The Penn's Grove record., 1908-01-03
TIE pUZRIf
A SERMON ASE%
PY ThE REV Mx1eR
1MWHENDEeS0NW0
Theme: Discipleship.

Brooklyn, N. Y.-Preaching at the
Irving Square Presbyterian Church;
Hamburg avenue and VERIFIED street,
on the above theme, the pastor, Rev.
Ira Wemmell Henderson, took as his
text / John 2:6: "He that saith he
abideth in Him ought himself also to
walk eve as He walked" He said:
A disciple is a learner. He i2 a
student who sits at the feet of a
teacher and imbibes knowledge and
wisdom. A disciple is a follower.
One who walks after another. One
who places his feet in the footprints
of his predecessor, who studies to
emulate the teaching and the practice
of his guide.
Prominently the disciples of Jesus
Christ are students and followers.
Students they are of the wisdom of
God revealed in and through Him,
the essence and the refinement of
eternal and supernal truth. Distinct
lively they are followers, il they be
true followers, and it is of such only
that 1 care to speak tonight, of the
Lord. They seek to emulate His
knowledge and to practice His pre-
cepts and become conformed to the
standards of His virtues. They are
His disciples. They glory in their
special allegiance to Him. They exalt
His overlordship and promulgate His
principles and declare His divinity.
They pray, and they profess to strive,
to become like Him. And all this
they do and endeavor to be simply
nnI cN1a1v hoooncn thew ho1inu0 If tn
be the Word of God that "He that
saith he abideth in Him ought him
self also to walk even as He walked"
This discipleship is The ambition
of us all. 1t is the glory of practical
Christianity. 1t is the outward evil
dence in large of the faith
that moves within our souls as Chris
tian men and m 1t is a true
standard of our worth as we walk
among men.
But it is manifest that before we
can practice the truth we must know
it; that before we can follow we must
have a vision of the leader, that there
must be footprints ahead that we may
tread therein, that there must be ex-
ample ere there will be emulation.
To say this is prosaic. But none the
less it is necessary.
All of which is to say that If we are
to be disciples of the Lord Jesus
Christ we must have some conception
of His character and IN understand
ing of the n of life He lived.
We must have a vision of the out
standing characteristics Of His man.
hood.
It would be impossible in the space
of time allotted to the sermon of this
or of any other day to enumerate the
virtues of our Saviour or to present
Complementary and fully the COM
ponents of His character. Tonight
we shall consider simply four of the
traits that we must possess and aug
ment by His grace within us and ex-
press to His glory about us If we
would he His disciples. And these
traits are: 1, a large outlook; 2, a
catholic spirit; 9, a militant right
%eousness; 4, an optimistic foresight.
These we must have are we to follow
Him and to be the sort of disciples
He bids us to become.
Jesus had a large outlook. His
horizon was b~oundless. His vision
pierced the veil of time and pene-
II dISu IuO AlyoICi VI CIClh Atys liz
was not circumscribed by the limita-
lions of His family relationships, nor
by the boundaries of His birthplace,
o by the confines of Palestine.
Much less was He concerned with the
smallnesses and the meannesses of
life which so dominant the minds and
stultify the spirituality of so many of
His followers. Jesus was so en-
crossed with the consideration of
large things that He had no time to
let little things annoy. He was so
busy promulgating principles and ex-
employing them to men that He had
no time for gossip The trouble with
the Christianity Of the day is that
we have reversed the process of
our Lord. We are so busy with the
small things that we have but
precious little tine or strength to at
tend the pressure of the large. We
are so busy with gossip that we for
get the proclamation Of principles.
The disciples of our Lord are gener-
ally so busy discussing what they
think of the manners and the meth
DDS and the clo.hes and the frailties
of brethren in the faith that they
have little time TO engross themselves
with the largest and perdurable af-
fairs of the Kingdom of Almighty
God. But if we were true disciples
of the Lord we you'd minify the falli-
bilities and iliosyncrasies of the
brethren in the household of faith
whose sins are no greater than our
own, and magnify the need of the
world, and the Importance of a stern
resistance in tle front rank in the
hot fight against sin, and the desira-
bility of communion here and eter-
nally with tie infinite King of
Heaven. And We would practice what
we preached, and labor as we prayed.
Jesus had a catholic spirit. There
never was a man who had frmer or
more ultimate convictions, a message
more final thar our Lord. His con-
fdence in Hin ambassadorial rela-
tionship BETWEEN God and the world
was supreme. His belief in the final
ity of His Gospel was consummate.
And yet He was never narrow. He
was tolerant o. all. Affirming the
value of the trlith that He declared,
He had ever a word of encouragement
for the seeker after light. Were that
seeker a Samaritan or a Roman, a
rich man or a slave. Jesus had tolera-
ton for him. He was disdainful {
all that is superficial in religion and
morals. He had a welcome for every
soul, however weak and wandering,
who was honest Quite otherwise is
it with multitudes within His church.
They seem to think that tolerance
and religious dishonor are co-termin-
Gus. They seem to imagine that the
they are the greater they
render homage 10 their Lord. And
still another multitude seem to think
that in order to be catholic in spirit
and tolerant in ttmper we must cecae
to affirm the finaity of our teachings,
and maui down otr flag, and minimize
our eternal Importance, and place
ourselves wholly within the class of
the so-called ethnc faiths. In other
words some of us, too man. Of us in
fact, have become so broad that we
have become shalhw, and so tolerant
that we have becfme vague, and so
good-natured that we have become
TO- n,.~x,