The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1901-03-29
RELIGIOUS REVIVALS
DR.. Talmage, in Timely Discourse,
Declares His Belief in Them.
Sermon Adapted from the Story of
Simon and the Fishcrs-Greatest
Obstacle to RevivaIs Is an
Unconverted Ministry.


copyright, 1901, by Louis Klopsch, N. Y
Washington.
This discourse of DIR. Talmage is
most pertinent at this time when a
widespread effort for religious awak-
ening is being made; text, Luke, verse
6: They inclosed a great multitude
of fishes and their net brake"
Simon and his comrades had expert
enced the night before what fishermen
call poor luck" Christ steps on board
the fishing smack and tells the sailors
to pull away from the beach and dl-
rects them again to sink the net. Sure
enough, very soon the net is full OF
fishes, and the sailors begin to haul IN.
So large a school of fishes. was taken
that the hardy men began to look red
in the face as they pull, and hardly
have they begun to rejoice at their sue
cess when snap goes threat OF the
net, and snap goes another thread, SO
there is danger not only of losing the
fish, but of losing the net.
Without much care as to how much
the boat tits or how much water is
splashed on deck the fishermen rush
about, gathering up the broken meshes
of the net. Out yonder there is ship
dancing on the wave, and they hail 1t:
"Ship ahoy! Bear down this way!
The ship comes, and both boats, both
fishing smacks, are filled with the
foundering treasures.
"Ah," says some one, "how much
better it would have been if they had
staid on shore and fished with hook
and line and taken one at time in
stead of having this great excitement
and the boat almost upset and the net
broken and having to call for help and
getting sopping wet with the seal!
The church is the boat, the Gospel
is the net, society is the sea, and a
great revival is a whole school brought
in at one sweep of the net. L have ad-
miration for that man who goes out
with a hook and line to fish. l admire
the way he unwinds the reel and ad-
justs the bait and drops the hook in a
quiet place on a still afternoon and
here catches one and there one, but /
and a net a mile long and swift oars
and stout sails and stiff breeze and a
great multitude of souls brought-so
great a multitude that you have got
to get help to draw it ashore, straining
the net to the utmost until it breaks
here and there, letting few escape,
but bringing the great multitude into
eternal safety.
In other words, 1 believe in revivals.
The great work of saving men began
with 5000 people joining the church in
one day, and it will close with 40 or a
hundred million people saved in "a
hours when nations shall be born in a
day. But there are objections to re-
vivals. People are opposed to them
because the net might get broken, and
if by the pressure of souls it does not
get broken, then they take their own
penknives and slit the net. "They in
closed a great multitude of fishes, and
the net brake
1t is sometimes opposed to revivals
of religion that those who come into
the church at such times do not hold
out. As long as there is gale of bless
ing they have their sails up. But as
soon as strong winds stop blowing
what are the facts in the case? In all
our churches the vast majority of the
useful people are those who are
brought in under great awakenings,
and they hold out. Who are the prom
inent men in the United States in
churches, in prayer meetings, in Sab
bath schools? For the most part they
are the product of great awakenings.
l have noticed that those who are
brought into the Kingdom of God
through revivals have more per-
sistence and more determination in the
Christian life than those who come
in under a low state of religion. Peo-
pie born in an icehouse may live, but
they will never get over the cold they
caught in the icehouse. A cannon ball
depends upon the impulse with which
it starts for how far it shall go and
how swiftly, and the greater the re-
vival force with which soul is started
the more far-reaching and far-resound-
ing will be the execution.
But it is sometimes objected to re-
vivals that there is so much excitement
that people mistake hysteria for relig-
ion. We admit that in every revival of
religion there is either a suppressed or
demonstrated excitement. Indeed,
if man can GO out of state of con-
demnation into state of acceptance
with God or see others go without any
agitation of soul he is in an unhealthy,
morbid state and is as repulsive and
absurd as a man who should boast he
saw a child snatched out from under a
horses hoofs and felt no agitation, or
saw a man rescued from the fourth
story of house on fire and felt no ac-
celeration of the pulses.
Salvation from sin and death and
hell into life and peace and Heaven for
ever is such a tremendous thing that
if a man tells me he can look on it
without any agitation L doubt his
Christianity. The fact is that some
times excitement is the most impor-
tant possible thing. In case of resus-
citation from drowning or freezing
the one idea is to excite animation.
Before conversion we are dead. 1t is
the business of the church to revive,
arouse, awaken, resuscitate, startle
into life. Excitement is bad or good
according to what it makes us do. If
it make us do that which is bad, it is
bad excitement, but if it make us agi-
tated about our eternal welfare, if
it make us pray, if it make us attend
upon Christian service, if it make us
cry unto God for mercy, then it is a
good excitement,