Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1914-12-05
lis THERE A LIFE AFTER DEATH2
The international Sunday School Les
son for December Is "Christ Risen
from the Dead."-Mark 1918; Matt
n2.11.1S
(By William T. Ellis.)

No question is more ancient, more
insistent, or more profound and i'm
portant than this one, IF a man die
shall he live again." To some degree
it is certain at some time or other to
engage the thought of every mature
mind. With the daily dispatches from
abroad fairly reekiug with news OF
bloody deaths by the myriad, the
problem is one that thrusts itself in
exorably into the consideration of even
the frivolous minded and the needless.
I, There is surer ground for convic-
ton of Immortality than any have yet
cited; and we shall consider 1t a few
para graphs later. First, though, we
need to remind ourselves of some prac-
! tica consequences of our belief upon
this subject.
If man dies as the dog dies, then the
greatest of all inspirations and inhibi-
TORS are removed from the realm of
morals 1t is because man is to live
| forever that he should live like an i'm
mortal here and now. Once grant that
this life is all and then we must admit
the wisdom of the injunction. Eat,
drink and be merry, for tomorrow we
die"
The chrism of earths friendships is
the hope Of the resurrection, which
sacredly anoints them for two worlds,
All our highest conceptions of love are
bound up with the expectation of life
! beyond the grave.
! Grounded in the resurrection teach
ing is the Christians hope of Christly
character and of future glory. IF We
then be risen together with Christ,
seek those things which are above"
Nov is Christ risen from the dead,
and become the first fruits of them
that slept" eff Christ hath not been
raised then is our preaching vain;
your faith also is vain" If we have
only hoped in Christ in this life, we are
tof all men most miserable"
Light From The Book.
Every day, in every section of the
world, there rage arguments about re.
ligion. Men cannot be restrained from
specializing about this supreme theme.
No aspect of these discussions strikes
an observer as more significant than
the fact that so often men debate as if
there were no authority above their
own reason to which appeal might be
made They talk as though historical
facts were to be decided by ''horse
sense" and as if one mans opinion
were as good as another. n other
words, they leave the Bible entirely
out of their discussion, and airily put
forth their own immature opinions as
if they were the last word on the sub
ject. Every reader of these lines has
probably heard controversies on the
resurrection, without single appeal
to the Bible as historical evidence.
That makes only one of two courses
possible. Either the Bible must be Gis-
carded utterly, or else it must be &C.
cepted as the only scientific and valid
evidence available up to the present
upon the subject of the resurrection.
To reject the teaching of the resurrec.
ton is to reject the New Testament;
for it is full of the fact and of the i'm
plications of the resurrection of Jesus
Christ. And apart from this book we
have absolutely no other historical evi.
derce of the raising of the dead to life
| I take concordance and follow
through the words raised" "risen,'
resurrection" and find one hundred
and twenty-three separate references
given to resurrection.
| When the sorrow of death enters a
circle of love, it is not to the barren
philosophy of the ancients that we turn
for comfort, but to this book of the i'm,