The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1898-02-11

tudG VIII leave you aDouL 10 years.
From these 16 you must subtract all
the time that you are necessarily en-
gagged in the earning of livelihood;
that will leave you about eight years.
From these eight years you must take
all the days and weeks and this
all the length OF time that is passed in
sickness-leaving you about one year
in which to work for God. o my soul!
wake up! How darest thou sleep in
harvest time, and with SO few hours in
which to reap? So that state it as a
vast majority of you will have for the
exclusive service of God will be less
than one year.
But" says some man, II literally
support the Gospel, and the church is
open, and the Gospel is preached; all
the spiritual advantages are spread be-
fore men, and if they want to be saved
let them come and be saved-I have
discharged all my responsibility" Ahl
is that my Masters spirit? Is there
not an old Book somewhere that COM
mands us to go out into the highways,
and the hedges and compel the people
to come in? What would become of
you and me if Christ had not
come down off the hills of
Heaven; and if He had not
come through the door of the
Bethlehem caravansary; and if He had
not with the crushed hand of the cruci-
fxion knocked at the iron gate of the
sepulchre of our spiritual death, cry
ing: Lazarus. come forth?" Oh, my
Christian friend! this is no time for in
ertia when all the forces of darkness
seem to be in full blast!-when steam
printing presses are publishing infidel
tracts, when express trains are carry
ing messengers of sin, when fast clip
pers are laden with opium and strong
drink, when the night air of our cities
is polluted with the laughter that
breaks up from the ten thousand sa-
looms of dissipation and abandon
ment, when the fires of the second
death already are lxindled in the cheeks
of some who, only little while ago,
were incorrupt. Oh, never since the
curse fell upon the earth has there
been a time when it was such an un-
wise, such cruel, such an awful
thing for the church to sleep. The
great audiences are not gathered in
Christian churches; the great audi
ences are gathered in temples of sin
tears of unutterable woe their bap-
tism, the blood of crushed hearts the
aw full wine of their sacrament, bias
phemies their litany, and the groans of
the lost world the organ dirge of their
worship.
Again, if you want to be qualified to
meet the duties which this age de-
mands of you. you must, on the one
hand, avoid reckless iconoclasm, and,
on the other hand, not stick too much
to things because they are old. The
air Is full of new plans, new projects,
new theories of government, new the
ologies, and I am amazed to see how so
many Christians want only nov
city in order to recommend
thing to their confidence; and so
they vacillate and swing to and fro; and
they are useless. and they are unhappy.
New plans-secular, ethical, philo-
religious, cisatlantic, trans
atlantic-long enough to make line
from the German universities
to Great Salt Lake City. All, my
brother, do not take hold of a thing
merely because it is new! Try it by
the realities of the judgment day.
But, on the other hand, do not adhere
to anything merely because it is old.
There is not single enterprise of the
church or the world but has sometime
been scoffed at. There was
f;,oa vuLaD mar 5ar;Gad nvoo Il;blo
societies, and when few young men
met in Massachusetts and organized
the first missionary society ever organ
lied in this country there went laugh
ter and ridicule all around the Chris
tian church. They said the undertake
ing was preposterous. And SO also
the work of Jesus Christ was assailed.
People cried OUT: .'Who ever heard of
such theories of ethics and govern
ment? Who ever noticed such style
of preaching as Jesus has?" Ezekiel
had talked of mysterious wings
and wheels. Here came a man
He drew His illustrations from the
lakes, from the sand, from the noun
tain, from the lilies. from the corn
stalks. How the Pharisees scoffed!
How Herod deridedl And this Jesus
they plucl1ed by the beard, and they
spat in His face, and they called Him
this felloww All the great en-
terprises in and out of the church
have at times been scoffed at and there
have been great multitude who have
thought that the chariot of Gods
truth would fall to pieces if it once got
out of the old rut. And SO there are
those who have no patience with any
thing like improvement in church
or with anything like
good, hearty, earnest church singing,
and they deride any form of religious
discussion which goes down walking
among everyday men, rather than
that which makes an excursion
On rhetorical stills. Oh, that the
church of God would wake up
to an adaptability of work. We
must admit the simple fact that the
churches of Jesus Christ in this day do
not reach the great masses. There are
50, 600 people in Edinburgh who never
hear the Gospel. There are I, 600. 900
people in London who never hear the
Gospel. The great majority of the in
nabitants of this capital come not un-
Ter the ministrations of Christ's truth,
and the church of God in this day, in
stead of being place full of living
spistles, known and read of all men, is
more like a dead-letter post Office.
but, say the people, 1.-THE world is
yoing to be converted; you must be
patient; the Kingdoms of this world
ire to become the kingdoms of Christ"
Never. unless the Church of Jesus
Christ puts on more speed and energy.
Instead of the church converting the
world. the world is converting the
church. Here is great fortress. How
ILL u Ia La. a