The Leon reporter. (Leon, Iowa) 1887-1930, 1900-05-31
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
REWARDS OF ENDEAvoR SUN
DAYS SUBJECT.
From the Following Text -'.I Have
Finished the Work Which Thou Gavest
Me to Do"-John XVII, 4-The Fruits
of Well Won Victory.

copyright. 1900. by Louis Klopsch.]
There is a profound satisfaction in
the completion of anything we have
undertaken. We lift the capstone with
exultation, while, on the other hand,
there is nothing more disappointing
than after having toiled in certain
direction to find that our time is vast
ed and our investment profitless.
Christ came to throw up highway on
which the whole world might, if it
chose, mount into heaven. He did it.
The foul mouthed crew who attempted
to tread on him could not extinguish
the sublime satisfaction which he ex-
pressed when he said, 81 have finished
the work which thou gavest me to
do"
Alexander the Great was wounded,
and the doctors could not medicate his
wounds,and he seemed to be dying, and
in his dream the sick man saw plant
with peculiar flower, and he dream
ed that that plant was put upon his
wound and that Immediately it was
cured. And Alexander, waking from
his dream, told this to the physician,
and The physician wandered out until
he found just the kind of plant which
the sick man had described, brought
It to him, and the wound was healed.
Well, the human race had been hurt
with the ghastliest Of all wounds
that of sin. 1t was the business of
Christ to bring balm for that wound
the balm of divine restoration. In
carrying this business to success
full issue the difficulties were stupen-
dous.
The Spiritual UpbuildIng.
In many of our plans we have our
friends to help us; some to draw a
sketch of the plan, others to help us
in the execution. But Christ fought
every inch of his way against bitter
hostility and amid circumstances all
calculated to depress and defeat.
In his fathers shop no more inter-
course was necessary than is ordinar-
lily necessary in bargaining with men
that have work to do; yet Christ, with
hands hard from use of tools of trade,
was called forth to become public
speaker, to preach in the face of mobs,
while some wept and some shook their
fists and some CRASHED upon him with
their teeth and many wanted him out
of the way. To address orderly and
respectful assemblages is not so easy
as it may seem, but it requires more
energy and more force and more con-
centration to address an exasperated
mob. The villagers of Nazareth heard
the pounding of his hammer, but all
the wide reaches of eternity were to
hear the stroke of his spiritual up
building.
q So also the habits of dress and diet
were against him. The mighty men of
Christ's time did not appear in appare.
without trinkets and adornments.
NGi Of the ga3esssfi IS would h
peared in citizens apparel. Yet here
was man, here was a protested king,
who always wore the same coat IN
deed, it was far from Shabby Shabby for after
he had worn it long while the gam
blers thought it worth rafting about,
but still it was far from being an
imperial robe. 1t was a coat that any
ordinary man might have worn on an
ordinary occasion.
Neither was there any pretension in
his diet. No cupbearer with golden
chalice brought him wine to drink.
On the seashore he ate fish, first hav-
ing broiled it himself No one fetched
him water to drink; but, bending over
the we'll in Samaria, he begged a
drink. He sat at only one banquet,
and that not at all sumptuous, for to
relieve the awkwardness of the host
one of the guests had to prepare wine
for the company.
Man Without n Diploma.
All this was against Christ. So the
fact that he was not regularly gradu-
ated was against him. If man come
with the diplomas Of colleges and
schools and theological seminaries,
and he has been through foreign trav-
ell, the world is disposed to listen. But
here was a man who had graduated
at no college, had not in any acad-
envy by ordinary means learned the
alphabet of the language he spoke,and
yet he proposed to talk, to instruct in
subjects which had COMPOUNDED the
intellects. John says: "The
Jews marveled, saying, How hath this
man letters, having never learned?"
We, in our day. have found out that
a man without a diploma may know
as much as a man with one and that
a college can not transform a slug
gard into philosopher or a theolog-
ical seminary teach a fool to preach.
An empty head after the laying on of
hands of the presbytery is empty still.
But it shocked all existing prejudices
in those olden times for man with
no scholastic pretensions and no grad
uation from a learned institution to set
himself up for teacher. 1t was
against him.
So also the brevity of his life was
against him. He had not come to what
we call mid-life But very few men do
anything before 33 years of age, and
yet that was the point at which
Christ's life terminated. The first Is
years you take in nursery and school,
Then 1t will take you six years to get
into your occupation or profession.
That will bring you to 81 years. Then