The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1897-03-12


next moment the world mathematics.
On. come over into this greater joy,
this sublime solace. this magnificent
beatituGe. The night after the battle
of Shiloh, and there were thousands of
wounded on the field, one Christian sol
der lying there a-dying under the
starlight. began to sing:
There is a land of pure delight
And when he came to the next line
there were scores of voices singing:
Where saints immortal reign.
The song was caught up all through
the fields among the wounded until it
was said there were at least 10000
wounded men uniting their voices as
they came to the verse:
There everlasting spring abideS
And nevcr-withering flowers:
It's but a narrow stream divides
This heavenly land from ours.
Oh, it is great religion to live by,
and great religion to die by. There
is only one heart-throb between you
and that religion. Just look into the
face of your pardoning God and sur
render yourself for time and eternity,
and He is yours. and Heaven is yours,
and all is yours. Some of you, like
the young man OF the text, have gone
astray. | know not the history, but
you know it, you know it.
But | notice that when the prodigal
came there was the fathers JOY. He
did not greet him with any formal
How do you do?" He did not come
out and say. You are unfit TO enter;
go and wash in the trough by the well,
and then you can come in; we have had
enough trouble with YOU" All, no!
When the proprietor of that estate pro-
claimed festival. it was an Outburst of
a fathers love and fathers JOY. God
is your father. | have not much sym
pathy with the description of God l
sometimes hear, as though He were a
Turkish sultan, hard and unSympa-
thetic, and listening not to the cry of
His subjects. A man told me he saw in
one of the eastern lands king riding
along, and two men were in alterca-
ton, and one charged the other with
having eaten his rice, and the king said:
Then slay the man, and by post
norton examination find whether he
has eaten the rice" And he is slain.
All! the cruelty of scene like that.
Our God is not a sultan, not a despot,
but father-kind, loving. forgiving,
and He make all Heaven ring again
when a prodigal comes back. Il have
no pleasure" He says, lin the death of
him that dieth." All may be saved.
If man does not get to Heaven, it is
because he will not go there. No diff
ference the color, no difference the his
tory, no difference the antecedents, no
difference the surroundings, no differ
ence the sin. When the white horses
of Christs victory are brought out to
celebrate the eternal triumph, you
may ride one of them, and as God is
greater than all, His joy is greater, and
when a soul comes back, there is in His
heart the surging of an infinite ocean
of gladness; and to express that glad
ness it takes all the rivers of pleas
ure, all the thrones of pomp and all
the ages of eternity. 1t is Joy deeper
than all depth and higher than
all height, and wider than all
width, and vaster than all immensely.
1t overtops, it undergirds, it outweighs
all the united splendor and joy of the
universe, and who can tell what Gods
Joy is? You remember reading the
story of king. who on some great day
of festivity scattered silver and gold
among the people, who sent valuable
presents to his courtiers; but methinks,
when a soul comes back, God is so glad
that to express His joy He filings out
new worlds into space, and kindles up
new suns, and rolls among the white
robed anthems of the redeemed a great
er hallelujah, while with a voice that
reverberates among the mountains of
frankincense and is echoed back from
the everlasting gates he cries: This,
my son. was dead, and he is alive
again.
l notice also, that when a prodigal
comes home there is the joy of the min
listers of religion. Oh, it is a grand
thing to preach this gospel. L know
there has been a great deal said about
the trials and the hardships of the
Christian ministry. l wish somebody
would write a good, rousing book
about the joys of the Christian minis
try. Since entered the profession,
have seen more of the goodness of God
than l will be able to celebrate in all
eternity. l know some boast about
their equilibrium, and they do not rise
into enthusiasm, and they do not break
down with emotion; but confess to
you plainly that when see man COM
ing to God and giving up his sin feel
in body, mind and soul a transport.
When l see a man bound hand and foot
in evil habit emancipated, 1 rejoice
over it as though it were my own
emancipation.
When in one communion service such
throngs of young and old stood up and
in the presence of Heaven and earth
and hell attested their allegiance to
Jesus Christ, / felt a Joy something
akin to that which the apostle de-
scribes when he says: Whether in
the body cannot tell, or out of the
body / cannot tell; God knoweth."