Connecticut western news., 1900-12-27

troubles, but 1 win some day under stand. And they do not come by acci- dent. God allows them to come, and God Is love-"
 Divine Pity.
 But for this divine feeling 1 think our world would long ago have beer demolished Just think of the organ. ized wickedness of the nations! See the abominations continental Behold the false religions that hoist Moham- med and Buddha and Confucius! Look at the Koran and the Shastra and the Zend-Avesta, that would crowd out of the world the Holy Scripturesl Look at war, digging It's trenches for the dead across the hemispheres! See the great cities with their holocaust of destroy ed manhood and womanhoodl What blasphenles assail the heavens! What butcheries sicken the centuries! What
 proccssions of crime and atrocity and
 woe encircle the globe! If justice had
 spoken, 1t would have said, 'The world
 deserves annihilation, and let annihi-
 lation come" If immutability had
 spoken, it would have said: T have al-
 ways been opposed to wickedness and
 always will be opposed to 1t. The
 world Is to me an affront infinite and
 away with ftp If omniscience had
 spoken, 1t would have said, Il have
 watched that planet with minute and all comprehensive inspection, and l cannot have the offense longer contin- ued" If truth had spoken, 1t would
 have said, T declare that they who of fend the law must go down under the law" But divine love took different view of the worlds obduracy and pol lutlon. It said: II pity all those woes of the earth. 1 cannot stand here and
 see no assuagement of those sufrerings.
 1 will go down and reform the world. I will medicate It's wounds. will calm its frenzy. I will wash off Its
 pollution. I will become incarnated.
 I will take on my shoulders and upon
 my brow and Into my heart the con- sequences of that worlds misbehavior.
 start now, and between my arrival at Bethlehem and my ascent from Oli- vet will weep their tears and suffer | their griefs and die their death. Fare well. my throne, my crown, my scep- | ter, my angelic environment. my heav- en, till have finished the work and come backw God was never conquer
 ed but once, and that was when he was conquered by his own love. "God Is love-"
 In this day, when the creeds of churches are being revised, let more emphasis be put upon the thought of my text. Let 1t appear at the begin | ming of every creed and at the close. | The ancients used to tell of great military chieftain who, about to go to | battle, was clad in armor, helmet on | head and sword at side, and who put out his arms to give farewell embrace | to his child, and the child. affrighted at | his appearance, ran shrieking away. | Then the father put off the armor that | caused the alarm, and the child saw who he was and ran into his arms and | snuggled against his heart. Creeds must not have too much Iron In their | make up, terrorizing rather than at | tracting. They must not hide the smil- | ing face and the warm heart of our | Father. God. Let nothing imply that
 there Is sheriff at every door ready to make arrest, but over us all and
 around us all mercy that wants to
 save and save now.
 Why the Bible Was Written. If one paragraph of the creed seems | to take you, like child, out of the arms of a father, let the next para graph put you in the arms of a mother. "As one whom his mother comforteth so will I comfort you" Oh, what | mother we have In God And my text | Is the lullaby sung to us when we are | III or when we are maltreated or when | we are weary or when we are trying to | do better or when we are bereft or | when we ourselves lie down to the last | sleep. We feel the warm cheek of the mother against our cheek, and there ] sounds In 1t the hush of many mothers, | God is love-"
 This was the reason the Bible was written. The world needs no inspired page to tell 1t that God will chastise
 sin, for that Is proved in the life of | many an offender You can look through
 the wicket of any prison and see the
 fact which the world understood thou. I sands of years before Solomon wrote It "The way of the transgressor is hard" | The world needed no Bible to tell 1t that God Is ornnipotent, for any one
 who has seen Mont Blanc or Niagara or the Atlantic ocean in cyclone
 knows that. The world needed no Bi-
 ble to tell 1t of Gods wisdom, for ev.
 erything, from a spiders web to the ] upholstery of a summers sunset, from
 the globe of dewdrop to the rounding of a world, declares that But there
 was one secret about God that was l wrapped up in a scroll of p&rrhment.
 and 1t staid there until apostolic hand
 unrolled that scroll and let out upon
 the world the startling fact, which 1t | could never have surmised, never | guessed, never expected, that he loved
 our human race so ardently that he | will pardon sin and subdue the offend | CT with divine kiss and turn foaming
 malefactors Into worshipers before the
 throne. Oh. I am so glad that the se- | cret is out and that 1t can never again
 be yelled! Tell 1t to all the shining,
 suffering, dying race, tell it In song and
 sermon on canvas and in marble, on
 arch and pillar; tell 1t all around the earth-"God is love-"
 | Notice that the wisest men of the
 nations for thousands of years did not amid their idolatries make something
 to represent this feeling. this emotion. They had love, representing night;
 Neptune, the god of the sea; Minerva,
 the goddess of wisdom; Venus, the god
 dess of base appetite; Ceres, the god
 dess of corn, and an Odin and an Osiris
 and Titan and Juggernaut and
 whole pantheons of gods and goddess
 es, but no shrine, no carved image, no
 sculptured form, has suggested god
 of pure love. That was beyond human
 brain. 1t took God to think that, a