that infinite life gives
I that power. Your grain of mustard seed
p Is worthless until there is life within.
ass The leaven which the woman puts in
! les bread would be worthless IL each
s6dIcp OF the lcaVen did not. contain q
million living germs within. II Is for
4 such parallels thatihe Saviour Is search
ing all the time. 1t Is because he can
Y not quicken these hearers by enough
= such parallels that he says, "Whereunto
Z shall 1 liken the kingdom of Heaven %
I Here are people who think, just as we
are apt to think, that the right thing
VIII come IL there Is a large majority
or IL there Is money enough, or If there
ars the right clothes, or II there Is an
army in uniform.
They are thinking all the time that the
outside Is what must be changed Jesus
Christ is here in the world to show us
4 tina what the world wants is life. II is
the inside that is to be changed There
3 Is to be a living seed Instead of q dead
3 speck. There Is TO be loaf of bread,
all quickened and alive with the sim
y mering yeast where there was nothing
but the heavy dough sunk in the bot
tom OF the pan. The world is to take
up Its bed and walk because It is alive
The disciples are to do greater things
than they have ever seen or heard OF,
pecause they are to have new life
And If he can find any parable small
, or large. which shall fix that idea In
their memories. why, he has attained
\ the optect OF his going and of his COM
ing, OF his llving-nay, and of his dying
me world feels every Easter morning
mat the great parable of all Is the par
able OF history. This world OF 1896 Is
20 dineren't from that world that we
wonder that we can read their language
a or that the forms of the statues OF men
ana women are the same. All society Is
now alive, and 1t is compared with a
social order then so dead. The beggar
boy works n miracle in the street to day
sat which the wisest physicist at the
Z court OF Augustus would have wondered
q AND all this Is not from any organ izn-
ton which Jesus Christ established. II
{ is not from any square intellectual les
gon that he taught. 1t Is from the life
\ porn into the world when these men
T. snd women went about his business.
Ihatlife has been caught from the con-
tagion of their lives, and in the moment
that they began to go and come thus
senltVened, why the world, without know
ing 1t. began to breathe with a new
. breath and to live in a new being. Is II
& harusto imagine a group of them, like
( those two disciples. for instance, of
Wnoin Luke tells the story, who walked
and were sad on the evening before
Z Easter?
Is 1t hard to imagine group of them
8 turning their backs on Jerusalem and
ready 70 curse 1t for the horror of Fri
Jay, VINO, on their way. If you please
70 the old farm at Main or Cana or
Bethsaida. asked each other IL they
\ really meant to fall back on that old
dead existence OF crusts and cool,inp
4 and sleeping and digging and delving.
j. only a year ago and they were living
\ with as much motive as the cattle and
i with no more IT was for food, IL YOU
please, for better food than they had
siast week. 1t was for drink, IL Won
i please. drink earned with less toll than
last week. But it was the dead going
= and coming of beast going to the mas.
) ture, lying under the shade. sleeninr
when 1t was time to sleep, and waking
when he could sleep no more. And
now! why. I have been walking with
him for weeks and months Not a. night
when 1 went to bed have not thanl,ed
God for some word that he spoke, or for
some deed that he did. Perhaps he tool,
my hand as we went through the corn
: fields. perhaps he pointed out to me the
s me OF the sea as we sat together at
supper time on the hillside. Or he sent
That pleasant message. message of in
\ mite truth and infinite love, to my
Y mother. Or he gave me those little
stories which he had written down.
which might put in the hands of those
who were at home.
Not a week but have been living on
this infinite food given me by the we'll
I beloved son Of God. as he made of the
lanes of GaHlee a present heaven. Am
going back from this luxury OF real
life. from life exalted thus, and made
divine, to that humdrum Of my old be-
Ing Not I. am going about his bust
ness. From this hour forward I will
segter into his work as he said to me
You remember what he said to that
young gentleman Of great possessions !?
! tFollow me-, he said; and l will follow
zhlnl, going and coming here as IL I