The Penn's Grove record., 1901-01-11

our great industries THIS awful load
Crime. individual and official. We hav
to pay the board of the villains who ar
incarcerated in our prisons; We have t
take care of the orphans Of those wit
plunged into their graves through beastl-
indulgence; we have to support the mum
eipal governments, which are eXpensiv,
just in proportion as the criminal proclivi
ties are vast and tremendous. Who sup
ports the almshouses and police %stationl
and all the machinery of municipal gov
ernment? The taxpayers.
But in the glorious time of which
speak g%rievous t~axation will all have
censed. There will be no need Of support
ing criminals; there will be no criminals
Virtue will have taken the place of vice
There will be no orphan asylums, for pa
rents will be able to leave a competency
to their children; there will be no voting
of large sums of moneys for some munich
pal improvement, which moneys, before
they get to the improvement, drop into
the pockets of those who voted them; nc
oyer and terminer kept up at vast expense
to the people, no impaneling of juries to
try theft and arson and murder and Sian.
der and blackmail; better factories; grand.
er architecture; finer equipage; larger for
tunes; richer opulenee. "a morning with
out Clouds
In that better time also coming to these
cities the churches of Christ will be more
numerous, and they will be larger, and
they will be more devoted to the service
of Jesus Christ, and they will accomplish
greater influences for good. Now it is
often the case that churches are envious
Of each other, and denominations collide
with each other, and ever ministers Of
Christ sometimes forget the bond of
brotherhood. But in the time of which l
speak, while there will be just as many
differences of opinion as there are now,
there will be no acerbity, no hypercriti-
cism, no e~xclusiveness.
In our great cities the churches are not
to-day large enough to hold mere than a
fourth Of the population. The churches
that are built-eomparatively few OF them
are fully occupied. The average attend
ance in the churches of the United States
to-day is not 400. Now, in the glorious
be vast churches, and they are going to be
all ~thronged with worshipers. Oh, what
r%ousing songs they will singi Oh, what
earnest ermon they will preach oh,
what feryent prayers they will offer! Now,
in our time what is called a fashionable
church is a place where a few people, hav-
ing attended very carefully to their toilet,
come and sit down-they do not want to
be crowded, they like a whole seat to
themselves-and then, if they have any
time left from thinking of their store, and
from examining the style Of The hat in
front of them, they sit and listen to the
sermon warranted to hit no mans sins,
and listen to music which is rendered by
a choir warranted to sing tunes that no.
body knows! And then, after an hour
and a half of indolent yawning, they go
home refreshed. Every man feels better
after he has had a sleep!
In many of the churches of Christ in
our day the music is simply a mockery. |
have not a cultivated ear nor a cultivated
voice, yet no man can do my singing for
me. | ho = nothing to say against artistic
music. The 81 or IS | pay to hear one. of
the great queens of song is a good invest
ment. But when the people assemble in
religious convocations and the hymn is
read and the angels of God step from their
throne to catch the music on their wings,
do not let us drive them away by our in
difference.
In the glorious time coming in our cities
and in the world hosanna will meet ho-
sauna and hallelujah hallelujah. In that
time also of which | speak all the haunts
Of iniquity and crime and squalor will be
cleansed and will be illumined. How is it
to be done? You say perhaps by one in
huence, Perhaps l say by another. l will
tell YOU what is my idea. and / know am
right in it. The gospel of the Son of God
is the only agency that will ever accom-
plish this.
In that day of which | speak do yoH
believe that there will be any midnight
carousal? viii there be any kicking off
rom marble steps of shivering mendicants?
VIII there be any unwashed, unfed, un-
children? VIII there be any
.blasphemies in the street? Will there be
any inebriates staggering past? No.
No wine stores, no lager beer saloons,
no breweries, where they make the three
KS; no bloodshot eye; NJ bloated cheek;
no instruments of ruin and destruction; no
pounded forehead.
But all these wrongs are going to be
/ expect to live to see the day,
| think | hear in the distance the rum
bling of the Kings chariot. Not always
in the minority is the church of God
going to be, or are good men going to be.
The streets are going to be filed with re-
generated populations.
What will you do with those who fleece
young man, getting him to purloin
large sums of money from his employer
the young man who came to an officer of
my church and told the story and franti-
asked what he might do? Nothing.
Gods love will yet bring back this
ruined world to holiness and happiness.
An infinite Father bends over it in SYM
And to the orphan He will be a
and to the widow He will be a
husband, and to the outcast He will be a
home, and to the poorest wretch that to-
day erawls out of the ditch of his abom-
crying for mercy, He will be an
pardoning Redeemer.
The rocks will turn gray with age, the
forests will be unmoored in the hurricane,
the sun will shut its fiery eyelid, the stars
will drop like blasted figs, the sea will
its last groan and lash itself in ex-
piring agony, the continents will drop like
anchors in the deep, The world will wrap
itself in sheet of flame and leap o the
pyre of the judgment day, but
love will never die. 1t shall kindle
its suns after all other lights have gone
out. 1t will be a billowing sea after all
other oceans have wept themselves away.
1t will warm itself by the blaze of a CON
world. 1t will sing while the
archangeTs trumpet peals and the air is
Tiled with the crash of breaking sepul-
and the rush of the wings of the
dead. Oh, commend that love to
liS CLUES ana tue morning WITHOUT
clouds will comet
| know that sometimes it seems a hope
task, You toll on in different spheres,
sometimes with great Encouragement.
have no faith and say: ut does
amount to anything. You might as
well quit that" Why, when Moses
his hand over the Red Sea it
not seem to mean anything especially.
came out, | suppose, and said,
'Aha!" Some of them found out what he
wanted to do. He wanted the sea parted.
It did not amount to anything, this
stretching out of his hand over the sea!
But after awhile the wind blew all night
from the east, and the waters were gath.
cred into a glittering palisade on either
side, and the pillows roared as God pulled
back on their crystal bits. Wheel into
line, o Israeli March, march! Pearls
under feet, flying spray gathers
into rainbow arch Of victory for the con.
querors to march under, shout Of hosts on
the beach answering the shout of hosts
amid sea, and when the last line of the
lsraelites reach the beach the cymbals
chap, and the shields elang, and the waters
rush over the pursuers, and the swift
fingered winds on the white keys of the
foam play the grand march of Israel deliv-
cred and the awful dirge Of Egyptian over.
throw.
So you and | go forth, and all the PEG.
pie OF God go forth, and they stretch their
hand over the sea, the boiling sea of crime
and sin and wTetehedness. ut doesn't
amount TO anything" people say. Doesn't
it? Gods winds of help will after awhile