The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1906-01-28

is the early environment. Likewise the
school days and the varied influences
that led up to the public career MOI
so i'm the greatest Biography Of them
all. There is a brief vision of the Babe,
then q fleeting glimpse of the Twelve
year-oid Boy.-and then eighteen ull-
recorded years.
That long. haracter-fraught 81
lence. when the Boy grew to manhood
I'm Nazareth and acquired knowledge
OF many other things besides the Car
penters trade. was abruptly ana ORA
maucally broken. This lesson tells me
story.
A Sensational Preacher.
Two great characters were in prep
aratiou for their lifewOrk at this time,
and they were cousins. The hrst, IN
point Of age. for he was SIX months olo-
er than Jesus. was John, the son OF
Zacharias and Eliza beth, whose birth
had been attended by signs and Won
ders- He had been trained in solitude
The most picturesque character In the
New Testament, he was the wilderness
man. the successor to Elijah, and the
last OF the Old DispensatOn prophets.
Jesus got His equipment by close as
ISOLATION with men; John walked apart
from men, Jesus came eating ana
drinking. John was a hairy ascetc,
with none of the gloss of civilization
about him. Amid the desolations OF
the desert he had communed with God
and received his message.
suddenly he burst forth as fear
less. flaming preacher of repentance
and Righteousness. Even ears duued
by the sound of much preaching heark-
ened to his vital note. He was a voice
I'm a world full of echoes limitations
q bounded. he was an original Then,
as now, the secret of big or little con-
gregatiOns is ultimately with the mes
sage and the man. Every empty church
needs but a John the Baptist to fill it.
He was a sensational preacher, was
John. He talked for the times. His
words had to do with present things.
Every class was touched on its tender
est spots by this knife-tongued evan
gelist. The man who tries to bring
practical Righteousness to pass is bound
to be called sensationalist; yet all
while the preaching and teaching to
be condemned is that which does not
awaken any sensations.
a Great Herald of a Greater.
John called himself a herald He
was merely preparer He blazed
the way for One Who Was to Come.
Some saw him as the diYinely-pr promised
forerunuer. the messenger who should
go before the face of the Messiah.
His business was to cry aloud for
straight paths The Lord cannot walk
crooked way; every man who expects
to keep company with Christ must
straighten out the devious turniugs and
tWistings of his life. In Johns view
repentance, restitution, Righteousness
were closely associated with regenera-
with the powerful grafters who wanted
to keep their ecclesiastical relations
correct In plain speech that often was
scorching he characterized the sins of
his time that society had long con-
doned. And the John the Baptist note
is being heard afresh in this day, to
the purging of the churches and the
CONSERVATION of the wicked.
With all his popularity and power.
John knew himself to be only subor-
dinate; he was a secOnd-place but not
q second-rate man. He was an evan
gelist who never became puffed up with
q sense Of his own importance. There
was no struttng OF posing or vanity
such as made offensive the conduct Of
John Alexander DOwie who recently
claimed to be John the Baptist come
again. The heart of Johns message
was HE must increase, must de-
A Man as a Fingerboard.
This uncouth. rough-spoken, hairy
child of the wilderness, with his cloak
of camels hair and his diet of locusts
and wild honey, was really a great
man. even judged by contemporary
standards alone. Greatness is not de-
pendent upon outward appearances or
circumstances. BeeCher might wear
his hair over his shoulders, but wear
ing their hair long never made his
score of imitators great.
Johns greatness lay in doing well
his own work. Happy is he who
knows himself. To understand ones
real place and work in life, though it
be but minor place, and to be con-
SciOuS Of ones limitations is really
truer success than to be maintaining
a station for which one is not fitted.
John was not the Christ; he knew he
was not. and he would not let hatter-
ers Ca1Ole him into taking a place
which was not his. To be finger
board was Johns mission He had
only one ambitiOu-tO point men to
THE Lamb of God who taketh away
the sin of the world This was his
work and he desired no other He
sincerely felt himself to be unworthy
10 unloose the sandals of the Coming
one. His humility was not a pose.
he was not even conscious of it, for
as a shrewd man once said, you can't
be humble and know it"
The STOPPING of the Mighty
A pupil may be greater than his
teacher, yet be taught of him. John
was merely the announcer of the Mes
siah, Yet To him, in spite of his own
reluctance it was given to baptize the
Slnless one. 1t come to pass on a day
as John stood by the bank Of the Jor-
dan preaching his old, old message of
repentance which set mems hearts to
quaking and turned them into ways of
right living, that among the gathering
was one whose appearance suddenly
broke the thread of the preacher
sermon He had been telling of the
Coming One. whose baptism would
be no mere symbolism. but with the
Holy Spirit. Then. as he caught sight
of Jesus on the river bank. whittier
the latter had come from his home in
Nazareth. he startled all his hearers
by crying Behold the Lamb of God
that taketh away the sin of the world. ,,
Then came to pass marvel Jesus.
Johns superior and master insisted
on being baptized too. Whv2 he
needed not this cleansing sign of the
sinful. No but he coveted kinship
with the sinner His purpose was to
identify himself with his fellow men.
He took upon himself all obligation
that would serve as ties Of brotherhood
and would show his complete oneness
with mankind. ct became him. Or.
a. r. Dunning aptly translates the
Scripture. ITO do all right things" In