Ottumwa semi-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1899-1903, 1903-07-28
TIE ABIDING WORD
BIBLE ELoouENTLY TREATED BY
REV. CAMPBELL coYLE.
CHURCHES JOIN In UNION SERVICES
Toledo Pastor Delivers Sermon at First
Methodist Episcopal Church Yester.
day Morning and Evenlns-Many At.
tend Services.

ey "o'ih'S anu GvStllH9-mdny AL.
tend Services.
From Saturdays Daily.
Union services We're held both morn
ing and evening yesterday at the First
Methodist Episcopal church. All the
| congregations which are not holding
regular services were invited to at
tend and there was large attendance
at both services. The sermons were
delivered by Rev. Campbell Coyle, pas
tor OF the Collingwood Presbyterian
church at Toledo, Ohio. Rev. Coyle
IS an able speaker and his words made
a deep impression upon his hearers.
His subject for the morning sermon
was The Abiding Word" and his text
was taken from I. Peter, 1923. "The
Word of God, Which Liveth and Abid-
eth Forever" He spoke in part as fol-
| lows:
TO me the Bible is like an altitudinous
MOUNTAIN, broad of base and absolutely
| iimmoyable, while its glory lit summit is
| lost amid the clouds. Full of clefts
wherein refuge may be taken from life's
| tumults and storms, 1t also abounds In
sorges and abysses where no sunlight ever
| Iaiis, and where mystery abides evermore
9rim ana terrible In many of Its aspects
yet sweet flowers cluster here and there
and trees that yield rich fruitage Noun
| tains of living waters break forth every
Where, blending in the rivers that flow
| down out of the attitudes to make glad
| and beautiful the lower levels, and sup
| ply with power the manifold mechanisms
| of man.
'"rhe black eagle of the clouds lives
4 amidst pc md 1x,s11 s.fa
ually beat against its granite bosom, vet
TINS mountain will abide, forever, the
throne of God amid its upper glory, while
| Its ever flowing fountains will ever slack
all thirst, its rivers fill all places and
| valleys with rich harvest and one day
al the races of man will come and build
them homes beaneath its gracious shad-
ow.
The Bible.
ITO me the -1.ole is like some great
promontory-a part of the celestial con-
tinent of the Substituting far out into
the tumbling seas of time. Angels and
| archangels come and go upon 1t, and God
Himself In human form, trailing after Him
| HIS fragrant robes of majesty. while the
| song OF the one hundred and forty -four
| thousand blends with myriad other voices
strong and clear, drifting upon us out of
| attitudes celestial Against the rock walls
| OF this promontory--the rolling pillows of
the years and centuries and milleniums
OF time beat. but swooning into dull foam
they fall back powerless to hurt or mar,
for this rock of truth will abide forever,
and some glad, golden day the ships of all
| nations will come, and. anchoring in its
shadows discharge their freight, and all
men and women from every nation under
heaven will pass by fthe way of this gran
| lite promontory up Into the summerland
Of God. To me the Bible is like unto the
4 hnnty !, t1p \. a.
places are visible. 1t is.ia font of glory
and rivers of light stream forth every
J where to water all barren fields where
darkness dwells, and warm all seeds into
life and beauty and fruitfulness, thus in
| due time banishing from our world the
chill winter months of SIM pain and sor-
row. and substitute for them the warm
summer months Of love, and peace, and
| joy.
Are TWO Books.
''1'o treat vast theme, like the one
before us. in half hours address would
be as impossible as to count the grass
blades and flowers of many meadows, or
the sunbeams on clear summer day.
There are two Bibles, this one which we
see and handle, so much paper and
printers ink, and weighing a pound or
two, and the one which is innermost, like
the sword in Its scabbord. This is the
weapon of warfare, this is the power Of
God. This is the innermost heart and
| life of truth, the innermost Bible of which
the outermost Bible is but the bodying
| forth. And this inner Bible can be under
stood only by those who have it's spirit
| in their souls. Only the child can under
stand the Fathers word.
Truthfulness of Bible.
"a very important thing Tor us to con-
| slider is the truthfulness of the Bible and
| It's absolute integrity. A good many peo-
| pie are finding fault with the Bible be-
cause of what they conceive to be its I'M
| truthfulness. There is slight historical
| inaccuracy here, chronological error
there, and a miscOnception elsewhere. No
doubt the Bible has its human side and
partakes of the mistakes of human copy
| lists, and there is nothing human that is
perfect. But are we going to allow a
wrong date. slip In grammer, mis-
quotation, to come between us and the
realization of spiritual life? Is not reveln-
ton higher than rhetoric, character more
| important than chronology and salvation
| more important than syntaX. There may
| be light imperfections IN the window pane
but this is due to the hand that made
| the glass and not to the original sub
stance. We should not allow the flaw to
\ trouble us but look past it, out upon the
world of wonders. Man made the window
| God made the world. Man wrote the BIZ
BILE with his own poor ink and stumbling
pen. In constructing the window pane
he got little of his own imperfectlons
into it but as we pause and adjust our
| inner eyes to the inner landscapes of the
Bible, what beatiic visions we be-
hold.
An Endless Book.
another wonderful thing about the
| Bible is its Observation-Disclosures The Bible
| is an abyssinal book, an endless book, with
| out beginning or end of days. 1t is Il
universe complete within itself, having
Christ as its most illustrlous sun, clusters