St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1901-07-13
GLIMPsES OF GOD.
Discourse of DR.. Talmage on the
Divine Saviour.
He Raises High Expectations of Day
When That Now But Dimly
Seen Will BE Fully
Revealed.
copyright, 1901, by Louis Klopsch. N. "
WASHINGTON.


copyright, 1901, by Louis Klopsch. N. 7.
Washington.
In this discourse DR.. Talmag
raises high expectations of the da.
when that which is now only diml,
seen will be fully revealed; text, Jol
26, IA: "Lo, these are parts of Hi
ways. But how little a portion il
heard of Him? But the thunder o
His power who can understand"
The least understood being in thu
universe is God. Blasphemous would
be any attempt by painting or sculp
ture to represent Him. Egyptian
hieroglyphs tried to suggest Him by
putting the figure of an eye upon 6
sword, implying that God sees anc
rules, but how imperfect the sug
gestion! When we speak of Him, il
is almost always in language figura
tive. He is Light" or ''Dayspring
from on High" or He is High
Tower" or the fountain of Living
Waters" His splendor is SO great
that no man can see Him and live
When the group of great theologians
assembled in Westminster abbey fo1
the purpose of making system OF
religious belief, they first of all want
ed an answer to the question: ''Who
is God?" No one desired to under
take the answering of that overmas-
tering question. They finally con-
cluded to give the task to the young
est man in the assembly, who hap
pened to be Rev. George Gillespie. He
consented to undertake it on the con-
dition that they would first unite
with him in prayer for Divine direc-
ton. He began his prayer by say
ing: 20 God, Thou art spirit, in
finite, eternal and Interchangeable in
Thy being, wisdom, power, holiness,
Justice, goodness and truth" That
first sentence Of Gil1espie's prayer
was unanimously adopted by the as
sembly as the best definition of God.
But. after all, it was only partial
success, and after everything that
language can do when put to the ut
most strain and all we can see of God
in the natural world and realize Of
God in the providential world we are
forced to cry out with Job in my
text: "Lo, these are parts of His
ways. But how little portion is
heard of Him? But the thunder OF
His power who can underestimate"
Archbishop Tillotson and DR.. Dick
and Timothy Dwight and Jonathan
Edwards of the past and the might
fest theologians of this young CEN
fury have discoursed upon the power
of God, the attribute of omnipotence.
And we have all seen demonstrations
of Gods almightiness. It might have
been far out at sea when in an
equinoctial gale God showed what He
could do with the waters. It might
have been in an August thunder
storm in the mountains when God
showed what He could do with the
It might have been in
South America when God showed
what He could do with the earth
quakes. 1t might have been among
the Alps when God showed what He
could do with the avalanches. Our
cheek was blanched, our breath
stopped, our pulses futtered, our
whole being was terrorized, but we
had seen only an instance of Divine
strength. What was the power of
that storm compared with the power
which holds all the oceans? What
was the power that shook the hills
with the power that swings
the earth through all the centuries
and for 5000 years and in forma-
tive and incomplete shape for hun
dreds of thousands of years? What
is that power that sustains our world
with the power which rolls
immensely the entire solar
system and all the consultations and
galaxies and the universe? The
mightiest intellect of man would
give way if for a moment there came
upon it the full appreciation of what
is.
We try to satisfy ourselves with
saying: 'It is natural law that con-
trolls things, gravitation is at work,
centripetal and centrifugal forces re-
spond to each other" But what is
natural law? It is only Gods way of
1oing things. At every point in the
universe it is Gods direct and con-
tinuous power that controls and har-
and sustains. That power
one instant would make
The planetary system and all the
worlds which astronomy reveals one
universal wreck, bereft hemispheres,
sunsets, dead constella-
lions, debris of worlds. What power
It must be that keeps the internal |
Tres Of our world imprisoned-only|
here and there squirting from a Coto-
9axi, or Stromboli, or from a Vesuvi-
Us, putting Pompeii and Herculaneum
into sepulcher, but for the most part |
The internal fires chained in their
cages of rock, and century after cen
Jury unable to break the chain or
BURST open the door! What power to
Keep the component parts of the
air in right proportion, so that all !
around the world the nations may
breathe in health, the frosts and the
heats hindered from working uni
1ersal demolition! Power, as Isaiah
AVS. "tO take ND the isles as n very