The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1897-11-26

the engineer said to me he put his and
on the airbrake to illustrate his mean
ing. and / looked at him and thought.
You would be just as much Of a hero
In the same crisis"
Oh. in that coming sermon Of the
Christian church there will be living IL
Illustrations taken from everyday life OF
vicarious NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS. that
will bring to mind the ghasuier sacri-
flee OF him who. in the high places OF
the field and on h cross. fought our
battle n wept our griefs and endured
our struggles and died our death.
THE IMAGE OF CHRIST.
A German sculptor made an image OF
Christ. and he asked his little child.
2 years old, who it was, and she said.
That must be some very great man."
The sculptor was displeased with the
criticism. So he got another block OF
marble and chistled away on 1t two or
three years. and then he brought in his
little child, 4 Or 5 years OF age. and he
said to her, Who do you think that
is?" She said, That must be the one
who took little children In his arms and
blessed them" Then the sculptor was
satisfied. Oh. my friends. what the
world wants is not a cold Christ. not
a severely magisterial Christ. but a
loving Christ. spreading out his arms
Of sympathy to press the whole world
to his loving heart.
But I remark. again, that the COM
ing sermon Of the Christian church VIII
be a hort sermon. Condensation Is de-
handed by the age in which we live.
No more need Of long introductions
and long applications and SO many di-
visions to a discourse that 1t may be
said to be hydra-headed. In other
days men got all their information
from the pulpit. There were few books,
and there were no newspapers. and
there was little travel from place to
place, and people would sit and listen
two and a half hours to a religious dis
course, and "seventeenthly" would find
them fresh n clipper. In those
times there was enough room for a
man to take an hour to warm himself
up to the subject M an hour to cool
off. BUT what was a necessity then is
a superfluity now. Congregations are
full of knowledge from books, from
newspapers, from rapid and continuous
intercommunication, and long disquisi-
tons Of hat they know already will
not be abided. II a religious teacher
ann compress what he wishes to
say to the people in the space OF IS
minutes better adjourn it to some other
day.
The trouble is we preach audiences
into a Christian frame, and we preach
them out of it. We forget that every
auditor has so much capacity Of atten-
ton, and when that is exhausted he is
restless. The accidents On the Long
Island railroad came from the fact that
the brakes were out of order, and when
they wanted to stop the train they
could not stop; hence the casualty was
terrific. In all religious discourse we
want locomotive power and propulsion.
We want at the same time stout brakes
to let down at the right instant. II is
a dismal thing, after a nearer has COM
pretended the whole subject. to hear a
a say, Now, to re%capitulate." and
"a few words by way Of application"
and "once more" and finally" and
"how to conclude"
THE MODEL SERMON.
Paul preached until midnight. and
Eutychus got sound asleep and fell out
of a window and broke his neck. Some
would say, God for him" I would
rather be sympathetic like Paul.
and resuscitate him. That accident is
often quoted now in religious circles as
a warning against somnolence in
church. It is just as nue. a warning
to ministers against prolixity. Euty-
chus was wrong in his somnolence, but
Paul made a mistake when he kept On
until midnight. He ought to have
stopped at II o'clock and there would
have been no accident. If Paul might
have gone on to too great length. let
all those of us who are now preaching
the gospel remember that there is a
limit to religious discourse, or ought to
be, and that in our time we have 10
apostolic power Of miracles. NAPOLEON.
in an address of seven minutes, thrilled
Europe. Christ's sermon on the mount
the modern sermon-was less than
Is minutes long cit ordinary mode Of de-
livery. It is not electricity scattered
all over the sky that strikes. but cleo
tricity gathered into a thunderbolt and
hurled, and it is not religious truth
scattered over, spread out over a vast
reach of time, but religious truth pro-
jected in compact form that flashes
light upon the soul and rives it's indif-
ference.
When the coming sermon arrives in
this Ian and in the Christian church
the sermon which is to arouse the
world and startle the nations and usher
in the kingdom-it will be a brief SER
mon. Hear it. all theological students,
all we just entering upon religious
work, all We men and women who IN
OdOOdl CIIOOlS Ill OlIlc departments
are toiling for Christ and the salvation
Of immortals. Brevfty, brevity!
But 1 remark also that the coming
sermon of which I speak will be a pop
ular sermon. There are those in these
times who speak OF a popular sermon
as though there must be something
wrong about it. All these critics are
dull themselves, the world gets the i'm
preston that a sermon is good in pro-
portion as 1t is stupid. Christ was the
most popular preacher the world ever
saw, and. considering the small numbe
of the worlds population. had the lar
gest audiences ever gathered. He never
preached anywhere without making a
great sensation. People rushed out in
the wilderness to hear him. reckless Of
their physical necessities. So great was
their anxiety to hear Christ. that. TAX
ing no food with them. they would have