The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1897-03-05

You say it is five hand-breaths, or it is
ten hand breaths. So indicates the
prophet God winds the blue ribbon Of
the sky around His hand. HE meteth
out the Heavens with a SPAN" You
know that balances are made of beam
suspended in the middle, with two
basis at the extremity of equal heft.
In that way what vast heft has been
weighed. But what are all the bal
ances of earthly manipulation
compared with the balances that
Isaiah saw suspended when he
saw God putting into the scales
the Alps and the Apprentices and Mount
Washington and the Sierra Nevadas.
You see the earth had to be ballasted.
1t would not do to have too much
weight in Europe. or too much weight
in Asia. or too much weight in Africa,
or in America; so when God made the
mountains He weighed them. The
Bible distinctly says so. God knows
| the weight of the great ranges that
cross the continents, the tons, the
pounds avoirdupOis. the ounces, the
grains. the millegrammes-just how
much they weighed then, and just how
much they weigh now. He weighed
the mountains in scales and the hills
in balance" Oh. what God to run
against: oh. what a God to disobey;
oh. what God to dishonOr; oh. what
a God to defy. The brightest. the
mightiest angel takes no familiarity
with God. The wings of reverence are
lifted with twain he covered his
! face"
Another seraphic posture in the text.
The seraph must not always stand still.
He must move and it must be without
clumsinesS. There must be celebrity
and beauty in the movement. with
twain he did flv." Correction. exhil-
aration. Correction at our slow gait.
for we only crawl in the service when
we ought to fly at the divine bidding.
Exhilaration in the fact that the soul
has wings as the Seraphs have wings.
| What is a wing? An instrument of To-
comotion. They may not be like
seraph's wing. they may not be like
birds wing, but the soul has wings.
God saws so: He shall mount up on
wings as eagles" We are made in the
divine image. and God has wings. The
| Bible SAYS so. Healing in his wings
Under the shadow of His wings"
| Under whose wings hast thou come
| to trust" The soul with folded wings
now, wounded wing, broken wing,
| bleeding wing, Gagged wing. Aye!
| have it now. Gagged within bars of
bone and under curtains of flesh, but
one dav to be free | hear the rustic
of pinions in Seagrave's poem which
we sometimes sing:
| Rise. my soul. and stretch thy wings
| hear the rustic of pinions in Alex
ander Pope's stanza, where he says:
mount fly.
Death. where is thy victory?
A diving Christian not long ago cried
out. wings, wings. wingsr' The air
is full of them, coming and going, COM
ing and going. You have seen how the
dull, sluggish chrysalid becomes the
bright butterfly; the dull and the
stupid and the lethargic turned into
the alert and the beautiful. Well, my
friends. in this world we are in the
chrysalid state. Death will unfurl the
wings. Oh, if we could only realize
what a grand thing il will be to get
rid of this clod of the body and mount
the heavens, neither seagull nor lark
nor albatross nor falcon, nor condor
pitching from highest range of Andes
so buoyant or so majestic of stroke.
See that eagle in the mountain nest.
1t looks so sick, so ragged-feathered,
so worn out and so half asleep. Is that
eagle dying? No. The OrnitholOgist
will tell you it is the moulting season
with that bird. Not dying. but mOult-
ing. You see that Christian sick and
weary and worn out and seeming
about to expire on what is called his
| death bed. The world says he is dy-
ing. | say. it is the moulting season
for his sOul-the body dropping away,
! the celestial piniOns coming on. Not
dying, but moulting. Moulting out of
darkness and sin and struggle into
| glory and into God. Why do you not
shout? Why do you sit shivering at
the thought of death and trying to
hold back and wishing you could stay
here forever, and speak of departure as
| though the subject were filed with
skeletons and the varnish of coffins, and
as though you preferred lame foot to
swift wing?
Oh. people of God, let us stop play
ing the fool and prepare for rapturOus
fight. When your soul stands on the
verge of this life, and there are vast
precipices beneath, and sapphired
domes above, which way will you fly?
VIII you swOop or will you soar? VIII
you fly downward or will you fly up
ward? Everything on the wing this
day bidding us aspire. Holy Spirit on
the wing. Angel of the new covenant
on the wing. Time on the wing, fly
ing away from US. Eternity on the
wing, flying toward us. Wings, wings,
wings.
Live so near to Christ that when you
are dead, people standing by your life
less body will not soliliquize saying:
''What disappointment life was to
him: how averse he was to departure;
what a pity it was he had to die; what
an awful calamity Rather standing