The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1898-03-25

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countenance. Sometimes I am abash-
ed before an audience, not because /
come under their physical eyesight.
But because I realize the truth that /
stand before so many immortal spirits.
The probability is that your body will
at last find a sepulcher in some of the
cemeteries that surround your town or
city. There is no doubt but that your
~obsequies will be decent and respect
full, and you will be able to pillow your
head under the maple or the Norway
spruce or the cypress Or the poisoning
fir. But this spirit about which
Stephen prayed-what direction will
that take? What guide will escort it?
What gate will open to receive it?
, What cloud will be cleft for it's path
way? After it has got beyond the
light Of our sun will there be torches
lighted for it the rest of the way? Will
the soul have to travel through long
deserts before it reaches the good land?
If we should lose our pathway, will
there be a castle at whose gate we may
ask the way to the city? Oh, this
mysterious spirit within u.s.! It has
two wings, but it is in a cage now 1t
is locked fast to keep it, but let the
door of this cage open the least and
that soul is off. Eagles wings could
not catch it. The lightnings are not
swift enough to take up with it. When
the soul leaves the body. it takes fifty
| worlds at a bound. And have 1 no
anxiety about it? Have you no ankle
ty about it?
STEPHENS PRAYER.
I do not care what you do with my
body when my soul is gone, or wheth-
er you believe in cremation or inhuma-
ton. 1 shall sleep just as we'll in a
| wrapping of sackcloth as in satin
lined with eagles down. But my soul
before this day passes I will find out
| where it will land. Thank God for the
intimation of my text, that when we
die Jesus takes us. That answers all
questions for me. What though there
were massive bars between here and
the city of light, Jesus could remove
them. What though there were great
| Sarahas of darkness, Jesus could IL
lume them. What though I get weary
| on the way, Christ could lift me on his
omnipotent shoulder. What though
there were chasms to cross, his hand
1 COulu u duSpOlI uuC. z z OICphCA .
| prayer be my dying 1itany, Lord
Jesus, receive my spirit" 1t may be
in hat hour we will be too feeble to
say a long prayer. 1t may be in that
hour we will not be able to say the
Lords Prayer, for it has seven petit
tiOns. Perhaps we may be too feeble
even to say the infant prayer our
mothers taught us, which John Quincy
| Adams, 70 years of age, said every
night when he put his head upon his
| pillow:
Now I lay me down tt sleep.
I pray the Lord my soul to keep.
We may be too feeble to employ
either of these familiar forms, but this
prayer of Stephen is so short, is so
concise, is so earnest, is so comprehen-
sive, we surely will be able to say that
LORD Jesus, receive my spirit"
Oh, if that prayer is answered, how
sweet it will be to die! This world is
clever enough to us. Perhaps it has
treated us a great deal better than we
deserve to be treated, but If on the
dying pillow there should break the
light of that better world we shall have
no more regret about leaving a small,
| dark, damp house for one large, beau
tiful and capacious. That dying min
lister in Philadelphia, some years ago,
beautifully depicted it when in the last
| moment he threw up his hands and
cried out, II move into the light"
A WORKING CHRISTIAN.
Pass on now, and I will show you
n more picture, and that is Stephen
asleep. With a pathos and simplicity
peculiar to the Scriptures the text says
of Stephen, "He fell asleep" "Oh,"
you say, what a place hat was to
sleep! A hard rock under him, stones
falling down upon him, the blood
streaming, the mob bowling. What a
place it was to sleep!" And yet my
text takes that symbol of slumber to
describe his departure, so sweet was it,
so contented was it, SO peaceful was it.
Stephen had lived a very laborious life.
His chief work had been to care for
the poor. How many leaves of bread
he distributed, how many bare feet he
had sandaled, how many cots of sick
ness and distress he blessed with min
istries of kindness and love, 1 do not
know, but from the way he lived, and
the way he preached, and the way he
died I know he was a laborious Chris
tian. But that is all over now. He
has pressed the cup to the last faint
ing lip. He has taken the last insult
from his enemies. The last stone to
whose crushing weight he is suscepti-
BILE has been hurled. Stephen is dead.
The disciples come. They take him
up. They wash away the blood from
the wounds. They straighten out the
bruised limbs. They brush back the
tangled hair from the brow, and then
they pass around to look at the calm
countenance of him who had lived for
the poor and died for the truth.
Stephen asleep:
/ have seen the sea driven with the
hurricane until the tangled foam
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