Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1905-07-17

my text symbolic il.
The Heavens sheets of Fire.
Could we find a more Respondent
pageantry for the second coming Of
Christ than in the chariots of clouds,
with the flashlights of dazzling light
nings? ''Gird the sword upon thy thigh,
o most mighty, with thy glory and thy
majestyr' cries the psalmist Yes. we
have seen Christ In symbol girding on
his sword and clothing himself in the
glory and in the majesty of the storm.
Some years ago we took a long drive
of some fifty miles over the Michigan
hills Before we got back TO our sum
mer cottage an awful storm overlook
US The night settled in. The black
clouds eclipsed for US the light Of every
star 1t was as black as the plague OF
darkness in Egypt. From an adjacent
farmhouse we borrowed a lantern. The
way became SO. black that even the
horses could not see the road. The lit
tie children in the stage crept up close
to their mothers in fear The silence
became as still as the famous half hour
of silence In heaven when the celestial
hosts, horror struck, could not utter a
whisper Immediately after the dying
agony Of Calvary's tragedy was ended.
Then came the rushing of mighty
winds. 1t seemed as though all the
were sweeping past me and meeting
In mighty conflict. Then the whole
heavens became sheets of fire. North,
east south and west, everywhere the
heavens were ablaze. The flames seem
ed to mount higher and higher, as
though they were climbing up a thou
sand story building. Then it seemed
as though the clouds with their mighty
Niagaras rushed toward them and
drowned out those Kissing furnaces of
Nebuchadnezzar, seven times-aye, sew
enty Unrestricted. Then the huge trees
alongside the road would bend and
groan like shuddering LAGOON in death
grip of huge monsters. Ahead Of the
horses l walked with the lantern to
show the way. Now I could see the
big stage following after me. Now,
after the thunders had rolled and swell
ed and died away, l could hear the
faint cry of a child or the soothing
tones Of a mother trying to quiet her
babe, she, the mother, just as fright
ened as the Child Then suddenly ey-
cry tree, every rock, every hillside
would come out as clear In outline as
during the day. Then midnoon In an
instant would be changed into mid
night Power, power, omnipotent, In
finite powerl Do you wonder that the
glory and the majesty of the coming
Christ were symbohzed by Jesus him
self in the sublime scenic effects Of
'the nghtnings coming out Of the east
and shining even unto the west%
svffter Than a Bullet.
I fear that our artists and poets and
religious teachers have too often dwelt
upon the humanity and the humility
and the hefplessness Of Christ and have
not emphasized enough his glory and
majesty and power as symbolized in
the lightnings and the chariot clouds
Of his second coming. It Is right and
Just that we should impress upon our
hearers and scholars the helplessness
Of Christ incarnated In the flesh Of q
little child The master artist drew a
true lesson for us when he made Mary
and the divine infant sleep between
the great paws of the old Egyptian
statue. There was the moon lowering
over the silent, bleak desert as the
omniscient eye Of God the Father
watching his only begotten Son.
There was Joseph, the carpenter, grim
and silent as sentinel, keeping guard.
There in the background rises the huge
statue, half man, half beast, chiseled
and anchored to its foundations thou
sands of years before Christ was born
and still there watching, watching,
waiting, waiting thousands of years
after Christ is dead Christ, the help
less Christ there, became helpless in
sympathy with US. But older than the
oldest rocks of the pyramids was the
same life of that divine Christ Longe.
than those rocks shall ever exist shall
the eternal, existence Of Christ endure
Greater than the power of Herod, who
made Bethlehem a slaughter house Of
: innocent blood, and greater than the
splendors. of Rameses II, whose palace
! grounds We're once Tapped by the wa
tiers of the river Nile and whose work
men made the desert blossom as tht
j rose, are the strength and the pove,
? and splendor Of that sleeping child
s ChEist's second advent shall revea
: him an omnipotent, an omniscient ant
S an omnipresent God. Christ's mex
Q coming shall be visible to all peopl
b as he is girded with glory and majesty
b By the flaming swords Of the light
p nings nay text in symbol pictures
j glorious, a sublime, a resplendent,
: celestial panorama. Let me repeat 70
you the glorious message Of my tex
( Hear. how the sublimity of that mi
e 'lenRial day echoes down the halls c
! time, ''As the lightning cometh out c
!: the east and shineth into the west, S
3 shall the coming Of the Son of man."
4 Lightning travels swifter than th
> birds wing, swifter than a rifles bu
let, .swifter than a hunters halloi
/: swifter than any other agency of lii