The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1898-08-05


No within of mine is this. without
Him was not anything made that was
made" Christ writing on the ground.
But what did Christ write on the
ground? The Bible does not state.
Yet as Christ never wrote anything ex-
cept that once you cannot blame us
for wanting to know what He really
did write. But l am certain He wrote
nothing trivial or nothing unimpor-
tant. And will you allow me to say
that think / know what He wrote on
the ground? l Judge from the circum-
stances. He might have written other
things, but kneeling there in the TEN.
Pile, surrounded by a pack of hypo-
critics. who were self-appointed con-
stabulary, and having in His presence
a prosecuted woman, who evidently
was very penitent for her sins, l am
sure He wrote two words, both of them
graphic and tremendous and reverber-
ating. And the one word was "hypoc.
risy" and the other was forgive
ness"
From the way these Pharisees and
Scribes vacated the premises and got
out into the fresh air, as Christ, with
just one ironical sentence unmasked
them, know they were frst-class
hypocrites II was then as it is now
The more faults and inconsistencies
people have of their own, the more sc.
we're and censorious are they about the
faults of others. Here they are-20
stout men arresting and arraigning
one weak woman! Magnificent bust
ness to be engaged in! They wanted
the fun of seeing her faint away UNI
der a heavy judicial sentence from
Christ, and then, after she had been
taken outside of the city and fastened
at the foot of the precipice, the Scribes
and Pharisees wanted the satisfac.
ton of each coming and dropping big
stone on her head, for that was tho
style of capital punishment that they
asked for. Some people have taken
the responsibility of saying that
Christ never laughed. But ! think as
He saw those men drop everything,
chagrined, mortified. exposed, and go
out quicker than they came in, He
must have laughed. At any rate, IL
makes me laugh to read of it. All of
those libertines, dramatizing indigna-
lecturing on optics! A flock of crows
on their way up from a carcass, de-
nouncing carrion!
Yes, think that one word written
on the ground tn at day by the finger
of Christ was the awful word hypoc-
risy. What pretensions to sanctity are
the part of those hypocritical Phari.
sees! When the fox begins to pray,
look out for your chickens. One of the
cruel magnates of olden times was
going to eXcommunicate one of the
martyrs, and he began in the usual
form-"In the name OF God, amen"
"Stopw says the martyr, don't say in
the name of Godp" Yet how many
outrages are practiced under the garb
of religion and sanctity! When in
synods and conferences, ministers of
the gospel are about to say something
unbrotherly and unkind about mem
Der, they almost always begin by be-
ing ostentatiously pious, the venom of
their assault corresponding to the
heavenly flavor of the prelude. About
to devour a reputation, they say grace
before meal.
But / am sure there was another
word in that dust From her entire
manner ] am sure that arraigned
woman was repentant. She made no
apology, and Christ in no wise belit-
tied her sin. But her supplicatory be-
havior and her tears moved Him, and
when He stopped down to write on the
ground He wrote that mighty, that
imperial word, forgiveness. When on
Sinai God wrote the law, He wrote it
with finger of lightning on tables of
stone, each word cut as by chisel
into the hard granite surface. But
when He writes the offense of this
woman He writes it in the dust, so that
IL can be easily rubbed out, and when
she repents of it, oh, He was merciful
Christ! Kindness in all His words,
and ways, and habits Forgiveness!
Word of IL letters, and some of them
thrones, and some of them palm
branches. Better have Christ write
close to our names that one word,
though He write it in dust, than to
have our name cut into monumental
granite with the letters that the
storms of a thousand years cannot
obliterate. Bishop Darlington had a
book of only three leaves. The first
leaf was black, the second leaf red,
the third leaf white. The black leaf
suggested sin; the red leaf atonement;
the white leaf publication. That is
the while story. God win abundantly
pardon.
must not forget to say that as
Christ, STOPPING down, with His fingers
wrote on the ground, it is evident that
His sympathies are with this penitent
woman, and that He has no sympathy
with her hypocritical pursuers. Just
opposite to that is the worlds habit.
| Why didn't these unclean Pharisees
bring one of their own number to
Christ for eXcoriation and capital pun
ishmentP No, no. They overlook that
in a man which they damnate in a
woman. And so the world has had
for offending woman scourges and OBJ
jurgation, and for just one offense she
becomes an outcast, while for men
whose lives have been sodomic for 30