WESLEYAN CHURCH.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 7534, 10 August 1903, Page 3

WESLEYAN CHURCH.

The Rev. D. J. Murray preached last evening in the Wesleyan Church. His text was selected from St. Luke's Gospel XXI. Chapter, verses 27-31: "Then, said he, I pray thee therefore father that thou wouldst send him to my father's houso, for I have five brethren, that ho may testify unto them lest they also come into this place of torment, etc." The preacher said: As a teacher of men, Jesus Christ conveyed his instructions in different ways, sometimes in plain language, but more frequently under that of parable and allegory. Few of His parables are more instructive and less more solemn than this ot the rich man and Lazarus. Among other things it is intended to teach the entire sufficiency of the Word of God to guide men to Heaven, and that no supernatural proofs or demonstration would add to the authority of tho Scriptures or our understanding of them. Viewing the parable in the light of this great truth, Mr Murray said : There is a revelation given to man, to guide him to happiness. " They have Moses and the prophets." These composed the given revelation of God to man in that period of the world's history. We have added to them for our guidance Christ and the Apostles. That this revelation is attested by all the evidence which the case can admit or reason require, cannot be called in question. And this revelation is sufficient for man's salvation. "If they hear not Moses and the prophote," there is nothing which we can offer in their place. God's Blessed Word is full of the spiritual truths essential to our salvation, and they are brought before us again and again.in these pages. They cannot be told more plainly. They appeal to the conscience, as do all religious truths; they have their roots there. And, said the preacher, if truth, backed by conscience and reason —brought to us on every page of the Bible, and presented to us at every ringing of the church bells —leaves us unaffected, what other power on earth, in heaven, or from hell will force us to hear it ? No, no, my friends, said Mt Murray, if the given Revelation is neglected, an extraordinary interposition is not to be expected. God in His Mercy, accords to every living soul, certain means for obtaining Salvation. They are ample for our enlightenment and deliverance, and if these are negleoted, no miracle will be wrought to startle the absorbed soul jrom its worldly interests. We are saved by faithful hearing, not by ghostly visions, or sepulchral words from the spirit world. Besides they who shut their minds against the clear evidence of Revelation, would equally reject the evidenco of one risen from the dead. Facts go to prove, said the preacher, that the result of such supernatural interferences is not always to produce conversion and salvation. Was Pharoah converted by the miracles of Moses ? Were the rebellious Jews softened and saved by the miracles and signs wrought by our Lord ? But, said Mr Murray, men are modernising and emphasising the request and argument of Dives, inasmuch as they both act and say. Well, if these are the miseries of che lost, and the blessing of the saved, respectively in the other world, which you preach about, let one come from them to us we will be I: eve him, and seek the one and shun the other." No you would not I If by a ghost you mean the spirit of a man stripped of the material and visible conditions —which has distinguished his appearances among men —it is not necessary to go out of this world to realise this condition. The world is full of such ghosts, they are coming to us from the depths of their ruia and woe, and they are talking to us, but who heeds them? See your ruined gamblers speaking to us of the torment that comes at the end of such a course. Is there one man iv a thousand that is turned from hia gambling by what they cay? Or take those who have been destroyed by strong drink. What hideous moral wrecks 1 What testimony they bear 1 They tell their tale, relate their woe. The young man looks, listens, and with a laugh turns to his glass again. But why classify. On every hand we look upon those coming to us from the wild waste of the waters of wickedness. Mental, physical, moral wrecks. Who are these !We cry, as we stand startled almost to madness. These ! these are the haggard ghosts of men, who were once respectable, and healthy and innocent, but now, stripped of all that makes men halt, they pass before us crying " The way of transgressors is hard," but in vain they tell their warning in the ears of men. If one will not hear these who come forth from these dens of hell, neither will they be persuaded, j He reasons from a wrong principle, from a false knowledge of human nature, who asserts that men would be convinced by the testimony of the dead. Oh, I entreat you, be wise in time. You haye in God's Word all that is necessary to your happiness and salvation. And if you neglect pad reject its teaching and perish your blopd will be on your own head.