The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1898-03-25
MARTYRDOM or STEPHEN
Rev. DR.. Talmage Presents a Sc
ries of Five Pictures.
tephen Looking Into Heaven Stephen
Looking at Christ-Stephen Stoned
Stephen in His Dying Pray
er-Stephen Asleep.

stephen in His Dying Pray
cr-Stephen Asleep.
The following sermon 10y Rev. T. De-
| Witt Talmage is selected for delivery
% the great congregation throughout
he land. The subject is the martyr
lom of Stephen, being based on the
| ext:
Behold see the heavens opened, ctc.--Acts
iii, So 60
Stephen had been preaching a rous-
.ng 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 preacher
| Of righteousness-kiI 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 to take
away life by stoning. Having 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 chambers up on his knees and
| folds his hands, while the blood drips
from his temples to his cheeks, and
| from his checks to his garments, from
his garments to the ground; and then,
looking up, he makes two prayers
one for himself and one for his murder
ers. Lord Jesus, receive my spirit"
that was for himself Lord, lay not
this sin to their charges" that was for
his assailants. Then, from pain and
loss of blood, he swooned away and fell
asleep.
want to show you to-day FIVE pic
lures. Stephen gazing into Heaven
looking at Christ stephen stoned.
stephen in his dying prayer. Stephen
asleep.
First, look at Stephen getting into
Heaven. Before you take leap you
want to know where you are going to
land. Before you climb ladder you
want to know to what point the ladder
reaches. And it was right that Ste
phen, within few moments of Heav-
en-, should be gazing into it. We
We uld all do well to be found in the
Heaven to keep Us gazing A ma1 of
large wealth may have statuary in the
hall, and paintings in the sitting
room, and works of art in all parts
of the house, but he has the chief pict-
ures in the art gallery, and there hour
after hour you walk with catalogue
and glass and ever increasing admira-
tion Well, Heaven is the gallery where
God had gathered the chief treasures of
His realm. The whole universe is His
palace. In this lower room where we
stop there are many adornments;
tessellated floor of amethyst, and on
the winding cloud-stairs are stretched
out canvaSses 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 exhilarations. John says of
it: 1.-The kings of the earth shall
bring their honor and glory into it."
And | 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 noun
tains, and the flag they bear is the
flame of a consuming world, and all
Heaven turns out with harps and trum
pets and myriad-voiced acclamation of
angelic dominion to welcome them in,
and SO the kings of the earth bring
their honor and glory into it. Do you
wonder that good people often stand,
like stephen, looking into Heaven?
We have many friends there.
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 older, the
number of his celestial acquaintances
very rapidly multiplies We have not
had one glimpse of them since the
night we kissed them good-by, and
they went away; but still we stand
gazing at Heaven. As when some of
cur friends go across the sea, we stand
on the dock, or on the steam tug, and
watch them, and after awhile the hull
of the vessel disappears, and then there
is only 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 our 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
come out and stand on some cloud, and
give us one glimpse of their blissful
and transfgured faces.
While you long to join their compan-
ionship, and the years and the days go
with such tedium that they break your
heart, and the viper of pain and sorrow
and bereavement keeps gnawing at
your vita1s, you stand still, like
stephen, gazing into Heaven. You
wonder if they have changed since you
saw them last. Yon wonder if they
would recognize your face now, SO
changed has it been with trouble You
wonder if, among the myriads delights
they have, they care as much for you
as they used to when they gave you 8
helping hand and put their shoulder
under your burdens. You woLder il
they look any older and sometime in
the eveningtide, when the house is all
quiet, you wonder if you should call
them by their. first name if they would
not answer; and perhaps sometimes
you make the experiment, and when no
one but God and yourself are there you
distinctly call their names and listen,
and sit gazing into Heaven.
Pass on row, and see Stephen looking
upon Christ. My text says he saw the
Son of Man at the right hand of God.
Just how Christ looked in this world,
Just how He looks IN Heaven, we can