Belding banner. (Belding, Mich.) 1889-1918, 1901-04-25

that. the poorest and the wannest and
the worst may wear Where sin
abounded grace may much more
abound"
"Oh, my sins, my sins" said Martin
Luther to Staupitz, my sins, my sins!'
The fact Is that the brawny German
student had found a Latin Bible that
had made him quake, and nothing else
ever did make him quake, and when he
found how through Christ he was par
doned and saved he writes friend say
ing Come over and join us, great
and awful sinners saved by the grace
OF God. You seem to be only slender
sinner. and you don't much extoi the
mercy OF God, but we who have been
such very awful sinners praise his
grace the more now that we have been
redeemed" Can it be that you are so
desperately egotistical that you feel
yourself in first rate spiritual trim and
that from the root of the hair to the
| tip OF the toe you are scarless and i'm
maculate? What you need is looking
glass, and here il Is in the Bible. Poor
and wretched and miserable and blind
and naked from the crown of the head
to the sole of the foot. full of wounds
and putrefying sores. No health in
us. And then take the fact that Christ
gathered up all the notes against us
and paid them and then offered us the
receipt.
And how much we need him in our
sorrows! We are Independent OF cir
cumstances If we have his grace Why,
he made Paul sing in the dungeon, and
under that grace ST. John from desc
late Patmos heard the blast of the
apocalyptic trumpets. After all other
candles have been snuffed out this is
the light that gets brighter and bright
er unto the perfect day, and after un-
der the hard hoofs of calamity all the
pools of worldly enjoyment have been
trampled into deep mire at the foot of
the eternal rock the Christian, from
cups of granite, lily trimmed and vine
covered, puts out the thirst of his
soul.
Manliness in Death.
Again, l remark that Christ is above
all in dying alterations. / have not
any sympathy with the morbidity
abroad about our demise. The en-
peror of Constantinople arranged that
on the day Of his coronation the stone
mason should come and consult with
him about his tombstone that after
awhile he would need And there are
men who are monomaniacal on the
subject OF departure from this life by
death, and the more they think of it
the less prepared are they to 60 This
is an unmanliness not worthy of you,
not worthy of me.
Saladin, the greatest conqueror of
his day, while dying, ordered the tunic
he had on him to be carried after his
death on a spear at the head of his
army, and then the soldier ever and
anon should stop and say: Behold all
that is left of Saladin, the emperor
and conquerorl OF all the states he
conquered, of all the wealth he ac-
cumulated nothing did he retain but
this shroud." | have no sympathy
with such behavior or such absurd
demonstration or with much that we
hear uttered in regard to departure
from this life to the next. There is a
common-sensical idea on this subject
that you and l need to consider, that
there are only two styles of departure
A thousand feet underground, by
light Of torch toiling in a miners shaft,
a ledge of rock may fall upon us, and
we may die miners death. Far out
at sea, falling from the slippery rat
lines and broken on the halyards, we
may die a sailors death. On mission
Of mercy in hospital amid broken
bones and reeking leprosies and rag
ing fevers we may die a philanthro-
pist's death. On the field of battle,
serving God and our country, slugs
through the heart, the gun carriage
may roll over us, and we may die a
patriots death. But after all there are
only two styles of departure, the death
of the righteous and of the wicked.
and we all want to die the former.
last Hours on Earth.
Gordon HALL, lar from home, dying
in the door of a heather temple, said,
GLORY to thee, o Cod" What did dy-
ing Wherefore say to his wife? Come
and sit beside me and let us talk OF
heaven. l never knew what happiness
was until l found Christ" What did
dying Hannah More say? "To go to
heaven, think what that is! To go to
Christ, who died that l might live!
oh, glorious gravel Oh, what a glori-
Gus thing it is to die! Oh, the love
Of Christ, the love OF Christi" What
did Mr.. Toplady, the great hymnmak-
er, say in his last hour? who can
measure the depth OF the third heav-
ca? Oh, the sunshine that fills my
soul! / shall soon be gone, for surely
no one can live here after such glories
as God has manifested to my soul"
What did the dying Janeway say?
Il can as easily die as close my eyes
or turn my head in sleep. Before a
few hours have passed shall stand on
Mount Zion with the one hundred and
forty and four thousand and with the
just men made perfect, and we shall
ascribe riches and honor and glory
and majesty and dominion unto God
and the Lamb" DR.. Taylor, con-
demned to burn nj the stake on his