Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1900-06-18

you, and what are you to do? [ tell
| you plainly that all who serve Christ
i must suffer persecution. 1t is the worst
| sign in the world for you to be able to
say, 81 have not an enemy in the
world" A woe is pronounced in the
I Bible against the one of whom every
body speaks WELL If you are at peace
with all the world and everybody likes
you and approves your work, it is be
cause you are an idler in the Lords
!! Vineyard and are not doing your duty
All those who have served Christ, how
ever eminent, all have been maltreated
at some stage Of their experience. You
know it was so in the time of George
Whitefeld when he stood and invited
men into the kingdom of God. What
did the learned DR.. Johnson say of
him? He pronounced him a miserable
.mountebank. How was it when Robert
Hall stood and spoke as scarcely any
runinspired man ever did speak of the
,glories Of heaven? And as he stood Sab
hath after Sabbath preaching on these
themes his face kindled with the glory
John Foster, a Christian man, said of
this man, Robert Hall is only acting,
and the smile on his face is q reflection
of his own vanity" John Wesley turn
ed all England upside down with Chris
fian reform, and yet the punsters were
after him, and the meanest jokes in
England were perpetrated about John
Wesley. What is true Of the pulpit is
true of the pew; it is true of the street;
it is true of the shop and the store. All
who will live godly in Christ Jesus
must suffer persecution. And set it
down as the very worst sign in all
your Christian experience if you are
any of you at peace with all the world.
The religion of Christ is war. 1t is
challenge to 1the world, the flesh and
the devil" and If you will buckle on
the whole armor of God you will find
great host disputing your path between
this and heaven.
Peace For the Troubled.
But what are you to do when you are
assaulted and slandered and abused, as
1 suppose nearly all of you have been
in your life? Go out and hunt up the
slanderer? Oh, no, silly man! While
you are explaining away falsehOod in
one place so people will just have heard
of it in other places. l counsel you to
another course. While you are not to
omit any opportunity Of setting your
selves right, want to tell you of One
who had the hardest things said about
him, whose sobriety was disputed,
whose mission was secuted, whose
companionship was denounced, who
was pursued as a babe and spit upon
as a man, who was howled at after he
was dead. 1 will have you go unto him
child prayer saying: 81 see thy wounds |
wounds of head, wounds of feet, |
wounds Of heart. Now look at my |
wounds and see what I have suffered |
and through what battles I am going, |
and 1 entreat thee by those wounds of |
thine sympathze with me-" And he |
will sympathize and he will help. Go |
and tell Jesus.
Again, 1 commend the behavior of |
the disciples to all the bereaved. How |
many in garb of mourning! How |
many emblems Of sorrow you behold |
everywhere! God has his own way of |
taking apart a family. We must get |
out of the way for coming generations. |
We must get off the stage that others |
may come on, and for this reason there |
is a long procession reaching down all |
the time into the valley of shadows. |
This emigration from time into eterni- |
ty is so vast an enterprise that we can
not understand it. Every hour we hear |
the clang of the sepulchral gate. The |
sod must be broken. The ground must |
be plOwed for resurrection harvest. |
Eternity must be peopled. The dust |
must press our eyelids. at is appoint
OIL nntO oil tn 6ip - This
igration from time into eternity keeps
three-fourths of the families of the
earth in desolation. The air is rent
with farewells, and the black tasseled
vehicles of death rumble through every
street. The body Of the child that was
folded so closely to the mothers heart
is put away in the cold and the dark
ness. The laughter freezes to the girls
lip, and the rose scatters. The boy in
the harvest field Of Shunem says, "My
head, my headw and they carry him
home to die on the lap of his mother
Widowhood stands with tragedies of
woe struck into the pallor of the
cheek. Orphanage cries in vain for
father and mother. oh, the grave is
crueli With teeth Of stone it clutches
for it's prey. Retween the closing gates
of the sepulcher our hearts are man
gled and crushed.
God Always Present.
Is there any earthly soIace? None.
We come to the obsequies, we sit with
the grief stricken, we talk pathetically
to their soul, but soon the obsequies
have passed, the carriages have left us
at the door, the friends who staid for
a few days are gone, and the heart sits
in desolation listening for the little feet
fbat will novor aoain ffor %hro,,-l,