The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 18??-1935, 1905-05-19
INHUMANITY
OF RICHES"
Subject of Strong, Practi-
cal Sermon BY Rev.
J. w. Cherry.

Rev. j. ". Cherry took Dives ana
Lazarus for his text Sunday morning at
the First Methodist church. and preach
ed a strikingly strong sermon. He said
the lesson taught was the "Inhumanity
of Riches. The tendency of great
wealth, he said, was to make people in
human, and that was what wac the mat
ter With Dives. The Hibe did not speak
OF him as hpmR particularly bad man;
he was about like the average ricn man,
no doubt. He passed by Lazarus every
day. and saw him eating the scraps from
his ia bile, and perhaps laid the flatter-
ing JUNCTION TO his soul that he was
doing a very generous thing to take
the scraps from his dogs and give them
to this poor beggar who had no claims
upon him. He had no computations of
conecience; the habits of his life were
so selfish and he had grown so iuhuman
10 the ind ulgences OF his great riches
that he just pass the poor beggar by
without thought 1t never occurred
to him to send for doctor for him; or
nurse; or to take him in and care for
him; he had simply grown Inhuman ;ano
that is what money will do for the aver
age man who comes into possession of
it, unless by the grace Of God he IS
saved from its polluting Influence. So
ciety worships money. They pretend
that it takes blood and family to get
into Society, but that is not true The
commonest scrub in Columbia could get
in If he had enough money; $4,000
would purify his blood IN twenty four
hours. Now have no objection to
aristocratic society l believe in arts.
tocracY; but believe 10 the aristocracy
Of virtue and intelligence. ana not the
aristocracy of money. Intelligent and |
virtuous men and women are Gods |
aristocrats, and you should uncover in |
their presence, whether they have a dol |
lar in the world or not.
Dives died and went to he'll because
of his inhumanity; and the great gulf
spoken Of in the parable, was a gulf he
created while here on earth. Between
the naughty rich and the medicant poor,
there is great gulf between virtue and
vice there is great gulf; between 81.
fishness and brotherly kindness there is
a great gulf; between proud disdain and
good fellowship, there is a great gulf:
a gulf too wide to he bridged or too deep
to be filed up; and nothing but the
grace of God can close that gulf,
ual church and luke warm church.
You never have any trouble with the
collections IN spiritual church; but if
You go to man who worships his
money, Of course you will have hard
time getting any Of it, Men love the
things they worship; do you expect a
man to give up the thing he loves? You
go to a man who loves dollar better
than he does the Church of God and
ask him for money, and of course he
will make excuses and hold to the thing
he loves. And just as Dives gave the
crumbs from his table to the beggar at
his gate, so do some men give crumbs
of their time to God. They will take a
half-hour they cannot possibly utilize
in making money, and give that to the
school or the church, and think
they have done something great; and
like as not they will complain that it did
not suit them to do that l know some
people of that kind God exnects more
than our crumbs Of time; He loves
cheerful giver; He demands all unselfish
heart; His teaching is for humanit, for
good fellowship, for brothery kind
ness. 1t takes very strong man to
posress and practice these virtues, while
being encountered with great riches.