Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1902-07-17
future Of crime.
Sinking an EVIL Past.

today bring to you the salutations Of
the saints In Caesars palace. I want to
encourage you With the fact that, just
as some OF the greatest Of moral heroes
have been physical weaklings, so some
Of the greatest Of Christian heroes
have been those who have sinned even
worse than you have sinned. Harry
Monroe, who for years has run the Pa
cinc Garden mission Of Chicago and
who has been instrumental in saving
thousands Of souls. was-what? A
college graduate? A member Of q
Christian church and Christian
home? No. He was a converted gam
bier. Jerry McAuley Of New York,
who did 30 much for the slums of New
York, was drunkard and a prize
fighter. John Newton was once vilely
dissolute and depraved, though in after
life he wrote the noted hymn:
saw One hanging on a tree
In agony and blood.
Who fixed his lansuid eyes on mo
As near the cross stood.
Sure never TIL my latest breath
Can forget that look;
| 1t seemed to charge me with his death,
| lnOuSn ne er a WORD ne spoke.
John Newton said that when he first
saw Christ hanging there upon the
cross he himself was wallowing in the
lowest depths of sin. John Bunyan
the dreamer was John Bunyan the
blasphemer. John Summerfleld the
saint about whom we have already
spoken, was John Summerfield the de-
| Il
came Paul the martyred saint. Oh,
my brother. IL the grace Of God could
! come into such sinful lives and recreate
and sustain them, surely the grace of
God is sufficient to recreate and sus-
tain us, no matter how black may have
been our dissolute past.
And bring to you who have an evil
past this message from the saints in
Caesars palace, because the man who
has publicly slnned, the man who has
been loathsomely vile. Is the man who
has an especial mission to save souls
for Jesus Christ. You know as no one
else knows how awful is the power of
temptation. You know as no one else
knows how difficult 1t Is for one who
has been social outcast to try to live
again among respectable social sur.
roundlngs. You can speak as Mary
Magdalene could speak. You can plead
as st. Della could plead. who was once
the noted Blue Bird the fiend OF the
New York slums. Although st. Della
had such an evil past. yet her life, un-
der the power Of the Holy Ghost. be-
came so pure and sweet and infuen-
tial that the rich and the poor, the pure
and the depraved alike, the old as well
as the young, sobbed over her casket.
You can speak from the heart. as John
b. Cough spoke to the drunkards, be-
cause you yourself have seen the phan-
toms of delirium tremens moving them
selves Alright in the cup until at last
they would bite like serpent and sting
like an adder. Struggling Christians,
you who have had an evil past, you
can plead for Christ IN the highways
and the hedges Of sin as the saints
who had an evil past could speak in
Caesars palace. Those saints today
are now placing their hands of holy or.
dination upon your head that you may
go forth and save your sinful fellow
men.
Encouragement For the Unfortunate.
l would also encourage today those
Christians who are compelled by force
of circumstances to live and work with
evil associates. Perhaps the young
man who is standing behind the same
counter with you In the store is an IN
fidel; perhaps some of your classmates
at school or in college are out and out
scoffers against the word of God; per-
haps your own father and brothers are
unbelievers and every day your faith
In Jesus Christ Is made an object Of
ridicule; perhaps, what IS the worst of
all, you find that you are married to a
man who never neglects an opportu-
nifty to ridicule your Bible. You have
found out also that your husband is
having perniclous and spiritually de-
stroying influence over your children
What are you going to do-leave these
evil associates7 Sometimes such q
course Is possible; sometimes 1t is not
1t evidently was not possible for the
ancient saints to have left CHsar's pal
ace, else they would have done so. II
Is most natural to suppose that those
saints would have instantly fled from
the Roman capital during the time of
Nero's persecution II they could have
run away with honor and self respect
But in all probability most Of those
saints said to themselves something
like this: mo; cannot. l will not, go,
1t would be cowardly for me to desert
my Lord and Master. l will stay here
and keep on testifying for Christ, /:
need be, until my body Is burned q,
the stake or eaten by the wild beasts
in one Of the arenas. And stay In
Rome these saints did. and die a mar.
tyr's death most Of them also did. So
1t may be your Christian duty to keep
on living for Christ and testifying OF
his love In place Of persecution and
among companions who make Christ
an object Of daily ridicule, as did the
prosecuted young Roman officer whose
epitaph can still be read In one of tho
Roman cemeteries In these words: "He
lived long enough to shed his blood for
Christ"
Now. l want you, my Christian
friends, you who are experiencing
these daily prosecutions. to fully real
lie that not one drop of blood which
: fell. from the Christian martyrs Of
Caesars ancient palace was ever shed
In vain. From those prosecutions the