The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1910-01-19
THE PULPIT.
A BRILLIANT SUNDAY SERMON BY
DIR. JOHN HUMPSTONE.
Theme: Light Of the World

manuel Baptist Church, returned
from a world trip of seventeen
months in time to be in his pulpit
Sunday. His subject in the morning
was, whence Came the Light of the
world?" The texts were from Mat
thew 4:16: THE people that sat in
darkness, saw a great light" John
S:12: Jesus spake unto them, say
ing, I am the light of the world" and
Hebrews IL, 2, 3: God hath
spoken to us in His Son = the
effulgence of His glory and the very
image of His substance" DR.. Hump
stone said:
These three Scriptures have unity
as answer to the question which Is
our subject. The land in which, and
the people to whom, Jesus came sat
in darkness, a darkness so deep that
it could be described with adequacy
only as 1.-The region and shadoW OF
death" In such surroundings sud
denly appeared one, sane ands poised
and e~ffectual, who said, II am the
light of the world" How ARE we to
! account for such an emergence? Is
| darkness the source of light; provin-
cialism the parent of universally;
narrowness of view the progenitor OF
worldwide outlook and sympathy?
Is supreme spiritual vitality the issue
to be expected from moral torpor?
| Could Journalism and phariseeism be-
get the superbly free sincerities OF
Jesus? Does death bring forth life?
Can He who called and has approved
Himself "The Light Of the World" be
accounted for my human heredity and
environment?
To such questions enlightened faith
has ever had but n answer. 1t Is
the answer of the New Testament.
The supremacy good and perfect gift
is from above and anne down from
the Father of Lights, in Whom is no
darkness at all. Gods Son is the
effulgence of His Fathers glory, the
very image of His substance. There
fore is He the Light of the World.
Such, in outline, are the thoughts
! now briefly to be expanded.
Palestine cannot account for Jesus.
That is the conviction which a visit to
the land, conventionally called holy
leaves within an open mind. If it Is
to be held holy, the hallowing is due
to Him and it's associations with Him.
He conferred upon it a distinction and
pre-eminence Which it did not, could
not, impart to Him. It everywhere
Eliminates and illustrates what He
said. 1t nowhere and in no wise eX-
plains what He was. One has a con-
tinual pleasure in tracing the paral-
lels between the Lords ministry and
His environment. The land and the
gospels are the counterparts OF each
other. At every step some word, or
image, of His flashes into the mind
with new sense of its truth and beau
ty. And this scarcely at all in cpnnec-
ton with the identification Of partic-
ular sites or places. On the contrary,
the mind recoils with disgust from the
effort to fix with exactitude the spot
presumptively sacred, because OF the
degradations to which the supposed
! Identification leads. There is as much
superstition in Palestine to-day as
there is in India, and 1t Is quite as
baleful. Mans purpose to locallze
Jesus Us the defeat of his chief intent.
His field is the world" If He were
now to visit the land Of His earthly
nativity, He would denounce with
righteous anger the vain superstitions
which defle the place # His transient
ministry. AS of old He swept the
traders from the temple courts, so
would He drive away the crowds that
cluster about the idols and The shrines
their own hands have fashioned,
thinking to do Him honor. One can
imagine how His tones would thrill
as He reafirmed His declaration,
1.-THE hour cometh and now is when
neither in this mountain, nor N Jeru-
salem, shall we worship the Father.
Ye worship that which We know not
. God is a spirit and they
that worship Him must worship Him
in spirit and in truth"
But true as this is. and keen as
are the pain and disillusionment the
fact occasions, still more exquisite
and satisfying is the sense of veri-
similitude, as, New Testament In
hand, one wanders over Judeani hills,
through Samaritan villages, over Es-
draelon's fertile plain. till he finds
himself at last afloat on Galilee's
lake. "He~ is not here, but risen:"
and yet His spirit permeates all. One
breathes the air He %breathed; one
sees the sights He saw; one feels the
thrill He felt, and still his compass
sions are awakened as one looks upon
the people of the land. Nothing could
be more perfect than the accord be-
tween landscape and narrative, apt
metaphor and obvious fact, persist
ing custom and moral appeal, physical
object and spiritual suggestion.
These are His flowers. that His city
set oa the hilltop; there few the birds
that taught Him Gods are. This
barren wild is the physical reflex of
His souls testing. Yonder snowy
height, flashing in the sunlight, is the
very SYMBOL whether it were the
scene or not, of His TRANSPORTATION.
To-day His sower goes forth to SOW;
the women He described are yet toll
ing at the mill or bearing aloft their
waterpots. The fishermen He COM
panioned are. there, drawing their
nets; and even as we are busy watch
ing them, such a sudden windstorm as
He quieted sweeps down the valley
between the hills and threatens to
overturn out boat. Yes! It is good
for faith to visit the land, however
much creduiity may have defiled it,
however sadly superstition has en-
crusted it with unrealities. But most
of all is it good for faith to see the
actual environment of Jesus, that the
mind may have sense Of the contrast
between it and Him. It is so small;
He is so great. Its color tones are so
neutral; He is SO ~resplendent. 1t is
so Oriental; He is so cosmopolitan.