The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1897-07-28

guilty of sinning-you would be innocent, but you would
never attain the plane of positive goodness-the hatred OF
evil, and the love and realization of goodness. AS our
Lord said of the blindness of the man whom he healed, so
we may say of all evil and sin in this world, in it and
through it all, Gods works are made manifest.
Now, in all that has been said my purpose has not
been to apologize for the presence of sin in the world,
least OF all to attempt any explanation OF Its or1gen, or to
give the reason for its existence. | have not thought to
relieve for you its ~blackness, nor to justify Gods ways and
dealings with men. My purpose is wholly a practical one,
and is, to say to you that mysterious and unexplained as is
the presence Of evil and sin, yet that, in and through it
all, you may, and you ought to be becoming better. You
ought, then, to be Selling and making your own that good
which seems to be dependent and contingent upon the
presence of sin and emptation-Purihe and redeemed
character. You. ought to make the evils and temptations
of the world stepping stones tor your advance IN the divine
life. Let me then remind you that you are all passing
away from the innocence of your childhood. Some of us
may have advanced a long distance from that. All are
destined to leave the innocence of childhood far behind.
And this necessarily. Time and advancing experience do
bring the knowledge of good and evil, and so to take away
our innocence. Nor need we regret this, if we advance in
the right line. Beautiful and idyGc as is the life and char
acter of man in Eden, it is inferior to that of man today
who out of the stress and struggle of sin has been regener-
ated after the image of Christ, And so you need look
with no regret upon the innocence OF childhood forever
gone, if for it you have substituted positive virtue and
Righteousness. Have you then as you faced life and came
Into touch with sin-have you hated and loathed it? AS
with advancing age you have more and more fully entered
upon life and its various duties and relatlons, tnere has
come to YOU inevitably greater knowledge and acquaintance
viii sin. With this growing knowledge of sin, has there
increased in you a correspondingly greater hatred and
loathing of it, Andi if at any time you have fallen into
sin, have you repented so repented that today you are
a better and stronger character because of the practical
experience that you have had of the evil caused by sin
or has knowledge of sin brought compiance' Have you,
at first sight of sin, perhaps been repealed? But, after
wards, have you learned to endure it, then to find pleasure
in the contemplation of it, and finally to embrace? If so,
YOU have lost innocence, but instead you have not attain
ed that virtue and holiness that God designs should take
its place.
Tesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor
his parents: but that the works of God should be made
manifest in him. 1t is an inspiring thought, then, that
the very evils and sins of this world are means and instru-
ments for Gods work of regenerating and purifying our
characters being accomplished in US. Mysterious and
terrible as is sin, out of it's presence we may get good.
This is an inspiring thought. And yet we need, too, to
remember that the converse is true also. We may make
of it awful loss and ruin to ourselves.