The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1907-01-18
Caln1age
Sermon
By Rev.
Frank De Witt Talmage, D. d.

through divine mercy and power to
those who ask in faith. The text is
John tx, 3. THAT the works of God
should be made manifest in him"
There is something very consolatory
to me in the fact that the character
sketches of the Old and the New Testa-
ments do not deal entirely with the
Enochs and the JOshuas and the Jo-
sephs. These men. to be frank, are
too good for me to feel fellowship with
them. | read and reread the records
of their lives, and do not find one flaw
in them. But when find God offering
his mercy and pardon to Jacob and a
David and a Peter and a doubling
Thomas l say to myself, "Ah, if God
can cleanse such men of their sins, |
know he can and will cleanse me of
my sins if | only throw myself upon
his mercy and his love-" Now, our
Lords disciples had the same doubts
Gnd the same failings in their nature
as we have. Though they lived very
close to Jesus in a physical sense, they
were just as far from him in spir-
itual sense as some of us are. The
same problems and difficulties which
are worrying us were worrying them.
The same questions which are being
discussed by us were being discussed
by them. And here today we find one
of the greatest of all modern questions
being brought by them to Christ for
settlement
Jesus was one day going out of the
temple accompanied by his friends.
There by one of the gates stood
young man blind from his birth. He
was beggar. He had that mute APP
peal of sightless eyeballs so pathetic
to look at He stood there as hundreds
of blind mendicants now stand in the
east, begging for money with the
words: "Backsheesh! Backsheesh! For
the love of God, give me backsheesh" |
think that the disciples as they were
walking along had their heads tOgeth-
er. talking earnestly upon some great
gospel theme They wanted Christ to
explain for them some Of the knotty
questions of theology which we all
want him to do. Among these prob
lens was probably that of suffering.
Was it true as so many Jews be-
lieved. that affection was sent as pun
ishment for sin? We know from the
book of Job that such an idea was
prevalent, but was it true? There were
some facts that contradicted the the
DRY. Some men were undoubtedly
good. yet were great sufferers. This
difficulty was so obvious that another
theory had sprung up. There were
some who said. perhaps the sufferer
his good, and his suffering may be the
result of the sin of his ancestors" AS
they talked they noticed the conspicu-
Gus beggar at the temple gate and
they made his case the subject Of a
question to their Master. Why was
this man blind? Was his blindness a
punishment for his own sin or for
some sin committed by his parents?
That is a question which has long been
a mystery and perhaps you and l
have discussed it a hundred times.
What did Jesus say? Why, he said
Neither hath this man sinned nor his
parents. but that the works of God
should be made manifest in him."
The Explanation.
Have you grasped the full signif- .
canoe of this answer? If you do you
have the key to some of the mysteries .
of your own life God has sent to you
that lung trouble, or that dizziness of
hearing, or that dimness of eyesight, /
or that family trouble, or that financial .
distress, not on account of your sins
or on account of your parents sins, but .
that Gods mercy and power might be
made manifest to all the world in your
life. Do you believe that? Well, if
not, l want to plead with you to be-
lieve it, Therefore let us try and find
out how the works of God can be made
manifest in your present physical, men
tai and spiritual troubles, as they were
made manifest in the miraculous cure
of the young man of the east who was
born blind and who had his eyesight
given TO him when he obeyed the COM
mands of the Lord Jesus Christ.
When the blind mans eyes were
opened Christ performed a miracle
which no power on earth had ever
been able to do. He was not an oculist
who was cutting away cataract
which. as a dark curtain, had been
dropped over the eyeball of an old
man. He was not a charlatan who
was making a salve out of the mud to
assuage the Inflammation of the oph-
thalmic nerves. But he was a miracle
worker who could give hearing to
deaf and dumb man who had been
born without any eardrum. without
any sounding board to catch the waves
of sound as they came surging into the
ivory vestibules of the ear. In other
words, Christ was giving to this young
man of the east his eyesight when
there was no visual organ there, when |
the ocular nerves were gone. The
work Christ was doing for that young
mans eyes was exactly what he could
do If he put new leg upon your body
after your leg had been crushed in a
railroad accident and amputated by the
surgeons knife. Never since the world
was created up to the time of Jesus
had any man ever received his sight
after he had been born blind This
was a test case Christ was
practically saying, "If / can give eye ,
sight to this afflicted one | can do
everything and anything, We of lit :
tie farh." ,
Test Case.
The other day / saw a picture of the :
new gallery of one of the largest audi :
.oriums of the west. 1t was filed with
hundreds of bags of sand and lime :
They were put there to test the
strength of the gallery, as every rail- !
= | :