The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1898-03-25
THE WORLD TO COME
REV, DIR. .TALMAGE PICTURES
LIFE BEYOND THE GRAVE.

Through the Eyes of the Great Preacher
The Eternal Sleep.
The discourse of DR.. Talmage which
we send out is a vivid story of marty
dom and a r%apturous view of the world
to come; text, Acts vii, $3.50, Behold
I see the heavens opened" etc.
Stephen had been preaching a rous-
ing sermon, and the people could not
stand it. They resolved to do as men
sometimes would like to do in this day
if they dared, with some plain Z. -2ch-
er of righteousness-kill him. The
only way to silence this man was to
knock the breath out Of him. So they
rushed Stephen out of the gates of the
city, and with curse and whoop and
below they brought him to the cliff,
as was the custom when they wanted
brought him to the edge of the cliff,
they pushed him off. After he had
fallen they came and looked down,
and seeing that he was not yet dead
they began to drop stones upon him,
stone after stone. Amid this horrible
rain of missiles Stephen clamors upon
knees and folds his hands, while the
blood drips from his temples to his
cheeks, from his cheeks to his gar
ments, from his garments to the
ground, and then, looking up, he makes
two prayers-one for himself and one
for hic nnnrHorarc at ord Tac,c ~
ceive my spirit" that was for himself.
Lord lay not this sin to their
CHARGE" that was for his assailants.
Then from pain and loss of blood he
SWOOned away and fell asleep.
THE MARTYRS VISION.
want to show o today five pic
tures-Stephen gazing into heaven,
Stephen looking at Christ, Stephen
stoned, Stephen in his dying prayer
and Stephen asleep.
First look at Stephen gazing into
heaven. Before you take a leap you
want to know where you are going to
land. Before you climb a ladder you
want to know to what point the ladder
reaches. And it was right that
Stephen, within a few moments of
ucdNtH, ouOulu Uc gazing luLO II. we
would all do we'll to be found in the
same posture. There is enough in
heaven to keep us gazing. A man of
large wealth may have statuary in the
hal and paintings in the sitting room
and works of art in all parts of the
house, but he has the chief pictures in
the art gallery, and there hour after
hour you walk with catalogue and
1900
Well, heaven is the gallery where God
has gathered the chief treasures of his
realm. The whole universe is his
palace. In this lower room where We
stop there are many adornments, tes-
sellated f1oor of amethyst, and on the
winding cloud stairs are stretched out
V on which commingle azure
and purple and saffron and gold. But
heaven is the gallery in which the
chief glories are gathered. There are
the brightest robes. There are the
richest crowns. There are the highest
civilizations. John a y of it, "The
kings of the earth shall bring their
honor and glory into it." And l see
the procession forming, and in the
line come all empires, and the stars
spring up into an arch for the hosts
to march under. The hosts keep step
to the sound of earthquake and the
pitch of avalanche from the mountains,
and the flag they bear is the flame of a
consuming world, and all heaven turns
out with harps and trumpets n my
riad voiced reclamation of angelic do
miniOn to welcome them in, and so the
kings of the earth bring their honor
and glory into it. Do o wonder that
good people often stand, like Stephen,
looking into heaven? We have many
friends there.
FRIENDS IN HEAVEN.
There is not a man in this house to-
day so isolated in life but there is
some one in heaven with whom he
once shook hands. AS a man gets old
er the number of his celestial &C
quaintances very rapidly multiplies.
We have not had one glimpse of them
since the night we kissed them gOOdby
and they went away, but still we stand
gazing at heaven. AS when some of
our friends go across the sea, we stand
on the dock or on the steam tug and
watch them, and after awhile the hulk
of the vessel disappears, and then
there is only a patch of sail on the sky,
and soon that is gone, and they are all
out of sight, and yet we stand looking
in the same direction, so when Il
friends go away from us into the future
world we keep looking down through
the Narrows, and gazing and gazing,
as though we expected that they would
com out and stand on some cloud and
give us one glimpse of their blissful
and TRANSPORTED faces.
While you long to join their COM
partnership n the years and the days
go with such tedium that they break
your heart, and the viper of pain and
sorrow and bereavement keeps gnaw-
ing at your vitals, you stand still, like
Stephen, gazing into heaven. You
auondor IL thou hauo chang pd since Vol