Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1917-01-12
BIG MAN WHO
CAME IN SECOND
"John the Baptist and Jesus"
Subject of Sunday School
Lesson
CBy William T. Ellis.)

AS now, so 1t was IN the uhy VI
John the Baptizer. A new day was
dawning, a new era was about to be-
/ gin: the old order was drawing to an
end. So there had to be an Intro
ducer of The Things That Were To
Be. Somebody must needs speak out
| fearlessly - somebody who saw the
inadequacy of the old and the char
acter of the new. A crisis without
prophet would be only calamity.
Then, as now, the Interpreter who
stood between the two times, was a
preacher of righteousness. In all the
high hours of life we listen to the
man who speaks for God and the
eternal verities. That is why the real
preacher, the man whose eyes and
ears and lips have been doing busi-
ness privately with God, is having
to-day his opportunity of ages. At
time like the present, there is supreme
need of men such as John the Bap-
| t1Zer - free men, who have been in
the desert, open-souled and alone with
God; fearless men, who are not inter-
ested in holding a job or filling pull
pit" but in speaking a message that
is vital enough to be sensational;
humble men, who are content to pass
the laurels and the honors on to 9TH
ers, If only they may point the way
for stumbling feet; God-envisaging
men, who are open-eyed to the divine
realities and the appearing of the Re-
deemer who comes bringing salvation.
Thee are such men. Successors to
John the BaptiZer are with us to-
day. Some are ordained ministers of
the Gospel; some are social workers
and publicists; some are writer's and
some are teachers. They are seers of
God, who know how to suffer but do
not know how to keep silence. All
of them are, like John, needless of
or
what the world needs most now
adays. We already have enough of
it to wreck the nation. Society is
overloaded with conservative, pru-
dent, cautious, tactful and sophiSti-
Gated leaders; our hope is not in
them, but In the few who dare smash
precedent, violate convention, ignore
eXpediency, and blaze forth with
Gods clear worth of truth concerning
our own day.
What if they are martyred for
their message? Like John, they have
borne witness to. the truth, and that
is the highest success possible to
mortal. In olden days the words
witness" and martyr" were used
INTERCHANGEABLE, SO that the martyrs
of Christ were called witnesses"
John had his head cut off long before
he saw the triumph of the kingdom
he proclaimed; but John has place
in the gallery of earth's few i'm
mortal names. Something of the
flavor of his character fingers in the
lines of Louis Untermeyer:
God, though this life is but a wrath,
Although we know not what we use,
Although we grope with little faith,
Give me the heart to highland
lose.
! eyer inSlIrrent let mo be
Make me more daring than devout;
| From sleek contentment keep me free,
And fill me with a buoyant doubt.
"Open my eyes to visions girt
With beauty, and with wonder lit
But let me always see the dirt,
And all that spawn and die in it.
open my ears to music, let
Me thrill with springs first flutes
and drums
But never let me dare forget
The bitter ballads of the slums.
From compromise and things half
Keep me, with stern and stubborn
pride;
And when, at last, the fight is won.
God keep me still unsatisfied."
n SENSATIONAL l'fcacilcr
Two Johns figure in this story, and
both shine in reflected light. One is
John the Evangelist, who wrote the
book we are studying and who was at
first a disciples of, the other John.
This central character, John the
Baptizer was a second cousin of Je-
sus, and himself the child of won
derful birth. A Nazarite, with un-
shorn locks and life of abstemious-
ness was John, the Wilderness dwell
Ter. He had lived apart from men
in the majestic spaces and silences
of the desert: for one must have
times apart from the world if one is
to serve the world. Why should we
expect the modern city pastor, slave
of telephone, of countless commit
tees and card-catalogs and social
engagements, to have a clear, ring
ing vital message? The poor man
does well if he keeps up with his en-
gagements and escapes nervous pros
tration. Only the man with courage
to insist upon solitude can speak the
fresh and living word of peace and
power to harassed and over-driven
world.
"A freak" would be the name that
cynical and overwise Jerusalem "men
about town" naturally applied to
John. He did not wear the clerical
garb of his time. with bordered robe
anu OSteilldIlOuS pnylaCIefleS. Drs
James Stalker describes his appear
ance tersely:
His hair was long and unkempt;
and his features were tanned with
the sun and the air of the desert.
Probably they We're thinned too, by
austerity; for his habitual food was
of the simplest order, consisting only
of locusts and wild honey. Locusts,
dried and preserved, form STILL at
the present day, an article of food in
the East, but only among the very
poor: people in the least degree lux
urious or scrupulous would not look
at 1T. Wild honey. formed by hives