Connecticut western news., 1897-11-25

Deen no sorrow anu WuSIe tncrS hha been no death, but she found none She went back to the god Veda and said a My mission is a failure. You see, haven't brought the mustard seed. l can't find place where there has been no sorrow and no death. " "Oh, says the god Veda, understand. your sor- rows are no worse than the sorrows of others. We all have our griefs and all have our heart breaks.
 Laugh. and the world laughs with yon;
 Weep, and you weep alone;
 For the sad old earth must borrow its inirth
 But has trouble enough of its own.
 We hear great deal of discussion now all over the land about why people do not go to church. Some say it is be- cause Christianity is dying out and be- cause people do not believe in the truth of Gods word, and all that. They are false reasons The reason is because our sermons are not interesting and practi- cal and sympathetic and helpful Some one might as well tell the whole truth on this subject, and so 1 will tell it The sermon of the future-the gospel sermon to come forth and shake the na- tions and lift people out of darkness will be a popular sermon just for the simple reason that it will meet the woes and the wants and the anxieties of the people. There are in all our denomina tions ecclesiastical mummies, sitting around to frown upon the fresh young pulpits of America, to try to awe them down, to cry out, Tut, tut, tut, sensa- tionalI' They stand today. preaching in churches that hold 1000 people, and there are 100 persons present, and if they cannot have the world saved in their way it seems as if they do not want it saved at all do not know but the old way of making ministers of the gospel is better. A collegiate education and an apprenticeship under the care and home attention of some earnest, aged Christian minister, the young man getting the patriarch spirit and assist ing him in his religious service. Young lawyers study with old lawyers. young physicians study with old physicians, and I believe it would be great help if every young man studying for the gospel ministry could put himself in the home and heart and sympathy and under the benediction and perpetual presence of a Christian minister.
 An Awakening Sermon.
 But, remark again, the sermon of the future will be an awakening ser mon. From altar rail to the front door. step, under that sermon an audience will get up and start for heaven There will be in it many a staccato passage It will not be lullaby, it will be bat tie charge. Men will drop their sins. for they will feel the hot breath of pur suing retribution on the back of their necks It will be sermon sympathetic with all the physical distresses as well as the spiritual distresses of the world Christ not only preached, but he healed paralysis, and he healed epilepsy, and he healed the dumb and the blind and the ten lepers
 That sermon of the future will be an everyday sermon, going right down into every man. life, and 1t will teach him how to vote. how to bargain, how to blow. how to do any work he is called to, how to wield trowel and pen and pencil and yardstick and plane, and it will teach women how to preside over their households and how to educate their children and how to initiate Mir jam and Esther and Vashti and Eunice, the mother of Timothy, and Mary, the mother of Christ, and those women who on northern and southern battlefields were mistaken by the wounded for an gels of mercy fresh from the throne of God.
 Yes, have to tell you the sermon of the future will be reported sermon. If you have any idea that printing was in- vented simply to print secular books, and stenography and photography were con trived merely to set forth secular ideas, you are mistaken. The printing press Is to be the great agency of gospel procla- nation. It is high time that good men instead of denounoing the press employ it to scatter forth the gospel of Jesus Christ. The vast majority of people in our cities do not come to church, and nothing but the printed sermon can reach them and call them to pardon and life and peace and heaven.
 So cannot understand the nervous. ness of some of my brethren of the min istry. When they see newspaper man coming in, they say, Alas, there is a reporter. Every added reporter is 1000 or 50, or 200, 900 immortal souls added to the auditory. The time will come when all the village, town and city newspapers will reproduce the gospel of Jesus Christ and sermons preached on the Sabbath will reverber- ate all around the world and, some by type and some by voice, all nations will be evangelized.
 The practical bearing of this is upon those who are engaged in Christian work, not only upon theological stu dents and young ministers, but upon all who preach the gospel, and that is all of you, if you are doing your duty.
 The Gist of Preaching.
 Do you exhort in prayer meeting? Be short and be spirited Do you teach in Bible class? Though you have to study every night, be interesting. Do you &C., cost people on the subject of religion in their homes or in public places? Study adroitness and use common sense. The most graceful, the most beautiful thing on earth is the religion of Jesus Christ, and if you awkwardly present it it is defamation. We must do our work rap- idly, and we must do it effectively Soon our time for work will be gone A dy. ing Christian took out his watch and gave 1t to a friend and said: "Take that watch l have no more use for it. Time is ended for me. and eternity begins !" Oh, my friends. when our watch has ticked away for us for the last moment and our clock has struck for us the last hour, may it be found we did our work well, that We did 1t in the very best way, and whether we preached the gos- pei ill pulpits, or taught Sabbath classes or administered to the sick as physicians or bargained as merchants, or pleaded the law as attorneys, or were busy as