The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1901-01-04

text roll In that soul and all its worri-
ments n losses and disasters will be
submerged with blessing, and the sufferer
will say: 81 cannot understand b rea-
son for my troubles. but l will some day
understand. And they do not come by
accident. God allows them to come, and
God is love-"
The Worlds wickcdness.
But for this divine feeling I think our
world would long ago have been demol-
ished. just think of the organized wick
edness- of the nations, See the abomina-
tons continental. Behold the false reli-
gions that hoist Mohammed and Buddha
and Confucius, Look at the Koran and
the Shastra and he Zend-Avesta that
would crowd out of the world the Holy
Scriptures. Look at war, digging its
trenches for the dead across the hemi-
spheres. See the great cities, with their
holocaust of destroyed manhood and wo-
manhood, What blasphemies assail the
heavens! What butcheries sicken the
centuries! What professions Of crime
and atrocity and woe e~nci-cle the globe!
If justice had spoken, it would have said,
THE world deserves humiliation, and let
humiliation come" II immutability had
spoken, it would have said: Il have al
ways been opposed to wickedness and
always will be opposed to it. The,world
is to me an affront infinite, and away
with it." II omniscience had spoken, il
would have said, 81 have watched that
planet with minute and all comprehensive
inspection, and I cannot have the offense
longer continued" II truth had spoken,
it would have said, II declare that they
who offend the law must go down under
the law" But divine love took a differ
ent view Of the worlds obduracy and pol
luton. 1t said: II pity all those woes of
the earth. I cannot stand here and Sc.
no Arrangement Of those sufferings. I
will go down and reform the world. l
will medicate its wounds. / will calm its
frenzy. I will wash off it's pollution. I
will become incarnated. I will take on
my shoulders and upon my brow and into
my heart the consequences of that worlds
m~isbehavior. l start now, and between
my arrival at Bethlehem and my ascent
from Olivet I will weep their tears and
suffer their griefs and die their death.
Farewell, my throne, my crown, my scep-
ter, my angelic environment, my heaven,
till 1 nave finished the work and come
back!" God was never conquered but
once, and that was when he was onquer-
GU ny Ills OWL lONe. UOu Is lOFe.
In this day, when the creeds of churches
are being revised, let more emphasis be
put upon the thought of my text. Let it
appear at the beginning of every creed
and at the close. The ancients used to
tell of a great military chieftain who,
about to go to battle, was clad in armor,
helmet on head and sword at side, and
who put out his arms to give farewell en-
brace to his child, and the child, alright
ed at his appearance, ran, shrieking,
away. Then the father put off the armor
that caused the alarm, and the child saw
who he was and ran into his arms and
snuggled against his heart. !Creeds must
not have too much iron in their make up,
terrorizing rather than attracting. They
must not hide the smiling face and the
warm heart Of our Father, God. Let
nothing imply that there is a sheriff at
every door ready to make arrest, but over
US all and around us all a mercy that
wants to save, and save now.
Christ the Comforter.
If one paragraph Of the creed seems to
take you, like q child, out of the arms Of
q father, let the mex paragraph put you
in the arms Of a mother. "As one whom
his mother comforteth, so will I comfort
sSas OAs "hoI - hOtAC VIC hotS III
God! And my text is the lullaby sung to
US when we are i'll. or when we are mall
treated, or when we are weary, or when
w are trying to do better, or when we
are bereft, or when we ourselves lie down
to the last sleep. We feel the warm
cheek Of the mother against our cheek,
and there sounds in it the hush of many
mothers: "God is love-"
This was the reason the Bible was
written. The world needs no inspired
page to tell it that God will chastise sin,
for that is proved in the life of many sn
offender. You can look through the
wicket Of any prison and see the fact
which the world understood thousands
o. years before Solomon wrote 1.-THE
way Of the transgressor is hard" The
world needed no Bible to tell it that God
is o~mnipotent, for any one who has seen
Mont Blanc or Niagara or the Atlantic
ocean in a cyclone knows that. The
world needed nc Bible to tell it of Gods
wisdom, for everything, from a spiders
web to the upholstery Of a summers sun
set, from the globe Of a dewdrop to the
rounding Of a world, declares that. But
there was one secret about God that was
wrapped up in q scroll Of parchment,
and it staid there until apostolic hand
unrolled that scroll and let out upon the
world the startling fact, which it could
never have surmised, never guessed,
never expected, that he loved our human
race so ardently that he will pardon sin
n subdue the offender with a divine
kiss and turn foaming malefactcrs into
worshipers before the throne. Oh, l am
SO glad that the secret is out and that
it can again be yeiledl Tell it to all
the shining, suffering, dying race; tell it
in song and sermon, on canvas and in
marble, on arch and pillar; tell it ali
around the earth-"God is love-"
The Domination of Fear.
Notice that the wisest men Of the ma
tons for thousands Of years did not,
amid their idolatries, make something to
represent this feeling, this emotion. They
had a Jove, representing might; Neptune,
the god Of the sea; Minerva, the goddess
of wisdom; Venus, the goddess Of base
appetite; Ceres, the goddess Of corn,
and an Odin, and an Osiris, and a Titan,
and a Juggernaut, and whole pantheons
Of gods and goddesses, but no shrine, no