The Cordele dispatch. (Cordele, Ga.) 19??-1971, 1918-03-17

There is not in all literature passage
more fraught with awful pathos than
David's grief for his selfish and erring
son: 20, Absalom, my son. would God
] had died for thee." Put over against
the light of such love as this. the sons
sin assumes the hideous blackness of
perdition itself. No man has ever sue
ceeded who sinned against a parents
love.
1t is significant that China, without
Christ. and without most of the arts of
civilization, has maintained through
the centuries comparatively static
existence upon the one edict. a.
your ancestors!" 1t is significant that
every great man has been sublmely de
voted to the father and mother who
Eourished him 1t is told of George
Washington that his mothers tears
over his contemplated departure for
England. where he had started as
youth to seek his fortune. caused him
TO cancel his passage and to remain in
Virginia Washington's love for his
mother made him the Father of his
country and changed the destiny of
the nascent American colonies. Jesus
love of His mother. evidenced even in
The agonies of the depth upon the
cross was undoubtedly the most beau
tiful of all the human traits of His
wondrously beautiful character The
hand of destiny is against the disobe-
dent and wilful child. God writes
"Ichabod' -failure-above every such
ones head.
But all these traits of character
rather lack of character-in Absalom.
we're drawn from one source as foun-
tain head: Absalom was without God
Utterly irreligious, this goddess sche-
m2r, is recorded to have made pre-
tense at religious worship only once in
all his life; And that was on an oc-
casion when che PLAYED religious" to
reinstate himself in the grace and ia
vcr OF the father against whom he had
sinned.
God had been left entirely out of this
young mans life. Fully adequate, in
his own conceit, to the direction of hi.
own life, he defed not only every prin-
ciple Of Justice and mercy, but ignored
the very existence of the God who is
the source of all good And the hand
CT God was against him; and it wae
God who defeated him; it was Cod
who in the wilderness, gave him
monument of abiding shame.
No life, no matter howsoever Won
drously endowed, is great without God.
Doomed beforehand are all the
schemes and Vaccinations of men who
leave out of their planning the will and
purpose OF God. Napoleon, on an occa-
sion when he boosted of his plans for
Russian conquest, was reminded
Sire. man proposes, but God dispo
Ses;" to this the naughty Corsican
made answer, Il am both he that pro
roses and disposes." But on the bar
ren rocks of ST. Helena, where he stood
in his lonely Punishment. and looked
mournfully out at sea, Napoleon con-
fessed his own impotence. He had
lived without God.
The great men of the past and the
present Gladstone, Mckinley, Wilson.
Daniel, Joseph, Wesley-men of all
periods, of all callings. have confessed
the source of their strength and use
luiness to have been the Lord God AL
mighty, without whom all life is mean
ingless little and mean.
Now, as never in history, we Ameri
can people stand in need of God. If
we are to be Gods lancet, to be used
IN His hands ito cut out the German
cancer" we must as such instruments.
else while He operates with US. He
may still further infect the world
Ours must, to change the figure. be a
battle both at home and abroad; a
fight for clean character, for unself-
ishness motives, for pure hearts. and
for lives which are hid with Christ in
God. Let us join this army-as we
pray for our soldiers, as for ourselves
:;Goc save our splendid men
From every stain of sin, God keep our
men.
When Satan would allure,
When tempted, keep them pure.
Be their protection sure
God save our men"