Decorah public opinion. (Decorah, Winneshiek County [Iowa]) 1895-1928, 1896-09-29
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4 Dr.. TaImage's Sermon. :
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CLARION note Oh THIS sermon, uSiifSieo
at the national capital, could sound
through Christendom, it would give
everything good a new start. DR.. Tai
IMAGES text was Romans, 1872: The
day is at hand"
Back from the mountains and the
seaside, and the springs, and The farm
house, your cheeks brouzed and your
spirits lighted, / hail you home again
with the words of Gehazi to the Shu-
nammite: lis IL we'll with thee? is
it well with thy husband? is 1t well
with the child?" On some faces | see
the mark of recent grief, but all along
the track of tears / see the story or
resurrection and reunion when all
tears are done; the deep ploughing OF
the keel, followed by the fash OF the
phosphorescence. Now that have asked
you in regard to your welfare, you nat
urally ask how am. Very we'll, thank
you. Whether it was the bracing air
Of the mountains, or bath in the SURF
Of Long Island beach, or whether 1t is
the JOY of standing in this great group
Cf warm-hearted friends, or whether
It is new appreciation of the goodness
Of God, l cannot tell. | simply know
1 am happy. 1t was said that John
Moffatt, the great Methodist preacher,
occasionally got fast in his sermon, and
to extricate himself would cry Halle
iujahw l am in no such predicament
to-day, but am full of the same rhap-
Sodic ejaculation Starting out TINS
morning on a new ecclesiastical year.
/ want to give you the keynote of my
next twelve months ministry. | want
to set it to the tunes of Antioch.
ariel" and Coronation" l want to
put a new trumpet stop into my SER
mons. We do wrong If we allow our
personal sorrows to interfere with the
glorious fact that the kingdom is COM
ing. We are wicked IL We allow appre-
hension of national disaster to put
down our faith in God and in the mis-
sion of our American people. The God
who hath been on the side of this ma
ton since the Fourth OF July, lfi6,
will see to it that this nation shall not
commit suicide on November Sd, 1896.
BY the time the unparalleled harvests
of this summer get down to the sea-
board we shall be standing in a sun
burst OF national prosperity that VIII
paralyze the pessimists who by their
evil prophecies are disappearing the
God who hath blest this nation as ne
hath blest no other.
In all our Christian work you and
want more of the element of gladness.
No man had a right to say that Christ
never laughed. Do you suppose that he
was glum at the wedding in Cana Of
Galilee? Do you suppose that Christ was
unresponsive when the children clam
bered over his knee and shoulder at
his own invitation? Do you suppose
that the Evangelist meant nothing
when he said of Christ: He rejoiced
in spirit?" Do you believe that the
- Divine Christ who pours all the waters
over the rocks at Vernal Falls, Yo-
semitic. does not believe in the sparkle
and gallon and tumultuous JOY and
rusing captures of human life? / be-
iieve not only that the morning laughs,
and that the mountains laugh, and
that the seas laugh, and that the cas-
cades laugh. but that Christ laughed.
Moreover. take a laugh and tear into
an alembic and assay them, and test
them. and analyze them, and you VIII
often find as much Of the pure gold or
religion IN a laugh as in tear. Deep
spiritual joy always shows itself IN IA
cial illumination. John Wesley SAID
he was sure of a good religious i'm
preston being produced because OF
what he calls the great gladness he saw
among the people. Goddess merriment
is blasphemy anywhere, but expression
of Christian joy is appropriate every
where.
Moreover, the outlook OF the world
nught to stir us to gladness. Asfron-
omers disturbed many people by telling
them that there was danger Of stellar
collision. We were told by these as
tronomers that there are worlds com
ing very near together, and that we
shall have plaques, and wars, and tu-
mults and perhaps the worlds destruc-
tion Do not be scared. If you have
aver stood at railroad center, where
ten. or twenty, or thirty rail tracks
cross each other. and seen that by the
movement of the switch one or two
inches the train shoots this way and
that without colliding, then you may
understand how fifty worlds may come
within an inch of disaster, and that
inch be as good as million miles. II
a human switch-tender can shoot the
trains this way and that without harm,
cannot the hand that for thousands OF
years has upheld the universe, keep
orr little world out of harms way?
Christian biologists tell us that this
world was millions of years in build
ing. Well, now, / do not think God
would take millions OF years to build
house which was to last only six
thousand years. There is nothing in
the world or outside the world, terres-
trial or astronomical, to excite dismay.
| wish that some stout gospel breeze
might scatter all the malaria of hui
man foreboding. The sun rose this
morning at about six o'clock, and 1
think that is just about the hour in
the worlds history. THE day is at
hand"
The first ray of the dawn ] see in
the gradual substitution of diplomatic
skill for human butchery. Within the
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