The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1901-01-09
DIR. TALMAGES SERMON
SUNDAYS DISCOURSE BY THE NOTED
DIVINE.
Subject: The Mission Of Christ - 1t Was
to Teach the World That God Ia Love
The Sympathy and Compassion Of
the Almighty King.
Copyright laoo.l

- The Sympathy and Compassion OF
the Almighty King.
Copyright Iaool
WASHINGTON, D. Gin this discourse
DR.. Talmage describes in new way the
sacrifices made for the worlds disentrall-
! ment and deliverance. His text is I. John
iv, l6. "God is love-"
Perilous undertaking would it be to at
tempt a comparison between the attributes
of God. They are not like mountain
range. with here and there a higher peak,
nor like the ocean, with here and there a
profounder depth We cannot measure
infnites. We would not dare say whether
His omnipotence or omniscience or omni-
presence or immutability or wisdom or
justice or love is the greater attribute.
But the one mentioned in my text makes
deeper impression upon us than any other.
1t was evidently a very old man who wrote
the chapter from which I take the text.
John was not in his dotage, as Professor
Eichhorn asserted, but you can tell by the
repetitions in the epistle and the rambling
style. and that he called grown people
''little children" that tie author was
probably an octogenarian. Yet Paul, IN
critics on Mars Hill, said nothing stronger
or more important than did the venerable
John when he wrote the three words of
my text, "God is love-"
Indeed, the older one gets the more he
appreciates this attribute. The harshness
and the combativeness and the severity
have gone out of the old man, and he is
more lenient and, aware of his own faults,
is more disposed to make excuses for the
faults of others, and he frequently ejacu-
lates, "Poor human nature" The young
minister preached three sermons on the
Justice of God and one on the love Of God,
but when he got old he preached three
sermons on the love of God and one on
the justice Of God.
Far back in the eternities there came
time when God would express one emotion
of His nature which was yet uneXpressed.
He had made more worlds than were seen
by the ancients from the top of the Egyp-
tian pyramid, which was used as an obser-
yatory, and more worlds than modern as.
tronomy has catalogued or deserted
through te.escopic lens. All that showed
the Lords almightiness, but it gave no
demonstration of His love. He might
make fifty Saturns and 100 Jupiters and
not demonstrate an instant of love. That
was an unknown passion and the secret of
the universe. 1t was suppressed emo
come time when this passion of infinite
love would be declared and illustrated.
God would veil it no longer. After the
clock of many centuries had run down and
worlds hady been born and demolished,
on comparatively obscure star race of
human beings would be born and who,
though 80 bountifully provided for that
they ought to have behaved themselves
we'll, went into insurrection and consplr-
acy and revolt and war-hnite against in
finite, weak arm against thunderbolt, man
against God.
If high intelligences looked down and
saw what was going on, they must have
prophesied determination - complete ex-
termination-of these offenders of Jeho-
yah. But, no! Who is that coming out Of
the throneroom of heaven? Who is that
coming out of the palaces of the eternal?
1t is the Son of the Emperor of the uni
verse. Down the stairs of the high heav-
ems He comes till He reaches the cold air
of a December night in Palestine, and
amid the bleatings of sheep and the low
ing Of cattle and the moaning of camels,
and the banter of the herdsmen, takes His
first sleep on earth, and fer thirty-three
years invites the wandering race to return
to God and happiness and heaven. They
were the longest thirty-three years ever
known in heaven. Among many high intel
ligences what impatience to get Him
back? The infinite Father looked down
and saw His Son slapped and spit on and
supperless and homeless, and then, amid
turn black in the face, His body and soul
parted. And all for what? Why, allow
the Crown Prince to come on such an er-
rand and endure such sorrow and die such
death? 1t was to invite the human race
to put down it's antipathies and resist
! ance 1t was because "God is love-"
Now, there is nothing beautiful in a
shipwreck. We 20 down to look at the
battered and split hulk of an old ship on
the Long Island or New Jersey coast. 1t
excites our interest. We wonder when
and how it came ashore, and whether it
was the recklessness of pilot or a storm
before which nothing could bear up. HUI
man nature, wrecked may interest the in
habitants of other worlds as curiosity,
but there is nothing lovely in that which
has foundered on the rocks OF sin and
sorrow. Yet it was in that condition OF
moral break up that heaven moved to the
rescue. 1t was loveliness lowering over
deformity. It was the lifeboat putting out
into the surf that attempted its demoli-
ton. 1t was harmony pitying discord. 1t
was living God putting His arms around
a recreant world.
The schoolmen deride the idea that God
has emotion. They think it would be a
divine weakness to be stirred by any
earthly spectacle. The God of the learned
Bruch and Schleermacher. is an infinite
intelligence without feeling, a cold and
cherries divinity. But the God we wor-
,h;r -, ooa &c hu opd oopo oc;op
and helpfulness and affection. "God is
love-"
In all the Bible there is no more con-
solatory statement. The very best peo-
pie have in their lives occurrences inexpli-
cable. They are bereft or prosecuted or
impoverished or invalided. They have
only one child, and that dies, while the
next door neighbor has seven children,
and they are all spared. The unfortunates
buy at time when the market is rising,
and the day after the market falls. At a
time when they need to feel the best for
the discharge of some duty they are seized
with physical collapse. Trying to do a
good and honest and useful thing, they are
misrepresented and belied as if they had
practiced a villainy. There are people
who all their lives have suffered injustices.
| Others of less talent, with less consecra.
ton, go on and up, while they go on and
down There are in many lives riddles that
have never been explained, heartbreaks
that have never been healed. Go to that
man or that woman with philosophic ex'
! planation, and your attempt at comfort
will be failure, and you will make mat
ters worse, instead of making them better.
But let the oceanic tide of the text roll in
that soul, and all its losses and disasters
will be submerged with blessing. and the
sufferer will say, "I cannot understand
the reason for my troubles, but will some
day understand. And they do not come
by accident God allows them to come,
and God is love-"