Forest City press. (Forest City, Potter County, D.T. [S.D.]) 1883-19??, 1905-02-23

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y IN THE RELIGIOUS WORLD y!
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% What the Church Folk Are Thinking About and Doing. w
VI News From Various Land. Subjective Words From Many Men. mi
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ID Sunday Schoo, Lemon and Yo.,x p.n,,... Tai. w
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~ Comnens by William I. Ella. w
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Sunday School Lesson and Young Peoples Topic...

Comment BY William T. Ella.

is an eternal law, written in the history
of every family, every neighborhood,
every nation. No young man sows his
wild oats without. in due time. reaping
the natural harvest thereof. Neverthe-
less Jesus did not stand aloof from the
sufferer because he had been "A sinner.
The pharisee's Serves him right" was
never on the lips of Jesus. He came
TO be the friend of sinners-their best
friend. by helping them out of their
sin.
BY His miraculous power He had re-
stored the mans health; now He would
remove the seeds of future suffering.
so He says. G and sin no more"
That is the remedy for everything that
ails humanity. When men quit sin
ming they will cease suffering. The
millennium comes when sin departs.
A Living Question.
Because of this miracle Jesus was
called upon to face a problem that is
very much alive in this twentieth CEN
fury, the problem of Sabbath keeping.
This is "A big question today. True. to
some ii is no question: they dispose of
it easily by saying: DO as | do. or be
condemned" Yet such as these are
merely the fiotsam and jetsam left
floating in the side eddies by the cur-
rent of time. The Sabbath question is
always a question to be decided afresh
by each new generation. according. it
is true. to eternal principles. But the
Puritan's solution will not serve for the
Christian of the twentieth century city.
The priestly Grove in Christ's own
time had reduced Sabbath keeping to
a set of limos intolerable regulations.
some of them utterly puerile and OPP
posed TO the spirit of the Old Testament.
So they promptly nailed this man
whom they found carrying his poo
tIl1at M, tho cnynntb dow ThAxy hnl
never shown compassion for his suffer-
ing; neither did his present joyful ella
ton appeal to them. They were miser-
able literalists. who by their narrow
ness killed the spirit of the law they
pretended to keep. AT once they We're
eager to find the rabbi who had given
the healed man such a command; they
would make an example of him in a
hurry.
C%uriously enough. the man who was
healed did not know his Benefactor.
nor did he seem greatly to care. Like
the blind man who said: "One thing l
know, whereas l was blind. now l see"
he was satisfied to trust the unknown
Healer on the evidence of his own ex-
p%erience. The pharisees and priests
would nav hard work to convince him
that there vas anything wrong with
this Mans orthodoxy. with respect to
the Sabbath or anything else. He asked
not theological certification OF his rab-
bis worth. He had felt it in every
vein and fiber and muscle of his re-
vivified being. And that is the testi-
mony of Jesus which most moves the
world. Men listen to the Il know"
This healed man. like every person
since whom the gospel has made over
into the new. was a walking volume of
Christian evidence, altogether unan-