Democratic Sentinel, Volume 20, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 December 1896 — Short Sermons. [ARTICLE]

Short Sermons.

Judgment.—The time of God’s final Judgments and the dispensing of rewards and penalties has not yet arrived. The Lord Jesus Christ does not formally and finally Judge the quick and the dead until the last great assize at the end of the world. We are not now through with life, nor Is God through with us. To Judge men at present Is to prejudice them. Judgment Is not £be matter which God has now in hand.— Rev. Henry Swentzel, Episcopalian Brooklyn, N. Y.

I ure in Heart.—Many who declare that their hands are clean and their hearts pure tell an untruth. Their hands would be repulsive If we could see them as God sees them. Many things in society and business are condoned. There Is a great deal of sham, which, according to an unwritten law, Is looked upon by the world as right and fair. There Is, however, a standard of honesty, and all should live up to it. We can not have clean hands If we have Impure hearts.—Rev. R. F. Maclaren, Presbyterian, San Jose, Cal. Money.—Money Is of God. It is one of his most benevolent provisions. But It belongs to him. Every dollar a man has he borrows. He can no more claim ownership over It than he can over the air he breathes, or the sunlight that guides his steps. It Is only giv’en to man In trust; God is the real owner. When man moves out of the world he does not take a dollar with him of the money he has been calling his own. Man has but one thing which Is peculiarly his own, and his forever, and that is his character.—Rev. Frank Hungate Baptist, Columbus, Ohio. The Bible and Progress.—No real progress of the race ever started from Infidelity, or was ever helped to success by men who cut themselves loose from the historic influences of Christianity. All remedial, preventive and redemptive philanthropy has always been rooted in the Word of God, and the men who have wrought the most for their fellows have ever been guided and empowered by the forces embodied and made radiant in the historic events and noble lives of the church of God In all .time, for all real progress will always be based on the principles of the Bible—Rev. T. Beeber, Presbyterian, Norristown, Pa.

The True Hero.—The true hero puts no faith In charms and nostrum*, but believes only in hard facts and in Immovable realities. He believes in Immutable laws, natural, economic, commercial, financial, social. He believes In an Iron chain of cause and effect, which for good and evil binds all things and all men and nations. He looks at things and men with clear and keen eyes. He weighs all matters in the balance of sober judgment He whatever questions and problems como before him only after considering the ripest experience of mankind.—Rabbi Moses, Hebrew, Louisville, Ky. Revival.—We wait for prosperity. What we need In order that prewperity be restored Is a revival, a rewval ot faith, or confidence In the business world. For this we pray. But if It be true that the church is the body of Christ through which he brings tokens of his power and grace to the nation, what we need most of all Is a revival of heart, religion In the church. A return to God In repentance and obedience, and a revival of common honesty with God, which will result in our bringing the tithe Into his storehouse and laying our offerings upon his altar. If we would have God open his treasury we must open ours.—Rev. J. K. Montgomery, Presbyterian, Cincinnati, Ohio, Divine Arthitecture.—A gentleman who was walking near an uncompleted building one day saw a stonecutter chiseling patiently at a block of stone in front of him. The gentleman went up to him. “Still chiseling?” he remarked, pleasantly. “Yes, still chiseling,” replied the workman, going on with his work. “In what part of the building does this stone belong?” asked the gentleman. “I don’t know,” replied the stonecutter. “I haven’t seen the plans.” And then he went on chiseling, chiseling, chiseling. And that is what we should do. We have not seen the great plans of the Master Architect above, but each of us has his work to do, and we should chisel away until It Is done.—Rev. 8. H. Haines, Epiacooallan. N*w York.