The Progress. (Shreveport, La.) 1892-1900, 1897-03-13

s+annc1 beyond that circle Would you not
like this day, by the grace of God, to step
back? This, say to you, Is your hour OF
salvation. There was In the closing hours
Of Queen Anne what Is called the clock
scene. Flat down on the pillow III helpless
sickness, she could not move her head or
move her hand. She was waiting Tor the
hour when tho ministers OF state shoulo
gather In angry contest and, worried anu
wornout by the coming hour and In mo-
mcntary absence OF the nurse, IN inc power
the strange power which deliriuln some
times gives one-shc arose and stood IN
front of the clock, and stood there watch
ing the clock when the nurse returned.
The nurse said, "DO you see anything Pc |
culiar about that clock!" She made no |
answer, but soon died. There is clock |
scene in every history. If somc OF you
would rise from the bed Of lethargy and
come out from your delirium of sin and
look on the clock of your destiny this mo-
ment, you would SEQ and hear something
you have not seen or heard before, and ev.
cry tick of the minute, and every stroke OF
the hour, and every swing of the pendulum
would say, "Now, now, now, now! On'
come homo to your Fathers house! Come
home, o prodigal, from the wilderness!
Como home, come home!
But 1 notice that when the prodigal
came there was the fathers joy. He did
not greet him with any formal How do
"You are unfit to enter. Go and wash In
the trough by the we'll, and then you can
| como in. We have had enough trouble
with YOU" All, no! When the proprietor
| Of that estate proclaimed festival, it was
an outburst Of a fathers love and q father
! JOY. God Is your Father. have not much
| sympathy with tho description of God
sometimes hear, as though he were a Turk
ish sultan, hard and unsympathctic 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 alteration, and one charged the
other with having eaten his rice, and the
king said, ''Then slay the man, and by
most mortem examination find whether he
has eaten the rice" And he was slain.
All, the cruelty of scene like that! Our
God is not q sultan, not n despot, but a
Father, kind, loving forgiving, and he
| makes all heaven ring again when prod1
gal comes buck. V! have no pleasure, ne
says, Gin the death of him that dieth. .
: All may be saved. If u man does not ge,
, to heaven, it is because he will not q
, there. No difference tho color, no differ
, ence the history, no difference the anteced
, cnts, no difference tho surroundings, M
: difference tho sin. When the white horse
!, of Christ's victory are brought out to cele
brntc tho eternal triumph, you may rid
> one of them, and, rs God is greater thai
: ALL his Joy is greater, and when n sou
. comes back there is in his heart the surg
ing of an infinite ocean Of gladness, an
to express that glndness 1t takes all tn
, rivers of pleasure, all the thrones of pom
= and nll the ages Of eternity. 1t Is a 10
deeper than NIL depth, and higher than a
height, ant; wider than all width, an
C ynster than nll immensely. 1t overtops,
undergirds, it outweighs NIL the unite
splendor and Joy of the universe, and VIII
70 can tell whnt Gods joy isp You rememb<
Is reading tho story Of II king who on SON
Il great day Of fcstivity scattered silver an
% gold among the people, who sent valuab
presents to his courtiers, but methink
when u soul comes back, God is SO gla
that to express his Joy he filings out ne
worlds into space and kindles up new SUI
and rolls among the white robed anthem
of the redeemed n greater halleluiah, Will
i'd with n voice that reverberates among Il
" mountains f frankincense and is echo'