The Penn's Grove record., 1899-10-27
DR.. TALMAGES SERMON.
SUNDAYS DISCOURSE BY THE NOTED
DIVINE.

SUNDAYS DISCOURSE BY THE NOTED
DIVINE.
Subject: Lay Hold of Chrlst-The Help
fulness of Religion In Fighting Lffe's
Battle-Be Bold For the Right and
Trust In the S~n of God.
Copyright, Louis Klopsch, 1921
W~AsHuNdToS, d. Gin this discourse DR..
Talnage employs a very bold figure OF the
Bible to bring out the helpfulness of re-
llgion for all those in any kind OF struggIe
The text is Isaiah XIV, Ii. .sHe shall spread
forth his hands In the midst OF them. as he
that swimmeth spreadeth forth his hands"
In the summer season multitudes OF peo-
pie wade into the ponds and lakes and
rivers and seas to dive or float or swim. In
a world the most OF which Is water all men
and women should learn to swim. Some OF
you have learned the side stroke intro
duced by George Pewters in 1850, each
stroke of That kind carrying the swimmer
a distance OF six feet, aud some OF you may
use the overland stroke invented by Gar
dener. the expert who by 1t won the 500
yard championship in Manchester in 1862,
the swimmer by that stroke carrying 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,
put most OF you usually take what is call
ed the breast stroke, placing the 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 unconscfously Illus
trate the meaning of my text, "He shall
spread forth his hands In the midst OF h
as he that swimmeth spreadeth forth his
hands to SWIM"
Inc fisherman seeks out ~unfrequented
hooks. You stand all dny on the bank Of
a river In the brolling sun and fling out
your line and catch nothing, while an ex-
pert angler breaks through the Jungle and
goes by the shadow of the solitary rock
and, in a place where no fisherman has
been Tor ten years, throws out bis line and
comes home at night, his face shining and
his basket full. l 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. l cannot understand the
policy of the minister who in Biackfrfars,
London, England, every week for thirty
years preached from the Epistle to the
Hebrews. 1t is an exhilaration to me
when l come across a theme which l feel
no one else has treated, and my text is one
OF that kind. There arc pat IS In Gods
word that are we'll beaten by Christian
feet. When men want to quote Scripture,
they quote the old passages that every one
has heard. When they want a chapter
read, they read a chapter that all the other
people have been reading, so that the
church to-day Is ignorant OF t~hree-fourths
Of the Bible.
You go into the Louvre at Paris. You
confine yourself to one corridor OF that
opulent gallery of paintings. As you come
out your friend says to you, aDid you see
tina RubensP" "No." "Did you see that
Titian?' mo" 'Did you see that Raph-
ael?" ''No." 'Well," says your friend.
''then you did not see the Louvre" Now,
my friends, think we are too much apt to
confne ourselves to one Of the great corri-
doris of Scripture truth, and so much so
lion who has ever noticed the all sugges-
tive and powerful picture in the words Of
my text.
This text represents God as a strong
swimmer, striking out to push down iniq-
uity and save the souls OF men. "Ho shall
spread forth his hands in the midst OF
them, as hethat swlmmeth spreadeth forth |
his hands to swim" The figure is bold and |
many sided. Most o. you know how to
swim. Some of you learned 1t In the city
school, where this art is taught; some of
you in ~boyhood, Ia the river near your
fathers house; some Of you since you came
to manhood or ~womanhood, while sum-
ncfinS On tue peucu OIL tue sea. 1T Is u !
good thing to know how to swim, not only
for yourself, but because you will after
awhile perhaps have to help others.
l do not know anything more stirring or
sublime than to see some man like Norman
Mckenzie leaping from the ship Madras
into the sea to save Charles Turner, who
had dropped from the royal yard while
trying to loosen the sail, bringing him back
to the deck amid the huzzas OF the passen-
gers and crew. III a mar has not enthusi-
asm enough to cheer in such circum-
stances, he deserves himself to drop into
the sea and have no one help him.. The
Royal Humane Society of England was es-
tablished in l774, its object TO applaud and
those who should pluck up life from
the deep. Any one who has performed
such u deed of daring has all the partieu-
lars of hat bravery recorded in a public
record and on his breast a medal done In
blue and gold and bronze, anchor and mon
ogram and inscription, telling to future
generations the bravery of the man or
woman who saved some one from drown
ing. But IL 1t is such a worthy thing to
save a body from the deep l ask you II 1t Is
not q worthior 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
spreadeth forth his hands to SWIM"
In order to understand the full force OF
this figure, you need to realize that our
race Is In a sinking condition. You some
times hear people talking of what they
consider the most beautiful words in all
our language. One man says 1t is ''home,"
says 1t Is the word "mother,s an
other says 1t the word Jesus" but / tell
you the bitterest word in all our language,
the word most angry and bsleful, the word
with the most trouble, the word
accounts for all the loathsomeness
and the pang and the outrage and the har-
and that word is ''sin." You spell
1t with three letters, and yet those three
describe the circumference and
pierce the diameter of everything bad In
the universe. Sin is a sibilant word. You
cannot pronounce 1t without giving the
siss OF the flame or the hiss OF the serpent.
Sin! And then If you add three letters to
that word it describes every one OF us by
~nature-sinner. We have outraged the
law of God, not occasionally, or now and
1t. Harki it thunders two claps: "The
is deceitful above all things and des-
wicked" "The sonlthat ~sinneth,
1t shall die" What the Bible says our
own conscience afirGs.
After Judge Morgan had sentenced Lady
Jane Grey to death his conscience troubled
him SO much for the deed that he became
insane, and all through his insanity he
kept saying: flake her away from mel
Lady Jane Grey! Take her awayl Lady
lane Greyln 1t was the voice Of conscience.
And no man ever does anything wrong,
however great or small, but the conscience
brings that matter before him, and at
every step OF his misbehavior 1t says,
Wrong, wrongi" Sin Is a leprosy; sin is a
paralysis; sin is a consumption, SIMS pollu-
lion: sin Is death. Give 1t a fair chance,