Akron daily Democrat. [volume] (Akron, Ohio) 1892-1902, 1899-06-30

ing, smile. If you feel Indignant at
some wrong assailed from the pulpit,
frown. Do not leave your naturalness
and resiliency home because 1t is Sun
day morning. If as officers OF church
you meet people at the church door
with black look, and have the music
black, and the minister in black preach
black sermon, and from invocation to
benediction have the impression black,
few will come. and those who do come
will wish they had not come at all
The seven Candle.ticks.
Golden candiesticks! Scour up the
six lilies on each branch and know
that the more lovely and bright they
are the more fit they are to hold the
light. But Christless light is dam
age to the world rather than a good
Cromwell stabbed his cavalry horses in
st. PauPs cathedral, and many now
use the church In which to stable vani-
ties and worldliness. A worldly church
is candlestick without the candle,
and it had Its prototype In st. Sophia
in Constantinople, built to the glory of
God by Constantine, but transformed
TO base uses by Mohammed the Second
Built out of colored marble; cupola
with "a windows soaring to height Of
$50 feet; the ceiling one great bewilder-
ment of mosaic; galleries supported by
eight columns of porphyry and 81 col
umns of green jasper; nine bronze
doors with alto-relievo work, fascinat.
ing TO the eye of any artist; vases and
vestments incrusted with all manner
of precious stones. Four walls on fire
with indescribable splendor Though
labor was cheap, the building cost ST.
100000. Ecclesiastical structure, al
most supernatural in pomp and maj
esty. But Mohammedanism tore down
from the walls of that building all the
sanity and Christly images. and high
up in the dome the figure of the cross
was rubbed out that the crescent of the
barbarous Turk might be substituted
A great church, but no Christ! A gor-
geous candlestick. but no candle! Ten
thousand such churches would not give
the world as much light as one home
made tallow candle by which last night
some grandmother in the eighties put
on her spectacles and read the Psalms
of David in larger type. Up with the
churches, by all means. Hundreds of
them, thousands of them, and the more
the better. But let each one be blaze
of heavenly light, making the world
brighter and brighter. till the last
shadow has disappeared, and the last
of the suffering children of God shall
have reached the land where they have
no need of candlestick or ''of candle,
neither light of the sun, for the Lord
God giveth them light, and they shall
reign forever and ever" Seven candle
sticks the complete number Of lights!
Let your light shine before men. that
they. seeing your good works, may |
glorify your Father which is in heaYen. |
Turn now in your Bible to the seven |
staIs. We are distinctly told that they |
are the ministers Of religion. Some are |
large stars, some of them small stars, |
some of them sweep wide circuit and
some of them small circuit, but SO |
far as they are genuine they get their |
light from the great central sun around
which they make revolution. Let each
one keep in his own sphere. The solar
system would be soon wrecked If the |
stars, instead of keeping their own
orbits, should go to hunting down other
stars. Ministers of religion should
never clash. But in all the centuries
of the Christian church some Of these
stars have been bunting an Edward
Irving or Horace Bushnell or an AL
bert Barnes. And the stars that were
in pursuit of the other stars lost their
own orbit, and some Of them could
never again find 1t. Alas for the heresy
hunters! The best way to destroy
error is to preach the truth. The best
way to scatter darkness Is to strike a
light There is in immensely room
enough for all the ministers. The min
listers who give up righteousness and
the truth will get punishment enough
anyhow, for they are "the wandering
stars for whom IS reserved the black
ness of darkness forever"
should like, as minister, when ]
lm dying. to be able truthfully to say
what captain of the English army,
fallen at the head OF. his column and
dying on the Egyptian battlefield. said
to General Wolseley. who came to con-
dole with him: 81 led them straight.
Didn't | lead them straight. general?"
God has put us ministers as captains
IN this battlefield of truth against error.
Great at last will be our chagrin if we
'all leading the people the wrong way;
put great will be our gladness If. when
the battle is over, we can hand our
sword back to our great commander,
saying: Lord Jesus! We led the peo-
pie straight Didn't we lead them
'traight?'
Those ministers who go off at a tan
gent and preach some other gospel are
not stars. but comets. and they flash
icross the heavens Il little while and
make people stare, and throw down a
'ew meteoric stones. and then go out of
sight if not out of existence. Brethren
n the ministry, let us remember that
iod calls us stars, and our business Is
o shine and to keep our own sphere,
md then when we get done trying to
light UP the darkness of this world, we
will wheel into higher spheres, and IN
is shall be fulfilled the promise 'they
hat turn many to Righteousness shall
hine as the stars forever and ever"
The ministers are not all Pecksniffs
md canting hypocrites, as some would
lave YOU think! Forgive me, if having
t other times glOritied the medical pro-
ession, and the legal profession. and
he literarr profession-I glorify my
'wn. have seen them In their homes