The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1899-08-04
SUBSCRIPTION: Sl.OO Per Year.

! do you say of that man who, sick in sir.
| has the healing medicine of Gods grace
offered him and refuses to take it? 81
| he dies, he is a suicide. People talk sls
| though God took n man and led him QUIZ
to darkness and death, as though He
brought him up to the cliffs and then
pushed him off. Oh, mol When a man
is lost, it is not because God pushes him
| off; it is because he jumps off, In olden
| times a suicide was buried at the cross
roads, and the people were accustomed
! to throw stones upon his grave. So it
seems to me there may be at this time
a man who is destroying his soul, and
! as though the angels of God were here
to bury him at the point where the
| roads of life and death cross each other,
throwing upon the grave the broken
law and great pile of misimproved
privileges so that those going by may
look at the fearful mound and learn
what suicide it is when an immortal
soul for which Jesus died puts itself
out of the way.
When Christ trod this planet with
foot of flesh, the people rushed after
| Him-people who were sick and those
who, being so sick they could not walk,
were brought by their friends. Here
see a mother holding up her little
child, crying: "Cure this Group, Lord
| Jesus! Cure this scarlet fever!" And
others: ''Cure this ophthalmia! Give
ease and rest to this spinal distress!
| Straighten this club foot!" Christ
made every house where He stopped
| dispensary. do not believe that in the
| 10 centuries which have gone by since,
His heart has got hard. feel that we
can come now with all our wounds of
soul and get His benediction. o Jesus;
here we are! We want healing. We
want sight. We want health. We want
life. ''The whole need not physician,
but they that are sick" Blessed be
| God that Jesus Christ comes through
| this assemblage now, His garments
smelling of myrrh"-that means fra
| grance-"and aloes"-they mean bitter
sacrificial memories-"and cassia''-
| that means medicine and cure.
According to my text, He comes "out
of the ivory palaces" You know, or,
if you do not know, will tell you now
that some of the palaces of olden time
were adorned with ivory. Ahab and
| Solomon had their homes furnished
with it. The tusks of African and Ash
attic elephants were twisted into all
manners of shapes, and there were
stairs of ivory and chairs of ivory and
| tables of ivory and pillars of ivory and
windows of ivory and fountains of
ivory that dropped into basins of ivory
and rooms that had ceilings of ivory.
Oh, white and overmastering beauty!
Green tree branches sweeping the
white curbs. Tapestry trailing the
snowy floors. Brackets of light fash
ing on the lustrous surroundings. Sill
very music ripping on the beach of the
arches The mere thought of it almost
stuns my brain, and you say: "Oh, if
l could only have walked over such
floors! If l could have thrown myself
in such a chair! If could have heard
the drip and dash of those fountains!"
You shall have something better than
that if you only let Christ introduce
you. From that place He came, and to
that place He proposes to transport you,
for His garments smell of myrrh and
aloes and cassia out of the ivory pal
The Tuileries of the French, the Wind
sor castle of the English, the Spanish
alhambra, the Russian kremlin, are
mere dungeons compared with it! Not
so many castles on either side of the
Rhine as on both sides of the river of God
the ivory palaces! One for the an
gels, insufferably bright, winged, fire
eyed, tempest charioted; one for the
martyrs, with blood red robes from un-
der the altar; one for the King, the
steps of His palace the crown of the
church militant; one for the singers,
who lead the one hundred and forty
and four thousand; one for you ran
somed from sin; one for me, plucked
from the burning. Oh, the ivory pal
aces
To-day it seems to me as if the win
Gows of those palaces were illumined
for some great victory, and look and
see climbing the stairs of ivory and
walking on floors of ivory and looking
from the windows of ivory some whom
we knew and loved on earth. Yes,
know them. There are father ard
mother, not 50 years and 70 years as
when they left us, but blithe and young
as when on their wedding day. And
there are brothers and sisters, merrier
than when we used to romp across the
meadows together. The cough gone.
The cancer cured. The erysipelas
healed. The heartbreak over. Oh, how
fair they are in the ivory palaces! And
your dear little children that went ont
from you-Christ did not let one of
them drop as He lifted them. He did
not wrench one of them from you. No.
They went as from one they loved we'll
to one whom they loved better. If |
should take your little child and press
its soft face against my rough cheek,
| might keep it little while; but when
you, the mother, came along it would
struggle to go with you. And so you
stood holding your dying child when
Jesus passed by in the loom and the
little one sprang out to greet Him.
That is all. Your Christian dead did
not go down into the dust and the
gravel and the mud. Though il rained
all that funeral day and the water came
uptothe wheels hub as you drove out TO
the cemetery, it made 70 difference u
them, for they stepped from the home
here TO the home there, right into the
ivory palaces. All is well with them.
All is well.
Queer Collection of Buttons.