Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1907-02-14
Calnnase
Sermon
BY Rev.
Frank De Witt Talmaee, d. d.

Los Angeles, Cal, Feb. 1O.-In this
sermon the preacher shows that as
Moses exile was necessary for his
practical training and development as
great leader so there are periods in
our own lives when we seem to be
hopelessly sidetracked by suffering,
trial or misfortune, all of which are
needed to bring out the better quail
ties Of our nature. The text Is Elk
odus II, 10, But Moses fled from the
face Of Pharaoh and dwelt in the land
Of INDIAN"
Hunger and hardship prove torture
to all men who endure them, vet they
entail the greatest suffering when they
assall men who have once dwclt in
the palaces Of luxury 1t is harder to
be a pauper after one has once been a
silk robed prince than it is to be pau
per when one has always been accus-
toned to wear rags. Moses would not
have felt the hot, blistering sands Of
the desert as he did nor would his
parched lips or his blistered tongue
have been so distressing, if his desert
Journey when he was fleeing away
from Egypt to the land of INDIAN.
near to old Mount Sinai, had been TAX
en- by a man who had never been any
thing else but Hebrew slave. Mo
ses. 1t Is true. had been born of q
slave. but he had been accustomed to
luxury through the adoption by which
he became the son OF Fharaoh's daugh-
ter. The finest garments crowded his
wardrobe The most costly viands
were in his larder. The richest OF pal
aces were his domicies The most
learned sages Conversant with all
Egyptian lore were his teachers. The
softest of touches were his resting
places. All that wealth and love could
give were lavished upon him as child,
| boy and man. Now as a handsome
prince and ms one OF the keenest intel
lects Of the world, as an epicurean,
who looked upon the rarest luxures Of
life as his necessities, we suddenly
find him hunted fugitive, fleeing
from his foster mothers home with a
price upon his head. He Is charged
with the crime of murder. But. worse
|
| the fact that the murdered man was
an Egyptian who was cruelty abusing
one Of the Hebrew slaves. In other
words. Moses was hated as the cham
pion Of an allen race, that race a race
of slaves. As an Egyptian prince he
had dared stand up and espouse the
cause and the rights of the Hebrew
slaves, who were the unpaid laborers
Of the kingdom of the pharaohs.
Moses Blessings.
want to dwell this morning on the
blessings which came 10 Moses life IN
his forty long years 81 exile in the
land of the Mldiantes. | want to
speak about the bless IS which came
to Moses in midlife The period he
spent In indian extended from the age
Of forty to fifty and from fifty to sixty.
and from sixty to seventy and from
seventy to eighty. These twoscore
years of Moses life We're in some re-
spects the most momentous of all
Moses career Moses spent his first
forty years as a beloved prince in
Pharaoh's palaces. The second forty
years he lived in the land of the
Midianites. The third forty years of
his life he spent in the wilderness with
the Hebrews leading them from the
scene Of Egyptian enslavement to the
crystal gates of the Jordan. 1t is about
the second epoch of Moses life that /
would speak today.
In the first place, God had purpose
| L. Ii,
exile. 1t was to teach him that Gods
thoughts are not as mans thoughts
nor Gods ways as mans ways. The
great Jehovah seemed to say to the
future emancipator of the Hebrew
race: "My son, ! want to take you
away from the palaces of Memphis
and the temple of Karnak and all the
repulsive heather worship of the
Egyptians. | want you to be alone
with me out in the desert sands.
want to talk with you and have you
talk with me. | want you to learn
about the God of Abraham and Isaac
and Jacob. | want you to be truly
my child and not be worshiper Of
cows, and bulls, and rams. and croco-
dies, and cats. and lions, and frogs,
and fishes and hawks. and falcons. 1t
is almost an impossibility for any man
to live in the concentrating spiritual
| atmosphere where his loved ones are
worshiping false gods without having
| his own spiritual ears dulled. Come
my child, to the faroff indian lands,
where in the stiffness OF the day and
In the stiffness of the night l can talk
with thee and thou canst talk with
me" Thus God led Moses far away
from the Egyptian temples into, the
quietude Of exile In order that Moses
might learn of him and study what
| God wanted him to do.
Was this not very wise plan?
Where in all the world was the abom-
| ination OF heather worship made more
attractive than in old Egypt? When
we stand amid the ruins of Memphis,
we find there that the sacred deity
was worshiped in the form Of bull.
| These bulls were allowed to live for
twenty years. Then they were put
TO death and their bodies embalme
like those of kings. Then. with great
ceremony, their bodies were carried
to magnificent tombs, which tomhs
thereafter were looked upon as sacred
ShrlneS HerodOtuS the Crack histO-