The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-05-17
SERMON ON SEEING GOD
zroouENT REMARKS or DR. !.
 B. HAWTHORNE.
Large Congregation at First Baptist Church Last Night Listsnsd to Distinguished Prsachsr-Will
 Speak Again Tonight.

pr. J. B. Hawthorne preached his second sermon at the First Baptist Church last night. The church was filled, every available seat being oc- cupied.
 pr. Hawthorne preached with his old | time fire and vigor. His scholarly re- marks were greatly enforced by his oratorical power. The subject of the sermon was Seeing God" and the text was selected from Matthew v. 8, "Bles- sed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God"
 In his preliminary remarks Dr. Hawthorne asked What do we mean by seeink God" He answered the question by a narrative: A little girl | just past i've years of age one day was looking through a stained glass and saw the moon rising over the hills. She turned to her mother and said Mother, see Cod The mother al- lowed the child to believe in simple child like way. and smiling approvingly said, "yes my child see God and how beautiful he is.
 q know a little girl" said Dr. Haw- thorne, "whose cup of bliss is full when she rocks her doll to sleep and talks of it's going to heaven. She is not told that doll babies are not in Heaven, but the child Is allowed to so believe" pr. Hawthorne said that the last part of the Bible is hgurative. John says he saw a rainbow in heaven. He spoke the truth, but he did not see rainbow. He referred to some of the beauties of the heavens. Just so with
 the walls of Jasper, the gates of pearl,
 the streets of gold. This is simply an accommodation for our lack of compre- hension of things spiritually Much Of
 the Bible is in child language. He
 said that when he was a child Johns description of heaven meant everything
 pleasing to childhood. The Bible Is
 child's book and a philosophers book.
 It Is adapted for the simplest minds and for those of the highest culture. But you may ask what is meant by
 seeing God. God Is a spirit and noth-
 inx spiritual can be seen with the
 natural eye. Why doth Christ say Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God When we see thing
 we are convinced that 1t is real. He meant a man with a clean heart, such a man knows what God Is and what the sacred scripture reports him toi be.
 What Is more worthy of human aspi-
 ration than a personal knowledge Of
 
 swayed over all worlds"
 pr. Hawthorne said he sympathized with . man who says he desires to be- iieve and who says he does believe, yet he is net certain He believes that 0od exists, that Jesus Christ is his Divine Son. He believes but is unsatisfiea and unhappy, because he does not know It. Such a man should be respected. He IS honest and his difficulty fs a real one.
 Az Axra n that the universe exists, but the fact IS evi- dent. Things religious are debatable because its realms lie beyond mortal ken, Do you covet this Knowledge of the Divine power, my brother? Where is the being who does not? Can poor mortals, such as we, know God? Can we know God with the same certainty that we know the sun and earth? I claim that we can attain such knowi" edge, and this Is meant when Jesus said "Bessed are the pure in heart, for they shall know God" If man does not know God the reason is in him. self.
 "It is your sin that hid His face from you." If we are in doubt about the existence of Divine Being or the at- tributes of His character there fingers in our hearts some sort of wilful sin.
 God is not a myth" declared pr.
 1 something that lies far away in space. All along the pathway of centuries are the footprints es men nhe have known him. Enoch walked with Him; Abra- ham talked with Him; Jacob com muned with Him; Moses stood face to face with Him at the burning bush, and at the Red Sea and at Mt. Sinai and on the summit of the mountain from whence he viewed the Land of Promise. John the Baptist knew Him as he went through the wilderness her. aiding the advance of the Messiah. Peter and his fellow disciples knew Him the day of Pentecost. John heard Him when the thunders of the unseen world were revealed to him. Luther knew Him when his agonizing spirit found surcease in the Gospel. Whit field. Sturgeon and Moody knew Him again and again when they were di- vinely empowered to unloosen a multi tude from a satanic bondage.
 such mer are still on earth" con- tinued Dr. Hawthorne. ''In this gen. eration there are men and women, to whom God is just as much a reality as the air of Heaven which they breathe or the solid earth on which they stand. The knowledge of God is an abiding possession. Fire cannot consume 1t, thieves cannot take 1t. To know God is to be a partaker of the Di- vine nature and that is enough, for l shall be satisfied"
 pr. Hawthorne closed his sermon with an eloquent appeal to the uncon- verted to give their lives and hearts to the Savior, then they would see aod He will preach again tonight.