The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1904-01-03
DR.. TALMAGE'S SERMON.
BY The REV. FRANK DE WITT TALMAeE. o. o.

Chicago, December Elm this sermon.
on the last Sabbath of the dying year,
the preacher sounds a loud call for re-
pentanee of the past sins and a gresolu-
ton with divine help to begin a new life
/ in Christ with the coming year. The
/ text is Luke xiii 5, Except We repent.
/ We shall all likewise perish
i Great accidents generally have their
/ two classes Of heroes. The one class is
composed of DYING heroes, the other of
living heroes. When. few weeks ago,
a coal train crashed into the Big -Four
special which was carrying a. thousand
! indianapolis to play for the state foot
ball championship the young men who
/ were unhurtpulled and tugged at the
were unhurt pulled and tugged at the
gled bodies of the dying and they col
| leeted the multitude remains of the dead.
| Young girls who in ordinary life would
! have screamed at the sight of a mouse
or tainted at a vaccination in that awful
crisis tore up their garments for banda
| ges and bathed the white forhead of
their young friends who were about to
pass away. On the other hand, those
who were being aided were just as self
sacrificing as those who were trying to
alleviate physical sufferings and minister
TO spiritual wants. An acquaintance of
mine arrived at that scene of horror only
a short time after the tragedy occurred.
He personally told me of the nobility of
some of those MANNED and dying heroes
One young man had crawled out of the
wreck and was seated upon the ground
with his thumb tightly pressed against
an artery His foot had been completely
amputated by the wreck When the
doctor found him, he turned with a brave
smile and said. Never mind me, doctor.
| am all right for the present. Go and
help those poor fellows down there They
need you more than l." Dying athletes
thought not of themselves. While tossing
about in mortal agony they begged their
friends not to let their father and mother
and sister and brother and sweetheart
know how badly they were hurt.
A Practical Theme.
We shudder at the details of these
sudden and appalling calamites. It
shocks us 10 think of strong men and
with apparently many years of happy
life before them, being overwhelmed
and crushed in one short hour by some
tarrific disaster. Yes, it is horrible.
But while we deplore and sympathze
let us not forget the lesson that Christ
would have us learn from such catas-
trophies. To those who told him of
great and sudden sacrifice of life he
said, "Ye too. shall likewise perish IN
less you repent" He did not mean that
their earthly lives would necessarily have
a similar end, but that without repenting
a doom beyond the grave as appalling
as that they had described awaited them.
The greatest railroad accident that ever
| al II III.
press went down through the broken
trestles of the Tay bridge; the greatest
tidal wave tragedy, when Galveston
was submerged; the greatest volcanic
horror as when Vesuvius emptied itself,
and the two favorite resorts of Romes
aristocracy in one night were buried in
their grave of ashes; the most awful of
fires, as when Chicago was burned; the
most bitter of murderous prosecutions,
as when PLATE slew the followers of Ju-
das of Galilee, are not to be compared
to the horror of that day when sinners
| who have not repented of and turned
from their sins shall hear their doom
pronounced by a righteous God. Listen
to the words of Jesus Suppose We that
these Galileans were sinners above all
things? | tell We nay, but except We re-
pent we shall all likewise perish" Re-
! pentance of sin is our subject. Repent
ance of sin is an imperative command.
Could we have a greater and a more
| practical theme to preach upon for the
last sermon of the dying year of 1908?
Gods Command.
| Standing between the open grave of
the dying year and the new made era
die of the coming year, we hear God
thunder the command: Repent, Re
pent Repent We of SIM What does this
mean? Not sorrow alone, though it in
! cludes that; not alone regret that we
| have sinned against a God so good and
SO loving, but reconciliation. There is no
real repentance until there is determna-
| ton to abandon sin. 1t means that each
sinner must first be willing to pluck the
wriggling, Kissing serpent of evil out of
! his heart and hurl 1t from him as though
| it had the poisonous fangs of a fatal
| cobra before Christs blood will blot out
| the evil results of a hideous past. 1t
means that heaven is not an orthouse of
| a Dante's Inferno. The paradise lost
which Milton described can never become
/ paradise regained to any sinner who
clngs to his sin. 1t means that the sinner
| has no ground for expecting heaven at
| the end of his course unless, through the
power of Christ, he has renounced his
/ sin. Either the repentant sinner, with
wide open eyes, is walking directly to-
ward the cross or else he is walking
directly away from it.
What says Paul in referance to this
remuneration of sin? To the church
| of Corinth he wrote practically these
| words: There are two groups of people
| group the first, those that are followers
| of the world; group the second, those
that are followers of Jesus. If you would
| be follower of Jesus you must leave the
group of the world and seek the group Of