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  SERMONS
  by Sam Jones
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A collection of revival sermons by the renowned Southern evangelist Sam Jones,
featuring messages like 'Hold the Fort' that use vivid illustrations and
military metaphors to call Christians to earnest engagement in evangelism and
faithful Christian living.

  Chapters: 14

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS
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    1. 01. Quit Your Meanness
    2. 02. Hold the Fort
    3. 03. Eternal Punishment, Or The Logic of Damnation
    4. 04. Law and Order
    5. 05. Whosoever Will May Come
    6. 06. God's Grace is Sufficient
    7. 07. The Righteous and the Wicked
    8. 08. Why Will Ye Die?
    9. 09. The Blessedness of Religion
   10. 10. A New Creature In Christ
   11. 11. Fighting the Devil
   12. 12. The Virtue of Honesty
   13. 13. It Pays to be Righteous
   14. 14. For Men Only

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  CHAPTER 1: 01. QUIT YOUR MEANNESS
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Quit Your Meanness "Receive us: we have wronged no man, we have corrupted no
man; we have defrauded no man" (2 Corinthians 7:2).

St. Paul knocked at the inner door of the Church of Corinth. He was met by that
Church, and he was asked: "Upon what ground do you demand so great a privilege?"
And he replied, "On the grounds first, I have wronged no man with my tongue. I
have corrupted no man by my example. I have defrauded no man in any business
transaction." Jesus Christ watched the doors of his Kingdom when he stood among
men, with the most uncompromising and most untiring scrutiny. And when the young
man approached Christ, and would have entered the Kingdom, and Jesus looked upon
him as be asked the question: "What must I do that I can get into the Kingdom?"
Jesus looked at him and said: "Keep the commandments." The young man said,
exultantly: "Why, Master, all these have I kept from my youth up." And Jesus
looked him in the face, and said: "One thing thou lackest yet." and the young
man walked away. I suppose his disciples, if they had been as worldly as we are,
would have said: "Master, that’s a magnificent young man. He’s a very rich young
man. He stands well in the community, and if he only lacks one thing let’s take
him in. He will give tone to the Church, and he will pay largely. We have few
members of that sort, and he’s got money to pay our expenses. Why, Master, if he
lacks but one thing let’s take him in." "One thing thou lackest yet." said
Christ, and the young man turned and went away, and that’s the last He heard of
him. The disciples caught at the same spirit and taught men this: that you must
deny yourself and take up your Cross and follow Christ. They taught us if any
man love the world the love of God is not in him; if any man have not the Spirit
of Christ he is none of His. A large Church membership does not mean much here
now. It does not mean much anywhere, under any circumstances, and I thank God
that with the state of things I now find in existence everywhere it doesn’t
amount to much with this world, to say the least of it. We ought to quit asking
the question, "What Church do you belong to?" but we ought to ask, "How do you
live now? How have you been doing? Do you pay your debts? Do you live right, and
live good, and keep the commandments?" Brethren, an open profession, an outward
profession, that isn’t backed up by the possession of the principles of
Christianity is not worth the paper your name is enrolled on. I want to see the
day in this country when Church membership means consecration, righteousness,
and Godliness.

I’m a natural, innate, constitutional inborn hater of shams and humbugs, and
above all humbugs that ever cursed this world, the religious humbug is the
biggest. That’s so. I will give you a little illustration: At Harvard, I believe
it was, there was in the college an old professor, one of those thick glassed
old fellows, near sighted, who was a wonderful bugologist. He knew bugology
better than he did manology, and he was acquainted with all the bugs from Adam
down, and he had all kinds of them in frames hung up around his office. In their
mischief and as a joke, the students got the body of one bug, and took the legs
of another and the head of another and the wings of another, and put them
together just like as if nature had formed it that way, and they all trooped
downstairs together into the old professor’s room, and one of the boys says:
"Professor, what kind of a bug is this?" and the professor stood up and took the
card on which the bug was pinned, and he cast his eyes on it, and after looking
at it awhile he said: "Gentlemen, this is a humbug."

Now you have my idea of a humbug. It’s a fellow that has a heart that belongs to
the Church, and a head that is run by the world, and his hands by the devil, and
he’s just nothing but a sort of a compound. God deliver us from humbugs in the
Church. Let’s be only one of a kind, and let that be a good Christian. If I were
asked now what is the trouble in Cincinnati - the greatest trouble - trouble you
can’t over-come as easily as other troubles -I believe I would answer that the
greatest trouble in Cincinnati is that you have too many Churches here.

I don’t mean to say there are too many buildings or too many Pastors. I would
not tear down a Church in this city, nor hush the voice of a single Preacher. I
would not demolish a single Church organization in the town, but I’ll tell you
the trouble. I will take this Church here for an illustration. Your Minister,
you know, is the Pastor of two Churches, and he has a hard time of it, too, I
tell you, for one Church is about as much as any Preacher can look after. The
one Church you have has an enrolled list of members, but you have a Church on
the inside of that, and whenever a man gets on the inside of the inside Church,
then he can talk about the communion of saints and fellowship of the Spirit, and
walk with God. A man who gets inside of the inside of a Church is safe for all
time. But how many get in there? I reckon, if you would call a meeting of the
truly spiritual members, you could hold it in some little side room. You
wouldn’t have to call it in this great room. It would be lost here. A double
handful of your truly spiritual members would look lonely in here, and you would
have to get them in the parlor. That’s a bad state of things. How many men in
this Church - and there is no better Church in the city - love God with all
their hearts, and love their neighbors as themselves?

I am willing for any body to have more money than I have, and more land than I
ever expect to have, and more stocks and bonds than I can ever get, but I ain’t
willing for any man that walks this earth to have more religion than I have. I
can get as much as a soul full, and that’s about as much as an angel can get. If
I am a Christian, I will be a Christian; if I am a Methodist, I’ll be a
Methodist; if I’m a Presbyterian, I’ll be a Presbyterian; and if I’m a Baptist,
I’m a going to be one all over, through and through; but I wouldn’t be a little,
old, dried up, knock kneed, one horse, shriveled nothing anywhere. Haven’t you
ever felt some time away down in your soul that you wanted to get above every
thing? Haven’t you had a desire to rise up above the sight of this kind of
little fellows, that you can put twenty of them in a sardine box? Haven’t you
ever had a glorious feeling in your soul that made you feel for a minute as if
you wanted to be a whale? You have never known much about religion if you never
felt in your soul as if you wanted to be somebody - something so big that you
feel as if you could fly up, and up, and up; then you can know something about
what religion is.

Religion’s a grand thing. There is nothing on earth like it, and nothing in
Heaven better than religion. A poor, tempest tossed, tempest driven soul, thrown
hither and thither in helpless wandering, tired, restless, and hungry, finds a
haven there. O! How dark it was once for me; how hungry this poor soul was once.
How like the crest of a wave! I knew no rest. But I found it in religion.
Religion! Religion! It’s a great word. In its etymological sense it means that
there is something in this small universe that can take up a poor, wandering,
hungry, restless soul, and tie it back to God. Religion means to bring the soul
back to its moorings. That’s it. I have often thought of the picture of the Lake
of Gennesaret, and, as I looked at the calm, placid little lake, surrounded on
all sides by rugged, towering mountains, I have thought that the winds of the
storm could never rue its bosom. But if there was any place on earth where the
four winds of Heaven more fiercely contested for supremacy, it was on this
little lake of Gennesaret. Christ was once riding over this lake in a boat with
His disciples, and the Savior was below in the cabin sleeping, when suddenly a
fierce storm arose, and the little ship began to toss and pitch and rock
fearfully, and the disciples, trembling with fear, ran and aroused Him, and
said: "Master, wake up, we are engulfed. We will be drowned." Christ opened His
eyes and raised Himself up, and wiping the spray from His forehead walked up to
the prow of the little ship, and gathered the waves up to Him on His lap, like a
mother tending her child, and the seas subsided, and the winds blew no more. And
the disciples said: "What manner of man is this, that the winds and waves obey
him?" Blessed Christ, with my poor soul, tempest tossed and driven, I’ll crawl
up under the Cross, and He will pull my poor, tired soul up in his great loving
arms and sweet peace will enfold me, and I’ll walk away singing:

Now, not a wave of trouble rows, Across my peaceful breast.

Brethren, there’s something in religion that will make a man of us, there’s
something in religion for Preachers and people. The more religion a Preacher
has, blessed be God, the better it is for him; and the more religion a merchant
has, the better it is for him; and the more religion a farmer has, the better it
is for him. Blessed be God, religion is not only the best thing in the universe,
but it is free for all.

"Receive us." Why? "I have wronged no man with my tongue." A man’s tongue has a
great deal to do with his religion, or rather a man’s religion has a great deal
to do with his tongue. We’ve got sanctified people all over this country. They
are sanctified in a thousand senses except the sense in which St. James talked
about sanctification. Hear his description of a sanctified man. Listen! "Pure
religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this: To visit the
fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from
the world." A man who has learned to manage this term has it right. I believe in
sanctification as strongly as justification; but, brethren, sanctification means
a great deal more, perhaps, than you have conceived. A Christian Preacher in
Augusta went down to St. James Church one night to a holiness meeting, a
sanctified meeting, where sanctified people met. Next day he met the Pastor of
St. James Church on the street, and said, "I learned last night for the first
time, the difference between justification and sanctification." "Well, how is
that?" said the Pastor. "Why, I found out last night that justification meant to
satisfy God with man and man with God. That is justification; and sanctification
means to satisfy a fellow with himself, and I thought to myself, there’s
something in that as sure as you live. Justification satisfies a man with God
and God with man, and sanctification satisfies a man with himself."

I have heard People talk as if they were well satisfied with themselves, but I
never found many in their neighborhood who were well satisfied with them.
Whenever a man gets more religion than he has sense, he’s going to talk
foolishness right straight. Don’t let anybody come and say I’m only talking
sanctification. I am not. Some of the best men on earth practice and live
sanctification. But you are obliged to have something more. You must get
something. Lord Jesus, Master, help men to see that religion does not consist in
what I profess, but it consists in how I live. I have no objection to a man’s
professing sanctification. It’s as much my privilege to confess sanctification
as it is justification. I don’t quarrel with a man as long as he lives on a
level with what he professes, but when he gets down below that, I’m going for
him sure. The tongue, said St. James - I ran off at a tangent for a while - is
full of deadly poison. Many a person in this city - if you will go to their
homes, and sit by their side, and put your ear to their heart - you can hear
their heart’s blood drip, drip, drip, and you say, "What does that," and they’ll
tell you an unkind tongue stabbed it there. God pity a man that will take his
tongue and stab a man’s character with it. I’ll tell you another thing. This
tongue is not only capable of stabbing Christ, but the tongue is the cause of
all the trouble in our midst. It’s not what we do, but what we say, that kicks
up the mischief all around - it’s what we say. I have known men who would leave
home in the morning and go down to their stores and be as polite to their women
customers, and palaver to them as sweetly as you please; but when they go home
at night they talk to their wives as if they were old bears. Did you ever know a
case like that, my friend? No? Didn’t you see one in the glass tonight when you
brushed your hair before you came to meeting? Many a time a good pains taking
wife has carefully arranged every thing to make home pleasant and bring smiles
to her husband’s face, but before he has been in the house five minutes he takes
that tongue of his and stabs his wife to the heart, even before her kiss of
welcome is dry on his lips, and she goes upstairs and buries her face in her
hands and sobs and cries as though her heart would break. God pity a woman that
has an old bear for a husband! Many a time a poor man who has toiled all day
with heart pressure upon him because of his kindness to her at home, goes
homeward and before he has been in the house five minutes the woman that should
be all to him stabs him with her sharp tongue, and he says, in his self, "I wish
to God I were dead."

I think the finest tombstone I ever saw, and the prettiest epitaph I ever saw,
was when I was visiting an old friend of mine. After dinner he took me into the
garden, and in the most prominent place there was erected a beautiful tombstone
of white marble, in memory of his wife, and on it I read her name and the date
of her death, and her simple epitaph was this line: "She made home pleasant."

I remember the old Irishman who said: "I hope I’ll never live to see my wife
married again." Brethren, let us be kind to wife, for she has left her father
and her home and her mother and given up all things for us, and she gives her
life to us, and we ought to be kind to her. Never let a word slip from your
tongue that will bring a drop of blood from her heart. We should be kind and
loving to our children, too.

I remember once, at a camp meeting two or three years ago, I was talking to two
or three of the brothers after dinner, and to one of them a little girl, a rosy
cheeked and bright eyed fairy, ran up and asked him some question, and he
snapped out a word to her that almost made her faint, so frightened was she. I
cried, "You brute, you!" Brethren, you can almost crucify one of your children
with one stroke of your tongue. How cruel it is. I know how it is myself.
Sometimes when I was busy at work my little boy would bother me and I would snap
at him and drive him away, but I afterward hunted him up and begged his
forgiveness. But some of you would sooner die than do that. Control your tongue
and be kind to your children.

Think of the picture! I look upon that sweet child with his arms around my neck
and he looks with beaming eyes of love in my face for the last time; and when
his little arms are forever folded on his breast and he has gone from us, I
never want to go in my parlor and look upon my child and say, "O, how his icy
cold fingers point my memory to the past, and to my hard words and actions to
that angelic child." God give us Christly teaching. Brethren, get your tongues
under perfect subjugation. This is one ground on which you can enter the inner
Church. Get your tongues straight. But upon what other ground must I rely?
"Because I have corrupted no man by my example." Brethren, what we need now is a
few good examples. You go home mother, and seat your little lovely daughter on
your lap, and ask her, "Daughter, who is the best woman in the world?" And she
will say, "Why, you, mamma." "Daughter, whom would you rather be like than any
body else?" and the sweet little child will say, "You, mamma." Ask the child
such questions as that and she will answer always, "You, mamma." Ah, sister,
that child is mistaken, yet she is that way - there’s no doubt about that. The
saddest thing a father ever said to me in all of my experience was this. I was a
Pastor of a Church then, and I have been Pastor for eight years, and know all
about the relations of Pastor and people. I tell you, brethren, you can’t love
your Pastor too much, or pray for him too much - he needs your examples and
prayers. This brother said to me, about four weeks after I had preached a sermon
in his town: "I heard your sermon on ’Home Religion’ and it waked me up." He was
a man of intelligence. I said, "What about it?" "I went home," said he, "and
studied my children four weeks, in all of their varied characteristics, and all
of the phases of their character and life, and I reached a verdict." "What was
that?" said I. "Well, I found out that my children haven’t got a single fault
that I or their mother hasn’t got, or a single virtue that we have not got; a
direct copy of my wife and myself our children are." Our examples! A father said
to me once, and he was a conscientious, good man, too: "A few days ago I was in
a grocery store, where they sold provisions in the front part and kept beer and
other liquors for sale in the back room. I was in there buying groceries, when a
gentleman came in and said to me, ’Won’t you have a glass of beer?’ Without a
thought, although I was never in the habit of it, I accepted. I walked back, and
the beer was drawn, and as I put it to my lips my little boy pulled at my finger
and said: ’Papa, what’s that you’re drinking? I stopped drinking, and told the
little fellow it was beer. After a while the child again pulled my finger and
asked me: ’Papa, what was that you were drinking just now?’ And I told him again
it was beer, lager beer; and so it was again as we were going up the street, my
child pulled at my finger again and said: ’What did you say that was you were
drinking, papa?’ and as he asked that again. O God, my God, I would have given
all the world to have been able to recall that act. I am afraid that one act
will make a drunkard of my child." Our examples! Brethren, hear me. I shall
never do, or suffer myself to do, or suffer any one else to do, in my home, in
the radius of my influence, any thing that would or could curse mine or
anybody’s child. You can have cards at your house if you want to, but until this
world burns down, I never will, so help me God. They shall never be brought in
or remain in my house. Do you ask me why? Nine tenths of the gamblers of this
city were raised in Christian homes; they are the most polite and refined
gentlemen in town, and if cards in any Christian home ever made a gambler out of
a Christian boy, then so long as life shall last, I will never have cards in my
house. If demi-johns, and glasses, and bottles ever damned a member of the
Church’s son, then, so long as I have given my home to God, demijohns, glasses,
and bottles shall have no place there. And I will tell you another thing. Old
Brother Demijohn and old Sister Demijohn, you are just raising up drunkards by
the hundreds, and I reckon if God Almighty lets your sort of folks into Heaven,
the very angels would call out, "Brother Demijohn and Sister Demijohn, have you
got in at last?" And some women have reached the degraded stratum where they are
nothing more or less than barkeepers for their husband, stirring their toddies
and mixing their drinks. Next to the biggest fool that God’s eyes ever looked
upon is a woman who stirs toddies for her husband; but the biggest fool God’s
eyes ever beheld is a woman that will marry a man with whisky on his breath.

I know what I am talking about. I believe if I had had such a wife as some
drinking men in this city have today, I would now be in a drunkard’s grave and a
drunkard’s hell this moment but, thank God, my wife never would touch, taste,
nor handle, nor suffer it in her house. I have had a woman come to me, who in
her young married life had indulged her husband and seen that his wines and
liquors were carefully prepared for him - I have had her come to me with haggard
face, and cry out, "O Mr. Jones, in God’s name, help me to save my husband from
death and hell"; and she gave her husband the first years of her married life in
the encouragement of drinking! An old woman in a county in Georgia - I was
preaching prohibition down there, and I never felt more at home preaching Jesus
Christ to sinners than I felt down there preaching prohibition - I know that
it’s unpopular in this city. I have been preaching prohibition experimentally,
practically, collectively, and personally for about thirteen years, and it’s
never hurt me yet, but whisky liked to have knocked me in about thirteen months.
In one county where I was talking prohibition this old snaggle toothed, wrinkle
faced bag said of me, "I hope God will kill that man before election day for
trying to rob people of their living." This old Mrs. So and so had buried three
husbands in drunkards graves. My Lord, what sort of an old hag was that?

I’ll tell you another thing; I don’t know how the Preachers have been preaching
to you - they are all better men than I am - but if the occupants of the two
hundred pulpits in this city will stand up and talk for law and order, sobriety
and righteousness will prevail in this city. God wake up the pulpits and help
the brothers to talk about things that are damning this city! One Preacher will
talk about evangelical methods, and another Preacher will split hairs a mile
long on real and unreal regeneration. I never hear a man read this text - with
all due respect to the Preachers -"Except ye be born again ye can not enter into
the kingdom of Heaven" - I say I never hear that text read from the pulpit but I
wish you to add: "If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us
our sins and to cleanse us from unrighteousness." Jesus Christ knew how to
preach, brethren, and Jesus Christ touched that subject to one man, an
intelligent man who staggered back and asked, "Why, how can this thing be?" Hear
me, brother. God’s Gospel is to teach a man to quit his meanness. Come to God,
and let the Lord explain His own works and let God do His own work. I heard of a
grand Preacher who had a grand revival; he preached day and night for three
weeks on regeneration, and he never had a single convert; but brother, I believe
the Gospel of Jesus Christ is adequate to reach every sinner in this city.

I am not going to run the grand old ship of Zion about ten miles from shore. I
am going to bring her to the land. Ten million sinners might look at the old
ship away off and say, "There she is, but I can’t get to her, for if I tried to
swim to her I would drown." Brother, brother, let’s run the old ship in until
her keel strikes the shore. Tell the world: "All aboard! This grand old ship is
going by!" You can’t get the old ship of Zion too close to sinners.

"I have corrupted no man with my life; my example has been right"; that’s it. "I
have wronged no man; I have set no bad example." In addition to that Paul said,
I have defrauded no man in a business transaction. O, for hands like these to
work for God and for man!

Talk about Ingersoll, I never met an intelligent man yet that had been damned by
Bob Ingersoll. The only difference between Bob Ingersoll and any other fellow
running after him is this: Bob Ingersoll plays the fool for $1,500 a night, and
this little fellow runs after him and plays the fool for nothing, and boards
himself. And I tell you Bob Ingersoll is going to continue to play that kind of
a fool as long as this country gives him $1,500 a night to insult God and
ridicule his precious Word; and yet you go to hear him. If I had a dog to go and
hear him I would kill him. He couldn’t come to my house any more.

"I have defrauded no man in any business transaction." Brother, let us look into
this and do what it says; do what you say you’ll do and quit defrauding men.
Brother, hear me; a man who has $50,000, $100,000 riding in a $1,200 carriage
and living in a $25,000 house, driving down the streets meets a poor old widow
from whom he has stolen. I tell you if there is any hell, it’s for that kind of
a man. There’s no use talking. I’ll tell you another thing. There are too many
men in this country boarding with their wives: no doubt about that. Let me tell
you another thing - when the fellow does a clean thing, God Almighty will stand
by him. He will give him three square meals every day if He has to put the
angels on one third rations. Let’s do right and defraud no man, and we will have
righteousness, peace, and joy.

Well, I have talked considerably over an hour. I did not intend to. But hear me,
let’s think about these things. I tell you I never - I tell you I never want to
see a revival in this city, or anywhere else, that isn’t bottomed on bed rock.
Let’s go down until you hear your boot heels grating and grinding against the
Rock of Ages. None of your corn stalk revivals! We want the sort of revival that
will make men do the clean thing. If we can have that sort of revival I want to
see it - but not corn stalk revivals. Do you know what a corn stalk revival is?
Well, if you were to pile up a lot of corn stalks as high as this house, and
burn them up, there wouldn’t be a hodful of ashes. We want a revival of
righteousness - we want a revival of honesty; we want a revival of cleanness and
purity, of debt paying, of prayer meetings, of family prayer, and of paying our
brothers a little more salary. That’s the sort of revival we want. The Lord give
us this sort!

One more illustration in conclusion. Some months ago a man was fearfully
crippled in his right leg by a railroad accident. It was fearfully mangled and
bruised. They wanted to amputate the leg, but he said: "O I don’t want to lose
my limb; preserve it if you can." They watched at his side until at last the
surgeon said: "My friend, the crisis has come when we must amputate your leg."
He said: "Doctor, has it reached that point?" "Yes," said the surgeon. "Well,"
said he, submissively, "if there is no chance to save my leg, get your knife and
go to work." When they got all ready and laid the patient on the table to
commence the fearful operation, the surgeons desired to administer chloroform,
but the mangled man said: "I do not want to take that; if I die I want to die in
my full consciousness, but I want you to let me know by some sign when I begin
to sink, so that I can breathe my spirit out in prayer." They told him that he
couldn’t stand the operation without chloroform, but he said that he could. The
doctor picked up the knife and said to the patient, "If you see me lay the knife
down on the table you may know that you are sinking." The doctor commenced the
operation, and the man did not flinch. When he struck the arteries he laid his
knife down to adjust them, and the young man took it for a sign that he was
dying, and commenced praying. The surgeon picked up the knife and resumed his
work. In a few minutes the operation was over, and he saw he was saved, and he
turned to the surgeon and said: "Doctor, when you picked the knife up from the
table and began your operation, it was the sweetest sensation I ever felt in my
life." "What do you mean?" said the doctor. "I mean," said he, "that those
sensations meant life for me." Now, brother, when God Almighty throws down the
pruning knife it is a sign that you are sinking - the sword of the Divine Spirit
cutting through the tendrils of sin; but, thank God, He has not laid down the
sword. The sword of the Spirit means life. O brother, come to life in the
presence of Jesus, and die in his love. God help us to take these things home
with us!


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  CHAPTER 2: 02. HOLD THE FORT
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Hold the Fort "My people doth not consider" (Isaiah 1:3) The charge that God
brought against his ancient people was this - "My people doth not consider"
(Isaiah 1:3). The etymological definition of that word is "to look at a thing
until you see it." If we look at a landscape a glance will take in the main
features - such as the mountain scenery, the stream, and the hamlet. A
consideration or careful examination will show the foliage of the mountain
trees, the road leading to the mansion, the cattle grazing on the hill slopes,
and so on. There is a great difference between glancing at an object and
considering it. Now let us consider the situation here. This service, brethren,
is rather an unusual service in the city - Saturday night service - and we wind
up the business of this week. And we’ll wind up life after awhile. What will we
be then? Oh, to be a grand, a pure, a noble man, is the assurance, and the only
assurance, that we’ll be happy and pure and noble forever. I am very anxious
indeed to see us not only right ourselves, but I am so anxious to see the
sinners of this town saved. When all the Church members get right - if such a
consummation could be brought about - then we have only prepared ourselves to do
the work God wants us to do.

I will tell you how I feel about it. I have been feeling a good deal since I
have been here. I have pulled, and pulled, and pulled at different times in
different places in my life; and here I have pulled and pulled. Sometimes it
looked like all the world was a load and I was pulling. And brethren, I have
reached the point now where you ought to pull some and you ought to push some. I
will tell you what is true, if God Almighty had blessed me with the money that
some of you have - and you may not have a great deal - if God Almighty had
blessed me with such a home as some of you have, and with so many blessings as
He has blessed you, I’d put in the next week for Him as no Christian in this
town ever put in a week for God.

We’ll never do anything with this city, when the Christian world looks like you
can just take nickels and scatter them along, one every ten feet, and tote them
right into hell with them. We’ll never do anything with such a world - never!

I will tell you another thing: you need not say I am a fool - and all that sort
of thing. I’ve got a wife and I’ve got children to support, just like you have,
and I love my wife and children just as you do; but I tell you one thing; here
is one man that is going to do his duty every day to God and the right, and if
me and my wife and children starve to death, we’ll make out like we died with
typhoid fever; we’ll not say one word about it in any way, shape or form. But I
want to see one man starve that is doing his duty. And we’ll never take this
town for Christ, and you down town at your business every hour of the day, and
when night comes, pin on the pinions of an old owl, and flap out and come to
meeting. We won’t do it.

God Almighty sent this very work along here in St. Louis to prepare some of you
members of the Church for your coffins, and to prepare many a sinner in this
town for eternity. And if an angel were to alight on this stand this moment and
say, "Ten people in this town will be in their coffins next Saturday night," ah,
me! - without mentioning any names - I’ll tell you that every soul in this house
would be here every time this bell rang. You are going to die next Saturday
night. I don’t know whether it is I or somebody else, but there are ten of us,
who may be in our coffins next Saturday night.

We have no time to throw away in this work. One third of my time is gone now. I
have no time or disposition to come here and camp with you all through the
winter - three or four or six months. I expect to be away from here, and before
the first day of February I expect to see thousands of souls converted in
another city. I expect to; verily I do. I have no time to fool away with you
all. If you want me and say so, I am your man, under God; but if you don’t I
want you to say so. I will take the first train that leaves this town on Monday
morning.

You aren’t in earnest. You don’t mean anything. I can buy out your interest in
this meeting for a quarter, and I expect a great many of you haven’t made a
quarter each day while we were here serving and praying and working the best way
we could, and you gadding about town.

I believe it’s the first meeting I ever ran in my life when there were more men
out at any service than women; and I tell you when it gets so good women in a
city are scarce, things are getting mighty bad, they are, sure as you’re born.

There isn’t any doubt about that. I’ve seen a few towns where good men were
scarce, but I believe you’ve got less earnest Christian women in this town than
any town I have ever known of its size. What do you think about that?

Now, there is no use in quibbling over the matter at all, brethren. If St.
Joseph can rush up under a tent four times a day, and turn everything loose -
and God has blessed that town as I scarcely know God has ever blessed a town in
the United States of America of its size, almost literally redeemed St. Joseph,
Mo. - you can. How came that? The people got interested and took stock; don’t
you see! That was all. Now, how may we obtain just such a blessing? By getting
interested and taking stock.

I will tell you how I feel about it. I can afford to fail. Christ could afford
to fail in some places, for in some places he didn’t do many wonderful works.
What paper is it in your city that that article was in today that spoke about
burying Sam Jones?

It says: "Jones has come here to be buried. We buried Moody here, and he has
never done anything since; and we buried Harrison here, and he has never done
anything since." I believe that is about the sense of the article. "And Jones
has come to St. Louis to be buried." Yes, I will be the best man that was ever
buried in this community. You’ll never bury Jones - I’ll say that to you. My
faith in God, and faith in the right, and faith in the Cross of Christ, will be
as strong when I leave this city if not a single soul is blessed, as it shall be
if one hundred thousand are blessed. My faith in God Almighty doesn’t depend
upon what the Christian people in St. Louis will or will not do. I have no
notion of going into my grave till I die, and then I will go in as gracefully
and as dignified as a man ever did; but I will never be dignified until I do
die. That’s just the way I feel about it.

Well, now, I don’t like to call up the memories of the war, not at all; and if
there is any section in all America that the war question brings up sad memories
in, it is here and in Missouri. I would not lift the mantle and veil of charity
from a single scar that was left by the war. Not that. But let me tell you a
little war incident. I do not care which side you were on. You admire a brave
man, to whichever side he belonged. I do. I love a brave man today, whether he
wore the blue or the gray. I like a brave man, for me or against me. I despise a
coward in blue or gray. When Johnston turned over his army to Hood in Atlanta -
Joe Johnston that carried his army on, back and back, retreating before Sherman
until be reached Atlanta - there Johnston turned over his army to Hood. Hood was
a gallant man and a brave man. He had already lost one of his legs in battle,
and when he took charge of Johnston’s army he came round back into Tennessee
with it, and, you recollect, fought the bloody battle of Franklin, perhaps one
of the most bloody battles of the war. When that battle was raging hot and
thick, Gen. Hood’s tent was on a prominence, and from that prominence Gen. Hood,
in walking up and down in front of his tent, could see the battle. He could see
lines and he could hear the booming of the cannon and the rattle of the
musketry. And as he walked up and down in front of the tent, halting with his
artificial leg, every time he turned his eyes downward towards the lines he saw
that there was a fort out in a locust grove that was literally hewing down his
ranks by the hundred. Every time he walked up and down in front of his tent,
limping as he walked and every time he turned his face towards the lines he saw
that that fort in the locust grove was literally hewing down his ranks.

After he had watched the fight awhile he called his Adjutant General to him.
That officer rode up on his bloody horse, and Gen. Hood said: "Adjutant, go and
present my compliments to Gen. Cheatham, and tell him that I ask at his hands
that fort in the locust grove." The Adjutant General loped off with all the
speed of his horse. In a few minutes he returned and said: "Gen. Hood, Gen.
Cheatham is missing. They think he has been killed, He has not been seen in two
hours." Gen. Hood bowed his head, and marched up and down in front of his tent,
and every time he turned his face to the lines, that fort in the locust grove
was literally hewing down his ranks to the ground. And directly he called his
Adjutant General again, and lie said: "Adjutant General, go and present my
compliments to Gen. Claiborne, and tell him I ask at his hands the fort in the
locust grove." The Adjutant General loped off down the lines and in a few
moments came back and said: "Gen. Hood, Gen. Claiborne is dead on the
battlefield."

Gen. Hood dropped his head, and the tears ran down his cheeks as he marched up
and down in front of his tent. He looked through the tears as they glistened in
his eyes and saw that the fort in the locust grove was still hewing his ranks to
the ground. And directly he called his Adjutant General again, and he said:
"Adjutant General, go and present my love" - he is softening down now, no longer
compliments - "Adjutant General, go and present my love to Gen. Cockrell and
tell him I ask at his hands that fort in the locust grove." The Adjutant General
loped off down the line, and rode up to Gen. Cockrell. I believe he is, perhaps,
from your city or state - one of the youngest Generals in the Southern army. The
Adjutant General rode up to him and said: "Gen. Cockrell, Gen. Hood sends you
his love, and says he asks at your hands that fort in the locust grove." Gen.
Cockrell straightened himself up in his saddle, and said: "1st Missouri Brigade,
attention!" And he dropped his fingers on that fort. They charged upon the fort
with intrepid courage and captured it, and Gen. Cockrell called his Adjutant
General and said: "Adjutant General, go and present my love to Gen. Hood, and
also tell him that I present him the fort in the locust grove." And I want to
tell you Christian people here whether that incident be true or not, it
illustrates what I desire to say to you. I am here as the adjutant general of
the Lord Jesus Christ, and I say to you Christian people, as I point over this
wicked city, that the Lord Jesus Christ presents his love to you Christian
people, and He wants at your hands every fort of sin in this community, and in
less than thirty days I hope you all with one accord will say, "Lord Jesus, we
present our love to you, and we also present the city redeemed by Thy grace."

I want every Christian man that is ready to march out into line, not to fight
his fellow man, but to bring his neighbor and friend to God and do what he can
for the race. This coming week I will do my best, and I want every Christian in
this house, of every denomination, who feels like saying: "God is my helper; I
will go into the fight, and pray and work and do my best". I want every such an
one to stand up; and I hope you will all stand up immediately and say: "That is
my honest conviction. I want to go into the fight. I want to do my best."

Brethren, there cannot be a movement without friction, a battle without an
issue, no issue without browsing of lines, and no victory without a fight. The
fight is now on. Will you come up to the help of the Lord against the powers
that be?

Well, thank God for this Saturday night meeting. God bless this service to the
good of every Christian here. Now, we say to you all, we want the battle to
begin now; we want the battle to be pushed on now. If you good women will pray
as you ought, you will hear of such a meeting as St. Louis never had before. God
give us power, and I want to tell you that nothing but the power of God can ever
reach this city. Nothing but the power of God. God Almighty does not ask any
more odds in St. Louis, if you take hold right, than He does in the smallest
town in the state. He is an omnipotent God, and can do all He undertakes. Now we
are going to sing "Hold the Fort, for I Am Coming." I want everybody to join in
that song, and afterwards we will pronounce the benediction.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 3: 03. ETERNAL PUNISHMENT, OR THE LOGIC OF DAMNATION
========================================================================

Eternal Punishment, Or The Logic of Damnation

"Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the
heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil" (Ecclesiastes 8:11)
This is a wonderful old book we preachers take our texts from. In the book of
Genesis we read of the creation of the world and the origin of man. God devotes
one book to tell me of my origin, and the thousand chapters that follow tell me
where I am going. We spend an hour here today on the pathway to the grave. This
text belongs legitimately to the conclusion of the sermon, which is the answer
to a question I want to ask you. I want first to ask the question, and I want us
to spend twenty or thirty minutes trying to answer that question, and then we
will let God answer this question; for we ought to be willing that God should
answer all questions that pertain to life and salvation. The question which I
now propound plainly stated is this: "Why will you continue in sin?" Now, as
simple as every word of that text is, may be we can spend a minute or two
profitably in consideration of these words, "Why will you continue in sin?" I
don’t ask why you happen to be already a sinner. That involves three logical
questions, which we have not the ability to discuss. I don’t ask why you have
come out to this service a sinner. That will involve exculpatory statements on
your part, which I have not the time nor disposition to hear. But the question
plainly stated is not, "Should you remain in sin?" or, "How you are a sinner?"
but, "Why will you leave here an impenitent sinner?" And we narrow the question
down a little, and we put it in this shape: "Why will you?" I don’t mean the one
behind you, nor the one in front of you. I mean you. God bless you! This is a
very personal matter.

You can’t get anybody to die for you; and can’t get anybody to stand in your
stead at the day of Judgment and be damned for you. You stand in your own shoes,
as if you are the only individual that ever violated a law of God. This is
preeminently a personal matter, and we don’t ask you why the world continues in
sin or why the members of the Churches continue in sin, but we ask you, "Why
will you continue in sin another day, another hour, another week?"

We say first: Is it because you are ignorant as to the nature of sin? Does any
man in this congregation give me as his reason for living today in sin and
living on in sin, because he doesn’t know what sin is? Is there a man here this
evening that doesn’t know it is wrong to drink, wrong to violate the Sabbath,
wrong to live in neglect of his Christian duty? Do you plead ignorance of the
nature of sin? The world stands convicted at this point.

You let a member of the Church do wrong, and you are the first one to see it.
You let my foot slip, and you are the first man to see it and talk about it; and
your criticisms upon the life of the Christian people are an everlasting
demonstration that you know what right is, and that you know what wrong is. You
know there is a vast difference between the way we look at men in Church and out
of Church. The world expects something of a man in Church. I am glad it does.
The world doesn’t expect much of you, and if it did it would be very much
disappointed. Here is the difference between a member of the Church and a man
out of Church. The member of the Church is a white piece of canvas, and if any
thing is sprinkled upon him it makes a spot easy to discern. But that old sinner
is a black, dingy piece of canvas, and you can just take any thing and rub upon
him, and it doesn’t show at all.

You let me go into a bar room and take a drink of whisky, and it is wired all
over the country, and read in every newspaper at the breakfast table tomorrow
morning. You go in and take a drink every morning and nobody notices you. This
is the difference between a gentleman and a vagabond. You let me go out on the
streets and profane the name of God, and it is flashed across the world, "Jones
is in the city swearing." You can swear every day. Nobody notices you. Nobody
expects any better of you for it. That is the difference between a gentleman and
a vagabond. I thank God, I have lived to see the day in my State when nobody
will swear or drink whisky but vagabonds. You don’t like that? Do you? I don’t
blame you. I would not either. Fifteen years ago I would have felt very much
insulted if I heard a Preacher say that. The truth is the same now that it was
then, but, O, what a different fellow I am now from what I was then. Drinking is
the habit of a vagabond, and profanity is the habit of a vagabond; and if you
will be profane and swear you lack that much of being a gentleman. No gentleman
will profane the name of God, and whatever else you lack, I am sorry to say that
many of you come that much short of being a gentleman.

Ignorant of the nature of sin! Will you say you don’t know your life is wrong?
Every man answers back, and says: "That is not my excuse. I know what right is,
and I know right is right. I know what wrong is, and further than that, I know
wrong is wrong." Then we stop here and ask you this question: Is there any man
that says, "The reason I live in sin is because I don’t know what the
consequences of a sinful life are"? I know, forsooth, because this nineteenth
century is wicked, there is a hell. I heard a Minister say once, "That science
is going to demonstrate that there is no hell." Said I, "When the delegation
comes back I want to be on hand when they report." Science knows as little about
hell, and what is in hell, as science knows about the birth place of God. The
biggest fool I know is that fool who gets into the biggest, broadest way to
hell, and stops by the way and tries to persuade men there is no hell. The
biggest fool is the man who spends his probationary existence in arguing that
there is no hell, and then lies down in hell forever, realizing that there is
one. You poor dunce, what do you know of what is down there? Did you ever attend
a Universalist meeting? I was at a Universalist meeting one day, and that day
all the red nosed drunkards and gamblers and rascals of the town had the front
seats and amen corners. All I want to know of a Preacher is, who has got the
amen corners?

God pity you living in sin. What is to become of you? Let this Book speak out,
and this is the only Book that says any thing of the other side of the tomb. I
will keep to this Book until you find us something better, for this Book says
that "the wicked shall be turned into hell with all the nations that forget
God." I believe in a bottomless hell, and I believe that the wicked shall be
turned into hell. I do believe that the righteous have hope after death, and
eternal life is the legitimate end of a good man. I mean to say that God will
not punish a single person except he fly in the face of the required law laid
down on every page of this Book; except he lay his hand over every scar in his
heart and says there is no scar there. I do believe if a man lives right he will
get to Heaven, and those who do wrong will go to hell. Do you think there is
fire there? I don’t know whether there will be any before you get there, unless
you take something with you to burn you through all eternity. Every sinner
carries his own brimstone with him. No sir, that man says he knows the
legitimate end of a sinful life is hell; and if you will tell me how long sin
will last, I will tell you how long hell will last. "It is not because I am
ignorant of the nature or consequences of sin that I continue in it," may be
your reply to my question. Then what is it? Are you indifferent to the results?
O, how many men meet truth without a tremor in their muscles. When a man reaches
this point, when you can’t move him with truth, he is immovable.

What stolid indifference we meet on all sides! Men know their life is short, and
that they may be in their coffins before tomorrow evening’s sun, yet they are
indifferent to their condition. "Indifferent?" You say, "I know what Preachers
think of me, and neighbors think of me as indifferent, but down in my heart I
think and feel more than anybody has discovered. I have gone home from Church
with my Christian wife, her arm in mine, and I have heard my soul beat with
conviction, but I would not have my wife hear it. Thank God, wherever else I
went, I was never indifferent to the great truths of eternity. No, sir; it is
not indifference. I look as if I were, but I am not."

Then, we ask, Is it recklessness? Is it because you know the truth and will dare
the truth? Is it that? Recklessness is a poor thing in any world. O, how
reckless some men are. We see that Alpine hunter as he walks on the narrow
paths, with precipices on both sides. He realizes his risk, yet he walks on
across the path, while the very dog that walks behind him will wince and turn. I
have known men who seemed to be so reckless that they were unwilling to live on
to their threescore years and ten, and lie down and die in the natural order of
things. I see them at twenty years of age begin to drink, and they drink on
until thirty years of age. They know they are about gone. "One year more, just
twelve months, is all I can last," they say. Yet the poor fellow goes on, and
seems to be grieving for damnation. And I see him walk out on the street, all
besotted with whisky, and pick a quarrel with a friend, and that friend shoots
him down, and he leaps from the sidewalks of the city into hell. God pity you!
After all that has been said and done you will go, within twelve months, to a
drunkard’s grave! Forty years old, and before you are forty-one you will fall
into a drunkard’s grave! How is it?

Recklessness! You say, "I know wrong is wrong, but I won’t heed it. I curse
publicly. I drink openly. I sin with a high hand." God pity you! If I were going
to sin I would crawl off in some dark corner and never let my example be seen to
lead on any others. How reckless poor humanity is at times concerning the truth!
It hurries on to the edge of the precipice, and stands and shudders but a
moment, then makes a leap, from which there is no recovering forever.

"No, sir, it is not recklessness!"

Then I stop and ask you this question - Is it because you are satisfied in your
present condition? Thank God, no man was ever satisfied with himself as a
sinner. Twenty-five years of the gall of bitterness and the bonds of iniquity
have persuaded me that no man would ever be satisfied with himself as a sinner.
Like the rough sea, you have no rest. You are devoid of peace within your
breast. Thank God, he will not let a sinner lie down and sleep on his way to
hell.

"No, Sir, I am not satisfied with myself." And when those innocent children
throw their lovely arms around your neck and look up in your face, in all the
innocence of their nature, you say, "Of all the women that God ever gave
children to, I am least calculated to lead them to God and everlasting life."

"Satisfied with myself? No, sir. Nobody can say that away from God and on his
way to Perdition."

Then we will ask again, is it because of your inconsideration? I know sometimes
a an will look at a thing and look off. Do you know what bar rooms are for, and
billiard tables, and cards, and germans? They are tricks of the devil to keep
your minds off of yourself. Sometimes men get conviction of the Divine Spirit,
and they will go and dance it off, drink and swear and gamble it off. God pity a
man who has convictions and will dance and curse them away; convictions that a
lost spirit would give the world if he could have. If the devil can keep you
busy all day in your store and make you dance yourself to sleep, he has got you
pretty safe. There are members of the Church that rent houses for bar rooms. You
are a joint stock owner of that thing, and if you can tell me how a man of God
can be a joint stockholder in a bar room, then you have explained to me one of
the profoundest mysteries of moral science. Every man belonging to a club is a
joint owner of that bar room. I have been expecting some of the high bred
gentlemen to come forward and defend the club. If I had such a nice thing I
would just hire newspapers and defend it. And I will tell you that no bar room,
that no deck of cards, can be defended in Heaven, on earth or in hell. You could
not hire a decent idiot to sail into me on that question. I suppose some of you
are mean enough to sail in, but you have got too much sense. I can associate
with members of the Church, who belong to it, but when you set in to defend it,
I would not wipe my feet on you. I am perfectly willing to give you all the time
that I am not engaged in preaching.

"It is not because I am satisfied with my present condition. It is not because I
won’t think. I have thought, but doubts arise about these things." Is it because
you are leading a sort of compromise life? Do you say, I am going to be
religious after a while? There is not a lost spirit in hell that has not said
the same thing. You are going to be religious tomorrow. All that is within you,
between you and eternal despair, is your heart that beats, and if that heart
stops beating you are gone forever. "No," you say, "it is not because I am
leading a compromise life." Is it because a spiritual apathy has taken
possession of you? O, how men sleep over their eternal interests! A man sleeping
on the edge of a precipice, and he may go over forever! The wife of Mr. Rogers,
of Marietta, Ga., was indisposed one morning. He sent a servant down the street
for quinine, and when he returned with it, his wife took the prescription, mixed
it and swallowed it. She then went to the door and said, "Husband, that was not
quinine I took, just now." He ran hurriedly to the drug store. "What is that you
sent my wife?" And the doctor answered, "I have sent enough morphine to your
house to kill a dozen persons. I did it by mistake."

He ran back and got another physician and they went to his house and commenced
to administer emetics. A death like stupor came over her, and she turned to her
husband and said: "Please, sir, let me go to sleep." "O, no, if you go to sleep
you will not awaken this side of eternity." They walked her up and down the
floor, threw cold water on her face and continued to administer emetics. Again
the death like stupor seized her and she said - "Please, sir, let me go to sleep
five minutes." "No, wife, if you sleep five minutes you will never waken up
again." And they worked and wearied until four hours passed away, and then the
doctor said, "Now we have saved her." I have seen thousands with that death like
stupor upon them, and they say, "Just let me sleep these last precious verses
through", and as the last note dies away they are asleep, and when they awake
they will open their eyes in hell. God pity a man that will sleep his eternal
interests away.

You say it is not ignorance as to the nature of sin; it is not the consequences
of sin; it is not because you are leading a compromise life; nor because of
inconsiderateness; nor because you are sleeping through your interests. Is it
because you have a conquered peace that defies all the batteries of Heaven?

Bishop Pierce was preaching at a camp meeting in Georgia, and among those
attending there was a man not a Christian. He was an old man, and sat out in the
straw in front of the Bishop. The Bishop said, when he sat down, "Something said
to me, ’You are preaching the last awakening sermon that man will ever hear,’
and the good power came to me, and I turned it upon the head of that old
sinner." He sat and turned and twisted in his chair, and bit his lips, and when
the Bishop quit preaching he got up, went to his cottage and barred the door,
fastened the window, and prostrated himself on his face. By and by his wife came
and knocked for admission, and the only answer she received was the groans of
her husband. She looked through the cracks of the door and saw him prostrated on
his face. She went back at 3 o’clock and he was in the same position. At sundown
the battle was going on; at 12 o’clock that night the contest was still going
on, waxing hotter and thicker, but grander in its results than the battles of
Waterloo, or Gettysburg, or any battle that earth ever saw. At sunrise the next
morning it continued, and at 9 o’clock it yet went on. At 1 o’clock the wife was
standing opposite the cottage, and she saw the door fly open and she ran up to
him. She could tell by the cold marble of his countenance that he had conquered.
Yet it took him twenty-five hours to do it. That old man lived and died, but he
did not have to fight any other battle.

You have got to surrender to God this evening. The hell spirit is here, and you
have got to expel this spirit out of your heart. It may not take you twenty-five
hours; it may not take you twenty-five seconds to fight the last battle. How
long will we go on in sin? How long win God forbear? Where does hope end, and
where begin the confines of despair? Will you take the step this evening from
which there is no recovery? In Ecclesiastes, chapter eight, eleventh verse, is
the logic of damnation. Because sentences are not speedily executed; because
justice does not crush you down immediately, are you to go on to ruin? Because
there are ten years between me and eternal punishment, shall I spend these ten
years in sin? Because God is good, shall I keep on in wickedness?

If that drunken man knew that in his next drunken dream God would send him to
hell; if that profane swearer knew that the next oath he swore God would send
him immediately to hell, they would not drink or swear any more. Don’t think
because the sentence is not speedily executed you can keep going speedily on.
God help every one of us this evening! I recollect that day in my experience
when I could look my precious wife in the face and say, "I have drank my last
drop, wife." I recollect when I could look my friends in the face and say, "I
have sworn my last oath."

Don’t put it off any longer, until you are gray headed. Choose you this day whom
you will serve. If I were a young man I would want to be religious. If I were an
old man I would want to be religious. If the Spirit of God in Christ had always
been cruel to me, I would serve him for what he was to my mother. O, how good He
was to her. How He charmed her to His loving heart, and how sweetly she died! If
Christ had always been cruel to me I would love Him for what He was to my
precious father. I would love Him for what He is to my precious wife and
children. I will love and praise Him forever for what He has done for me and
mine.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 4: 04. LAW AND ORDER
========================================================================

Law and Order "And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall
reap, if we faint not." (Galatians 6:9)

Brethren, I want to preach from two sides of this text tonight, one half to you
as Christians and the other half to you brethren - I mean what I say -who are
not Christians. You are my brother, but I shall preach the first few minutes
from this text to Christian people.

"And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we
faint not." God says if we don’t weary in well doing, we shall reap. I trust
that in thirty days from this good hour every Christian here can write "T. P."
opposite this verse in the margin of his or her Bible - "tried and proven" to be
true. God says if we would not grow weary in well doing we should reap - reap a
harvest of husbands and wives and sons and daughters for garners in the sky.
Now, brother, this is a declaration with a promise attached - if you won’t grow
weary in well doing you shall reap a harvest.

I wonder what that "well doing" referred to in this verse is? I will drop back a
few verses and find out. Brethren, first, well doing in a Christian life is
this: "Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual
restore such a one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou
also be tempted." Thus I learn from the lesson before us that the first duty of
every Christian man is to ignore himself, and crucify himself, and live only for
the good of others. We never have much trouble after we have gotten rid of
ourselves. My biggest job is managing myself, and I’d rather undertake to
control and manage Cincinnati than to manage myself.

I can get the police to help me manage Cincinnati, if I can get them straight to
start with. I can get the Law and Order League and the Committee of One Hundred,
and get help from various other directions, to help me control this city. I’ll
tell you another thing: I hope when God blessed Cincinnati with another election
- I refer not to any previous election, or to any man who ever held the office
of mayor - but I trust that the next mayor you have will enforce the laws of the
city if he has to die in the ditch in his endeavor to keep it straight. I’ll
tell you another thing; If I were a citizen of Cincinnati I would die by the Law
and Order League. I would stand up with the citizens of the Committee of One
Hundred until my feet flew from under me. I would go into every thing and stay
with every thing that looked towards law and order. Understand that? It is your
only safety as a city; it is the safety of the commonwealth of each State, and
the safety of municipal corporations - the enforcement of law. Law is made not
for good citizens, but for bad citizens, and there isn’t a law on the statute
books of Ohio that is odious to law abiding people. What do you say to that? I
am ready now and ready forever to die by the laws of my State, good or bad. I am
branching off from my text, but what I have said is Gospel just as much as any
thing I could say.

God bless you people of Cincinnati and rally you round the code of your city,
and the laws of your city, and help you to stand by them and to see them
enforced, and if any fellow doesn’t like these laws let him emigrate -you have
no use for him, no how! This is a free country. If he doesn’t want to stay in a
law abiding city, why, let him emigrate, and if you all haven’t money enough to
buy him a ticket, if he will write me a letter I’ll furnish him a ticket, for
the sake of the love I bear to you all. Law and order, righteousness, let it
reign on earth, and let all good citizens stand by it. That’s it! If I were
mayor of this city next Sunday and Monday, there would be a thousand fellows in
your lock ups, and station houses, and jails, on Monday night sure. Put that
down!

Every man in this town that opened his bar room on Sunday I would put in jail,
if I had to call out the militia of the city to help put him there. Every bar
room door that is flung open in Cincinnati on Sunday is against the law, and in
direct opposition to the law of your city and of your State; and, brethren, in
the name of God, let’s enforce the law, or let’s call our Legislature home, and
quit paying them to go up there to Columbus and enact a set of rules and laws
that they don’t intend to carry out. Abolish the Legislature, burn the code, or
make up your mind to stand up for law and order. God bless the Law and Order
League and the Committee of One Hundred!

If there’s a saloon keeper in this city that doesn’t like the way things are
run, tell him to emigrate, demijohn and all - you wouldn’t miss him! You can
well spare twenty-nine hundred saloon keepers and beer gardens, and then have
one hundred of them left, and the Lord knows that’s enough. A hundred saloons
ought to do you, if you ain’t the greediest crowd I ever struck. If we can’t do
any thing with law and order on these saloons, let’s starve them out. I
understand that a good many of them have got to that point now that they can’t
settle their bills. They say they never saw business so dull in their line in
their life. Thank God for dull business along on that line!

Brethren, stand by your Law and Order League, by your Committee of One Hundred,
and by your mayor in the enforcement of the law, and not only stand by your
mayor, but tell him if he doesn’t pitch in and enforce the law he can never be
elected dog pelter in this town, much less mayor again. The mayor isn’t the boss
of the town. He’s the servant of everybody and anybody, and, brethren, let’s
make our servants do what we want them to do. That’s the way.

Law and order! Why, see what this little movement here has already done. You’ve
shut up the theaters here on Sunday, and I’ll tell you, if you’ll push the
battle on you will do like the citizens of St. Joseph, Mo. When I went there, an
honest Preacher, the Pastor of a Church in that city, came to me and said:
"Brother Jones, don’t open your mouth about the liquor traffic here or they’ll
put dynamite under the house you sleep in and blow you up!" "What?" said I.
"They’ll kill you before twenty-four hours if you ever denounce the liquor
traffic, and they’ll do it with dynamite," said the Preacher, earnestly. "If
they blow me up with dynamite," said I, "I’ll get a fine momentum, and I’ll keep
on all the harder. The tendency of the flash of this thing is upward, and it’ll
give a fellow a good start. I like that."

Well, out there in St. Joseph I turned my guns loose on that traffic, and in
less than thirty days from the time I left there they had over hauled the 18O
bar keepers, found 18O true bills against them, indicted them, brought them up
before the court, and they walked up to the judge and took solemn oath they’d
never sell another drop of liquor on Sunday if the judge would only be light on
them that time and let them off. They knew they were doing wrong, and they
persisted in it until they were brought up sharply. Law and order has got to
prevail in this city, and if it does, you’re going to see another state of
things in Cincinnati. You good people are in the majority.

It is all a great big lie about the hoodlums running this town. I know some of
the best citizens of this city are Germans, and I have received letters while I
have been here from German citizens that have brought joy to my heart. Thank God
for every German in this city that is for law and order! Thank God for every
American here that is in favor of law and order! In this democratic country, I
mean republican country, the majority rules. In a republican form of government
the majority always rules, and the good citizens of this town are in that
majority; and, now, let’s come forward and dare to assert ourselves in favor of
law and order and righteousness.

Well, I must come to my text. What I have been saying is good Gospel, and it
will do your children good after you are dead and gone if you will follow that
kind of Gospel; and the Lord knows I didn’t come to this city to get up a shout
and go round corn stalk meeting, where they all shout and afterward go on with
their devilment, but I came here to get up a Ten Commandments revival, a Sermon
on the Mount revival, and to preach righteousness among the people.

I will tell you another thing; the responsive hearts and the responsive presence
of the people here in this hall to the Gospel as it has been preached have
convinced me that Ohio and Cincinnati are overwhelmingly in favor of law and
order, and may God bless you for showing it.

But, brethren, I must return to my text: "And let us not be weary in well doing:
for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not." The first duty of every man
is to ignore himself and his own purpose and desires and intentions, crucify
himself and live only for the good of others. That’s it. O, how I love to see a
self sacrificing man - a man that loves humanity better than he loves himself. I
like that sort of a man. He is an honor to his race and a blessing to the world.

We have a man down our way in Georgia; he’s a little Methodist Preacher on a
circuit now. Whenever I walk into the presence of that man I think he’s the
largest man I ever looked at, and he just expands in my presence when I look in
his face, and I get whittled down until I feel I’m no bigger than a mole hill
beside a majestic mountain. Why does he look so large? Because, when I look into
that face, I’m looking into the face of the most unselfish man I ever saw. He
doesn’t care one cent for himself. He doesn’t live or do for himself, but every
thought of his life, every act of his life is, "How can I help some one else?"
He’s the happiest man, and the most glorious being I ever looked at, and I trace
it all to the one source, that he’s so supremely unselfish. He just lives for
other people. Brother, you’ll never be worth any thing until you can get
yourself down and get your foot squarely planted on yourself, and say, "Now, you
lie there. If you get up I’ll mash your mouth for you." When you do that you get
in a position where you can help some one else. Blessed be God, I have got
myself out of the way, and have nothing to look after now but other people.
There’s nothing in the way now, and, with my whole self in the background, I
have nothing to do but to live and act for others all the day long. This text
says: "If a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual restore such a
one in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted."
Your first duty is to live for your brother. I’ve often heard people say, "I
have no time to look after other people. I’m doing first rate if I can get into
Heaven myself. I’m in big luck if I can get there myself without looking after
other people." Brother, you’ve made a mistake here as long as eternity. Listen
to me, if I just wanted to make sure of damnation I would just settle it. "I’ll
never try to help anybody else in this country. I will spend all my days helping
myself." What is hell at last? It’s the very quintessence of selfishness, and
selfishness is hell, and there is not an element in hell that does not enter
into selfishness; and the supremely selfish man has already lighted the fires of
hell in his soul that shall burn forever and forever. A selfish man! Just as I
am unselfish I am lovable, and just as I am unselfish I am a blessing to the
world. Just as I am selfish I am unlovable and a curse to the world.

"Live for myself!" Why, what is it that makes a man sell whisky? Selfishness!
What is it that makes a man gamble? Selfishness! What is it that makes a man
steal? Selfishness! Do you catch the idea? In all the devilment that people have
ever done in this world there is a seed at the bottom of the tap root of the
whole thing, and that seed is selfishness. All that is good on earth today grows
in this soil we call unselfishness. Divest yourself, brother, of all
selfishness, and strike out to do good for the world.

I will tell you another thing. As Christian people we ought to join hands here
now as a great army of Christians, and march to the front hand in hand, heart to
heart, faith to faith, love to love; march straight along as Baptists,
Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, and Christians of all denominations. We
must join hands and march to the front, and let us say to this grand army, "We
will hang together, and stick together, and fight together, and die together,
and we will all go to Heaven together, or we will all go to hell together. We
will stick to one another world without end!"

There’s many a Preacher that has been unable to get up a successful meeting in
his own Church, and if some other Preacher gets up a big meeting in his Church,
and four or five hundred souls are converted and brought to God, this poor
Preacher looks as if he’d been sick for six months; he just goes drooping about.
I don’t mean any Cincinnati Preacher - I mean a Georgia Preacher. I have seen
them. They were so glad their brother Preacher was having such a successful
revival that it was like to have killed them, they just fell off pounds and
pounds. I mean these Georgia Preachers - I haven’t any reference to any
Cincinnati Preachers. I have seen that the case with a Preacher; he couldn’t be
happy over another preacher’s revival to save his life.

It takes a good deal of religion for some Pastors to stand by and see the Pastor
of another Church having such a big time with a revival. It takes more religion
there than anywhere else in the world. It does that! I have been along there. I
am a human being, and all of us Preachers are human beings. Brethren, I want to
see the day come when you will rejoice in every good act, for there never was a
revival in this town that didn’t help every Church in the town, if they put
themselves in a right attitude towards it. Every revival in any Church in this
city, no matter if not more than five hundred are out, will do good to every
other Church, if they put themselves in a right attitude to the work of Christ.

If I never had saved a soul in the world, and the Lord allows me in Heaven with
the workers that did save the souls, I’d stand and shout hosannas over the work
of the others. It takes a good deal of religion to do that. We want religion
enough to stand by and enjoy another fellow’s doing what we tried, but were
unable to do ourselves. It takes one hundred and eighty pounds of grace to the
square inch right there to let me crow over and enjoy another man doing a thing
that I couldn’t do myself.

I have known Preachers - Georgia Preachers, you know - to try for two or three
years to get up a big revival in their Church, and they couldn’t get up any, and
then they lammed in and preached hard against revivals. They tried to have them
themselves and couldn’t, and then they just lammed in and preached as hard
against them as they could. Lord, have mercy on selfish Preachers. If God will
take all the selfishness out of the hearts of all the Preachers, myself as well
as others, we will be in a position to lead the ranks of God into the belching
mouths of the cannons of the devil and run him back into his citadel and bombard
it until we run him out and capture this world for Christ.

There are Preachers in this town that haven’t been in this hall at all; and mark
what I tell you. The Preachers of this city that have stood aloof - I want them
to hear this, I hope it will I do them good - when they saw God was with it and
saving souls, and yet kept away, will have to make out that a clear case of
insanity was upon them during these meetings or go to hell, in my candid
judgment. I don’t care, brother, if he is your Pastor and does rack around to
see you every week, and talk with you on religion. I tell you when God
Almighty’s cannon and musketry begin to roar, every loyal citizen will rush to
the front and help fight the battles. If your Pastor, brother, has been hanging
back, you tell him he ought to go before a jury and be tried for insanity, and
carry a good certificate with him to the Judgment, for he’ll need it.

Selfishness! Good Lord take the selfishness out of our Preachers and out of our
Churches, and then we’ll win this world to Christ. We’re not running this thing
for ourselves, but running it for Christ.

Now, suppose an insurance company had a hundred agencies and agents in this town
and they were to pull against one another, undercut one another, as the Churches
pull against and undercut one another. Let a disaffected member get mad at one
Church here because the Preacher raked him about progressive euchre, and leave,
another Church will say, "Come, live with us." All the same Church, all agents
for the same house and compromising and cutting rates! Why, there isn’t an
insurance company in America that wouldn’t send their inspector of agencies out
here and discharge every agent in the town if they ran on that schedule.

Selfishness is the curse of the world, and unselfishness is a blessing to the
world. You have as unselfish Preachers in this town as walk the face of the
earth. You have the others too; I never call any names, but every fellow knows
his number. If this cap fits any Preacher in this house let him wear it. If it
doesn’t fit you throw it away and get a better one. People say I arrogate a
great deal to myself. But I do not intend to take any thing to myself. I don’t
want any praise from anybody. I don’t care what you think of me so long as you
think well of my Savior and do what He wants you to do. There are no selfish
aims or ambitious to be gained in this fight, and God has blessed me in
proportion as I have been unselfish. I don’t want any praise - as I said before,
I’d just as soon you’d throw mud on me as praise me. Brethren, with an unselfish
spirit, let’s join hands and march on to glory and to God with this city. In St.
Joseph, Mo., those brothers gathered and worked and worked for weeks together,
and there they are today with more than a thousand souls that they reaped since
the union revival closed. And now, brother, here is a harvest field of one
hundred and fifty thousand souls away from Christ; and I hope every pastor will
call his Church together on Sunday at 11 o’clock, and give them the plan of the
battle, and tell them what he expects them to do. And brother and sister in
Christ, if you never did a faithful month’s work for God in your life, and you
never intended to do one month’s work, you tell your Pastor next Sunday morning
at 11 o’clock: "Brother, put me down in the first of the soldiers that will go
in to conquer or to die." And if you will do that, in less than six weeks from
today I will show you fifty thousand souls converted to God and added to the
Churches. The doors are wide open. O, let us fight this old world and get in the
rear of this old world, and drive them into the kingdom of God, and there is
nothing else here to do. And brother, let us go with unselfishness into this
fight, and all meet and pray together, and then they will scatter out to the
different Churches in the city, and save this town from death and hell.

I will tell you another thing. Every man of righteousness ought to join in the
battle. And you that are not members of the Church, surrender your heart to God
tonight, and Sunday morning at 11 O’clock come in and join some Christian
Church, and be one of the most valiant soldiers of the Cross for the next five
or six weeks in bringing to Christ those around you. If a man is trying to help
others to Christ, it is the best evidence that he has got it himself. Go to
work, and go to work for Christ now. As a good man said, "I will pay the balance
in good works as long as I live. I am going to devote my life to God and
humanity."

I will tell you another thing. You can’t be too patient toward one another.
These new converts will need your care and mercy and good will and help every
day - mark that. I want to say, I frequently hear this question: Do Jones’s
converts stick? Now, let me tell you, I never run any insurance on them at all;
no guarantee. I don’t run any guaranty on my converts. They may, every one, be
in the penitentiary before this time next year. But I will tell you one thing,
every convert of these meetings will average up with the Churches they join. Do
you hear that? Average up with the Churches they join. A woman said to me once,
"Brother Jones, we had a revival here two years ago, and seventy-five joined our
Church, and now where are they, those seventy-five?" She said, "I don’t believe
in revivals." I said, "Sister, ain’t those seventy-five here in town?" She said,
"Yes, but I never see much of them. Why," she says, "some of those converts are
getting drunk." Said I, "Ain’t some of your old converts getting drunk?" "Well,
yes," said she; "but some of the new converts don’t come to meeting." "Don’t
some of your old ones stay away, too?" said I. "Well, yes," said she; "and some
of the new converts play cards." Said I, "Don’t some of the old ones play cards,
too" "Well, yes." Said I, "Sister, the new converts will live right up with the
old ones; some of the new ones are getting drunk, so are some of the old ones;
some of the new ones play cards, so do some of the old ones; some of the new
ones are staying away from meeting, so are some of the old ones."

It is not so much the weight and bigness of the infant as it is what sort of a
mother has God given it to take care of it! There is many a Church in this
country - O, what mothers, what mothers, what mothers they are! Ah, me, there is
that mother with her sweet, beautiful babe yonder who cares nothing for it! She
keeps it in the nursery, and the mother doesn’t see it once a week or once a
month. O, such a mother isn’t worthy of a child! She isn’t worthy the name of
mother. The Church in this town is a mother to its converts, and there’s many a
Church in this town that cares nothing for its converts. They hire a Preacher to
look after the Church, hire him by the month, and pay him by the month to look
after the babies, and I tell you there is a sight of them to look after. I would
rather preach three hundred and sixty-five sermons every year for one of your
Churches, than to look after the babies for one week. It’s a solid fact. It is
whine and whine, and cry and cry; and soothing syrup and soothing syrup. How
many bottles do you reckon have been used in this Church? I suppose you can go
into the closet and find hundreds of empty bottles of soothing syrup. And before
the Pastor can get one fellow quiet, another breaks out, and it is running with
the spoon and bottle all the time.

Obliged to do it! It isn’t right the way we do with our Preachers; it is not
right before God. I told them the other day in my sermon, that in some of these
Churches the whole Church will be in the wagon, every single member of the
Church up in the wagon, some laughing, some cursing, some drinking, some playing
cards, some shouting, but the whole lot up in the wagon, and the poor little old
Preacher out in the shafts trying to pull the whole thing along. There goes the
poor fellow under this big load, just tired to death, and here some fellow wipes
his mouth after taking a drink, and says, "Jab him up a bit." I say, get out of
that wagon and catch hold and pull or push at once. O, brethren of the Ministry,
God bless you, hitch up that crowd to the wagon, and get up on the spring seat
and drive a while!

It is a heap easier for you all to pull the Preacher, than it is for the
Preacher to pull you. Let us swap about with him; let us all get out of the
wagon a while. And about the only time you get out at all is when you go down a
steep hill, and then you get out and push. The Lord have mercy on that sort of a
man. Live for others, work for others. Your Preacher needs unselfish members.
God needs unselfish members. The world needs you every day. The poor, weak
brethren in the Church need you every day.

Now this incident. I read it a few months ago. It was related by Bishop Marvin.
He said that in one of his charges once, when he was a young Pastor, he
commenced a meeting on his circuit at a Church, and he said at that Church there
were from two to three hundred members. He commenced preaching, but the Church
didn’t get aroused. And he said when he had preached about two weeks,
seventy-five had professed conversion and joined the Church, but the Church
never got waked up. And before the first day of next January - this was in July
- before the first day of January seventy-two of the seventy-five had gone back
to the world, just as bad or worse than they were before. He said right over
there on that same circuit there was another Church, the most faithful Church he
ever saw, with two of the most faithful class leaders he ever knew. He commenced
his meetings there, and the Church was on fire with love to God and man. And
that is pure unselfishness, love to God and love to man. And he said while
preaching at that Church one night, he noticed an old blacksmith, dingy, black,
and dirty, come in and take a back seat; and after the service one of the class
leaders came up and said: "Brother Marvin, did you see that old dingy, dirty
blacksmith take his seat?" "Yes," he said. "Well," said the class leader, "he is
the worst old drunkard this country possesses, and I was glad to see him here,"
The bishop said: "You ought to invite him back again." "Well, I tried, but he
was gone before I could get to him," "Well," said Marvin, "you must go to see
him."

Next morning, bright and early, the class leader rode up to the blacksmith’s
house and said to him: "I am mighty glad I saw you at the Church last night, and
I want you to come again." Said he: "I love to hear that man preach; he caught
hold of my heart; but," said he, "look at these ragged clothes and this
debauched body; and my poor wife in rags, and my children in their desolation;
we can’t go to Church; we’ve got nothing to wear." "Ah," said the class leader,
"I know that; but I am going to bring you a suit apiece for the whole family,
and come with my wagon and take you to Church." He did. On that night the
blacksmith, his wife, and two oldest children were there, and knelt at the
altar. The next thing, the blacksmith and his wife and two oldest children were
converted and joined the Church. And when the blacksmith walked up and joined
the Church, the sinners out in the back of the house said: "The first time that
old blacksmith goes to town and gets drunk they’ll lose him." The meeting
closed. They got him to pray in his family; they carried him work to his shop,
and got the neighbors to patronize him, and kept him busy at his trade; and
before two years he had bought himself a nice cottage and paid for all his
tools, and was one of the respected men of the community. About six months after
these two years were over the Western fever broke out in the settlement. People
all took a notion to go West, and the blacksmith said he thought he would go.
And the class leaders said: "Sir, we don’t want you to live out West; the
company is too bad, and we want you to stay here with us, with your family, and
go to Heaven with us." He said: "I can do better with my children out there."
They couldn’t persuade him, and in a short time a small company started out West
with about forty wagons, and the blacksmith and his family with them. They
crossed the Mississippi River, and one of the company wrote back, and among
other things said: "We gather in the blacksmith’s wagon, and he reads his Bible
and offers family prayer with all the company every night and morning." And when
they got the next letter they had arrived at their place of destination, and
they were almost afraid to open it, but it said; "The blacksmith has gone right
into Church with all his family and gone right to duty." Every letter they got
said, "He is faithful to God and duty."

About six months after he went out one of the class leaders one morning got a
letter with a black margin all around the envelope, and he opened it, and it was
from the wife, bathed in her tears, and it read: "My husband died shouting happy
last night, and went home to Heaven, and he told me to write back to his
faithful class leaders and tell them another one is saved by Grace and gone home
to God."

O, for that spirit of religion in this country! That is what we want. O, my
brethren, let us stand by one another; let us die by one another! There is too
much doubt and hesitancy on the mind of the people. I recollect when Sam Small
was converted. O, how dissipated that man was! He told you all himself. I don’t
go behind his back; I have said all before his face that I say here, and I am no
prouder of my precious child, or of my wife, than I am of Sam Small. Thank God
for the Grace that brought him to me. When Sam Small was converted to God I
heard him talk once, and my wife and friends said, "Sam Small has got religion,
just as sure as Sam Jones has got it; he has got it, certain." He has. He has
got the right aim. The first thing I did, I threw my arms around him and said,
"Brother, come and go to work with me in the cause of God " The wise brethren
walked up and said, "Brother Sam, you had better be very particular; if his foot
were to happen to slip it would be death on you, and you had better be mighty
particular now." "If he falls down," said I, "he shall fall on me; I will hold
him up, and stand by him until I die myself. And thank God Almighty, he never
fell on me. I have never held up a pound for him, but I have got so now, thank
God, I can lean on him, and he is helping to hold me up. Glory be to God for the
spirit that will throw his arms around a poor fellow struggling and help him on
to God!

I never see a poor drunken man but I want to throw my arms around him and keep
them there. I never see a poor, weak brother come up that I don’t wish I had
nothing else in the world to do but to keep him out of temptations and keep him
straight until he gets firmly on his feet. They need your nursing; they need
your help. But O, what is the use of bringing them in and nobody taking care of
them? Take hold of souls and bring them through to God. You who are spiritual go
and love him, stand by him, do your best for him.

I learned how to love a man once by a game of town ball. When I was a boy we
used to play town ball. But I will tell you what, if I had a dog and he were to
go out and look at a game of base ball an hour, and then come back in my yard, I
would go out and kill him, I would. None of your base ball in mine. There is not
a more corrupting thing this side of hell than base ball. Now, put that down.
They all thought I had forgotten that, I never have had any use form it. The
idea of a great big young buck twenty-five years old running all over creation
for a ball. If your mother wanted you to cut a stick of wood she couldn’t get
you to do it to save her life, but you dress up in a fool’s garb and run after a
ball, the hottest day, until your tongue lolls out, you fool you. That isn’t
all. It is one of the finest fields for gambling in America. And that is not
all. I wouldn’t wipe my feet on any crowd that would go out and play base ball
on the Sabbath. Those are my sentiments. I couldn’t put it in any more concise
way than that. I don’t know whether you agree with me or not; but you understand
me, I reckon, don’t you? I will let my boy play ball until he is ten years old,
but after he is fifteen years old I believe I will wear him out with work. If he
falls catch him at such foolishness as that.

Men, stand by one another and help one another, and when down let us catch him
immediately and straighten him up, and then call to other brothers, and say,
"One of you get under this arm and one under the other," and let him hobble on
toward glory, and when he gets into Heaven his crutches will be there too,
blessed be God. It is about the only way you will ever get to Heaven. It is to
go there as a crutch under some poor fellow’s arm, and the only way he will get
there is for you to play the crutch for him. O, thank God, the crutches and the
lame have to go in together, and they rejoice together in the name of the good
work.

Stand by one another! Help one another! Do your duty toward one another! And
when a poor fellow falls down do not look at him and say - "Just look at that
brother now; he joined the Church during the revival, and now is drunk; look at
him!" There is the poor, fallen brother in the ditch; he is drunk, beastly
drunk; and here are two brethren standing off, looking at him and saying, one to
the other, "I told our Pastor not to take him into the Church." Do you want to
know whom God thinks more of, that one lying there, or these two? That sot lying
in the gutter is better than a hundred such in the sight of God. That poor,
drunken fellow is better in the sight of God than these Pharisees that will see
their brother sink and then say, "Just look at him." A brother would run to him
and drag him out of the ditch and stand by him and say, "You have done wrong, so
have I, and we will quit now and try to live right."

There is many a poor fellow who has gone to hell from this community that
Christian people never made one effort to save from death and hell. They just go
to the dogs all around us.

I have talked more than an hour, and now I am going to close with just these
words. I never preached on the subject that I started out on in my life, and I
have gone off in this direction, and I hope God will use it to your good.

Now a word or two to you men out of the Church. Let me say this to you: There is
a great responsibility on you. You have seen rich men in the community; you have
seen a rich man and you have seen all the poor people turn away; and you hear
the poor people talk and say: "That rich man doesn’t care any thing about us
poor folks." The truth of the business is, these poor people imagine that that
rich man doesn’t care any thing about them; and when they see him they treat him
coolly, and he does the same, for the poor fellows don’t know what else to do.
Now you have imagined many a time the Church didn’t care any thing about you and
that these people didn’t want to have any thing to do with you, and you have
turned away yourself. Turn to the Church and say, "Give me help and assistance,"
and they will take you by the hand and take you to glory and to God. When you do
that once, men of the world, you will be on the right direction.


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  CHAPTER 5: 05. WHOSOEVER WILL MAY COME
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Whosoever Will May Come "And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him
that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will,
let him take of the water of life freely." (Revelation 22:17)

You see, I get this text from the last page of this blessed hook. This is Gods
last message to man. And for fear that something might be added to, or that
something might be taken from, the Scripture, God puts this fearful admonition.
He says: "For I testify unto every man that hearth the words of the prophecy of
this hook. If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the
plagues that are written in this hook. And if any man shall take away from the
words of the hook of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the hook
of life and from the things that are written in this book,"

I am glad that God winds up his revelation to man with this gracious verse: "And
the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that hearth say, Come. And let
him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take of the water of life
freely."

GOD’S LATEST WORD TO MAN

If I have been corresponding with a friend on any given subject, and he has
written me a dozen or a hundred letters upon that subject-if I want to find his
mind now concerning that, I will turn to the last letter received from him-the
one bearing the most recent date. And now, if I would know Gods will concerning
the race of man I wont run back over Genesis or Deuteronomy or the prophecies of
Isaiah or the Epistle to the Romans by St. Paul. When I want to find out what
were the concluding words, the last message of God to man, I run through the
book, and I see Gods last message, and I see the fearful warning added: "Dont
any man take away these work. If he does, I will take away his part out of the
book of life. And if any man shall add any thing to this book which shall make
it so that these are not my last words, then I will add unto him the plagues
that are written in the book." And after all the fearful warnings and judgments
and denunciations of the Scripture, thanks be to God, this Is his last message
to man:

"And the Spirit and the bride may Come. And let him that hearth say , Come. And
whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely."

SOME GRAND DAYS s a grand day in the worlds history when the evening and the
morning were the seventh day, and the Son of God and angels shouted over a
finished world. It was a grand day in the worlds history when Adam and Eve, the
first pair, stood before God, with their reason clear and perfect, unruffled by
passion, unclouded by prejudice and unimpaired by disease. It was a grand
conception to them as they looked out over a finished world and said that the
flowers were Gods thought in bloom; that the rivers were Gods thought imbedded;
that the mountains were Gods thought piled up, and that the dewdrops were his
thoughts in pearl as they mingle in loving tenderness and join together on the
leaf of the rose. And wherever man looked about him, all nature in its beauty
and freshness whispered back, "The hand that made me is divine." It was a grand
day in the worlds history when It was announced through the moral universe of
God that man had violated the law of God and had brought misery and woe upon
himself and upon his progeny forever. It was a grand day in the worlds history
when God met the fallen and degenerate pair and said to Eve: "The seed of the
woman shall bruise the serpents head." It was a grand day in the worlds history
when the last strong swimmer sank beneath the flood and left Noah in the ark
with his three sons and their wives and two of all sorts to perpetuate the race
upon the face of the earth. It was a grand day in this worlds history when
Pharaoh and his hosts and all of his chariots and men were swallowed up and
engulfed by the Red Sea. It was a grand day in this worlds history when a
burning hail fell on Sodom and Gomorrah and all the plains thereof, and
destroyed the cities of the plain. It was a grand day in this worlds history
when 185,000 soldiers under the blast of an archangels wing were wrapped in
their winding sheets. It was a grand day in this worlds history when on Korah
and Dathan and Abiram and their wicked com pany the earth burst open and
swallowed them up out of the sight of men. THE NEW SAVIOR

It was a grander day in the worlds history when the old prophet of God stood on
the hills of Judea with his spark in hand and let its beneficent rays shine down
through seven centuries, and his voice was heard through the seven centuries,
saying: "Simon and Anna prepare the cradle to rock the babe of Bethlehem." It
was a grand day in this worlds history when the star poised itself over the
manger of Bethlehem and when the wise men gathered about the babe of Bethlehem.
There they looked upon an everlasting God lying asleep in Marys arms, and the
King of Angels and God over all, blessed for evermore, as he was carried about
in a virgins arms, as they looked upon the King of Angels, the carpenters
despised boy. It was a grand day in this worlds history, when at twelve years of
age, this God-man surprised all the wisdom of Jerusalem by his forethought and
by his Intelligence. It was a grand day in this worlds history when the Son of
God notified his disciples, to whin he had been sent from the Father: "I put you
on notice that I must be crucified, dead, and that I will arise again in the
third day." It was a grand day in the worlds history when he hung there
suspended between two thieves and cried out with aloud voice: "My God! My God!
Why hast thou forsaken me ! It was a grand day in the worlds history when they
buried this sacrifice yonder in the grave of Joseph, and put the seal of the
Roman government upon it, and put sturdy Roman soldiers around It to guard it.
THE SACRIFICE ACCEPTED

It was a grand day in the worlds history when on the morning of the third day
God summoned an angel to his aide, because Christ himself had announced the
fact, "I am the sacrifice. I go to die for the world." And now the only question
with his disciples and with all humanity is, "Will God accept the sacrifice !"
He has suffered, bled, died. He is buried. Will he ever rise again! Will God
accept the sacrifice?

It was on the morning of the third day that God summoned an angel to his side
and told him to go to earth as swift as morning light and roll away the stone
from the grave, and when he made his appearance there at the grave and rolled
away the stone, and the Son of God stood up ii the sepulcher and took the
napkins from his jaws and the grave clothes from his body, and folded them up
and laid them to one side, and walked forth from the tomb, the first fruits of
the resurrection, then God accepted the sacrifice, and grasped the stylus in his
own hand and signed the magna charts of mans salvation. And ever since that God
blessed moment it has been written: "Whosoever liveth and believeth shall never
more die."

It was a grand day in the worlds history when the Savior man stood yonder,
surrounded by a company of five hundred, and chariot descended from the skies,
and he stepped into the chariot and above star and moon he disappeared until it
overvaulted the very throne of God itself. And as they stood gazing into heaven,
an angel flew back to earth and shouted aloud to them:

"Why stand ye here gazing up into heaven? As ye have seen the son of man
’ascending, so he shall descend at the last day to judge the world of
righteousness." THE COMFORTER That was a grand day in this worlds history when
the one hundred and twenty gathered in that upper room, that upper chamber
yonder, in Jerusalem. And they had prayed the first day and the second day and
the third day and on until the tenth day. They were praying for the imbuement of
power from on high. Christ had told them:

"Tarry ye here at Jerusalem until ye are imbued with power from am high. It is
expedient for you that I go away. After I go away the Comforter will come, the
Holy Ghost. He will come to the world."

I have often thought that that expression: Jesus said it is expedient "The best
thing I can do for you is to leave the world and go home to the Father and then
the Spirit will come."

"Master, can there be anything better than thy presence? Thou art the bread of
life to us. Thou art the water of life to us. Thou art the door by which if any
man enter he shall go in and eat and find pasture. Thou art the truth and the
way to life. Master, is it expedient, is it best that thou go away?"

He said: "It is expedient that I go to the Father." And on the morning of the
tenth day, as that company gathered and prayed in that upper chamber, the Holy
Spirit, the Holy Ghost, the third person of the adorable Trinity, flew right
through the wounded side of the Son of God and laved his wings in that precious
blood, and flew down to earth and rushed in upon that company and filled the
room like a rushing, mighty wind; and Peter opened the door and the company
followed him down upon the streets of Jerusalem, and there, on the morning of
the tenth day, he preached that memorable sermon in Jerusalem that worn 3,000
souls to Christ more conversions to Peter in that one sermon than Christ had in
all his ministry. And Christ knew what he was talking about when he said:

"It expedient for you that should go way. If I go away the Comforter will come
and the Spirit shall come." THE WOOING OF THE SPIRIT That Spirit is the third
person of the adorable Trinity. God gave the Son and the Son comes to suffer,
die and to arise again. And now the Spirit comes to woo and beseech and implore
and enlighten and convict and convert the world to God. It seemed like after God
had loved the race and called them to him and they had wandered off, that they
would have died without excuse, but God sent his Son to live among us and to die
for us and to preach to us and to instruct us, and if he had stopped at that,
man would have died without excuse. But he didnt stop there. And now the Holy
Ghost comes into the world the third person of the adorable Trinity, and every
good resolution we ever have and every good that ever inspired us, and every
good deed ever done, we owe it all to the inspiration and blessed in. fluence of
the Holy Spirit of God.

Oh, thank God! we have an even-present omniscient, omnipresent God with us
to-night When I bid wife and children "good-by" at home, God boards the train
with me, and he is with me all the weary miles of my road from home. And then I
am conscious God is at home. with my family, and when I come into the Christian
homes of St. Louis I find God present in every Christian home, and that God is
with the missionary in China, and God is with thousands and millions of pulpits
on earth. No wonder the blessed Christ said: "It is expedient for you that I go
away. I wills send the Comforter." THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT

Oh, brother, sister, hear me to-night! Is there in your soul the desire to be
good? Is there a purpose to be good? Is there a resolution to be good? It was
born under the touch of the Divine Spirit upon these cold, dead hearts of ours.
And the Spirit comes to woo. He comes to teach. He comes to implore. For when he
shall come he will re prove the world of sin and of righteousness and of
judgment to come.

Come Holy Spirit,

Heavenly Dove, With all thy quickening powers, Kindle a flame of sacred love, In
all these hearts of ours

Help us to walk close with God! Help us, Divine Spirit, ever to be tender and
impressible! Help us ever to hear and heed the Gospel of the Son of God! The
Divine Spirit broods over the congregation to-night. He touched your heart
to-day. He touched your heart last night and day before yesterday. He has
touched a thousand hearts or more, and called them to a better life in the last
few days in this city. And the most fearful sin that you may commit is to wound
the Spirit of God, to drive him out of your heart and to drive him away from
your presence. The book says:

"Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of
redemption."

GRIEVE NOT THE HOLY SPIRIT

You may laugh at me. You may deride me. You may scoff at the church. You may
defy God, and you may crucify my Savior afresh, and put him to open shame, but I
warn you to-night: Take heed how you trifle with the Spirit of all grace! I have
seen men reject and insult the Divine Spirit, until I could almost hear the
Spirit of God as he closed the gates of Heaven forever in an immortal spirits
face. My friend, to-night, if there is in your soul the desire to be a
Christian, nurse it, foster it, shield it Keep it there, and pray God to fan the
spark into a living flame that shall burn on and on when the stars have gone and
when the moon shall turn to blood. Lets you and I pray for this, and whatever
others may do, God help us to be impressible and movable under the Divine Spirit
of grace. The Spirit says, "Come." The third person of the ever adorable Trinity
is the active agency in the world to-day to teach men, to move men, to stir men
and use men, and but for his divine presence with me as I preach the gospel, I
declare to the fact that I would never have the heart to take another text in
this world. Oh, how many struggles the earnest preacher may have in the world!
God only knows the burdens that I have carried on my own poor head since I
landed in your city. God only knows the wakeful hours, the tears and the prayers
that have gone up from my poor heart, and I say:

"God save the city! God arouse the city! God save our young men! God save our
young women God save the fathers and mothers in this city!" And I can almost
hear God as he whispers back: "I’ll be with you. Ill stand by you. And when the
din and smoke of the battle has blown away, you will find that I have been your
friend through the thickest of the fight, and all God asks of the Christian
people of St. Louis to-night is to come up to the help of the Lord against the
mighty. God arouse you! And God help his church in St. Louis to heed the wooing
of the Spirit, and come to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against
the mighty. The Spirit says, "Come." THE SPIRITS BESEECHING ENTREATY

Well, if God had stopped at the point given his Son, and sent his Spirit to woo
men-we would have died without excuse. But God pushes his work on and on and on
until he shall say to a guilty world: "What more could 1 have done to my
vineyard that I have not already done 1" God will never leave a stone unturned,
God will never leave an effort unput-forth as long as man is out of hell and out
of the grave. And I tell you, my congregation, to-night, I know God is in
earnest about the salvation of man, and I have felt thousands of times that the
worst of sinners would rejoice if they were to see his face. God help men to
look up to-night and see their Fathers face, with all the love of his heart as
it beams forth, and hear his voice as he calls them to the better life. God
loves you, and he has given you every manifestation of his love. He tells yon in
his blessed book:

"When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up."

SPARKS OF DIVINE LOVE

I have seen a mother as she followed a wayward boy on, and on and on to the very
brink of hell, and when the son made his final leap from his mothers arms she
too his poor body and buried it, and would go to his grave and water It with her
tears day after day. Oh, how that moth. ors heart clung to that wayward boy! I
have seen the wife, when every friend in the world had forsaken her husband, and
all mankind scoffed him away from their presence-when he would come home drunken
and debauched and ruined, his precious wife would meet him at the front gate and
help him up the steps, and help him into the room and carry him to the bed and
pull off his muddy shoes and bathe his fevered face, and imprint the kiss of
love and fidelity upon his dissipated cheek. Oh, why did wife do that? Why does
mother do that? It is just a little of the nature of God poured into that
mothers heart and that wifes heart that makes her love and cling to that son and
to that husband as she does.

"When my father and my mother forsake me, then God will take me up." THE
MOTHERHOOD OF GOD The sweetest thought in Gods word to me is the place where we
are taught the motherhood of God. God is not only my father, but God is my
mother, too, in all his loving kindnesses and tender mercies to us. Oh, my
Father! my Father! with the rod of correction, and with the stern words of
advice, I look to thee in admiration and love; and oh, God, my precious mother,
I run to thy arms I Thou art my mother, I love thee with all my heart. And the
Spirit, says "Came!"

Oh, God! Thou art interested for us and thou art interested in us.

"And the Spirit and the bride say, Came."

God did not stop with that.

"The Spirit and the bride say, Come." The Church of God is the bride of the
lamb. I wish we where wrapped in waiting for the bridegroom. Oh, how I wish we
had always lived, and always been faithful to our bridegroom! He said:

"I go to prepare a place for you." THE UNFAITHFUL BRIDE.

You see that young man yonder. He has plighted his vows to a young lady, and he
bids her good-by for a short time. "I am going West. I am going West to prepare
our fortune and build our house and have everything ready." Brethren, that young
lady, instead of being faithful to that earnest, laborious young man preparing
good things for her, is flirting with her betrothed husbands enemies and
associating with those that despise her husband. God forgive the unfaithful
girl. And while Christ is, by his divine power and infinite wisdom, exhausting
all the riches and glories of heaven preparing for us, his bride, here we are
consorting with his enemies and flirting with the gay and giddy godless ones of
the world. Precious Savior, forgive us! Forgive us! We will not associate with
the godless any longer.

"The bride says, Come!" A GOOD WORD FOR THE CHURCH.

I wish we lived better. But there is one thing I have found out: We know we have
been unfaithful; we know we have not been what we ought to have been. But one
thing I can say and tell the truth: The Church of God Almighty has not lost her
interest in sinners and in the world. For over one thousand years the church has
been on her knees and praying for sinners, and the message of the Church of God
is a God-given message.

"Come thou and go with us and we ’ll do thee good, for the Lord has promised
good concerning us."

You have cursed the church and abused the church, and bemeaned the church and
called them hypocrites, but do you want to see whether the church loves you or
not! If the worst old sinner in St. Louis would come with streaming eyes and say
to the Church of God, "Men and brethren, pray for me. I want to join your
company and go with you to Heaven." I see the church in a minute, as her tears
come flowing down to the earth and she lifts her hand to God, and she says,
"Blessed be God! Another sinner coming to repentance and coming to life." The
old Church of God does love the world, and she has been praying for the world in
all its ages, and while we have forgotten a thousand things and neglected a
thousand things, thanks be unto God, we have never neglected to pray for you, my
fellow. citizens. There is not a day or night in St. Louis that in the Church of
God her best men and women are not on their knees praying, "God save the wicked
of the city and save the fallen of humanity;" and the cry of the church and the
song of the church is, "Rescue the perishing and save the fallen."

THANK GOD FOR THE CHURCH!

Thank God for the old church. She has been worth all the world to me. I know now
I should have wandered a poor, motherless orphan if it had not been for the
Church of Jesus Christ. She has been so good to me! Oh, she has been a mother in
the best sense to me. I never joined the church because I thought I could help
it along, but I joined the church that it might take me, a poor babe, in its
arms, and nurture me and feed me and take care of me; and, whatever the church
has been to others, I can say of Gods church to-night, they have given me my
meat and my drink, and they have been friends and brothers to me.

Oh, friend, you will never know what you have missed staying out of the pale of
the Church of God, and I beg you to hear the voice of the Church of God as it
cries to-night.

"Come thou and go with us, and we’ll do thee good."

Wont you come? Wont you come? The Church of God, with her Bibles and
missionaries and preachers and consecrated ministry and good women and men on
earth, with her churches and Sabbath-schools, and her prayer-meetings and family
altars-hey all cry aloud and say:

"Come thou and go with us, and well do thee good."

HIM THAT HEARETH "The Spirit and the bride say, Come."

It looks like if God had stopped there wed have died without excuse. It goes
further "And the Spirit and the bride say, Come, and let him that heareth say,
Come."

Oh, blessed thought! blessed thought! A man need not wait until he comes into
the church before he says to those around him, "Come, thou, and go with us...
Let him that heareth say, Come."

We get this figure from the caravan crossing the desert. When the water is all
given out on the desert and man and beast are famishing for water, then they
hold a counsel and they start one on ahead hurriedly, and in about five minutes
they start another, just so as to keep him in sound of the front ones voice, and
in five minutes more they start another, and on and on until they are stretched
out on the plains for miles, and finally the head man finds the oasis, and he
hallows back: "Water, I have found it!" to the next man, and the next man voices
it on down the line, and on and on until the caravan hears the cry, "We have
found it! Water! Water! We have found it!" And they hear the welcome news and
press on with all their might, that they may slake their thirst and preserve
their lives. THE APPLICATION. And all the way from Heaven to earth God has
strung out a line, and he shouts it from his own lips in Heaven, and we catch it
up and pass it on and on until we shout at the very gates of Hell, "Come! Come!
Come! and let him that heareth Come!"

If you ever heard the gospel, preach it to somebody else and say, "Come on! Lets
go and live right and do right and get to Heaven."

"Let him that heareth say, Come!"

Let each man be a power that will echo the call, and on and on down the line.

Once one of our little boys ran up a stairway calling his little brother, and as
he said, "Buddie Paul" something up stairs echoed it back, "Buddie Paul!" He ran
down to his mother and said, "Mamma, what is that upstairs that said, ’Buddie
Paul every time I said ’Buddie Paul! " and his mother explained it by telling
him it was the echo of his voice-the walls of the room above echoing his voice
back. And, brother, when God shouts from Heaven, let every man be the sounding
board that will pass it on and on until this whole universe shall hear the glad
word:

Let "whosoever heareth say, Come," and "whosoever will, let him take the water
of life freely."

"Let him that heareth say, Come."

OUTSIDE WORKERS

Why, I have often known men to go to work before the word got to them. They have
gone around among their friends, saying, " Boys, look a-here I we have not done
right. Suppose we go to church and give our hearts to God and live religious!"
-and how many men have been brought to Christ by men who were not religious?
When I was in Jackson, Tennessee, I was met by the mayor of the city and other
gentlemen, and they said to me "We were going to your room to see you. We have a
friend in this town that we want you to talk to. We want him to be saved."

Said I, "Gentlemen, I am glad to find you interested: but," said I," gentlemen
are you Christians? Members of the church?"

"No, Mr. Jones, we are sorry we are not. We are not Christians, but we feel an
interest in our friend."

"Well," said I, "God says that when a kingdom is divided against itself it can
not stand. And Satans kingdom is divided in this very town. His very servants
are going to the ministers of God and asking them to go and see their friends."

NEARING THE KINGDOM. When a man is interested and says, "boys, lets do better,"
that man is not very far from the Kingdom of God. He has just put his foot over
the line, and all he has got to do is to put it down, and one other step and he
is in the Kingdom of God.

"Let him that heareth say. Come."

There are five hundred men and women here to-night that are just putting their
foot over the dividing line, and all youve got to do is to put that foot down
and bring the other foot even with it and you are in the Kingdom of God, a saved
man, saved forever and forever. Will you put your foot down to-night and say,
"God helping me, I will give myself to God, I wont stand here any longer?

"Let him that heareth say. Come." And then he said: FOR THE THIRSTY SOUL.

"And let him that is athirst come."

Whether you have heard anything or not, God bless you, the call is to you. If
there is down in your soul a thirst, a hunger for a better life, God stood with
one hand and touched your heart and made it hunger and made it thirst, and then
he stood with the other hand loaded with the broad and with the water of life,
and he quenched that thirsty souls thirst forever. Blessed be God! He stands
ready to quench thirst and to appease hunger to-night, and he is going all over
St. Louis with one hand laden with the bread of life, and the other with the
water of life, and the hungriest man will be the first man to get it; and I tell
you, hungry man, to-night, when God rings the dinner bell of grace throw down
your hearts and come in, dinner is ready to eat, and satisfy your longing needs
forever.

"Let him that is athirst come."

If down in your soul there is a desire to be a good man, start to-night-start
to-night. If there is a hungering for a better life, God says:

"Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness."

Then he says again: Oh, how far down the line God brings this to us. He brings
it right down to where he throws heaven and hell at every mans feet, and tells
him to take his choice. Now he says:

WHOSOEVER WILL.

"Whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely."

I like that grand "whosoever" there. I have read a heap. Oh, I have read a great
deal about election, but I think I have found out from Gods word what you mean
by election. The "elect" are the "whosoever-will," and the ’non-elect" are the
"whosoever-wonts." Now which side will you take-the elect or the
whosoever-wills, or the nonelect or the whosoever-wonts? "Elect," whosoever
will. Thank God for that grand old word, and thank God that as the ages wear
away men see God in nature, and see God in all his goodness, and see God in his
books. Preachers are coming closer to that grand old word every day, and I
verily believe that I shall live to see the day when every pulpit in this world
will be bottomed on that grand old "whosoever will," and there they will stand
and preach the gospel of the Son of God.

"Whosoever will."

ANOTHER STORY That reminds me of the penitent down in Georgia at the altar. He
was agonizing, praying. The preacher went up to him, trying to encourage him,
and, "Well," he said, "I am not one of the elect, I am one of the reprobates; I
feel it all over "-and I dont reckon a poor soul ever did try to seek God that
the devil didnt slip up with something of that sort-" You are one of the
reprobates; God never died to save you"-and there he was in agony, and the
preacher said to him:

"Well, my brother, listen to me a minute. Now," said he, "if you could see your
name, ’James B. Green, written upon the Lambs book this minute, would you
believe then Christ died for you and you were one of the elect?" The poor fellow
thought a moment and he said, "No, sir. There are other people in this world of
my name." (Laughter.)

"Well," said the preacher, "if you could see it, ’James B. Green, Sc riven
County, Ga., would you believe it was you then?"

Well," he says, "there may have been other people of ’my name in this county
before I was born. I dont know."

"Well," said he, "if you could see it, ’James B. Green, Scriven County, Ga., and
the year ’1867, would you believe it was you?"

"Well," he said, "it may be there is somebody in this county now of my name."

"Well," said he, "if you could see it, ’James B. Green of Scriven County, and
the Nineteenth District and the year ’67, would you believe it was you?"

"Well," he says, "I could not know definitely."

"Now," said he, "my friend, God Almighty saw all that trouble and he just put it
into one word and he said: ’Whosoever will, let him take the water of life
freely." And the poor fellow jumped up and clapped his hands and said, "Thank
God! I know that means me." A UNIVERSAL SALVATION And "whosoever will, let him
take the water of Life freely."

Blessed be God! It is for all of us. It is for all of us.

"Whosoever will."

Listen, brother. It aint "Whosoever feels," it aint "Whosoever is fit," it aint
"Whosoever has repented," it aint "Whosoever has got faith," it aint "Whosoever
does this or that or the other," but it is, "Whosoever will - will - will"

LEFT TO THE HUMAN WILL.

God throws it all on the will, and I am glad he does. I know God traverses my
emotional nature, and runs through hope and fear and desire and anxiety and
dread and affection. God runs all through my emotional nature and my
sensibilities. God goes as he pleases through my sensibilities. When God reaches
intellect he goes up through perception and conception and judgment and memory
and reason and all the faculties of the mind. God goes through them all and asks
me no questions. But when God goes to the door of the human will, he stands on
tip toe and knocks, and says:

"Behold I stand at the door and knock, and if any man will open unto me I will
come in and sup with him and he shall sup with me."

Thank God, it is "whosoever will." If you will, God will; and I say to-night God
dont say "whosoever feels," or whosoever says this or that or the other, but he
throws it all on your will as a man, and says:

"Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." And I like the
conclusion:

"Let him take the water of life freely."

Blessed be God, ye thirsty men can drink, and there is enough for to-day, enough
for all of us, enough forever and evermore. Come and drink freely.

LET HIM COME And there is another little word in there I like, that little word
"let"

"Let him take the water of life freely."

Six thousand years ago God said: "Let there be light," and there was light. It
was a word of command, and God looks out upon a famishing race with the water of
life in reach, and he says: "Let him come;" and when God says "Let him come," he
says, "Go behind him, powers and principalities, and clear the way. Let him take
the water of life freely." God has taken down the mountains and filled up the
valleys, and made you a straight and even and smooth way, so that you can drink
and live forever, and if you perish you perish because you will not live. God
never suffered a soul to be captured and carried away by the enemy of souls and
will never suffer you to die; as long as you leek to Christ or lean to Christ or
pray to Christ, God will not suffer you to die. God never suffered the devil to
take possession of an immortal soul and drag it down to Hell until that soul had
walked up to the feet of the devil and stacked its arms, and said: "I surrender
forever." Then Gods own arm and power can never rescue you. God help you
to-night to say: "Gods goodness leadeth me to repentance, and I intend to lead a
better life." THE LAST APPEAL

Now, before we leave this audience room, how many men in the church or out of
the church will stand up to-night and say: "I will get closer to God, and drink
more of the water of life, God being my helper." And I hope every man and woman
in this house will long to-night for the bet- ter life, with the sweet assurance
that God will reach down and give them that for which they seek. Now every man
and woman here to-night that will stand on their feet and by standing up say: "I
will drink more freely of that water, and eat more of that bread. I will get
closer to God. I will get closer to God." Now every man of you that feels that
way stand up, and say, "Here is one! Here is one!" Now we will see how many here
to-night, in the church or out of it, that will make this declaration.

To-morrow night I will preach in Centenary Church. I can not hold out to preach
in this hall. Let us go to Centenary Church, and if you pack the upper room we
will run services in both rooms. I do not say which one I will run. Now
to-morrow night come out and let us bring souls to Christ. If any one wants to
converse on religion to-night we will talk and sing and pray with you, and may
God bless you and save your souls. Amen. Stay, friends, if you want to be saved.
And now may the blessing of God abide with you forever and ever. Amen.


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  CHAPTER 6: 06. GOD'S GRACE IS SUFFICIENT
========================================================================

God’s Grace is Sufficient

"And lest I should be exhalted above measure through the abundance of the
revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan
to buffet me, lest I should be exhalted above measure. For this thing I besought
the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me. And he said unto me, My grace is
sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness." (2
Corinthians 12:7-9)

We ask your attention, especially to these words: "My grace is sufficient for
thee." The devil is cunning and an artful adversary. His first effort on
humanity is to make us believe that we are strong enough and that we are good
enough without any religion, that we are all right, and we needn’t give
ourselves any trouble; we’re as good as anybody, a first-class fellow; but by
and by we become possessed with an idea that we are not so strong, and not so
good, and not so pure. The fact of the business is that when we reach the
conclusion of a sensible and wise man, we say, "I am not good at all - I am not
strong at all," and then the devil takes that fact and works on it and says:
"You’re too mean and too weak to travel and to talk about being good."

How many thousand men who walk the streets of this city have been possessed of
one of these ideas to their ruin and to other’s ruin! The first thing a man so
possessed says, is: "I’m all right - I don’t need any help - I don’t want any
Christ to die for me. I don’t ask odds of anybody." And the next thing you see,
the poor fellow has jumped clear over on the proposition, and says, "Now, there
isn’t any use of my trying; I’m the meanest man in the world, the wickedest and
of the least account. If I just thought there was a chance for me I wouldn’t
mind starting. The fact is, I’m so lowdown, and so weak, there’s no chance for
me at all."

Now, I want to say to you, brother, that of the two cases, I prefer the latter.
There is no hope at all for a fellow who believes he is all right, when he
isn’t. That man is hopelessly lost while in that condition, but I have great
hopes for a fellow that has touched bottom on the other side, and who feels, "I
am not right, I’m not pure, nor good, and I haven’t strength to be so, though I
want to be right."

"I sat this morning a half-hour talking to an honest man. I believe he was an
honest and a true man. He said, "Mr. Jones, I have indulged in sin and been so
depraved that I have lost my will power. I want to be good. I want to be a
Christian and to abandon my sins. I want to live right and get to heaven. But,
Mr. Jones, my will power is gone." I wish every Christian in this house and all
these preachers could say, "I have lost my will power." Their case is mighty
hopeful then. They can then say, "All my will is swallowed up in Thy will. Now I
will consult the will of God and bid goodbye to my will and accept the will of
God and the truth of God." I wish the whole universe would lose its will and
have its will swallowed up in the will of God.

Now, here, we have a case before us today. Paul was largely like some of us, in
that he once felt, "I am all right now; I am blameless; I never did contrary to
right; I live on the straight edge;" but the time came, when in hopeless despair
he fell; and when he arose he said: "Though I am a Pharisee of the Pharisees, of
the tribe of Benjamin, I count all these as nothing compared to the excellency
of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord."

Paul seemed to have been in need of this subdued condition of his will. He had
been exalted to the third heaven, and had heard the unspeakable words which it
is not lawful for a man to utter; his ears had been touched with the music of
heaven; but at last he came down from these towering heights. Like Paul, the
deeper down you go, the more Artesian power will be added to the current of your
life. There are many little shallow wells in this country, with a great many
wiggle-tails in them. You all don’t know exactly what that means. We do in South
Georgia. In some places down there, they keep a long-handled gourd - they don’t
need any bucket or rope for a man can dip his water out of the well - but in one
place in South Georgia, there is long-handled gourd and a pine knot at the well.
The pine knot is very much worn. The first thing they do when they want to get
water out of the well, is to knock against the wooden sides with the pine knot
to make the wiggle-tails sink, so that they can dip the water up, free from
them. And there are many preachers in this country that have to use the pine
knot.

O, brother, we will go into the deepest depth, and go up into the highest
heights, but there are depths and heights in piety I know nothing about. There
are heights in divine life I never have reached. There are beauties in Christian
experience that you and I know nothing about. O, brother, let’s go down in
humility, in contrition, in honest confession before God.

Now, when you find a fellow away down, remember David said, "I was brought low
and the Lord helped me." The Lord fishes on the bottom, and if you want to get
to his bait and hook, you’ve got to get right on the bottom, brother. "I was
brought low and the Lord helped me." Now, St. Paul had been high and he had been
low. We find him here on a very low plain. "There was given to me a thorn in the
flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me."

What was that thorn, do you know? I am glad I do not know. I am glad no human
being knows just what that thorn was. Some of the wise men say the thorn in St.
Paul’s flesh was the fact that his eyesight was defective. For you know when he
fell under the convicting power of God, he was blind three days and nights, and
they tell us his eyesight was never entirely restored, and that that was the
thorn in his flesh. Perhaps as he walked the streets the people said, "There
goes old half-blind Paul, trying to teach people the way to heaven. Just look at
him!" This was trying to a sensitive nature such as his. Others have said that
the thorn in St. Paul’s flesh was a defect in one of his legs, by reason of
which he had to limp as he went through the world, carrying the Gospel, and then
perhaps they would say as they saw him, "Watch old Paul now, hobbling along,
trying to show the people how to get to glory. He is a nice fellow trying to
teach people." The fact that he was lame was indeed a sore trial to him, and
then to be scoffed at on account of his infirmity was indeed sad. Another wise
man tells us that he thinks the thorn in St. Paul’s flesh was the continued
suppression of the ambition of his nature. Paul was eminently a great man. God
never made a greater man, intellectually, morally, or spiritually than St. Paul.
I measure his head and his heart, and I don’t know which is the bigger. If you
will find me a man who has a great deal of brains and no heart, I will find you
a stolid, sound, solid, decent, dogmatic doctor of divinity that has not won a
soul to Christ in twenty years; but there is one thing he will do, - he will
"contend for the faith once delivered." And he is giving a falsehood to his own
proposition, "contending for the faith once delivered." It ought to be for the
faith delivered ten thousand times.

Brother, I reckon we need these men in the world. I have never been wise enough
to know why these men go all to head. There is a woman, they say, in the show
who is nearly all gone to feet, but it’s a sad sight to see a fellow gone
altogether to head. He would wear a number thirty hat, I suppose, and his head
would weigh fifty pounds and his body forty. That’s out of proportion. Brother,
it’s the head and the heart together that we are to look at, and this grand man
had both. And now to curb the ambition of his nature, St. Paul - the Saul of
Tarsus, with a world stretched out before him, with powers to succeed in any
direction, with qualifications equal to the grandest accomplishments in life -
is chained in the eyes of the world to the humble and despised Nazarene and his
truths.

I do not think it was the defect in his eyesight; I do not think it was his
lameness. I do not think it was suppressed ambition or subdued ambition. You ask
me what it was - this thorn in his flesh? I say I do not know. Look here. If
suppressed ambition were all my trouble, I could get along finely. If it were
only lameness, I could hobble along. If it were defect in my eyesight, I could
put up with that. But I tell you, brother, every man in this world has some
supreme thorn in his flesh, and he can cherish the blessed thought, "Maybe this
was the very thing that crushed St. Paul’s spirit, and brought him so low to the
mercy-seat."

Now, what your thorn is I do not know, but there is not a person here today
without a thorn. You know there is something you never talk about, never mention
to any human being on the face of the earth. Did you ever notice that? You may
talk a great deal, yet there is something you keep to yourself. There are some
moments when God alone can take our arm and walk with us, or we would not go
right.

Paul did not tell what his thorn was. He might have said, "I am suffering more
than angels can bear." What is your case? "I can not tell you about it; I want
your sympathy and prayers." Where is the man who has not carried a thorn in his
flesh of which he has never spoken? I know that I have gotten a great deal of
consolation in my distressed moments in the thought that "Well, after all, may
be this thing that pressed so sorely on the life and character of this great man
- may be I am to bear that."

Now, brother, St. Paul carried this thorn in his flesh, the messenger of Satan,
to buffet him. He carried it until he felt in his heart, "I can carry it no
longer." Haven’t you been right there? Have you not felt that you must be
relieved, or you would die? St. Paul reached that point. What did he do? St.
Paul looked at this whole trouble, and then, when the world and his friends had
turned their backs upon him, he fell on his knees and prayed, "O, Lord, I
beseech thee, let this depart from me; I am overloaded." He got up off his knees
and said: "I get no relief in prayer. If angels don’t help, humanity won’t. My
friends turn their backs on me. What must I do?" And he dropped on his knees the
second time, and said, "O, Lord, do have mercy upon me." And he prayed
earnestly, and got off his knees the second time, and there was the thorn still
in his flesh, with all of its unspeakable pain. He looked at the world; his
friends turned back from him; and at the angels, and there was a moment,
perhaps, when he said, "O, what can I do?" And St. Paul dropped the third time
to his knees. And there is a charm in this third prayer, brother; and imagine
the third prayer of St. Paul, and the blessed Christ, as he stood at the
Father’s side and said: "Father, something must be done. I recollect the third
time I prayed in the garden of Gethsemane. I remember when I had prayed once and
got up, I found my disciples all asleep, and I awoke them, and when I went into
the garden a second time, and came back, I found them asleep again, and I went
all alone and almost hopeless into the garden, and kneeled down the third time,
and the bloody sweat burst from my body, and how I prayed that the cup might
pass from me, and that I might be fanned with the wings of thy love. O, Father,
I recollect that. Something must now be done." And I imagine the great God stood
up in the presence of the angels, and looked over the parapets of heaven,
reached down and put his thumb on the thorn in St. Paul’s flesh, and drove it
up, and said, "My grace is sufficient for thee." And St. Paul stood up, and has
never said a word about that thorn from that day to this. Thank God!

"My grace is sufficient for thee." That’s it, brother; that’s it!

I tell you, my brother, today, whatever your supreme trouble is, whatever may be
the thorn you are carrying, go to God with it. If God does not pluck it out, he
may drive it to the very head, but he will say, "My grace is sufficient for
thee." When we go to God, and he puts his hand on that thorn, and drives it up,
and says, "My grace is sufficient for thee," trust him and he will give you
strength. When you are weak, you are going to be strengthened under him.

Thank God, I say, that there are weak moments in our lives. Then God shows his
power and love. May God help you to trust in him, and help you to see that
whatever your thorn is, he will take care of it for you.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 7: 07. THE RIGHTEOUS AND THE WICKED
========================================================================

The Righteous and the Wicked "The righteous shall flourish like the palm-tree;
he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon." (Psalms 92:12) "I have seen the wicked
in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay-tree." (Psalms 37:35)

We narrow these two expressions which I have just read down to this: "The
righteous are like the palm-tree, the wicked like a bay-tree." First let us stop
and ask, "What is a palm-tree? What is that thing which I am or ought to be
like?" The Eastern people boast of the fact that the palm-tree is good for three
hundred and seventy-six different things. They say, "We live upon its fruits; of
its sap we make wine and medicinal purposes; its wood we use for various
manufacturing purposes; its bark and its roots we use for this and that;" and
they have summed up all the different things that the palm-tree is good for.
They say that from its topmost sprig to the last fiber of its roots it is of
use. There is not a particle of the palm-tree that is not useful, and all over,
through and through, first to last, it is good for three hundred and seventy-six
different things. "The righteous are," or ought to be, "like the palm-tree,"
good for many different things, good from top to bottom, through and through,
with not a particle of soul, body, or spirit that is not good in the service of
God. My Bible here, brethren, looks upon me as a sort of trinity in unity - a
body, a mind, and a spirit. Now, a man who takes good care of his body, and eats
when he ought to eat, and does so with special reference to the great purpose of
his existence, is physically religious. Then contemplate the mind. A man who
reads the right books, and only the right books, and who improves his mind and
grasps at those thoughts which are ennobling and elevate him, is intellectually
religious. A man who looks after the spirit - a man who lives in a spiritual
atmosphere, and who abides in eternal life, and has eternal life abiding in him
here and now - that man is spiritually religious; and, brethren, I like a
religion that permeates a man from the top of his head to the sole of his foot.
I like a religion, a Bible, a Gospel, a system that looks after me as I am now -
mind, body, spirit. A man who eats too much, drinks too much, sleeps too much,
or sleeps too little, is a physical sinner, and he will suffer for it, too. I
don’t know how much he’ll suffer for it in the next world, but he’ll catch it in
this - no avoiding that! A man who punishes his mind, sins against it. It has
its life just as the body has, and needs nourishment, too. There’s many a
starved mind in this country, brethren. If I were simply to feed my body upon
husks that had no nutriment, how could I perpetuate physical life? If I do not
sit down and eat those things that tend to produce strength and perpetuate life,
in so far am I sinning against my body. I wonder what those people are doing
that spend their intellectual hours playing cards? How much mental food is there
in that? One evening, where I was preaching, I denounced social card-playing and
progressive euchre. (Note: Euchre is a game of cards.) Let me tell you, too, if
you play progressive euchre - and I don’t care whose son, whose wife, whose
husband you are - you are a gambler as much as any blackleg in this city. You
can’t play progressive euchre without the "Booby prize," and you can’t play for
a Booby prize without putting up the stakes; and if you win or lose, you are a
gambler in the sight of God just as much as is the worst blackleg that ever
cursed this city. Well, one of the society women who heard me, a member of the
Church, said: "Why, I’m disgusted with that preacher. I have a contempt for him.
How in the world could I interest my husband at night if I didn’t play cards
with him? It’s the only way I have of amusing my husband." If I were you,
sister, I’d send my husband to a lunatic asylum, where they have cards for the
inmates in all the rooms. The Lord pity the woman who has married such an
intellectual starveling that she has to sit down and debauch her mind to
interest her husband.

Intellectually religious! Thank God for a system of religion that from foot to
scalp makes one a holy man all over. I like that sort! The religion of Jesus
Christ makes me eat just as the engineer fires his engine - to get strength to
go on! Nothing more, nothing less! My intellectual nature calls for things that
bring out the brain sweat, and fill the brain with thoughts like those which God
thinks, and the brightest man in this world is the man who thinks the thoughts
of God.

I can see how the righteous are like the palm tree, for they are good all over,
good for many different things. Brother, how many are you good for? Sister, get
out your pencil and little piece of paper, and let’s run the rule of addition
over your life. Now, how many things are you good for? I mean how many things
are you good for religiously? You can run a world of things outside of your
religious duty, but I am talking about the thing religiously. Now how many of
these things are you good for? That sister yonder says, "Wait a minute - I’ll
tell you. I’m good for - I’m good - I’m - I’m - I - I - um;" and brethren,
that’s just where she’ll get to. That brother yonder has been in the Church for
ten years, and he is idle today, and God speaks every day in his hearing, "Go
work in my vineyard," and he stands there with his hands in his pockets, and
says, "I would go to work in a minute if I only knew anything in the world to go
to work at." Whenever you hear a man talk that way, he’s a fool or a rascal,
one, inevitably; and sometimes he’s a compound of both, and then you get him in
bad shape indeed! Standing here idle with his hands in his pockets, and there
are thirteen hundred and fifty millions of sinners in this universe! He’s
standing around idle, with a world sinking, sinking down to hell, and he says, -
"I can’t find a thing to do!" Brother, when you talk that way, you show mentally
you are a blank. If you are intellectual at all, then you are intellectually
false, and you misrepresent yourself when you say, "I can’t find a thing to do
in the world."

There’s a work for you. Every sinner in this town is a good subject for you to
work on. If I had my home here I wouldn’t say, "I can’t find a thing in the
world to do;" and you’d better not go to the judgment and talk that sort of
foolishness, for God will say, "Didn’t you live in such and such a city?" Good
anywhere - good everywhere! O, brethren, the Lord gave us the sort of religion
that doesn’t stand on the banks of the river and shudder and shake with dread,
and shrink; but the Lord gave us the sort of religion that runs and leaps into
the current that is lined from source to mouth with human wretches. God help us
to bring them over. The Lord give us the sort of Christianity that doesn’t sit
around with folded hands waiting for something to turn up, but give us the sort
of Christianity that will pitch in and pound the iron until it gets red-hot, and
then we can shape it as God wants it shaped. It will get warm under the blows of
an honest, earnest heart! God everywhere, and God all over! I want the
Christianity that makes every deed of my life and every word of my life a maxim
for universal application, and as I apply the maxim, the world grows better.

Good for three hundred and seventy-six different things! I have heard some
brethren in the Church say, "You’re all loading me too heavy. I must help myself
some. I’m going to quit being deacon. You’re all putting everything on me." Look
here, brother, get down on your knees and count the three hundred and
seventy-six different things you are good for and busy at, and then when you
come out, get the measure of the palm tree, and then you’ll let them put
anything on you. There’s something wrong with the man that lies down on the
ground with his cross on top of him.

I am disgusted with the Christianity that thus breaks down. I look back about
eighteen hundred years ago, and I see what the disciples of Jesus Christ went
through in order to make their way to God, and to make themselves the ministers
of God’s grace, and I am ashamed of every officer of religion we have upon the
face of the earth. Why, brethren, then they took them out of their homes and
stripped them and misrepresented them, and persecuted them, inflicting stripes
and imprisonment, and crucified them. And yet people are no better now than they
used to be. I wonder if the difference is in the preachers, and not with the
people? I have been hunting for amartyr, a fellow that died for the truth. If I
could get him, I would have a text that I could make things hum with. But I have
been hunting one for thirteen years, and I have never found a martyr yet. O, for
a Christian that goes out to battle red-hot, and makes it so warm for thosewho
sin that this world would surrender, or put that man out of the way. You can get
it in that shape if you want it. God forbid that I should bring a railing and a
scoffing against any preacher. I would not strike ablow at you that I would not
be willing myself to receive. But what is the matter with us? We want a
Christianity that walks right out. A liquor paper in Georgia denounces Sam Jones
as a firebrand. God grant that if ever I have my name changed from Sam Jones to
"Firebrand," I may go forth a firebrand in the name of Jesus Christ. Jesus said:
"I am come to send fire on this earth." We need an issue, brethren - a clearly
defined issue, and we must have it, brethren, if we ever get this city for
Christ. The devil now possesses it, and the only road we have to take in order
to get it from him is the road of Christ. The Lord help every preacher in this
city next Sunday morning to turn his guns on sin, and if you will bombard
sinners in the right way, they will run up their white flag within thirty days
from today. Let the pulpit be sure that it is right, and then go to hitting
hard, and "carry the war into Africa." Rush it right on. How your enemies will
howl, and kick, and rear, and pitch, and talk about vulgarity and vulgar
witticisms, and slang, and all that sort of thing. But I tell you, brethren, one
thing, that you will get at the meanness of them if you will get at them in the
right way. Meanness is always cowardly. One good Christian can chase away a
thousand, and two good ones put ten thousand to flight if you will get God with
you. I hope that every newspaper in this city, and every pulpit in this city
will square up on the Ten Commandments. They are good for anything and
everything; good everywhere, and good at all circumstances. They are good at
prayer-meetings. They are good at family prayer. They are good at visiting the
sick. They are good at serving the needy. They are good at helping the weak.
They are good anywhere and everywhere.

O, my, how I do like to see a Christian that knows his rights, let you talk to
him and abuse him as you will. How many in this house can say, "I am the Lord’s
with reserved rights in the world?" Christianity is like the man when he found
the pearl of great price. He sold out everything and put it all into the pearl
of great price. Brother and sister, have you a reserved right in Christian life?
Turn it all over to God. Then he will use you for his glory and your eternal
good. A reserved right! Some people promise to enter a Church if the preacher
will not ask them to pray or to speak in public. He takes them in as a sort of
honorary members. And don’t you honor the Church with a vengeance, you honorary
members! A fellow told me one night, "I am going out to the Church tonight, but
I want you to promise me that you will not call on me to pray." "I won’t make
any promise," I said. "Then I won’t go," he replied. I said, "I would fight you
from now to daylight before I would promise not to call on you to do your duty.
How are you to give us an example if you don’t pray?" The freest man is the one
who is ready at all times for anything that God or the Church calls upon him to
do. Brother, I would rather be a whole Christian and do my whole Christian duty
fifty times over, than shirk a duty, as you do, once a week. God knows it is
easier. He who does otherwise is always dodging. He never gets clear from fear.
He’s afraid somebody will shadow him when he walks out, and proclaim all he
sees. You want to be good in three hundred and seventy-six things until you
build up a palm-tree in heaven. A good Christian will grow anywhere, like the
palm-tree, which will grow anywhere in its latitude - in the bottoms, in the
marsh, among the rocks, on the hillside.

Some people say, "I can not be good and keep house." But there is more religion
in the kitchen than in the parlor. "I can not be good and be a merchant." "I can
not be good and be a lawyer." A palm tree grows everywhere; and some of the best
people that I ever knew were hotel keepers, were lawyers, were merchants. And
every good hotel keeper and every good merchant, every good lawyer is a
demonstration of the fact that all of them could be good if they wanted to be.
All can be good anywhere, no matter their business may be.

Another thing about the palm-tree. If you plant it in the Desert of Sahara, you
will notice that it takes root and shoots out and other palms grow up around it,
and these draw moisture, and by and by a palm-tree grove is spread around the
spring that is formed in this oasis in the desert, where the weary traveler can
stop and slake his thirst. A good Christian is like a palm-tree in this respect.
When you find one, another one will grow up around him. His roots are like those
of the palm-tree. They just spring up all around him, and their moisture is the
river of life, and these form the oasis in the desert of life, where the weary
traveler can slake his thirst in the shadow of the tree of life.

Then there is another thing about the palm-tree. You can take it and bend it
over and press it right down to the earth, but it shoots itself up again toward
heaven. Poor Job said when he was smashed down in the ash bank, and his wife put
additional pressure on his fall by telling him his breath was a stench and his
body corrupt, and told him to curse God and die, "Shall we receive good at the
hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? Though he slay me, yet will I trust
in him." Glory be to God that we can be like a palm-tree. Let us be like the
palm-tree - good everywhere and through every day in the week from head to foot;
good anywhere you hitch. I like that sort of Christianity. But the wicked are
like a bay-tree. Do you know what a bay-tree is?" Now you will find your
latitude, some of you. If you have studied yourself for hours you will know. A
bay-tree is good for nothing in the universe, that we know of. God may see good
in it, but we can not. In the first place, a bay-tree will come out and blossom
as prettily as any tree in the land, but it never has any fruit. Then another
thing about the bay-tree. If I were going out for a load of wood, I would drive
five miles further rather than try to split up a bay-tree, it is so hard. And
another thing about a bay-tree. It not only has no fruit upon it, and not only
is it not fit for wood, because it is so hard to cut, but it will only grow down
in a marsh bottom, and is fit for nothing but shade, and it casts its shade just
right where the sun ought to shine. The wicked are like the bay-tree. O,
brethren, what is a wicked mother worth to her children? O, sister, what are you
worth? You will bear and blossom out beautifully in your worldly life, but you
have no fruits of righteousness. You flower best in the marshy bottom of sin;
and you are fit for nothing but to shade, and you shade the light of heaven from
your precious children. God forgive us. Brother, is it true that you are a
bay-tree? In any heavenly sense, are you good for anything? Good for yourself,
or any good for the next world? O, brother, you flourish best in the swamp of
sin, and do nothing but shade, and you shade the light of heaven from the
precious ones in your home.

Mother and sister, let us go to our homes this evening and ask ourselves, "Am I
like the palm-tree, or am I like the bay-tree?"

I might talk and hour about this subject, but we have got enough to think about.
I want to get you down to bottom rock. I want to get you down to the roots. We
want to shuffle off the incrustations of evil until we can plant our feet on the
"Rock of ages," and then we will stand secure when the last storm has swept over
us. I know I am not up, but I am down, and the way up is down. If you want to go
up, start down. He that humbleth himself shall be exhalted. If you go down deep
enough you will never break off the stem. Go down and down. David said he was
brought low, and the Lord helped him. Good Lord, help me to go down.

And, brethren, God will help us to see eye to eye. Some of you don’t understand
me, and, perhaps, I don’t understand you. But God will help to bring us to where
we can see each other face to face; mark what I tell you. There are as good
people in this house as any that live on this earth. I have never said
otherwise. I will tell you another thing. You talk about living out of the
Church. It is all I can do to live in the Church. It is the only house that
Christians have got; and if they turned me out of one, I would join the next I
came to, and be ready for the next opening of the door; and if they turned me
out, I would go again. A colored man was noticed joining a Church every time he
could get a chance. He was asked, "What makes you do that way?" He answered, "O,
it did me so much good the first time that I joined, that I want to keep on
joining every time you open the door." Thank God for his grand Church.

God bless you and help you to see that the Church of Jesus Christ is the only
hope of this world. If that is the truth, then let us make the Church what God
wants it to be.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 8: 08. WHY WILL YE DIE?
========================================================================

Why Will Ye Die?

"Say unto them, As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death
of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn ye, turn ye
from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?" (Ezekiel 23:11)

God said frequently to his children, "Come, let us reason together." He is a
reasonable God, and you are reasonable men in many things, and he challenges you
into his presence, and says, "Let us reason together about this. I have no
pleasure in the death of the wicked." In other words, "I have nothing to do with
the death of the wicked." I say there is nothing in the grace of God, and
nothing in the blood of Jesus Christ, to save an impenitent man.

These are clear, honest statements of Scriptural truths. There is nothing in the
Pacific Railroad’s movement of its trains to make you ship your goods over that
road if you don’t want to ship them that way. There is nothing in the management
of the Pacific road that can compel a man to travel over its lines if the man
doesn’t want to go over them; and we say honestly and emphatically that there is
nothing in the atonement of Jesus Christ to save any but the lost; and no man is
saved, in a Gospel sense, until he first sees and feels he is lost. When a man
feels that he is lost in this sense, thank God he is getting to be found! Your
salvation depends on your patient continuance in well-doing.

What is the judgment at last? "Well done, thou good and faithful servant." It
isn’t, Well commenced. I have known people to begin a great many things well. It
isn’t, Well carried on. I’ve known a great many people to carry on an enterprise
for years, and then break down. It isn’t, Well begun or well carried on, but it
is "Well done, well finished, well rounded up, thou good and faithful servant."
And now, brother, listen: If you are an earnest, humble Christian, your
salvation does not depend so much on what happened in the past, may be, as on
what are you going to do from now on?" "If a righteous man forsake his
righteousness and commit iniquity, the righteousness he hath done shall be
forgotten, and he shall die in his sin." God says to the wicked, "If you forsake
your wickedness and do right, you shall live. I have no pleasure in the death of
the wicked."

I know the question is asked, "If God is omnipotent and is love, then why should
any perish?" Brother, we have what we call human will in this world, and that
will determines for you where you will go. If you go to hell, it is a matter of
choice with you; if you go to heaven, it is likewise a matter of choice. Say,
why did God endow man with will, then? Look here, there are some things that are
inherent in the nature of the thing. How cometh that engine on the track yonder?
Its gauge indicated one hundred and fifty pounds pressure of steam. What do they
want with the steam? Why, to pull the train behind the engine. But it may burst
the boiler into ten thousand pieces! Yes, but that’s the inherent nature of the
steam. When you sit in the train, you always feel the powerful pulsations of the
majestic engine in front, and that engine has power enough in its nature to blow
the boiler into ten thousand pieces. The powers that God has given you to direct
you and move you, these same powers may destroy you for time and eternity.
Righteousness is the right use of God’s given thing, and sin is the wrong use of
God’s given thing. If you use a thing wrongly, God is not responsible if you are
blown up by it; and the power to do right or wrong is inherent in the nature of
man. I suppose they could have made an engine so that its boiler wouldn’t burst;
but if they did, they’d have to make some other sort of an engine than a steam
engine. I’ve seen caloric engines, but they never get anywhere.

Hear me. God has no pleasure in the death of him that dies! My mother loved me
because she had some of the nature of God in her own heart; my wife loves me
because some of the nature of God has been poured into her heart. God is love,
and the great store-house of God’s love is his heart, and we all draw from that
store-house; and all the love my wife and my mother and my children have for me
has been drawn from the great store- house of the love of God. Did my wife’s
love save me? Did my mother’s love save me from a wicked life? No, sir! No, sir!
In that sense, God’s love can’t save any man, and it never did save any man.

If God’s mercy, and God’s love, and God’s goodness could save a man, then God
was guilty of cruelty to send his only begotten Son to suffer on the cross that
he might wash away with his blood, our sin. There is no means by which we can be
saved except in the name of the only begotten Son of God. The Father sent his
Son into the world not to condemn the world, but that through him the world
might be saved. He bridges the chasm between a sinking world and the God that
made it; and he was sent not to break down and crush and ruin humanity, but that
we might cross over in safety on his atonement into the kingdom of God.

I declare it to be as true as that I read my Bible that there is not a man here
tonight but who may be in heaven within a hundred years from today. There isn’t
a man here tonight but who, if he makes the choice, can be in hell a hundred
years from today. Those ten decades will soon be gone, brethren. O, how the time
flies! Let’s you and I settle it tonight. "By the grace of God, if that be true,
I’ll be in heaven a hundred years from now." We may be there in ten years; it
may be in ten months; it may be in ten days; it may be in ten hours; - we will
be in the one place or the other. To the righteous I say, "Keep on; plow your
furrow out; go on through;" but to the wicked I say, "Stop! there’s danger and
death ahead of you." There’s a message for you both tonight! Christian people,
hear me, and go on in your way; but, sinners, just stop long enough in your mad,
onward rush to hear these truths. "Turn ye, turn ye, why will you die." The
turning spoken of here means an actual, business-like turning away from sin, not
a mock turning. There’s no farce about this thing; it’s an actual turning away
from sin.

Here’s a merchant that’s been merchandising ten years, and he’s been losing
money right along, and now he’s almost near to bankruptcy, and he resolves he’ll
close out his stock on hand, and quit the business and go to farming. There’s a
business turn about that thing. He doesn’t want to go on losing money; he sees
he’s sinking every year, and he resolves to quit merchandising and go to
farming. Turning away from sin is just as actual as is that man turning from
merchandising.

It seems to me sometimes that we’ve got religion diluted down to a sentiment or
to a song; but it’s an outrage on the glittering, glorious Gospel of the Son of
God. It is not a sentiment - it’s a sanctified business. It’s a business
contract binding on you. You do what God tells you to do, and then if God
doesn’t do what he said he would do, you have an issue that will bankrupt heaven
in a minute. A great many people in this world want their pay before they do
their job. There are two bad paymasters - one who pays before the job is done,
and the one who never pays at all; and the one that never pays at all is the
best one, because if he pays humanity before they do the job, they will tell a
thousand lies to get out of it, and never do it at all. Listen! Some of you
people want the pay before you do the work! That’s your trouble. You say, "If
God will bless me, I will do so and so." I guess you will. Who are you that want
to dictate the terms to him, and receive all the benefit yourself? God says,
"You do so and so and I will do so and so." Do your duty; that’s the way. If you
will do your duty, you will be religious, and you will be religious if you do
your duty. Some people are always troubled to know what the Lord will do for
them. Turn and you will be saved, said the Lord. The turning is your duty, and
the saving is God’s. If you turn and God doesn’t save you, then you will have an
issue that will overturn the pillars of justice. The turn must be business-like,
however. You don’t want other people to pay you before you do your duty, and why
do you want the Lord to do it? A man doesn’t want to pay for a bill of goods
until he orders and receives them. You don’t want to pay the blacksmith until he
shoes your horse. Let’s be decent and sensible in our turning to God.

What’s the use in forswearing ball-rooms, and then wanting to go back to them?
What’s the use in giving up cards, and still you’re nearly dead to play cards
again? I believe in Christian liberty, in a fellow getting religion and doing
right. But whenever you get to rubbing up against ball-room and card-rooms and
theaters, and such, you make a mistake - you haven’t given up anything. I loved
to dance and do a hundred things that are wrong, but I have had as much desire
to go to hell as to a ball-room since I got religion. I believe in a religion
that sets us at liberty, and makes us do the things we love to do, and makes us
love the things we ought to do. You can’t turn away heartily to heaven, and yet
long for the fleshpots of Egypt. I’ve got into Canaan now, where the grapes and
the pomegranates and the figs cluster thick above my head, and I can eat and
rejoice. I have had enough of the leeks and onions. It is all choice. I take
God’s love to my heart, and put it on, and follow his directions.

Now, from ever thing that is wrong, I take my heart, and put it on these things
which are right. And a man is never converted until he is converted from the
wrong and converted to the right.

God pity you, my brother! Let us go out on one side or the other. Let us take a
stand. If it is right to do wrong, let us go on boldly; and if it is right to do
right, and stick to God and live for heaven, let us go over on that side.

I heard of a gambler in Louisville who gave himself to God, and joined the
Church; and then he went on the streets next day, and when he met his former
companions, he said to them, "Goodbye, boys; I will never do those things again;
and unless you come into the Church and take a stand with me, I will cut your
acquaintance today, and cut it forever." That is what I call taking a stand! And
if you want to be religious, take a stand. May the good Lord give these poor
sinners grip. That is what we want; the nerve to come up and assert our manhood,
and take sides in this great moral issue.

Turn - an actual, hearty turning away from sin. And not only that, but let it be
an immediate turning. Be not among these everlasting dilly-dally men, putting
off, and putting off.

You can’t be in too big a hurry in this great question of preparing for
eternity. And, thank God, when a man prepares to die, then he is prepared to
live; he is prepared for every good work and word. It is an immediate turning
away from sin that is necessary. O, brother, that heart that beats in your bosom
is but a muffled drum beating your funeral dirge to the tomb, and you know not
when that heart will stop beating. Brother, you have no time to lose - you have
no more time to throw away. Whatever else may happen, if you will put in your
best licks from this hour until you die, you will find out you just barely made
your way safely to the good world. An immediate turning away from sin! And not
only must it be an immediate turning away, but a thorough turning. Brother,
there is no use in talking about giving up part. One sin in your life is like
one leak in a ship; it will sink your soul before it reaches the other shore;
and it is a question not of how many sins have you given up, whether twenty or
fifty or a thousand, the one question for eternity is, have you given them all
up; and have you emptied them down tonight so that you can say, "There is the
last sin of my life, it is given up forever?" Will you do that? O, brother, you
can not swim the ocean of time with any sin resting upon you; you can not do it.
And you can just as well give your sins up now and give them all up. I know what
human nature is. I recollect how I tried to scatter my sins along and give up
those I felt I could get along best without. But, brother, I never made any
headway until I emptied them all down, and said, "Lord, I will never do another
thing that displeases thee."And I said, "If I am damned at last it will be for
those sins already committed. I will never commit another." And it must not only
be a thorough giving up, but, brother, hear me once more - it must be an eternal
giving up of sin. When General Lee, under the apple tree at Appomattox, handed
his sword to General Grant, he said with his whole heart, and said it for his
whole army, "We will never take up arms against the old flag again."

I tell you, my fellow-citizens, when a poor sinner goes to the cross and
surrenders, let him surrender with the understanding that he lays down his old
weapons of rebellion. Let him say: "I do not lay them down for a week, or a
month, or a year, but so help me God I will never, never fire that old gun
again. I will never handle it anymore. God helping me, I will be true to the
flag of the cross from this day until the minute I die."

Now you say, "What is the necessity of my turning?" Do you know, brother, that
this nineteenth century is wicked, and more wicked perhaps than the century that
preceded it, and that the more wicked and depraved men get, the more they fight
this idea of hell? And did you ever see a man that didn’t believe in an eternal
hell, but that when he came to die he would go there? There is many a fellow in
this country who says, "There is no hell," and mark the expression, he won’t be
in hell more than ten minutes before he jumps up and cries out, "O, what a
mistake I made in my doctrine. I didn’t have any hell in it, and now I am in
hell forever."

Hear me, my brother. Let us open the pages of this Book, and we will see that
for the wickedness of man, God drowned this old world. We turn over a little
further, and see the burning hail falling on Sodom and Gomorrah. And we turn
over a little further, and there are Pharoah and his hosts, horses, chariots,
all drowned in the Red Sea. We turn over page after page, and we find a little
further along Ananias and Sapphira as they dropped dead in their tracks for
lying. We turn over and over until the end, and find that God has been punishing
sin for four thousand years. As I look an all merciful God and loving Father in
the face tonight, then I look at myself and say, O, God, if thou has destroyed
armies and drowned the world, and sent the burning hail upon cities and
destroyed them, and caused the earth to burst open and swallow the wicked; I
look at all this and then I ask myself the question, if God will drown worlds
and burn cities and destroy armies as he has done in the past, then will God let
me go unpunished in the future? And the man who says that God will not punish
sin, must fly in the face of the record and of the history of this universe.

And, now, the means of turning. What are the means? "Lord, here I am tonight, a
poor sinner. I give up and surrender to the cross. I take the line of duty thou
has marked out for me. I give myself to thee from this time on." Brother,
sister, won’t you turn tonight?

"Sinners, turn! why will you die? God, your Savior, asks you why?"

Won’t you turn tonight and be saved forever?Turn! Turn!


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 9: 09. THE BLESSEDNESS OF RELIGION
========================================================================

The Blessedness of Religion

"Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth
in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful; but his delight
is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night."
(Psalms 1:1-2) The Psalms are an interesting study for any man. I like to read
Dickens and Thackeray and Bulwer and Shakespeare, because they evince such a
deep insight into human nature. A man may study the pages of such books as these
to advantage, but there is more for me in these one hundred and fifty psalms
than in the writings of all these masters. The authors I have named give me
human nature as we might see it if we were standing on the streets or in your
stores. But David gives us human nature as it is acted upon or influenced by the
Divine Spirit. I never have much to say against human nature. I have very little
abuse for a man in his normal state.

It is perverted human nature I fight. It is the perversion of hand and foot and
tongue and mind that I am ready always and forever to denounce. David gives me
human nature as it is acted upon and influenced in the best way. I love to read
David, because, in the first place, David knew what he was talking about. I love
to hear a man talk who seems to know what he is talking about. I’ve heard men
trying to explain a great many things they didn’t understand. I love to read
David, because he experienced what he was talking about. No man before him knew
more of God and more of humanity than David, and the best preacher that ever
planted his foot in this city is the preacher who knows the most about God and
the most about humanity. He stands between the two, and hence he ought to know
God, and lay his hands on the shoulder of his living Father in heaven, and then
put the other arm around the race, and try to lift humanity up to God. This
David could do.

Now this man who had studied life in all its phases, a man who seemed to
understand God as no man before him and very few after him, a man who seemed to
understand himself and understand human nature - gives us the conclusion he had
reached in these words, "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of
the ungodly," as much as if to say, "If you want to be a happy man" - and all
men want to be happy - "If you really are in search of happiness, listen to this
prescription: ’Blessed and happy you will be, if you walk not in the counsel of
the ungodly.’" An ungodly man may be a very moral man; an ungodly man need not
swear, nor drink, nor violate the Sabbath, nor commit any of the flagrant sins
which men are so often guilty of. An ungodly man means simply an ungodlike man.
Ungodliness and ungodlikeness are synonymous - they mean the same thing. What
does ungodly mean? It signifies not acquainted with God, and God’s ways. Every
man who knows God, loves God, and every man who does not know God, doesn’t love
him. It is just as natural for a soul that knows God to love God, as it is for a
mother to love her babe, or as it is for a father to love his son. An ungodly
man is a man who cares nothing about God. I’ll tell you the distinguishing
characteristic of that sort of men. They love to talk. They scoff at the idea
that anybody ever died for them, but they are all right, and they can give more
advice, and practice less of it than any tribe in creation. The way to tell an
ungodly man is that he is always talking about what harm is there in this, that,
or the other thing, and the way to tell a godly man is, he is always hunting
around for something with good in it, and not going about trying to find
something that people can see no harm in, as they say. If there is no harm in
cards, why I haven’t the time to play cards, and I’m sorry for the man and woman
that have time to dance. I tell you, brethren, when I look around me and see a
sinking world and humanity drifting off from God, and so many sick beds to
visit, and so many that are poor and need sympathy and help, I have no time to
spare for these things; and you wouldn’t have either if you were of any account.
You can put that down!

"Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly." In other
words, if you want to be happy in this life, don’t take counsel or advice from
ungodly men. Don’t do that! When you are lost as to any moral problem, go to the
best man or the best woman you know in the world for good advice, for they’re
the only ones capable of advising you. I want a man first to practice what he
preaches, and show me it is good to do it, and then tell me how he did it, and
then I want to do just like him. An ungodly man! As I said before, you can
hardly pick a flaw in him; he never goes far enough to be dubbed immoral. What’s
the difference between an immoral sinner and a moral sinner? Why, it’s just the
difference between the typhoid fever and the smallpox. That’s the only
difference at all. One’s internal and the other is external, but both will kill
nine times in ten. An ungodly man "Can’t see any harm in anything." He is like
an old Irishman down in our town, who was a devout member of his Church. He was
very profane, and a man said to him one day, "Jack, how can you be called a
devout member of your Church and swear and curse as you do?" And Jack replied,
"Faith, sir, and there’s no harm in cursing unless you make harm out of it." Do
you get the idea, brethren? I am not hunting those things that have no harm in
them, but I’m hunting the things that have good in them, and so are all good men
under all circumstances. They ain’t inquiring whether there is much or little
harm in this, that, and the other thing. If you want to be happy, brethren,
don’t take the advice or counsel of the ungodly, or of those men who run on that
line of things. They’ll get you into trouble sooner or later, sure.

Take the question of theater-going, and nine-tenths of these ungodly people in
the Church and out, you’ll find go to the theaters. Let’s raise that question a
little while here. A preacher in St. Louis told me that during his pastorate in
Chicago there was a young lady, teacher in one of the schools, who came to him
during a revival. Her conscience was stirred, and she walked up to him and said,
"I want to be a Christian. I want to join your Church, but you object to
theater-going, and I can’t see any harm in that at all." The pastor said to her,
"Sister, give your heart to God, join the Church, and go to the theater as much
as you please." She joined the Church, and after that went to the theater. Next
Summer the revival started again, and the young lady came into the church, and
took a class in the Sunday-school, and tried to live right. One day during the
revival one of the young lady’s pupils, who had become penitent, came to her and
said, "Miss So-and-so, do you go to the theater? And she answered, "Yes; I go
occasionally." The pupil then asked, "Do you think it is right as a Christian to
go to the theater?" "Well," said the teacher, "I don’t know." And the pupil
asked again, "Miss So-and-so, if you go as a Christian, can I go as a penitent?"
And the young lady told her pastor, "I looked that sweet girl in the face, and
said, ’Darling, I’ll never put my foot inside another theater, God helping me,
as long as I live.’ My liberty as a Christian was costing that girl her soul,
and I said to myself, ’My liberty shall never do that,’ and I gave up the thing
that was leading a soul from God."

That’s the way a Christian will settle that question every time. My liberty and
license in these things shall never cost a human being his soul. Lord cure us of
this abominable way of asking, "What harm is there in this?" But nobody has ever
asked me, "Is there any harm in family prayer?" They never asked me if I thought
there was in harm in reading the Bible! Do you want to know why? Because they
knew there was no harm in it! Why did they ask me the other question? Because
they knew there was harm in it, and that settles the whole question.

"Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly." When a man
gets to listening to bad advice the next thing he’s going to do is to stand in
the way of sinners. That means, keeping the company of sinners; and a man isn’t
going to listen to bad advice long before he’ll be with sinners. I don’t care
whose boy, or wife, or child you are, you can not stand the pressure of bad
company.

We need to inform ourselves in this question of company. There isn’t an angel in
heaven that can keep company some of you do and be pure. Above everything in the
universe, a man ought to be choice about his company and about his books. If you
will show me the company you keep, I will write your biography ten years ahead
of your death, and I will not miss the mark one time in ten. "Birds of a feather
flock together."

I will tell you another thing. There is but one safe rule in this line. Don’t
you ever go with anybody that will say things you won’t, that will do things you
won’t do. You won’t run with them long until you will be doing those things and
saying those things yourself. Always hunt better company than you are, for when
some of us get up to ourselves, we are with the biggest rascal in town right
then. And that gets things in a bad shape, doesn’t it? I am sorry for a fellow
when, every time he goes off by himself, he is in the worst company he was ever
in in his life. I will illustrate that for you. There was a very stingy man I
once heard of down in our country. His wife was a Methodist, and he would go
with his wife to Church, but he never would pay a dime toward the support of the
Church. One summer he professed religion and joined the Church himself. Well,
shortly after he joined the Church, the stewards went over to his house and
spoke to him kindly and told him: "Our preacher is now in need of provisions,
and I came over to see if I could get some meat from you for him." He had a
smoke-house full, and he thought a minute: "Why," said he, "certainly, I will
give the preacher some meat." He went out to his smoke-house while the steward
sat at the window. He walked up to the smoke-house, unlocked the door, took down
a big, fine ham, brought it about half-way to the house, stopped and laid it
down. He looked at it a while, and turned around and walked back to the
smoke-house, got another and came and laid it down also. Then he stood and
looked at it for a minute, turned back to the smoke-house and brought another.
The steward was watching him, and he looked down at the three hams. He heard him
say: "If you don’t shut your mouth, you old stingy devil, I will go and give him
all the meat there is in the smoke-house." The devil was in him, and told him
every time: "Are you going to give away that ham?" And the devil kept after him,
and he tried to hush his mouth by putting down one ham at a time, but finally he
silenced him when he said, "If you don’t hush your mouth I will give him every
ham in the smoke-house." And then the devil hushed. So a man can be in bad
company when he is by himself. "Bad company will ruin you."

Above all things we ought to be careful about the associations of our children.
If that neighbor of yours is worth fifty, or seventy-five, or a hundred thousand
dollars, he may have the worst children in town, and yet you will let those
children of his come over there and ruin yours because he has got a little
money. Did you ever notice that streak of human nature? If that neighbor’s son
of yours drives a fine horse and buggy in the streets of this city and belongs
to one of the fashionable clubs, that is all I want to know about him or any
other man. It is only a question of time when he will be drowned in debauchery
and ruin if he is a member of a city club. I don’t care if you are as pious as
Job, if you will join one of those clubs and begin to run with them, I would
swap your chances of heaven for those of Judas Iscariot.

I am determined to be understood, you see, and you all can disagree with me if
you want to; but you shan’t run away from here and say: "I declare, I didn’t
understand that fellow." You shan’t say that. I want to make you see what I am
talking about.

"Nor standeth in the way of sinners." O, mothers, look to the company of your
children. Fathers, look to the company of your sons. And I say to you tonight,
whenever it becomes a known fact that my daughters keep company with dissipated
young men and my sons have gone out into bad company, I shall lose all hope for
the future of my children. O, stand by your children and protect them.

Boys, listen to me. You never can get higher than the company you keep. If you
would be noble and true, seek the best atmosphere of earth, and live in it
forever. Stand not in the way of sinners. In this verse, David adds, "Nor
sitteth in the seat of the scornful." Now, brethren, we notice first he is
walking along, in the counsel of the ungodly. Well, when a man is walking in
this way, he can turn to the right or turn to the left by the movements of one
set of muscles; but you let him stand right still and he has got to move every
muscle in his body to get off; and then let him sit down, and nine times in ten
he is there to stay. While walking along in your youthful days, God’s minister
used to come and impress you and move you and turn you, but by and by you got to
standing, and then the thunders of worlds could not shake you or turn you. Some
of you have reached the last stage, the ante-room to hell, and that is sitting
in the seat of the scornful. God pity a poor wretch that has gone through bad
counsel into bad company until finally he is sitting down in the seat of the
scornful, where he can laugh at the preacher and make fun of God and scorn the
Bible.

"Nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful." A man never gets over the fact that
he has taken such an attitude toward God. "But his delight is in the law of the
Lord." I tell you, brother, when you get to where you will like this Book, and
read this Book, you are laying a foundation then. Young boys, take this Book;
let your delight be in the counsel, in the law of the Lord. I never think of
what this Bible is to a man but I think of a little boy. He was the good boy in
the town, and all the boys recognized him as a good, upright boy. And they laid
their traps to get him drunk. They sent one of the shrewdest of the bad boys to
him, and he met him on the street, and he said, "Johnny, come into the grocery
and let us have a mint julep." Johnny say, "O, no, I can’t go in there." "Well,
why?" "Well, my Book says, ’Look not upon the wine when it is red,’ much less
drink it." "O, he says, "I know the Book says that, but come in and take one
drink." "Well," he says, "I can’t do it." "Well, why?" "Because my Book says,
’At the last it biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder.’" "O," he
says, "I know the Bible says that, but come in and take one drink." "No," he
says, "my Bible says, ’When sinners entice thee, consent thou not.’" And the bad
boy turned off and left him, and went over to his companions, and they said,
"Did you see him?" "Yes." "Did you get him to drink?" "No, I couldn’t get him in
the grocery." "Well, why?" He said, "That boy was just as chuck full of Bible as
he could be, and I couldn’t do a thing with him." Ah, brother, "his delight is
in the law of the Lord."

Now, let me give you the germ of happiness that may spring up and be a tree
under which you can sit in its shade and eat its fruits. Listen: these texts,
these two verses, furnish the secret of a happy life. I beg you, don’t walk in
the counsel of the ungodly! Don’t stand in the way of sinners! Don’t sit in the
seat of the scornful, but take the Book of God, make it your counsel, give
yourself to the right, and live and die for God.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 10: 10. A NEW CREATURE IN CHRIST
========================================================================

A New Creature In Christ "Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new
creature." (2 Corinthians 5:17)

Christ Jesus was a man, and in referring to his relation to our race, he spoke
of himself as "the Son of man." "These works that I do demonstrate that I am
divine. Now I would not have you forget that I am also the Son of man."

We have Christ in two manifestations, and I wish we had more of him in a third.
We have Christ in his works, and we have him in his words. We have books written
on the latter. Rudolph Stier, on the Words of the Lord Jesus, is, perhaps, one
of the most valuable books in a preacher’s library. I have been panting and
hungry a long time for a book on the Thoughts of the Lord Jesus. Really, when I
look at his works, I wonder and say, "Behold!" Then, when I read his words, I
say, "A man that could talk like that, of course could work like that;" and when
I get into the great thoughts of Christ, then I say, "The words and works of
Christ are the mere bubbles on the great ocean of life. He who thought like
Christ could surely work like Christ and talk like Christ."

Christ Jesus is a great deal more to us, brother, than we have ever realized.
Really, the wealth of the universe is hidden in Christ. Now I would not stand
here and study Christ; I would not stand here with all the infirmities and
difficulties that encompass me, with the seen things, and study the Lord Jesus,
but I would go where Jesus is, and study the universe; and a man who stands
where Jesus is understands things very differently from a man who stands here
and studies them.

Jesus Christ is the great telescope to the Christian’s eye. He not only brings
the unseen things, which are afar off, down to where I may reach them, but he is
also the great microscope to the Christian’s eye, so that the things that are
close to me I can see a thousand times better when I look through Christ.

Christ in his works and in his words, Christ in his thoughts, in the unfailing
purity of his social life, his grandeur of intellectual life in the whole sum of
his life, is an examplar for all men. O Jesus, thou art all in all, and from
thee and through thee I may see all things in the light God see them.

"If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature." I believe that Jesus Christ was
born of the Virgin Mary. I believe that he was God. I believe that he was man. I
believe we needed this God-Man. Jesus Christ is a mediator - one who works
between two parties. I think it was Bishop Morris who put this in the strongest
way. He said, "Jesus was the mediator, the one between the two, and Jesus was
divine, and Jesus was human, and he laid the left hand of his humanity on the
shoulder of man, and then, reaching up, caught the shoulder of God with the
right hand of his divinity, and he brought God and man together." We needed
Christ. And I believe another thing, brother. I believe the Lord Jesus Christ
not only came and lived among men, but he fared largely as other men did and do.
Jesus Christ suffered and died for what he was and for what he said and for what
he did. That’s true. And Jesus Christ died as naturally as St. Paul died, and
St. Paul died a natural death. Do you want to know what I mean by this? I mean
that in that day, in the fullness of the time, when Jesus came, it was death to
any man to preach righteousness and live it before the people. And Jesus came
and suffered the penalty of his righteous life and his righteous words. Now, on
this question, I want to say, brethren, that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the
Savior of men, suffered the penalty of his words and his works. It was death to
the God-man. It was death to those who loved this God- man, to talk and preach
as he did. Then I see Jesus on that cross as he suffers and dies; and, listen,
brother, on that cross I see the divinest, grandest manifestation of God’s love
to man. If you want to draw out from the deepest depth all that’s true in me,
listen. You see Christ on that cross. I have heard men say that Jesus hung on
the cross to satisfy the claims of divine justice. I have heard them say Jesus
was hung on that cross to appease God’s wrath against man; but I will tell you
my conception of it, and this little bundle of paper, the Bible, which I hold in
my hand, is with me. Jesus Christ was not there to satisfy claims of divine
justice. He was not there as a target of divine wrath. No. Would you make me
believe that God was angry with humanity six thousand years ago, and that the
only way to keep him from killing out the whole concern was to put his only Son
on the cross and sacrifice him? I do not believe God suffered his Son to be
crucified because he was mad with men, but that Jesus came and died because of
God’s love for man. "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son,
that whosoever believeth on him might not perish, but have everlasting life."

God doesn’t love me because Christ died for me, but Christ died for me because
of God’s unspeakable love for me. Now you are getting your theology right on
this question, and you can knock all the infidelity out of this country by this
great New Testament doctrine. Love! "Herein is love, not that we loved Him, but
that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." And
this old idea we have, that God does not love anybody but good people, won’t do.
Some people get this idea in their heads, and the first thing you know they
think they have a corner on the grace of God, and are trying to run a monopoly
on the love of heaven.

Hear, my brethren, God loves every man in this universe. I will take this view.
The sun in mid-heaven shines on everything alike. It shines on the verdant
valleys, on the bold mountain peaks. It pours its vivifying rays on growing
grain, fruits, and flowers, as well as on the stricken oak, or blasted tree, and
sterile ground. It shines on all alike. Why? Because it is its nature to shine
on everything. God’s name as well as nature is love, and God loves everything
that comes under the burning rays of his love. God loves all men. He loved me
just as much before I was converted as he loves me now. If he had not, I never
would have been converted. It is God’s nature to love, and you cannot make it
out that God is mad with men. O thou infinite God of love and mercy, of long
suffering and goodness, show us all that thou hast never dealt with us in anger,
but always in love.

God loves us, brethren, and Jesus Christ was not hung on the cross as a target
of divine justice, or to placate divine anger, but as the manifestation of God’s
love to dying men. That’s it. I hope I am orthodox, brethren! I hope I am. If I
am not, I will tell you this much, I can love God more with this view of the
divine atonement than I can with any other; and you must let me have my way,
because I can get along better on that than on any other ground. We won’t
quarrel about it. You may take the other view of it if you like, or mix the two
together if you please, but I love Him because he first loved me. He is a loving
Savior; a loving Savior, living; loving, dying; loving, going to the grave;
loving, rising; always filled with love for me.

"Now, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature." Jesus was emphatically a
new creature in the world. There was none like him before, nor any like him
since. Jesus prayed, "Father, as we are one, grant that these people may be all
one with us." All are merged into one in Christ - one in purpose, one in desire,
one in intention, one in love, one in purity, one in faith, one in forgiveness,
one in pardon. It is a oneness in sentiment, purpose, virtue, desire, love, and
purity.

You see two men walking along. You say these two men have the same purposes, the
same interests, the same desires, everything the same. When you hit one, you hit
both. The bar-keepers in this city are all one. If you raise your voice against
one of them, they will all rise up against you. You hit one of them in
denouncing their traffic, and you hit them all. Their interests are identical. I
wish I could say that when you hit one Christian in this town, you hit all; but,
instead of that, when you hit one, the rest all say, "I am glad it was not me."
Thank God, though we cannot know like him, and cannot have power like him, one
thing we can do, and that is, love like God. And that is the grandest of his
attributes - love.

Now, brother, being in Christ Jesus, presupposes a longing for Christ. I said
before, Jesus Christ is not a sentiment. He is a divine person, and in the
divinity of his person he embraces all wisdom, justice, mercy, love, and purity.
Of all these attributes, Christ is the living embodiment, and he who is in
Christ the most necessarily partakes most of these divine characteristics. The
Scriptural term for this longing is "hungering and thirsting after
righteousness." That is a healthful and religious state. David said: "As the
hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God."
Hunger of the soul is a hunger for Christ. The sense of hunger and of thirst of
the body, how intense it is. Did you ever locate the sense of physical hunger? A
little boy once said to his father, "Papa, I feel so hungry." "Son," said the
father, "how do you feel when you are hungry?" "I feel like chewing something,"
said the boy. So the organs of the appetite are where to look for physical
hunger. Now where do I locate the sense of spiritual hunger? It is in the heart.
My heart, my soul panteth after the living God. This longing, this intense
burning desire, O Christ, nothing can satisfy but thyself.

See that baby boy; how he cries and kicks and screams! His nurse endeavors to
pacify him by offering him his little toys and playthings, but he says: "I don’t
want my toys." She offers him marbles, but he cries, "I don’t want any marbles."
After she has exhausted all her resources to quiet him, and he still cries and
refuses to be comforted, the little fellow’s mother comes in. The instant his
eyes light upon her his crying ceases; he rushes up and is caught in her loving
arms. He "just wanted mamma." He did not want anything else; and with her his
soul was satisfied. And, brother, whenever a soul gets to the point in its
childlike simplicity, that the devil, the world, and the flesh, with its cards,
and dancing, and theaters, and all its other allurements cannot satisfy it, and
it says, "I don’t want that, I want my Savior," he is sure to come and abide
with that soul. The way to get the fullness of Christ is to empty your heart of
everything that rejects Christ and his affinities. Always lean to those things
that are Christ’s. Let your prayer be, "Lord, help me to turn each idol out that
dares to rival thee." How many can say now, "I would rather have Christ for my
portion than all else besides?" Being in Christ not only presupposes a longing
for Christ, but a fleeing to Christ. O, blessed Christ, I run upon the swiftest
feet of faith to meet thee. O, dear Lord, I tried until I could try no more to
remain away; my soul became impatient, and I could stay no longer; show me thy
way. I will rush into thine arms of waiting love. Thank God for that purpose of
my soul that makes me go out in search of my Lord. I will search for him. I am
so glad that I never let the grass grow up in my pathway between my Lord and me.
The devil shall never come between my Savior and myself.

I saw some time ago an illustration of how the devil works among his crowd, by
an old colored preacher down South. He laid three objects on his Bible, and he
said: "Now, brethren, I’m a-going to show how de debbil works de Christuon.
Here’s de Savior, here’s de Christuon, and here’s de debbil. Now when de
Christuon move up to Christ, den de debill he move off; de Christuon move nearer
Christ, and de debbil he move furder off; den de Christuon sort o’back-slides,
den de debbil move up; de Christuon gets furder and furder away from Christ, and
de debbil moves up closer and closer to him, and de first thing you know, de
debbil jump over him and get right between him and Christ; and when he gets over
dar between you and Christ he’s got you, and den he’ll say, ’Now I’s got you,
sure.’" This is a living illustration. Never let the devil get between you and
your Lord. Say to him, "Get thee behind me, Satan; you shall never come between
me and my Lord."

Then running to Christ! Thank God for the privilege of going to Christ. Is there
trouble anywhere? Take it to the Lord in prayer. What a Friend we have in Jesus!
Thank God, brother! I have been at times in such tight places that I could not
do a thing in the world but pray; and thank God that was all I needed to do.
Just leave it all with the Lord. That’s what we call rushing to the Lord in
prayer.

O, my brother, if I wanted to divide the armies of Satan and put all perdition
to flight, I would not order down a legion of angels and all the artillery of
heaven; but I will tell you what I would do: I would fall on my knees in prayer
to God. "And Satan trembles when he sees The weakest saint upon his knees." A
man can fall into no harm while he is on his knees praying. Did you ever hear of
a man getting drunk on his knees? Did you ever hear of a man stealing while on
his knees in prayer? I will tell you, your trouble is, you have not been on your
knees enough.

Ah, me! how Satan has tempted me, how the passion for drink has come on and
almost overwhelmed me; but, thank God, I have found his grace sufficient to
sustain me. Those people who say, I cannot help drinking; or, I cannot help
doing this or that when tempted, - I know what the matter with them is: you
don’t do enough of this knee-work I am talking about. I hear people say, "I’m
afraid to join the Church, I’m afraid I can’t hold out, I’m afraid I’ll swear or
drink or do something wrong;" and I have said to them, "I never have been afraid
of but one thing since I joined the Church, and that is, I am afraid I won’t
pray enough." I am omnipotent when leaning on the arm of God in prayer. If you
want to whip the devil, just fall on your knees in prayer. Being in Christ
pre-supposes, again, submission to Christ. O, how we want our own way! How
jealous we are of what we call our privileges! How we kick and rear if we cannot
have our own way, and how we rave, and pitch, and tear if we don’t get it! Why,
we fall out with our preacher and abuse him like a pick-pocket if he attempts to
abridge "our privileges." Ah, we are jealous of these "privileges." You touch
them, and you get your foot into it. I sail into you on your dram-drinking,
theater-going, card-playing, and dancing, and the town rises up in arms against
me; but it is the hit dog that hollers, and you may put that down. If you go and
break a drunkard’s jug, he’ll get mad, every time; but his wife won’t. If we
sail into these people who do these things I have the utmost pity and sympathy
for them, and I do believe, my brethren, the poor people are so deluded and
persuaded by the world, that they don’t see any harm in the things they are
doing. Let us get them to reading books that have sense in them - I mean
religious sense. If I have got but a little sense, good Lord, let it be
religious sense.

I heard a man say once, "Myself and my wife never had asquabble in our lives -
never had aquarrel - only when she wanted to have her own way." Well, who isn’t
lovable that way? The devil himself is agreeable enough when he has everything
his own way. Listen: I am sorry for Christian people who have reserved rights.
Religion is like that pearl of great price, which, when found, the buyer sold
all that he had and purchased. And, brother, thank God, from the day Igave up
sin tothis hour, I never had a reserved right. I say, "Lord, I will doanything -
everything." I have invested my all in it. All that I have is in this Book, and
if itdoesn’t break I am a millionaire through all eternity. That’s the way to
talk it.

Submission to Christ! Do as he tells you to do. You are a most humble member of
your Church until your preacher says something that touches you, and off you
fly, and say: "If I can’t live in peace here, I’ll go and join another Church."
Or perhaps some good sister says, "My husband and I were talking about this the
other night, and we ain’t going to stand this sort of thing." Sister! God bless
you; go over there, and have the best time you can while you are here. A
gentleman said to me that at a meeting of an official board of his Church, at
which his wife and himself were present, rum was passed around, and everyone
present, members of the board, including the pastor of the Church, except the
gentleman who told me and his wife, drank of it. A preacher who will indulge in
such things, not only with his members, but privately, belongs to the devil from
his hat to his heels. I know when I did that way I belonged to the devil, and I
don’t care whether the man is a preacher or not, the test of his allegiance to
Christis how he lives.

Christ says, "Not everyone that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the
kingdom of heaven." Now you say, "Mr. Jones, you ought not to be so rough on the
ministers." Well, I called no names, and I would not tell my preacher that
"Jones is hitting at him." It’s an insult to tell him that he is being hit.

Then we say again, that being in Christ Jesus presupposes union with Christ. "I
am the vine, and ye are the branches," says Christ. Did you ever go into a
vineyard and examine the vines and branches? Did you ever see how closely in
vital forces they were united? How the very vitality of the branch was
determined by the vine? If united to Christ, he and myself are one, one in all
things, in earnestness, in energy, in goodness, in mercy, in purity, in truth.
Being in Christ Jesus presupposes also all the affinities which control one’s
life - his likes, his looks, his thoughts, his tastes, his all. It is a
religion, assimilation with the character of our Lord Jesus Christ, doing like
him, thinking and being like him. Blessed Christ, give us a religion that makes
us like thyself, and then we shall be Christians in the grandest sense. Our
blessed Lord loved the sinners and died for them. Let us, brethren, imitate our
divine Lord, and do the best we can for the sinning and erring ones around us.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 11: 11. FIGHTING THE DEVIL
========================================================================

Fighting the Devil

"Now while Paul waited for them at Athens his spirit was stirred in him when he
saw the city wholly given to idolatry." (2 Corinthians 5:17) The preacher
explained that by "them" was meant Silas and Timothy, co-workers with Paul, who
were to follow and accompany him on his missionary tour, and said:

I believe Saul of Tarsus was the greatest man in this world’s history. When I
measure his head I look and admire. When I measure his heart I am at a loss to
know which is the greater, his head or his heart. It takes both head and heart
to make a true man. If there was a leading characteristic in the life of this
great man it was his sterling integrity, his downright honesty.

There was never but one trouble in the mind of this great man, and that was
touching the divinity of Christ. It took the biggest guns of Heaven to arouse
and convince him, but when once convinced he was loyal forever. I believe I am
ready to say here in my place that St. Paul being an honest man, God put him
straight once, and he never gave God a moment’s trouble after that until God
said: "It is enough; come up higher." St. Paul was such a man as I would
imitate. I admire his character, true, noble, courageous, honest. And now this
man, waiting for his companions at Athens, sees the whole city given to
idolatry. The charge that God brought against his ancient people was this: "My
people will not consider." The etymological definition of that word is "to look
at a thing until you see it." Here the speaker illustrated the words "glance"
and "consider" by reference to the study of a landscape picture. A glance would
take in the main features, such as the mountain scenery, the stream and the
hamlet. A consideration or careful examination would show the foliage of the
mountain trees, the road leading to the mansion, the cattle grazing on the hill
slopes, and so on. There was quite a difference between glancing at an object
and considering it. St. Paul had considered the state of affairs in Athens and
his spirit was stirred within him when he saw how the whole city was given to
idolatry.

Now, said Mr. Jones, I want to say: One of two things is true of St. Louis
tonight. Either the eyes of Christian people are closed to the fact, or else the
facts are falsehoods; one or the other. You can take whichever horn of the
dilemma you please. I can take the daily papers of St Louis and read your local
columns, and see, without getting at the Bible, that St Louis is wrong; that
there is something radically wrong about this city; there are too many debauched
characters, too many suicides, too many murders, too many that are drifting
daily to destruction and ruin. The fact is, a man don’t need a Bible to see this
world is all wrong; all you need to do is just to read your morning and
afternoon papers, and then walk this street with your eyes open, and if you do
that it will not be one week from today until you look on with horror that is
indescribable.

Now, let me ask each of you: Did you ever look at your heart until you saw it? I
grant you that you have glanced at it a thousand times, but did you ever kneel
down and pray for light and look and look and look until you saw your heart. My
Bible teaches me that:

"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked." My Bible
teaches me:

"Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it come the issues of life and
death." My Bible teaches me:

"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God."

I once saw a pictorial representation of the human heart. It represented the
sinner’s heart; full of all kinds of wild beasts, reptiles and unclean birds --
a hideous sight to look upon. Then there was the heart under conviction of sin,
with the heads of all these animals turned outward, as if they were getting
ready to leave. Then I saw the heart converted, cleansed, and it was represented
with a shining light and a cross. I saw also the backslider’s heart, with the
heads of all the beasts and reptiles as if they had turned backward, and I saw
the apostate’s heart -- a Methodist heart -- as it was filled to overflowing
with all manner of horrid things, and the last state of that man was worse than
the first.

Oh, the heart! the heart! This world reminds me, in some of its phases, of the
man down in the spring branch trying to clear the water, so he could get a clear
drink. He was doing all he could to filter and clear the water when some friend
called out to him: "Stranger, come up a little higher and run that hog out of
that spring, and it will clear itself." No trouble then. And I declare to you
tonight, the hardest job man ever undertook in this world is to lift up your
life with an unclean heart.

There is no such thing as a clean life outside of a clean heart. I know we have
what we call moral men, but I don’t believe you can separate morals and
Christianity. In fact, the morals of this world are the paraphernalia of
Christianity. The man who is moral in the sense that he will pay his debts and
tell the truth, and that sort of thing, may be a villain at heart. Our Savior
looked at the most moral men this world ever saw, and said: "You white washed
rascals, you!" That is our version. His version was: "Ye whited sepulchers!" I
had rather be called the former. And I want to say to you men that don’t profess
to be Christians, I don’t bring a railing charge against you. In the life of
Jesus Christ not a single harsh word ever escaped His lips toward a sinner. When
Jesus would talk with a sinner, He would fetch up the parable of the lost sheep,
where the man left the ninety and nine safe in the fold and followed the poor,
wandering sheep, and when he found it he didn’t take a club and beat it back
home, but picked up the poor, tired, hungry sheep and laid it on his shoulder
and brought it back to the fold. But I tell you one thing. The Lord Jesus
himself never lost a chance to pour hot shot and grape and canister into the
Scribes and Pharisees, and they are the gentlemen I am after, begging your
pardon. Now, if the sinners about this town want to go to theaters, and want to
dance and want to play cards and want to curse and want to live licentious
lives, I say, "Go it Go it boys;" but if you members of the church want to do
it, I will brand you as hypocrites until you renounce your faith in Christ and
have your name taken off the church books. I’ve got a right to say a few things
along there, and neither this world, nor the flesh, nor the devil, will
interpose any objection. Don’t anybody say I interposed an objection to any man
who don’t profess to be a Christian, or placed any obstacle in the way of his
doing just as he pleases. We will attend to your case later, but now I want to
look in the faces of men who have made their vows and their promises to God, and
who have sworn eternal allegiance to Jesus Christ, and their lives are a shame
to the Gospel and a disgrace to the character they profess. That’s it.

Now, let us look at our hearts. I believe this incident, related of Mr. Moody,
will illustrate the point I am on. On one occasion, when he had invited
penitents to the altar, there came forward a great many, and he walked back two
or three pews to where two Christian ladies were sitting, and he said, "My
sisters, will you walk forward and talk to those penitents?" They looked up at
him and said, "No, sir, Mr. Moody; we are praying for you." "Praying for me?" he
said. "Am I not trying to live right and get to Heaven?" "Yes, Mr. Moody; but we
are praying that you may have a clean heart." And he said conviction entered his
spirit in a moment, and he dismissed the services later and went home and fell
down on his knees and prayed, "Lord God, show me my heart. Let me see it as it
is -- " And he said, "When the light of Heaven poured in upon my heart I saw it
was full of Moody, and full of selfishness, and full of worldly pride; and then
I said, ’Lord God, help me to "Cast every idol out That dares to rival thee/"

"And," said he, "the Lord came and washed out all unrighteousness from my heart,
and from that day until now I have never preached a sermon that didn’t win souls
to Christ." And I declare to you, if Jesus had in this town an army of pure
blood-washed hearts we could win St. Louis to Christ And never, never, never
will we accomplish the work and bring the world to Christ until we, who profess
Christ, arouse ourselves and wake up and shake the devil’s fleas, off ourselves
and get to be decent.

I can stand anything better than I can a hypocrite. I always did have a hatred
for shams and humbugs and cheats, and of all the humbugs that ever cursed the
universe, I reckon the religious humbug is the humbuggest You remember how the
students played a joke once on the professor -- at Princeton, I believe it was.
He was one of these old bugologists, and I reckon he had specimens of all the
bugs in the world in his frames and boxes. And the mischievous boys got the legs
of one bug and the body of another and the head and wings of others and put them
together like nature had formed them, and then they laid it on the old
professor’s table, and walked in and ask him what kind of a bug that was, and he
said, "Gentlemen that is a humbug." And I tell you when a fellow gets a little
Methodism in him, and a little of theaters, and a little card playing, and a
little of most everything, and is made up out of a hundred different sort of
things, then he is a first- class humbug in every sense of the word. He is just
good anywhere.

Oh, my heart! With the heart right, with the fountain clear, the stream will be
clear. With a good tree the fruit will be good. And I declare to you tonight
that the hardest work a man ever tried to do is to be a Christian without
religion; to be a good man with a bad heart.

Why there are just scores sitting in front of me tonight that if it were
literally true that we had wild beasts and serpents and other venomous things in
bodily form in our hearts, as they are typically there, I would hate to be close
round some of you, for fear I might get bit before I could get out of the way.
Oh, God, give us clear hearts and clear hands. And then I will say, to be
practical all along the line, did you ever look at your tongue until you saw it?
Oh, these tongues of ours! These tongues of ours! We Methodists pour the water
on, and the Presbyterians sprinkle it on and the Baptists put us clean under,
but I don’t care whether you sprinkle, or pour, or immerse, the tongue comes out
as dry as powder. Did you ever see a baptized tongue? Say, did you? Did you ever
see a tongue that belongs to the Church? You will generally find the tongue
among man’s reserved rights. There come in some reservations, and always where
there is a reservation the tongue is retained. The tongue! The tongue! The
tongue! Pambus, one of the middleage saints, went to his neighbor with a Bible
in his hand and told him "I want you to read me a verse of Scripture every day.
I can’t read, and I want you to read to me." So the neighbor opened the Bible
and read these words:

"I will take heed to my ways that I sin not with my tongue."

Pambus took the book out of his hand and walked back home, and about a week
after that the neighbor met him, and he said: "Pambus, I thought you were to
come back and let me read you a passage of Scripture every day?" and Pambus
said, "Do you recollect that verse you read to me the other day?" "No," said the
neighbor. "Well," said Pambus, "I will quote it:

’I will take heed to my ways that I sin not with my tongue.’

"And," he said, "I never intend to learn another passage of Scripture until I
learn to live that one." Oh, me! If every man, woman and child in this house
tonight would go away from here determined to live that passage of Scripture! "I
said, I will take heed to my ways that I sin not with my tongue. I will keep my
tongue from evil and my lips from speaking guile."

Oh, me! Shakespeare told a great truth when he said:

He that steals my purse steals trash, But he that filcheth from me my good name
Takes that which not enricheth him! But makes me poor indeed.

These violators of character -- I will venture the assertion there are many,
many, many here tonight if every word you said about people in this house was
posted up there n legible words, here tonight, you would immediately leave this
house and never be seen in public again "We ain’t going anywhere where they put
up everything we say for folks to look at" Now I I look at my tongue until I see
it. There is many a man that in other things may do well, that will at last lie
down in Hell forever, and say: "I am conscious I am tongue damned. I would have
gone to Heaven if I hadn’t got a tongue" My tongue! And I say to you tonight the
best thing we can do with our tongues is to speak well and to speak kindly of
all men. I dare assert here in my place tonight, when you take me from this
sacred stand that I occupy tonight, I defy you to put your finger on a word of
mine against the character or reputation of anybody. But I am not talking for
myself up here. Understand that. Once in Jerusalem a great crowd -- it was 1,800
years and more ago, as the legend goes, or the allegory -- a great crowd was
gathered in Jerusalem, and they were gathered around a dead dog, and they stood
and looked, and one of them said: "That is the ugliest dog I ever saw." Another
said, "Oh, he is not only the ugliest dog I ever saw, but I don’t believe hid
old hide is worth taking off of him." Another said, "Just look how crooked his
legs are." And so they criticised the poor dog. And directly one spoke up and
said, "Ain’t those the prettiest, pearly white teeth you ever looked at?" And
they walked off and said, "That must have been Jesus of Nazareth that could have
found something good to say about a dead dog." Oh, me I I like those people that
always like to see something kind in people in their ways and walks of life. And
then, I ask you again, did you ever look at your feet until you see them? There
is a good deal in that.

"Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path."

Oh, Lord God! I would follow in the footsteps of Him who led the way to Heaven.
There is no circumspect Christian who does not see to it that his feet are kept
in the narrow way that leads from earth to Heaven. A Methodist, a Baptist, a
Presbyterian, a Catholic in a ballroom! Their feet, that they have pledged
should follow in the footsteps of Christ, are there cutting the pigeon-wing to
music! Now what do you think of that? And I hear this expression: They say,
"Well, our church don’t object to it" Now I would say a very strong thing here
-- and I hope you will take it in the very spirit in which I say it, for I never
said a kinder thing or a harder thing than that -- you never, you never shall
hear a truer thing. Whenever a Presbyterian, or a Methodist, or a Baptist, or a
Christian, or a Congregationalist, or a Catholic says that their church don’t
object to dancing and theaters, and all such things as that, they could not tell
a bigger lie if they would try in a hundred years! Thank God, there not a church
named after Christ on earth that has not thundered out after these things with
all the power they have got.

"Our church don’t object!" Well, now, the Episcopal Church being a church in
authority -- how they did thunder against these worldly amusements. That little
church you belong to may not That rotten little thing! I would not stay in it
long enough to get my hat if it didn’t.

I was sitting in a train some time ago and the train rolled up to the station,
and just up on the platform, near by, were three ladies. One of the ladies said
to the other: "Are you going to the ball tonight?" The other lady said, "I ain’t
going." "But," she said, "I forgot; you are a Methodist, and you don’t go to
such places. I would not be a Methodist I want to enjoy myself." The other said,
"Yes, I am a Methodist, and, thank God! I don’t want to go to such places."
"Oh," said the other one, "I would not be a Methodist," and the train rolled
off, and I felt like jumping on the top of that train myself and hollering,
"Hurrah for Methodism!" And whenever she goes into copartnership with ball rooms
and with all of the worldly amusements that embarrass the Christian and paralyze
his power -- whenever the Methodist Church goes into co partnership with these
things, I will sever my connection with her forever. And I love her and honor
her today because she has stood like a bulwark against these things and
denounced them from first to last.

One of the honored preachers of this town, a man whose good opinion I value
highly, one of the noblest, truest ministers of this town, said to me: "I
declare to you, our churches are little more than a graveyard. We have been
killed and almost buried by this tide of worldliness that has swept over our
homes year after year." And that is the truth And I can read a ten-page letter
that I got from a citizen of St. Louis today, and turn every face in this house
as pale as death. That man wrote like he knew what he was talking about. There
is many a mother at 12 o’clock at night in this town that can sing with the
blood trickling in her heart, Oh, where is my wandering boy tonight?

He was as pure as the driven snow. And oh, why, why, why would I take this
carcass, and that carcass, and the other carcass that are so offensive? Why
would I bring them out before this congregation? Nothing, nothing, nothing would
make me do it but to get you to take those carcasses that are despoiling the
very odors of your city, and bury them out of sight forever. That is it. You all
have spent two or three nights looking at me. God help you to look at yourselves
awhile. And you will think I am a beauty before you get through. I look at
myself from head to foot -- my hands, my heart, my feet, my tongue. I look at my
ways and walks and character in this community. Did you ever look at yourself as
a member of the church? Did you ever wake up some morning and shut your eyes and
lay there and say, "Well, suppose every member of the church in town was just
like me, what sort of a church would we have in this town? Suppose every member
of the church in town prayed as little as I pray, what sort of a church would we
have? Suppose every member of the church in town paid as little as I pay, how
long before the whole thing would be sold out by the sheriff?"

Oh, my brother! it is well enough, now and then, for a fellow to get a square,
honest look at himself. What sort of a Methodist are you? There is a man that
has promised to renounce the world, the flesh and the devil, and the pomp and
the glory of this world, and he has promised on oath, before God and man, not to
follow or be led by them. What is your life? There is that Presbyterian,
consecrated to God by the most solemn ceremony that heaven ever listened at.
Now, what is your character? There is the Episcopalian; with the imposing hands
of the clergy laid upon his head, and with a ceremony as solemn as eternity, he
was dedicated in the church to God last night, and tonight he is in the biggest
ball in town, dancing his way to Hell. And no longer than this very year, in one
of the cities of the South, one gentleman told me -- said he: "I saw the
Episcopal clergyman lay his hand on the heads of a class of twenty one night,
and," he said, "the next night eighteen out of that twenty were at a magnificent
ball." Now, you say: "I wouldn’t have done that, I would have waited a week."
Well, if a fellow is going to do it at all, better get right at it. Don’t you
think that’s so? How long ought a fellow to wait after he joins the church
before he goes to his devilment? Now, that’s it.

I wish I could get all the Methodists and Baptists and Presbyterians in this
city, and all other churches, to live just like they promised to live. I wish I
could get all the Episcopalians in town to be as good out of Lent as they are in
Lent. That would be good, wouldn’t it? And I never could see why a fellow ought
not to be as good one time as another. Did you? I never could. And I’m going to
be as good the year round as any Episcopalian in this town is during Lent. I
reckon they al hope to die in Lent. If a heap of them die out of Lent, the devil
will get them in my judgment. In a great many places they dance Lent in, and
they dance it out. Like the Irishman talking about holidays in America -- said
he: "Instead of hanging our heads and sorrowing over the crucifixion of our
Savior, we Americans fire it in and fire it out

Now, I don’t pick out any denominations, and say anything about one denomination
that I would not say about another. There is no denominationalism in this. I
have no purpose and no desire in my heart to say one thing about one
denomination that I would not say against another. That is true. I am just
talking true things, and any night you come here if you don’t like the way this
is rattled off, you can rack out of here just the minute you please. For I
propose, God being my helper, to speak of the truth as I see it, and I don’t
care what man or devil or cities or earth or hell may say, I am going to preach,
while I do preach, what I believe to be the truth. And I will tell you,
Christian people, if you think the devil is going to surrender any ground in
this town until every inch is covered with blood, you do not know the devil as
well as I do. I will tell you that. I have been fighting His Majesty several
years, and I declare to you that he is always ready for a fight. He has
possessed nearly two thirds of this city for nearly forty years, and if you
think he is going to make a voluntary surrender of his territory, you do not
know him. He is going to fight and fight, and every child he has got is going to
help him; you can put that down. And I tell you there is another thing; there is
a heap of members of the church to help him, too. They will that. Some places
the devil goes to he never has anything to do himself. He puts his hands in his
pockets and goes round and gets members of the church to run his devilment for
him. They do his work cheaper for him than any other class. He don’t have to pay
them, and they board themselves. In some towns the leading ballroom dude is a
member of the church -- the fellow that gets them all up and runs the thing.

I look at myself as a member of the church. Oh me, brother! when you see
yourself as a member of the church, as a professor of religion, it will do you
good. I will ask you again, did you ever look at yourself as a father? Oh, me!
how close you get to a man’s heart when you talk to him of his family. Brother
and sister, did you ever have your innocent child sit on your lap, put its
little arms round your neck and imprint the kiss of innocence on your cheek?
Have you ever looked on your lovely children lying in their bed and said: "Of
all children God ever gave, my children have the purest and best of fathers."
You can go home tonight and wake up your little Willie. Get him quite awake, and
ask him "Who is the best man in St Louis?" He will answer, "Why, you, papa." Ask
him, "who would you rather be most like" and he will reply, "why, you, papa."
Ask him who is best man in the world and he will say, "why, you, papa." He ain’t
got no sense. And that is why we curse, and damn and ruin our children. They can
see no harm in us and just as we do they will follow and imitate us. A single
man may drink, as a single man he may swear, as a single man he may lead a
godless life, but as a married man you had better call a halt and ask where you
are leading your children to day by day. You may sit in the chairs of this hall
night after night; you may simply have your curiosity excited; you may simply
come here to laugh; but when you gather your children in your arms and see that
your bad example is leading them to death and hell, there is no joke about that
-- no laugh about that! God pity me and pity you in our relations toward those
that lean upon us; and if there is any fact in my history I bless God for in my
heart tonight, it is the fact that not a sweet child of mine ever looked in my
face when I was not a Christian, trying to serve God and set it a good example.
Did you ever look at yourself as a mother? Of all beings that earth claims its
blessings from, it looks as though a mother ought to be the best. Mother, what
is your life before your children? Consider yourself. Did you ever look at your
children till you saw them? Wife, did you ever look at your husband till you saw
him? Husband, did you ever look at your wife until you saw her? If there is
anybody in the world I would have get to Heaven, it is my wife; and there is a
husband who never talked ten minutes to his wife on religion; and there is a
wife who never opened her mouth to her husband about the way of life. Oh, me!
when we think of a home that has been Christless, what a sad thing! And then we
ask you again, did you ever look at St Louis until you saw it? Did you ever take
it by streets and blocks? Did you ever count the bar-rooms in this town? Did you
ever count the beer gardens in this town? Did you ever count the number of men
that went in and out of the bar-rooms and beer gardens? I bring this question
square before you. Did you ever count the number of soiled doves that curse this
city and curse themselves? Oh, my God, when we look at these pictures we have to
shut our eyes and drop down upon our knees. We say, "God deliver us and God
speed us." Did you ever count the billiard tables in this town? Did you ever
count the gambling hells in this town? Oh, me! No wonder this one writes and
that one writes, "Jones, God bless you! turn loose your guns and do your best to
wake up the Christian people and show them how this town by streets and blocks
is drifting to Hell every day."

Now, I am going to stick to truth while I am here, and I say to every man and to
every influence in this town unfriendly to Christ and unfriendly to the Bible to
fight back. I do not look for anything else. I want to say right now that I like
to see things moving up, and if you can say anything worse of me than I can of
you, lamn [sic] in, and I will beat you to the tank in that line, maybe. Pick
every flaw you can in every sermon, and if I can not pick more flaws in your
life than you do in my sermons I will yield the feather to you. I say to you now
we propose to get your eyes open so that you can see yourselves. That is the
first sight you ought to look at. Then look at St Paul. When he went to the city
of Athens so wholly given up to idolatry it stirred his heart within him. I have
heard Christian people say that they had no feeling, no enthusiasm, no religious
fervor, but never since I joined Christ’s church have I been devoid of religious
fervor and enthusiasm. The man who goes about like a corpse, with no feeling
enthusiasm, that man is either dead to all intents and purposes, or he has
closed his eyes to what is going on about him. When that great man visited the
city of Athens, so wholly given up to idolatry, it stirred his heart within him.
And he went over to Mars Hill, pointed to the inscription "To the Unknown God"
and preached that grand sermon generated in his soul as he walked through the
streets of the city and saw that it was wholly given up to idolatry; and I tell
you tonight when we see ourselves and our city and our surroundings as they are,
there is hope for us.

There is just one thing more I want you to do -- that is, to see the cross. It
is the hope of the world. It is the Balm of Gilead. It has the power to save. It
is the redemption of the race. Oh, my brother, fourteen years ago and a few days
I, a poor, wretched, ruined, lost sinner, walked up to see my father die. Oh,
how I loved that father, and how I broke his heart I have wished a thousand
times that I had my father back just one hour that I might lean my head on his
bosom and hear him speak the words of kindness and advice he has spoken to me in
the past As I stood by his dying couch he took my hand in his bony hand, and a
heavenly smile rested on his face just before he passed out of this world. He
did not die; he did not die. His faculties were as bright and his hope as
buoyant in the very agonies of death as they ever had been. As I took his bony
hand he said: "My poor, wayward Godless boy! You have almost broken my heart,
and you have given me so much trouble! Won’t you tell your dying father, now,
that you will meet him in the good world?" I stood there for a moment convulsed
from head to foot. I said, "Yes, father, I will meet you in the good world" I
turned away from that dying couch, and every step I have made from that time to
this has been to the good world. And I mean, with the grace of God, to keep my
promise. I left that bed a wretched sinner, and looked to God. I looked up there
and -- I saw one hanging on the tree In agonies of blood.

He fixed his languid eyes on me, As near his cross I stood.

Sure, never, to my latest breath Can I forget that look;

He seemed to charge me with his death, Though not a word he spoke. My conscience
felt and owned the guilt And plunged me in despair;

I saw my sins his blood had spilled And helped to nail him there. A second look
he gave, which said:

"I freely all forgive, My blood is shed to ransom thee, I die that you may
live."

Blessed Christ, live forever to save dying men.


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  CHAPTER 12: 12. THE VIRTUE OF HONESTY
========================================================================

The Virtue of Honesty

"For the grace of God, that bringeth salvation, hath appeared unto all men,
teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly,
righteously and godly in this present world." (Titus 2:12)

Last night we selected this text in the second chapter of St. Paul to Titus.
"For the grace of God, that bringeth salvation, hath appeared unto all men,
teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly,
righteously and godly in this present world."

I announced last night we would take up the discussion of that text again
tonight. I think we left off at this point about the grace of God teaching us,
and how it is necessary that we should be taught. The honor of Christ and the
salvation of our own souls depend largely upon our holding and practising proper
views of the Scripture. Ignorance is a sort of heterogeneous compound that God
nor man can do much with. The fact is, we must know something before we are
capacitated to do something, and all intelligent action is based on intelligent
thought, and there can be no intelligent thought unless, perhaps, we know some
things. The man who really knows one thing well is on the road to know a great
many things, and the trouble, perhaps, with a large mass of humanity is they
have never known one thing well.

"And the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared unto all men
teaching us --" instructing us, qualifying us. Teaching us what?

"That denying ungodliness and worldly lusts we should live soberly, righteously
and godly in this present world." In plain English, teaching us, "cease to do
evil; learn to do well." Conversion is a very common term in the church and in
the pulpit. Sometimes we use it in a very vague sense. Conversion, scripturally,
means simply two thing:1) "I have quit the wrong." 2) "I have taken hold of the
right." No man is scripturally converted until he throws down the wrong and
walks off from the wrong, and walks up to the right and espouses the cause of
the right. Religion is a two-fold principle, or rather it is a principle that
enables a man to discern the right and to do the right, to discern the wrong and
to make him hate the wrong. There are two elements in every pious life:1)
Negative goodness. 2) Positive righteousness.

Negative goodness is not religion. If negative goodness was religion, then one
of these lamp-posts out here would be the best Christian in town; it never
cursed, nor swore, nor drank a drop since it was made; it never did anything
wrong. If negative goodness is religion, then a stock, or stone, or mountain,
would be the best specimen of Christian this world has. Negative goodness is,
perhaps, one of the halves of religion; but genuine religion, Christly religion,
means not only that a man is negatively good, but that he is positively
righteous. There is no power in a negative position, or in being negative.
Christ Jesus saw this when he told his preachers to go forth and affirm and
preach the gospel, not go to denying the denials of infidelity. I never uttered
a sentence in my life to prove that the Bible was true. I never spent five
minutes in my life trying to prove there was a hell. I never spent fifteen
seconds in the pulpit in my life trying to prove there is a God. Nobody but a
fool needs such argument. A man told me once, "I don’t believe there is a God. I
don’t believe I am anything but mortal." Said I, "If I was you I would get me a
little more hair and a tail and be a sure enough dog." I believe I would.

There is, as I said, no power in a negative force, and none in a negative
position of any sort. We are not sent forth to deny anything that anybody says,
but we are sent forth to affirm something. An aggressive Christianity is always
affirmative. I am sorry for the preacher that has backslidden far enough to try
to prove in his sermon that there is a God. I am sorry for the preacher that has
got so low down in his theology that he is trying to establish the fact that
there is a hell sure enough. I know of men trying to establish the fact that
there is no hell. A gentleman said to me the other day that the fact was nearly
established. I said to him, "When did you start your exploring party down there,
and when will they return to report?" He said he hadn’t started anybody and he
wasn’t looking for them to return. Said I, "How are you going to prove anything,
then?" And I want to tell you this much: The assertions of the word of God on
all these questions stand unshaken today, and a little child of three years old
in this city knows just as much about Hell as any living scientist. I suppose
some of the dead ones know more about it There’s many a fellow that has written
hell out of his theology here, but he won’t be in hell fifteen seconds till he
will jump and say, "My Lord! What a mistake I made in my theology. There is one,
sure enough." Bob Ingersoll was speaking on one occasion -- I have got a good
deal of respect for Bob Ingersoll -- a great deal more respect than I have for a
great many members of the church in this town, a great deal. When Bob says he
don’t believe the Bible and don’t pay any attention to its precepts, they say
they believe it, but do just like Bob, you see. I can’t stand that. And it isn’t
theoretical infidelity that is cursing this country; it is practical infidelity;
that’s the sort.

Well, Ingersoll was lecturing -- I believe it was in Milwaukee -- and in his
lecture he came to this assertion, and while he lectured there were standing up
in the corner of the platform three or four drunken men, standing there talking
in an undertone. That crowd felt like they ought to take the amen corners on
Bob; and all I want to know about any fellow is who takes the amen corners on
him; and when you find Bob preaching you will find the amen corners filled with
old red nosed drunkards and other vagabonds of the town; they have rushed up and
taken the amen corners on him. And while Bob was lecturing, when he reached the
assertion, "There is no hell, and I can prove it to any reasonable man," he got
the attention at that word, of course. They were interested at this point , and
one of them straightened himself up, and staggered up to Bob and put his hand on
his shoulder, and said,"Can you, Bob?" He said, "Yes, I can." "Well," the fellow
says, "do it, Bob, and make it mighty strong, for," he says, "I tell you that
nine tenths of us poor fellows in Milwaukee are depending on how you make that
thing." So we say we never need try to prove anything that the Bible asserts. We
are to preach the word to the people and the Bible will take care of itself. The
Bible was the guide of my mother. It was the stay of my father’s life; it was a
lamp unto his feet and a light unto his path, and he bequeathed it to me as his
richest gift to his wayward boy, and I say to you tonight: take all other things
from me and my home, but leave me my Bible. The precious book I’d rather have
Than all the golden gems That o’er in monarchs’ coffers shone Or on their
diadems. And were the seas one chrysolite, This earth a golden ball, And gems
were all the stars of night, This book were worth them all.

Ah, no, the soul ne’er found relief In glittering hoards of wealth;

Gems dazzle not the eye of grief;

Gold can not purchase health. But here’s a blessed balm For every human woe, And
they that seek that book in tears, Their tears shall cease to flow.

Bless God for the Bible, which is the guide of my life and the inspiration of my
soul.

We said a moment ago that its positive and negative features -- these two
combined -- give it force and power -- give Christian life force and power.
There is no power in electricity until you bring the two forces, positive and
negative, together. You see that negative electricity gathering about the trunk
of this old oak tree? That tree has withstood a thousand storms, and now we see
this negative electricity climbing up its body and settling in its foliage; and
now the positive electricity passes over it in the cloud, and negative strikes
positive, and the two forces come together in the top of this old oak tree, and
it comes with a crash and splits that oak tree from its topmost twig to the last
bottom of its roots. There’s power. There’s omnipotence. And so in the life of
every good man who is negatively good and positively righteous look at George
Whitefield with his whole nature surcharged with negative goodness and his life
full of positive righteousness. We see him going out to the moorfields of London
at 3 and 4 o’clock in the morning with 10,000 lanterns blazing all around him.
George Whitefield preaches the gospel, and before daylight and sun-up he has a
thousand penitents and a thousand converts and does more before breakfast in the
morning than all the pulpits in London did the year round. That looks like
business.

Negative goodness! The Lord knows I have a contempt for the good-goody members
of the Church. Old Brother Goody-Goody and Old Sister Goody-Goody just
goody-goody and so good they are good for nothing. Haven’t you seen ’em?

I believe in doing good. I like goodness. I despise every wicked act that a man
can do. But I tell you this: I have had members, as a pastor, who would work and
do their level best, and every three or four months they would get drunk in
spite of everything I could do. When they were sober, they went up to their eyes
in religion and in work and righteousness, and I tell you I hate this thing you
call drunkenness, and no man hates it more than I do, but I had rather have a
member of the Church who would get drunk every three or four months, but would
work when he is sober and do his level best, than one of these sober fellows
that ain’t any account anyhow, that might just as well be drunk or just as well
be dead. God pity these lazy, shiftless kind of fellows. All they want in God’s
world is somewhere to sit down and somewhere to spit. Spitting room is a big
thing with lazy men. Now recollect, if anybody says they don’t believe in
laughing in church that you are in a music hall tonight. You can just cut your
patching on that line. There ain’t any harm in laughing here.

Teaching that we must quit the wrong --

"That denying ungodliness worldly lusts we must live soberly, righteously and
godly in this present world" -- teaching me this fact, and the first lesson
Christ ever taught man here was this: "You are a sinner; you are a wrongdoer;
you ought to cease to do evil." And I will say right here at this point, I could
never lay any claim to the salvation of Jesus Christ until I bundled all my sins
up in one common bundle and threw them all down and walked over the river of
Resolution, and then turned round and set fire to the bridge and stood and
watched till the last expiring spark dropped into the water; and then I turned
my back on sin and said "I am in now for the conversion or nothing," and I
hadn’t got fifteen steps from the bank of that river till I was in the arms of
God, a saved man , and I say to you tonight -- you men of the Church who say, "I
can’t live without sin," that no man ever found God and no man was ever
converted until he quit his sins. That’s all there is about it. When I stand up
and preach against sin and sinners, the Church hollers, "’Lay on MacDuff.’ Give
it to him. He ought to have it." But when I preach at the Church and say, "You
men who profess to be Christians, you are living in sin"’ they say, "Oh, he’s
one of these sanctificationists, and he’s putting on airs." You want me to give
it to these old sinners, but let you alone.

Ah, me! brother! If God Almighty expects these sinners to quit sin, what does he
expect of you who profess love him, who profess to be Christians? That’s the way
to talk it.

Cease to do evil and learn to do well. I want to say here in my place tonight
that I profess to know a few things along this line, and propose to say them to
that member of the Church that dances and attends theaters and plays progressive
euchre -- and that’s the best named game I ever heard -- progressive euchre!
Progressive euchre doublequick to Hell right along. And I say another thing.
There is no progressive euchre player in this house that ought not to be
indicted for violating the laws of Missouri and be put in one of the jails of
this county. How do you like that? It is just gambling scientifically,
magnificently, gloriously, sociality, and so forth. That’s what it is. And I’ll
tell you, in our State we can indict a man and put him in the penitentiary for
playing progressive euchre with his neighbors, any time, and I want to see the
day come when if Christians haven’t got faith enough in the Lord Jesus Christ
and their profession to bind them to decency and right that the law will help us
to make our members decent. I do. I do sure. And the man who is running these
things, I’ll tell you the truth, brethren, that man never was converted; that
man never has repented; that man is still in the bonds of iniquity and the gall
of bitterness. You ask me why? Well, I got religion fourteen years ago last
August -- I was right sure there -- and if it did not knock that card-playing,
theater-going system out of me right there! And I never got a symptom of it
since; and whenever the day comes in my religious experience when I want to play
cards, and when I want to drink whisky, and when I want to attend theaters, I
want to drop down on my knees and tell the Lord, "My religion is played out,
sure. I never felt this symptom since I was converted, and now, Lord, like most
Methodists, my religion has left me and give it back to me again." That’s the
way I talk , and all I can say of you Presbyterians and Christians and Baptists
that are not on that line is, you never had any, because you can’t lose yours,
you know. . When our members go to the devil we say "they have lost their
religion," and when your members go to the devil you say "they never had any."
Well, it don’t make any difference which way it is, the devil has got them sure.

"Teaching us that we must cease to do evil and learn to do well." This is the
Christian truth that teaches me that I must deny ungodliness and worldly lust,
and I must live soberly as to myself, righteously toward my neighbor, godly
toward Him unto whom I owe so much.

Now, here are three positive attitudes of the Christian. He is a sober-minded
man in his relations toward all the world around him. I like one of these
sober-minded men that takes a particular view of everything, and goes for the
long run all the time, and cares nothing for counting the present results, but
is looking to the great long run. I like one of these sober-minded men. He is
the same every day, and the same under all circumstances and the same
everywhere; he is just as good in New York as he is in St. Louis.

There is many a fellow that is a good Christian in St. Louis, but if he were to
wear an indicator when he went New York, when he got back his wife would quit
him, in my candid judgment. He is just as sober and pious here in church and in
this community as he can be, but let him go on a fishing trip, and he’ll carry a
quart of liquor for every day he’s going to be out. I like a religion that keeps
me as good off of my knees as I am on my knees; just as good on the outside as I
am on the inside; just as good in New York as I am at home; just as good
anywhere and everywhere and forever, as my promises and my vows demand I should
be. I like that sort of Christianity -- sober-minded sort that regulates all my
life. I like that. This dead-level sort, this straightforward sort; I like that
sort of a Christian.

Sober-mindedness. That’s the regulating force of every good man’s life, that
makes him step along in an even, smooth way toward the good world. Some people
think Heaven is away off yonder, and some think Hell is away down yonder, but I
want to you that Heaven is on a dead-level with every good man’s heart, and I
want to tell you the way to Heaven is dead-level. Christ dug down the mountains,
and filled up the valleys, and the way to Heaven is a dead-level, and the way to
Hell is a dead-level, and there is only one road in the moral universe, and one
end of that road is Hell, and the other end of the road is Heaven, and it don’t
matter who you are, but which way are you going? Don’t you see? Soberly,
righteously, a sober-minded man.

You look at that stationary engine out yonder at the sawmill. You see little
governors playing around over the steam-chest, and you see there that saw as it
runs into that large log -- that sixty-two inch circular saw runs right into the
log, and the little governors let down, and additional steam is thrown against
the piston-head, and I see that saw wade right along through the log, and run
out at the other end, and the little governors lift up, and let off the steam,
and the ssw runs at the same revolution to the minute, whether it is in or out.
There is the Christian man, like Job. Oh, my, he was a sober-minded man. In
prosperity, and when adversity came, and the last dollar was swept away from
him, Job run in and out that log, and he was running the same revolutions to the
minute when he run into infirmity and disease and pain, and as he run right
through and came out, running the same revolution to the minute, and he said "I
will trust him though he slay me," and when they placed the charge against his
character that he had sinned and done wrong, he went right along through that,
and came out on the other side, and the Lord God said to him: "Job, take my arm,
and walk with me, and I will make your latter days more prosperous than your
former days." I like a sober-minded man -- a man who will do the same thing all
the time; not one of those men who will do some thing during the revival
meeting, and who don’t recollect that he did anything out of the revival, and
one day he will shake your hands and another day he will hardly know you when he
meets you on the street. I don’t like one of those persimmon-headed sort of
fellows: I want a fellow who knows you when he meets you, everywhere, and will
do the same thing everywhere, and under all circumstances.

Sober-minded! A Christian man ought to be so minded, and rest on this one
promise -- all things are given for good to them that love God -- sober-minded
as to ourselves and righteous toward our neighbors.

I will tell you if there is anything the religion demands a man, it is that he
be downright honest. Honesty! As somebody said, "An honest man is the noblest
work of God," and that is the grandest utterance outside the lid of the Bible.

"An honest man is the noblest work of God." And when I say an honest man, I
don’t mean a man simply that pays his debts -- some of us ain’t honest enough to
do that. But I have known men that would walk across town to pay a nickel that
they owed, and I never saw a man that would do that, that I would not hide my
pocket book from at night. One of those fellows that are so scrupulous he is
fixing things to cheat somebody. I am not talking about that class.

I’ll tell you what this world needs right now. It needs a larger course of
downright honesty; that’s it. I will tell you what, the Church of God will never
take this world until we get honest. There are too many men in the Church
boarding with their wives -- there are that -- agents for their wives. I want to
die the day before my wife appoints me her agent. Do you hear that? A man in the
Church of God and a prominent character, and that man living in a $30,000 house,
and riding around in a $1,200 turnout, and the poor widow woman whose money he
has is walking these streets with scarcely bread to eat. And if there is a Hell
at all, that man will go there as certain as God is just.

Honesty! We want in this country men in the Church of God who will do what they
say they will do. That’s it. Why sir, a man’s Methodism ain’t worth anything him
in this country, and a man’s Baptism and his Presbyterianism ain’t worth
anything to him. You go down to a store tomorrow and want a thousand dollars’
worth of goods on credit, and the fellow says, "Can you give me any security?"
"No; I am a Methodist." "You can’t run that thing on me here."* And let a
Baptist go down there and say, "I’m a Baptist, and I want credit."* "If you will
come in here and let me show you how these Baptists have gouged me, you would
not play yourself as a Baptist." And so with every denomination. And I tell you
here tonight, the Church of God will never do the work He wants her to do until
she is honest -- honest toward God and honest toward man. I want to see the day
come when all the churches in the world will have the character in commercial
life that the old Hardshell Church has in Georgia. Down in Athens, Ga. an old
Hardshell walked in one day to a store, and said to the merchant: "I want a
couple of hundred dollars’ worth of goods this year on credit." The merchant
looked at his old hat and jean pants, and he concluded that was not the sort of
a man to trust, and he told him he would not give him the goods. The fellow
turned and walked out, and the merchant asked a clerk in the store: "Who is that
man?" "That’s Mr. So-and-So; he belongs to the Hardshell Church up here." The
merchant went out after him and said: "Friend, come back here. Are you a
Hardshell?" He said, "Yes." "Well," said the merchant, "you can have all you
want; you can have all I have here in this store on credit for as long time as
you need." And down in Georgia the Hardshells will turn a member out of church
for taking the homestead exemption or going into bankruptcy just as quick as
they would for stealing -- they will that.

Honesty! I like that. We have collecting laws all over this country, and we have
ruined our people; we have made our people dishonest by our laws -- that is the
truth about it. Our people are made dishonest by our laws. Our law, our
Congress, our Legislature, fixes it so that a man can, by a turn of
technicalities in law, just wipe out all his debts, and he can compromise with
his creditors.

Out in Waco, Tex, last year, there was a merchant there thrown into bankruptcy,
and he compromised his debts at a hundred cents in the dollar -- just think
about that -- and paid it, every bit. He compromised his debts at a hundred
cents in the dollar! He was a fool, wasn’t he? He was a fool. They say in one
heathen country they make every holiday a day for a general hand shaking among
all enemies, and every fellow pays every dollar he owes in the world. That’s a
grand holiday ain’t it? They are heathens, though, ain’t they? They must be
heathens if they do that way. Make friends with all my enemies, and pay every
dollar I owe every holiday! Nobody but a heathen would do that, would they?
Righteously do the right thing; do the right thing. And I want to say about it,
that those bankrupt and homestead laws have been the curse of this country in
all ages of it. I want to see the day come -- and I beg your pardon for the
expression -- I want to see, the day come when you can sell a man’s shirt off of
his back to pay his debts. I’d rather die than to be in debt, and have things
that other people ought to have. That’s the way I look at it.

You say, "Yes, you are talking mighty big." Yea, and I have talked little, too,
I want you to understand that. The devil bankrupted me for both worlds, and when
God converted my soul and I was called into the ministry, I was hundreds of
dollars in debt, and I know how a man feels; I know how it cows a man; and I
know how I have gone up with $2.50 at a time to pay a debt and my wife had one
dress and I had one suit, and we were living at starvation rates, and my wife
doing her own ironing and her own nursing, and I splitting the wood and working
and saving every nickel I could to pay my debts, and in spite of that I have
heard of fellows saying: "If that fellow Jones would pay his debts I could have
more confidence in him," and if they had put their ears to this side (placing
his hand on his head) they could hear the blood drip! drip! I paid every cent,
thank God! a hundred cents on the dollar, and I was just as good a man after I
paid as I was before. And thank God that a poor man can be an honest man! Thank
God that is true.

I’ll tell you the sort I find in my Bible -- where Obadiah borrowed $500 from
Ahab and died before the money was due. After his death Ahab sued the widow for
the debt, and levied on her and her two children for the money. They could levy
on children in those days, and they were to be sold in this case to pay the
debt. The mother was in distress, and she hunted up -- I had almost said a
lawyer, but she never went within a mile of one, God bless you. She hunted up
the best old prophet of God on the face of the earth. She stated her case to him
and said: "My husband died owing this money and they have levied on my two
children to pay this debt. What must I do?" The old prophet looked at her and
said: "What have you in your house?" The poor woman replied, trembling: "Nothing
but a pot of oil, and that is to embalm our bodies with." The prophet never said
a word about the homestead, but he said: "You go and sell that oil and pay that
debt." She went home and borrowed vessels and drew enough oil out of the pot to
pay the old debt, and she had more oil left afterwards than when she commenced
to draw it. That was God Almighty standing by an honest woman, don’t you see? I
have seen it repeated again and again, and I tell you that God Almighty will
take care of honest men, if he has to put the angels on half rations for twelve
months. I was once appointed to certain work in a certain county in a Georgia
circuit. The year before the whole country was blighted with drouth. The people
had not made a bale of cotton to twenty acres, when they ought to have made a
bale to every two acres. Corn was not a paying crop, and merchants were pressing
their Claims. I commenced preaching righteousness. I said, "I know your soil has
been parched by the drought, I know your crops are failures, I know that you are
poor, but," I continued, "listen at me. If the sheriff comes on you and takes
your house and your stock, and your all, let him take them, and then walk out
with your wife and children, bareheaded and barefooted, so that you can say, ’we
are homeless and breadless, but my integrity is as unstained as the character of
God.’ " Oh, for an unstained character! That is what we want in this country. An
honest man. I tell you there are too many men in this country who have widows’
and orphans’ legacies in their pockets, and I am sorry to say, too many of that
sort have broken into the churches of this country, and every dollar of that
money that you keep in your pocket as a preacher, and in your treasury as a
church, the devil will make you pay it back with compound interest. He well
knows that that is his money, and he does not loan his money without interest,
and big interest at that.

Righteously. Righteous men. I like righteous men. Tom Moore, the poet, was
righteous in this sense. They asked him on his dying pillow, "Are there any of
your manuscripts that you have changed or altered?" He said "No; I never wrote a
line in my life that I would now wipe out with my little finger." You are a
merchant Can you say on your dying pillow, "I never performed a deed I would now
wipe out with my little finger?" Samuel, the prophet, was a righteous man, and
when he walked out to his burial place, all Israel gathered around him, and the
clear voice of the old prophet rang out and he asked these questions: "Whom have
I cheated?" "Whom have I defrauded?" "Of whom have I received a bribe of money
to blind my eyes?" And all Israel echoed back, "No one." Oh, that was a grand
victory. But brethren, the man who does not recognize his obligations to God is
but half a man at best I have my relations toward my family, and my relations
toward my country, and my relations toward my God. I will meet the demands of my
children and my home. I will meet the demands of my country. I will meet the
demands of the God that made me and them. I am good for all worlds. A godly man
is one that does everything with reference to the great eye of God that is
looking down upon him; a man that is godly in his life and character, and that
does right toward the God that made him. Where do we find examples of godly men?
St. Paul, the author of this text, was a godly man. He lived for God, and
counted all things as lost that he might please God. In his dying moments he sat
in his dark dungeon and wrote in his last letter to Timothy:

"The time of my departure is at hand."

Oh, what a thought! St. Paul meant to say to him: "I shall have a cold supper
tonight and a cold breakfast in the morning; I shall sleep on a hard bed
tonight, but I shall take dinner in Heaven tomorrow with God and the angels." He
talked about his departure as a school boy talks of leaving school for home, and
when his head was severed from his body God stooped down, picked up that bloody
head and placed a crown of everlasting life upon it. He was a godly man and God
will take care of that sort of man, living or dying.

Just such a man as this died in our State some months ago, and when his large
family of Christian boys and girls stood around him, he struggled for breath in
the last extremities of life. Just as his moments were drawing to a close he
seemed restless and wanted to speak. His children’s attention was attracted by
his looks and they said, "Father, is there any request you wish to make? If so
tell us what it is." He caught his breath and said, "Bring -- " but breaking
down he could not utter another word. His children gathered close around him and
said, "Oh father, do not die without telling us what you want." Again he said,
"Bring -- " and could not utter another word. The children bent over him and
said, "Father, do not die without telling us what you want." Presently his
system relaxed in death, and his lips moved freely as he said:

"Bring forth the royal diadem, And crown Him Lord of all."

Then the soul swept out of his body and he never breathed another breath. God
help us to live righteously soberly and godly in this world, and to look forward
with blessed hope to the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior,
Jesus Christ. At times within the past ten years I have thought of going back to
the practice of law and of accumulating a fortune, that my family might be
provided for, and of preaching the gospel in after life; but with the blessed
hope of God before me I continued right on. My eyes were on something better,
grander and nobler. When kind friends in Nashville said: "Here is a $10,000 home
and thousands in bonds if you will make your home in our midst," I replied: "No,
in our own quiet little cottage my wife and children and myself love God and are
striving to get to Heaven. Excuse me, I love you just as much as if I accepted
it" Then my wife said to me, "Husband, I am prouder of you for that than for any
act in your history." And I want to say to this congregation that I am getting
higher and higher. I sympathize a good deal with the eaglet caged up yonder. Now
a kind friend, pitying its drooping condition, opens the cage door and lets it
out. I see it leave its cage and turn its eye to the sun and to the
mountain-tops. Its ruffled feathers begin to smooth down and it raises its wings
and shakes them for a moment. I see it fly up into the air and poise itself on
its wings. It looks back toward the cage and utters a scream, as much as to say,
"Farewell cage; farewell imprisonment and weary hours!" I see it fly higher and
higher, until at last it poises on its wings just in sight and I hear it scream
again. It seems to say. "Farewell earth and imprisonment and cage and dreary
days." Higher and higher it goes, poises itself, flies off and alights on the
mountain top, free as air. Brethren, the soul of man, that has been ruffled by
ten thousand cares, some of these days will look toward that blessed hope of
God, plume its wings and fly upward. And the higher we go, earth shall hear our
voices, growing the fainter, saying, Farewell cares, imprisonment and earth!"
Higher and higher we shall go until at last we fly off in a bee-line for the
other world. We shall go up until there is nothing in the way. That is what a
bee-line means. The bee, after passing from flower to flower and filling its
little honey cell, begins to circle up and up and up, until it gets above the
highest tree top. Then it strikes a bee-line for its home. Brethren, let us get
above worldly care and sin and temptation, and let us strike a bee-line for that
home beyond where sin and suffering are felt no more. May God bless you all, and
may you ponder over these words in the spirit in which they have been uttered.
If you do not like anything that has been said, and if you come and apologize, I
will forgive you, for I never bear malice to anybody in this world.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 13: 13. IT PAYS TO BE RIGHTEOUS
========================================================================

It Pays to be Righteous "The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is
eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." (Romans 6:23)

We invite your attention tonight to the last clause of the tenth verse of the
second chapter of the Gospel by St John Really the text is this:

"The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus
Christ our Lord." But we take this text tonight because it is illustrative of
the principle we want to discuss: "But thou hast kept the good wine until now."

I want to say to you before I proceed that I feel less like preaching tonight
and more like talking. I feel like I wanted to talk to each man and woman just
as if we were sitting in our parlor or sitting in your family room face to face.
Let us talk about this, and you talk back at me with your mind and let us see
where we will get to tonight in this discussion.

There are two questions that always come up naturally and legitimately, and, you
might say, inevitably, between employer and employee. There can be no such thing
as a contract for labor without the asking and answering of two questions. Now,
if you seek to employ a man for a day or a year or an hour, the first natural
and inevitable question on his part will be: What kind of work do you want me to
do? And when this question is satisfactorily answered, there is another just as
inevitable and natural, and that is: What will you pay me for it? We say these
two questions are at the very basis of all contracts for labor. There can be no
intelligent agreement without, the question, 1) What kind of work do you want me
to do? and, 2) What will you pay me for it?

Now, there are persons here tonight who may boast of the fact: "I never was in
the employment of any one; I never sustained the relationship of a hired
servant." They boast of the fact that they live under the freest government the
world ever saw, whose very constitution guarantees to every man his life, and
his liberty and his property. And yet there is a very special sense in which we
are all servants, and there is a very special sense in which we are employed,
and there is an awful sense in which payday is coming.

Now, whose servant am I? In a spiritual sense every man is a servant. He has his
master and his employment and payday is coming to him. Now, whose servant am I?
We may settle that very easily and in a very short time. Our Savior said:

"To whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servant ye are, whether of
sin unto death or obedience unto righteousness."

He said again:

"No man can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other,
or else he will despise the one and cling to the other."

He said something a little stronger than that:

"He that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad." The dividing line is so
narrow that no man can stand on that line. I am either on one side or the other.
There are a great many men here tonight, though, that will tell you, you go to
them with a question like this:

"Are you a bad man?"

"No, sir."

"Are you a good man?

"No, sir."

Neither good nor bad. There are a great many of this sort in the world. Really,
they are in the majority. Well, now let me tell you. There are two characters in
every community that ever I have been in, that are a puzzle to half the
community. One character is that member of the church that will pray in public
and pray in his family, and do anything the church wants him to do, and pay
liberally but he don’t treat his fellow-man right; won’t pay his debts won’t
live right toward his fellow-man. He seems to do everything that God wants him
to do and to do right toward God, but he don’t treat his neighbor right. Well,
now, here’s the other one, standing right by his side. He’s a just man and pays
his debts; he is generous to the poor; he seems to be, all in all, a good
citizen. Well, now, there the two stand, and the balance of the community, a
large proportion of the community, stand and look at these two characters, and
say: "Well, I’d rather be that man out of the church, that’s just and generous
and pays his debts, than to be that man in the church that mistreats his
neighbors." Well, why do you want to be a fool and be like either one? I don’t I
assure you, and by the grace of God I don’t intend to be like either one. I am
going to do right toward God, and I’m going to do right toward man, and there’s
the whole man.

"And this is the first and greatest of the commandments. Thou shalt serve God
with all thy heart and mind and strength. And ths other is like unto it: Thou
shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." And no man who is an enemy to his neighbor
is a true friend to God. And no man who is an enemy of God can be a true friend
to his neighbor. A half man! A half man! He will do right toward his neighbor.
He won’t do right toward God. He will do right toward God, but won’t do right
toward his neighbor. Now, my friend, I say, in all love and kindness, if you are
of these, I don’t want to be like you, I don’t care which character you
represent God helping me, I want to do right toward God, and I want to do right
toward my fellow-men. And after all, these men, neither good nor bad, you ask
then: "Will you go to Heaven if you die?" "No, sir; I hardly think I will." "Go
to Hell?" "No, sir; don’t think I’ll go to Hell." And your sort will necessitate
some sort of third universe or world in eternity. You are not fit for Heaven;
you admit it, and you are hardly bad enough to go to Hell. And here you are, and
you have been to God and to this community, all your life, in just such an
attitude as that.

Brother, let me say this to you, you are on one side or the other. I recollect
once at a county camp-meeting a gentleman approached me and he said:

"I’m mighty glad to see this grand work going on here. I hope this whole
community will be saved."

"Well," says I, "thank you, brother. What church do you belong to?"

He said: "I don’t belong to the church, but," he says, "I’m a Christian."

I said: "You a Christian and not belong to any church! Why, you are the man I’ve
been looking for, too, these many year"’. I’ve offered a reward -- a large
reward -- for one of your sort Christians are sort of scarce in the church, and
the Lord knows I didn’t know there was one out of the church. I’m gone lost,
now. I’ve found an anomaly in the moral universe of God -- a Christian out of
the church!" And I said to him: "I am mighty glad to meet you, sir. Now," said
I, "this afternoon when I call up the penitents, I want to call on you to pray
them."

"Oh, no!" he says, "I can’t pray in public"

Says I, "Why?"

Said he, "Because I’m not a member of the church."

"Well," said I, "when the service is over this afternoon, take one of the boys
-- one of the penitent out from the altar -- and go out into the woods and pray
with him."

"Oh, no!" he says, "I can’t do that."

"Why?" said I "Because I am not a member of the church, Mr. Jones."

"Well," said I, "can’t you just take one of the boys by the arm and take him off
out into the woods and talk with him about Christ?"

"No!" he said, "my trouble is, I’m not a member of the church."

"No, sir," said I, " That ain’t your trouble. Your trouble is, you belong to the
devil from your hat to your heels! That’s your trouble."

"He that is not with me is against me."

"He that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad."

There is no neutral ground, sir. Every Christian man has his banner and his
weapon, and he is out in the front ranks, and he is fighting for Christ and for
his cause. Now, whose servant am I?

"To whom ye yield yourselves servant, to obey, his servants ye are."

Well, now, let’s settle this question, each one for himself. The Lord Jesus
Christ said this:

"If ye love me, keep my commandments."

"Do you do that?"

"No, sir."

He said again:

"Come out from among them and be ye separate."

"Have you done that?"

"No, sir."

"Deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me."

"Have you done that?"

"No, sir."

Well, that settles the question beyond all cavil that you are not a servant of
the Lord God, and then, if you are not a servant of the Lord God Almighty, there
is but one alternative you have: You are a servant of the devil. Every man that
walks this earth is a loving, willing, cheerful servant of God, or he is a
servant of the devil -- one or the other.

Now, will you slip up to your master, the devil, and ask him what kind of work
he wants you to do? Ah me! That seems like a foolish proposition! What kind of
work does the devil want his servants to do? He wants them to profane the name
of God; to violate the Sabbath; to bear false witness; to do a thousand things
that we are guilty of every day. He wants me to do those things that will make
my wife think less of me and make my children think less of me and make my
parents think less of me. He wants me to do those things that are disreputable
and that dishonor God and that will doom my soul forever. Isn’t that so? I can
prove it by fifty thousand sinners in St. Louis that that is true.

Then, if I must do such disreputable work as this, and must engage in such
disreputable employment as that, what is the wages? Woe and misery and anguish
on earth and damnation in the end. Is that so? Well, there are thousands of
sinners living and thousands in eternity tonight that are living witnesses to
the truth that the devil would ruin them upon earth and degrade them in time and
damn them in eternity. Payday is coming. It has come to millions. It is now
coming to thousands.

What’s the wages?

Preaching once in my own church on a line of thought like this, I turned to an
old gray-headed sinner sitting over to my left. Said I: "There you are, after
sixty odd years of age, and I wish you would get up and tell this congregation
your wages for sixty-five years of sinful bondage." The old man twisted and
turned in his pew, and next day he met me on the road and said he: "Oh, Jones,
when you put that question to me last night, if I had stood up and told the
plain truth it would have frightened many a soul last night. I can tell you,
sir, that for sixty-five years of sinful bondage, all I have to show for it in
the world is the most godless family in all this settlement, and a hard heart,
and a stiff neck, and a rebellious soul, and no assurance at all that I will
ever be saved."

Oh, sir, when a man of sixty-five years of age reaches a point where his stock
in trade is all things like that, it is enough to frighten a man who has not
gone farther than some of you boys. Then, if I be a servant of the Lord God
thank God he has many servants in the city -- the question comes up: What does
the Lord God want his servants to do? He wants me to love mercy and to do justly
and walk humbly before God. He wants me to bear the fruits of the spirit, which
are love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness and faith. He wants
me to work diligently and work righteousness and speak the truth in my heart. He
wants me to do those things that will make my wife think more of me, and that
will make my neighbor think more of me, and make my children think more of me.
He wants me to do those things that will honor me in time and elevate my soul
every day, and ultimately bring me to the saint’s everlasting rest, in a world
of bliss and peace.

Now, brother, if this is true, the Lord want us to serve him gladly and serve
him joyfully, and there is nothing that the Lord wants me to do that I won’t be
in doing it, a better merchant, a better farmer, a better lawyer, a better
doctor, a better mechanic, a better everything and anything, for religion is the
best thing on earth to mix with life, and there is nothing better in Heaven than
religion.

Now, there are some seemingly hard things we have to do for Christ, but I will
honor him that this declaration is true as earth and Heaven ever listened to.
Listen! I will honor my Savior with this fact: I have done some seemingly hard
things, but the hardest thing I ever did for Christ was the thing that made me
most like him after I got through with it. He that sweats and toils and suffers
for Christ shall have flagons of joy and rivers of pleasure for every tear and
pang he has ever had.

Now, if it is such delightful service that I am to render in the employ of my
God, what is the pay? What is the pay? Why, brother, he gives me enough cash to
live on every day, and when I get old and wrinkled and grayheaded and can not
work any longer, God comes down and picks me up in his loving arms and carries
me home to Heaven to live for ever and ever. Is that true? True as Heaven. Then
I stop and ask myself this question: If these things are, and this world knows
they are true, then what? Why is it that every man in the world is not a servant
of God? Why is it that there is a servant of the devil in the universe? If the
devil wants to employ me in disreputable service and degrading service, and it
is misery and anguish in time and damnation in eternity, and God gives me
delightful, joyous employment and helps me to build a character that will stand
the test of judgment, and finally sits me down on the streets of the paradise of
God a saved man -- if one is true and the other is true, why is it that there is
a servant of the devil in all this broad land? Now, let us see why.

"Thou ha kept the good wine until now." This text illustrates a principle in
this moral universe on both sides of the question. The devil’s economy is to
give the best he has got first and then it gets worse through all eternity. Now,
to illustrate -- and I ways could illustrate thing faster and perhaps better
than I could talk it.

Now, when I was a ten or twelve years old young boy, the devil took me up into a
large, capacious palace -- a magnificent structure it was, beautiful, glorious
in all its architectural beauty. He carried me into the palace and led me
around, and I looked upon and worshiped the pictures hanging around the walls,
and then I looked at the beautiful carpets on the floor; I looked at those
beautiful windows, with their lace curtains. I looked again, and there was a
table of pleasure, and a chair of ease, a sofa of contentment, and, oh, how many
thousand things in that palace charmed my heart. And then he said to me: "If you
will be my servant, all this is yours." And I surveyed those pictures, and those
beauties, and that elegant furniture, and that beautiful palace, inside and out,
and I said: Well, sir, I enter your service. If all this is mine, what do I care
for God and Heaven and everlasting life?" and I took possession. I remained in
there, joyfully, several days. But I walked out one day, and when I returned I
saw my chair of ease was gone, and, somehow or other, I never felt as easy in
there afterward as I did before. I returned another day and my sofa of
contentment was gone, and, somehow or other, I never felt contented in there
after that. I came back another day and my table of pleasure was gone, and some
how or other, the pleasures had departed with the table.

I came back another day and one of those beautiful windows had been removed and
a solid wall placed in its stead, and I said: "It is not quite as light in here
as it once was." I came back another day -- a beautiful picture was removed, and
how blank that wall looked! Another day, and another piece of furniture gone.
Back another day, and a window gone -- perceptibly darker. Another day and a
door had been removed, and I said: "There are not as many ways of ingress and
egress, now, as I once had." And on and on and on, until by and by the last
picture was gone, the last window had been removed, and, oh, how dark and gloomy
was my home! And again, and again, and the carpets were all taken up, and how
bare and cold that floor! And again, and again, and another door removed, until
the last door had been removed, except one, and the windows were removed and
everything gone, and, oh, how desolate! But fourteen years ago the latter part
of August last, I walked out of that palace to see my father die, and I promised
him I’d never go back any more.

I know a man that stayed there just a little longer than I did -- my friend he
was. He stayed there until the last piece of furniture was gone, and every
window removed, and the doors all taken out, and he said: "I can’t get out of
that large, capacious palace." The walls were coming together every day, every
hour, and on Thursday night, about one o’clock, as his wife stood by his
bedside, the walls of that palace crushed together, and he admitted with his
dying breath that "the wages of sin is death!" My God! how many souls in St.
Louis are encompassed in that palace tonight! How many in there, with doors all
removed and windows taken out! And they will realize some of these days, as the
walls crush together, that "the wages of sin is death." But how on the other
side? This is but a picture of life, brethren. Life! Why, I can remember the
first dram I ever drank. It made me feel manly. I thought, "Well, surely I have
found the elixir of life, the grand panacea for all sad feelings." But I drank,
and drank, until I despised myself and loathed, and loathed, and loathed my very
being, because I was a miserable drunkard. I recollect the first oath I ever
swore. I thought it sounded manly. But I cursed and swore until I was a
black-mouthed villain, and I despised myself when I walked into the presence of
a Christian gentleman. Oh, my congregation, tonight I tell you that sin has its
richest, sweetest ingredient at the top of the cup, but as you go down, and down
and down, the bitterest drink that a human being can swallow is the last dregs
of the sinner’s life. Oh, how painful! Some of you know that to be true. The
devil offers and gives the best first, and it gets worse and worse and worse
through all eternity! And there is not a sinner, twenty-five years old, in this
house, but what you will realize in eternity that you saw more real pleasure in
a life of sin up to twenty years of age, than all eternity had for you after
that time. When Lord Byron, who drank of every cup that earth could give him,
and who had all the ministers of earth to play around him at his bed, Lord Byron
with an intellectual and a physical nature that could dive down into deepest
depths and could soar into the highest, and whose wings when spread could touch
either pole -- and that poor man just before he died, sitting in his gay
company, was meditative and moody, and they looked at him and said: "Byron, what
are you thinking about so seriously?" "Oh," he said, "I was sitting here
counting up the number of happy days I had in this world." And they said: "How
many do you make it?" "Oh," he said, "I can count but eleven, and I was sitting
here now wondering if I would ever make up the dozen in this world of tears and
pangs and sorrows."

Oh, brother, he went to depths you know nothing of, and to heights you will
never reach. Let me say to you night, you are reaching the point like the great
prominent character in England who was sitting thinking in his study, and a
friend said: "What arc you thinking about?" He said: "I was sitting here looking
at my dog on the mat and wishing in my heart I were that dog lying there." Oh,
sir, there are depths to which humanity can go that we loathe ourselves and
despise ourselves, and yet the things promise mighty nice in the beginning. But
how about the other side of the picture? The first thing the Lord gives to a man
is the bitterest cup that he ever swallowed up to that hour -- the cup of
conviction -- repentance. Oh, me! when David took this cup in his hand and drank
it down he said:

"It is the wormwood and the gall." And he said:

"It makes my knees to smite together, and the pains of hell got hold upon me. I
found trouble and sorrow."

There is no experience in all the universe of God like the experience of the
soul in the deepest hour of its spiritual anguish. And this cup that God
presents -- the cup of conviction -- to the honest soul, oh, how it makes his
knees smite together, and what wormwood and gall it is! I can never forget the
hours in my life when I turned this world aloose and had no God to take my hand.
Oh, brother for nearly a week I was wading and wading through the deepest
trials. I had turned loose all my sins, and I could not find the hand of God. I
was reaching up, saying, "Father, take my hand! take my hand!" And on I went. I
felt like the veriest orphan in all the universe of God, and miserably I pressed
my way along, the most miserable man in the world. Thank God for those awful
hours! They have been so awful to me that my footsteps shall never go back over
that road. God, let me die before I shall ever cross that weary quagmire again
in my human experience, poor and wretched and miserable! That was the first cup.
I drank it down. And oh, what anguish and misery of soul. The next cup God
presented to my lips was the cup of justification, and I drank it down, and I
said, "Well, surely God has kept the good wine until now." Oh, none but God can
know how glorious the sinner feels when he hears the voice of God saying:

"Son, daughter, thy sins, which are many, are all forgiven!" That is the second
cup. And on, and on -- I have had a thousand I think sometimes -- but I want to
tell you it is bitter! bitter! bitter! And as you swallow the cup down, ever and
anon as you hand the cup back to the hand of God, he tells you, "and still there
is more to follow." And on, and on, and on!

Why, the first cup God presented to St. Paul, he was stricken down in the road
and struck stone blind. For three days and nights he groped his way in darkness
until he reached the house of Ananias, and when Ananias laid his hands upon him
and the scales fell from his eyes and joy came into his soul, I expect St. Paul
thought, "Well, God has kept the good wine until now." And a few months after
that St. Paul was caught up into the third heaven and poised himself over the
city of God and looked down on the towering spires and jasper walls and pearly
gates and his ears were charmed with the songs of angels and the music of the
redeemed. I expect as he looked down on that city of God that he said: "Well,
verily God has kept the good wine until now." But by and by in his lonely prison
at Rome God presented another cup and St Paul took his pen again and wrote
Timothy:

"The time of my departure is at hand."

He just took that great clod of a word which we call "death" and threw it on one
side and he said:

"The time of my departure is at hand. I have fought the good fight, I have
finished my course; I have kept the faith." But God stooped over the parapet of
heaven and shook his crown in his face, and Paul said, "I will wear that
tomorrow. I will sleep in this old dungeon tonight and eat a cold breakfast in
the morning, but I will take dinner in Heaven tomorrow with God and the angels."
And if we had St. Paul down here tonight to conclude this service, and he would
just tell us what good things God has in store for us, we would all leave here
shouting the praises of God for the glorious hope of an immortal life beyond the
skies. Oh, brother! better and better and better through all eternity.

I have thought of a thousand things in reference to eternity I have thought this
way; I have laid down and dreamed of Heaven, and I have stood up and thought of
Heaven and I have sat down and read of Heaven, and then I have sung of Heaven,
and on I go; but, brethren, all the money I have got in the universe is in this
bank, and if it don’t break I am a millionaire. I have felt it many a time. All
my calculations and all my interest is in that direction, and if at the final
day God should say to me -- "Depart ye cursed into everlasting flames,"

I will turn my back and walk away from the gates of Heaven the worst
disappointed man that God ever drove away from his presence. No, sir. My
calculations are all that way. And then after a while if I do succeed and step
inside of the pearly gates and turn around and see God and angels, and precious
mother and father and loved ones, brethren, I will just bury my face in my hands
and say, "Sure enough, beyond all doubt or cavil, I am here, I am here." And
blessed be God, I just as fully expect to realize that I am in heaven as I
realize tonight I am in St. Louis; in fact more so. I may be mistaken about
being in St Louis, it may be somewhere else; but when I get to Heaven, there is
no place in the world like Heaven, and I will know I am there, sure enough. When
I was in Waco, Texas, I was stricken down by laborious work with malarial
typhoid fever. I suffered day after day and day after day for fourteen long
days. I saw the anxious care on the doctor’s face, and on my wife’s face, and
one day the devil, almost in his visible presence, came into my room, and,
slipping up to my bedside, said: "Now you have worked yourself to death. Now you
are down with typho-malarial fever. Your system is reduced, and your nervous
system is exhausted. You will never rally from your sickness; you have worked
yourself to death." I said to His Majesty: Now, you get out of here! You get out
of here! If I had it all to do over again I would not strike a lick less. I do
not care much whether I go to Heaven about this time next week. Do you think you
can set me back with that sort of talk?" Said I: "You can get out! You get out
of here! If I have worked myself to death, glory be to God! I have worked myself
to Heaven, and that is the grand consummation of it all."

About nine tenths of the reasons why I want to stay down here is not because I
think so grandly of this old world, but I want to stay here until God gives me
time to eliminate from me everything that ought to be eliminated before I go. As
soon as God shall empty me of all worldliness, and all self and fill me with his
presence, I am ready to go any time. I don’t want to be forever what I am
tonight I want to be eliminated of some things and take in some other things
before I crystallize forever and shall be forever what I am.

Better! Better! Well, now I know what a servant of God will do for other folks,
and we are all alike. I have been watching some things mighty close during the
last few years. I was pastor of a church and in that church there was one of the
most faithful, godly women I ever saw in my life. Her husband was wealthy, and
she gave with a princely hand to the poor and to every good cause, and it was
joy to her heart to do for the Master. And finally her time came to pass out of
this world. I visited her in her last illness. She was dying of consumption, and
had spent several winters in Florida. She was now dying of consumption, and when
I would go into her room and talk to her, she would frequently say, "I dread to
die, not the results of death," she said, "but the agonies of death." And I
talked to her and encouraged her all I could. She said, "I am so frail, I am so
weak I can scarcely lift my hands, and, oh I how can I grapple with physical
death?" The last time I visited her before she died she motioned to the company
present to leave the room -- I suppose she did, for they all got up and walked
out at once and left me alone with her. Then she said: My pastor, I have some
things of importance to say to you that I never want you to mention while I
live, for the world makes light of such things, and what I say to you is as
sacred to me as my own soul." She said, "You know told you when you were here
last that I was afraid of the agonies of death; not of the beyond." "Yes,
ma’am," I replied. "Well," she says, " I am not now." "Well," said I, "what
brought about the change?" She said, "Yesterday I was lying in my room there and
I put my handkerchief over my face and I was thinking of Heaven, and," she says,
"all at once a scene just as natural as life presented itself. It seemed that I
stood upon the moss-covered banks of a beautiful river, and the noiseless water
was rolling gently by." And she said, "All at once a little boat ran its prow
out right at my feet, and the oarsman invited me into the boat; I stepped into
the little boat and it moved off so noiselessly, and we disembarked on the other
bank amid the shouts of the angels and the songs of the redeemed, and," she
said, "they carried me up a beautiful avenue to a palace, and we walked up to
the door of the palace and the door stood jar." She said, "They carried me into
the palace, and I felt like a stranger in a strange place. They carried me up to
the King and introduced me to him, and as soon as my eyes fell upon him, I saw
and recognized immediately that it was the world’s Redeemer, my precious Savior,
and I was at home from that time on. Now," she said, "I am not afraid to die."
Just a few days afterwards, as her husband sat with her, she called him in a
whisper. He went to her. She said: "Husband, I feel so delightfully strange;
what do you think is the matter with me?" He felt her hand and felt her arm to
her body, and it was cold. "Oh, precious wife," he said, "you are dying." She
raised her arms and clasped them around his neck, and said: "Oh, husband, if
this is death, what a glorious thing to die." And she fell back on her pillow
and never breathed another breath.

Just eleven days after that I was walking along by the hotel, and the husband of
this good woman said: "Mr. Jones, my little Annie is very sick. I wish you would
come and see her." She was the only child of that man and the good sister that
had died. As I walked into the room, there was little Annie, little ten-year-old
Annie, sick with diphtheria. I walked in and took her hand, and said: "Sweet
darling, are you suffering much?" She said in a whisper: "Yes, sir; a good
deal." I said: "Darling, do you want me to talk to you? And she said: "Yes. sir
if you please." "What about I?" I asked. She said: "I want you to talk to me
about Heaven." I said: "Well, darling, it is a great country, a glorious place,
where little girls never suffer, and mamma is never sick, and where all is life
and health and peace" And her little eyes would fairly dance like diamonds in
her head while I talked. And directly the doctors walked in, and her father
said: "Annie, darling, the doctors want to cauterize, to burn your throat
again." She looked up so pleadingly, and said: "Papa, please, sir, don’t let
them burn my throat any more. Mamma has been calling me all the morning, and I
want to go." "Why " he said, "sweet darling, if you go papa won’t have any
little girl. Won’t you stay with papa?" "Well," she said, "they may burn my
throat, but it won’t do any good. I am going to mamma." They burned her throat,
and she lay perfectly quiet a minute or two. Then she was visited by some
Sunday-school children, and she turned and said: "Won’t you sing, ’Shall we
gather at the river?"’ And she said: "I have heard them singing it over there,
and mamma is joining in." The little children began to sing, and just as they
commenced the chorus the sweet spirit of little Annie left the body with a
placid, heavenly smile on its face, and went home to live with her mamma
forever. No wonder the old prophet said:

"Let me live the life of the righteous and die a happy death, and may my last
end be like his: Mark the perfect man and behold the upright, for the end of
that man is peace."

Peace! Peace! Now, another incident, and then I will quit, just to show you the
difference; a simple contrast. I want you to see it. During the last cruel war
-- and how cruel it was! -- a minister in our State was summered to Virginia by
a telegram, which read:

"Your brother is mortally wounded. Hurry to the front." This minister hurried to
the front as fast as the trains could carry him to the battlefields of Virginia.
When he reached Virginia he found his brother was wounded sure enough fatally.
He was in a country home, and he made haste to the place, and when he walked
into the room where his suffering brother was dying he went up to the bed and
took his hand. He saw immediately that death was doing its work, and he said:
"Brother, I am so glad to get here before your death. Brother, I am so anxious
about your soul. You have been a wicked man all your life; I have prayed for
you, and talked with you many a time. Now, brother, brother, will you right here
surrender your heart to God?" "Oh," said the wounded man, "brother, do not talk
to me about my soul. I have thrown away all my health and vigorous days and
despised God and religion, and now I can do nothing with every fiber of my body
burning and aching. Oh, brother, I can not talk with you now about religion."
The next day the brother tried his best to preach him again, but the wounded
brother waved him off, and said: "Brother, I am tortured to death with physical
pain. Please, sir, do not trouble me now. I am unprepared and shall die
unprepared, but do not torture me more than I am being tortured." he could not
approach him. It was the sixth night this preacher brother had sat by his
brother’s bedside. Loss of sleep and exhaustion and anxiety had reduced him so
much and worried him so that as the wounded brother was lying quietly that night
about 12 o’clock he said to himself, "I will lie down on the cot and rest for a
few moments. I won’t go to sleep. I see brother is very low." And he said, "I
lay down on the cot and in a moment almost was sound asleep. And while asleep he
dreamt that his brother died with his mouth wide open, and just as soon as the
soul left the body he saw the devil come in in bodily form and approach the bed,
and walk up to his dead brother and look down into his brother’s mouth and he
saw that the soul was gone. And he said: "I thought that when the soul of my
brother left his body it hid among the piles of wood I had piled up by the fire
to keep the fire going, and the devil scented the soul, and started around to my
brother’s hidden soul, and as the devil approached that hiding place the soul
flew out of the room, crying ’Lost! Lost! Lost! Forever lost!’ And," said he,
"in the distance I heard the wail of my brother’s soul as it hurried out of the
reach of the devil, and in the distance I could hear the shrieks and screams of
my brother’s soul as the devil fastened his talons in it forever and ever. And,"
he said, "when I woke up agitated and frightened the light had gone out" And
said he, "I jumped up and lit the lamp. I walked up to the bed. There was my
poor brother, lying with his mouth wide open. And I believe God shut my eyes in
sleep to show me the scene that transpired in that room."

God have mercy on men who will 1et the last chance of being saved pass away and
then go into eternity unprepared. Will you risk it I Will you risk it? How many
men sitting before me, or anywhere in this church, tonight, who are not
religious, who are not professors of religion, young men who are not religious,
fathers who are not religious, how many of you will stand up before God and man
and say, "I don’t want to do without religion; I want to be a Christian here and
live with Christians here on earth and with them forever hereafter"? How many of
you will stand up tonight and say,"God being my judge, I do not want to die a
sinner. I want to be a Christian; I want to be saved from sin"? Have you
interest enough in your soul to stand up and say: "I want the prayers of all who
pray. I want to be saved from my sins"? Will you stand up -- every person who
wants to be a Christian and shun the death that never, never dies -- will you
stand up? Do not be ashamed or afraid. That is right God sees you, and I tell
you a man is not far from the kingdom of God when he will stand up and say: "I
want to be a Christian." Oh, my Lord, save these people tonight. You can all sit
down. God help us tonight to prepare for eternity. We have no more time to lose.


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  CHAPTER 14: 14. FOR MEN ONLY
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For Men Only "Escape for thy life!" (Genesis 19:14) I want to invite your
attention this evening to a part of the fourteenth verse of the nineteenth
chapter of Genesis:

"Escape for thy life!"

There is in the bosom of every man an instinctive love of life, and an
instinctive fear of death. Man has a spiritual nature as well as a physical
nature, and there are certain things which are death-dealing poisons to the
moral and spiritual life as there are things which are poison to the physical
life. So the warning, "Escape for thy life," means escape from sin. I intend to
speak plainly to all of you this evening. When a man preaches to me there are
three questions I ask of him: "Do you mean kindly to me, and are you my friend?"
"Are you posted on the subject you are discussing?" and "Do you love what you
preach?" You can tell whether or not I am your friend by the way I speak to you;
you can find out how I live by inquiring where I have lived, and you will find
out before I get through that I’m I intend to discuss.

Profanity

Now, I intend to discuss some cardinal sins, and the first is the sin of
profanity. What an awful sin it is and how it has got into society. If I should
say that the man who did that would lie and drink, you would say that I am
right; but if I should say that the man who will swear will lie and drink, you
would say: "Hold on there, don’t say that or there’ll be a row; I swear
sometimes." Now I tell you that the man who will swear will do all the other
things if you just take the bridle off him and turn him loose, and the young man
that stilts himself upon his honor and integrity, and is a swearer -- I say that
young man would steal and crush the virtue of the sweetest maiden in this great
city, if only the obstacles that now prevent him from doing it were removed. The
swearing man that went into the army, stole and went to a house of ill-fame at
night. The bars were down. Don’t you know that?

They say at when the devil wants to catch any other kind of a sinner he baits
his hook; but when he wants to catch a profane swearer he just drops his hook
without any bait, and the poor fool just gobbles it up. The man who swears --
you can say what you please about it -- the man who swears lacks just that much
of being a gentleman. Those men that swarm the railway trains. The railway
trains have their fine chair cars, and sleeping cars, and smoking cars, and they
need now just one more car, and that is the man that steals gets something, but
the man that swears, what does he get? You ask me if I stole when I swore, and I
say "yes," I did. I stole the peace from my home and the roses from the cheeks
of my wife, and that was about as far as I could get without running against the
sheriff.

Sabbath Breaking The next cardinal sin I want to talk about is the sin of
Sabbath breaking.

See these men having all the money that they can make during the week, and
sometimes money that they don’t make and all for the purpose of going out Sunday
and breaking the Sabbath. Just go up to a crowd of those fellows and hear them.
Hear the nasty, obscene language and the miserable oaths they use. Why if a
buzzard would come along flying in the air above a crowd of those men, he’d get
within about ten feet of them and stop, and then say. "Whe-e-e-e-u," and spread
his wings and sail away. And I tell you, when a crowd of men get so low that a
buzzard won’t come near them, they’re pretty low. You say to me, "I don’t like
these Sunday Christians." I tell you that I do. I tell you that the man that
keeps the Sabbath holy keeps every other day holy, and the man that violates the
Sabbath violates every other day in the week.

Gambling Now, I want to talk to you about gambling.

I have no respect for those cotton gamblers and these speculators. I see that
those fellows in the East have made a spec, and there’s going to be many a one
squeezed. I am glad that every now and then they catch some Ward or Fish and
disgrace them. I wish these Christians would quit speculating, I do indeed. I
tell them it’s wrong to buck against futures, but you can’t convince any of
these old Methodist deacons who’s just won about $30,000 that gambling in
futures is wrong; oh, no. He wouldn’t think that was any more wrong than it is
for a goat to eat grass. But just let him lose $30,000 and he’ll come and say:
"O, it’s wrong to deal in futures." The church raffles and lotteries are wrong,
but the devil will help you to get them up. The devil will help you to get up
anything of this kind in the church, but he charges you compound interest, and
he’ll sue you and levy on you when you haven’t got a cent. I know that. I’ve
been there. I say to you, fellow citizens, that people may talk about their gold
and silver and greenbacks, and their hard and soft money, but I say to you, let
us have honest money. I’d rather have one dollar I had worked for, that I had
earned by the sweat of my brow, than all the millions of Jay Gould.

Here is a young man getting $50 a month. His livery stable is $25, Louisiana
lottery tickets $10 or $15, theater tickets $15, tailor’s bill $25. Where does
he get his money? I knew a boy getting $40 and spending money like this in
Atlanta, and one day his employer took him into a room and backed him up against
the door and said: "Now, I know you are spending all this money. Where do you
get it?" And the boy -- aha! the boy said that his step-mother sent it to him.
Now, how foolish that was, for everybody knows that step-mothers don’t send
their boys any money. I had a step-mother, but she never sent me money. Look at
this boy that’s just won $10,000 in the Lousiana lottery, a concern which can’t
receive letters through the mails, and you have to whip the devil around the
stump to get your money to it even. The money all goes in vile companionship and
in pouring liquor down his throat, and he hunts up something else which will
give him a chance of getting something for nothing. And here’s the boy who has
earned a dollar by hard work, and he puts it covered with sweat in his pants
pocket, and he puts his pants under his pillow and goes to sleep, and that eagle
on the dollar turns to a nightingale and sings to him in his dreams. But the man
who deals in cotton futures can’t blame his boy for buying Louisiana lottery
tickets. A man told me once "There’s a man who’s a cotton buyer, and he’s one of
the most honest men on earth. He is so honest that he’ll pay the poorest man,
that can’t read or write, the fair price for his bale of cotton," and I felt
like going up to him and shaking hands with him and asking him if he didn’t feel
lonesome among his associates.

Liscentiousness

I want to speak licentiousness. It is the worst and most damnable of the
cardinal sins. I was told not long ago that this wave of licentiousness had
involved half of our society, and if it this is so I thought how long will it be
before the mighty wave sweeps over and engulfs the other half. Let us build a
wall around the virtue of our pure women a mile high. Oh, I believe that the
most awful hell there is in the next world is reserved for the man that tampers
with the virtue of a pure woman; and yet so our society is, that when such a
thing as this happens, the woman sinks down lower and lower and passes into
oblivion, while he is lionized. How different was the action of Christ! This the
evangelist illustrated by the story of Christ and the woman taken in adultery.
"Let him who is without sin cast the first stone," and they all shrank away.
There are many of these poor creatures who are longing for other things and
other lives, and there are many of your St. Louis millionaires who would
contribute thousands toward the building of a house of refuge for them. The
evangelist then discussed libertinism and libertines, young and old, denouncing
both in language far more vigorous than that used by evangelist Varley, although
he did not descend to the indecent description and filthy detail of the London
preacher. The immoral husband he especially denounced, saying as he did so, that
he knew very well that he had in his audience a number of the very men of whom
he was speaking, concluding his remarks upon this sin, with:

"I have more hope of any man than of the one who is in the power of
licentiousness, and has given himself up to it. We can do very little with the
man who has yielded himself up to an unhallowed alliance of this kind. We put
our arms around him and try to pull him away, but he clings to his sin.

Sin of Intemperance In conclusion, I’m agoing to tell you to beware of
intemperance, the deadly sin of intemperance. This the evangelist disposed of
briefly. In St. Joseph he had angered the saloon-keepers by speaking of their
business, and he had heard that they were talking in an aggrieved way of his
remarks. He had gone to one of them and told him to meet him and go with him to
see the wife of a man who had sunk from respectability to drunkenness and had
committed a crime for which he was then in the penitentiary. "Thus we will put
our ears to her side and hear the lifeblood trickling away, and then, if you say
I have been unjust, I will get down on my knees and beg your pardon." His own
miserable experience as a drunkard was told from the time he married his
Kentucky wife to the time of his conversion "I never had but one child who saw
me drunk, and God took him away. I may, when I was raving, have said something
brutal to him. When I meet him in Heaven I shall kneel down before him and ask
him if this is true, and if it is I shall ask forgiveness."

Now I want all of you who think you will try to abandon or shun these sins I
have spoken of to stand up and let me see you.


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Source: https://sermonindex.net/books/jones-sam-sermons-by-sam-jones/
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