Rensselaer Republican, Volume 20, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 August 1888 — TROUBLE ON BOTH SIDES. [ARTICLE]

TROUBLE ON BOTH SIDES.

ONE TROUBLE AT A TIME MAY BE CONQUREp. ■- But When Tb&y Cl me from AllgiiUt It U (imply Awful—The Only Ktfuge and Comf i t Are by Way of the Crusi. » Rev. Dr. Talmage preached at the Brooklyn Tabernacle last Sunday. Subject: “Trouble on Both Sides;” and his text: “There was a sharp rock on the one side and a sharp rook on the other side.” —I. Samuel* 4. My friends, you have been, or are now some of you, in this crisis of the text. If a man meets one trouble lie can go through"with it. He gathers all his energies/concentrates them upon one point,and in the strength of God, or by his own natural determination, goes through it. But the man who has trouble to the right of him and trouble to the left of him is to be Did either trouble come alone he might endure it; but two troubles, two disasters, two overshadowing misfortunes, are Bozez and Seneh. God pity him! In this crisis of the text is that man whose fortune and health fail him at the same time. Nine-tenths of all our merchants' capsize in business before they come to forty-five years of age. There is some collision in commercial circles, and they stop payment. It seems as if every man must put his name on the back of a note before he learns what a fool a man is who risks all his own property on the prospect that some man will tell the truth. It seems as if a. man must have a large amount of unsalable goods on his own shelf before he learns how much Easier it is.to buy than to sell. It seems as if even- man must be completely burned out before he learns the. importance . of always keeping fully insured. It seems as if every man must be wrecked in a financial tempest before he learns to keep things snug in case of a sudden enroclvdon. When the calamity does come, it is awful. The man goes home in despair, and he tells his family: “ We’ll have to go to the poor house.” He takes a dolorous view of everything. It seems as if he never could rise. But a'little- time passes, and he says: “Why, I am not so badly off after all; I have mV family left.”

Before the Lord turned Adam out of Paradise, He gave him Eve, so that when he lost Paradise he could stand it. Permit one who has read but a few novels in-all his life, and who has not a great deal of romance in his composition, to say, that if, when a man’s fortunes fail he has a good wile—agood Christian wife -he ought not to be-despondent, “Oh!” you say. “that only increases the embarrassment, since you have her also to take care of.” You are an ingrate, for the woman as often supports the man as the man supports the woman. The man may bring all The dollars, hut the woman generally brings the courage and the faith in God. Well, this man of whom I am speaking looks around, and die finds his family is left, and he rallies, and the light comes to his eyes, and the smile to his face, anil the courage to his heart. In two years he is quite over it. He makes his financial calamity the chapter in a new era of prosperity. He met that new trouble—conquered it. He sat down for a little while under the grim shadow of the rock Bozez; yet he soon rose and began, like Jonathan, to climb. But how often it is that physical ailment comes with financial embarrassment. When the fortune failed it broke the man’s spirit. His nerves were shattered. His brain was stunned. I can show you hundreds of men in New York whose fortune and health failed at the same time. They came prematurely to the staff. Their hand trembled “ with incipient paralvsis. They never say a well day since the hour they called their creditors together for a compromise. If such men are impatient, and peculiar, and irritable, excuse them. They had . two troubles; either one of which they could have met successfully. If, when the health went, the fortune had been retained, it would not have been so bad. The man could have bought the very best medical advice, and he could have had the very best attendance, and long lines of carriages would have stopped at the front door to inquire as to his welfare. But poverty on the, one side and Sickness on the other are Bozez and Seneh! and they interlock their shadow's and drop them upon the poor man’s way. God help him! “There is a sharp rock on the one side and a sharp rock on the other side.”

Now, whffTls such a man to do? In thejiame of Almighty God, I will tell him w hat to do. Do as Jonathan did—climb; climb up into the sunlight of God’s favor and consolation. I can go through the churches and show you men who lost fortune and health at the same time, and yet who siug all day and dream of heaven all flight. If you have any idea that sound digestion, and steady nerves, and dear eyesight, and good bearing, and plenty of friends are necessary to make a man luppy, you have miscalculated. I suppose that these overhanging rocks only made Jonathan scramble the harder and the faster to I get up and out into the sunlight; and 1 hjs combined shadow of invalidism and financial embarrassment has often, sent

a man up the quicker into the sunlight of God’s favor aud the noonday of His glorious promises. It is a difficult thing for a man to feel his dependence upon God when.he has SIO,OOO in the bank anil $50.000 in Government securities and a block of stores aud three ships. “Well,” the mart says to himself, “it is silly for me to pray,' ‘Give me this day my*daily bread,’ when my pantry is full and the canals from the West are crowded with breadstuff's destined for mv store houses.” Oh! my friends, if the combined misfortunes and disasters of life have made you climb up into the arms of a sympathetic and compassionate God, through all eternity you wi'l bless Him that in this world “there was a sharp rock on the one side and a sharp rock on the other side.” Again, that tuan is in the crisis of the text who has home troubles and outside persecution at the same time. The world treats a man Well just as long as it pays to treat him well. As long as it can manufacture success out of his bone, and brain, and muscle, it favors him. The"world fattens the horse it wants to drive. But let a man see it his duty to cross the track of the world, then every bush is fall of thorns and tusks thrust at him. They will belittle him. They will caricature him. * They will call his generosity self-aggrandizement, and his piety sanctimoniousness. The very worst persecution will some time come upon him from those who profess "to be Christians.

e ’« • • > • Now, a certain amount of persecution rouses a man’s defiance, stira his blood for magnificent battle, and makes him fifty times more a man than he would have been without the persecution. A certain amount of persecution is a tonie and inspiration, but too much of and too long continued becomes the rock Bozez, throwing a dark shadow' over a man’s life. What is he to do then? Go borne,von say. Good, advice, that.. That is just the place for a man to go when the world abuses him.* Go hpme."... Blessed be Got! for our quiet anil sympathetic homes. «But there is many a man who has the reputation of having a home when he has none. Through unthinkingness or precipitation there are many matches made that ought never to have been made. An officiating priest can not alone unite A couple. The Lord Almighty must proclaim banns. There is many a hofne in which there is no sympathy, and no happiness, and no good cheer. The clamors of the battle may not have been heard outside, but God knows, notwithstanding all the playing of the “Wedding March,” and all the odor of the orange blossoms, and the benediction of the officiating pastor, there has been no matriage. Sometimes men have awakened to find on one side of them the rOck of persecution, and on the other side the rock of domestic infelicity. What shall Such an one do? Do as Jonathan did—climb. Get up on the heights of God’s,consolation from which we may look down in triumph upon outside persecution and home trouble. Again, that woman stands in the, crisis ofllie text who has bereavement and a struggle for a livelihood at the same time. Without mentioning names, I speak from observation. Ah! it is a hard thing for a woman ’to make-an honest living, even when her heart is not troubled and she” has a fair cheek and the magnetism of an exquisite presence. But, now the husband, or the father, is dead. The expenses of the obsequies have absorbed all that w T as left in the savings bank, and, w y an and wasted w ith weeping and watching, she goes forth—a grave, a hearse, a coffin behind her —to contend for her' existence and the existence of her children. When I see such a battle jas that open I shut my eyes to the ghastliness of the aiectaiie. Men sit with embroidered ippers and write heartless essays about women’s wages, but that question is made up of tears and blood, and there is more blood than tears. O, give women free excess to all the realms where she. can get a livelihood, .from the telegraph office to the pulpit. Let men’s wages be cut down before her’s are cut down. Men have iron in their souls and can stand it. Make the way free to her of the broken heart. May God put into my hand the cold, bitter cup of privation, and give me nothing but a widowless hut for shelter for many years, rather than that after I am dead there should go out from my home into the pitiless world a woman’s arm to fight the Gettysburg, the Austerlitz, the Waterloo of life; for blood-. And yet how many women there are seated between the rock of bereavement on the one side, and the rock of destitution on the other. Bozez and Seneh interlocking their shadow and dropping them upon her miserable way. “There is a sharp rock on the one side, and a sharp rock on the’other side.” What are such to do. Somehow, let them climb up into the bights of the glorious promise: “Leave thy* fatherless children: I will preserve them alive, and let thy widows trust in Me.” Or get up into the heights of that other glorious promise: “The Lord preservetli the stranger and relieveth the widow' andthe fatherless.” O! ye sew'ing women on starving wages. 01 ye w idows turneif out from the once beautiful home. O! ye female teachers, kept on niggardly stipend. O! ye despairing women, seeking in vain for work, wandering along the docks, and thinking to throw yourself into the river last night. O! ye women of weak nerves and aching sides, and short breath and broken heart, you need something more than human, sympathy; you need the sympathy of God. Climb up into his arms. He knows it all, and He loves you more than father or mother or husband ever eouhl or ever did, and, instead of wringing your hands in despair, you had better begin to climb. There are heights of consolation for you, though now “there is a sharp rock on the one side and a sharp rock on the other side.” Again, that man is in the crisis of the text who was a wasted life on the one side anil an illuminated eternity on the other. Though a man may all his life have cultured deliberation and selfpoise, if he gets into that position all his self-possession is gone. There are all the wrong thoughts of his existence, all the wrong deeds, all the wrong words — strata above strata, granitic, ponderous, overshadowing. Thafcvrock I call Bozez. On the other sido-are all the retributions of the future, the thrones of judgment, the eternal ages, angry with his long defiance. That rock I call Seneh. Between these two rocks Lord Byron perished, and Alcibiades perished, and Herod,perished, find ten thousand times ten thousand have perished, - O! man | immortal, man redeemed, man bloodr bought, climb up out 6f those shadows. Climb up by the way of the cross. Have your wasted life forgiven; have your eternal life secured. ‘{This morning just take one look to theipast and see what it has been, and take one look to the future and see what it threatens to be. You can afford to lose your health, you can afford to lose your property, you can afford to lose your reputation; but you cannot afford to lose your soul. That bright, gleaming.glorious, precious, eternal possession you must carry aloft in the day when the earth burns up and the heavens burst, ..

You see from my subject that when a man goes into the safety and peace of the gospel he does not demean himself. There is nothing in religion that leads to meanness or unmanliness. The Gospel of Jesus Christ only asks you to climb as Jonathan did—climb toward God, climb toward heaven, climb into the sunshine of God’s favor. To become a Christian is not to go meanly down; it is to come gloriously up—-up into the communion of saints, up into the the peace that passeth all understanding, up into the companionship of angels. Relives up; he dies up. O! then, accept the wholesale invitation which make this morning to all j the people. Come up from between your invalidism and , financial embarI rassments. Come up from between a | wasted life and an unlimited eternity. Like Jonathan, climb with all your might,Jiristeid of sitting down to wring your hapds in the shadow and in the darkness - “a sharp rock on the one side I and a sharp rock on the other side.”