The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1899-11-03
LAY HOLD OF CHRIST.
REV. CIR. TALMAGE POINTS THE WAY
To SALVATION. +.
show. the ~~Helpfulness of Religion
In Fighting LIES Battle Bold
for the Right and Trust I'm the SON
of Christ.


ploys a very bold figure Of the Bible to
for ali those in any kind of struggle.
The text is Isaiah XIV, ii, He shall
spread forth his hands in the midst of
them, as he that swimmeth ~spreadeth
forth his hands."
In the summer season mu1titudes Of
people wade into the ponds and lakes
and rivers and seas to drive or float or
swim. In a world the most Of which Is
water an men and women should learn
to swim. rome Of you nave earned
the side stroke introduced By George
Pewters in 1850, each stroke Of that
kind carrying the swimmer a distance
Of six feet, and some of rot may use
the overland stroke invented by Gar
dener. the expert who by IT won the
500 yard championship II Larc1c~ser
in 1867, the swimmer by that stroke car
rying his arm in the air for a more
heightened reach, and some OF you
may tread the water as though you
had been made to walk the sea, but
most of you usually take what is CALL
ed the breast stroke, placing n hands
with the backs upward, about five
inches under the water, the inside of
the wrists touching the breast, then
pushing the arms forward coincident
with the stroke OF the feet struck out
to the greatest width possible, and you
thus unconsciously illustrate the mean
ing Of my text, He shall spread forth
his hands in the midst of them, as he
that swimmeth spreadeth forth his
hands to SWIM"
The fisherman seeks out u~nfreQuent-
ed hooks. You stand all day on the
bank of a river in the boiling sun and
fling out your lime and catch nothing,
While an expert angler breaks through
the jungle and goes by h lac of
the solitary rock and, in a place where
no fisherman has been for ten years,
throws out his lime and comes home at
night, his face shining and his basket
full. I do not know why we ministers
of THE gospel need always be fishing in
the same stream and preaching from
the same texts that other people preach
from. I cannot understand the policy
OF THE minister who in Blackfriars,
London, England, every week for 80
years preached from the Epistle to the
Hebrews. Tt has an e~xhilaration to me
when I come across a theme which I
feel no one elise has treated, and my
text is ONE of that kind There are
paths in Gods word that are we'll beat
en- by Christian feet When men want
Ito quote Scripture, they quote THE Old
passages that every n has heard.
When they want a chapter read, they
read a chapter shat ain the other people
have been reading, SC that the church
today is ignorant of three-fourths of
the Bible.
PUSH DOWN INIQUITY.
You go into the Louvre at Paris. You
comfine yourself to one corridor of that
opulent gallery Of paintings. AS you
come out you Friends says to you,
did you see THE Rembrandt % mo"
did you see that Rubens?" NO"
Did you see that Titan?" mo" Did
you see that Raphael?" No" WE'LL"
says your friend, 'fthen you did not see
the Louvre" Now, my friends, I think
we are too much apt to confine our
selves to one of the great corridors Of
Scripture truth, and SO much so that
there lis not One person out Of a million
who has eve noticed the all suggestive
and powerful picture of the words of
my text
Mi text represents God as a strong
swimmer. striking out to push down
iniquity and save the souls Of men.
HE shall spread forth his hands in the
midst of them, ais he that swimmeth
~spreadeth forth his hands to swim"
Most of you know how to swim. Some
of you learned it in the city school,
where this art is taught; some of you
in boyhood, in the river near your IA
theirs house; some OF you, since you
came to manhood or womanhood, while
summarizing on the beach of the sea- 1t
is a good thing to know how to swim.
not only for yourself, but because you
will after awhile perhaps nave to help
others
I do not know anything more stirring
or sublime than to see some mai like
Norman Mckenzie 1eaping from the
ship Madras into h sea ito save
Charles Turner, who had dropped from
the royal yard while trying to loosen
the sial, bringing him back to the deck
amid the huzzas of the passengers and
chew II a MAN has not enthusiasm
enough to cheer in such circumstances,
he deserves himself to drop into the
sea and have no one help him The
Royal Humane Society OF England was
established in 1774, it's object to ap-
plaud and reward those who should
pluck up life from the deep Any one
who has performed such a deed of lar
ing has all the particulars Of that
bravery recorded in a public record
and on his BREAST a medal done in blue
and gold and bronze. anchor and mono
gram and inscription, telling to future
generations the bravery of the man or
woman who saved some one from
IIHIfS buI II 1T IS SuCn a worthy
thing to save a body from the deep I
ask o if it is not a worthier thing to
save an Immortal soul And you shall
see this hour the Son of God step forth
for this achievement HE shall spread
forth his hands in the midst of them.
as he that swimmeth speadeth forth
his hands to swim"
MOST BALEFUL WORD.
In order to understand the full force
of this figure, you need to realize that
our race is in a sinking condition. You
sometimes hear people talking of what
they consider the most beautiful words
in III language. One man says Il "a
home" another man says it is the
word mother" another says it is the
word Jesus" but I tell you the bitter
est word in all our language, the word
most angry and baleful, the word sat
urated with themost trouble, the word
that accounts for all the 1oathsomeness
and the pang and the outrage and the
narrowing. and that word is ssh"
You spell it with three letters. and vet
those three letters describe the circum- |
ference and pierce the diameter OF ey- !
cry fhino had in +1a Trrix-1--o C;- =.