FOR 
 
 
 THE PEOPLE 
 
Class 
 
 Book._ 
 
 _.-. — 
 
 Copyright N°. 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 
 
SERMONS FOR THE 
 PEOPLE 
 
 BY 
 WILLIAM HENRY BOOK 
 
 Author of "Columbus Tabernacle 
 Sermons," Vols. I. and II.; 
 "The Indiana Pulpit," 
 Etc., Etc 
 
 CINCINNATI 
 
 THE STANDARD PUBLISHING COMPANY 
 
Copyright, 1918, by 
 The Standard Publishing Company 
 
 DEC i3 1518 
 
 \ 
 
This volume is dedicated to my father, 
 Henry L. Book, who gave his life upon the 
 battlefield, and to my mother, who sacri- 
 ficed and struggled for me when 1 was too 
 little to understand. We send it out on its 
 mission praying that it may be the means 
 of helping some soul to see the light and to 
 walk therein. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Introduction 7 
 
 I 
 
 "In the Beginning God" — Gen. 1:1 9 
 
 II 
 The Bible God's Word 29 
 
 III 
 
 Jesus Christ the Son of God 46 
 
 IV 
 Spiritual, Worship 61 
 
 V 
 Christ 's Prayers 73 
 
 VI 
 Learning to Pray 85 
 
 VII 
 Prayer a Necessity 99 
 
 VIII 
 Prayers Answered Ill 
 
 5 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 IX 
 That Tongue of Mine 126 
 
 X 
 The Home 137 
 
 XI 
 Now and Hereafter 147 
 
 XII 
 What We Are — What We Shall 
 
 Be 156 
 
 XIII 
 Where Are Our Dead ? 167 
 
 XIV 
 Heavenly Recognition 192 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 THERE are books of sermons of diverse 
 styles and characteristics. Some are 
 logical, cold, and purely didactic. Others 
 are inspirational and filled with warmth 
 and color. Not a few are dry and tire- 
 some. 
 
 This book is of the inspirational and 
 more distinctly popular type. It sparkles 
 with humor, and is permeated through 
 and through with the language of the 
 Scriptures. It is a book which will lighten 
 the burdens of the reader and which will 
 give him renewed encouragement to pur- 
 sue his daily tasks. 
 
 The author needs no introduction at 
 our hands. As a gifted speaker, a min- 
 ister of rare sympathy and power, and a 
 man who has climbed to the heights in 
 his profession, he has won an enviable 
 reputation throughout the American con- 
 tinent and beyond. His work speaks for 
 itself, and we are sure that it will prove 
 appealing to a vast host of readers. 
 
 7 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 The sermons in this book are all upon 
 great themes. They touch the founda- 
 tion principles and issues of life. No one 
 is too learned to enjoy them or to profit 
 by them, and no one is so unlettered as to 
 be unable to grasp their practical import 
 and meaning. The wealth of illustration 
 by which the lessons contained in the 
 book are enforced, is in itself a rare ele- 
 ment of charm. Best of all, these ser- 
 mons are thoroughly loyal to the great 
 basic truths of our common faith. 
 
 It is a genuine pleasure to stand in 
 the gateway and to commend such a vol- 
 ume to the thoughtful attention of its 
 readers. Frederick D, Kershner, 
 
I 
 
 "IN THE BEGINNING GOD"-Gen. /:/ 
 
 THERE is just one mystery, and that 
 is God. Accept the statement of the 
 text, and all things can be explained; re- 
 ject it, and nothing can be understood. 
 
 The agnostic comes to us with the cry : 
 "I can not understand, and therefore I do 
 not believe." An agnostic is an igno- 
 ramus, and when he tells me he is that, I 
 take him at his word. If we refuse to 
 believe everything we can not understand, 
 then there is nothing we believe, for there 
 is nothing we can understand. 
 
 The atheistic astronomer says, "I do 
 not believe in your God because I can not 
 understand him," and yet he will offer 
 me his book of astronomy, which is being 
 taught in our colleges and universities, 
 and he says everything contained in the 
 book is true. Let us see if he is honest in 
 his objection and if he is consistent in his 
 criticism. We stand out beneath the out- 
 9 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 stretched, boundless blue sky and gaze up 
 into the distance. Star after star beams 
 upon us, some glimmering but faintly, and 
 with a far-away look, while others through 
 infinite realms of space shed forth their 
 glorious streams of radiance. Planets, 
 stars, fixed stars, worlds upon top of 
 worlds, how we wonder what you are! 
 This atheistic astronomer says: "I have 
 measured the distance from the earth to 
 the moon and the sun ; I can tell you their 
 velocity ; I know the material out of which 
 they are formed ; I have measured the cir- 
 cumference and the diameter of each; I 
 have weighed them in my balances and 
 can tell you their weight; the moon is a 
 dead planet where no fire is; there is no 
 water and no life there. I can, through 
 my telescope, see the burnt-out volcanoes 
 that exist there.' ' He grows eloquent 
 when he talks to me about the rings and 
 the satellites. He says, "The sun is the 
 center of the solar system, and beyond this 
 sun there are other suns," and thus, with 
 his imagination, he mounts his cloud 
 chariots drawn by fiery steeds and leaps 
 from star to star and from world to 
 
 10 
 
"IN THE BEGINNING GOD" 
 
 world, counting until his imagination is 
 worn out and falls back on itself, and he 
 exclaims: "Height without a top, depth 
 without a bottom, length and breadth 
 without a beginning or an ending; great 
 indeed is the immensity of space !" Let 
 us ask this man of wisdom a few ques- 
 tions and find out if he understands. 
 "Where is the center of the universe? 
 How old are these stars f Tell me the cir- 
 cumference and the diameter of the uni- 
 verse. Are these stars inhabited? On the 
 right, on the left, before and behind, he 
 will find that things are broken off, and 
 he can not answer because he does not 
 understand. Then, Mr. Astronomer, why 
 do you not burn up your books of astron- 
 omy and stop teaching the doctrine of the 
 stars, since you can not understand, and 
 therefore can not believe in your own 
 books of astronomy? If you can believe 
 in the doctrine of the stars when you do 
 not understand, can you not believe in 
 the God who made the stars, even though 
 you can not comprehend Him? 
 
 I hold in my hand a book. See it fall. 
 What caused it to go down rather than 
 11 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 up? You say: "The law of gravity." 
 What is that? Have you ever seen grav- 
 ity? Can you explain it? You tell me 
 that it is an incorporeal, intangible, invis- 
 ible something that causes the lesser body 
 of matter to go toward the greater. Now, 
 if you can believe in gravity, why not be- 
 lieve in the God who made gravity? You 
 refuse to believe in God because you can 
 not see him, and yet you believe in gravity 
 which you have never seen. 
 
 The atheistic geologist comes to me 
 with his reasons for his atheism. He re- 
 fuses to believe in God because he can not 
 understand him, and yet he believes in his 
 book of geology. He says that he can go 
 down and down until he comes to fire ; but 
 if there be no God, ask him to tell you 
 who put that fire there. He can go back 
 and back, but he can never touch the be- 
 ginning. Ask him to tell you how it is 
 that almighty God sent forth a ray of 
 heat from the sun millions of years ago 
 with force enough to penetrate the earth 
 and there lie latent until the strong-armed 
 miner dug it from its prison cell and gave 
 it to us in the form of oil to burn in our 
 12 
 
"IN THE BEGINNING GOD" 
 
 lamps or coal to burn in our grates? 
 What is fire? Do you know? Are you 
 ready to say there is no such thing, and 
 refuse to be benefited by its comfort be- 
 cause you can not understand it? What 
 is light? I never heard of but one per- 
 son who could tell, and he was a lazy, 
 sleepy, stupid boy in the school, and when 
 the teacher asked, "What is light ?" he, 
 when half awake and half asleep, replied : 
 "I did know, Professor, but I forgot. " 
 The professor said: "Think how much 
 this world has lost because of the bad 
 memory of this boy!" Do you know? 
 Tell us if you can. Now, are you ready 
 to say there is no such thing as light be- 
 cause you can not understand it? Are 
 you willing to blow it out and live the rest 
 of your days in the dark? 
 
 Electricity — what is it? I remember 
 going to the city with my first son. I had 
 been to town before, but he was ac- 
 quainted only with the mountain scenes. 
 When we pulled into the station he saw a 
 car going by without any horses, and he 
 became greatly excited and cried out: 
 "Father, what is that*" I told him it 
 
 13 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 was a trolley-car. Then he wanted to 
 know what made it go, and I told him 
 electricity. Then he cried out: "What is 
 electricity! " I did not tell him. He is 
 now a man with a family and I have not 
 told him. If you think you can, you may. 
 I went into a railroad station one day 
 to see a man who had moved to town. I 
 had heard that he was a member of the 
 church, and I felt it would be a good thing 
 to hold a meeting in that town with a view 
 of establishing a congregation. He was 
 a negative Christian. Do you know what 
 kind that is? It is a dead one. I found 
 him at his office and engaged in sending 
 a message. I leaned over on the window- 
 facing, thinking I'd wait for him to get 
 through with his work. I felt something 
 like needles in my arm, and the sensation 
 was going through me. I felt like you do 
 when you hit the crazy-bone in the arm. 
 I became excited, and wondered if I were 
 paralyzed. When I got away from the 
 window the feeling left me. I went back 
 and touched it again, and with the same 
 results. I jumped away just as the 
 operator looked at me. He asked: "Did 
 
 14 
 
"IN THE BEGINNING GOD" 
 
 you touch this window !" I told him I 
 did. He then informed me that he had 
 charged the window with electricity with 
 the view of catching a negro that loafed 
 in the station, and he caught me. Now, I 
 did not argue with him and say, " There 
 is no such thing as electricity, ' ' and that 
 I would not believe in a thing I could 
 not understand. What is electricity? Can 
 you tell? You refuse to believe in God 
 because you can not see him; have you 
 ever seen electricity? You have seen 
 lightning, but you have not seen elec- 
 tricity. You have not the eyes with which to 
 see electricity. A negro was lecturing be- 
 fore a large crowd of his race and he 
 said: "Ladies and gentlemen, I am here 
 to-night to tell you what electricity is. 
 Electricity is — electricity. Electricity — 
 electricity is, ladies and gentlemen, elec- 
 tricity is electricity, and it is none of your 
 business what electricity is." Edison can 
 not give a better definition than did this 
 negro. 
 
 An evangelist had conducted a meeting 
 in a small town, and a number of the 
 young men had become converted. A 
 
 2 15 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 professional infidel lived in the hotel, and 
 he took delight in giving the young men 
 that gathered in the hotel at nights theo- 
 logical nuts to crack. One night the old 
 parson had come to town and was in his 
 room in that hotel. The infidel had a 
 group of men about him and he was 
 knocking their props from beneath them, 
 when one of the boys went to the stairway 
 and called for the parson. "Come down, 
 parson, and help us out. This man is 
 doing us all up. ' ' Just as the old parson 
 got to the head of the steps he heard the 
 infidel say : " If you have a God, show him 
 to me; let me feel him; let me hear him; 
 let me taste him; let me smell him. ,, He 
 was told they could not comply with his 
 requests. "Then," he said, "if you can 
 not approach your God through any of 
 the avenues of approach — the senses — you 
 have no God." By this time the minister 
 had gotten into the room, and he put his 
 hand on the shoulder of the infidel and 
 said: "I perceive that you are an idiot." 
 The man became angry and said : " I have 
 never been accused of that before." "I 
 will prove it," said the minister. "What 
 
 16 
 
"IN THE BEGINNING GOD" 
 
 is an idiot ?" He was told that it is a 
 man without a mind. He then said: "Let 
 me see your mind; let me taste it; let me 
 feel it; let me smell it; let me hear it." 
 He was told that it would be impossible 
 to grant his requests. Then," said the 
 parson, "you only have five avenues of 
 approach, and if I can not get hold of 
 your mind through any of these avenues, 
 you have no mind, and if you have no 
 mind, you are an idiot." The minister 
 says: "I was walking the street one day 
 and saw this man approaching me. I 
 wondered if he meant to thrash me. He 
 came to me and took my hand in his and 
 said: * Parson, I want to thank you for 
 what you said to me that night in the 
 hotel. I am now a believer. I never 
 knew before what a fool I was. I believe 
 now in things I can not understand/ " 
 
 A boy is flying a kite. It is out of 
 sight. A stranger sees the boy and asks: 
 \ ' What are you doing, my lad V 9 " Flying 
 a kite," the boy replies. The man looks 
 into the heavens, but he can not see the 
 kite He says: "I do not believe you are 
 flying a kite, my boy, I can not see it." 
 
 17 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 The boy says: "Then take hold of this 
 string and you can feel it pull. ,, We 
 may not see God, but we can feel him 
 pull. ,, 
 
 If yon do not believe in anything you 
 can not understand, then you do not be- 
 lieve in your parents; you do not believe 
 in your children; you do not believe in 
 yourself. Who can understand man? 
 The ancients one time had a motto: 
 "Man, know thyself.' ' None of us have 
 learned this art. Like Sir Isaac Newton, 
 we are children drifting on the surf -beaten 
 shores, gathering here and there a pebble, 
 while all of the regions about us are 
 depths of unexplored knowledge. 
 
 We are told that a man by the name of 
 Harvey discovered the circulation of the 
 blood. If there be no God, can you tell us 
 who started that blood through the veins? 
 Books have been written on the formation 
 of the hand, but Bell and all who have 
 written on the subject can not tell how I 
 move my finger if there be no God. Take 
 the mechanism of the eye. Can you un- 
 derstand this self -focusing machine? See 
 it as it makes many pictures in a second! 
 
 18 
 
*'IN THE BEGINNING GOD" 
 
 Is beauty in the eye or is it in the indi- 
 vidual ? A man said : ' * I am thankful that 
 all men can not see as I do. ' ' When asked 
 why, he said: "They would want my wife 
 Nancy. " A man replied: "If every one 
 saw as I do, there would not be a man in 
 the world who would have her." Who 
 understands the brain? We boast of liv- 
 ing in the twentieth century, and of our 
 wonderful inventions, but I want to tell 
 you that I agree with Solomon in the 
 statement that there is nothing new under 
 the sun. Take telegraphy. When God 
 made Adam and placed him in the garden 
 he established a complete system of teleg- 
 raphy, and every one born into the world 
 since has been a duplicate of the same. 
 Let me illustrate. You are sitting in the 
 church on some hot August night and the 
 minister is preaching a lengthy sermon, 
 and you find a mosquito sailing over the 
 heads of the people looking for his cousin, 
 when all of a sudden he takes up his abode 
 on your bald pate. A message is at once 
 sent to the central station — the brain, and 
 a call is made for connection, and then a 
 dispatch is sent to your hand with the 
 
 19 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 news, "A mosquito is on the head," and 
 it is gone ! This is telegraphy. Messages 
 are coming and going all the time, and 
 they never get confused when the central 
 office is all right. Do you understand 
 this? The backbone is an immense tele- 
 graph pole with forty pairs of nerves — 
 wires — and with ten million branches run- 
 ning in all directions. 
 
 Take the body, which is covered all 
 over with pores. We are told that one 
 grain of sand will cover one hundred 
 scales, and that each scale covers from 
 three to five hundred pores, and that each 
 pore has in it an innumerable multitude 
 of living things swimming around in it, 
 ^and with as much freedom as a whale has 
 in the sea. Can you understand this? Do 
 you believe it? 
 
 Some years ago I met a noted atheist 
 who took great delight in giving young 
 preachers theological nuts to crack. She 
 said: "If you have a God, then show him 
 to me and I will believe.' ' When asked 
 how this world came into existence, she 
 said: "From chance or from evolution." 
 When I asked her who made her, she said : 
 
 20 
 
"IN THE BEGINNING GOD" 
 
 "I came from a spore, an atom, a germ. 
 I began with an atom and kept on evolv- 
 ing until I became a tadpole, and then a 
 monkey, and then a creature of intelli- 
 gence. ,, I had heard that there is a con- 
 necting link somewhere, and I concluded 
 that if the theory of evolution be true I 
 had found this link, for she was the ugli- 
 est woman I had ever seen. I further told 
 her that she might be related to the 
 monkey, but I did not claim to be of any 
 kin to the animal. 
 
 Let us notice her objections. Could 
 not believe in God because she could not 
 see him. Ask her if she had ever seen an 
 atom and she would say "No." If she 
 could believe in the atom without seeing 
 it, why not believe in God who made the 
 atom! If a man came from an atom, 
 who put the life into the atom? When the 
 germ of an egg, the germ of a snake and 
 the germ of a man are all placed under 
 the microscope, why do they all look 
 alike, and what is it that keeps the germ 
 of the tree from evolving into a snake, 
 and the germ of the snake from evolving 
 into the man, and the germ of the man 
 21 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 from evolving into a tree? Why does not 
 man evolve into an archangel? 
 
 If the world came from chance, how 
 do you account for the order and per- 
 fection and the wisdom revealed in the 
 creation! Suppose I would quote a beau- 
 tiful poem and you would ask me who was 
 the author, and I would say, " There is 
 no author. I just took a handful of 
 type and threw them against the wall, 
 and it happened !" You can spell my 
 name with four letters, but you could 
 not do it by throwing four letters 
 against the wall, if you were to try for 
 a century. 
 
 I met the husband of this woman. He 
 was an intelligent man, but an atheist. 
 When I asked him why he did not believe, 
 he said: "I can not understand. I do not 
 believe in a thing I can not see." He 
 said man came as a result of evolution. 
 There has never been an evolution where 
 there has not been an involution. The 
 hardest thing I ever tried to do was to 
 evolve out of my pocket a ten-dollar bill 
 to pay for a new hat for my wife, when it 
 had not been involved into my pocket. 
 
 22 
 
"IN THE BEGINNING GOD" 
 
 Did you ever try it? If the world is here 
 as a result of evolution, who involved the 
 idea? In my early manhood I was a 
 schoolteacher, and after getting my license 
 I purchased a Waterbury watch. It could 
 out-tick any small piece of machinery I 
 had ever seen, but I had to keep winding 
 it all the time to keep it going. It was 
 like some church-members. One day I 
 decided to look into that watch and see 
 the jewels. I took out the three little 
 screws, and there jumped out in that 
 schoolroom a spring nine feet long. I 
 tried to place it inside of the watch, but 
 I could not find room enough to hold the 
 spring. I took it to town and sold it to 
 a man who had watch sense. I could not 
 fix it because God had never involved into 
 my head any watch sense. He had in- 
 volved some into the head of the other 
 man and he could fix it. That watch could 
 not repair itself; when it stopped it could 
 not start itself. It had no sense. It was 
 unorganized matter. 
 
 Let us look up into the blue sky and 
 behold the greatest piece of clockwork 
 man has ever looked upon. It did not 
 
 23 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 make itself. A creation implies a Crea- 
 tor; a design, a Designer. 
 
 "The spacious firmament on high, 
 With all the blue ethereal sky, 
 And spangled heavens, a shining frame, 
 Tiheir great Original proclaim. 
 The unwearied sun, from day to day, 
 Doth his Creator's power display, 
 And publishes to every land 
 The work of an almighty hand. 
 
 "Soon as the evening shades prevail, 
 The moon takes up the wondrous tale, 
 And nightly to the listening earth 
 Repeats the story of her birth; 
 "Wihilst all the stars that round her burn, 
 And all the planets, in their turn, - 
 Confirm the tidings as they roll, 
 And spread the truth from pole to pole. 
 
 "What though in solemn silence all 
 Move round this dark terrestrial ball; 
 What though no real voice nor sound 
 Amid their radiant orbs be found; 
 In reason's ear tihey all rejoice, 
 And utter forth a glorious voice, 
 Forever singing as they shine, 
 
 'The hand that made us is divine.' " 
 
 You may burn all the churches and 
 kill all of the preachers, but so long as 
 there is a blazing star shining^ in the 
 heavens, so long will there be a witness to 
 testify in burning eloquence, and with 
 24 
 
"IN THE BEGINNING GOD" 
 
 logic that can never be refuted, that God 
 is. 
 
 This intelligent atheist said he did not 
 believe in God because he could not under- 
 stand him. He believed in himself and in 
 his fellow-man, and yet had to confess 
 that he did not understand either. Man 
 eats, but he does not understand diges- 
 tion. He can not tell how it is that the 
 food produces hair, bone, flesh, nerve, etc. 
 What is it that takes the part out of the 
 beefsteak that makes hair and puts it on 
 the head; that makes nail and puts it on 
 the finger and never on the nose? He 
 tells us that where the artery ceases to 
 be an artery and the vein begins to be a 
 vein (no one knows where this is) the 
 selection is made. Two men eat the same 
 food for five years, and one has a mus- 
 tache and the other has not; why is it? 
 When the man said he could not believe 
 in God because he could not see him, I 
 asked: "If I can prove to you that you 
 have never seen your father, that you 
 have never seen your mother, and that 
 you have never seen yourself, will you 
 confess that you never had a father, that 
 
 25 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 you never had a mother, and that you do 
 not exist V He said he would. Then I 
 said: "I stab you with a knife, and your 
 body falls upon the hard pavement and 
 it is soon cold and lifeless; is that you? 
 Is that lump of cold clay lying there the 
 one that invented that machinery, that 
 enjoys the sublime and the ridiculous, 
 that thinks and acts? If that be you, 
 why not let us embalm you as the Egyp- 
 tians did, and keep you with us for- 
 ever V He confessed that the body was 
 not the man. Then I said: "You have 
 never seen yourself; no man can see a 
 live man. It takes spiritual eyes to see 
 God and to see man. You have only seen 
 the house in which man has lived. These 
 eyes do not see; they are the windows, 
 and I am back inside looking out through 
 the windows. That was not your baby 
 that you deposited in the grave; it was 
 only the place in which the baby lived 
 for a short time. ,, He said: "I do see 
 myself manifesting myself through my- 
 self.' ' "You see God manifesting him- 
 self through himself, too, and if you can 
 believe in your own existence upon such 
 
 26 
 
"IN THE BEGINNING GOD" 
 
 evidence, why not believe in God upon 
 the same kind of testimony ?" I asked. 
 
 What is life? What is death? With- 
 out God all is mystery; with him all 
 may some day be understood. He has 
 century plants, and they will unfold in 
 their own good time. 
 
 Death! A father puts his son into a 
 plain building, and tells him he must live 
 there for a short time and then he may 
 have a beautiful mansion. The house 
 becomes dilapidated and a leak is re- 
 vealed. The carpenter is called and the 
 leak is repaired. Then another break is 
 seen and he is called again. Soon the 
 building is almost ready to fall down, but 
 in sight of this building is another that 
 is nearing completion, and the father, 
 when it is finished, comes to the son and 
 says: "You have remained in this house 
 without complaining, and now I want 
 you to come into this beautiful dwelling 
 I have prepared for you." Man is put 
 for a season into the body which is his 
 house. Again and again the break is dis- 
 covered and the physician is called to 
 repair and make it comfortable, but after 
 
 27 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 a time it is ready to fall to pieces because 
 of disease, and the father says to his 
 son: "Come now and live in this house 
 I have prepared for you. This is to be 
 your home. ,, And the soul comes out of 
 this house of mortality and enters into 
 a house that is to be eternal. This is 
 death. 
 
 28 
 
II 
 
 THE BIBLE GOD'S WORD 
 
 Text. — "But men spake from God, being moved by 
 the Holy Spirit."— 2 Pet. 1: 21. 
 
 "T AM, therefore God is, for no man 
 * ever made himself. I speak, there- 
 fore God spake, for no man has ever 
 spoken who was not first "spoken to." 
 
 God has given to man two books — 
 the book of nature and the book of reve- 
 lation. The book of nature reveals a 
 God of wisdom and of power; the book 
 of revelation reveals a God of love, and 
 this is the highest and best revelation. 
 It reveals God as our Father. 
 
 The Book is here; if God did not 
 write it, who did? Man could not have 
 done it, and he would not if he could. It 
 is a book that reveals man's defects and 
 pronounces condemnation upon his head. 
 All of the combined wisdom of all the 
 combined ages could never have written 
 this Book. We are certain that the devil 
 
 29 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 did not write it, for it is opposed to his 
 kingdom, and to follow its teachings will 
 mean the destruction of the devil and his 
 kingdom. It is antagonistic to all that 
 is devilish. 
 
 Let me give you only a few reasons 
 for believing it came from God and that 
 it is the product of inspiration. Men of 
 God spake from God, being moved by 
 the Holy Spirit, says the apostle. It can 
 not be destroyed, and therefore we argue 
 that its indestructibility is a proof of its 
 inspiration. When Moses saw the burn- 
 ing bush, the flames loomed and the fire 
 burned, but the bush could not be con- 
 sumed. God was in it. God is in this old 
 Book and it can not be destroyed. It has 
 come to us through a river of blood. 
 Every page is stained with the blood of 
 the martyrs. Some one says: "It has 
 been upset more times than any other 
 book, and yet it is a solid cube right side 
 up every time." It is like the Irishman's 
 fence which was five feet thick and three 
 feet high, and some one said: "Pat, are 
 you not afraid to keep fooling with that 
 fence — afraid you will upset it?" Pat 
 
 30 
 
THE BIBLE GOD'S WORD 
 
 replied: " Faith, if I do, it will be two 
 feet higher after I've completed the job!" 
 It is this way with the Bible. Every time 
 a destructive critic or an infidel makes an 
 attack on it, it comes before the people 
 with renewed power and strength. Those 
 who opposed it and tried to destroy it 
 in the past ages have been almost for- 
 gotten, and were it not for the fact that 
 they linked themselves to its history, 
 would not be thought of to-day. Voltaire 
 predicted that within one hundred years 
 there would be no Bibles, but when the 
 hundred years had rolled around, the 
 Christian people were printing Bibles on 
 the very printing-press which had been 
 used by the French infidel. Thomas Paine 
 did his best to kill it in his day and gen- 
 eration, but to-day there are millions of 
 men reading the Book, and never in the 
 world's history have we had so many 
 copies of the Bible, and in so many lan- 
 guages, as we have to-day. No book at- 
 tracts attention as does this one. Can 
 you picture the scene in New York when 
 the new version came from the press : ex- 
 press-wagons loaded with Bibles and the 
 
 3 31 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 Bible houses unable to supply the de- 
 mand! Think of it: 118,000 words sent by 
 telegraph to Chicago in order that the 
 people in that locality might be able to 
 read the message at the same time they 
 were reading it in New York ! 
 
 Its Style. — The style of the Book is 
 another reason for believing in its inspira- 
 tion. When you translate a piece of liter- 
 ature into a foreign tongue it loses its 
 personality and its individuality. 
 
 "Shakespeare^ magic could not copied be; 
 WitJhin that circle none durst walk but he." 
 
 The moment you translate his writ- 
 ings, and put them into another tongue, 
 they lose their power. Not so with the 
 Bible; you can put it into every dialect, 
 and you can create a language and then 
 put it into the one you have created, and 
 it is still the powerful, uplifting, soul-sav- 
 ing message. It is a universal Father 
 speaking to his universal family. Its con- 
 ciseness is characteristic. You write the 
 history of the Johnstown flood and you 
 will have a book of hundreds of pages, 
 but when God wrote the history of the 
 
 32 
 
THE BIBLE GOD'S WORD 
 
 greatest flood the world had ever seen, 
 he put it into a few sentences, and you 
 can not add to it. It is a perfect descrip- 
 tion. If you write the history of a man, 
 you will use pages, but God can write the 
 history of a nation and put it all into a 
 few paragraphs, and you are impressed 
 with it as being finished. 
 
 Its Uniqueness. — Suppose the Presi- 
 dent should issue a proclamation calling 
 upon men from every country under the 
 " Stars and Stripes' ' to bring to the city 
 of Washington, on a certain day, pieces 
 of marble taken from the quarries of their 
 own land, and that these men, ignorant 
 of each other's work, should come to the 
 city on that day and place their pieces of 
 marble, and when it was all done, with- 
 out the use of hammer or chisel, there 
 would go up a beautiful and magnificent 
 temple, perfect in form and in design. 
 What would be your conclusion — that each 
 man wrought under the direction of some 
 master mechanic or that it was mirac- 
 ulous? Here we have sixty-six blocks of 
 spiritual marble, and they have been 
 quarried by forty men and at different 
 
 33 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 times and in different places, and when 
 they are put into proper form we have 
 the beautiful and magnificent spiritual 
 temple of inspired wisdom and truth in 
 which God is pleased to dwell. How do 
 you account for it upon any other basis 
 than that all of them wrote as they were 
 moved by the Holy Spirit? 
 
 Its Influence. — Just as the desert is 
 made to blossom because of the presence 
 of the spring of water, so society is bless- 
 ed by the word of God. Wm. E. Glad- 
 stone said: " After fifty-eight years of 
 public life — forty-seven in the English 
 Cabinet — having been associated with 
 sixty master minds of the world, all but 
 five were Christians." 
 
 Who would live in a community of in- 
 fidels 1 The Bible in a community guaran- 
 tees protection to property and to life. 
 Two young men were traveling in what 
 was then termed the "wild West." One 
 night they stopped at a cabin and asked 
 to be taken in for the night. One of the 
 young men was an infidel and the other 
 was a devout Christian. The infidel said 
 to his companion: "I am afraid to stay 
 
 34 
 
THE BIBLE GOD'S WORD 
 
 here all night. This old man would kill 
 you for a quarter. I have determined 
 to take my revolver to bed with me, and 
 to cut a hole in the bed-quilt and peep out 
 with my hand on my pistol and be ready 
 to shoot.' ' When the time came to retire, 
 the old man got his big family Bible and 
 said: " Young men, it is our custom to 
 read God's word and pray before going 
 to bed. I hope you will join us." He 
 then read the chapter, and they got down 
 on their knees and he prayed: "Father, 
 bless these young men who are so far 
 away from home. Keep them from dan- 
 ger and from the power of the evil one. 
 Bless their parents who are so anxious 
 about them to-night. Comfort them with 
 the thought that God will be unto them a 
 Father and that he will care for and pro- 
 tect them, we beg in Jesus' name." The 
 infidel was the first to get into his bed. 
 The Christian noticed that he did not 
 Lave his revolver and that he had not 
 cut the hole in the bed-quilt, and he asked 
 him why he had not made provision for 
 his safety. He replied: "That old man 
 wouldn't hurt you." The presence of 
 
 35 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 that Bible and the fact that he was a man 
 of prayer made the man feel he was safe. 
 Suppose he had placed on his table a deck 
 of cards and a bottle of moonshine and 
 said, "Now, gentlemen, we want to have 
 a good time before we retire,' ' what 
 would have been the effect on the man, 
 do you think? 
 
 Internal Proofs. — One Sunday morn- 
 ing I was in the hotel in my city talking 
 with a minister who was to preach near 
 the city that day. He was one of the 
 high-brows and made light of miracles 
 and certain books in the Bible. A Jew 
 was present and heard our discussion, 
 and he said: "I am a Jew and I do not 
 believe in miracles. I do not believe in 
 the Virgin birth. I am from Missouri and 
 you will have to show me." I said to 
 him: "Did I understand you to say that 
 you are a Jew and that you do not believe 
 in miracles, and that you are from Mis- 
 souri and that I must show you?" He 
 said, "Yes." "Then I will proceed to 
 show you. Come and stand up in front 
 of that looking-glass and take a good 
 square look at yourself. Now explain to 
 
 36 
 
THE BIBLE GOD'S WORD 
 
 me how the prophet, hundreds of years 
 before you were born, knew that you 
 would be a hissing and a byword and with- 
 out a dwelling-place? How came you 
 here? Look at yourself. You are a mir- 
 acle of the twentieth century. ' ' He quick- 
 ly replied : i i There are more Jews to-day 
 than when Christ was crucified." I said: 
 "Why is it? How did the prophet know 
 when he said, hundreds of years before 
 you were born, that you would be here as 
 a people, but not as a nation, when the 
 Lord returns? You are here — you can 
 not be destroyed. God has pronounced 
 a curse upon the nation that persecutes 
 you, and the nations of the earth that 
 have put their hands upon you have paid 
 the penalty, but you have no country and 
 you are a hissing and a byword among 
 the nations of the earth. Men of God 
 spake as they were moved by the Holy 
 Spirit." 
 
 Fulfilled prophecy is the miracle of the 
 age. Had we time, we could give a ser- 
 mon on fulfilled prophecy. Take the 333 
 that relate to Christ, and all were fulfilled 
 to the letter. 
 
 37 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 This book is in the present tense. 
 Like its author, it is I am. One day a 
 Mormon elder came into my home and 
 said: "I am an apostle of the Latter-day 
 Saints. I can work miracles and speak in 
 tongues, and if I take deadly poison it 
 will not hurt me." I asked him if an 
 apostle did not mean a witness. He said 
 it did. Then I wanted to know how a 
 witness could have a successor. He ad- 
 mitted that there are twelve thrones and 
 that the twelve apostles are to sit upon 
 the thrones, and then I told him that all 
 of the seats were occupied, and if he were 
 an apostle he would have to stand, for 
 there was no vacant seat. I said : ' ' I have 
 been reading about you." He was anxious 
 to know where. I told him in Paul's let- 
 ter to Timothy, where he said that in the 
 last days — and he professed to belong to 
 the latter-day crowd — perilous times 
 would come, and that men would creep 
 into houses and take captive silly women, 
 and that I noticed he had arrived on 
 schedule time. He said he could perform 
 miracles, and then I told him I had read 
 again in the Book that out of the mouth 
 
 38 
 
THE BIBLE GOD'S WORD 
 
 of the beast came three frogs claiming to 
 work miracles, which were of the devil, 
 and I felt sure he was one of the frogs. 
 The Bible is loaded, and when you want 
 to kill false teaching all you need to do 
 is to know your gun and how to pull the 
 trigger. 
 
 It Is Not a Scientific Booh. — The Bible 
 is not a book of science ; it is a revelation 
 of God and the way to heaven. It does 
 not contradict science, however. One time 
 I was engaged in a meeting in Hagers- 
 town, and I was using a query-box, giving 
 the people a chance to ask questions on 
 the Bible, and an infidel would cram the 
 box with hard questions, and then leave 
 as soon as I had answered the questions, 
 refusing to hear me preach. One night 
 he put this question in the box: "If your 
 God has all power and the devil is the 
 cause of sin, and sin is the cause of mis- 
 ery, why does not your God kill the devil 
 and put a stop to this?" I told him God 
 could not afford to do it ; it would leave too 
 many orphans in Hagerstown. He became 
 angry, and the next day called at the 
 parsonage and challenged me for a de- 
 
 39 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 bate. I refused, and told him I could not 
 afford to give him any notoriety at my 
 expense. He then said: "Your Bible con- 
 tradicts science and I would not accept a 
 Bible that does this." I insisted that he 
 show me one contradiction, and he said: 
 "Your Bible says that God in six days of 
 twenty-four hours each made the heavens 
 and the earth, and this would be an im- 
 possibility. It would have taken millions of 
 years for the earth to have cooled off." 
 I gave him the Bible and challenged him 
 to show me the statement, and he was a 
 long time finding the first chapter of 
 Genesis. When he read it I did not see 
 the statement. He read again: "In the 
 beginning God created the heavens and 
 the earth." I stopped him and asked: 
 "When was the beginning?" He could 
 not tell. Then I said: "God created all 
 of this in the beginning, and we do not 
 know how long that was, but we know that 
 the evening and the morning were the 
 first day. Now, there was no day until 
 the earth revolved on its axis, and it did 
 not revolve until it had been created and 
 cooled off, and the evening and the morn- 
 
 40 
 
THE BIBLE GOD'S WORD 
 
 ing made the first day. No contradic- 
 tion." Then he said: "Your Bible says 
 that Abraham was a man after God's 
 heart; but Abraham was an old liar, and 
 I have no respect for a Bible that makes 
 such a man a man after God's own 
 heart.' ' I asked him if he had ever told 
 a lie. He insisted that he was a gentle- 
 man. I told him I was glad to hear it, 
 but I wanted to know if he had ever told 
 a lie. He admitted that when in a tight 
 place he might have prevaricated. I told 
 him Abraham was in a tight place and 
 prevaricated, and that God told the truth 
 on him. That, fortunately for him, God 
 had not seen fit to write his history, and 
 when he did the world would learn a lot 
 of which it was then ignorant. The Bible 
 tells both sides — the good and the bad. 
 
 It Is Its Own Interpreter. — A noted 
 lawyer, who had been for many years an 
 infidel, was told by his physician that he 
 had organic trouble and could live only a 
 short while. He went to his associate in 
 law, a Presbyterian elder, and asked: 
 "Have you a book that will prove the 
 Bible V 9 His partner handed him the 
 41 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 Bible and told him to read it. He said: 
 "You do not understand. I want a book 
 to prove the Bible.' ' "Then," said the 
 lawyer, "go home and read your Bible.' ' 
 He noticed the emphasis on the command, 
 and went home and began to read it. One 
 morning he came into the office, and his 
 partner asked him how he was getting on 
 with his Bible. He said : " I want to know 
 where that man Cain got his wife." I 
 have been in but few places where some 
 man did not want to know this. The 
 Bible was not written to tell where every 
 man got his wife. You do not know where 
 I got mine, and it is none of your busi- 
 ness, and yet it is just as necessary to 
 know where I got a wife as to know 
 where Cain got one. It is a bad business 
 to be looking after some other man 's wife. 
 He was told to keep on reading his Bible. 
 He came in one day, and again was asked 
 how he was getting on. He said : " I am try- 
 ing to find out if that flood was universal. ' ' 
 He was told to just keep on reading his 
 Bible. One day he came and was greatly 
 excited. He said: "I am a lawyer and 
 have been practicing law for many years, 
 
 42 
 
THE BIBLE GOD'S WORD 
 
 and I would like to know where that man 
 Moses got that law. It would have taken 
 a God to have given such a code. I am 
 convinced and I am now a believer/ ' We 
 read too much about the Bible and not 
 enough of it. 
 
 Not a Booh of Theology. — The Bible 
 is not a book of theology. God made some 
 stars and hung them up in the heavens, 
 and then man made a telescope and began 
 to study stars and then wrote out what 
 he thought about stars and called that 
 astronomy. God made the stars and man 
 made the astronomy. God made the rocks 
 and man began to dig and blast and ana- 
 lyze the rocks and called that geology. God 
 made the rocks and man made the geology. 
 God made the daisy to laugh on the hill- 
 side and man began to pick it to pieces, 
 and then wrote what he thought about it 
 and called it botany. God made the flow- 
 ers and man made the botany. God made 
 a Bible and man began to study it, and 
 then wrote out his interpretations of it 
 and called that theology. God made the 
 Bible and man made the theology. The 
 world will go to sleep on theology, but it 
 
 43 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 will sit up and listen when yon give it 
 the simple word of God. It is hungry for 
 it. 
 
 One time a minister was visiting an- 
 other minister, and he was taken into his 
 cellar where he had a lot of dried leaves, 
 broken sticks and roots and a smoky 
 lamp. He said: "Here is where I study 
 botany." The visitor started to pick up 
 one of the dead sticks, and the man said: 
 1 ' Don 't touch it ; it will break. ' ' Then the 
 visitor said: "Let me out into the fresh 
 air where I can smell the fragrance of 
 living flowers. I do not want to live 
 among a lot of dead leaves and roots; 
 they are musty and you dare not touch 
 them for fear they will break/ ' This is 
 the way it is with the sermons that are 
 composed of men's opinions, and the old, 
 musty, lifeless doctrines: the world will 
 not stand for them. 
 
 The Bible is God's universal library. 
 Do you want to study astronomy? Then, 
 behold the Bright and the Morning Star. 
 Do you want to study geology? Then, 
 read about the Eock of Ages. Do you 
 want to study botany? Then, take some 
 
 44 
 
THE BIBLE GOD'S WORD 
 
 lessons in the Eose of Sharon or the 
 Lily of the Valley. Do you want to study 
 biology? Then, become acquainted with 
 the one who is the Way and the Truth 
 and the Life. 
 
 The Bible will do to live by and to 
 die by. A noted infidel was called to the 
 bedside of his daughter who was dying. 
 Her mother was an earnest Christian, and 
 had taught her to believe in the promises 
 contained in the blessed old Book. The 
 father had told her it was all a myth. 
 She took the hand of the father and said : 
 " Father, I am dying. Mother says the 
 Bible is true, and that Jesus is my Sav- 
 iour, and that he has gone to prepare a 
 home for me, and that he will come and 
 take me to be with him. You say it is 
 all a lie. I am dying, and I want to know 
 — must I believe you or must I believe 
 mother ?" The infidel, with the tears 
 streaming down his cheeks, said: "My 
 child, you believe your mother.' ' I am a 
 poor, blind, helpless cripple, and the Bible 
 is my only crutch. Will you be so cruel 
 as to try to knock it from beneath me? 
 
 45 
 
Ill 
 
 JESUS CHRIST THE SON OF GOD 
 
 Text. — "What think ye of the Christ? whose Son 
 is he?"— Matt. 22: 42. 
 
 JOHN tells us that "in the beginning 
 was the Word, and the Word was 
 with God, and the Word was God." He 
 further tells us that "the Word became 
 flesh, and dwelt among us (and we beheld 
 his glory, glory as of the only begotten 
 from the Father), full of grace and 
 truth.' ' 
 
 The Old Testament Scriptures tell of 
 the coming of this "Just One," and when 
 he came he endorsed the Scriptures. When 
 his apostles preached, they had but one 
 proposition to prove, and they proved it 
 from the Scriptures. This one proposi- 
 tion was: "Jesus is the Christ, the Son 
 of the living God." When Jesus preach- 
 ed and taught, his one theme was himself 
 — the fulfillment of prophecy, the end of 
 the law and the fulfillment of type and 
 
 46 
 
JESUS CHRIST THE SON OF GOD 
 
 shadow. His sermons were filled with 
 quotations from the old Book. Matthew 
 quotes from twenty-two of the thirty-nine 
 books; Mark from thirteen with fifteen 
 passages; Luke, from thirteen with 
 twenty-five quotations, and John, from 
 six with eleven. From 189 chapters we 
 have 140 quotations. Evidently Jesus and 
 his apostles believed the Old Testament 
 Scriptures to be the inspired word of 
 God. 
 
 Christ was himself a prophet, and his 
 prophecies were fulfilled to the letter. He 
 said: "Now I tell you before it come 
 to pass, that ye may believe that I am 
 he." 
 
 Witnesses. — Let us hear the evidence 
 as it comes from the witnesses. John the 
 Baptist preached that one was to come 
 after him and that the people were to be- 
 lieve on him. God had told him he might 
 know Jesus. He sent him to baptize with 
 the promise that when the Holy Spirit 
 came upon one of the number being 
 baptized he should know he was the 
 Christ. John beheld the Spirit as he 
 came upon this one in the form of a dove, 
 
 4 47 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 and he heard the Father confess him to 
 be his Son. After this he said to certain 
 ones: "Behold, the Lamb of God, that 
 taketh away the sin of the world.' ' 
 
 On certain occasions the Father testi- 
 fied, and we must listen to his testimony. 
 When Jesus was being baptized, the 
 Father said: "This is my beloved Son, 
 in whom I am well pleased." On the 
 Mount of Transfiguration he said: "This 
 is my beloved Son; hear ye him." 
 
 On another occasion, when Jesus re- 
 quested that he glorify his name, there 
 came a voice from heaven saying: "I 
 have, and will glorify it again." Jesus 
 said: "There is another that beareth wit- 
 ness of me, and I know that the witness 
 which he witnesseth of me is true. I 
 and my Father are one. For as the Father 
 raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them, 
 even so the Son quickeneth whom he 
 will." 
 
 The works of Christ were stronger 
 evidences of his divinity than the words 
 of John the Baptist. Jesus insisted that 
 his works should be proof that the Father 
 had sent him into the world. In no age 
 
 48 
 
JESUS CHRIST THE SON OF GOD 
 
 of the world's history has God sent one 
 to represent him without giving to the 
 one sent his credentials. The signs done 
 by Jesns were to make it possible for 
 people to believe. He did among the Jews 
 works that no other man had ever done. 
 He not only raised the dead, but declared 
 that he had the power to lay his own life 
 down and to take it up again. He demon- 
 strated this in his resurrection from 
 among the dead. 
 
 Seven hundred years before he came, 
 the prophet had said: "For unto us a 
 child is born; unto us a Son is given; 
 and the government shall be upon his 
 shoulder: and his name shall be called 
 Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God, 
 Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." 
 
 When Matthew writes of the birth of 
 this child, he quotes from the old prophet 
 and says: "Now all this is come to pass, 
 that it might be fulfilled which was spok- 
 en by the Lord through the prophet, say- 
 ing, Behold, the virgin shall be with child, 
 and shall bring forth a son. And they 
 shall call his name Immanuel; which is, 
 being interpreted, God with us." 
 
 49 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 Jesus said unto them: "If God were 
 your Father, ye would love me: for I 
 proceeded forth and came from God; 
 neither came I of myself, but he sent 
 me." When he answered his critics he 
 said: "My Father worketh hitherto, and 
 I work." 
 
 "Therefore the Jews sought the more 
 to kill him, because he had not only brok- 
 en the sabbath, but said also that God 
 was his Father, making himself equal 
 with God." 
 
 When the angel told Mary about the 
 birth of this child, he said: "The Holy 
 Spirit shall come upon thee, and the pow- 
 er of the Most High shall overshadow 
 thee: wherefore also the holy thing which 
 is begotten shall be called the Son of 
 God." 
 
 The Word was in the beginning with 
 God. Jesus was born in Bethlehem of 
 Judea when the Word became flesh and 
 dwelt among men. Jesus became the 
 Christ when he was anointed at his bap- 
 tism. 
 
 Paul tells us that Jesus one time ex- 
 isted in the form of God, and that he 
 50 
 
JESUS CHRIST THE SON OF GOD 
 
 emptied himself and took upon him the 
 form of a servant, being made in the like- 
 ness of men, and was found in the fashion 
 of man; he humbled himself and became 
 obedient unto the death of the cross (Phil. 
 2:6-8). He makes it clear in his Epistle 
 to the Colossians that Christ is the Son 
 of God in a peculiar sense, and that he 
 was at one time with the Father (Col. 
 1:12-20). 
 
 A Unique Character. — Man could 
 never have created such a character. His 
 greatness is conditioned upon his extent 
 of influence and the purity and the gen- 
 uineness of his character. He did more 
 within three years to regenerate and lift 
 the race than all of the priests, philos- 
 ophers and teachers of all the ages. He 
 was born in poverty, and was forced to 
 confess that while the foxes had holes and 
 the birds of the air had nests, he did not 
 have where to lay his head. When 
 the disciples went to their homes at the 
 close of the day's teaching, he went to the 
 mountain. He came at a time when the 
 world needed light; came of a Jewish 
 family and was taught by the scribes 
 
 51 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 that the Jews were the best and the only 
 people God honored. He was born and 
 reared in a narrow sphere, lived a brief 
 life, wrote his message in the sand and 
 not in a book, had no influence with the 
 men of authority, was hated by his own 
 people, betrayed by his own disciple, was 
 condemned and killed by a mob, died the 
 most ignominious death possible, and yet 
 his life and power have touched all parts 
 of the globe and transformed the lives 
 of millions. 
 
 When He came from among the dead 
 the world began a new day. The darkness 
 gave way to light and governments began 
 to be formed anew. 
 
 He Lives. — All philosophers, with their 
 imperfect teachings, have faded away and 
 are almost forgotten; but his teachings 
 command the attention of the learned 
 and the ignorant, the great and the small. 
 He is great because he is alive. When 
 Peter preached the sermon of Pentecost, 
 he preached a live Christ. The preach- 
 ing of all of the New Testament ministers 
 breathes the doctrine of a living Christ. 
 When an army was discouraged and begin- 
 
 52 
 
JESUS CHRIST THE SON OF GOD 
 
 ning to retreat, the men heard the voice 
 of the dying captain when he said, "I see 
 you," and they rallied and went to vic- 
 tory. The chnrch of Christ succeeds to- 
 day because its membership looks at the 
 Captain who is able to see them in their 
 struggles against evil. Their faith in this 
 living Captain gives courage and guaran- 
 tees victory. 
 
 The Jews had their Moses, Eome had 
 her Caesar, France had her Napoleon, En- 
 gland her Gladstone, America her Wash- 
 ington, and the church has her Jesus, the 
 Christ, the Son of man and the Son of 
 God. He is not the son of a man, but the 
 son of man — the child of the race. Through 
 his veins coursed the blood of all races. 
 He is the gift of the Father to the whole 
 world. 
 
 His Life Is Unapproachable. — No man 
 can improve on the life of Christ. If the 
 infidel can offer us something better, let 
 him do it. He has had nearly twenty 
 centuries to do it and has never ap- 
 proached unto it. A noted man said: 
 "If Shakespeare were to come into this 
 room, we would rise to our feet; but if 
 53 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 Christ were to come, we would fall to our 
 knees.' ' 
 
 His Sinlessness. — Nearly two thousand 
 years ago Christ thrust a challenge into 
 the face of blatant atheism and infidelity 
 when he said: 'If any man can convince 
 me that I have sinned, let him do it. ' ' No 
 man from that day until now has ac- 
 cepted his challenge. 
 
 His Claims. — If Jesus is not more than 
 man, then he was the greatest impostor 
 the world has ever seen. The following 
 is a beautiful quotation: 
 
 "If Jesus Christ is a mai» 
 And only a man, I say 
 That, of all mankind, I will cleave to him, 
 And to him I will cleave alway.*' 
 
 If he be only a man, then he has been 
 a deceiver, and I do not care to cleave to 
 one who has proved himself to be the 
 greatest deceiver of all ages. 
 
 His Claims. — ' ' I am the bread of 
 life." "If you have seen me, you have 
 seen the Father.' ' "I am the door." 
 "I am the way, the truth and the life." 
 "I am the resurrection and the life." "I 
 have the power to lay down my life, and 
 
 54 
 
JESUS CHRIST THE SON OF GOD 
 
 I have the power to take it up again. ' ' "I 
 am the good shepherd. ' ' ' * Come unto me, 
 all ye that labor and are heavy laden, 
 and I will give you rest." 
 
 He Imparts Life. — Man is not saved 
 by ethics. Mind culture is a good thing, 
 but it can not wash away the guilt of 
 sin committed. Man can not lift himself. 
 There must be some divine power from 
 above that takes hold of him and gets 
 into his being and lifts him. Evolution 
 can never do it. Jesus can do this for 
 man. Christianity is God coming down 
 to earth and lifting man up to heaven. 
 Christ must be formed in man the hope 
 of glory. Man must be in Christ and 
 Christ must be in man in order that man 
 may be saved. I know that Jesus saves 
 because he saved me. The sage said: "I 
 need a God who can speak to me." Our 
 Christ is near and we can have fellowship 
 with him. He forgives sins, is my judge, 
 has all authority, is unchangeable and is 
 an object of worship. 
 
 He is the one Saviour of the world, 
 for there is no other name under heaven 
 "wherein we must be saved." 
 55 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 "In the still air the music lies unheard; 
 
 In the rough marble beauty hides unseen; 
 To make the music and the beauty needs 
 
 The master's touch, the sculptor's chisel keen. 
 Great Master, touch us with thy skillful hand; 
 
 Let not the music that is in us die! 
 Great Sculptor, hew and polish us; nor let, 
 
 Hidden and lost, thy form within us lie! 
 Spare not the stroke! Do with us as thou wilt! 
 
 Let there be naught unfinished, broken, marred; 
 Complete thy purpose, that we may become 
 
 Thy perfect image, thou our God and Lord." 
 
 The Church Rests upon Him. — Jesus 
 said to Peter, when he confessed him, 
 that he would build his church upon the 
 rock — the Christ confessed. Paul says: 
 " Other foundation can no man lay than 
 that is laid, which is Christ Jesus/ ' 
 
 He Is the Creed of His Church. — I 
 have trouble and am in court: I do not 
 care to read law books; I want a lawyer, 
 a man who can represent me before the 
 court. I am in financial straits: I do not 
 want to hear a lecture on political econo- 
 my; I want a man who can come to my 
 help with funds. I am sick : I do not want 
 medicine books ; I want a living physician 
 who can feel my pulse, diagnose my case 
 and give the remedy. I am lost, and I 
 
 56 
 
JESUS CHRIST THE SON OF GOD 
 
 feel the guilt of sin: I do not want theol- 
 ogy; I want the living, personal Christ, 
 who has the power to comfort and to for- 
 give, to come to me and be my helper and 
 my Saviour. 
 
 A religion without this Christ is like 
 a painted fire that gives out no heat, or 
 a painted bouquet that exhales no fra- 
 grance. It is like a painted stream of 
 water to the thirsty man, which refuses to 
 satisfy, but aggravates the suffering. 
 
 The belief in this divine Christ has 
 held nations together. Greece had her 
 culture and Eome had her law, but they 
 could not save them. Take Christ out of 
 the Bible, and what would follow? It 
 would bleed to death. It would be like 
 the shell without the kernel; the wire 
 without the electricity; the lamp without 
 the oil; the body without the spirit. 
 
 He Has Power to Draw. — He said: 
 "And I, if I be lifted up, will draw all 
 men unto me." No other person can do 
 this. He draws the man of wealth, Zac- 
 cheus, and the poor blind beggar, Bar- 
 timeus; the cultured Nicodemus and the 
 ignorant woman at the well; the poor 
 
 57 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 fisherman and the man of the Sanhedrim 
 Men of all nations, all trades, all profes- 
 sions and all tastes are drawn together 
 by the Christ. He satisfies the wants of 
 mankind. He meets every desire of the 
 soul. He gives liberty and forms govern- 
 ments, gives free speech, free schools, 
 free hospitals, free homes; brings peace, 
 elevates woman, transforms society. 
 
 What is it that lifts and influences? 
 Not a philosophy, but a religion; not an 
 intellectual theory, but an experience of 
 the soul; not a product of originality, but 
 a revelation of our Father and our Broth- 
 er; not a system of theology, but a divine 
 force and life reaching through all organ- 
 ized life. We see it in literature, art, 
 climate, character. Take Him out of the 
 world, and what would follow? What 
 would happen to literature, to art, to 
 character? Prayer would die on the lips 
 of men; the Old Testament could not be 
 understood; there could be no relief in 
 the hour of sorrow and death ; there would 
 be no hospitals, no homes for the aged 
 and the poor, no asylums, no free schools ; 
 no more missionaries would be sent out, 
 
 58 
 
JESUS CHRIST THE SON OF GOD 
 
 and all who are giving themselves in the 
 foreign fields would be recalled, and this 
 world would become a world without light 
 and life. 
 
 My Creed. — It is not, What do you 
 think of a dogma? but, What do you think 
 of a person? It is not faith in a doctrine, 
 but faith in a personality. I can not put 
 my creed into writing. I might be able 
 to put my intellectual conception, but 
 never my heart's trust. I do not believe 
 in commands, but in the Commander. I 
 repent, not because I believe in repent- 
 ance, but because I believe in the One who 
 said: "Except ye repent, ye shall perish." 
 I do not believe in baptism; I believe in 
 the One who commanded me to be bap- 
 tized, and therefore I am baptized. I do 
 not believe in prayer, but I believe in 
 Christ, who has promised to hear when I 
 pray, and I pray. 
 
 Let us hear what the people say of 
 Christ: John Baptist: "Behold, the Lamb 
 of God, which taketh away the sin of the 
 world. ' ' The woman of Samaria : ' ' Come, 
 see a man who told me all things that 
 ever I did: can this be the Christ ?" A 
 
 59 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 devil: "What have I to do with thee, 
 Jesus, thou Son of the Most High God?" 
 Judas : " I have betrayed innocent blood. ' ' 
 Pilate : ' ' I find no fault in him. ' ' Pilate 's 
 wife: "Have nothing to do with this just 
 one." The centurion: "Truly this was 
 the Son of God." The earthquake gave 
 testimony in his favor, and on the day of 
 Pentecost the Holy Spirit testified through 
 his apostles. 
 
 "All hail the power of Jesus' name! 
 Let angels prostrate fall; 
 Bring forth the royal diadem, 
 And crown him Lord of all." 
 
 CO 
 
IV 
 
 SPIRITUAL WORSHIP 
 
 Text. — ' ' God is a Spirit : and they that worship him 
 must worship in spirit and truth. M — John 4: 24. 
 
 "And still the soul a far-off glory sees; 
 
 Strange music hears. 
 A something, not of earth, still haunts the breeze, 
 
 The sun and spiheres. 
 All things that be, all thought, all love, all joy, 
 
 Spellbind the man, 
 As once the growing boy, 
 
 And point afar — 
 Point to some land of endless, endless truth, 
 
 Of light and life, 
 Where souls, renewed in an immortal youth, 
 
 Shall know the infinite. " 
 
 TV /f AN is a religious being. He is the 
 ***- offspring of Jehovah and naturally 
 is an upward-looking animal. One thing 
 that distinguishes him from all other ani- 
 mals is his religious instinct — his desire 
 to worship. He must have a God. If 
 revelation does not reveal his God, then 
 he will create a God. He knows that the 
 best within his heart has come from 
 
 61 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 above, and he finds himself reaching out 
 after the source of all good. He feels 
 within his soul a holy aspiration to be 
 holy. He must lean upon one greater 
 than himself, he must commune with one 
 who possesses more wisdom and power 
 than he possesses. He must have a God 
 that can sympathize with him and who 
 will have compassion when he is weak 
 and conscious of his lost and helpless con- 
 dition. In the language of one of old, he 
 finds himself exclaiming: "Lord, I have 
 loved the habitation of thy house, and the 
 place where thine honor dwelleth. I will 
 offer in thy dwelling an oblation with 
 great gladness. I will sing and speak 
 praise unto the Lord. One thing have I 
 desired of the Lord which I will require, 
 even that I may dwell in the house of the 
 Lord all the days of my life ; to behold the 
 beauty of the Lord, and to visit his tem- 
 ple.' ' "Oh! how amiable are thy dwell- 
 ings, thou Lord of hosts! My soul hath 
 a desire and longing to enter into the 
 courts of the Lord; my heart and my 
 flesh rejoice in the living God. Blessed 
 are they that dwell in thy house, they will 
 
SPIRITUAL WORSHIP 
 
 still be praising thee." "One day in thy 
 courts is better than a thousand. I had 
 rather be a doorkeeper in the house of 
 my God than to dwell in the tents of un- 
 godliness." "What reward shall I give 
 unto the Lord for all the benefits that he 
 hath done unto me? I will receive the 
 cup of salvation, and call upon the name 
 of the Lord. I will pay my vows unto 
 the Lord in the sight of all his people; 
 in the courts of the Lord's house, even 
 in the midst of thee, O Jerusalem.' ' 
 Can you say in the language of the 
 Psalmist: "I was glad when they said 
 unto me, Let us go into the house of the 
 Lord"? 
 
 When we study the history of the hu- 
 man family we find that the people of 
 every age worshiped. As we begin the 
 study of this history we are told that Cain 
 and Abel sacrificed unto Jehovah. The 
 altar was given its proper place in their 
 lives. In this first age we read of a man 
 who walked with God, and one day he 
 followed him too far to come back; he 
 went with him into his invisible kingdom 
 and took up his abode with him. 
 5 63 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 When Noah had been redeemed through 
 the water and had come into the new 
 world, he honored his God by building 
 an altar and sacrificing unto him. It was 
 then that God smelled a sweet savor and 
 said in his heart: "I will not again curse 
 the ground any more for man's sake." 
 
 Abraham heard the call and obeyed 
 God. He was a man of faith and was 
 constantly in communion with Jehovah. 
 He was strong in his faith because he 
 did not get far from his altar. 
 
 In the beginning, when men called 
 upon the name of Jehovah, they did not 
 have attractive and comfortable houses of 
 worship; they met out in the groves, un- 
 der the tent of azure blue which had been 
 stretched by the hand of a personal and 
 a living God, and there on his footstool, 
 over which he had spread the carpet of 
 green and pinned it down with the lilies, 
 he held sacred communion with his God. 
 After awhile he erected a tabernacle ac- 
 cording to the pattern which God had 
 given in the mount, and there God re- 
 corded his name, and his people came to 
 worship. By and by the children of men 
 
 64: 
 
SPIRITUAL WORSHIP 
 
 were permitted to erect a beautiful and 
 a magnificent temple unto Jehovah, and 
 then they met in this house which had 
 been dedicated unto Jehovah and here 
 they called upon his name. 
 
 Miniature temples — the synagogues — 
 were erected that the people might be ac- 
 commodated, and in these places God had 
 recorded his name and the people met to 
 study his word, to pray unto him and to 
 worship. 
 
 We are told of a noted man who made 
 a long pilgrimage from his home to Je- 
 rusalem for the purpose of worship. This 
 man, on his return, heard the gospel from 
 the lips of one of God's evangelists and 
 became a Christian. 
 
 Jesus' life was one of worship. He 
 spent the whole night in prayer. He with- 
 drew from the crowd that he might get 
 close to his Father and have fellowship 
 with him. His soul was filled with indig- 
 nation when he came into the temple and 
 saw it being desecrated by the thieves and 
 the robbers. 
 
 No man can willfully absent himself 
 from the place of worship and continue 
 
 65 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 spiritual. Certain ones were exhorted by 
 the apostle not to forsake the assembling 
 of themselves together. It is in the honse 
 of the Lord we get instruction. "Thy 
 way, God, is in the sanctuary. When I 
 thought to know this, it was too painful 
 for me; until I went into the sanctuary 
 of God; then understood I their end." 
 
 Here the people are converted. Here 
 we find the elements of spiritual life. 
 Here we have the emblems that represent 
 the death and the resurrection of our Lord. 
 Here we receive strength and comfort. 
 "But they that wait for Jehovah shall 
 renew their strength; they shall mount 
 up with wings as eagles; they shall run, 
 and not be weary; they shall walk, and 
 not faint" (Isa. 40:31). Here the indi- 
 vidual burden is forgotten. We come 
 into the place of worship thinking of our- 
 selves and of our burdens, and when the 
 songs are being sung, the Word is heard 
 read, the prayers are being offered, we 
 see Jesus; and then we lose sight of our- 
 selves and of our troubles, and soon we 
 have found that our light afflictions have 
 wrought out for us an exceeding and an 
 66 
 
SPIRITUAL WORSHIP 
 
 eternal weight of glory. Here we give 
 an outward expression of our inward life. 
 Here we meet with Jesus. He has prom- 
 ised to be in the midst of the two or 
 three that meet in his name. He never 
 disappoints. The disciple that stays away 
 from the place of worship will miss see- 
 ing Jesus. The one that misses the pres- 
 ence of the Christ will soon begin to 
 doubt. Thomas was a doubter because 
 he was not present when Jesus came. 
 
 The normal Christian will worship. 
 Not to worship means to become bestial. 
 This germ of reverence in the heart must 
 be watered at least once a week. Suppose 
 no one came to the house of the Lord on 
 the Lord's Bay, what would follow? No 
 worship would soon mean no church of 
 Christ, and no church and no opposition 
 to evil would soon result in barbarism and 
 universal darkness. The one who remains 
 away from the house of worship is an 
 enemy to good society and a promoter of 
 all that is devilish. 
 
 Manner of Worship. — "But let all 
 things be done decently and in order' ' (1 
 Cor. 14:40). Why did the apostle write 
 
 67 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 these words! The members of the church 
 at Corinth had lost their reverence for 
 the Lord's table. Some of the members got 
 drunk on the wine and they made a feast 
 out of this holy Supper. We teach our 
 children to be mannerly when in the 
 homes of neighbors. It is more important 
 to teach them to be mannerly and rever- 
 ent when in the house of the Lord. It is 
 here we come into the presence of God, 
 Christ, the Holy Spirit, and the spirits 
 of just ones made perfect. 
 
 Our worship consists of preaching, 
 and no one should sleep in the house of 
 the Lord and in the presence of the King 
 of kings. He should give heed to the 
 things read and the things spoken. No 
 one should talk and visit when in the act 
 of worship. It consists of praying. All 
 should kneel, or stand or bow the head, 
 when the minister says, "Let us pray." 
 We should all do the same thing. The 
 one who leads the prayer should not be 
 expected to do all the praying for all the 
 congregation. He is only leading, and all 
 should unite in spirit in the prayer to our 
 spiritual God. 
 
SPIRITUAL WORSHIP 
 
 Singing is a part of the worship. We 
 should sing with the spirit and with the 
 understanding also. We have no more 
 right to hire a quartet to do our singing 
 than we have to hire one to do our pray- 
 ing. When the minister says, "Let all the 
 congregation sing," all should sing or 
 make a joyful noise unto the Lord. The 
 one who leads the music or sings the spe- 
 cial song should be a Christian. Let us 
 understand that God is a Spirit, and that 
 he must be worshiped in spirit and in 
 truth, and that a singer should worship 
 in his singing as much as the minister 
 worships in his preaching or you wor- 
 ship in your praying. If he does not 
 worship in this act, then it is solemn 
 mockery and an abomination in the sight 
 of God. 
 
 Fellowship is also a part of worship. 
 It is just as essential to give as it is to 
 pray. We must understand that the act 
 of giving is an act of worship, and we 
 must give in the spirit and with the un- 
 derstanding also. It is important that all 
 shall worship. "Let every one of you lay 
 by in store on the first day of the week 
 
 69 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 as the Lord hath prospered him" (1 Cor* 
 16:2). 
 
 The sermon should be simple and 
 given in a way that all can understand 
 it. Paul's ambition was to be understood. 
 He says: "I thank God, I speak with 
 tongues more than all of you: howbeit in 
 the church I had rather speak five words 
 with my understanding, that I might in- 
 struct others also, than ten thousand 
 words in a tongue.' ' The preacher has 
 no right to show himself off. Think of a 
 minister spending an hour before a mir- 
 ror practicing on his gestures that he 
 might appear unto men to preach! The 
 real minister will feel that he is worship- 
 ing God in sermon. The window-pane 
 that is painted and gaudy is not good for 
 letting in the light; the minister that is 
 drunk on egotism, and that tries to place 
 himself on a pedestal, is a stumbling-stone 
 to every honest man or woman. He is 
 missing the mark, and sooner or later 
 will be found out to be a miserable hypo- 
 crite. 
 
 "Let us have grace whereby we may 
 worship him acceptably with reverence 
 
 70 
 
SPIRITUAL WORSHIP 
 
 and godly fear." Let us heed the words 
 of the inspired writer: "Worship the 
 Lord in the beauty of holiness." Rever- 
 ence is the essence of true worship, and 
 if there be no reverence there is no wor- 
 ship. 
 
 Here in Body, but Absent in Spirit. — \ 
 We have those who occupy a pew at al- 
 most every service, but they are absent. 
 They are here in body, but miles away 
 in spirit. A minister received the con- 
 fession of a man who had been a frequent 
 visitor at his church. He was anxious to 
 know which one of his sermons impressed 
 him, and dared to ask. The man said: 
 "I have never heard you preach. It is 
 true I have filled a place in the pew many^ 
 times while you were preaching, but I 
 did not hear you. I was calculating and 
 counting prospective gains I hoped to 
 make that week. I was present, but never 
 heard you. I was made to think by the 
 simple life of a Christian woman." 
 
 Present in Spirit. — We have another 
 
 class who stay away from the services, 
 
 but always tell the minister that they 
 
 are with him in spirit. I had a man like 
 
 71 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 this in my congregation. He would visit 
 on Sundays and let any little excuse keep 
 him from the house of worship, and when 
 I would tell him I missed him, he would 
 immediately inform me that he was with 
 me in spirit. I told him I was afraid of 
 ghosts. Think of a minister on a Sun- 
 day morning preaching to a thousand 
 ghosts! I'd rather have five spirits in 
 bodies present at a church service. 
 
 Should Prepare for It. — When a pa- 
 tient is to undergo an operation he is pre- 
 pared for it. To get the best out of the 
 Lord's Day worship we should spend 
 some time shut in with God, with the 
 world shut out, and get our hearts in 
 tune for the day. Let us give our spirit 
 a chance to grow. 
 
 "What am I? 
 Naught! But the effluence of Thy light divine, 
 
 Pervading worlds, hath reached my bosom too. 
 Yes, in my spirit doth Thy spirit shine, 
 
 As shines the sunbeam in a drop of dew. 
 Naught! But I live, and on Hope's pinions fly 
 
 Eager toward Thy presence; for in Thee 
 I live and breathe and dwell, aspiring high, 
 
 Even to the tihrone of Thy divinity. 
 
 I am, O God, and surely thou must be! " 
 
 72 
 
CHRIST'S PRAYERS 
 
 Text. — "And it came to pass, as lie was praying 
 in a certain place, that when he ceased, one of his dis- 
 ciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, even as 
 John also taught his disciples. ' 9 — Luke 11 : 1. 
 
 DRAYER is the spirit of Christianity. 
 * There can be no spiritual life without 
 it. It is the Christian's breath. Man can 
 no more live a Christian life without 
 praying than he can live a physical life 
 without breathing. To be physically 
 strong we must breathe deeply. There 
 are many sickly church-members to-day 
 because they are too lazy to breathe into 
 their souls the oxygen of heaven. It is 
 two spirits holding communion. Like the 
 commerce carried on between the oceans 
 and the clouds, bringing down the moist- 
 ure in the dew and rain to quench the 
 thirst of vegetation, and then ascending 
 again in the mists back to the clouds to 
 return again to fill the babbling brooks, 
 
 73 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 the rivulets and the rivers which roll into 
 the fountains of the great deep, our spir- 
 its go out to God for help and guidance, 
 and the blessings come from his unwast- 
 ing hand to satisfy our wants. 
 
 Prayer belongs to all ages and to all 
 peoples. In every Christian's heart must 
 be his altar of incense. When the fires 
 go out upon this altar, his spiritual life 
 becomes extinct. 
 
 The Scientific View. — We are told by 
 the scientist that God does not answer our 
 prayers; that God works according to a 
 fixed law, and that to answer the prayers 
 of his children he would have to violate 
 his laws. We are told that we do not 
 bring heaven down to earth when we 
 pray, but that we lift ourselves up to 
 heaven. Imagine a man standing at a 
 closed door, one he knew would not open, 
 and knocking, or a thirsty soul pumping 
 at a dry well ! We believe that our Father 
 hears and answers the prayers of the 
 saints. He has commanded us to knock, 
 with the promise that it shall be opened 
 unto us; to seek, with the promise that 
 we shall find. 
 
 74 
 
CHRIST'S PRAYERS 
 
 We can not explain how prayer influ- 
 ences God; there are many things we can 
 not explain, but we know from experience 
 that it does. Every Christian has the con- 
 sciousness of a living and a prayer-an- 
 swering God. He knows that with this 
 God he has had personal and vital rela- 
 tions, and that he has had with him the 
 closest affinity and fellowship. The con- 
 sciousness of this fellowship is a unique 
 and distinct thing, found only in the re- 
 ligion of Jesus Christ. 
 
 We must learn to pray. Man learns 
 to articulate the language of heaven just 
 as the babe learns to speak its mother 
 tongue. Every member of the family of 
 our Father in heaven is invited to take 
 lessons under the divine Teacher. There 
 is no excuse, and we can not plead ig- 
 norance. When should we begin to pray? 
 The moment we are born into the divine 
 family we will naturally begin to make an 
 effort to make known our desires unto 
 our Father. 
 
 Jesus Was Given to Prayer. — He 
 would spend the night in holy communion 
 with his Father. If this sinless, spotless, 
 75 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 divine Son of God had to pray in order 
 to do the work of his God, do yon think 
 it possible for his disciples to live his 
 life and do his work without it? A man 
 withont sin, and filled with the Holy Spir- 
 it, recognized the importance of prayer. 
 He practiced what he preached and 
 preached what he practiced. 
 
 Have yon ever studied the prayers of 
 this master Teacher? "And in the morn- 
 ing, rising np a great while before day, 
 he went ont, and departed into a solitary 
 place, and there prayed.' ' "And when 
 he had sent them away, he departed into 
 a mountain to pray." When the work 
 was pressing and he needed strength, he 
 went to his Father in prayer. "But so 
 much the more went there a fame abroad 
 of him: and great multitudes came to- 
 gether to hear him, and to be healed by 
 him of their infirmities. And he with- 
 drew himself into the wilderness, and 
 prayed." He would not select his apos- 
 tles without first engaging in prayer. 
 "And it came to pass in those days, that 
 he went out into a mountain to pray, and 
 he continued all night in prayer to God." 
 
 76 
 
CHRIST'S PRAYERS 
 
 Unrecorded Prayers. — The Gospel 
 writers tell us of the times when our Lord 
 prayed, but they do not always record 
 the prayers. I have often wondered what 
 he said. We know they were prayers of 
 earnestness and of faith. "Now when 
 all the people were baptized, it came to 
 pass that Jesus, also being baptized, and 
 praying, the heaven was opened.'' 
 
 When Saul was told what to do to 
 be saved, he was commanded to continue 
 to call on the name of the Lord. When 
 Jesus had looked into the heart of Simon 
 Peter, he discovered that he was self-con- 
 scious and weak and that there was dan- 
 ger of falling. He knew that he was a 
 man of good intentions, but that he was 
 easily influenced. He was taking an in- 
 ventory of the spiritual strength and 
 power of the apostleship, and he found 
 that Judas was lost to his cause, and that 
 the devil meant to sift all of them. Judas 
 had already gone through the sieve, and 
 there was danger of Peter, too, going 
 through. He says: "Simon, Satan hath 
 desired to have you [all of the apostles], 
 to sift you as wheat: but I have prayed 
 
 77 
 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 for thee [Peter] that your faith fail you 
 not." It is glorious to know that our 
 great High Priest is acquainted with us, 
 and that he takes us to his Father in 
 prayer, and that his prayers are always 
 answered. 
 
 When He was on the Mount of Trans- 
 figuration he prayed, and it was at the 
 moment of prayer that the fashion of his 
 countenance was altered, and his raiment 
 was white and glistering, and the Father 
 again confessed him. 
 
 Certain Things for Which He Prayed. 
 — When standing under the shadow of the 
 cross, he thought of his church and king- 
 dom, and he prayed that his disciples, and 
 those who might believe oil him through 
 their word, should be one. The world 
 was on his heart, and he knew that it 
 could never be brought into the divine 
 fellowship so long as they were divided. 
 He prayed that they might be one as he 
 and his Father were one, and that the 
 world might believe that God had sent 
 him into the world to be its Saviour. 
 
 When he was on earth he was limited 
 in his power and in his authority. He 
 
 78 
 
CHRIST'S PRAYERS 
 
 was then a human as well as a divine 
 Christ. He looked forward to the time 
 when he would be a spiritual Christ, and 
 when all power and all authority would 
 be given unto him. To have this power 
 he must go away from them. He told 
 them that after he went away he would 
 pray the Father to send to them another 
 Comforter, another Advocate, the Holy 
 Spirit, and that when he came he would 
 abide with them forever. The world could 
 lay hold on him, the Christ of flesh, and 
 take him from them, but they would not 
 be able to receive — to take hold of — this 
 spiritual Guest he was to send into their 
 hearts from his Father in answer to his 
 prayer. The world might take them and 
 lock them up in the prison cell, and it 
 might kill them, but it can never get hold 
 of the Holy Spirit that shall live in them. 
 They would need equipment for the great 
 work of the kingdom, and the coming of 
 the Spirit would qualify them for the 
 work. He would bring to their minds 
 everything he wanted them to preach; he 
 would tell them in the hour of need the 
 message to deliver. 
 
 79 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 At the conclusion of that last public 
 discourse, when Christ placed emphasis on 
 sacrifice and service and uttered that won- 
 derful statement, "Verily, verily, I say 
 unto you, Except a grain of wheat fall 
 into the ground and die, it abideth by 
 itself alone ; but if it die, it beareth much 
 fruit,' ' he prayed these words: "Father, 
 save me from this hour. But for this 
 cause came I unto this hour. Father, 
 glorify thy name." This prayer was an- 
 swered. There came a voice out of heaven, 
 saying: "I have both glorified it, and will 
 glorify it again.' ' 
 
 When in the dark garden of Gethsem- 
 ane, crushed under the sins of the whole 
 world, he prayed that the cup might be 
 removed from him. He was about to die 
 from physical exhaustion. He wanted to 
 finish the work he had come into the world 
 to do. He needed strength at this critical 
 moment. Eead Hebrews, chapter 5, and 
 you can see what he meant by "this 
 cup." He received an answer to this 
 prayer. Did he pray to escape the cross? 
 If he did, he did not receive an answer. 
 He came into the world for this purpose. 
 
 80 
 
CHRIST'S PRAYERS 
 
 He wanted to escape physical death, 
 and he sweat drops of blood. An angel 
 came to him and strengthened him, and 
 he went joyfully to the cross to become a 
 sacrifice for sins. 
 
 When dying on the cross, he prayed 
 for those who had caused his death. As 
 he looked on them, in the anguish of his 
 soul he prayed: "Father, forgive them, 
 for they know not what they do." He 
 had taught his disciples to pray for their 
 enemies, and he is now practicing his 
 teaching. Was this prayer answered? 
 Yes; on the day of Pentecost, when Peter 
 preached the gospel, they were present 
 and heard the message. He told them 
 of their awful deed. They asked to know 
 what to do, and were told to repent and 
 be baptized, and these murderers became 
 the charter members of the church of 
 Jesus Christ. 
 
 A Capable Teacher. — All will agree 
 that Jesus is a capable teacher. If any 
 one ever knew the meaning and the power 
 of prayer, he did. As he started from the 
 Jordan to do his Father's will, he started 
 with a prayer on his lips, and when he 
 
 81 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 finished his work on the cross he closed 
 it with a prayer. The chnrch of Christ 
 can not carry out the Christ program un- 
 less it learns to pray. All great souls 
 have been much in prayer. All great spir- 
 itual movements have had their birth in 
 prayer. The church that desires to send 
 out ministers and missionaries must first 
 send out earnest, fervent prayers. If 
 these are sent out, the others will follow. 
 The success of the church does not rest 
 so much on the gifts of a wealthy mem- 
 ber as it does upon the prayers of a con- 
 secrated and faithful member. Before 
 Pentecost and the great revival there was 
 a prayer-meeting in the upper room. We 
 care nothing about theology — the world 
 is tired of it, too — but we are interested 
 in knee-ology. If we want to drive out 
 the demons, let us advance on our knees. 
 An Irishman was pounding the rocks on 
 the street in a city. The Catholic priest 
 was looking on. He said: "Pat, I wish 
 I could break the hearts of my people like 
 you break these stones." "Faith, and you 
 could/ ' said Pat, "if you would stay on 
 your knees like I do. ,, The church of 
 
 82 
 
CHRIST'S PRAYERS 
 
 Jesus Christ can never conquer this sin~ 
 cursed world unless it learns to pray. 
 
 On one occasion, an evangelist was be- 
 ing assisted by his young Timothy. He 
 would send the young man to the next 
 field to begin the work, and he would fol- 
 low later. The young man was sent into 
 a difficult field. It was a town that had 
 not had a revival in a long time. The 
 people did not seem to be interested in 
 such things. The young man began the 
 meeting and soon received a letter stating 
 that the evangelist could not come for 
 some time, on account of an accident that 
 had happened to one of his children. He 
 advised him to continue the meeting. Af- 
 ter a number of days he arrived at the 
 town and found that the whole community 
 was being stirred. Sinners were being 
 converted and the cold and indifferent 
 members had begun to come too. He in- 
 quired of the young minister how it hap- 
 pened, and this is what he said: "It has 
 been one of the hardest experiences of 
 my life. You said to 'go on' and the peo- 
 ple said: 'We did not ask you to hold the 
 meeting, and we want it stopped. ' " The 
 
 83 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 evangelist then asked how it happened 
 he was having such a wonderful meeting, 
 and he said: "Come and go with me to 
 the power-house. ' * He expected it was 
 a place where he would see machinery, 
 but it was a plain log cabin and in it 
 were two old women. He said: "Each 
 evening I'd come to this place and we 
 three would get down on our knees and 
 pray, and then I'd go to the meeting- 
 house and preach, and the interest 
 grew." Every church and every minis- 
 ter needs a power-house. 
 
 4 'Believe and trust; through stars and suns, 
 
 Through life and death, through soul and sense, 
 His wise paternal purpose runs; 
 The darkness of His providence 
 Is starlit with divine intents." 
 
 84 
 
VI 
 
 LEARNING TO PRAY 
 
 Text. — ' ' Lord, teaoh us to pray. ' ' — Luke 11 : 1. 
 
 •""THE children of our heavenly Father 
 * must learn to speak his language. It 
 will be our purpose in this discourse to 
 study this important duty. To whom should 
 we pray? We have heard men pray to the 
 Holy Spirit. Is this right? When the 
 disciples came to Jesus with the request 
 that he teach them how to pray, he said: 
 " After this manner pray ye." He then 
 gave them the model prayer. This was 
 to be their pattern or copy, and they were 
 to make their prayers to correspond with 
 the copy. The prayer is to be addressed 
 to our Father — to God. We must ap- 
 proach the Father in the name of the 
 Lord Jesus. Sometimes we are convinced 
 that people pray to the audience rather 
 than to God. It can be detected in the 
 tone of their voices, and we are disgusted 
 rather than edified. 
 
 85 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 One reason why some will not pray 
 in public is because they are afraid those 
 to whom they pray will criticize. On one 
 occasion a man who believed in "free 
 grace" had in his audience a man who 
 was a strong believer in " Calvinism. ' * 
 He did not want to say anything that 
 would offend him, and he tried to make 
 a prayer that was a cross between the 
 two doctrines, and he stammered and hesi- 
 tated and then exclaimed: "What is the 
 matter with me! I can not pray." The 
 man in the audience said, in reply: "Stop 
 praying to me and pray to God." I was 
 one time conducting a meeting for a man 
 who was eloquent in prayer, and he im- 
 pressed you with the thought that he 
 knew it. He prayed three times in one 
 of the meetings. His language was per- 
 fect, and he threw bouquets to God and 
 then seemed to wait for applause. You 
 could feel that there was a lack of sin- 
 cerity, and that his prayers were directed 
 at the audience, and I was reminded of 
 the reporter in Boston who said, in speak- 
 ing of a man's prayer: "He prayed the 
 most eloquent prayer that was ever pray- 
 86 
 
LEARNING TO PRAY 
 
 ed to a Boston audience." I told him 
 after the services that I felt he was cer- 
 tainly gifted in prayer, but suggested 
 that he tell God all of these things in 
 private and not in public, for I thought 
 God would understand him better than we 
 did. 
 
 Bow Should We Pray? — Paul says: 
 "I will pray with the spirit, and I will 
 pray with the understanding also. ' ' What 
 does he mean by praying with the under- 
 standing? We are told that "Elijah was 
 a man of like passions with us, and he 
 prayed fervently that it might not rain; 
 and it rained not on the earth for three 
 years and six months. And he prayed 
 again; and the heaven gave rain, and the 
 earth brought forth her fruit.' ' Let us 
 read Dent. 28:15-24. Here we find that 
 God had promised that, if the children of 
 Israel turned from him and went after 
 other gods and became disobedient, he 
 would shut up the heavens and withhold 
 the rain. Israel had become guilty and 
 deserved to be punished. Do you not 
 think that Elijah knew these promises and 
 that he presented them to his God in his 
 
 87 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 prayers! This is praying according to 
 the Word and according to the under- 
 standing also. Then, when the people 
 turned and he prayed for the rain, we be- 
 lieve that he remembered the promises 
 contained in the "Word as mentioned in 1 
 Kings' 8:35: "When the heaven is shut 
 Tip, and there is no rain, because they 
 have sinned against thee; if they pray 
 toward this place, and confess thy name, 
 and turn from their sin, when thou dost 
 afflict them: then hear thou in heaven, 
 and forgive the sin of thy servants, and 
 of thy people Israel, when thou teachest 
 them the good way wherein they should 
 walk; and send rain upon thy land, which 
 thou hast given to thy people for an in- 
 heritance." We know that we are asking 
 according to his will when we ask ac- 
 cording to his promises. The old proph- 
 et could tell God that the people had now 
 complied with his word, and he could ask 
 that God send the rain, and he did it. 
 
 How Long Should Our Prayers Be? — 
 This depends. If in private, you may 
 pray all night; but in public they should 
 be short. We knew a man who made long 
 
 88 
 
LEARNING TO PRAY 
 
 prayers. We wondered when we heard 
 him if he did not try to make up for lost 
 time. He would begin in a certain way 
 and go over Virginia, the United States, 
 then over the waters into the foreign 
 lands and come back home by way of 
 South America, closing with these sig- 
 nificant words: "Now, Lord, since we are 
 not heard for our much speaking, and 
 since thou knowest what we have need of 
 before we ask thee, give unto us the things 
 thou knowest we need. Amen." He re- 
 minded us of the man who had one prayer, 
 and it was a long one he prayed each 
 night in his home. The children knew it 
 by heart, and could repeat every word 
 of it. One night a Jew peddler stopped 
 for the night with him. When the time 
 came for worship he read the lesson and 
 all got down on their knees. The peddler 
 got tired and changed from one knee to 
 the other, hoping to rest them a little. 
 After he had grown weary he whispered 
 to one of the boys near him and asked: 
 "Is he 'most done?" The boy asked: 
 "Has he said 'Jew' yet? He is just half 
 done when he gets to the Jews." This is 
 
 89 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 not praying; it is simply saying over 
 words in God's name. We should have a 
 definite desire when we go to our Father 
 in prayer. We should go to him as a child 
 goes to its earthly father. Do not change 
 the voice; do not make a speech; do not 
 try to give God information; do not be 
 like the preacher who tried to rebuke the 
 young man for misbehaving during the 
 services when he said: "Lord, there are 
 a lot of things going on here to-night 
 that thou art not aware of." Have you 
 not heard men in prayer when you felt 
 that they were trying to give God in- 
 formation? If Peter had prayed at great 
 length when he was sinking into the 
 lake, it is morally certain that he would 
 have been under the water and dead 
 before he could have finished the prayer. 
 He wanted help and he asked for it 
 in a sensible manner. He went straight 
 to the point: "Lord, save me or I per- 
 ish." 
 
 Praying with Open Eyes. — Jesus told 
 his disciples to "watch and pray, that ye 
 enter not into temptation." Many times 
 we pray with our eyes closed to the pit- 
 
 90 
 
LEARNING TO PRAY 
 
 falls in life's pathway, and we walk right 
 into them. It is just as necessary to 
 watch as it is to pray. You have heard of 
 the story of "Raccoon" John Smith and 
 the wine. In his day it was an act of 
 hospitality to place the wine on the table 
 where all could get it — everybody (preach- 
 ers included) ; and I have always won- 
 dered why the members of the church 
 could do things the preacher could not do. 
 If it were ever right for the member to 
 drink wine, it was light for the preacher 
 too. When Smith Hn'd a minister of an- 
 other church stopped at a country tavern 
 to spend the night, the tavern-keeper put 
 the decanter on the table and they filled 
 their glasses full of wine. Smith turned 
 up his glass and swallowed the wine. The 
 preacher rebuked him by saying: "Broth- 
 er Smith, I am surprised that you would 
 drink your wine without first returning 
 thanks. It is from God we receive every 
 good and perfect gift. I am going to 
 thank God before I drink.' ' He shut his 
 eyes and began to thank God. Smith 
 reached over and got his glass and drank 
 his wine. When the preacher opened his 
 
 91 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 eyes he saw that his wine was gone and 
 he said: "You got my wine." Smith re- 
 plied: "Brother, yon must watch as well 
 as pray, I thanked God, but did it with 
 my eyes open; you did it with your eyes 
 closed and you lost your wine." 
 
 Putting Action into Our Prayers. — 
 Man must answer his own prayers. He 
 must do his part and trust God to do the 
 rest. "Ask, and ye shall receive; seek, 
 and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be 
 opened unto you." When you pray for 
 your daily bread, do not expect God to 
 rain down a mess of biscuits for break- 
 fast, but remember that he will give them 
 to you when you have earned them in the 
 sweat of your face. If you want the 
 earth to laugh biscuits, tickle it with the 
 plow. 
 
 An evangelist was conducting a meet- 
 ing in one of our cities. A woman came 
 to him and requested him to speak to her 
 husband about becoming a Christian. He 
 asked: "Have you ever spoken to him 
 on the subject?" She said she had not. 
 He then told her he would not speak to 
 him until after she had spoken. When 
 92 
 
LEARNING TO PRAY 
 
 she came to church that night her husband 
 was with her. She was happy and went 
 to the minister and said: "I went home 
 and prayed that God would give me the 
 courage to speak to my husband. I 
 watched for him, and when I saw him 
 coming through the gate I ran to him and 
 threw my arms around his neck and be- 
 gan to cry. He asked me what was the 
 matter, and I told him that he was lost 
 and I wanted him to promise me he would 
 become a Christian, and he told me he 
 had often wondered why I had not spoken 
 to him on the subject, and that he 
 would be glad to accept Christ." This 
 woman was learning how to answer her 
 prayers. 
 
 Individual Prayer. — "But thou, when 
 thou prayest, enter into thine inner cham- 
 ber, and having shut thy door, pray to thy 
 Father who is in secret, and thy Father 
 who seeth in secret shall reward thee 
 openly.' ' Do you see that mother who 
 was left with a number of fatherless chil- 
 dren? Many times she prayed to her 
 God in secret for wisdom and help in 
 training her children. Her children are 
 93 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 now filling responsible positions, and she 
 is enjoying openly the reward of indi- 
 vidual and private prayer. We had, in a 
 congregation where we labored, a man 
 who was a machinist and who refused to 
 work on Sunday. He was discharged. 
 He began to sell groceries, and his busi- 
 ness grew until he became one of the lead- 
 ing merchants of the city. Many times 
 did he tell me that he was in partnership 
 with God, and that his success was a re- 
 ward for earnest prayer. 
 
 United Prayer. — Here is the promise: 
 " Again I say unto you, that if two of you 
 shall agree on earth as touching anything 
 that they shall ask, it shall be done for 
 them of my Father who is in heaven.' y 
 The church had its birth in a prayer- 
 meeting. "And when they were come in, 
 they went up into the upper chamber, 
 where they were abiding; both Peter and 
 John and James and Andrew, Philip and 
 Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, 
 James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon the 
 Zealot, and Judas the son of James. These 
 all continued stedfastly in prayer, with 
 the women, and Mary the mother of Je- 
 94 
 
LEARNING TO PRAY 
 
 sus, and with the brethren. ' ' Thomas be- 
 came a doubter because he was not with 
 them when Jesus came. This was before 
 Jesus went back to the Father. It was 
 during the postgraduate period when he 
 was instructing his disciples in the spir- 
 itual things of the kingdom. Jesus has 
 promised to meet with us when we have 
 gathered together in prayer. He never 
 disappoints. When you remain away 
 from the prayer-meeting you have missed 
 seeing Jesus. Paul exhorted the saints to 
 meet for prayer. "Now I beseech you, 
 brethren, by our Lord Jesus Christ, and 
 by the love of the Spirit, that ye strive 
 together with me in your prayers to God 
 for me" (Rom. 15:30). 
 
 Family Prayer. — The family altar has 
 been taken away, and we have allowed the 
 things of the world to crowd God out of 
 our thoughts and out of our homes. 
 Joshua said: "As for me and my house, 
 we will serve the Lord." The men of old 
 erected their altar and worshiped God in 
 the home. Job practiced family religion. 
 Read Job 1 : 5. Cornelius prayed to God 
 with his house or family. 
 7 95 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 The father that neglects this will lose 
 in spirituality and miss getting the bless- 
 ing. When holding a meeting for one of 
 the churches in the valley of Virginia, I 
 urged the importance of the family altar. 
 I came back to the community five miles 
 from this church to conduct another meet- 
 ing. A man who had been an elder in 
 the church for many years came to me 
 and said : i ' I want you to preach that ser- 
 mon on family prayer. I have been an 
 elder in the church for years and never 
 knew the importance of it. After hear- 
 ing you, wife and I erected the altar, and 
 soon our daughter would take her turn 
 and we have been blessed, and I just want 
 others to know that it brings joy and 
 strength. I want others to get the bless- 
 ing.' ' 
 
 When holding a meeting in Washing- 
 ton City, a good woman came to me after 
 the sermon and said: "I want you to go 
 home with us." I did, and she gave her 
 experience. I shall relate it as she gave 
 it. "When you were at our home in Ten- 
 nessee, you know old Scott [this was her 
 husband] would not even return thanks 
 
 96 
 
LEARNING TO PRAY 
 
 at the table. I told him some time ago 
 that we were not going to live this way. 
 We must have an altar in our home. Scott 
 said he just couldn 't pray in public. Well, 
 one night I got the Bible and asked him 
 to read and pray, and he refused, then I 
 said, 'I will,' and I read a chapter; then 
 I told Scott to get down on his knees and 
 I prayed. The next night when I took 
 the Bible he said, 'Let me have it,' and he 
 read and prayed. We have our worship, 
 and I want you to come and be with us.'' 
 I could see that they had grown in the 
 grace and in the knowledge of Jesus 
 Christ. They had been feeding their souls 
 on the hidden manna. 
 
 There lived a family on the opposite 
 side of the street from our home. They 
 trusted in God. The man lost his posi- 
 tion and was almost in destitution. One 
 day I saw he was selling goods and that 
 he had quite a stock. He told me this: 
 "Bro. Book, one night when it seemed so 
 dark and I was discouraged, my little 
 daughter saw my grief and came to me 
 and said, 'Papa, let me ask God for help,' 
 and she asked God to give her papa some- 
 
 97 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 thing to do, and this is in answer to that 
 prayer. Many years ago I assisted a 
 young man who was in hard luck. I had 
 lost sight of him. After that prayer a 
 letter came, and it was from this man, 
 and he told how he had wanted to show 
 his appreciation for what I had done for 
 him, and he sent the check and asked me 
 to take it and purchase goods and to go 
 into business. I am here in answer to 
 the prayer of my child." This family had 
 honored God in the home and he was now 
 rewarding them openly. 
 
VII 
 
 PRAYER A NECESSITY 
 
 Text. — "Continue stedfastly in prayer, watching 
 therein with thanksgiving; withal praying for us also, 
 that God may open unto us a door for the word, to 
 speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am also in 
 bonds; that I may make it manifest, as I ought to 
 speak."— Col. 4:2-4. 
 
 ■""PHERE must be seven distinct elements 
 ■■■ in every prayer : adoration, thanksgiv- 
 ing, repentance, resolution, petition, inter- 
 cession and submission. Paul was a man 
 of prayer. He has much to say on the 
 subject, in his epistles to the churches. 
 He often requested that the brethren pray 
 for him. He seemed to think that his 
 success in the ministry was conditioned 
 upon the prayers of the saints. Feeling 
 his human weakness, and seeing the forces 
 of evil arrayed against him, he wrote to 
 the brethren at Thessalonica : "Finally, 
 brethren, pray for us, that the word of 
 the Lord may run and be glorified." 
 
 99 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 If a man like Paul, cultured, eloquent, 
 logical, Spirit-filled, and in every way 
 capable, felt that he could not succeed 
 without he had the prayers of the church, 
 can you expect your minister to be at his 
 best when you never take his name to 
 God in prayer? On one occasion I went 
 into the pulpit of a church that had some 
 of the symptoms of a would-be aristo- 
 cratic, proud, polished and critical con- 
 gregation. I was there to hold a meeting, 
 and for one time in my life felt just a 
 little anxious to say the right thing in 
 the right way. I was conscious of the 
 opinion they had of themselves and tried 
 to get their approval. I was cramped, 
 and stammered and blundered in my de- 
 livery. One evening, as I was going into 
 the pulpit, a consecrated woman, a woman 
 who believed in the power of prayer, and 
 who had evidently detected my embarrass- 
 ment, met me at the pulpit and, taking 
 my hand in hers, said: "You preach, 
 brother, and I will pray for you." Say, 
 I preached that night! I cut loose all 
 strings and it was easy. I could feel the 
 power. "You preach and I will pray." 
 
 100 
 
PRAYER A NECESSITY 
 
 I had always felt it was, "You preach 
 and I will criticize." 
 
 When I visited my old home in Vir- 
 ginia I would preach in the old church. 
 The colored people would come to hear 
 me and they would sit in the gallery. Old 
 Uncle Sam Carter, an ex-slave, would 
 break in now and then with a word of 
 prayer and it could be heard by all. He 
 came to me one time after I had preached, 
 and said: "I jis ? can't see how you 
 preach; none of de people scotch fer ye. 
 I jis' felt like I had to scotch some while 
 you was givin' dem de Word." I want to 
 say that the consciousness of this old, 
 humble saint praying for me did help. 
 If the people would prepare themselves 
 for the sermon before coming to the house 
 of the Lord, there would not be so much 
 criticism. We all agree that the minister 
 should be much in prayer before he comes 
 into the pulpit. He should get heart pow- 
 er on his knees. It is just as necessary 
 that the people, also, be in the proper con- 
 dition to hear the message, and this prep- 
 aration, too, must be made on the knees. 
 Have you prayed for your minister! If 
 101 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 you have not, begin now. Make it the rule 
 of your life to pray for him daily. 
 
 "What is prayer? One time a father 
 took his boy from the country home to 
 the city. They visited the telegraph sta- 
 tion. The little fellow heard something 
 going 1 1 Click, click, click ; click, click, click. ' ' 
 He asked his father to tell him what it was. 
 The father tried to explain, and then said : 
 "Do you want to speak to uncle who lives 
 in Calif ©mia?" The boy wondered how 
 he could be heard so far away. The father 
 had to tell him what he wanted to 
 say, and he wrote it down and handed it 
 to the operator. The operator placed his 
 fingers on the instrument, and it began to 
 say, "Click, click, click; click, click, click.' y 
 After a short time it began again, and the 
 operator wrote down some words and 
 handed them to the man. He read them 
 to the son. The uncle had received the 
 message, and this was his reply. The 
 boy could not quite understand how he 
 could speak to one so far away. He was 
 told how the sounds were carried by elec- 
 tricity and how they could be read by the 
 operator at the other end of the line. 
 102 
 
PRAYER A NECESSITY 
 
 This is like prayer. There is a connec- 
 tion between the heart of the child of God 
 and his Father. The man had to come to 
 the city, where there was a telegraph sta- 
 tion and one who could send the message 
 for him; he had to pay to send it; it had 
 to be received by the operator and then 
 given to him. Every Christian has con- 
 nection with heaven and is his own opera- 
 tor, and he can send the message without 
 money and receive the answer in his own 
 heart. Listen: "And it shall come to 
 pass that, before they call, I will answer; 
 and while they are yet speaking, I will 
 hear" (Isa. 65:24). 
 
 Stated Times to Pray. — I used to 
 wonder how that man Daniel could be so 
 courageous. He was not afraid of the 
 wicked rulers. He could defy decrees, 
 and, with his windows open towards Je- 
 rusalem, pray to his God. A little child 
 was reading about this man and she got 
 a little mixed in her pronunciation. Where 
 it says he had a spirit in him she read: 
 "He had a spine in him." She did not 
 miss it far. He had a backbone. This 
 is what many do not have. It would not 
 
 103 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 be possible for some people to have spinal 
 meningitis; they haven't the thing with 
 which to have it. The chiropractor could 
 not do business with them. 
 
 One day I read Dan. 6 : 10 and I un- 
 derstood. He gave his soul three square 
 meals each day. "And he kneeled upon 
 his knees three times a day, and prayed, 
 and gave thanks before his God." I have 
 wondered why David was a man of such 
 strong faith and could say: "The Lord 
 is my shepherd; I shall not want." One 
 day I read the secret; it is recorded in 
 Ps. 55:17: " Evening, and morning, and 
 at noonday, will I pray, and cry aloud: 
 and he shall hear my voice." He fed his 
 soul at stated times. He was regular in 
 his spiritual diet. We learn from the 
 third chapter of the Acts of the Holy 
 Spirit of certain disciples going up to the 
 temple at the hour of prayer. The man 
 who is not regular in his habits will have 
 indigestion. The church is full of spir- 
 itual dyspeptics. Their trouble is due to 
 the fact that they do not feed their spirits 
 at regular times. They become grumblers 
 and chronic kickers, and stumbling-stones 
 
 104 
 
PRAYER A NECESSITY 
 
 in the way of sinners. Let us learn to 
 give the spirit at least three meals a 
 day. 
 
 Here We Renew Our Strength. — "But 
 they that wait for Jehovah shall renew 
 their strength; they shall mount up with 
 wings as eagles; they shall run, and not 
 he weary; they shall walk, and not faint' ' 
 (Isa. 40:31). 
 
 I was on a train one time when it 
 stalled. We became impatient, and some 
 of us got out and walked up the track to 
 the engine. I asked the engineer why we 
 were waiting, and he said: "To get up 
 steam.' ' By and by the engine began to 
 move and the wheels began to turn, and 
 we were soon going at a good speed. 
 There come times when the Christian 
 finds a high grade to pull, and for a time 
 it looks to be impossible. Let him wait 
 for Jehovah in prayer, and He will renew 
 his strength, and then he can climb the 
 grade with ease. 
 
 A minister of wide reputation was an- 
 nounced to preach at a certain church 
 one day. The people came and waited un- 
 til long past the hour, but the minister 
 
 105 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 did not come. A committee was appointed 
 to go to his room to find out the cause 
 of his delay. They went to the door and 
 knocked, but received no response. They 
 opened the door and heard some one 
 praying, and this is what he was saying: 
 i ' Lord, I can not go unless you go with 
 me." He was talking to God as a child 
 talks to its parent. "God, please go with 
 me; I must have your presence and your 
 help." They waited. All at once he 
 jumped up from his knees and said, "I 
 go now, Lord, ' ' and he ran into the pulpit 
 and began to preach. Those who saw 
 and heard him, say: "His face was radi- 
 ant, and never before have we heard a 
 man preach as did he." 
 
 Take Little Things to Him in Prayer. 
 — Make out your program and then take 
 it to God for his endorsement. Do not 
 sign your name first and then demand 
 that God shall approve of it. Ask him to di- 
 rect, and be willing to accept his changes. 
 Let this be your prayer: "Cause me to 
 hear thy lovingkindness in the morning; 
 for in thee do I put my trust; cause me 
 to know the way wherein I should walk; 
 
 106 
 
PRAYER A NECESSITY 
 
 for I lift up my soul unto thee" (Ps. 
 143:8). 
 
 " Watch ye therefore, and pray always, 
 that ye may be accounted worthy to es- 
 cape all these things that shall come to 
 pass, and to stand before the Son of 
 man" (Matt. 26:41). 
 
 "In everything by prayer and suppli- 
 cation with thanksgiving let your requests 
 be made known unto God" (Phil. 4:6). 
 
 We can not go to our friends with 
 our troubles; they will soon become tired 
 of us and will avoid us. When I was in 
 deep trouble, a minister said to me: "Do 
 not go to your friends with your trouble ; 
 they do not care to be bothered with the 
 troubles of others." This cut to the quick, 
 and I wondered if it could be true that 
 humanity is so selfish. I could go to 
 Jesus and to my Father and feel that 
 they never tired of my coming, and that 
 they were willing to listen to all of my 
 complaints. Let us learn to take all 
 things — the little as well as the big things 
 of life — to them. When Job was afflicted 
 he could say: "Make me to know my 
 transgression and my sin." 
 107 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 Do you want to be cleansed from your 
 sin? Then breathe this prayer: "Wash 
 me thoroughly from mine iniquities, and 
 cleanse me from my sin. Purge me with 
 hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, 
 and I shall be whiter than snow. Create 
 in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a 
 right spirit within me." 
 
 Should we go to God with our busi- 
 ness? We are told that Jabez called on 
 the God of Israel, saying: "Oh that thou 
 wouldest bless me indeed, and enlarge my 
 coast, and that thine hand might be with 
 me, and that thou wouldest keep me from 
 evil, that it may not grieve me." God 
 granted him that which he requested. 
 
 Pray without Ceasing. — How can we do 
 it ? Breathe without ceasing ; how can we do 
 it? On one occasion at a great religious 
 gathering some one placed this question 
 on the table: "What does it mean in the 
 seventeenth verse of First Thessalonians 
 when it says: 'Pray without ceasing' f" 
 The moderator said: "This is a hard 
 verse to explain. I will appoint Drs. A, 
 B and C to write papers for our next con- 
 ference, explaining it." Just then a wo- 
 
 108 
 
PRAYER A NECESSITY 
 
 man stood up and said: "I am a poor 
 servant-girl, but I can explain it now." 
 From all parts of the room voices were 
 heard: " Explain it, then." She said: 
 "When I open my eyes to the light of 
 day, I say, 'Lord, I am blind; let the light 
 of thy countenance come into this dark 
 heart of mine and make me to behold thy 
 beauty.' When I begin to dress myself, I 
 say, 'Lord, I am spiritually naked; clothe 
 me with the robe made white in the blood 
 of the Lamb.' When I make the fire in 
 the stove, I say, 'Lord, enkindle in this 
 cold heart of mine the fire of thy love and 
 burn out all of the dross.' When I go 
 to the spring to get the water, I say, 
 'Lord, give me from the water of life that 
 flows out from the throne of God and the 
 Lamb, that my thirst may be satisfied.' 
 When I prepare the bread for breakfast, 
 I say, 'Lord, give me that hidden manna, 
 the bread that comes down from heaven, 
 that I may be strong and able to do thy 
 will.' When I sweep the floors and dust 
 the furniture, I say, 'Lord, sweep out 
 this heart of mine and remove all the sin 
 and iniquity and make it a fit place for 
 109 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 thy Holy Spirit, and may he dwell in this 
 heart as my abiding Guest and Com- 
 forter. ' This is what this verse means to 
 me. Everything I see has a spiritual sig- 
 nificance, and it suggests a prayer which 
 I breathe to my heavenly Father.' ' Then 
 some one said: "God has kept these 
 things from the wise and given them unto 
 the humble and faithful." 
 
 no 
 
VIII 
 
 PRAYERS ANSWERED 
 
 Text. — "Continue stedfastly in prayer, watching 
 therein with thanksgiving; wdthal praying for us also, 
 that God may open unto us a door for the word, to 
 speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am also in 
 bonds; that I may make it manifest, as I ought to 
 speak."— Col. 4:2-4. 
 
 UOR Whom Should We Pray?— Our 
 
 * minister, our brethren, our enemies 
 (Matt. 5:44), those who persecute us. 
 This is hard to do. I find, in order to 
 do this, I must pray first for W. H. Book. 
 No man can long count one an enemy 
 after he has earnestly and sincerely prayed 
 for him. We are exhorted to pray for 
 all men. Hear Paul's instructions to the 
 young evangelist: "I exhort, therefore, 
 first of all, that supplications, prayers, 
 intercessions, thanksgivings, be made for 
 all men ; for kings and all that are in high 
 place; that we may lead a tranquil and 
 quiet life in all godliness and gravity' ' 
 8 in 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 (1 Tim. 2:1, 2). Have you ever prayed 
 for our President! Of course you have 
 if he happened to be the one that repre- 
 sents your party. If we would pray as 
 much as we criticize, we would have a 
 better Government. Have you ever 
 prayed for the Congress of the United 
 States ? The Lord knows they need to be 
 prayed for! Have you ever prayed for 
 your mayor? We are commanded to pray 
 for all of our rulers. 
 
 Our Prayers Must Be in Faith. — 
 "And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask 
 in prayer, believing, ye shall receive" 
 (Matt. 21:22). "All things whatsoever 
 ye pray and ask for, believe that ye 
 receive them, and ye shall have them" 
 (Mark 11:24). One morning a father 
 was starting to his office, when his little 
 girl said: "Father, bring me some paints 
 when you come home to dinner." When 
 he came, the little child went to meet him, 
 and threw her arms around his neck and 
 kissed him, and said: "I thank you for 
 the paints." She had faith enough to 
 thank him before seeing the paints. This 
 is what is meant in this Scripture. When 
 
 112 
 
PRAYERS ANSWERED 
 
 we ask, believe we have the thing de- 
 sired. 
 
 When at my home in Virginia, I saw 
 an old friend of mine — a colored minister. 
 I told him when I went home I 'd send him 
 my preacher 's suit, and he said : ' ' Thanks ! 
 Fse got it now." 
 
 James tells us to ask in faith, and he 
 declares that the one who doubts has no 
 promise. An evangelist accompanied the 
 pastor to a home in which was a sick 
 child. The pastor prayed for the recov- 
 ery of the child, and when they started 
 home he said to the evangelist: "That 
 child will be dead before night. " " Then, ' ' 
 asked the evangelist, "why did you ask 
 God to spare its life? That which is with- 
 out faith is sin." "And without faith it is 
 impossible to be well-pleasing unto him; 
 for he that cometh to God must believe 
 that he is, and that he is a rewarder of 
 them that seek after 11™." Many believe 
 the first proposition, that God is, but they 
 do not believe the other proposition, that 
 he is a rewarder of them who diligently 
 seek after him. We sing the song, 
 "Standing on the Promises," and we 
 
 113 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 make loud professions of our faith in 
 God, and then are afraid to get out on 
 these promises. We are like the man who 
 was crossing the Mississippi River on the 
 ice. He got out a few yards and he heard 
 a crash; he fell to his knees and drew a 
 deep breath with the thought: "I'm gone 
 now." He soon discovered that the ice 
 had not broken. He crawled along on the 
 ice with great caution, and, when near the 
 shore, he heard a tremendous crash, and 
 he lifted his arms and sighed, and said, 
 "Surely I'm gone this time;" but he was 
 not. He looked behind him, and to his 
 chagrin he saw a four-horse wagon loaded 
 with pig-iron coming after him, and he 
 had thought that he, a poor little, insig- 
 nificant man, would break through. This 
 is the way we get out on God's promises: 
 we are afraid to take God at his word — 
 to put him to the test. 
 
 We Must Confess Our Sins. — "And 
 David said unto God, I have sinned 
 greatly, because I have done this thing; 
 but now I beseech thee, do away with 
 the iniquity of thy servant; for I have 
 done very foolishly." Job said: "Behold, 
 
 114 
 
PRAYERS ANSWERED 
 
 I am vile; what shall I answer thee? I 
 will lay mine hand upon my mouth. ,, 
 Isaiah said: "Then said I, Woe is me, for 
 I am undone; because I am a man of un- 
 clean lips; and I dwell in the midst of a 
 people of unclean lips; for my eyes have 
 seen the King of hosts/ ' 
 
 We Must Be Sincere. — "But if from 
 thence thou shalt seek the Lord thy God, 
 thou shalt find him, if thou seek him with 
 thy heart and with all thy soul." "The 
 Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon 
 him, to all that call upon him in truth' ' 
 (Ps. 145:18). "And ye shall seek me, 
 and find me, when ye shall search for me 
 with all your heart" (Jer. 29:13). "If 
 my people, which are called by my name, 
 shall humble themselves, and pray, and 
 seek my face, and turn from their wicked 
 ways; then will I hear from heaven, and 
 forgive their sins, and will heal their 
 land" (2 Chron. 7:14). The confession 
 carries with it the forsaking of our sins. 
 It is the fervent prayer of the right- 
 eous man that has power with God. Such 
 a prayer avails much. (See Jas. 5:16- 
 18.) 
 
 115 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 Loud sounds — physical demonstrations 
 — are not always evidences of praying. 
 Hosea says: "They have not cried unto 
 me with their heart, but they howl upon 
 their beds." 
 
 We Must Have Vital Connection. — 
 Many times we fail to get an answer and 
 wonder why it is. We try to pray, and 
 the words go up to the ceiling and fall 
 back on us bruised and lifeless. Why is 
 this? We are not connected with the 
 central station. I went into a store one 
 day and saw a telephone box on the wall. 
 I took down the receiver and called the 
 name, but no response. I continued to 
 ring and yell. After I had done this 
 several times, the merchant asked: "Did 
 you ring that telephone ?" I told him I 
 had. He said: "That is only a sample, 
 and it is not connected!" How many 
 times have we prayed when we were only 
 using a sample, and without any connec- 
 tion with a live wire? "But your iniqui- 
 ties have separated between you and your 
 God, and your sins have hid his face 
 from you, so that he will not hear" (Isa. 
 £9:2). The Psalmist says: "If I regard 
 
 116 
 
PRAYERS ANSWERED 
 
 iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not 
 hear." 
 
 What are some of the sins? " Whoso 
 stoppeth his ears at the cry of the poor, 
 he also shall cry himself, but shall not be 
 heard/ ' "And when ye stand praying, 
 forgive, if ye have aught against any; 
 that your Father also which is in heaven 
 may forgive your trespasses. But if ye 
 do not forgive, neither will your Father 
 which is in heaven forgive your tres- 
 passes.' ' Matthew makes it still stronger. 
 He says: "If therefore thou art offering 
 thy gift at the altar, and there remem- 
 berest that thy brother hath aught against 
 thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, 
 and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy 
 brother, and then come and offer thy 
 gift. ' ' No man can get right with God 
 who will not do all he can to make him- 
 self right with his fellow-man. 
 
 We must ask with the thought of obe- 
 dience. John tells us that "whatsoever 
 we ask, we receive of him, because we 
 keep his commandments, and do those 
 things which are pleasing in his sight' ' 
 (1 John 3:22). Disobedience breaks the 
 
 117 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 connection and puts the local station out 
 of commission. 
 
 Selfishness will put the line in trouble. 
 James tells us that we ask and receive 
 not, because we ask amiss that we may 
 consume it upon our lusts. 
 
 We Must Have the Combination. — I 
 was one time the minister of a church 
 when it was perfectly natural to get be- 
 hind with the pastor's salary. It was 
 necessary to have a running account at 
 the store, and it often ran with great 
 speed and for a long time. One day I 
 went to the proprietor and asked for my 
 statement. He went to his big iron safe 
 and tried to open it. After much exertion 
 on his part he said: "I have lost the com- 
 bination and can not get this door open, 
 and your statement is locked up in this 
 safe." It looked to me that it would be 
 easy to open the door, and I asked him 
 to let me try. He did and I went at it. 
 I soon had more perspiration than I had 
 inspiration. I gave it up in disgust. As 
 I came back that afternoon, he came to 
 the door and smiled, and said: "I've got 
 the combination now, and you can have 
 
 118 
 
PRAYERS ANSWERED 
 
 your statement. ' ' He went to the safe 
 and turned the big wheel to a certain 
 figure, and then turned the little wheel to 
 another point. I heard something click, 
 and he pulled the door open and reached 
 in and brought out the statement. I de- 
 clare unto you that I would not be afraid 
 to be turned loose on the Pacific coast 
 without a penny in my pocket if I had in 
 my possession my check-book on the bank 
 of heaven — my New Testament. The 
 checks are already signed, and the space 
 is there for me to make known my needs. 
 Listen: "No good thing will he withhold 
 from them that walk uprightly." Mark 
 you, the emphasis is on "good." He does 
 withhold from me the things that are bad, 
 and for this I am thankful. Many times 
 we ask for the things that would do us 
 harm if God were to give them. My little 
 son comes to me and begs me to give him 
 a Texas pony and a cart. I give him a 
 billy-goat and a wagon. This is just what 
 he wanted. It satisfies, and he is happy. 
 Had I given him the pony, it might have 
 been his death. We go to our heavenly 
 Father and ask for things, and he knows 
 
 119 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 just what we need and he gives it. Many 
 times I have asked for things and have 
 not received them, because I had lost the 
 combination. They are locked up in the 
 Father's safe, and to have them I must 
 be able to open the safe. What is this 
 combination? John 15: 7, 8: "If ye abide 
 in me — [big wheel — turn it], and my 
 words abide in you — [little wheel — turn 
 it] ; " — click, reach in and help yourself. 
 
 The strongest evidence of a living 
 Christianity is the experience in your own 
 heart of answered prayers. I am just as 
 certain that my Father hears and answers 
 the prayers of his children as I am that 
 I live. I could give a number of examples 
 out of my own personal experiences. 
 
 Dr. A. J. Gordon tells of two experi- 
 ences that I shall relate: "Opening my 
 mail one morning, I found a most earnest 
 appeal from a poor student in whom I 
 had for some time taken much interest. 
 He detailed the circumstances by which, 
 in spite of his utmost endeavors, he had 
 been brought into rare straits, debts for 
 board and books severely pressing him 
 until he was utterly discouraged. He was 
 
 120 
 
PRAYERS ANSWERED 
 
 extremely reluctant to ask aid, and only 
 wrote now, tie said, to tell me how earnest- 
 ly he had besought the Lord for deliver- 
 ance and to request my prayers in his 
 behalf. It was only a little sum that he 
 needed to help him out of his dilemma — 
 fifty dollars — but it was a great sum for 
 a poor student, and he was now asking 
 the Lord to send it. Having read his 
 letter with real sympathy, I continued 
 opening my mail, when, to my surprise, 
 the next letter whose seal I broke was 
 from a wealthy gentleman, expressing 
 great thankfulness for a service I had 
 rendered him a few days before, and in- 
 closing a check of fifty dollars, which he 
 begged me to accept as a token of his 
 gratitude. Instantly I perceived that the 
 poor student's prayers were heard — that 
 the second letter contained the answer to 
 the first; and, endorsing the check, I sent 
 it by return mail to the young man, with 
 my congratulations for his speedy de- 
 liverance. ' ' 
 
 He tells another experience of a young 
 student that wrote to him for help. This 
 student told how he had asked God for 
 121 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 help and how discouraged he was. Dr. 
 Gordon determined to telegraph this poor 
 student that he would be responsible for 
 one-half of the amount needed, provided 
 he could get the other half. He was at 
 the office writing the dispatch, but had 
 forgotten the street number. He had also 
 forgotten the amount the young man 
 wanted. He started to his house to get 
 the letter, and stopped in at a store to 
 pay a bill. When he asked for the amount, 
 he found that some friend had already 
 paid the bill. It was thirty-seven dollars 
 and fifty cents. He says: "When I read 
 the letter, I found the amount wanted was 
 just exactly the amount of that debt. It 
 was not my prayers that were answered, 
 for I had not been moved especially for 
 these young men. It was not my money; 
 the Lord provided the exact funds in each 
 instance; but I have told you literally 
 what happened." 
 
 Let me tell you of a wonderful insur- 
 ance policy. A man in England was en- 
 gaged in Christian work, and early in life 
 was stricken with a fatal disease. When 
 the physician told him he must soon die, 
 
 122 
 
PRAYERS ANSWERED 
 
 lie became frantic, and, tossing himself 
 from one side to the other of his bed, 
 he cried: "Lord, I can not die. I have 
 made no provision for my family. I 
 can nor die until you give me a promise 
 that you will take care of my wife and 
 my children. ' ' He had given his time and 
 his money to the cause and he was dying 
 in poverty — as the world would count 
 poverty. His eyes soon fell upon this 
 insurance policy — have you seen it? Let 
 me read it to you: "Leave thy fatherless 
 children, I will preserve them alive; and 
 let thy widows trust in me" (Jer. 49: 11). 
 This beats bank stocks and all earthly 
 wealth. It can not fail, and God will 
 honor his promise to the letter. The man 
 became calm, and, with a smile, said: "I 
 die happy.' ' He then called his family 
 and revealed to them the policy. Within 
 a few days after he went home the people 
 gave of their wealth and this family was 
 provided for. 
 
 I shall close with this story. I heard 
 Moody tell it. He said: "In the days of 
 the Civil War I was a clerk in a store in 
 Chicago. I was also the superintendent 
 
 123 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 of a Bible school, and one day I was out 
 visiting my scholars. I went into a small 
 cottage and found a woman weeping. She 
 said: 'Mr. Moody, I am so glad you have 
 come. We have lived in this little cottage 
 for months. I have worked hard to make 
 a living. We had hoped that husband 
 would soon come back from the war, but 
 we have just received word that he was 
 killed on the battlefield. What are we to 
 do? I am back in my rent, and the land- 
 lord has told me that unless my rent is 
 paid I must get out, and we have nowhere 
 to go. Let me tell you about my little 
 girl; she goes to your school. She came 
 to me when I was crying, and put her 
 arms about me and said: 'Mamma, let us 
 ask God to give us a home.' She got 
 down on her little knees, and this was her 
 prayer: 'Dear Father, my papa is dead, 
 my mother is sad, and we have no home; 
 won't you give us a home for Jesus' 
 sake?' Then she kissed me and said: 
 'Don't cry, mother; he will do it, because 
 he said he would.' " Mr. Moody said: 
 "God sent me to that cottage in answer 
 to the prayer of that child. I told the 
 
 124 
 
PRAYERS ANSWERED 
 
 story, and the people gave the money, 
 and we built a home for the widow, and 
 when the fire came it was destroyed, but 
 the first house to go up after the great 
 fire was the widow's cottage." God help 
 us to accept his promises and to put them 
 to the test. 
 
 125 
 
IX 
 
 THAT TONGUE OF MINE 
 
 Text. — "If any man thinketh himself to be relig- 
 ious, while he bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth 
 his heart, this man's religion is vain.'' — Jas. 1: 26. 
 
 HPHIS sermon is a personal one, and is 
 
 * designed to hit close home to all of 
 
 us. It is for you, and not your neighbor. 
 
 A man sent his slave to the meat- 
 market and instructed him to bring back 
 with him a piece of the best meat in the 
 market. The man brought a piece of 
 tongue. He told him to go again and 
 bring a piece of the worst meat in the 
 market. He came this time with another 
 piece of tongue. The master said: "How 
 can it be the best, and at the same time 
 the worst ?" The slave replied: "If it is 
 good, it is the best, but if it is bad, it is 
 the worst.' ' 
 
 That which gives more trouble in the 
 home, in society and in the church than 
 anything else, is the tongue. Some wo- 
 
 126 
 
THAT TONGUE OF MINE 
 
 men can sit in their homes and stab their 
 neighbors hundreds of miles away. We 
 have been amazed at the power of a gun 
 to carry a ball eighty miles — the tongue 
 can carry a deadly discharge across the 
 continent. 
 
 It is hard to tame. It is a fire, and 
 can start a conflagration that will consume 
 all of the good will in the community. It 
 is a world of iniquity, and defiles the 
 whole church. It is a restless evil and 
 full of deadly poison. It gets its supplies 
 from hell. The members of this hell-bent 
 organization are known as the "They Say 
 Company." They are an irresponsible 
 set and are accountable to no one. They 
 are social hyenas, and are not satisfied 
 with feeding on the living, but will rob 
 the graves and feed on the things that 
 have long ago begun to decompose. 
 
 If it were a law to place in quarantine 
 all who have this mouth disease, there 
 would be but few now at large. They 
 carry with them a bundle of personalities 
 and persuade you to let them unload. Be- 
 ware of the one who comes to you with 
 a secret — one who tells you that he is 
 9 127 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 going to tell you something, and that yon 
 must promise never to tell it to any one. 
 You will be a thousand times better off if 
 you do not hear it. I am ready to confess 
 that I do not believe there is a woman 
 on the earth that can keep a secret. Do 
 not get excited — I shall go further, and 
 state that I do not believe there is a man 
 on the earth who can keep a secret. We 
 must tell it to some one. I give you a bit 
 of experience. I had, in a congregation 
 where I was pastor, an old woman — a 
 good old soul, but she would talk. She 
 would make it a business to hear all of 
 the mean things some of my enemies had 
 said about me, and she would come to my 
 wife and tell her and then tell her not 
 to tell any one but me. She kept me in 
 a peck of trouble all the time. At last 
 I announced from my pulpit that I wanted 
 the women who heard mean things about 
 me to keep it from us, and that I did 
 not appreciate their kindness (?). 
 
 A physician came to me one day and 
 told me a secret, and made me promise 
 I'd never tell it to any one. My! this 
 burden was more than I could carry! 
 
 128 
 
THAT TONGUE OF MINE 
 
 I'd find myself dreaming about it. I was 
 trying to keep a secret! Then I'd talk to 
 my wife and say : l i I heard something the 
 other day that is simply awful." She 
 would get excited and ask: "What is it?" 
 Then I'd say: "I can not tell it." At last 
 I said a word here and another there and 
 left her to guess, and she did, and said: 
 i ' 1 know it now. ' ' Then I said : i ' I did not 
 say so." I got relief, however. I made 
 myself the promise then and there never 
 to let any one burden me with a secret 
 again. I mean, a lot of slander and gos- 
 sip. 
 
 We learn to tattle in childhood. We 
 get it often from the parents too. When 
 parents gossip in the presence of their 
 children they are giving them lessons in 
 this devilish art. Children are frank and 
 honest and will speak what they hear. 
 One day a man came to my home in my 
 absence and asked to see me. When I 
 came home my wife told me he had been 
 there. I knew the man to be a bad man, 
 and said: "I do not want to see him." 
 He came again, and my little child met 
 him at the door and blurted out as soon 
 
 129 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 as he saw him: "My father says he does 
 not want to see you." He was learning 
 the business. Often church-members turn 
 their children away from the church by 
 their criticisms of the minister and the 
 church. 
 
 The family is disrupted by the tongue. 
 Take the example of Miriam, Aaron and 
 Moses. The brother and sister had be- 
 come offended at Moses because he had 
 married an Ethiopian woman. When be- 
 hind his back, they said some mean things 
 about him. Let every woman and every 
 man here who has never said anything 
 mean about a brother or a sister stand up. 
 God heard what they said. Miriam con- 
 tracted the leprosy for this act. It is not 
 so fatal to talk to-day; if it were, there 
 would not be enough outside the camp to 
 look after those inside. 
 
 "Whoso keepeth his mouth and his 
 tongue keepeth his soul from troubles" 
 (Prov. 21:23). While holding a meeting 
 in one of our cities, the minister pointed 
 to a woman who was passing, and said: 
 "There goes the woman that whipped her 
 husband." We were invited out to sup- 
 
 130 
 
THAT TONGUE OF MINE 
 
 per. When at the table the name of this 
 woman was mentioned, and, without think- 
 ing, I asked : i ' Is she the one who whipped 
 her husband V Mark you, I did not say 
 she did — I only asked a question. The 
 woman who was entertaining us slipped 
 out at the back door and told the woman 
 that the evangelist said she whipped her 
 husband. When I got to my home in 
 Virginia I received a letter from this 
 place, and, being anxious to see what 
 good thing some one had written me, I 
 opened the letter and began to read: "I 
 understand that you said I whipped my 
 husband. You may have to prove this." 
 I could see myself going back to that city 
 under the direction of an officer, and I 
 fancied I could see great crowds at the 
 station ready to see me get off of the 
 train. I tried to explain, and I apolo- 
 gized, but I could never fix it. I had not 
 said she whipped her husband, but I had 
 let my mouth go off half-cocked, and it 
 got me into a lot of trouble. One ounce 
 of keep your mouth shut is worth a whole 
 bushel of apology after you have made 
 the mistake. 
 
 131 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 We are exhorted not to go up and down 
 the earth as a talebearer. A talebearer 
 will get you into trouble. How would you 
 like to have your degree from the school 
 
 of tattlers, , T.B. ! If all who have 
 
 merited this degree should be made to 
 publish it, the world would be better off. 
 
 A talebearer is like the man who 
 curses the deaf or puts a stumbling-block 
 in the way of the helpless blind. He in- 
 jures those who are not present to take 
 their part. He is a coward. He is a 
 traitor. He is a son of his father, the 
 devil. 
 
 "He that goeth about as a talebearer 
 revealeth secrets ; but he that is of a faith- 
 ful spirit concealeth the matter/ ' Never 
 repeat what you have heard until you 
 have asked three questions: Is it true? 
 Can it do me any good to tell it? Can it 
 do the party any good for me to repeat 
 it? 
 
 "A whisperer separates chief friends" 
 (Prov. 16:28). When Paul wrote to the 
 Corinthians he said: "I fear lest by any 
 means, when I come, I should find you not 
 such as I would, and should myself be 
 
 132 
 
THAT TONGUE OF MINE 
 
 found of yon as yon would not; lest by 
 any means there should be strife, jealousy, 
 wraths, factions, backbitings, whisperings, 
 swellings, tumults" (2 Cor. 12:20). The 
 whisperer is a dangerous character. Did 
 you ever attend a gathering when the 
 members began to discuss those who had 
 not yet arrived, and witnessed them pick 
 them to pieces, each new arrival joining 
 the group and helping to pick the one who 
 was yet to come? Have you seen them 
 begin again on the one who left first, and 
 so on until all were gone? I have been 
 places where I was afraid to leave, and 
 remained for my own protection. 
 
 "He that goeth about as a talebearer 
 revealeth secrets; therefore company not 
 with him that flattereth with his lips' ' 
 (Prov. 20:19). 
 
 On one occasion a good woman of my 
 congregation came to me with a profound 
 secret and wanted my advice. She said: 
 "You are the only one that knows this, 
 with the exception of my brother.' ' I 
 felt highly honored. She had flattered 
 me. In a little while another woman 
 came to me and told me the story. I 
 
 133 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 never let on. She said: "You know it, 
 for yon and I are the only ones who know 
 it." Do not get puffed up with the idea 
 that you are the only one who knows the 
 secret. There are others. If there is 
 slander in the congregation or in the com- 
 munity, remember that "for lack of wood 
 the fire goeth out; and where there is no 
 whisperer, contention ceaseth" (Prov. 26: 
 20). 
 
 "Let all bitterness, and wrath, and 
 anger, and clamor, and railing, be put 
 away from you, with all malice: and be 
 ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, 
 forgiving one another, even as God also in 
 Christ forgave you" (Eph. 4:31, 32). 
 "Putting away therefore all wickedness, 
 and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, 
 and all evil speakings" (1 Pet. 2:1). 
 
 "Finally, brethren, whatsoever things 
 are true, whatsoever things are honorable, 
 whatsoever things are just, whatsoever 
 things are pure, whatsoever things are 
 lovely, whatsoever things are of good re- 
 port: if there be any virtue, and if there 
 be any praise, think on these things" 
 (Phil. 4:8). 
 
 134 
 
THAT TONGUE OF MINE 
 
 Have you ever heard of Gossip Town, 
 
 On the shores of Falsehood Bay, 
 Where old Dame Rumor, with rustling gown, 
 
 Is going the livelong day? 
 It isn't far to Gossip Town 
 
 For people who want to go; 
 The Idleness train will take you down 
 
 In just an hour or so. 
 
 The Thoughtless road is the popular route, 
 
 And most people go that way; 
 But it's steep downgrade; if you don't look out, 
 
 You will land in Falsehood Bay. 
 You glide through the valley of Vicious Talk, 
 
 And into the tunnel of Hate; 
 Then, crossing the Add-to Bridge, you walk 
 
 Right into the city gate. 
 
 The principal street is called "They Say," 
 
 And "I've Heard" is the public well, 
 And the breezes that blow from Falsehood Bay 
 
 Are laden with Don't You Tell. 
 In the midst of the town is Tell-Tale Park; 
 
 You are never quite safe while there, 
 For its owner is Madam Suspicious Remark, 
 
 "Who lives on the street Don't Care. 
 
 Just back of the park is Slanderers' Row; 
 
 'Twas there that Good Name died, 
 Pierced by a shaft from Jealousy's bow, 
 
 In the hands of envious Pride. 
 From Gossip Town, Peace long since fled; 
 
 But Trouble and Grief and Woe 
 And Sorrow and Care you'll meet instead, 
 
 If ever you chance to go. 
 
 — Harvey M. Barr. 
 
 135 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 When you are discussing a neighbor, 
 
 Or a friend who is far away, 
 Or an absent one of the family, 
 
 With the caller of to-day, 
 Just speak of their wisdom or kindness, 
 
 'Tis all you should care to recall; 
 Pray do not allude to their failings — 
 
 Don't speak of their faults at all. 
 
 When you go to church on Sunday, 
 
 It is not the place to display 
 The knowledge you have of another's sin — 
 
 'Tis the holy Lord's Day. 
 You should go there only to worship 
 
 The God who created all, 
 And not to pick flaws in the sermon — 
 
 Don't speak of the failures at all. 
 
 When a fellow-creature has fallen, 
 
 And society stares with a frown, 
 Just stretch out your hand in assistance; 
 
 Don't strike a man when he's down. 
 Condemn not; in like provocation 
 
 Perhaps you also might fall, 
 And then it would be quite different — 
 
 Don't speak of his faults at all. 
 
 — Baltimore Sun. 
 
 136 
 
X 
 
 THE HOME 
 
 Text. — "And they went unto their own home. " — 
 1 Sain. 2: 20. 
 
 ONE of the best evidences of civiliza- 
 tion is the dwelling. Every man 
 should strive to own his own home. He 
 then becomes interested in the country 
 in which he lives, and feels himself a part 
 of it. To be able to pay taxes to the 
 Government on real estate is an honor. It 
 gives to the man a feeling of indepen- 
 dence, and he feels that his home is his 
 castle and that under its roof he has 
 security. 
 
 What It Should Be. — The home should 
 be more than a place in which to eat and 
 sleep and grunt. It should be a place of 
 fellowship. Fountains of love should be 
 seen springing up in every direction. 
 Words of kindness should be heard on 
 every hand. A home must be more than 
 four brick walls with elegant rooms filled 
 
 137 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 with fine and costly furniture. It should 
 be a place where personalities blend and 
 where affection, fidelity and loyal service 
 are rendered. No man can be a good 
 citizen who is not devoted to his home. 
 He should prize it as the most holy and 
 most sacred spot on earth. When a na- 
 tion loses its love for the home it begins 
 to decay. 
 
 There are homes in this country only 
 in name. The fathers are strangers to 
 their children. They spend their spare 
 time at the lodge-rooms, on the streets 
 and in the places of amusement. The 
 mothers spend their time at the clubs, at 
 the card parties, at the social gatherings 
 and on the streets. The children are left 
 to run at large and are being trained for 
 the criminal courts and the prisons. The 
 woman is at her best when she is a keeper 
 at home. The ambition of some women 
 is to enter politics and hold office. Wo- 
 man clamors for her rights. She should 
 know that in the home she is queen and 
 that her home is her kingdom. It is here 
 that she has the opportunity to influence 
 the national life. The mother of James 
 
 138 
 
THE HOME 
 
 A. Garfield made it possible for her son 
 to become the President of the United 
 States. Were you to study the lives of 
 the men who have become prominent in 
 the worlds history, you would discover 
 that their success was made possible by 
 consecrated motherhood. 
 
 The Home Should Be Dedicated to 
 God. — It should be just as sacred as the 
 house of worship. It should be a place 
 of worship. The altar should be erected, 
 and we should be on intimate terms with 
 Jehovah. Like the old patriarch, we 
 should exclaim: "As for me and my 
 house, we will serve the Lord" (Josh. 
 24:15). The apostle exhorts that men 
 pray everywhere (1 Tim. 5:17, 18). We 
 are to pray without ceasing (1 Thess. 5: 
 17). The curse of God rests upon the 
 home that has refused to acknowledge 
 him. "Pour out thy fury upon the hea- 
 then and upon the families that call not 
 upon thy name" (Jer. 10:25). The fam- 
 ily is older than the church. The first re- 
 ligion was a family religion. The father 
 was the priest or minister. Noah builded 
 an altar when he came out of the ark, and 
 
 139 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 he worshiped God. Cornelius, the Gen- 
 tile centurion, prayed to God with his 
 house. "When a man and woman unite 
 their hearts and start in life together, 
 they should take Christ as their silent 
 partner. They should have him always 
 as the honored guest in the home. A home 
 with Jesus in it is a wealthy home; a 
 home with no Jesus is a home of poverty, 
 even though it be made out of the finest 
 material and furnished with the most 
 beautiful and most costly furniture. 
 
 A little child was in the habit of visit- 
 ing the child in the home of a rich man. 
 It looked at the magnificent paintings and 
 the many beautiful toys, and said to its 
 little playmate : ' ' Me do not have any nice 
 paintings and nice toys in my home, but 
 me has Jesus in my home. Does you 
 have Jesus in your home 1 P , When the 
 child went home the little one in this home 
 said to the parents: "Does we have Jesus 
 in our home?" I'd rather live in a cabin 
 by the side of the road, with bare floors 
 and bare walls, and have to sleep in a 
 bed of straw, with the consciousness of 
 Jesus in my home, than to live in a man- 
 
 140 
 
THE HOME 
 
 sion with all of the modern comforts and 
 no Jesus. 
 
 The Bible Should Have a Prominent 
 Place in the Home. — It should not be one 
 of these fancy, great big books to be 
 placed on the center-table as an ornament, 
 and a thing in which to record births and 
 divorces — I beg your pardon, we do not 
 record them, bnt it should be placed where 
 it can be used by all the members of the 
 home. At least once a day one of the 
 parents should take it down and open its 
 pages and read its great truths to the 
 children. A Bible school should be or- 
 ganized in the home. Israel was com- 
 manded to make the Commandments 
 known unto their children. "Only take 
 heed to thyself, and keep thy soul dili- 
 gently, lest thou forget the things which 
 thine eyes saw, and lest they depart from 
 thy heart all the days of thy life; but 
 make them known unto thy children and 
 thy children's children; the day that thou 
 stoodest before Jehovah thy God in 
 Horeb, when Jehovah said unto me, As- 
 semble me the people, and I will make 
 them hear my words, that they may learn 
 
 141 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 to fear me all the days that they live 
 upon the earth, and that they may teach 
 their children" (Deut. 4:9, 10). "And 
 that thou mayest tell in the ears of thy 
 son, and of thy son's son, what things 
 I have wrought upon Egypt, and my signs 
 which I have done among them; that ye 
 may know that I am Jehovah" (Ex. 10: 
 2). "Therefore shall ye lay up these my 
 words in your heart and in your soul; 
 and ye shall bind them for a sign upon 
 your hand, and they shall be for frontlets 
 between your eyes. And ye shall teach 
 them your children, talking of them when 
 thou sittest in thy house, and when thou 
 walkest by the way, and when thou liest 
 down, and when thou risest up. And 
 thou shalt write them upon the door-posts 
 of thy house, and upon thy gates; that 
 your days may be multiplied, and the 
 days of your children, in the land which 
 Jehovah sware unto your fathers to give 
 them, as the days of the heavens above 
 the earth" (Deut. 11:18-21). 
 
 The Psalmist tells us that it was ob- 
 ligatory upon Israel to instruct the chil- 
 dren in the words of Jehovah. (See seven- 
 142 
 
THE HOME 
 
 ty-eighth Psalm.) They were to make the 
 words known, that the generations to 
 come might know them, even the children 
 that should be born. Timothy had known 
 the Scriptures from his childhood. He 
 had a mother and a grandmother who 
 taught them to him. 
 
 There Must Be Law in the Home. — 
 We are living in an age when discipline is 
 discouraged. If a child is not taught to 
 respect law and to render obedience in the 
 home, when it becomes grown it will, in 
 all probability, become an anarchist. The 
 old patriarch said: "For I know him, 
 that he will command his children and his 
 household after him, and they shall keep 
 the way of the Lord, to do justice and 
 judgment' > (Gen. 18:19). 
 
 "He that spareth his rod hateth his 
 son; but he that loveth him chasteneth 
 him betimes' ' (Prov. 13:24). This doc- 
 trine would be considered out of date by 
 some of the modern psychologists. "Chast- 
 en thy son while there is hope, and let 
 not thy soul spare for his crying' ' (Prov. 
 19:18). "The rod and reproof give wis- 
 dom; but a child left to himself bringeth 
 10 143 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 his mother to shame. Correct thy son r 
 and he shall give delight unto thy soul" 
 (Prov. 29:15-17). The wise man exhorts 
 us to bring up the child in the way he 
 should go. To-day we are bringing them 
 up in the way they would go. Often the 
 czar in the home is the little chap that 
 occupies the high chair, and the rattle is 
 his scepter and he permits the family to 
 compose his parliament. There is but 
 little chance for a child under such influ- 
 ences. He is never taught to mind, and 
 when he gets older he will speak of the 
 father as the "old man," and the mother 
 as the "old woman." He will never re- 
 spect law. He is destined to be a lawless 
 creature. 
 
 The True Home Should Have One 
 Law. — The parents should be of one mind. 
 When one disagrees and the child finds 
 it out, the blunder has been made. There 
 will come a time when the final test must 
 be made. Often the fatal mistake is 
 made at this time. The parents let go 
 the reins and the child is permitted to 
 have its way, and soon it has gone wild, 
 and ruin and disgrace follow. When we 
 
 144 
 
THE HOME 
 
 see a child en route to the reformatory we 
 pity the child and wonder if the fault 
 was not with the parents. Take the case 
 of David and Absalom. Children should 
 be taught to honor the parents as the 
 Lord God hath commanded them; that 
 their days may be long, and that it may 
 go well with them in the land which the 
 Lord God giveth unto them. Let us take 
 the advice of one who could speak with 
 authority: "My son, keep thy father's 
 commandment, and forsake not the law 
 of thy mother ; bind them continually upon 
 thine heart, and tie them about thy neck. 
 When thou goest, it shall lead thee; when 
 thou sleepest, it shall keep thee ; and when 
 thou wakest, it shall talk with thee" 
 (Prov. 6:20-22). 
 
 Some day we shall appreciate our 
 homes, and we shall remember the words 
 that fell from our lips which were spoken 
 in anger and which wounded to the red. 
 It is sad to think of the day when the 
 family is scattered and the voice of chil- 
 dren is no more heard, and the old peo- 
 ple sit by the open grate through the long 
 winter nights and live again the past. 
 
 145 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 The home on earth must be forsaken; 
 but we rejoice in the promise of our Lord, 
 who is preparing a home for us in which 
 there are many mansions, and which shall 
 be our eternal home, in which the Master 
 shall dwell with us. 
 
 One of the saddest things I ever wit- 
 nessed was in Pennsylvania. It was an 
 old woman who had followed her son from 
 a strange land to America, and with the 
 promise that she should live with him. 
 He married, and the wife drove the wo- 
 man from the home. She could not speak 
 the language of her new country and was 
 taken to the poorhouse to spend her days. 
 She would walk up and down the corri- 
 dors of the building, wringing her hands 
 and crying. I asked the keeper to tell me 
 what was her trouble. He told me that 
 she was heartbroken and now crazy, and 
 that she was crying because she was a 
 homeless one and in a strange land. I 
 have often wondered what it will mean to 
 be a homeless one in eternity! To go 
 into that land unacquainted with the lan- 
 guage, and no inheritance! It must be so 
 to all who die out of Christ. 
 
 146 
 
XI 
 
 NOW AND HEREAFTER 
 
 Text. — "Jesus answered and said unto him, What 
 I do thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know here- 
 after. . . . Jesus answered him, Whither I go, thou 
 canst not follow me now; but thou shalt follow me 
 afterwards."— John 13: 7, 36. 
 
 'T'HE apostles did not understand the 
 * teachings of the Master. Their 
 thoughts took the coloring of things 
 material. They were not able to grasp 
 the spiritual significance of his words. 
 They were blinded by gross materialism. 
 Jesus had to use the simplest illustrations 
 to make known his mind to them. He 
 used the most lucid arguments and held 
 before them object-lessons. 
 
 Here and hereafter; Now and . 
 
 Then . They are like two great 
 
 mountain peaks, and they may be named 
 Yesterday and To-morrow. The valley of 
 Now lies between them, and we are in 
 this valley. Yesterday is the background, 
 and we can never traverse its roads 
 
 147 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 again. We see the mountain-top of To- 
 morrow before us, and we move our feet 
 in the direction of it. This valley of Now 
 separates us from the seen and the un- 
 seen, the knowable and the unknowable, 
 the temporal and the spiritual. 
 
 We know but little. The valley that 
 separates the seen and the unseen, the 
 known and the unknown, is only a step. 
 Our dealings must have to do with the 
 Now. We eat, but do not understand 
 the laws of digestion and assimilation. 
 We use the compass, but we can not tell 
 why the needle points toward the North 
 Pole. We ride upon the waves of the 
 sea, but we can not explore all that is 
 beneath. We can not tell what fire is 
 and why it burns. We know that water 
 will quench thirst, but we can not tell 
 why it is and what it is. There are but 
 few things we know. The religious field 
 is full of mysteries. We like to speculate 
 — man is an interrogation point — he 
 wants to delve into the deep things of 
 God. This is all right; he was made to 
 think, and to acquire knowledge — he has 
 an ambition to find out things. 
 
 148 
 
NOW AND HEREAFTER 
 
 The great apostle says: " While we 
 look not at the things which are seen; for 
 the things which are seen are temporal, 
 but the things which are not seen are 
 eternal." We see the apple fall, but we 
 can not seen gravitation. We see the 
 car move, but we can not see the electric 
 current that makes it move. We see the 
 engine and watch the ponderous wheels 
 of machinery turn, but we can not see 
 the steam that causes them to turn. No 
 one has ever seen steam; we have seen 
 the vapor. We see the pieces of matter, 
 but we can not see cohesion which holds 
 them together. We find the coal, the iron, 
 the gold and the silver, but we can not get 
 hold of and analyze chemical affinity. We 
 can handle the grain of wheat, but we 
 can see the life within the grain only 
 as it is manifested through the material. 
 Who can see faith, hope, love and pa- 
 tience? 
 
 Man tries to fathom all of these great 
 questions. He tries to find out the origin 
 of God, but who, by searching, can find 
 him out? Many volumes have been writ- 
 ten on the origin of sin, and we are just 
 
 149 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 as much in the dark on this question as 
 Ave were the day Adam fell. How many 
 sermons do you think have been written 
 on the origin of the devil? Ministers and 
 theologians have preached and written on 
 the philosophy of the atonement. Angels 
 desired to look into these questions. What 
 is man? How can he live forever? "What 
 is life? What is death? Where is heav- 
 en? What is heaven? 
 
 Eevealed things belong to man, and 
 the things not yet revealed belong to God. 
 God will reveal them unto us just as fast 
 as it is possible for us to comprehend 
 them. He has century plants, and again 
 he has plants that will not unfold until 
 he comes again, when we shall have the 
 new heaven and the new earth and when 
 we shall get back in the second Adam 
 what we lost in the first. 
 
 To-day we can not understand why 
 the good woman must suffer while the 
 bad woman is blessed. We can not un- 
 derstand why the good man must meet 
 with misfortune while the bad man 
 abounds in wealth. Why is death per- 
 mitted to come into the home and fasten 
 
 150 
 
NOW AND HEREAFTER 
 
 its grip upon the form of my child? 
 When I look into its face and see it in 
 the throes of death and undergoing ter- 
 rible suffering, I find myself asking, 
 "Why does God permit it!" I can not 
 answer now. It is not given to me to 
 know now, but I shall know hereafter. 
 Some day I shall understand that all of 
 these light afflictions have wrought out 
 for me an eternal weight of glory. 
 
 On one occasion a mighty flood was 
 witnessed in a certain community, and a 
 man awoke to find that his farm had been 
 destroyed. He saw the dark side and 
 complained. He felt that he was ruined 
 financially. Soon after this flood he dis- 
 covered a vein of gold which had been 
 exposed by the madly rushing waters, 
 and it proved to be a fortune. This mis- 
 fortune was a blessing in disguise. 
 
 I plant the seed without knowing just 
 what it is, but after the flower blooms I 
 can know. We are living in the Now and 
 must have to do only with the present. 
 The old man looks back to the mountain 
 peak of Yesterday, and he lives in the 
 past; the young man stands in the valley 
 151 
 
SERMONS EOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 and anticipates the blessings to be en- 
 joyed in the To-morrow. The mother 
 and the father stand by the casket that 
 holds the ashes of their little child, and 
 sob with broken hearts, but with the vi- 
 sion of faith they behold it in the arms 
 of Jesus, as it sings a song no man can 
 sing, and they live in the hope that some 
 day, when Jesus comes back to earth, 
 they will see the child and be glorified 
 together with it. 
 
 "I know in grief like yours how more than vain 
 
 All comfort to the stricken heart appears; 
 
 And as the bursting cloud must spend its rain, 
 
 So grief its tears. 
 I know that when your little darling's form 
 Had freed the angel spirit fettered there, 
 You could not pierce beyond the breaking storm, 
 
 In your despair. 
 You could not see the tender hand that caught 
 
 Your little lamb, to shield him from all harm; 
 You missed him from your own; but never thought 
 
 Of Jesus' arm. 
 You only knew those precious eyes were dim; 
 
 You only felt those tiny lips were cold ; 
 You only clung to what remained of him 
 
 Beneath the mold. 
 But, oh, young mother, look! the gate unbars! 
 
 And through the darkness, smiling from the skies, 
 Are beaming on you, brighter than those stars, 
 Your darling's eyes. 
 
 152 
 
NOW AND HEREAFTER 
 
 'Tis said that, when the pastures down among 
 
 The Alpine hills have ceased to feed the flocks, 
 And they must mount to where the grass is young — 
 
 Far up the rocks — 
 The shepherd takes a little lamb at play, 
 
 And lifts him gently to his careful breast, 
 And, with its tender bleating, leads the way 
 
 For all the rest; 
 That quick the mother follows in the path, 
 
 Then others go, like men whose faith gives hopes, 
 And soon the shepherd gathers all he hath — 
 
 Far up the slopes. 
 And on those everlasting hills he feeds 
 
 The trusting fold in green that never palls. 
 Look up! Oh, see! Your little darling leads — 
 The Shepherd calls." 
 
 Paul is now persecuted, but after- 
 wards he shall be glorified. Some day 
 the light shall break, and we shall know 
 as we are known. Now we must look 
 through the mirror darkly, but then we 
 shall see face to face. Now we must 
 know in part, but then we shall know 
 even as we are known. 
 
 On one occasion a man stood in the 
 presence of a great crowd and gave an 
 exhibition of his skill as an artist. He 
 painted before them a picture. The 
 wheatfields and meadows appeared, and 
 then the cattle and the sheep: another 
 
 153 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 stroke of the brush, and the old home- 
 stead, then the old well and the bucket, 
 and then the father, the mother and the 
 children appeared, and when the picture 
 was completed he folded his arms and 
 waited for applause. They looked upon 
 this picture and gave evidence of their 
 appreciation by their cheers. Then he 
 took the brush and dipped it into a pot 
 of paint, and with one stroke he blotted 
 out the wheatfields and the meadows; 
 with another he blotted out the cattle 
 and the sheep, and with another the 
 faces of father, mother and children, 
 with the old homestead, were gone. He 
 then folded his hands and waited for ap- 
 plause, but no one gave it. The picture 
 was destroyed! He changed the canvas, 
 and the people began to applaud, for 
 their eyes were feasting upon one of the 
 most magnificent paintings eyes had ever 
 seen. What they had believed to be de- 
 structive strokes were constructive when 
 viewed from the right angle. 
 
 God is painting a picture for us, and 
 sometimes when trouble, misfortune, sor- 
 row and death come to us, we feel that 
 
 154 
 
NOW AND HEREAFTER 
 
 our picture is ruined, but let us wait to 
 see it from his angle when he unfurls it 
 in the eternities, and we shall then know 
 that all things have worked together for 
 our good and that what we one time 
 thought to have been destructive was 
 constructive, and then we shall under- 
 stand and rejoice. Jesus had to go away 
 from his disciples — he had to leave this 
 world of material things — in order to 
 make it possible for his disciples to have 
 the Holy Spirit and be fitted to enjoy the 
 things to be known and enjoyed in the 
 hereafter. 
 
 A child was dying. Its mother stood 
 near it. The little thing reached out its 
 hand to its mother and said: "Mother, 
 please go with me." The mother said: 
 "My child, I shall follow, but each of us 
 must make the journey alone. I can not 
 go with you, but I know One who will go 
 with you — it is Jesus. " Each of us must 
 go alone, and our loved ones must follow 
 after. Jesus will go with us all the way. 
 
 155 
 
XII 
 
 WHAT WE ARE— WHAT WE SHALL BE 
 
 Text. — "Behold, what manner of love the Father 
 hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the 
 sons of God; therefore the world kcuoweth us not, be- 
 cause it knew him not. Beloved, now are we the sons 
 of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: 
 but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be 
 like him ; for we shall see him as he is. ' ' — 1 John 3 : 1, 2. 
 
 PONS of God. — How did we become 
 ^ sons of God? By regeneration and 
 by adoption. By his own will God begat 
 us through the word of truth (Jas. 1: 18). 
 We are the children of the Holy Spirit. 
 We are the sons of God, not because we 
 have evolved into spiritual beings, but 
 because we have received the engrafted 
 Word of truth into our hearts. This 
 Word has the germ of divine life. We 
 have been born from above, and are there- 
 fore miniature Christs, human saviors. 
 Having received this Word of life 
 into our hearts, we have been made par- 
 
 156 
 
WHAT WE ARE AND SHALL BE 
 
 takers of the divine nature. Peter 
 throws light on the subject when he says: 
 11 Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle 
 of Jesus Christ, to them that have ob- 
 tained like precious faith with us through 
 the righteousness of God and our Saviour 
 Jesus Christ: grace and peace be multi- 
 plied unto you through the knowledge 
 of God, and of Jesus our Lord, accord- 
 ing as his divine power hath given unto 
 us all things that pertain unto life and 
 godliness, through the knowledge of him 
 that hath called us to glory and virtue; 
 whereby are given unto us exceeding 
 great and precious promises: that by 
 these ye might be partakers of the divine 
 nature, having escaped the corruption 
 that is in the world through lust" (2 
 Pet. 1:1-4). 
 
 We can not circumscribe or make 
 bounds for the kingdom of heaven. It 
 is not something that was established in 
 Jerusalem and for a select few. It is 
 something established within the heart 
 of the individual. Jesus startled his dis- 
 ciples by telling them that the kingdom 
 of heaven was within them. Paul tells 
 
 157 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 us that "the kingdom of God is not eat- 
 ing and drinking, but righteousness and 
 peace and joy in the Holy Spirit." And 
 again he says: "Whereof I was made a 
 minister, according to the dispensation 
 of God which was given me to you- ward, 
 to fulfil the word of God, even the mys- 
 tery which hath been hid for ages and 
 generations: but now hath it been mani- 
 fested to his saints, to whom God was 
 pleased to make known what is the 
 riches of the glory of this mystery 
 among the Gentiles, which is Christ 
 in you, the hope of glory: whom we 
 proclaim, admonishing every man and 
 teaching every man in all wisdom, that 
 we may present every man perfect in 
 Christ" (Col. 1:25-28). 
 
 We reflect outwardly what we are in- 
 wardly. Three men were standing on 
 Pike's Peak. One said: "If we had the 
 implements of war, we could make a 
 great fort here and it would be impossi- 
 ble for the enemy to take it." One said: 
 "If I had a pick and shovel and some 
 dynamite, I could go into the earth and 
 find gold and silver." The other said: 
 
 158 
 
WHAT WE ARE AND SHALL BE 
 
 "If I had some paint and a canvas and 
 a brush, I could paint a beautiful pic- 
 ture." One man was thinking of war 
 and blood, and he had to express it in 
 his words. One was thinking of money 
 — gold and silver and profit and loss — 
 and this is all he could see. The other 
 was an artist, and he could see nothing 
 in the surroundings but beauty and 
 grandeur. The man who worships his 
 farm will talk corn, wheat, hogs and 
 cattle; the one who lives for pleasure 
 will talk the dialect of the pleasure-seek- 
 ing world. 
 
 Man will put into words the thoughts 
 that are in his heart. Show me a man 
 that never talks about his wife and his 
 children, and I will show you a man 
 that does not love his family. The man 
 or woman that never talks about the 
 kingdom of heaven is not interested in 
 spiritual things. You can discover a 
 man's god by hearing him talk. Do not 
 tell me your life — let me hear your con- 
 versation and I can tell it. Out of the 
 abundance of the heart the mouth will 
 speak. Children will speak the language 
 u 159 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 of the parent. The sons of God will 
 speak the language of heaven. God is 
 our Father. The Holy Spirit is our 
 abiding Guest and Comforter, and Jesus 
 Christ is our Elder Brother. If we are 
 the sons of God, we will speak of the 
 things that have to do with the divine 
 relationships. 
 
 Sons of God now, but then! We can 
 not comprehend it; we can not express 
 it. We can not comprehend man as he 
 is. The ancients had a motto: "Man, 
 know thyself." The Psalmist was made 
 to exclaim: "What is man that thou art 
 mindful of him?" He was made but 
 little lower than God. What does the 
 child know of its own origin? What are 
 its thoughts of what it shall be when it 
 becomes a man? How its imagination 
 plays! We are now the children of God 
 — we are undeveloped and incapable of 
 comprehending all we are capable of be- 
 coming some day. Take the painter of 
 poor attainments and let him stand be- 
 fore some of the great paintings, and he 
 will be unable to comprehend all that has 
 been put on canvas. Let a mechanic who 
 
 160 
 
WHAT WE ARE AND SHALL BE 
 
 is learning his trade walk through the 
 Congressional Library building, and he 
 will be impressed with the fact that he 
 can give a lifetime to the study of this 
 wonderful building, and then there will 
 be much he has never grasped. 
 
 Our capacity to know and to love 
 must be given a chance to expand. My 
 dog knows me, but it does not know me 
 as my child knows me. It knows me as 
 the one that feeds it and pets it, but if 
 I were to die it would not grieve. My 
 child knows me in a higher sense than 
 does my dog, and if I were to die it 
 would weep and for a time grieve; but 
 it would soon forget me. It could not 
 fully understand what it had lost. I 
 have stood beside the casket that held 
 all that was mortal of a loving, sym- 
 pathetic mother, and the little child 
 would play and laugh while I tried to 
 speak words of comfort to those who 
 sorrowed. It did not comprehend all — 
 it could not know and love like the chil- 
 dren of mature age. There are degrees 
 of love. My child, when he becomes a 
 man, will love me with a deeper and a 
 
 161 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 more comprehensive love then it is pos- 
 sible for him to have now. 
 
 Our conception of God must change 
 and grow as we better understand him. 
 When I was a child I thought of God 
 as being far away, a great man sitting 
 upon a throne and looking down upon 
 the world. I do not have this concep- 
 tion of him now. I think of him as be- 
 ing a living Personality that fills the 
 whole universe, and that he is a loving 
 Father who is near me and within me, 
 providing for and helping me to live the 
 life modeled after the life of his Son. 
 
 (( wonderful story of deathless love! 
 Each child is dear to that heart above. 
 He figttits for me when I can not right; 
 He comforts me in <the gloom of night; 
 He lifts the burden, for He is strong; 
 He stills the sign and awakes the song; 
 The sorrow that bows me down He bears, 
 And loves and pardons because He cares." 
 
 "Then, speak to Him, thou, for He hears, 
 And spirit with spirit can meet; 
 Closer is He than breathing, 
 
 And nearer than hands and feet." 
 
 The soul must be trained to appre- 
 ciate heaven. Heaven is being prepared 
 
 162 
 
WHAT WE ARE AND SHALL BE 
 
 for the children of God. If unconverted, 
 unreg'enerated, undeveloped spirits should 
 be permitted to enter, they could no more 
 appreciate and enjoy it than could an 
 infant appreciate and enjoy the paint- 
 ings in an art gallery. 
 
 The kingdom is like unto a mustard 
 seed — it has in it the power of expan- 
 sion and development. Knowledge is ex- 
 perience, and no soul can be wise in spir- 
 itual things that has not had an experi- 
 mental religion. One man stands and 
 views the Acropolis, and he sees only 
 ruins; another stands and views it, and 
 he sees rising in the moonlight the 
 Parthenon. I like to think of heaven, 
 and I find myself speculating as to 
 just what it shall be. Southey said: 
 "It is fellowship with Shakespeare, 
 Dante, Chaucer and other great souls.' ' 
 John Foster said: 'It will be the place 
 where all mysteries will be explained.' ' 
 Lightfoot said: "It will be a place where 
 all evil will have been banished and only 
 love and purity will exist.' f My concep- 
 tion is that it will embrace all of these 
 definitions and more. Yes, we shall come 
 
 163 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 into the presence of the just spirits made 
 perfect — the old patriarchs, the apos- 
 tles, the martyrs — all of the redeemed of 
 every age and of every clime; and we 
 shall sit in the presence of the great 
 spirits of that new world, and listen to 
 them as they tell of the wonderful things 
 which are now incomprehensible, and we 
 shall be clothed in the righteousness of 
 the saints, with all sin destroyed, and we 
 shall be like unto the Son of God him- 
 self. It will be a place where the spirit 
 shall expand and grow in knowledge, and 
 a place of activity. 
 
 "When earth's last picture ia painted, 
 
 And the tubes are twisted and dried; 
 When the oldest colors have faded, 
 
 And the youngest critic has died — 
 We shall rest — and, faith, we shall need it — 
 
 Lie down for an aeon or two, 
 Till the Master of all good workmen 
 
 Snail set us to work anew. 
 
 "And those that are good shall be happy; 
 They shall sit in a golden chair; 
 They shall splash at a ten-league canvas 
 
 With brushes of comet's hair; 
 They shall find real saints to draw from — 
 
 Magdalene, Peter and Paul; 
 They shall work for an age at a sitting, 
 And never get tired at all. 
 164 
 
 
WHAT WE ARE AND SHALL BE 
 
 "And only the Master Shall praise ua, 
 
 And only the Master shall blame; 
 And no one shall work for money, 
 
 And no one shall work for fame; 
 But each for tlhe joy of the working, 
 
 And each in his separate star, 
 Shall draw the thing as he sees it 
 
 For the God of things as they are." 
 
 This is Paul's picture: "For ye have 
 received not the spirit of bondage again 
 to fear; but ye have received the Spirit 
 of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, 
 Father. The Spirit himself beareth 
 witness with our spirit, that we are the 
 children of God; and if children, then 
 heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with 
 Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, 
 that we may be also glorified together. 
 For I reckon that the sufferings of this 
 present time are not worthy to be com- 
 pared with the glory which shall be re- 
 vealed in us. Wherefore we faint not; 
 but though our outward man is decaying, 
 yet our inward man is renewed day by 
 day. For our light affliction, which is for 
 the moment, worketh for us more and 
 more exceedingly an eternal weight of 
 glory; while we look not at the things 
 
 165 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 which are seen, but at the things which 
 are not seen: for the things which are 
 seen are temporal; but the things which 
 are not seen are eternal." 
 
 Let us look upon John's picture: 
 1 'Behold, the tabernacle of God is with 
 men, and he will dwell with them, and 
 they shall be his people, and God him- 
 self shall be with them, and be their 
 God. And God shall wipe away all tears 
 from their eyes; and there shall be no 
 more death, neither sorrow, nor pain: 
 for the former things are passed away." 
 
 The Psalmist reaches the climax when 
 he says: "As for me, I will behold thy 
 face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied 
 when I awake with thy likeness." Sin- 
 ner, we beg you accept sonship in this 
 royal family. 
 
 166 
 
XIII 
 
 WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 Text. — "And as it is appointed unto men once to 
 die, but after this the judgment. ' ' — Heb. 9 : 27. 
 
 WHEN just a young man the writer 
 stood in the presence of deep sor- 
 row. A young father had heard the call. 
 His body lay in the casket in the cold 
 embrace of death. The little daughter, 
 clinging to the skirts of a broken-hearted 
 mother, cried: "Let me kiss him too." 
 I found myself asking: "Why all of this 
 sorrow? What is the cause of death V 9 
 The answer came: "By the transgres- 
 sion of the law sin entered the world, 
 and death is the result of sin. ,, 
 
 When the minister of a church in 
 Virginia, one of the elders invited me 
 to go with him to the cemetery — the city 
 of the dead. Without thinking, I told 
 him I had no interest in that place, and 
 did not care to go. I noticed tears well- 
 
 167 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 ing up in his eyes and running down his 
 cheeks, when he replied that he did have 
 an interest there. I saw my mistake. 
 Poor fellow! it had been but a short time 
 since he had taken all that remained 
 visible of his child and his devoted com- 
 panion, and in that sacred enclosure he 
 had placed it beneath the sod! 
 
 Sooner or later all of us will have 
 an interest in this city. At this very 
 moment many of us have a desire to 
 steal away from the busy scenes of life 
 and spend hours among the marble slabs. 
 And yet, our loved ones are not there. 
 
 The grave holds only that which is 
 mortal. 
 
 " There is a stream whose narrow tide 
 The known and unknown worlds divide, 
 
 Where all must go; 
 Its waveless waters, dark and deep, 
 'Mid sullen silence, downward sweep 
 
 With moanless flow. 
 
 "I saw where, at that dreary flood, 
 A smiling infant prattling stood, 
 
 Whose hour was come. 
 Untaught of ill, it neared the tide, 
 Sank as to cradled rest, and died, 
 
 Like going home. 
 
 168 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 "Followed with languid eye anon, 
 A youth diseased and pale and wan; 
 
 And there alone 
 He gazed upon the leaden stream, 
 And feared to plunge — I heard a scream, 
 
 And lie was gone. 
 
 "And then a form in manhood's strength 
 Came bustling on, till there at length 
 
 He saw life's bound. 
 He shrank, and raised the bitter prayer 
 Too late — his shriek of wild despair 
 
 The waters drowned. 
 
 "Next stood, upon that surgeless shore, 
 A being bowed with many a score 
 
 Of toilsome years. 
 Earth-bound and sad, 'he left the bank, 
 Back turned his dimming eye, and sank, 
 
 Ah! full of fears. 
 
 "How bitter must thy waters be, 
 
 Death! How hard a thing, ah, me! 
 
 It is to die ! 
 
 1 mused — when to that stream again 
 Another child of mortal man 
 
 With smiles drew nigh. 
 
 " ' 'Tis the last pang,' he calmly said; 
 'To me, O Death! thou hast no dread; 
 Saviour, I come! 
 Spread but thine arms on yonder shore — 
 I see! Ye waters, bear me o'er; 
 There is my home.' " 
 
 Man is a triune being. He is com- 
 posed of body, soul and spirit. "And 
 169 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 the very God of peace sanctify you whol- 
 ly; and I pray God your spirit and soul 
 and body be preserved blameless at the 
 coming of our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 
 Thess. 5:23). 
 
 God breathed into man the breath of 
 lives and he became a living soul. He pos- 
 sesses chemical life, vegetable life, animal 
 life and spiritual life. Like the temple, 
 he has the outer court — his body — which 
 was made first, and of the earth, and is 
 therefore earthy; the holy place — the soul 
 — which is the life, the connecting link 
 between the body and the spirit; and the 
 most holy place — the spirit — which is the 
 part that thinks, loves, chooses and lives 
 on forever. 
 
 The body which is made out of the 
 earth is the house in which the spirit 
 lives. The spirit came from God (for we 
 are also his offspring) ; the soul which is 
 physical life binds body and spirit to- 
 gether. 
 
 Death is separation. Physical death 
 is the separation of the spirit from the 
 body — the opening of the door and the 
 going out of the occupant. "For it is 
 
 170 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 soon cut off, and we fly away" (Ps. 90: 
 10). Notice that it is we that fly away. 
 
 "Who knoweth the spirit of man that 
 goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast 
 that goeth downward to the earth! . . . 
 Then shall the dust return to the earth 
 as it was : and the spirit shall return unto 
 God who gave it" (Eccl. 3:21; 12:7). 
 
 The spiritual death was the separation 
 of man from God when he transgressed 
 the law in the Garden of Eden; and the 
 second death spoken of in the Word will 
 be man's final separation from God. Life 
 is union or fellowship with God. Adam 
 brought death, and Christ, the second 
 Adam, the Lord of glory, brought life (1 
 John 1 ; John 2 : 25, 26 ; 14 : 6) . Disobedi- 
 ence separates me from God; obedience 
 unites me with God. 
 
 Man does not possess a spirit; he is 
 a spirit, and possesses a body. You do 
 not read anything in the Bible about an 
 immortal soul; neither do you read of a 
 mortal soul. Mortality and immortality 
 have to do with the body and not with the 
 spirit. The body is mortal because of 
 Adam's sin; and it will get its immor- 
 
 171 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 tality in the resurrection through Christ. 
 Christ is the only one who has immor- 
 tality. 
 
 Read 1 Tim. 6:15, 16; Rom. 8:23; 1 
 Cor. 15:21, 25, 42, 58. 
 
 "Let not sin therefore reign in your 
 mortal body" (Rom. 6:12). "But if the 
 Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from 
 the dead dwell in you, he that raised up 
 Christ from the dead shall also quicken 
 your mortal bodies by his Spirit that 
 dwelleth in you" (Rom. 8:11). 
 
 "For this corruptible must put on in- 
 corruption, and this mortal must put on 
 immortality" (1 Cor. 15:53). The body, 
 which is mortal, sleeps in the dust of the 
 earth; but the spirit, which emanated 
 from God, must live on in a conscious state 
 somewhere. It must either exist in God's 
 presence or in the presence of the devil. 
 But some one is ready to ask: "Can the 
 spirit exist apart from the body?" Evi- 
 dently Paul thought so when he said: "I 
 knew a man in Christ above fourteen 
 years ago, (whether in the body I cannot 
 tell: or whether out of the body I can not 
 tell: God knoweth;) such an one caught 
 
 172 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 up to the third heaven. And I knew such 
 a man, (whether in the body, or out of 
 the body, I cannot tell; God knoweth;) 
 how that he was caught up into paradise, 
 and heard unspeakable words, which it is 
 not lawful for any man to utter" (2 Cor, 
 12:2-4). 
 
 The writer believes that this man was 
 Paul and that he had reference to the 
 time when he was stoned and left for 
 dead at Lystra. He speaks of the dual 
 man in 2 Cor. 4:16. "For which cause 
 we faint not ; but though our outward man 
 perish, yet the inward man is renewed 
 day by day." Let us not forget that the 
 real man is the spirit, and that the body 
 is the house in which the man lives, while 
 sojourning in this world. If the man so 
 desires, he can give his house to destruc- 
 tion. (See 1 Cor. 13:3.) 
 
 Can the man live in a conscious state 
 when out of this house? Moses and 
 Elijah were evidently conscious when on 
 the Mount of Transfiguration, and surely 
 they were not in those mortal bodies they 
 possessed when on earth. (See Matt. 17.) 
 
 When Christ spake of Abraham, Isaac 
 
 173 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 and Jacob, who had long ago departed this 
 life, he spake of them as being alive and 
 conscious. (See Matt. 22:23-33.) 
 
 Paul evidently believed this doctrine 
 when he said: "For we know that if our 
 earthly house of this tabernacle were dis- 
 solved, we have a building of God, an 
 house not made with hands, eternal in the 
 heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly 
 desiring to be clothed upon with our house 
 which is from heaven; if so that being 
 clothed we shall not be found naked. For 
 we that are in this tabernacle do groan, 
 being burdened: not for that we would be 
 unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality 
 might be swallowed up of life. Now he 
 that hath wrought us for the selfsame 
 thing is God, who also hath given unto us 
 the earnest of the Spirit. Therefore we 
 are always confident, knowing that, whilst 
 we are at home in the body, we are ab- 
 sent from the Lord: (for we walk by 
 faith, not by sight:) we are confident, I 
 say, and willing rather to be absent from 
 the body, and to be present with the Lord. 
 Wherefore we labor, that, whether pres- 
 ent or absent, we may be accepted of him. 
 
 174 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 For we must all appear before the judg- 
 ment seat of Christ; that every one may 
 receive the things done in his body, ac- 
 cording to that he hath done, whether it 
 be good or bad" (2 Cor. 5:1-11). 
 
 Peter tells us that Christ preached to 
 the spirits in prison — those who were 
 dead — during the three days he was in 
 the unseen world (1 Pet. 3:17-21; 4:6). 
 
 Now, if Christ preached, he must have 
 been conscious, and those to whom he 
 preached must have been conscious also, 
 or the preaching could not have done them 
 much good. Let us take the Word just as 
 it reads and not try to explain it away. 
 
 When the spirit leaves the body it does 
 not cease to live. It is even more alive. 
 Let me illustrate it in this way: In my 
 native county in old Virginia a beautiful 
 spring bursts out from the mountain-side ; 
 its clear, sparkling, limpid waters mean- 
 der down the valley, percolating through 
 the rocks, laughing and singing as it 
 widens and deepens in its course to the 
 great ocean. Abruptly this beautiful 
 stream sinks into the earth; it disappears 
 from our vision; but it is not lost. It is 
 12 175 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 moving on underground; and, after 
 awhile, we see it as it bursts out into New 
 River, where it unites its music with the 
 millions of little streams with which it 
 is now having fellowship. 
 
 This represents the life of the Chris- 
 tian. At first it makes its appearance in 
 the form of the little child; it grows and 
 deepens in experience maybe for three- 
 score years and ten, when it abruptly dis- 
 appears from our vision, and there in the 
 unseen world it moves on and on; until 
 the judgment, when we shall see what we 
 thought had been lost is now visible in the 
 great ocean of eternity, having fellowship 
 with that innumerable company, the 
 blood- washed throng who have made their 
 robes white in the blood of the Lamb. 
 
 11 Think of— 
 
 Stepping on shore, and finding it paradise! 
 
 Of taking hold of a hand, and finding it Christ's 
 
 hand; 
 Of breathing a new air, and finding it celestial air; 
 Of feeling invigorated, and finding it spiritual 
 
 strength ; 
 Of passing from storm and tempest to an unbroken 
 
 calm; 
 Of waking up, and finding it in the presence of 
 
 Jesus. ' ' 
 
 176 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 "Though I stoop 
 Into a dark, tremendous 6ea of cloud, 
 It is but for a time. I press God's lamp 
 Close to my heart; its splendor, soon or late, 
 Wall pierce the gloom; I shall emerge somewhere. ' ' 
 
 Does the spirit go to its final place of 
 reward at death? We think not. All go 
 to the same place, but are in different 
 states. All are conscious of their doom 
 — and happy or miserable, as the case may 
 be — and are awaiting their final reward. 
 Let us illustrate: A and B are in prison, 
 charged with murder. A is innocent and 
 knows he can establish his innocence. He 
 longs for the court to convene, when he 
 shall get his liberty. B is guilty and 
 knows his guilt will be proved. He is 
 miserable and dreads for the court to con- 
 vene. It means his condemnation. Both 
 are in the same place, but are separated 
 by a hall- way; they can see, and talk to 
 each other; and, while they are under the 
 same roof and within the same walls, they 
 are separated. This is illustrated in the 
 sixteenth chapter of Luke. The rich man 
 and Lazarus are in the unseen world — 
 Hades; but they are in different states; 
 
 177 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 a great gulf separates them. They can 
 talk to each other and see each other ; but 
 the gulf is fixed and they can not cross 
 it. One is happy and the other is in tor- 
 ment. Each knows what the verdict is to 
 be. 
 
 In the twenty-eighth chapter of First 
 Samuel we have an account of the witch, 
 and Samuel being brought up. Samuel 
 said: "Why hast thou disquieted me, to 
 bring me up? . . . And to-morrow shalt 
 thou and thy sons be with me." 
 
 Now, we do not believe that Samuel, 
 the prophet, the man after God's own 
 heart, went to hell — the place of the wicked. 
 Neither do we believe that Saul, the 
 wicked king, the man who was so vile 
 that God would have nothing to do with 
 him, and his wicked sons, who were in 
 league with the devil, went to heaven. 
 But we learn from Scripture that they 
 are to be together. Where? In Hades — 
 the unseen world, there to remain till the 
 day of judgment. Jesus says: "Marvel 
 not at this: for the hour is coming, in 
 which all that are in the graves shall hear 
 his voice and shall come forth; they that 
 
 178 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 have done good, unto the resurrection of 
 life; and they that have done evil, unto 
 the resurrection of condemnation ' ' (John 
 5:28, 29). 
 
 Daniel says: "And at that time shall 
 Michael stand up, the great prince which 
 standeth for the children of thy people; 
 and there shall be a time of trouble, such 
 as never was since there was a nation 
 even to that same time; and at that time 
 thy people shall be delivered, every one 
 that shall be found written in the book. 
 And many of them that sleep in the dust 
 of the earth shall awake, some to ever- 
 lasting life, and some to shame and ever- 
 lasting contempt. And they that be wise 
 shall shine as the firmament; and they 
 that turn many to righteousness, as the 
 stars for ever and ever" (Dan. 12:1-3). 
 
 Where are our children — infants? 
 
 Let us read Revelation, chapter 14: 
 1 l And I heard a voice from heaven, as the 
 voice of many waters, and as the voice of 
 a great thunder : and I heard the voice of 
 harpers harping with their harps: and 
 they sung as it were a new song before 
 the throne, and before the four beasts, 
 
 179 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 and the elders: and no man could learn 
 that song but the hundred and forty and 
 four thousand, which were redeemed from 
 the earth. These are they which were not 
 denied with women; for they are virgins. 
 These are they which follow the Lamb 
 whithersoever he goeth. These were re- 
 deemed from among men, being the first- 
 fruits unto God and to the Lamb. And 
 in their mouth was found no guile: for 
 they are without fault before the throne 
 of God" (14:2-5). 
 
 Who are these who have the Father's 
 name written upon their foreheads; who 
 are without fault, without guile; and who 
 are the firstfruits of redemption; and 
 who sing a song that no man can sing; 
 and who follow the Lamb whithersoever 
 Jie goeth? They can not be men and 
 women, for they are with fault, and guile 
 is in, or has been in, their mouths. They 
 sing a song that no man can sing. Who 
 are they? We believe that they are those 
 who die in infancy — before they have 
 committed sin. They are redeemed 
 without any volition of their own and are 
 the firstfruits of redemption: man is re- 
 
 180 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 deemed by his own volition when he ac- 
 cepts the gospel plan of salvation. These, 
 of the one hundred and forty and four 
 thousand — a definite number for an in- 
 definite number — follow the Lamb whith- 
 ersoever he goeth. 
 
 When shall we go to our final place 
 of reward! When Christ gets the place 
 ready for us. When he gets this place 
 ready he will come for us. Hear his 
 sweet promise: "Let not your heart be 
 troubled; ye believe in God, believe also 
 in me. In my Father's house are many 
 mansions : if it were not so, I would have 
 told you. I go to prepare a place for 
 you. And if I go and prepare a place 
 for you, I will come again, and receive 
 you unto myself; that where I am, there 
 ye may be also" (John 14:1-3). He is 
 now preparing this place for his own. 
 He will build the mansion, but we must 
 furnish the material. It is said that a 
 wealthy society woman dreamed that she 
 had died and had gone to heaven. She 
 saw one of the most magnificent man- 
 sions her eyes had ever gazed upon. She 
 asked the apostle Peter to tell her who 
 
 181 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 occupied that house. Peter told her that 
 Sister A would live in it. She exclaimed: 
 "This is the name of my servant-girl. ' ' 
 Peter said: "She sent up the material 
 which represented her daily life, and the 
 Master constructed the building out of 
 this material. ,, "Where shall I live?" 
 she asked. Peter pointed to a cabin. The 
 woman said: "No; I shall not live in such 
 a place. I lived in a beautiful mansion 
 down in yonder world. I shall not live 
 in a place of this sort." Peter replied: 
 "We did the best we could for you with 
 the material you furnished.' ' She awoke 
 with the prayer: "Lord, send me back 
 and give me another chance to furnish 
 better material for my home." 
 
 Paul tells us in 1 Cor. 15:20, 21: 
 "Now is Christ risen from the dead, 
 and become the firstfruits of them that 
 slept." Now, if Christ is the firstfruits, 
 no one ever came from the dead to die 
 no more before his resurrection. We 
 learn that some were raised by miracu- 
 lous power, but they died again. 
 
 But we are told that when Christ 
 came from among the dead he abolished 
 
 182 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 the intermediate state and took all of 
 the redeemed to heaven with him. If 
 that be true, it seems that David would 
 have been among that number; but we 
 hear Peter say, after the resurrection 
 and the ascension: "Men and brethren, 
 let me freely speak unto you of the patri- 
 arch David, that he is both dead and 
 buried, and his sepulchre is with us unto 
 this day . . . For David is not ascended 
 into heaven" (Acts 2:29, 34). 
 
 The New Testament speaks of a cer- 
 tain day when we shall be judged and 
 come into the possession of our reward. 
 "And this is the will of him that sent 
 me, that every one which seeth the Son, 
 and believeth on him, may have ever- 
 lasting life: and I will raise him up at 
 the last day" (John 6:40). See the 
 logical statement made by Paul: "But 
 every man in his own order: Christ the 
 firstfruits; afterward they that are 
 Christ's at his coming. Then cometh the 
 end, when he shall have delivered up the 
 kingdom to God, even the Father; when 
 he shall have put down all rule and all 
 authority and power. For he must reign 
 
 183 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 till he hath put all enemies under his 
 feet" (1 Cor. 15:22-28). 
 
 "For I am now ready to be offered, 
 and the time of my departure is at hand. 
 I have fought a good fight. I have fin- 
 ished my course. I have kept the faith 
 [past] : henceforth there is laid up for 
 me a crown of righteousness [present], 
 which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall 
 give me at that day [future] ; and not to 
 me only, but unto all them also that love 
 his appearing" (2 Tim. 4:6-8). 
 
 "Behold, I show you a mystery; we 
 shall not all sleep, but we shall be 
 changed, in a moment, in the twinkling 
 of an eye, at the last trumpet: for the 
 trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall 
 be raised incorruptible, and we shall 
 be changed. For this corruptible must 
 put on incorruption, and this mortal 
 must put on immortality" (1 Cor. 15: 
 51-54). 
 
 Those who are dead shall be raised, 
 and those who are here at Christ's com- 
 ing shall not die, but be changed. Jesus 
 said at the grave of Lazarus: "I am the 
 resurrection, and the life: he that be- 
 
 184 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 lieveth in me, though he were dead, yet 
 shall he live: and whosoever liveth and 
 believeth in me shall never die" (John 
 11:25, 26). Those who remain at his 
 coming must be changed, and in the 
 change become immortal. "But I would 
 not have you ignorant, brethren, con- 
 cerning them which are asleep, that ye 
 sorrow not, even as others which have 
 no hope. For if we believe that Jesus 
 died and rose again, even so them also 
 which sleep* in Jesus will God bring 
 with him. For this we say unto you by 
 the word of the Lord, that we which are 
 alive and remain unto the coming of the 
 Lord shall not prevent [go before] them 
 which are asleep.* For the Lord him- 
 self shall descend from heaven with a 
 shout, with the voice of the archangel, 
 and with the trump of God: and the 
 dead in Christ shall rise first [that is, 
 before the living shall be caught up]. 
 Then we which are alive and remain 
 shall be caught up together with them 
 in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the 
 
 * Remember that sleep refers to the body. 
 185 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 air: and so shall we ever be with the 
 Lord" (1 Thess. 4:13-17). 
 
 At this time we shall get our reward. 
 "For we must all appear before the 
 judgment seat of Christ; that every one 
 may receive the things done in his body, 
 according to that he hath done, whether 
 it be good or bad" (2 Cor. 5: 10). "And 
 I saw the dead, small and great, stand 
 before God; and the books were opened: 
 and another book was opened, which is 
 the book of life; and the dead were 
 judged out of those things which were 
 written in the books according to their 
 works" (Rev. 20:12-15). (See Matt. 25 
 and Eev. 22:10-12.) 
 
 "And I saw a new heaven and a new 
 earth: for the first heaven and the first 
 earth were passed away; and there was 
 no more sea. And I John saw the holy 
 city, new Jerusalem, coming down from 
 God out of heaven,* prepared as a bride 
 adorned for her husband. And I heard 
 a great voice out of heaven saying, Be- 
 
 * Heaven here is the paradise or the state of the 
 saved in the unseen world. The new Jerusalem is the 
 church of Christ — the redeemed. 
 186 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 hold, the tabernacle of God is with men, 
 and he shall dwell with them, and they 
 shall be his people, and God himself 
 shall be with them, and shall be their 
 God. And God shall wipe away all tears 
 from their eyes; and there shall be no 
 more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, 
 neither shall there be any more pain: for 
 the former things are passed away. And 
 he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, 
 I make all things new. And he said 
 unto me, Write: for these words are true 
 and faithful" (Rev. 21:1-5). 
 
 In this world of sorrow we shall shed 
 tears of grief. Do you not remember 
 when you were a little tot, how you 
 would go to your mother with your 
 troubles, with tears streaming down your 
 cheeks, and she would tenderly put her 
 arms around you, take you upon her lap 
 and kiss away the tears? Soon you 
 would forget all about your troubles and 
 your heart would be full of joy. Some 
 day, blessed be his name, our Lord will 
 kiss away the tears, and we will forget all 
 of our trials and cares and shall rejoice 
 in his presence. 
 
 187 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 Death Becomes a Blessing. — This 
 world is not our home. Man will become 
 weary and tired of this earthly home. 
 He has in him something that will after 
 awhile long for eternity. I remember 
 meeting an aged woman who sat and 
 patiently waited to be removed. She 
 complained of being lonesome. Her 
 friends and associates had all gone, 
 things had changed and she had out- 
 grown her environments. 
 
 The twelfth chapter of Ecclesiastes 
 gives a graphic description of old age. 
 Read it. 
 
 THERE ISN'T ANY ONE FOR ME TO PLAT 
 WITH ANY MORE. 
 
 The glow is fading from the western sky, 
 And, one by one, my comrades, as of yore, 
 
 Have given up their play and said good-by; 
 
 There isn 't any one for me to play with any more. 
 
 Don't ery, dear heart! for I am worn and old; 
 
 No longer have I largeness in my store; 
 E'en love's best gifts to me I could not hold; 
 
 There isn't any one for me to play with any more. 
 
 I miss the tender handclasp of old friends, 
 
 The kisses of loved ones gone before; 
 'Tis lonely, when the heart first comprehends 
 There isn't any one for me to play with any more. 
 188 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 I need these loving hearts, so fond and leal; 
 
 I want tihem in my arms, as heretofore; 
 When they are readhed, I shall no longer feel 
 
 There isn 't any one for me to play with any more. 
 — James Terry White. 
 
 Some one may desire to know what 
 we mean by the "unseen world.' ' It is 
 all about us. If we could only pull aside 
 the thin veil, we should be able to see 
 the unnumbered host. We believe that 
 they are with us, and near us, and are 
 looking down upon us in our walks of 
 life. Read Hebrews, eleventh chapter, 
 and you will have mentioned some of the 
 number that compose the "great cloud 
 of witnesses' ' as mentioned in the twelfth 
 chapter. 
 
 The Lord help us to be true and faith- 
 ful, as we think of the beautiful land of 
 the dead. 
 
 By the hut of the peasant, where poverty weeps, 
 
 And nigh to the towers of the king, 
 Close, close by the cradle where infancy sleeps 
 
 And joy loves to linger and sing; 
 
 Lies a garden of light filled with heaven's perfume, 
 
 Where never a teardrop is shed, 
 And the rose and the lily are ever in bloom — 
 
 "Itis the beautiful land of the dead. 
 189 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 Each moment of life a messenger comes 
 
 And beckons man over the way; 
 Through the heart-sobs of women and the rattle of drums 
 
 The army of mortals obey. 
 
 Few lips that have kissed not a motionless brow; 
 
 A face from eadh fireside has fled, 
 And we know that our loved ones are watching us new 
 
 In the beautiful land of the dead. 
 
 Not a charm that we knew ere the boundary was crossed, 
 
 As we stood in the valley alone; 
 Not a trait that we prize in our darlings is lost — 
 
 They are fairer and lovelier grown. 
 
 As the lily bursts forth when the shadows of night 
 
 Into bondage of daybreak are led, 
 So they bask in the glow by the pillar of ligttrt 
 
 In the beautiful land of the dead. 
 
 Oh! the dead, our dead I Our beautiful deadl 
 They are close to the heart of eternity wed. 
 
 When the last deed is done and the last word is said, 
 We shall meet in the beautiful land of the dead. 
 
 — Unknown. 
 
 May God comfort you in this dark 
 hour; at a time when the heartstrings 
 are breaking; when the clouds are dark 
 and heavy, and he is anxious to help you 
 to see the light, which after awhile shall 
 come through the rift in the clouds: 
 therefore he sends this token of love: 
 "Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and he 
 
 190 
 
WHERE ARE OUR DEAD? 
 
 shall sustain thee" (Ps. 55:22). Hear 
 him say to you: 
 
 "Child of my love, lean hard, 
 And let me feel the pressure of thy care. 
 I know thy burden, child, I shaped it; 
 Poised it in mine own hand; made no proportion 
 In its weight to tbdne unaided strength: 
 For even as I laid it on, I said, 
 I snail be near, and while he leans on me 
 This burden shall be mine, not his; 
 So shall I keep my child within the circling arms 
 Of my own love. Here lay it down, nor fear 
 To impose it on a shoulder which upholds 
 The government of worlds. Yet closer come; 
 Thou art not near enough; I would embrace thy care 
 So I might feel my child reposing on my breast. 
 Thou lovest me? I knew it. Doubt not, then: 
 But, loving me, lean herd.'* 
 
 191 
 
XIV 
 
 HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 
 
 Text. — "For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of 
 rejoicing? Are not even ye, before our Lord Jesus at 
 his coming? For ye are our glory and our joy. " — 
 1 Thess. 1 : 19, 20. 
 
 T^HEEE are times when all of us are 
 * interested in this question. Many 
 times the minister goes into the homes of 
 the members of his charge, and they do 
 not care to talk about things that are 
 spiritual and things that are eternal. 
 The death angel has visited your home 
 and taken one of your loved ones. When 
 the minister comes again you will get 
 the family album and turn to a picture 
 that is more precious now than gold, and 
 you will take it into your hand and press 
 it to your lips, and then talk tenderly of 
 the absent one, and you will be interested 
 in all of the Scripture that speaks of the 
 state of the dead. Then you will ask a 
 
 192 
 
HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 
 
 question — one that is constantly coming 
 up for settlement: "Does the Bible tell 
 us that we shall know our loved ones in 
 heaven ? ' ' 
 
 A gentleman lived in a beautiful man- 
 sion on the banks of a great river, and 
 there was on the other side another 
 beautiful mansion in which lived one who 
 was to him a stranger. He says : * * I often 
 looked over the river and admired the 
 mansion, but I was little interested in the 
 people who lived there. One day a man 
 came from that home to my home. He 
 came many times, and one day when he 
 went back he took with him my only 
 daughter. Now I love to think of that 
 home, and I am deeply interested, be- 
 cause my home is divided and a part of 
 the family lives on that side of the river, 
 and I want to go over and visit." This 
 is like death. Some of our loved ones 
 have moved into another world, and un- 
 til they went we thought but little of that 
 country. The home is now divided, and 
 we feel that it will not be long until all of 
 us shall have moved out and across the 
 river, where we shall inhabit a new home 
 
 193 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 and where we shall be reunited with those 
 who are dear to us. 
 
 But some one is ready to ask: "If 
 we are to know our loved ones, how can 
 we be happy if all of them are not with 
 us in heaven f" God is our Father, and 
 he loves us far more than it is possible 
 for us to love our children. Jesus is 
 our Elder Brother, and he loves us, too, 
 more than it is possible for us to love 
 our children. Then I ask, If God and 
 Christ shall be happy when all of the 
 children and brothers are not present, 
 shall we, too, not be happy? We can 
 not understand and we can not explain 
 it, but we must believe that God and 
 Christ shall know all who have been cre- 
 ated in the image of the Father; and 
 more, all who have been created in the 
 image of God shall know God and Christ 
 Jesus, God's Son. Now, does it not 
 logically follow that if we shall recog- 
 nize our Father and our Elder Brother, 
 we shall also recognize other members 
 of the family? 
 
 Man possesses reason. He is com- 
 posed of mind, and mind is composed of 
 
 194 
 
HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 
 
 intellect, sensibility and will. Intellect is 
 composed of being, space, time, person- 
 ality, number and resemblance. Man can 
 never forget ; he may not be able to recol- 
 lect. When the impression has been 
 stamped npon the soul, it is there for 
 all time. When Abraham spake to the 
 man in the unseen world who was being 
 tormented, he said: "Son, remember." 
 Every act of man's life touches a chord 
 that will vibrate in eternity. Man is 
 hanging up pictures around the cham- 
 ber of his heart at which he shall be 
 forced to gaze in eternity. This man in 
 Hades knew Abraham, and he recognized 
 Lazarus as being the man who stopped 
 at his home in this world and begged for 
 the crumbs that fell from his table. He 
 remembered that he received good things 
 in the world from whence he had come 
 and that Lazarus received evil things, 
 and that now things had changed and 
 that he was getting the evil things while 
 Lazarus was getting the good things. I 
 care not to speculate about hell, but I 
 want to say that there is one thing of 
 which I am certain, and that is that mem- 
 
 195 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 ory is a worm that shall never die. The 
 fact that man must live over his life 
 again shall make him miserable, if it 
 has not been a life lived in Jesus Christ. 
 
 Paul before the throne is the same 
 Paul who preached before Felix. He is 
 Paul minus his imperfections. The 
 twelve apostles were promised the honor 
 of sitting upon the twelve thrones and 
 with the privilege of judging the twelve 
 tribes of Israel. 
 
 When Peter, James, John and Christ 
 were on the mount, some strange things 
 happened. Jesus was transfigured and 
 glorified, but he was yet known by these 
 apostles. Moses stepped out from the 
 unseen world, having been dead fifteen 
 hundred years, and Elijah also appeared 
 upon the stage of action. Can you tell 
 me how Peter came to know these two 
 distinguished spirits? "Who gave him an 
 introduction? He knew Moses as being 
 different from Elijah, and Elijah and 
 Moses as being different from Jesus. He 
 knew Moses as Moses and Elijah as Eli- 
 jah. Now, if Peter, here on earth and 
 in his flesh, could recognize these souls of 
 
 196 
 
HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 
 
 the unseen world, do you think he will 
 be unable to recognize them when he is 
 clothed upon with immortality and when 
 he stands in their presence in the great 
 eternity? 
 
 Let us look at the statement found in 
 the Eevelation (6:9-11): "I saw under- 
 neath the altar the souls of them that 
 had been slain for the word of God, and 
 for the testimony which they held: and 
 they cried with a great voice, saying, 
 How long, O Master, the holy and true, 
 dost thou not judge and avenge our blood 
 on them that dwell on the earth? And 
 there was given to each one of them a 
 white robe; and it was said unto them, 
 that they should rest yet for a little time, 
 until their fellow-servants also and their 
 brethren, who should be killed even as 
 they were, should have fulfilled their 
 course." John saw the beings under- 
 neath the altar. They remembered their 
 persecution and how they had suffered 
 for the gospel. They remembered that 
 it occurred on this earth, and they re- 
 membered that those who were respon- 
 sible for their suffering were yet living 
 
 197 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 on the earth. They were to expect the 
 same kind of persecution to come to their 
 brethren who were then living on the 
 earth, and that they, too, were to come 
 to be with them. 
 
 When we come into the other world 
 we shall, be with Christ and we shall wor- 
 ship him. "The four and twenty elders 
 shall fall down before him that sitteth 
 on the throne, and shall worship him 
 that liveth for ever and ever, and shall 
 cast their crowns before the throne, say- 
 ing, Worthy art thou, our Lord and our 
 God, to receive the glory and the honor 
 and the power: for thou didst create all 
 things, and because of thy will they were 
 and are created' ' (Rev. 4:10, 11). 
 
 To worship Christ we must know him. 
 We must know him as different from all 
 others. If we shall know him, is there 
 any sufficient reason why we shall not 
 know the four and twenty elders and all 
 of the host of the redeemed? 
 
 Our text tells us that these converts 
 in this church at Thessalonica are Paul's 
 joy and crown. How could they be his 
 if he is not to know them as his converts? 
 
 198 
 
HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 
 
 How can he present them unto the Father 
 as his hope if he is not to claim them? 
 
 Man shall know himself in that world. 
 He shall know himself as different from 
 others. In the final judgment he will 
 tell the Lord about the work accomplished 
 in the name of Jesus Christ (Matt. 7: 
 21-24). Study the twenty-fifth chapter 
 of Matthew and you will find that the 
 final test will be: "I was hungry, and ye 
 fed me; naked, and ye clothed me." When 
 we ask when this was done, we are to 
 be told that it was when we did it unto 
 his disciples. 
 
 "And I John am he that heard and 
 saw these things. And when I heard and 
 saw, I fell down to worship before the 
 feet of the angel that showed me these 
 things." He knew the angel as not being 
 the Lord of glory. "And he saith unto 
 me, See thou do it not: I am a fellow- 
 servant with thee and with thy brethren 
 the prophets, and with them that keep 
 the words of this book. Worship God." 
 
 The prophets in the unseen world 
 were the prophets on earth. Man lives 
 out of the body. When death comes, the 
 
 199 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 door is opened and the man flies away. 
 All intelligence continues to live. The 
 separation from the body does not in 
 any way prevent the man from thinking 
 and remembering. 
 
 "A solemn m/urmur in the soul 
 Tells of a world to be, 
 As travelers hear the billows roll 
 Before they reach, the sea." 
 
 The old patriarchs, we are told, died, 
 and were buried and were gathered unto 
 their people. Some buried in a strange 
 land were themselves gathered unto their 
 own people in the unseen world. 
 
 God is not the God of the dead, but 
 of the living. He is the God of Abra- 
 ham and of Isaac and of Jacob. Abra- 
 ham, Isaac and Jacob are themselves in 
 the unseen world. They will be them- 
 selves in heaven. Will it not be glorious 
 to sit down with these great souls and 
 converse with them on questions which 
 have not yet been made plain? When 
 we sit in the presence of Paul we may 
 be able to hear him explain the things 
 he heard when he was left for dead at 
 Lystra — the day he climbed his mount 
 200 
 
HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 
 
 of transfiguration. Then we may learn 
 what he meant by the thorn in the flesh. 
 Who knows but that we shall have won- 
 derful experience-meetings over there? 
 If we sit down in the presence of Abra- 
 ham and of Isaac and of Jacob, do you 
 not think we shall know them? 
 
 "They are perfectly blessed — the redeemed and the 
 free — 
 Who are resting in joy by the smooth, glassy sea; 
 They breathed here on earth all their sorrowful sighs, 
 And Jesus has kissed all the tears from their eyes. 
 
 "They are happy at home! They have learnt the new 
 song, 
 And warble it sweetly amid the glad throng; 
 No faltering voices, no discords, are there; 
 The melodious praises swell high through the air. 
 
 "There falls not on them the deep silence of night; 
 They never grow weary — ne'er fadeth the light; 
 Throughout the long day new hosannahs they raise, 
 And express their glad thoughts in exuberant praise. 
 
 "E'en thus would we praise thee, dear Saviour divine; 
 We, too, would be with thee — loved children of thine; 
 Oh, teach us, that we may sing perfectly there 
 When we, too, are called to that city so fair. ,, 
 
 We sorrow not as others which have 
 no hope, for we believe that Jesus died 
 and rose again, and that he will bring 
 with him all who sleep in him, and that 
 
 201 
 
SERMONS FOR THE PEOPLE 
 
 together we shall be caught up in the 
 air to ever be with the Lord. 
 
 "Look above thee! Never eye 
 Saw such pleasures as await thee; 
 Thought ne'er reached such scenes of joy 
 As are there prepared to meet thee; 
 Light undying, seraphs ' lyres, 
 Angel welcomes, cherub choirs, 
 Smiling through heaven's doors to greet thee. ,, 
 
 Can it be possible no words shall welcome 
 
 Our coming feet? 
 How will it look, that face we have cherished, 
 
 When next we meet? 
 Will it be changed, so glorified and saintly, 
 
 That we shall know it not? 
 Will there be nothing that will say, I love thee, 
 
 And I have not forgot? 
 
 O faithless heart, the same loved face transfigured 
 
 Shall meet thee there, 
 Less sad, less wistful in immortal beauty, 
 
 Divinely fair. 
 The mortal veil, washed pure with many weepings, 
 
 Is rent away, 
 And the great soul that sat within its prison 
 
 Hath found the day. 
 
 In the clear morning of that other country, 
 
 In Paradise, 
 With the same sweet face that we have loved and cher- 
 ished, 
 
 It shall arise; 
 Let us be patient, we who mourn with weeping; 
 
 Some vanished face 
 
 202 
 
HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 
 
 The Lord lias taken but to add a richer 
 And a diviner grace. 
 
 And we shall find once more, 
 
 Beyond earth's skies, 
 In the fair city of the "sure foundations, ' ' 
 
 Those heavenly eyes, 
 With the same welcome shining through their sweetness, 
 
 That met us here; 
 Eyes, from whose beauty God has banished weeping 
 
 And wiped away the tear. 
 
 — Unknown. 
 
 Many suggestions contained in this book were 
 prompted by general reading. 
 
 203 
 
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