Rensselaer Republican, Volume 27, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 July 1896 — TALMAGE’S SERMON. [ARTICLE]

TALMAGE’S SERMON.

THE PREACHER USES GOSPEL ARCHERY AS HIS THEME. fie Tells About the Mighty Hunters of Scripture and Shows How to Use the Gospel Arrow—The Kind of Game to Seek. A Search for Game. All people who are trying to do good will find this discourse of Dr. Talmage inspiring as well as unique. . His text was Genesis 'x., 9,, “He hunter before the Lord.” In our day hunting is a sport, |but in the lands and the times infested with wild beasts it was a matter of life orldeath with the people: It was very different from going out on a sunshiny afternoon with a patent breechloader to shoottreedbirds on the flats when Pollux ayd Achilles and Diomedes went out to clear the land of lions and tigers and bears.! My text sets forth Nipirod as a hero wltn it presents him With broad shoulderstand shaggy apparel and sun browned fries and arm bunched with muscle —“a mifchty hunter before the Lord.” I think he Ised the bow and the arrows with great success practicing archery. . II Gospel Archery. « c It , I have thought, if it is such a grand thing and such a brave thipg to clear viatd beasts out of a country, if it is not a l»t----ter and braver thing to hunt down and destroy those great evils of society twit are stalking the land with fierce eye aid bloody paw and sharp tusk and quirk spring. I have wondered if there is not such a thing as gospel archery, by whfch those who have been flying from the trwth may be captured* for God and heayen. The Lord Jesus in his sermon used/the art of angling for an illustration then he said, “I will you fishers of And so I think I have authority formsing hunting as an illustration of gpspelftruth, and I pray God that there may, ba many ATfffinT®-dayzwhq;wiirteghrto stuffy-gos-pel archery of whom it may afterJawhile be said, “He was a mighty hunter before’ the Lord.” ’r ’

How nnich awkward Christian work there is done in the world! Hojv many good people there are who drife souls away from Christ instead of ,(bringing them to him! Ail their fingers ar# tbjfimbs religious blunderers who upset more than they right. Their gun has fl crooked barrel and kicks as it goes off. They are like a clumsy comrade who g*#es along with skillful hunters. At the very moment when ho ought to be most} quiet he is crackling an alder or falling diver a log and frightening away the gnirfe. How few Christian people have ever learned the lesson of which I read at the beginning of this service; how that i the Lord Jesus Christ at the well went item talking about a cup of water to thetnost practical religious truths, whiritf won the woman’s soul for God! Jesus/in the wilderness was breaking bread td the people. I think it was good bread. It was very light bread, rind the yeast sad done its work thoroughly. Christ, after he had broken the bread, said to? the people, “Beware of the yeast or o-f/the leaven of the Pharisees.” So natum.a transition It was, and how easily they all understood him! But how few Christian people there are who understand how to fasten the truths of God and, religion to the spuis of men. Truman Osborne, one of the evangelists who werit through this country years ago. had a Wonderful art in the right direction.. He came to my father’s house-one day, ansi while we were all seated in the room hej said; “Mr. Talmage, are all your children Christians?” Father said, "Yes, all but De Witr. ’’ Then Truman Dsborne looked: down into the fireplace and began to tpll a story of a storm that came on the mountains, and all the sheep were in thei fold, but there was one lamb outside that perished in the storm. Had he looked ape in the eye I should have been a ngereff when- he told that story; but he looked into the fireplace, and it was so patheticaliyfand beautifully done that I never found afcy peace until I was sure I was inside the fold where the other sheep were. The archers of olden times studied their art. They were very precise in the matter. The old books gave special directions as to how an archer should go and as to what an archer should do. He must stand erect and firin,' bit left foot a little in advance of the right foot. With his left hand be must take hold of the bow in the middle, and than with the three dingers and the thumb!of his right hand he should lay hold ST the arrow and affix it to the string—so precise was the direction given. But how el iimsy we are about religious work! How ittle skill and care we exercise! How often our arrows miss the mark! Oh, that there were more institutions established iji, all the towns and cities of our land, wheie men might learn the art of doing good-lstudying spiritual archery, and known a| “mighty hunters before the Lord.” Look to Vtmr ,W*ppon. In the first place,- if youjrhnt to- be effectual in doing good, youMuust be very sure of your weapon. Th|(e was, something very fascinating ab<At the archery of olden times. Perhaps yjth do not know what they could do. with tie bow and arrow. Why, the chief baffiles fought by the English Were with the long bow. They would ta je the arrow of polished wood and feath Jr it with the plume of a bird, and tiri n it would fly from the bowstring of pl jted silk. The’ broad fields of Agincou 1 and Solway Moss, and Neville’s crosMbeurd the loud thrum of the archer’s bdjvstring. Now, my Christian friends, werfcave a mightier weapon than that. It is t|<- arrow of the gospel; it is a sharp arrowlr.it is a straight arrow; it is feathered frJln the wing of the dove of God’s spirityfiit flies from a bow made out of the woA of the cross. As far as I can estimatonr calculate it has brought down 400,000m)0 souls. Paul knew how to bring the n«ch of that arrow on to that bowstrinmi and its whir was heard through the Cirinthian theaters, and through the coi»t room, until the knees of Felix knockeß.together. It was that arrow that stut*in Luther’s heart when he cried out: *®h, my sins! Oh, my sins!" If ft strike Iman in the bead, it kills his skepticism;!! it strike'a man in the heel, it will turn Ils step; if it strike him in the heart, he thk>ws up his hands, as did the Emperor .Titian of old .when wounded in the battle, frying. “O -<&jih','in, thou hast conqueredSfIn*Wte armory of the Earl oflPembroke there atWjold corselets which Bhow that the nrrow%tf the English fried to go through the bfiMstplate, throifch the body of the warrior intai out through the backplate. What a armbol off that gospel which is sharper thata a two-edged sword, piercing to the dividing asupder of body and sonl and of the yMtffiTand marrow! Would to God we had more faith in that gospel! The humblest man, if he had enough faith in It, could bring 100 souls to Jesus—perhaps 500. Just in proportion as this age seema to believe less and less In ft I believe more and more in It. What are men about that they will not accept their own deliverance? There is nothing proposed by men that can do anything like this gospel. The religion of Ralph Waldo Emerson was the philosophy of icicles. The religion of Theodore Parker was a sirocco of the desert covering up the soul with dry sand. The religion of Renan was the romance Of believing

nothing, the religion- of the fluxleys and the Spencers .merely a pedestal on which human philosophy sits shivering in the night of the soul, looking up-to the stars, offering nofficlp to the nations that cropch. and groan at the base. Tell me where there is one man who lilts rejected that gospel for another. wl\p is thoroughly satisfied and helped and contented In his skepticism, an£ J WillWr tomorrpty hnd r W -500 miles to se# Jhim,. The full power of the gospel has ngi yet been touched. As a sportsman throws up his head catches the ball flying through the air, just so easily will this gospel after awhile catch this round world flying from its orbit an® bring it back tithe heart of Christ. Give it full swing, and it will pardon every sin, heal every wound, cure every , trouble, emancipate every slave and ransom every nation. Ye Christian meh and women who go out this afternoon to do Christian work, as you go into the Sunday schools, the lay preaching stations and the , penitentiaries and the asylums I want you to feel that you bear in your hand a weapon, comparer! with which the lightning has no speed, and K avalanches have no heft, and the thunderbolts of heaven have no power. It is the arrow of the omnipotent gospel. Take careful aim. Pull the arrow clear back until the head strikes the bow. Then let it fly. And may the slain of the Lord be many. Searching for Game. Again, if you want to be skillful in •spiritual archery, you must hunt in unfrequented and secluded places. Why does the hunter go three or four days in the Pennsylvania forests or over Raquette lake into the wilds of the Adirondacks? It is the only way to do. The deer are shy,, and one “bang” of the gun clears the forest. Frpm the California stage you see as you go over the plains here and there a coyote trotting along, almost within range of the gun—sometimes quite Within range of it. No one cares for that; it is worthless. The good game is hidden and*secluded. Every hunter knows that. So many of the souls that will be of most worth for Christ and of most value to the church are secluded. They not come in your way. You will have to go where they are. Yonder they are down in that cellar; yonder they are up in that garret. Far away from the door of any cljnrch, the gospel arrow has not been pointed at them. The tract distributer and city missionary sometimes catch a glimpse of them, as a hunter through the trees gets a momentary sight of a partridge or a roebuck. The trouble is we are waiting for the game to come to us. We are not good hunters. We are standing in some street or highway expecting that the timid antelope will come up and eat out of our hands. We are expecting that the prairie fowl will light on our church steeple. It is npt their habit. If the church should wait 10,000,000 of years for the world to come in and be saved, it will wait In vain. The world will not come. What the ehurch wants now is to lift its feet from damask ottomans and put them in the stirrups. We want a pulpit on- wheels. The church wants not so- much cushions as it wants saddlebags and arrows. We ha ve got to- put aside the gown and kid gloves and put on the hunting shirt. Ws have been fishing oolong in the brooks that run under the shadow

of the- ehurch that the fish know us, that they avoid the hook and escape as soon as we come to- the bank, While yonder is I'pper Saranac and Big Tupper’s lake, where the first swing of the gospel not would break it for the multitude of the fishes. There is outside work to be done. What is that I see in the backwoods? It is a tent. The hunters have made a clearing and camped out. What do they care if they have wet feet, or if they have nothing but a pine branch for a pillow, or for the northeast storm! If a moose in the darknesa steps .into the lake to d rink, they hear it-right away. If a loon cry in the moonlight, they hear it. So in the service of God we have exposed work. We have got to camp out and rough it. We are putting all our care bn the people who come to our churches. What are we doing for the thousands np on thousands that do not eorne? Have they no souls? Are they sinless that they need no pardon? Are there no dead in fheir houses that they need no comfort? Are'they cut off from God to go into eternity—no wing to bear them, no light to cheer them, no welcome to greet them? I hear to-day, surging up from the lower depths, a groan that comes through our Christian assemblages and through our beautiful churches, and it. blots out all this scene from my eyes to-day', as by the mists of a great Niagara, for the dash and the plunge of these great torrents of life dropping down into the fathomless and thundering abyss of suffering and woe. I sometimes think that just as God blotted out the churches of Thyatira and Corinth and Laodiqea because of their sloth and stolidity he will blot out American and English Christianity and raise on the ruins a- stalwart, wide-awake nyssionary church that can take the, fill! meaning of that command. “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature'.“ Cou’ratje. I remark, further, if you want to succeed in spiritual archery you must have courage. If the hunter stand with trembling hand or shoulder that flinches with fear, instead of his taking the catamount the catamount takes him. What would beeonie of the Greenlander if, when out hunting-for the bear, he should stand shivering with terror on an iceberg? What would havb become of Dn Chaillu and Livingstone in the African thicket with a faint heart and a weak knee? When a panther conies within twenty paces of yon, and it has its eye on you, and it has squatted for the fearful spring. “Steady therel” Courage, Oye spiritual arehers! There are great monsters in iniquity prowling all around about the community. Shall we not of the strength of God go forth and combat them? We not only need more heart, but more backbone. What is the church of God that it should fear to look in the eye any transgression? There is the Bengal tiger of drunkenness that prowls around, and instead of attacking it how many of ns hide under the church pew or the communion table! There is yo much invested In it we are afraid to assault it; millions of dollars in barrels, in vats, in spigots, in corkscrews, in gin palaces with marble floors and Italian top tables, and chased ice coolers, and in the strychnine, and the logwood, and the tartaric acid, and the mix vomica that go to make up our “pure” American drinks. I looked with wondering eyes on the “tleidelberg tun.” It is the great Jiquor vat of Germany, which is said to hold Rt» hogsheads of wine, and only throe times in 100 years it has been tilled. But as I stood and looked at it I said to myself! “That is nothing, 800 hogsheads. Why, our American vat holds 2,500,(MM) barrels of strong drinks, and we keep 200,000 men with nothing to do but to see that it is filled.” Oh! to attack thia great monster of intemperance, and the kindred monsters of fraud and uncleanness, requires you to rally all your Christian courage. Through the press, through the pulpit, through the platform, you must assault it. Would to God that all our American Christians would band together, not for crack-brained fanaticism, but for holy Christian reform. I think it wfls in 1793 that there went out from Lucknow, India, under the sovereign, the greatest hunting party that was ever projected. There were 10,000 armed men in that hunting party. There were camels and hones and elephants. On some nrinces

rode and royal ladies under housings, and 500 coolies waited upon tSe train, and the dpsojate places of India' were invaded by‘this excursion, and the rhinoceros, the deer and elephant fell under the stroke of i saber and bullet.' After awhile the party brought back trophies worth 50,000 rupees, having left the wilderness of India ghastly with the slain bodies pf mid beasts, Would to oi£J»4 a ?<3 there a striggleF?£ !“? t° “ght these great monstefs~of iniquity imour country the million membership of our churches would band together and hew r in twain these great that ipake the land frightful with their roar and are fattening upon the bodies and souls of immortal theft! ’ Who is ready for such a party as that? Who will be a mighty hunter for the Lord? Bring In the Game, I remark, again, if you wanted to be successful in spiritual archery, you need not only to bring down the game, but bring it in. I think one of the most beautiful pictures of Thorwaldsen is his “Autumn." It represents a sportsman-com-ing home and standing under a grapevine. He hash staff over his shoulder add on the other end of that staff are hung a rabbit and a brace of birds. Every hunter brings home the game. No one would think of bringing down a reindeer or whipping up a stream for trout and,letting them .He in the woods. At eventide the camp is adorned with the treasures of the forest—beak and fin an<J antler. If you , go out to hunt for immortal souls, not only bring them down under the arrow of the gospel, but bring them into the church of God, the encampment we have pitched this side of the skies. Fetch them in. Do not let them lie out in the open field. They need our prayers and sympathies and help. That is the meaning of the church of God —help. O ye hunters for the Lord, not only bring down the game, but bring it in! If Mithridates liked hunting so well that for seven years he never went indoors, what enthusiasm ought we to have who are hunting for immortal souls! If Domitianus practiced archery until be could stand a boy down in the Roman amphitheater, with a hand out, the fingers like that, and then the king could shoot an arrow between the fingers without wounding them, to what drill and what practice ought not we to subject ourselves in order to become spiritual archers and “mighty hunters before the Lord!” But, let me say, ydu will never work any better than you pray. The old archers took the bow, put one end of it down beside the foot, elevated the other end, and it was the rule that the bow should be just the size of the archer. If it were just his size, then he would go into the battle with confidence. Let me say that your power to project good in the world will correspond exactly to your own spiritual stature. In other words, the first thing in preparation for Christian work is personal consecration. Oh, for a closer walk with God,. A calm and heavenly frame, A light to shine upon the rOad , .That leads me to the Lamb! A Great Hunter. < I am sure that there are some here who, at some time have been hit by the gospel arrow. You felt the wound of that conviction, and you plunged into the world deeper, just as the stag, when the hounds are after it,- plunges into Schroon lake. .AstPS.ctjat.in that way to escape. ■ Jesus Christ is on your track to-day, impenitent" man—not in wrath, but in mercy. Oye Chased and panting souls, here is the stream of God’s mercy and salvation, where you may cool your thirst! Stop that ehase of sin to-day. By the red fountain that leaped frdm the heart of my Lord I bid you stop. Is there in all this house any one who can refuse the offer that eombs from the heart of the dying Son of God? Why. do you know that there are In -the? banished- workLsauls. thaLforthac. offer you get to-day would fling the crown of the universe at your feet if they possessed it? But they went out on the mountains; the storm took them, and they died. There is in a forest in Germany a place they call the “deer leap”—two crags about eighteen feet apart, between them a fearful chasm. This is called the “deer leap" because once a hunter was on the track of a deer. It came to one of these crags. . There was no esca'pe for it from the pursuit of the hunter, and, in utter despair, it gathered itself up and in the death agony attempted to jump across. Of course it fell and was dashed on the rocks far beneath. Here is a path to heaven. It is plain, it is safe. Jesus murks it out for every man to walk in. But here is a man who says, “I won’t walk in that path. 1 will take my own way.** He comes on until he confronts the chasm that divides his soul from heaven. Now his lust hour has come, and he resolves that he will leap that chasm, from the heights of earth to the heights oJ heaven. Stand back now and give him full swing, for no soul ever did that successfully. l,et him try. Jump! Jump! ‘ He misses the mark, and he goes down, depth below depth, “destroyed without remedy.” Men. angels, devils, what shall we call that place of awful catastrophe? Let it be known forever as the sinner’s death leap.