The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1898-05-06

/ thorn In the flesh. L do not know
either; but it was something sharp,
something that srucl1 him. / gather
from all this that physical disorder
may be the means of grace to the soul.
| You say you have so many temptations
from bodily ailments, and if you were
only well you think you could be a
Good Christian. While your tempta-
tions may be different, they are no
more than those of the man who has
an appetite three times day and
sleeps eight hours every night.
From my observation, judge that
! invalids have a more rapturous view
of the next world than well people,
and you will have higher renown in
/ Heaven. The best view of the delecta-
BILE mountains is through the lattice of
the sick room. There are trains run
ming every hour between pillow and
! throne, between hospital and mansion,
| between bandages and robes, betwe en-
crutch and palm branch. Oh, wish
some of you people who are COM
| PEELED to cry: my head, my head! my
! foot my foot! my back, my back!"
would try some of the Lords medicine;
| You are going to be well anyhow be-
| fore long. Heaven is an old city, but
has never yet reported one case of
sickness or one bill of mortality. No
opthalmia for the eye. No pneumonia
for the lungs. No pleurisy for the
side. No neuralgia for the nerves. No
rheumatism for the muscles. 1.-The in
habitants shall never say: am sick. :"
''There shall be no more pain"
ACoir Won ourht +o m lya tho host ~
Iife's fnality. Now, you think L have
how | am to strike a spark of light out
of the flint of the tombstone. There
are many people who have an idea that
death is the submergence of every
thing pleasant by everything doleful.
If my subject could close in the upset
ting of all such preconceived notions,
it would close we'll Who can Judge
best of tbs features of a man-those
who are close by him, or those who are
afar off? oh" you say, ''those can
judge best of the features of man
who are close by him!"
Now, my friends, who shall judge of
the features of death-whether they
are lovely or whether they are repul-
sive? You? You are too far off. If 1
want to get a judgment as to what
really the features of death are, l
would not ask you; l will ask thosa
who have been within month of death,
or an hour of death, or minute of
death. They stand SO near the features
they can tell. They give unanimous
testimony if they are Christian poo
pie that death, instead of being demo-
Il IL
of Christians VINO have been carried
through the gates of the cemetery,
gather up their dying experiences, and
you will find they nearly all bordered
on a jubilate. How often you have
seen dying man join in the psalm be-
ing sung around his bedside, the mid
die of the verse opening to let his ran
somed spirit free!-long after his lips
could not speak, looking and pointing
upward.
- One week of the year is called bio s.
som week-called 50 all through the
land because they are more blossoms
in that week than in any other week
of the year. Bios son week! And that
is what the future world is to which
the Christian is invited-bloSSon week
forever. 1t is as far ahead of this world
as Paradise is ahead of Dry Tortugas,
and yet here we stand shivering and
fearing to 60 out, and we want to stay
on the dry sand, and amid the stormy
petrels, when we are invited to ar bors
of jessamine and birds of paradise.
l am amazed at myself and at your
self for this infatuation, under which
we all rest. Men you would suppose
would get frightened at having to stay
in this world instead of getting fright
ened at having to go toward Heaven. 1
congratulate anybody who has right
to die. by that | mean through sick
ness you can not avert, or through &C
cident you can not avoid -your work
consummated. "Where did they bury
Llly?' said one little child to another.
"Oh," she replied, They buried here in
the ground?" ''Oh, no, no; not in the
cold ground, but i'll the warm ground,
where ugly seeds become beautiful
flowers"
But" says one, sit pains me so
much to think that | must lose the
body with which my soul has so long
companioned." You do not lose it.
You no more lose your body by death
send it to have it repaired, Or your
jewel when you send it to have it re-
set, or the faded picture when you
send it to have it touched up or the
photograph of friend when
you have it put in new
Iocl1et. You do not lose your body.
Paul will go to Rome to get his, Pay
son will go to Portland to get his,
President Edwards will go to Princeton
to get his, George Goodman will go to |
the bottom of the Atlantic to get his, |
and we will go to the village church
yards and the city cemeteries to get |
ours; and when we have our perfect |
spirit rejoined to our perfect body, |
then we will be the kind of men and |
women that the resurrection morning |
will make possible.
So you see you have not made out |
any dOleful story yet. What have you |
proved about death? What is the case |
you have made out? You have made |
out just this-that death allows us to |
have a perfect body, free of all aches, |
united forever with perfect soul |
free from all sin. Correct your |
theology What does it all mean? |
Why, it means that moving day is COM
ing, and that you are going to quit |
cramped apartments and be mansioned |
forever. The horse that stands at the |
gate will not be the one lathered |
and despatched, carrying bad news,
but it will be the horse that St, |
John saw in Apocalyptic vision-the
white horse on which the King comes |
fn 10
the palace will quake with tires and
i