The Penn's Grove record., 1908-11-20

E- 49, a. NAAS - IA
people saw only the tabernacle in the
plain, but the eyes of Moses looked
beyond and through that and saw
the pattern he had beheld in the
mount with God. And that is our
thought together this morning, the
pattern in the mount, the building in
the plain, for life still has its Sinais. :
where we behold ideals, and it has
its plain, where these are to be real
lied. Surely he is a sorry builder
who has seen no pattern in the
mount.
For the success of our building,
much will depend upon our choice of
a pattern.
The costliest building is manhood
and womanhood, that something we
call self, a life, character. Yet there
is much haphazard building. With
the greatest variety of plans there is
little attention to standards, and an
infinite variety of results, because the
pattern is not selected with the care
an architect draws his designs upon
his trestle board.
What shall we build our lives
howell, or palace, or temple? 1t is an
celebrating reflection that every act
or thought is building them into
something. What an infinite variety
OF patterns. We can not build after
them all-which shall we choose?
There must be unity in the design.
The eclectic method, pure and simple,
will hardly avail for this. What n
age approved fails to win the appro-
baton of the next. There must be
permanencc and real worth. in the
pattern, if it is to satisfy ourselves or
others as the years pass. AS we read
history and the great names of past
eras move before us, we often feel
how transient they were. How like a
howell is Midas, the Phrygian king of
legend and story. How like a mold
ering triremo upon the shores of time
is Pompey the Great. How like a
dust covered ruin in the Roman
forum is Caesar.
Now we may all be tabernacle
builders, like Moses, if we will.
For this method Moses followed is
not to be thought of by us as excep-
tional. 1t is a type for us each in our
building. We, too, are building,
building every day, building for
eternity" and u Scripture lesson
told us that our building must stand
Gods test. We have like opportuni-
ties with the great Jewish lawgiver.
II he had eyes to see God, and ears
TO hear God, so have we. Will we
choose the tabernacle pattern for our
lives? Every human SOUL" wrote
Hartford's greatest divine, "has a
complete and perfect plan, cherished
for it in the heart of Coda divine
biography marked out, which it en-
tiers into life to live. This life. right
ly u%nfolded, will be a complete and
beautiful whole, an experience led
on by God, and unfolded by His Sc
crct nurture, great in it's conception.
great in the divine skill by which IT
Is shaped; above all, great in the mo-
mentous and glorious issues it pre-
pares." Life may be used for other
purposes, no doubt, but do they sat
isfy? Is not life insipid, unsatisfying,
lost, I'll 1t is all wrought out a temple,
a dWeiling place for God most high?
here some will say, But my life is
cast on other levels. It deals with
common things, with the doing of
momentous acts n routine service.
What opportunity can there be for
me to achieve such largo or worthy
ASouieS' IL COiuiClOuS were inherent,
or my calling other than it is, all this
might be of interest to me. Ions to
put just this into my living, but it is
all too remote from life as l have to
live it." Here lies the value of the
scene before US. Through Moses the
humblest of the people became part.
ners with him in building the tabor.
nacle. Moses did not resr it ,.pon the
cloud-encircled mount, but in the
plain, that you and l might be cncour-
aged to realize the purpose of Cod
for us in the field of common daily re-
lations and amid what will otherwise
be the drudgery of daily living. He
leaves US the same task. Merchant
and teacher, sailor and soldier. farm.
er and workman, author and editor
housewife and clerk, mistress and
maid, lawyer and preacher. however
humble and obscure our lives seem
we arc to be fellow workmen with
God In bringing things divine into
those seemingly common and I'm.
meaning activities and relations
After the clouds and glory had with.