SUNDAY READING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XV, Issue 5065, 9 February 1878, Page 3

SUNDAY READING.

A H A K V EST S E B 0 N. BV NEW T. D.U. ■•jry Fatlier is th» lm i baudmau."-John xv. 1. \yns „ jt nofc-be appropriate if I preach a ~ h * ;. si-rmon J Tfcis summer, having gone ; in TiiVr<>ut directions over between five and - *houVand wiles of harvest-fields, I can ha~dlv open my Biblfc without smelling the of uow-mowa hay and seeing the roidcn Kiiir of the wheat-fields, aud when I o-feii my Bib!.: to take my text, the Scripture leaf rutlles! like the tassels of the corn. We were ~rl} ua i' l the country. "Wc dropped com in the hill, four grains to the hi'.i; and went on Saturday to the mill, *' tving the ,;ri<t in the centre of tho sack, so tiiaW'K- contents on either side the horse balanced each other ; n'-'l drove the cattle &-{idd, our bare feet wet with tile dew ; and rode the horse* with the Walter to the brook until we fell on: and Uuntol the mow for ajitil tho feathered occupants went .., tackling awayi We were nearly all of us Cj born io tho country, and would have stayed there had not some adventurous lad on his vacation come back with better clothes and softer hands,,aud ..sefej.be whole village on f»« vsitb wl)gtfiiifeSS&B>ty life. So we all understand, rOS3. The Bible is full of_ th i sermon on tlie . 15.0Unt 11 lilies, and the glossy blank of the crow's wing as it flies OTer Mount Olivet. David and John, Paul and Isaiah find in country life a source of frequent illustration, while Christ in the teixt takes the responsibility of calling God a farmer,' declaring:—"My Father is the husbandman." Noah was tlie first farmer. 'We Bay nothing about Cain, the tiller of the soiL Adam was a gardener on a large scale; but to Noah was given all the acres of the earth. Elisha was an agriculturist, not culturing a ten-acre lot, for we find him ploughing with twelve yoke of oxen. In Bible times the land was so plenty and the inhabitants so few that Noah was right when he gave to every inhabitant a certain portion of land; that land, if cultured, ever after to be his own possession. Just as now, in Nebraska, the Government on the payment of sixteen dollars, will give pre-emption right to one hundred and sixty acres to any man who will settle there and cultivate the soil. * All classes of people were expected to culture ground except ministers of religion. It was supposed that they would have their time entirely occupied with their own profession ; although sometimes ministers do deal in stocks, I am told, and they are superior judges of horses, and make one think sometimes of what Thomas Fraser said in regard to a man in his day, who preached very well hut lived very ill: —" When he is out of the pulpit, it is a pity he should ever go into it, and when he is in the pulpit, it is a pity he should ever come out of it." They were not small crops raised in those times, lorthoughthearts were rude the plough turned up very lich soil, and barley and cotton and flax, and all kinds of graiu came up at the call of the harvesters. Pliny tells of one stalk of grain that had on it between three and four hundred ears. The rivers and the brooks, through artificial channels, were brought down to the roots of the corn, and to this habit of turning a. river wherever it was wanted, Solomon refers when he says :—• " The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord, and He turneth it.as the rivers of water are turned, withersoever He will.'-' The wild beasts were caught and then a hook was put in their nose, and then they were led over the field, and to that God refers when He says to wicked Sennacherib, " I wilt put a hook in thy nose and 1 will bring thee back by the Way which thou earnestand God has a hook in every bad mau's nose, whether it be Nebuchadnezzar or Aliab or Herod ; he may think himself very independent, but some time in his life, or in the hour of his death, he will find that the Lord Almighty has a hook in his nose. This was the rule in regard to the culture of the ground : —" Thou shalt not plough with an ox and an ass together,"' illustrating the folly of ever putting intelligent and useful and pliable men in association with the stubborn and the unmanageable. The vast majority o£ troubles in the churches and in reformatory institutions comes from the disregard of this command of the Lord: " Thou shalt not plough with an ox and an ass together." There were large amounts of property invested in cattle; Tlie Moabites paid one hundred thousand sheep as an annual tax. Job had seven thousand, sheep, three thousand camels, live hundred ' yoke of oxen. The time of vintage was ushered in with mirth and music. The clusters of the vine were put into the wine- ] press, and then five men would get into the press and trample out the juice from the ' grape, until their garments wera saturated with the wine, and had become the emblems of slaughter. Christ Himself, wounded until covered with the blood of crucifixion, making use of this allusion, when the question was asked: " Wherefore art thon red iu Thine apparel and Thy garments like one who tieadeththe wine-vat ?" Bo responded : "I have trodden the wine-press alone !"' In all ages there have been great honour paid to agriculture. Seven-eighths of the ' people iu every country are disciples of the j plough. A government is strong in proportion as it is supported by an athletic and industrious yeomariy. So long as before the fall of Carthage, Nabo wrote twenty-eight books on agriculture; Hesiod wrote a poem on the subject—" The Weeks and Days." Cato was prouder of his work on husbandry than of all his military conquests. So far back as the reign of Claudius, Columbella wrote a book of the subject of agriculture. But I must not be tempted to a discussion of agricultural conquests, ttanding amid the harvests, and orchards, and vineyards of the Bible, and standing among the harvests, Mid orchards, and vineyards of our own country —larger harvests thau have ever before been gathered—l want to run out the analogy between the production of crops and the growth of grace iu the soul; all these sacred writers making use of that analogy. In the first place 1 reinark, in grace, as in the fields, there must be a ploughing. That which theologians call conviction is only tho ploughshare turning up the sins that have been rooted and matted in the soul. A farmer said to his indolent son: "There are a hundred dollars buried deep in that field." The son went to work and ploughed the field from fence to fence, and he ploughed it very deep, and then complained that he had not found the money; but when the crop had been gathered, and sold for a hundred dollars more than any previons year, then the young man took the hint as to what his father ment when he said there were a hundred dollars buried down in that field. Deep ploughing for a crop. Deep ploughing for a soul. He who makes light of sin will never amount to anything in the Church or in the world. If a man speaks of sin as though it were 1 an inaccuracy or a mistake, iustead of the 1 loathsome, abominable, consuming, aud damning thing that God hates, that man will never yield a harvest of usefulness. When I was a boy, I ploughed a field with a team of spirited horses. I ploughed it very quickly. Once in a while I passed over some of the sod without turning it, but I did not jerk back the plough with its rattling devices. I thought it made no difference. After a while my father camo along and said : " Why this' will never do ; this isn't ploughed deep enough ; there, you have missed this and you have missed that," and he ploughed it over again. The difficulty with a great many people, is that they are ordy scratched with conviction, when the subs-ii! plough of God's truth ought to bejput j iu iu tlie beam. M; rd is to all Sabbath-school teachers, 1 to ;?!i parents, to all Christian workers, — Plough di.rp ! plough deep ! And if iu your 1 P'.r ,>:.n! experience you are apt to take a '■ .it v of the sinful sideof your nature, i T«ss down into your soul the ten command- ; flints wfi :h reveal the holiness of God, aud that sharp and glittering coulter will turn cp your soul to the deepest depths. U a man preaches to you that you are / litele out of order by rea-ionof sin and - ,u need only a little fixing up, he deo-.-ives! You have suffered an appalling injury by reason of sin. There are quick puUoas, and slow posions, but the druggist 1 e-jiiUl give you one drop that would kill the 1 tody, and sin is like that diug ; bo virulent, 1 so prisonous, so fatal, that one drop is J er.o-liu » 0 kill the Bo nl. Deep ploughing'for 1 ee P ploughing for a soul. Broken i ,r "o religion. Broken soil, or no i ' .cat. Why was it that David, and the 1 a '"*. the publican, and Paul r.iado \ thoit aoou ' ; their sins ? Had they lost 1 them Bei J? fcß No. The ploughshare struck 1 thin»a ,V°° vl(;t ' oa turns up a • great many I wcr ? forgotten. Ab a farmer 1 8 ng sometimes turns up the skeleton 1

of a man, or tho anatoiuy of a monster long ago buried, so the ploughshare of conviction turns up the ghastly skeletons of sins long ago entombed. Geologists never brought up from the depths of the mountain mightier ichthyosaurus or megatherium. But what means all this crooked ploughing, these crooked furrows, the repentance that amounts to nothing, the repeutauce that ends in nothing ? Men groan over their sins, but get no better. They weep, but their tears aro not counted. They get convicted, but not converted. What is the reason ? I remember that on the farm we set a standard with a red flag at the other end of the field. We kept our eye on that. We aimed at that. Wc ploughed up to that. Losing sight of that, we made a crooked furrow. Keeping our eye ou that, we made a straight furrow. Now, in this matter of conviction, wo must have some standard to guide us. It is a red standard that God has set at the other end o£ the field-. It is the Cross. Keeping your eye on that, you will make a straight furrow. Losing sight of it, you will make a crooked furrow. Plough up to the Cross. Aim not at either end of the horizontal piece of tho Cross, but at the upright pieco, at tho centre of it, tho heart of the Sou of God who bore your sins and

made satisfaction. Crying and weeping will not bring you through. "Him hath God exalted to bo a Prince, and a Saviour to give repentance." Oh ! plough up to the Cross ! Again, 1 remark, in graco as in the field, there must be a sowing. In the autumnal weather jox find the farmer going across the field, at a stride of about twenty three inches, and at every 1 stride he puts his haiid in the sack of grain, and he sprinkles the seed corn over the field. It looks, silly to a man who does not know what he is doing. He is doing a very important woik. He is scattering the winter grain, andthouigli tho snow may come, the next year there will bo a great crop. Nor-, that is what we are doing, when we are preaching the Gospel—wo are scattering the seed.' It is the foolishness of preaching, but it is winter grain; and though the snows of wordlines may come down upon it, it will yield after awhile a glorious harvest. Let us lie sure wc sow the right kind of seed. Sow mullen-stalk and mulleii-stalk will come up. Sow Canadathistles and Canada-thistles will come up. Sow wheat and wheat will come up. Let us distinguish between truth and error. Let us know the difference between wheat and hellebore, oats and henbane. The largest denomination in this country is the denomination of Nothingarians. Their religion is a system of negations. You say to one of them, "What do you believe? 7 ' " Well, I don't believe in infant baptism." "What do you believet" "Well I don't believe in the perseverance of the saints." " Well, now tell me what you do believe." '' Well, I don't believe iu the eternal punishment of the wicked." So their religion is a row of ciphers. Believe something, and teach it; or, to resume the figure of my text, scatter abroad the right kind of seed. A minister in New York, the other day, preached a sermon calculated to set the denominations of Christians quarrelling. He was sowing littles. A minister in Boston, the -other day, advertised, that ho would preach a sermon on the " Superiority of Transcendental and Organized Forces to Untranscendental aud Unorganized Forces." What was he sowing ? The Lord Jesus Christ, nineteen centuries ago, planted the Divine seed of doctrine. It sprung up. On one side of the stalk are all tho churchcs of Christendom ; 011 tho other side of the stalk are all the free governments of tho earth ; aud 011 the top there shall be a (lowering millouuium after a while. All from Gospel seed of doctrine. Every word that a parent, or Sabbath-school teacher, or city missionary, or other Christian worker speaks for Christ conies up. Yea, it comes up with oompouud interest—you saving one soul, that 0110 saving ten, the ten a hundred, the hundred a thousand, the thousand ten thousand, the ten thousand a hundred thousand —on, ou for over. It seems very insignificant to see a mother tcachiug her child : — " Xow I lay nie down to sleep." What is tho use of it? That; child docs not know what he is saying. Ho has his head in his mother's lap, and ho is turning about, and is breathing hard, and is playing with his feet, and ho says " Amen" two or three times before it is the right place to say it. Why is not that mother reading Bulwer's " Last Days of Pompeii," or Hawthorne's " House with Seven Gables ?"

I will tell you a story of "Now I lay me down to sleep." At the inauguration of President Hayes in Washington, last March, two men went ever from Baltimore, worldly men. At night, the rooms of the hotels were all crowded, and these two worldly men were introduced into a room, where there were seven or eight men lying down trying to sleep. As these two worldly meu from Baltimore went into the room, one of them said to his comrade : " I can't sleeps here ; I am always accustomed to saying little prayer which my mother taught inc, and 1 cau't sleep until I have said it." " Well," said the other worldly man from Baltimore, "that's the way with mo; I can't sleep until I have said my prayers." So they retired from the room, but finding no accommodation, they came back to the same room, passed in, and one of those m«i from Baltimore said to the people who were lying on the floor still awake : " Gentlemen, I am accustomed to say a little prayer before I go to sleep ; I cau't sleep until I do say it, if you will excuse me I will just say it now, and I always say it aloud." They all said : "Of course, we'll excuse you." Ho knelt down and his comrade with nim, and all the men in that room got up on their knees, aud audibly recited : — "No vj] iy ni>* il.iwn fo sleep, I piay thy Lord my soul to keep " To make a long story short, those -two men from Baltimore through their own fidelity, were convicted of sin and converted to God, and all those other men, so far as they have been heard from, by that ono exercise that night, were ushered into the kingdom of God's dear Son. The two men went back to Baltimore, and under the ministry of Thomas Harrison, a young man who graduated from our Lay College, the year before last, these two men telling the story of their own conversion at Washington, sixteen hundred souls in seven months were brought into the kingdom of God. When I saw Thomas Harrison this summer, and f found that he was the Thomas Harrison who came out cf our own institution the story thrilled mo beyond almost anything I have heard. So you see that a mother, whoso name I do not know;, 40 or 50 years ago, taught her child the infant prayer : *' Now I lay mo down to sleep." The first harvest of it is the conversion of her own son, and then of one thousand six hundred souls iu tho Baltimoretide of influence rolling on for ever and for ever. Oh 1 Sabbath-school teacher ;oh ! mother ; oh ! Christian worker; —you shall reap if you faint not. We have with us this morning somo of the men of the sea. They came in tho vessel Cape of Good Hope from Calcutta, and have had a long voyage. I welcome them to this house of God. They sit right before me. Many of them, I am told, are from Scotland —glorious land of Thomas Chalmers and John Knox. I never speak the name of that country without emotion : I felt after 1 had been there as if I had seen all the world, and wanted to come back. O I men, far away in your childhood days was the Gospel seed planted in your soul, and it is coming up today. Many of you, I hear, are children of God, and I congratulate you ; and in the hearts of others of you the good word will spring up to-day, and the memory of that land of Biblc3 and of Sabbaths—good, old, glorious Scotland—the memory of that time when yoit knelt at your mother's knee and said your evening prayer, conies over yonr soul to-day; and who knows but that coming in here this morning may be the occasion of your eternal salvation. "Star of pcnc, beam o'er (he billow, lilcss the soul tint for thee : lllesg tho sailor's lonely pillow. Far, fur at sea. Star of ppQce, when winds are mocking All ill* '.oils, h« ilies to thee ; Savo him on the billows rocking. Far, far at sea."

Again, I remark, in graco as in the farm, there must be a harrowing. I refer now, not to a harrow that goes over the field in order to prepare the ground for tlie seed, but a harrow which goes over after the seed is sown, lest the birds pick up the seed, sinking it down into the earth so that it can take root. You know a harrow. It is made of bars of wood nailed across each other, and the under side of each bar is furnished with sharp teeth, and, when the horses are hitched to it, it goes tearing and leaping across the field, driving the seed down into the earth, until it springs up in the harvest. Bereavement, sorrow, persecution, are the Lord's

harrows to sink tho Gospel truth into the heart. These were truths that you heard 30 years ago, that havo not affected you until recently. Some great troublo came over you, and the truth was harrowed in, and it has

conic up. What did Goil mean in this country in 1557 ? For a oeutury ihero waa the Gosiiel preached, but a great defcl.of 't produced no result. Than baru«Bs«l a wild panic to a harrow of oot&iheroial disaster, ami that harrow went down WalJstreet and up Wall-street, down and up Tliird-straet, down State-tetreet and up State-street, until the whole lisid was torn to pieceß as it never had been bsforv. What followed the harrow ? A great awakening, iu which there were five_ hundred thousand Boula brought into the kingdom of our Lord: No harrow, 110 crop. j Ag-iii), I reinark, in grace, as in (die farm, there must be a reaping. Many Christians speak of religion as though it were a matter of economics or of insurance. Thoy expect to reap hi tile next world. Qh no ! now is the time to reap. Gather up the joy of the Christian religion this morning, tbi3 afternoon, this night. If you have not a 8 much grace as you like to have, thank God for what you have, and pray for more. You are no worse enslaved than Joseph, no worse troubled than was David, no worse scourged than was Paul. Yet amid the rattling of fottora and amid the gloom of dungeons and umid th« horror of shipwreck thoy triumphed iu the graco of God. The weakest man in this house this morning has five hundred acres of spiritual jay all ripe. Why do you not go and reap it ? You have oeen groaning over your infirmities for thirty years. -Now giro one round shout over your emancipation. You say you have it so hard. You might have it worse. You wonder why this great cold trouble keeps revolving through yoar soul lilro a grindstone turning and turning, with a black hand on the crank. Ah ! that" trouble is tho grindstone on which you are to sharpen your sickle. To the fields ! wake up ! Take off your grecu spoctaeles, your blue spectacles, your black spectacles. Pull up the corners of your mouth as far as you pulled them down. To the fields I Heap ! Heap ! Again, I remark, in grace as in farming, there is a time for threshing, i tell you bluutly that is death. Just as the farmer with a llail beats the wlioat out of the straw, so death beats the soul out of the body. Every sickness is a etroko of tho flail, and tho sick bed is the threshing-floor. What, say you, is death to a good man only taking the wheat out of the straw ? That is all. .All aged man has fallen asleep. Only yesterday you saw him in tho sunny porch playing with his grandchildren. Calmly ho received tho message to lonvo this world, Ho bade a pleasant good-bj eto his old friends. Tho telegraph carries the tidings, and 011 swift rail-trains the kindred come, wanting once more to look on tho face of dear old grandfather. Brush baok the gray heirs from his brow ; it will never ache again. Put him away iu the slumber of the tomb. Ho will not bo afraid of that night. Grandfather was never afraid of anything. He will rise in tho morning of the resurrection. Grandfather was always the first to rise. His voice has already mingled in tho doxology of Heaven. Grandfather always did sing in church. Anything ghastly in that ? No. Tho threshing of the wheat out of the straw, that is all.

The Saviour folds a lamb in His bosom. The little child filled all the house with her music, aud her toys are scattered all up and down tho stairs, just as she left them. What if llio hand that plucked " four o'clocks" out of the meadow is still 1 It will wave in the eternal triumph. What if the voice that made music in tho home is still. It will sing tho eternal hosanna. Put a white rose in one hand and a red rose in the other hand, and a wreath of orange-blossoms ou the brow : the white flower for the victory, the red flower for the Saviour's sacrifice ; the orange-blossoms for licr marriage day. Anything ghastly about that ? Oh, 110. Tlie sun went down, and tho llowor shut. The wheat throshed out of tho straw. " Dear Lord, give me sloop," said a (lying boy, tho sou of one of my elders. "Dear Lord, give me sleep," aud he closed his eyes and awoke in glory. Henry W. Longfellow, writing a letter of condolence to thoso parents, says: "'Jiioao last words were beautifully poetic ;" and Mr. Longfellow knows what is poetic. " Dear Lord, givo me sleep." " 'Tw:w not In cr Jolly, not ill wrath, ■ That tho roapor ctimn that dfijr; "JV.is tiu nngel that visited tho earl!), .Ami took tho lloneraway." So may it be with us when our work is all done, and our trials arc all euded. "Dear Lord, give me sleep." I have one more thought to present. I have spoken of the ploughing, the sowing, of of the harrowing, of the reaping, of tho threshing ; I must now speak a moment of the garuering. Where is tho garner ? Need I tell you V Oh ! no. So many havo gone out from your own circles- yea, from your own family, that you havo had your eyes ou that garner for many a year. What a hard time some of them had V In Gethsemanes of suffering, they sweat great drops of blood. They took the "cup of trembling," and they put it to their hot lips, aud thoy said : "If it be posible, let this cup pass from me." With tongues of burning agony, thoy cried : "Uh ! Lord, deliver my soul." But they got over it. They all got Over it. Garnered 1 Their tears wiped away ; their battles all ended ; their burdens lifted. Garnered ! Tho Lord of the harvest will not allow thoso sheaves to perish in the equinox. Garnered ! Some of us remember on tho farm, that tho Bheavea wero put on tho top of tho rack which surmounted tho waggon, aud theso sheaves wore piled higher and higher, and after a whilo the horses started for tho barn ; and these sheaves swayed to and fro in the wind, aud tho old waggon creaked, and tho horse made a struggle, and pulled so hard, the harness came up in loops of leather on tlioir back, aud when tho frout wheel struck the elevated floor of tho barn it seemed as if tho load would go no farther, until tho workmen gavo a great shout, and then, with ouo last tremendous strain, the horses pulled In the load ; then they woro unharnessed, and fork full after fork full of grain fell into the mow.

Oh ! my friends, our gettiug to Heaven may be a pull, a hard pull, a very hard pull; but these sheaves aro bound to go in. The Lord of tho harvest has promised it. I see the load at last coming to the door of tho heavenly garner. Tho sheaves of the Christian soul sway to aud fro in tho wind of death, and the old body creaks under the load, and as the load strikes tho floor of the celestial garner, it seems as if it can go no farther. It is the last strugglo until tho voices of angels, and tho voices of our doparted kindred, and the welcoming voice of God shall send tho harvest rolling in to the eternal triumph, while all up aud down tho sky tho cry is hoard: "Harvest Homo! Harvest Homo !"