Connecticut western news., 1898-12-15

those who were always sick, when they are always well, and after 20 years of pain to have millions of years of health What light will be the light of heaven for those who on earth could not see their hand before their faces! And what will the music of heaven be to those the fympanum of whose ears for many years had ceased to vibrate! De- nied on earth the pleasure of listening to Handel and Haydn and Mendelssohn's symphonies, at last reaching world where there has never been a discord, and hearing singing where all are per feet songsters, and oratorios in which all the nations of heaven chanti Great heaven it will be for all who get there, but hundred times more of a heaven for those who were shut in.
 Divine Sympathy.
 Meanwhile you have all divine and angelic sympathy in your infirmities. That satan thoroughly understood poor human nature was evidenced when in plotting to make Job do wrong the great master of evil, after having failed in every other way to overthrow the good man, proposed physical distress, and then the boils came which made him character is physical suffering. Critics are impatient at the way Thomas Car lyle scolded at everything. His 70 years of dyspepsia were enough to make any man scold. When you see people out of patience and irascible and lachrymose, inquire into the case, and before you get through with the exploration your hypercriticism will turn to pity, and to the divine and angelic sympathy will be added your own. The clouds of your indignation, which were full of thun- derbolts, will begin to rain tears of pity.
 By strange providence, for which 1 shall be forever grateful, circumstances with whiot. I think you are all fa- miliar, I have admission through the newspaper press week by week to tens of thousands of Gods dear children who cannot enter church on the Sab bath and hear their excellent pastors because of the age of the sufferers, or their illness, or the lameness of foot or their incapacity to stay in one position an hour and half, or their poverties, or their troubles of some sort will not lot them go out of doors, and to them as much as to those who hear me I preach this sermon, as I preach many of my sermons, the invisible audience always vaster than the visible, some of them tossed on wilder seas than those that tossed the eight members of Noah's family, and instead of 40 days of storm and five months of being shut in. as they were, it has been with these in- valids five years of "shut in," or ten years of "shut in," or 90 years of "shut in." Oh. comforting Godl Help me to comfort theml Give me two hands full of salve for their wounds. When we were 800 miles out at sea, @ hurricane strHck us, and the lifeboats were dashed from the davits and all the lights in the cabin were put out by the rolling of the ship and the water which through the broken skylights had poured in. Captain Andrews entered and said to the men on duty: "Why don't you light up and make things brighter, for we are going to outride this storm? Passengers. cheer upi Cheer upl'' And he struck match and began to light the burners He could not silence either the wind or the waves, but by the striking of that match, accompanied by encouraging words, we were all helped.
 Light In Darkness.
 And as now find many in hurricanes of trouble, though cannot quiet the storm, can strike a match to light up the darkness, and I strike a match. "Whom the Lord loveth he ohasteneth. I strike another match. Weeping may endure for night, but joy oometh in the morning." I strike another match. "We have great High Priest who can be touched with the feeling of our in- firmities, and he was in all points tempt ed like as we are." Are you old? One breath of heaven will make you ever lastingly young again. Have you aches and pains? They insure Christ's presence and sympathy through the darkest De- oember nights, which are the longest nights of the year. Are you berefta Here is a resurrected Christ, whose voice is full of resurrectionary power. Are you lonely? All the angels of heav- en are ready to swoop into your oom- panionship. Here is the Christ of Mary and Martha when they had lost Lazarus. and of David when be had lost his son, and of Abraham when he had lost Sarah, and of your father and mother when in time of old age they parted at the gates of the tomb. When last was in Savan- nah, at the close of the Sabbath morn ing service, I was asked to go and see a Christian woman. for many years an in valid. 1 went I had not in all that beautiful city of splendid men and gra- eious women seen face brighter than hers. Reaching her bedside, put out my hand, but she could not shake hands, for her hand was palsied. said to her, "How long have you been down on this bed?" She smiled and made no answer, for her tongue had been palsied, but those standing around said, Eff teen years. said to her. "Have you been able to keep your courage up all that timei" She gave very little mo- ton of her head in affirmation, for her whole body was paralytic. The sermon I had preached that morning had no power on others compared with the power that silent sermon had on me. What was the secret of her conquest over pain and privation and incapacity to move? Shall tell you the secret? I will tell you. The Lord shut her in.