Rensselaer Republican, Volume 27, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 September 1894 — A FAMOUS BANQUET. [ARTICLE]

A FAMOUS BANQUET.

The Invited Guests Fail to Re —"spend. Therefore the Feast Was Eaten by ‘«tha Foor, the Maimed, the Halt and the Blind”—Dr. Talmage’s Sermon. The Rev. Dr. Talmage, who is still absent on his round the world tour, selected as the subject of his sermon through the press for last Sunday “Holy Compulsion,” the text being Luke xiv, 23, “And compel them to come in.” The plainest people of our day have luxuries which the kings and queens of Olden times never imagined. There are fruits in Westchester county and on Long Island farms far better than the pomegranates and apricots of Bible times.. Through ail the ages there have been scenes of festivity and the wealthy man of my text plans a great entertainment and invites his friends. If one builds a beautiful home he wants his acquaintances to come and enjoy it. If one buys an exquisite picture, he wants his friends to come and appreciate it, ajnd_it was a laudable thing when the wealthy rnan of my' text, happy himself, wanted to make other people happy. And so the invitations went put, but something went very much wrong. You can imagine the embarassment of any one who has provided a grand feast when he finds out that the guests invited do not intend to come. There is nothing that so provokes the master of the feast as that.

Well, these people invited to this great banquet of the text made most frivolous excuses. The fact’ was, I suppose, that some of them were offended that this man had succeeded so much better in the world than they had. There are people in all occupations and professions who consider it a wrong to them that anybody else is advanced. I suppose these people invited to the feast said among themselves: “We are not going to administer to that man’s vanity. He is proud enough now. We won’t go. Besides that we could all give parties if we made our money the way that man makes his.” So, when the messenger went out with the invitations there was a unanimous refusal. One man said. “Oh, I have bought a farm and I must go and look at it!” He was a land speculator and had no business to buy land until he knew about it. A frivolous excuse. Another man said, “I have bought five yoke of oxen.” The probability is he was a speculator in livestock. He ought to have known about the oxen before he bought them. Besides that, if he had been very anxious to get to the feast he could have hooked them up and driven them on the road there Another frivolous excuse. Another man said, “Oh, I have married a wife and I can’t come,” when if he had said to his wife: “I have an invitation to a splendid dinner. It is highly complimentary to me. 1 should very much like to go. Will you go along with me?” she wtfuld have said, “To be sure I will go.” Another frivolous excuse. The fact was they did not want to go. “Now,” said the great man of the feast, i‘l will not be defeated in this matter. I have, with an honest purpose, provided a banquet, and there are scores of people who would like to come if they were only invited. Here, my man, here; you go out, and when you find a blind man give him your arm and fetch him in, und when you find a lame man give him a crutch and fetch him in-, and when you find a poor man tell him that there is a plate for him in my mansion, and when you find some one who is so ragged and wretched that he has never been invited anywhere, then, by the kindest tenderness and the most loving invitation any one ever had, compel him to come in.” Oh, my friends, it requires no acuteness on my part to see in all this affair that religion is a banquet. The table was set in Palestine a good many years ago, and the disciples gathered around it, and they thought they would have a good time all by themselves, but while they sat by this table the leaves began to grow and spread, and one leaf went to the east, and another leaf went to the west, until the whole earth was covered up with them, and the clusters from the heavenly vineyard were piled upon the board, and the trumpets and harps of eternity made up the orchestra, and as this wine of God is pressed to the lips of a sinning, bleeding, suffering, dying, groaning world, a voice breaks from the heavens, saying: “Drink, O friends! Yea, drink, O'beloved!” O blessed Lord Jesus, the best friend 1 ever had, the best friend any man ever had, was there ever such a banquet? Religion is a joyous thing. I do not want to hear anybody talk about religion as though it were a funeral. I do not want anybody to whine in the prayer meeting about the kingdom of God. Ido not want any man to roll up his eyes, giving in that way evidence of his sanctity. The men and women of God whom I happen to know for the most part find religion a great joy. It is exhiliration to the body. It is invigoration to the mind. It is rapture to the soul. It is balm for all wounds. It is light for all darkness. It is harbor from all storms, and though God knows that some of them have trouble,enough now they rejoice because they are on the way to-the congratulations eternal. Oh, my friends, the curse of God : on the church, it seems to me, in this day is metaphysics. We speak in an unknown tongue in our Sab* bath scboolsy and in our religious

assemblages, and in out pulpits, and bow can people be saved unless they Understand us? We put on our official gowns, and we think the two silk balloons flapping at the elbows of a preacher give him great sanctity. The river of God’s truth flows down before us pure and clear as crystal, but we take our theological stick and stir it up and stir it up until you cannotjsee the bottm. Oh, for the simplicity He practiced when, standing among the people. He took a lily and said, “There is a lesson of the manner I. will clothe you.” and, pointing to a raven, said: “There is a lesson of the way I will feed you. Consider the lilies —behold the fowls.” I think often in our religious instuctions we compel the people to stay out by our church architecture. People come in, and they find things angular and cold and stiff and they go away never again to come, when the church ought to be a great home circle, everybody having a hymnbook, giving half of it to the one next him, every one who has a hand to shake hands! shaking hands, the church architecture and the church surroundings saying to the people! “Come in and be at home.” Instead of that. I think all these surl roundings often compel the people to'Stay out.

I think there is work in the wayi of kindly admonition. I do not believe there is a person in this house who, if approached in a kindly ana brotherly manner, would refuse to listen. If you are rebuffed it is because you lack in tact and common sense. But, oh, how much effective work there is in the way of kindly admonition! There are thousands of men all around about you who havd never had one personal invitation tot the cross. Give that one invitation and you would be surprised at the alacrity with which they would accept it. I think there is a great work alsd to be done in they way of prayer. If we had faith enough to-day, we could go before God and ask for the salvation of all the people in our, churches and they would all be saved there and then, without exception., There might be professional men) there, political men there, worldly 1 men there, men who had not heard the gospel for twenty years, men who are prejudiced against the preachers, men who are prejudiced 1 against the music, men who are prejudiced against the church, men' who are prejudiced against God—l do not care —they might be brought in by fervent prayer—you would compel them to come in. I tell you today, my friends, of a great salvation. Do you understand what it is to have a Savior? He took your place. He bore your sins. He wept your sorrows. He is here now to save your soul. A soldier, worn out in his country’s service, took to the violin as a mode of earning his living. He was found in the streets of Vienna playing his violin, but after awhile his hand became feeble and tremulous, and he could no more make music. One day, while he sat there weeping, a man passed along and said, “My friend, you are too old and too feeble. Give me your violin,” and he took the man’s violin and began to discourse most sxquisifg music, and the people gathered around in larger and larger multitudes, and the aged man held his hat, and the coin poured in until the hat was full. “Now,” said the man who was playing the violin, “put that coin in your pockets.” The coin was put in the old man’s pockets. Then he held his hat again, and the violinist played more sweetly than ever and played until some of the people wept and some shouted. And again the hat was filled with coin. Then the violinist dropped the instrument and passed off, and the whisper went: “Who is it? Who is it?” and some one, just entering the crowd, said: “Why that is Bucher, the great violinist, known all through the realm. Yes, that is the great violinist.”

The fact was, he had just taken that man’s place, and assumed his poverty, and borne his burden, and played bis music, and earned his livelihood, and made sacrifice for the goor old man. So the Lord Jesus hrist comes down, and He finds us in our spiritual penury, and across the broken strings of His own broken heart he strikes a strain of infinite music, which wins theattention of earth and heaven. He takes our poverty. He plays our music. He weeps our sorrow.’ He dies our death. A sacrifice for you. A sacrifice f or me. Oh, will you accept this sacrifice now? Ido not single out and that man and this and that woman. But I say all may come. That sacrifice is so great all may be saved. Does it not seem to you as if heaven was very near? I can feel its breath on my cheek. God is-nfear. Christ is near. The Holy Spirit is near. Ministering angels are near, your glorified kindred in heaven near, your Christian father near, your glorified mother near, your departed children near. Your’ re ; demption is near.