The Lutheran visitor. (Columbia, S.C.) 1869-1904, September 08, 1871, Image 1

Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page. It is also available as plain text as well as XML.

ONE LORD, ONE FAITH, ONE BAPT18M"—EPHESfANS IV: 5. COLUMBIA, S.C., FRIDAY. SEPTEMBER 8, 1871 OLD SERIES, VOL. V.-NO. 157 in applying to me the text, “Being confident of thin very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ” (PhU. i: 6); for it re fers to the work of sanctification, ami a* yet I was not justified. I sought my old frieud John Cameron, who wept in his sympathy with me, and took me to his minister, Christopher Anderson, author of the “Annals of the Kuglish Bible.* This devoted man listened to tny story, told m a romantic style; for 1 spoke of my sufferings as if I was passing through purgatorial fires. He saw I was lifted up, and said, “Young man, were I-to say I am pleased with you, you would go dowu that stair in a happy frame; bat yon are yet far from the kiugdoiu of God. You have never yet dealt with the jnstioe of God. His instice in condemning yon for breaking His law has never yet entered your thoughts. I see you are angry with God for not giviug you salvation as tha reward of works. But it must be pwee from first to last.” After a few words he told ant to go., f thought it very harsh. 1 seemed cut off from all hope. I reeled to the door, aud when 1 reach ed the street I felt shut up to God and alone with Him, and exclaimed, “O Got^ it shall henceforth be Thee, and Thee alone!" After this I dc sired that everything might be set tled between God and myself, and 1 prayed that every truth might be burnt into my heart by the Holy Ghost. Wearied ami auiioua, I left for home. A great change was seen in me. My fierce temper was checked ; the lion had thus far become a lamb. All the town beard of it, and pitied the poor I ml who had, as they thought, gone mad. Old corn pan ions, who 1 feared would hinder aw, never came uear me. Faith was still the prevailing question. The dor trine of the imputation of Adam’s sin. I conk! not see, and I rebelled against Xhe sovereignty of God, and thought He dealt hardly with me. Slowly the trnth in regard to itnpn tation was opened up. Dimly 1 be gan to see that I had nothing bo I unholy Brought*, words, or deeds, and that for these 1 must die. I saw that Jesus only had holy thoughts, words, and deeds, and that these were placed to my account the mo ment I believed. I wanted a right eousness in which I could appear “The Hev. Mr. and the dfetin- gnished Mr. Y., contribute to the pa per." Mach contribution* are fre quently bought up by these papers for baits, to entice Christians to sub scribe, and secare not only their (istroBSge bat also their influence. No. Examine carefully what you would have your children read, dis carding everything that does not come up to a strict standard of moral and literary excellence. If yon feel incompetent to decide, get some one in whose judgment and piety yon have confidence, to decide for you. Ktidesvor, in the light of Christian duty, to keep yoor own mind, and the minds of those yon love, free from the vitiated taste for flimsy itenodicals. aud tawdry novels, a taste which unfits for great deeds, ami a taste to which can be ascribed a great deal of the mental incapacity and general inefficiency which daily coulee under our observation Ckris- Building on the land. In the Hast the peasaoto’ hats are often very unsubstantial structures. They are of mod or sunburnt brick. A night’s hard rain-storm will some times nearly demolish the entire village. Their mountain streams, also, possess a very' peculiar char actor. The beds of these brooks are called wadies. In the hot season they are entirely dry. Yet, even then, they often offer the best pas turage. In the rainy seasons they are swollen streams. The shepherd builds his hat by the banks of one of these wadies. If it is built high opou the rock, it is safe. If it is built on sandy soil, though there is no water at the time of building, the treach erous foundation gives with the first freshet . Appearances are deceitful —this is one lesson of the image. The man's house seems safe so loug as the wady is dry. It needs a tor reut to test it No man knows whether be is safe till he has been tried. The storm is needed to show whether be bnilt on rthe rock or on the sand. There is another lessoh quite as ioqKHtant The bearers of Christ’s Sermon understood it, doubtless. A friend of mine was onee traveling through Palestine. The party pitch ed their tents one night in one of these wadies. The night was fair, the air dear, the grass green and soft, the torrent bed dry. Suddenly my friend was awakened by hearing the gurgling of water. Before he was dressed it was a foot high be neath his bed. He escaped with difficulty. His clothes, books, man a IS PUBLISHKD At a time when the country is over* flowing with every variety of literary production, when the powerful and Urrleas arm of Urn proas is scattering frii>ay and opinion* of every etas* and grade of writer, it become* a most impor lent duty of every Christian to guard himself and family from the noxious inflneoee of evil paMtcntiooa. It can not be denied that the prana, to a great extent, is prostitute to the ser vice of the devil. Outside of thoee vile and obseroe publications that ineult decency at almost every news depot, and which no true man or wo man hesitates utterly to condemn, them is a class of literature more respectable, which, perhaps, is pro ductive of more evil results, on nc- ooaat of the extent to which it ie patnmiced [Volojfical Student*. ...... 3.00 fafeS who fail to rt unit at XjfrstioB of their »n acrip- tnll be charged per i lunum 3.00 r same* are entered in the *ub book, without the flftt payment ce. .11 xxwarAPKR DXcisnCt*. pe«on who take* a|j*ai*r reg- om the post ofth-e- > Whether di- , toto ( the better class of people. In the garb of fiction, and generally ia the shape of pamphlets The following beautiful thought* have an interesting meaning to all men: It ia uot only appointed unto ns all to die, bat also that every man shall die in aad separation from all earthly friend.*. The hand that press** as out upon the great sea keeps all earthly aasneiattoo* aahore while we make the voyage. Without earthly captain or pilot or companion we must |mss over the water*. In the loneliness of death ran there be found no companion t 1* there no friend there f Oar faith, hope and love respond, yes. There ts One who sticketh closer than a brother, life lore, Miffmag and change and death have tested, hot not destroyed, life perernrr, the trials of life sod the lonqjincm of death ran not exclude. His rod and bis *tsfl wifi protect and comfort when nil earthly power fe broken and nil earthly comfort shall have censed. “ Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil." Let our faith embrace Him, and neither life nor death aor thing* to roue, nor even the kmettaea* of dying, shall separate as from the love of God which fe in Christ Jeans. It fe perha|M more easy to |er reive and feel that tar life is not a! together oar own than it it to per reive and feel that oar death fe not altogether oat own. To tinman oh serration it woukl seem that nothing broadest license its alluring but de struct!ve nonsense, to minds capalde of nobler things. Kvery day the mails are burdened with paprrs, |mmpblrts and book* that are filled with tales aud ro mances—the emanation* of diseased bnuns—whose ante popularity mats in their valgar scenes of passion, horrifying detail* of hair breadth escapes, sod ia their power of exci ting* n maudlin sympathy for crime aad seosnabty, and a morbid craving in the mind of the reader for more of the uisaflerabte trash. This liters turr. especially intruded for the young, while fe attracts, asps the fountain of intellectual strength, ro cerates the moral system, aad bFin fusing its richly and immoral scab j meat, its (todleas sod antral philono phy, leads the hearts of the youth captive, sod unfits sad disinclines their minds for purr solid thought. Not only fe H intended to coin money by feeding the vitiated taste which it excites, bat it fe let often mad<* the vehicle for diffusing the moat nbaox ioas heresies, aad men hating the most baneful and dangerous ideas of morals sad sociology. Kvery doe trior that threatens sueiety, every heresy that strikes at the ehnrrh, sneaks into it* popular fiction, from a hoar gilded |mge« the pofeott of a ikations to Religious. |*osed by man. It is a marvel even In the marvelous Book of books. 'It is the most spiritual and ideal of the gospels. It introduces us into the Holy of holies in the history of our Ixtrd; it brings ns, as it were, into his immediate presence, so that we b*bokl free to face the true Stick i nab, “the glory of the Only Begotten of the Father, fnll of grace and truth.” It presents in fairest har mony the highest knowledge and the deepest loro of Christ. It gives us the clearest view of hi* incarnate divinity ami his most real humanity. It seta him forth as the Eternal Word, who has the sourer of life from the NOtTCE DRY GOODS! ■fehai <o $20 «*4 • hell at every* stop,! and, like t other awakened sii ners, I be to work for life. Tin language *y heart was, “llav - patience Ijme, and I will, pa; ’ thee all.” t| I did pray, and a; ;ouixe, ami fe! I was on the w ong track, did not know that "Doing is a deadly tliitfer. : 'Doing ends in death.”! hegau to read man/p chapters, king that would do lute good. If M started to my eye I felt proud , aod thought surely now Jeans regard my case. ( I had a long r >f seventy steps to climb to my «; at every step I uttered a I r. lake Lather, as be ascended i teps in the chnrch at Koine, I feed out a petition for deliver- S bat w> voice came to tne say- ] The just shall live by faith.” bond to make of my works a % to heaven. I put my anxiety Ace of Christ; and instead of titig the One to be believed in, I tint in gearch of faith, that they of jrllterf promptly wp- 1**4* and pa|mr« are eagerly bought by the youth, sad rend with avidity. Ami but only the young, but the old people, to a must lamentable degree, greedily devour the literary poison, uhirh charurterinrs a large number of t be popular periodical* of the «lay. And what fe still worse, very many profeusrd Christian* who, by their tows hare ram winced the world and its vanities, sra among the most life eral patrons of this literature, there by lending 4»r evil one an efficient helping hand. We know member* of the chirrrh a bo do not subscribe to any religions paper, a boar fireside fe visited by some of the weekly *eunational “blood and thornier" ps|wr* of the day, ahieh are eagerly rand from the head of the family down to the youngest child who can rand. Is not this inconsistency f ('an any intelligent Christian deny that the taste for sock rending fe detrimental to spiritual culture f < 'an any chrfe linn parent he Mind to the feet that this sfusatkmal stuff fe ruinous, not only to the minds, but to the hearts of his children f If so let him wake np to the fart, aad if there fe a doubt mi to the propriety of jfiviug hi* children such food for their minds, then the duty fe Hear and plain. Ws propose no tirade upon the ftress at large. The high toooil literary journal whose commendable otyert fe to encourage a taste for pure literature, and cultivate a high state ol excellence ia all of its branches, deoorrro the honored place fe already hold* in the estimation of •rety enlightened people. Neither would we countenance the narrow minded puritaatsm that frowns down all reading that fe not roseatially Faith come* ta with ltooC “No man dieth nato kit break* the Mdttode. .i adds: “If we db* we < Lord* That binds the to the thing hriool “Whether We live or die. Uml V That smrtiir* and aaptratwm. Imoked light, the death fort fe ti looked at friuu the other surpassingly brilliant.— .V Bt txks c in oar SONS, parent* bate a share, in his birth the mother sad the child are part ner* in the agony ami the joy. Along all the ways of life he may have a companion j in all the sorrows sad joys of life one who sympathises. In all the march of life hr keepaHnp to the music of humanity. But vhrtt be comes to die he fe separated, lie fe alone. He fe hearing a burden which none ran share. He fe fight ing a battle single banded, in the dark Many a jf lionr I spent trying to discover faith is. a.tion. t ^ rnSBU * one volume, at read and learn ii*. It should be WhL throughout le eiremar, with I read all the books I I find, and searched the Word rod. Faith! faith 1 faith! was ®y cry. Oh, if I had faith! Star of Bethteh.em was shining jfr before me. Jesus was ling near. He was uttering voi<-e, “Ix>ok unto Me, and be ye <L? But I passed Him by. ' ent to a minister in Kdiubnrgh, began to tell me bow good a t |t was to be awakened, and ajviewfcomy being comforted, i<<i passages of Scripture that 'gt d only to the peoplei of God. Iij:ed me to hope, instead of bid tne believe. Thns mauy are led ri I they may be saved, ami rest k instead of obeyiug the com il 5f God to “believe on Him to He hath sent." The effect I )ecatne proud of my convic- my fear* were hushed ; for ► < ays I felt great selfesatisfac I i nd, thinking that He who had |n i good work wonld carry it it smoothly. „ ' days after this I was startled hiding my heart beginning to things I had forsaken, and theu ) the terrible question, Wlrat if Is felse pence f I felt £ bad not Q bold of Christ, and something :^bw or ueverl now or never! It fe the wisdom of life, mm well mm mm Its joy, to be always feeling thi« grout need of Jeon*. A Urnc chrfe tiaa feel* that he could no more tiro for on hour u it boot Jean* than he could m hour lire without air, or under the water TWro fe something delight fat in this sense of utter de Ot e Coming Joy.—If even now our hearts burn within us while Christ o|ieiis to us tbe Scriptures and makes himself known unto ns in the breaking of bread, what shall it be when we become like him, and see him as lie is, and share his glory, when wc drink the uew wiue with him in liis Father’s kiugdom f But wc know this, that in our oommuuion now* w e look forward as well as back want; we eater iuto a fellowship of glory as well as of suffering; we roll before us the uew Jerusalem not less than the old; it is the P^sover of Cauasii as well as of Egy pt aud the wilderness; we sit together as in heaveuly places in Christ Jesus, and have au earnest of that day when tbe veil of iuvisibility shall be reut asunder, and all shall be fulfilled iu tbe kiugdom of God. “They shall hunger uo more, neither thirst auy more ; neither shall the suu light ou them, nor any heat For the Lamb, which is iu the midst of the throue, shall feed them, and shall lead them uuto living fountaius of water; aud God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." He is happy who knows the will of God, and has a heart to do it Christ could say, “My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, aud to finish his work." We are to partake of his Spirit, and find a joy in the Lord’s work as he did. Perhaps only a few chriRtians have tbe expe rience of the Psalmist who ooukl say, “I delight to do tby will," pud thus become tbe spokesman for Christ himself/ Instead of being meat to ns, tbe will of God » often medicine. We do it or take it, npon preeerip tioo, and nave sometimes more of a legal fear of consequences prompting us than an evaugelical love constrain . ing us. But this i* one of the “in firmities," and it is ouiy overcome when the “Spirit Uelpeth" , in n vAttan in which cloaking steel ran give no sound. Or, to change the figure, he ha* soiled out. Tbe rabies have been loosened. The s nr born haro been lifted. He fe slowly turning from port. Tbe spectator* look ou in sol enmity. He glides into the stream. He * team* down into “The Narrow*.” A hue gather* about him. Bat long before be fe lout to *ight he fe hast to hearing. If he speak, wo hear him uo lotiger. If he fire the forewrll gnu, we see the flash down the bay j but there are too many utlervewtng sound* and we are too for off to bear the report. Il« goes on and on, like a vessel going to sea, until his marts lie like a speck on the horison, and then he has gone. No firing of a cannon, no waving of signals, no telegraphic communication can roach tbe ship. It fe oat oa the ocean, and shall behold token of land no more nntil it sera tbe birds that come fly ing and the flowers that oome drill iog from the shores on the other side. Horh seems a stas's death to os who see It from this side. Out to a certain point ws can hold common! cation with him. We can follow him in from the market, the forum, the crowded assembly; we can gather about his last ill ocas; we con speak to him nntil his hearing become wb I NT AUO., Jii«. 7th St., liladeipbia, Pn. hlnk of This!’ s'!! 30,000 rv of the Franco m days. It *«" f tbe Bed Be** 1 ' SEElfi'Si rttofore. Pfe f > prork*, writtefi m and French, are iji stratio » V ihg to be offlefeL Brockett’s, in attending chntrh. Never go, except when you can matin tort nrr no good excuse to stay at home. 2. When at chnrch, asleep or staring about, listen to the sermon. 3. When yon go home, complain of the sermon aa light and chaffy, or dry and uninteresting. 4. Treat your pastor with a cold and uninviting civility, and then complain of him ltecaiise he docs not visit you. 3. Neglect to pray for a blessing npon him ami his labors, aud then complain of him because tbe church does not prosper. «. Be always finding fault with your pastor, and yet regret that be is not more popular with the i*eople, 7. Be very Inkewsrm and worldly minded, and yet complain of him for want of seal. A Neglect to iwovide for his doc rosary’ wants, and then complain of him because be wants bis salary*. Do all these things, and yon will never foil to have a poor pastor. vest, our only liberty m tho world It fe the bandage of our imperfection, that we can not be directly and nrtn ally thinking of Jean* all day aud night, yet it fe art mushing bow near we m*w to this. Owr %*ery sleep at fort becomes soltjrot to the thought of Josns j and saturate! with it. It fe part of the gtadar** of growing older ; not only that we are thoroby drawing nearer to owr first sight of him, but that ere feel oer depmdrocr npon hub move end more. We have learned more about him. We have had a longer aad moro varied expe rience of Urn. Oar love for him has become moro of a passion, which, by be either Do not tan. is the most WSi ©heap mm Look to your md you oa® 5X! n *pe>:p & (*>" ora)* ; four can be nagrowiag. la our pbyiurjl spiritual life, we sensitive to the k, to the necessity of ,w Iew deal with anxtons ! Here was a g<x>d man set- in b on my lees, taking the chil- s bread and giving it to a dog. ia4 no right to give me any i8f pddressed to the children of The promises are all yea and but only in Christ Jesus. » Genesis to Revelation the isR8 belong to tbe 1 Christian : afe his iu Christ “This little fellow," said Martin laither of n bird going to roost, “has chosen hie shelter, and is queitly locking himself to sleep without a care for to morrow^* lodging; calmly holding by hi* little twig, and leaving God alone to think of him." and grasp bin hand until be a longer recognise whether it h pressure of lovo, or hypoerfej hate; aud thou, still dying, out —be fe alone. He doee not heu wailing wife nod children- lie not bear the oob of the ntaoly f Kvery art of sin is more ii^jarious to him who commit* it than it can possibly be to any other who suffers by it; but it will return into tbe coo •aieoee aad perform n strange work Many have wn to hell, pillowing their a promise, but not taking The good man was wrong