The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1907-02-07
Abram Called to be a Blessing.

had passed since the Flood. Noah
himself had been dead only seven
ty-five years. Yet the new race
seemed as deeply sunken in sin as
the old. The goodness and sever
ity of God in the Deluge appeared
to have been in vain. In the mid
night gloom of a general degener-
acy some few tapers, like that of
Melchisedec's on Zion, were yet
slight; but even these were in dam
ger of extinction by the violence
of the wicked.
The race was in revolt against
God. 1t had built its defiant
tower, whose lofty stories were to
be refuge in case of a second
flood. 1t seemed to have learned
nothing by the sudden Judgment
which COMPOUNDED its language and
scattered it abroad. The first
chapter of the Epistle to the
Romans gives faithful portraiture
of the moral condition of the race
at this period. Though they
knew God, they gloried Him not
as God, were thankless, and
changed His glory into an image.
with their theoretical errors the
stream of their practical transgres-
sions rose to a fearful height.
The remains of these eldest cities
of the Euphrates Valley, now be-
ing dug up, show the people given
to those gross immoralities usual
ly attendant upon heathenism.
The peril was extreme that the
knowledge of God would be en-
tirely lost, and that, too, not by
accident, but by design. They
did not like wish or care) to re-
tain God in their knowledge, 50
the foolish heart of the race was
darkened.
At this crisis an ever watchful
Providence stepped in, meeting
the emergency in a manner to ex-
cite the admiration of men and an
gels. He let the stream of human
life flow on in its perverse course,
not arresting it by any further
general judgments. But from the
great torrent foaming out its shame
and casting up its mire and dirt,
He took aside little stream COM
paratively pure and had it run in
a channel He had prepared for it,
much as water is taken aside in
the race to turn the mill. Here
was no capricious favoritism. The
design was to bless all humanity
by blessing one of its families.
The proverb, What God does,
is we'll done, ".has no finer exem-
plifcation than in the selection of
the progenitor of the new race.
His very name is significant, -
Abram, exalted father" Physi-
cally, intellectually, spiritually,
he was Gods man for the hour.
His phenomenal virility has sur
vived in his descendants for forty
centuries. So has his intellectual.
ity. He was ready for the glorious
appearance that approached him
Then, as ever, the prepared mes
sage came to the prepared mind.
Abram was the first of pilgrim
fathers, the first emigrant impelled
by religious motives. He under
took his journey for conscience's
sake. He left a lovely land
matvelously rich-the home of the
wheat grain, pomegranate, apple
and grape, He left the highest
civilization of his day and libraries
with their tile-page volumes. He
left country, kindred, fathers
house, to become henceforth a pill
grim and stranger.
Well may his name be engraven
high upon that tall obelisk, the
eleventh chapter Of the Epistle to
the Hebrews, among the immortal
heroes of faith-for it was with
faith that he heard the Divine call
and by faith he obeyed, going out,
not knowing whittier he went.
1t pleased God to encourage and
sustain his faith with exceeding
great and gracious promise Cod