The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1897-05-21

4 AdDDAIlE VI "luRSg anu 1uSGGdu VI IgNl
/ gar A. Poe's insane raven allghting or
the chamber door. ''DDly this and moth
ing MORE you will find Elijah's twC
ravens, or two ravens of the Lord, The
one bringing breau and the Other
| bringing meat-plumed butcher ant
baker.
God is intimate in resource. Wher
the city of Rochelle was besieged, anc
| the inha bitants were dying OF the
! famine, the tides washed up on the
/ beach as never before, and rs never
since, enough shell-ish TO 4eeG the
whole city. God is good. There i,
no mistake about that. History tells u:
that in 1855 in England there was &
great drought. The Ecrops failedi btt
in Essex, on The toclfs, in place where
they had neither sown nor cultured,
great crop of;peas grew until they filed
hundred measures; and there were
blossoming vines enough, promising as
much more.
But why go so far? l can give you d
family incident. Some generations
back there was q great drought in
Connecticut, New England. The water
disappeared from the hills, and the
farmers living on the hills drove their
cattle down toward the valleys, and
had them supplied at the wells and
fountains of the neighbors. But these
after awhile began to fail, and the
neighbors said to Mr.. Birdseye, ot
whom shall speak: ''You must not
send your fiocks and herds down here
any more; our wells are giving out. +"
Mr.. Birdseye, the old Christian man,
gathered his family at the altar, and
with his family he gathered the slaves
of the household-for bondage was
then in vogue in Connecticut-ando ON
their knees before God they cried for
water, and the family story is that
there was weeping and great sobbiDg
at that altar that the family might
not perish for lack of water, and that
the herds and focks might not perish.
The family rose from the altar. Mr..
Birdseye, the old man, took his staff
and walked out over the hills, and in
place where he had been scores of
times without noticing anything par
ticular, he saw the ground was very
dark, and he toon; his staff and turned
up the ground, and water started; and
he beckoned to his servants, and they
came and brought pals and buckets
until all the family and all the focks
and the herds were cared for; and then
they made troughs reaching from that
place down to the house and barn, and
the water flowed, and it is a living
fountain to-day.
Now, 1 call that old grandfather
-
gan to roll then, and is rolling still.
the brook Cherith; and the lesson to
me and to all who hear it is, when you
are in great stress of circumstances,
pray and dig, dig and pray, and pray
and dig. How does that passage go?
'The mountains shall depart and the
hills be removed, but my lovingkind-
ness shall not fail" If your mer-
chandise, if your mechanism, if
your husbandry fail, look out
for ravens. If you have in your
dependency put God on trial and con-
demned Him as guilty of cruelty, l
move to-day for a new trial. If the
biography of your life is ever written,
1 will tell you what the first chapter,
and the middle chapter, and the last
chapter will be about, if it is written
accurately. The first chapter about
mercy, the middle chapter about mercy,
the last chapter about mercy. The
mercy that hovered over your cradle.
The mercy that will hover over your
grave. The mercy that will cover all
between.
Again, this story of the tsxt impress
coz fhof ,-o1iof To f,ic YoT-OT1hof
with the most unexpected and with
seemingly impossible conveyance. If
it had been a robin-redbreast,o or mu-
sical meadow lark. or meek turtle
dove, or a sublime albatross that had
brought the food to Elijah, it would
not have been so surprising. But, no.
1t was a bird so fierce and inauspicate
that we have fashioned one of our
most forceful and repulsive words out
of it-ravenous. That bird has a pas
sion for picking out the eyes of men
and of animals. 1t loves to maui the
sick and the dying. 1t swallows with
its beak on; and yet all the food Elijah
gets for six months or year is from
ravens. So your supply is going to
come from an unexpected source.
You think some great-hearted, gen
erous man will come along and give
you his name on the back of your
note, or he will go security for you in
some great enterprise. No, he will
not, God will open the heart of some
Shylock toward you. Your relief will
come from the most unexpected quar-
ter. The providence which seemed
ominous will be to you more than that
which seemed auspicious. 1t will not
be a chafinch with breast and wing
dashed with white and brown and
chestnut; it will be black raven.
Mrs. Jane Pithey, of Chicago. we'll
known Chicago woman, was left by her
husband widow with one-half dollar
and cottage. She was palsied, and
had a mother 80 years of age to sup
port. The widowed soul every day
asked God for all that was needed in the
and the servant even was
at the precision with which
God answered the prayers of that wom-
an item by item, item by item. One
day, rising from the family altar, the
servant said: ''You have not asked for
coal and the coal is out"
Then they stood and prayed for the
coal. One hour after that the servant
threw open the door and said: 'T;4.
coal has come" A generous man, whose
name l could give you, had sent-as
never before and never since-a supply
of coal. You can not understand it. /
do. Ravens, Ravens!
Ny friend, you have a right to szgue
from precedent that God is going to
take care of you. Has He not done it
two or three times every day? That
is most marvellous. / look back and
that God has given me food
three times day regular all my life
time, never missing but once, and then