Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1900-12-10

forted about your departed friends Be
ccmforted about your own demise
when the time shall come. Tell it to all
the people under the sun that no Chris
tan ever dies alone; the King is in the
boat
A Narrow Stream.
Again, my text suggests that leaving
this world for heaven is only crossing a
ferry. DR.. Shaw estimates the average
! width Of the Jordan to be about 80
yards. What, so narrow! Yes. ''There
went over a ferryboat to carry over the
kings household" Yes; going to heav-
/ ell is only short tr1p-Only a ferry. 1t
may be so miles-that is, so years-be-
fore we get to the wet bank on the 9TH
er side, but the crossing is short. will
tell you the whole secret. 1t is not five
minutes across nor three nor two nor
one minute. 1t is an instantaneous
transportation. People talk as though
leaving this life the Christian went
plunging and f1oundering and swim
ming, to crawl up exhausted on the
other shore and to be pulled out of the
pelting surf as by a Ramsgate lifebOat
No such thing. 1t is only ferry. 1t is
SO narrow that we can hail each other
from bank to bank. 1t is only four
arms length across. The arm of earth
~ farewell put out from this side, the
arm of heavenly welcome put out from
the other side, while the dying Chris
tan, standing midstream, stretches out
his two arms, the one to take the fare
we'll of earth and the other to take the
greeting of heaven. That makes four
arms length across the river.
Blessed be God that when we leave
this world we are not to have a great
and perilous enterprise of getting into
heaven; not q dangerous Franklin eX-
petition to find the northwest passage
among icebergs; only ferry. That
accounts for something you have never
been able to understand. You never
supposed that very nervous and timid
Christian people could be so unexcited
and placid in the last hour. The fact is
they were clear down on the bank, and
they saw there was nothing to be
frightened about; such short distance
only a ferry With one ear they
heard the funeral psalm in their mem
Dry, and with the other ear they heard
the song of heavenly salutatiOn. The
willows on this side the Jordan and the
Lebanon cedars on the other almost in
terlocked their branches-only a ferry.
The Landing Safe.
My subject also suggests the fact
that when we cross over at the last we
shall find a solid landing. The ferry
boat, as spoken of in my text, means a
place to start from and place to land
David and his people did not find the
eastern shore of the Jordan any more
solid than the western shore where he
landed, and yet to a great many heav-
en- is not a real place. To you heaven
is a fog bank in the distance. After the
resurrection has come you will have a
reSurrected foot and something to
tread on and a resurrected eye and
colors to see with it and a resurrected
ear and music to regale it. Smart men
in this day are making a great deal Of
fun about st. Johns materialistic de-
scriptions of heaven. Well, now, my
friends, if you will tell me what will be
the use of q resurrected body in heaven
with nothing to tread on and nothing
to hear and nothing to handle and
nothing to taste then / will laugh too.
Are you going to float about in ether
forever, swinging about your hands
and feet through the air indiscrimi-
nately, one moment sweltering in the
center of the sun and the next moment
shivering in the mountains of the
moon? That is not my heaven. Dis
satisfied with Johns materialistic heav-
en-, theological thinkers are trying to
patch up a heaven that will do for
them at last. l never heard of any
heaven | want to go to except st. |
Johns heaven. I believe l shall hear
Mr.. Toplady sing yet and Isaac Watts |
recite hymns and Mozart play. "Oh," |
you say, where would you get the or
gan?" The Lord will provide the or !
gan. Don't you bother about the organ.
l believe l shall yet see David with a
harp, and 1 will ask him to sing one of !
the songs Of Zion. l believe after the |
l shall see Massillon, the |
great French pulpit orator, and 1 shall |
hear from his own lips how he felt on
that day when he preached the kings
funeral sermon and flung his whole
audience into a paroxysm of grief and
solemnity. l have no patience with
your transcendental, gelatinous, case
Gus heaven. My heaven is not a fog
bank. My eyes are unto the hills, the
everlasting hills. The Kings ferryboat,
starting from wharf on this side, will
go to a wharf on the other side.
Friends to Greet Us.
Again, my subject teaches that when
we cross over at the last we shall be
met at the landing. When David and
his family went over in the ferryboat
spoken Of in the text, they landed amid
a nation that had come out to greet
them. AS they stepped from the deck
Of the boat to the shore there were
thousands Of people who gathered
around them TO aynraSS q satisfaction