The Penn's Grove record., 1900-12-07
DIR. TALMAGFS SERMON
SUNDAYS DISCOURSE ~ THE NOTED
DIVINE.



Subject: Lack ofPatience-Faith. Hope and
Charity Bloom in Many Hearts Where
the Grace Of Patience IL Wantine-Pits
Rather Than Condemn the Erring.
tCopyrieht isOu.l
WASHINGTON, D. C-This discourse Of
DR.. Talmage is full length portrait Of q
virtue which ell admire, and the lessons
taught are very helpful; text, Hebrews <,
80, ''Ye have need Of patience"
Yes, we are in awful need of it. Some
of us have little of it, and some Of us
have none at all. There is less Of this
grace in the world than of almost any
other. Faith, hope and charity are all
abloom in hundreds Of souls where you
find one specimen of patience. Paul, the
author of the text, on a conspicuous occa-
sion lost his patience with coworker,
and from the way he urges this virtue
upon the Hebrews, upon the Corinthians,
upon the Thessalonians, upon the Ro-
mans, upon the Colossians, upon the
conclude he was speaking out Of his own
need of more of this excellence. And I
only wonder that Paul had any nerves left.
Imprisonment, hagellation, Mediterranean
cyclone, arrest for treason and conspir-
acy, the wear and tear of preaching to
angry mobs, those at the door of a thea
tire and those on the rocks of Mars hill,
left him emaciated and invalid and with a
broken voice and sore eyes and nerves a.
jangle. He gives us snap shot of him
self when he describes his appearance and
his sermonic delivery by saying, I'm bodily
presence weak and in speech contempti-
ble," and refers to his infamed eyelids
when, speaking of the ardent friendship of
the Galatians, he says, IF it had been
possible, We would have plucked out your
own eyes and have given them to me-"
We all admire most that which we have
least of. Those of us with unimpressive
visage most admire beauty; those of us
with discordant voice most extol musical
cadence; those of us with stammering
speech most wonder at eloquence; those
Of us who get provoked at trifes and are
naturally irascible appreciate in others the
equopoise and the calm endurance of pa
tience. So Paul, with hands tremulous
with the agitations of a lifetime, writes of
the "God of patience" and of ministers
of God in much patience" and of patience
of hope" and tells them to follow after
patience" and wants them to "run with
patience" and speaks of those strength
ened with all might to all patience" and
looks us all full in the face as he makes
the startling charge, eye have need Of
patience"
The recording angel, making pen out
of some plume of bird of paradise, is not
getting ready to write opposite your name
anything explanatory. All your sublime
equilibrium of temperament is the result
OF worldly success. But suppose things
nightly change with you, as they some
times do change. You begin to go down
hill, and it is amazing how many there are
to help you down when you begin to go in
that direction. A great investment fails.
The Colorado silver mine ceases to yield.
You get land poor; your mills, that yield
ed marvels of wealth, are eclipsed by
mills with newly invented machinery; you
get under the feet of the bears Of Wall
street. For the first time in your life you
need to borrow money, and no one is will
ing to lend. Under the narrowing worri-
ment you get distressful feeling at the
base of your brain. Insomnia and nervous
dyspepsia lay hold of you. Your health
goes down with your fortune; your circle
OF acquaintance narrows, and where once
you were oppressed by the fact that you
had not time enough to return one-haf Of
the social calls made upon you now the
card basket in your hallway is empty, and
your chief callers are your creditors and
the effect of the last prescription. Now
you understand how people can become
pessimistic and cynical and despairful.
You have reached that stage yourself
Now you need something that you have
not. But know of reinforcement that
you can have if you will accept it. Yon-
der comes up the road or the sidewalk
messenger of God. Her attire is unpre-
tending. She has no wings, for she is not
an angel, but there is something in her
countenance that implies rescue and deliv-
erance. She comes up the steps that once
were populous with the affluent and into
the hallway where the tapestry is getting
faded and frayed, the place now all empty
of worldly admirers. l will tell you her
name if you would like to know it. Paul
baptized her and gave her the right name.
She is not brilliant, but strong. There is
deep quiethood in her manner and q
frmness in her tread, and in her hand is
scroll revealing her mission. She comes
from heaven. She was born in the throne
room of the King. This is Patience. rye
have need of patience"
First, patience with the faults of others.
No one keeps the Ten Commandments
equally well. Ones temperament decides
which commandments he shall come near
est to keeping If we break some of the
commandments ourselves, why be SO hard
on those who break others Of the ten? If
you and l run against one verse of the
twentieth chapter of Exodus, why should
we 80 severely excoriate those who run
against another verse of the same chap
ter? Until we are perfect ourselves we
ought to be lenient with our neighbor's
imperfections. Yet it is often the case
that the man most vulnerable is the most
hxyv>o 81 E..
yet has no tolerance for theft, when pro-
latter is robbery of a man, the former is
robbery Of God. Perhaps he is given to
defamation and detraction and yet feels
himself better than some one who is
guilty of manslaughter, not realizing that
the assassination of character is the worst
kind of assassination. The laver for wash
ing in the ancient tabernacle was at its
side FURNISHED like looking glass, so that
those that approached that laver might
see their need Of washing, and if by the
gospel looking glass we discovered our own
need of moral cleansing we would be more
economic of denunciation. The most of
those who go wrong are the victims of cur
cumstances, and if you and I had been
rocked in the same iniquitous cradle, and
been all our lives surrounded by the same
baleful influences we would probably have
done just as badly, perhaps worse.
We also have need of patience with slow
results of Christian work. We want to
see our attempts to do good Immediately
successful. The world is improving, but
improving at so deliberate rate; why not
more rapidity and momentum? Other
wheels turn SO swiftly; why not the gos-
pei chariot take electric speed? lido not
know. only know that it is Gods way.
We whose cradle and grave are SO near to-
gether have to hurry up, but God. who
manages this world and the universe, is
from everlasting to everlasting. He takes
800 years to do that which He could do in
five minutes. His clock strikes once in q,
thousand years. While God took only q
week to fit up the world for human resi-
dence, geogolgy reveals that the founda-
tions of the world were cons in being laid,
and God watched the glaciers, and the fire,
and the earthquakes, and the volcanoes as
through centuries and millenniums they
were shaping the world before that last
week that put on the arborescence. A
few days ago my friend was talking with a
geologist. As they stood near a pile Of
rocks my friend said to the scientist, II
suppose these rocks were hundreds Of