The San Francisco call., 1897-01-18
DIVINE PROPHETS.
Sermon by Rev. William RAIDER, De-
livered at the Third Congre-
RationaI Church.
The following is a synopsis OF Sc

gationaI Church.
The following is a synopsis OF a SER
mon delivered last night by Rev. W.
RAIDER of the Third Congregational Church {:
A prophet is not fortune-teller The origi-
nal Hebrew root means "boiling or bubbling
over" The sites chosen by the Grecian oraeles
were marked by rushing springs, which. .bub-
bled up out of the rocky recesses of the native
hills So the Psalmist says: "My heart is
bursting, bubbling over with good matter"
In the Indo-Germanic languages the word in
dicates fermenting yeast or the steaming gey
ser. The practical meaning of the prophet is
an interpreter; not a foreteller only, but
q spokesman or expounder of truth. He is al-
ways distinguished by splendid earnestness,
welded to O commanding piety grounded in
convictions of right and wrong. There is q
difference between the priest and prophet
The one interprets man to God, the other in
terprets God to maR. The prophet is greater
than the priest
Prophecy is the noblest passion OF history,
belonging alike to neathenism and Christian
ity. 1t is the most i'm mportant part of the Old
Testament 1t rings with the noblest elo-
quence. Thunder rolls through this prophetic
period Thrones fall, but in ell the clash and
conflict the prophet stands unmoYed with his
vision of golden age
The heather seer placed the golden age be-
hind. The Christian prophet locates it in the
future. The three steps oil prophecy known as
the dream, the vision and the spiritual in
sight, are common to the religious world.
The first is the most wonderful, the second is
the most common and the third is the most
rational. There is an evolution OF prophetic
gift these artists have pain ted progressively.
At first the dream outlines OF golden age,
and then a person becomes the incarnation of
these divine dreams, and We have Messianic
prophecy. The burden of it all was that the
best was yet to be. A great good was ex-
pected.
! All the prophecies were not fulfilled. We
stin await the model state OF Isaiah,
and jeremiah never saw the fullhllment of
his predictions OF a regenerated Israel. The
model King has not yeteome, but those unful-
filed prophecies do not in the least inValidate
the character Of these men, or the messages
they deliver.
The predictive element In prophecy is by nc
means the most important. The prophet is
still the man for the hour. He stands for in
tellectuat honesty and for the courage of his
convictions. What this Nation needs is the
honest man. The time server is q popular
menace. He who sells his thought is traitor
10 truth. The man who escapes from the av-
erage" is the true evangelist. We need men
who speak for the living God as distinctly as
the waves echo his almighty power. Many
men speak for humanity. Champions of pop
ular liberty abound.
hey lean on the bars of gilded saloons and
they stand on the corners of the street talking
for humanity. Men there are who shape their
! thought according TO the popular drift.
Spokesman there are who interpret the plati-
tudes OF the masses. Diplomats are numer-
Gus who never venture far from the shore,
and who are always anchored in the "conven-
tional ignorance" OF the people. Men abound
who have courage because they are in the ma
jority. But it is not the priest for whom the
nations cry, but the man who comes with in
tellectual honesty, interpreting the mind of
God for the sake of the people. No man is
truly great who does not speak for God. 1t is
then, and then only that man stands alone,
and that is sta tatesmanship; that is genius
We need prophets who will stand before the
organized vices of our times and spare not the
selfish wishes of the people in their denuncia-
tion of public wrongs. 1t is the prophet not
the politician, who will solve the temperance
question and drive out many of the evils of our
land. 1t is the prophet, not the priest, who
will recover the greater truths OF the revela-
ton and set them forth as the very mind of
God.
The spirit of Christ is the spirit of prophecy.
Christianity is the incarnation OF hopeful
courage. The world has not been left without
its prophets. st. Augustine was a prophet.
John Wikcliffe, who saved the Bible and hon.
ored reason; Martin Luther, who carried his
convictions and hurled them in thunder bolts
at the head of Charles V; Savonarola and MAJ
zini, John Wesley, Fred Dennison Maurice
and Horace Bushnell were prophets And
Re V. DR.. Parkhurst, standing before the Tam
many ring of New York City ,reproduces in the
kinetoscope of our own times the splendid
figures of Jeremiah and Savonarola of old.
But they have always been stoned. Whether
they have appeared in science, letters, polite
or religion, they have been stoned. Always
have they spoken within sight of the cross.