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4 THE ATLANTA GEORGIAN AND NEWS. SATURDAY, MAY 11, 1907. “WhyStand Ye Here Idle”! Why stand ye here all day Idle? • • • <Jo ye also into the vineyard, and whatsoever fa right ■ *.i u® 1 ! 3 I® 1 !! By REV. RICHARD ORME FLINN, Pastor North Avenue Presbyterian Church IHHHMMW One of the most dazzling minds that | ever thriled men by Its brilliant scin tillations, one of the most richly en- | d'owed men that England ever gave the world, was Lord Bryon. His was a splendid opportunity. He had riches. I Influence, and station. But, living j by caprice, and wasting his glorious privileges, when little more than thir ty years of ago. a broken, sin-aged, lonely and disappointed man, he wrote | out of his heart's emptiness, as might have written a man of seventy, the following lines which come Uke a sob from a burdened breast: "My days are In the yellow leaf; The flower and fruits of love ore gone. The worm, the ranker, and the grief Are mine alone. The Are that on my bosom preys In lone as some volcanic isle; No torch Is kindled at Its blaze A funeral pile." Oh, the barrenness of such a look backward, when life has been used for selfish or for sensual ends. Oh, the bitterness of the look Inward, the hope lessness of the look forward,, when lift has been purposeless and undirected toward any great spiritual attainment; when there has been nothing but a planting of weeds, and. when there ettn be therefore no anticipation of a golden harvest to be garnered In but only the fear of the reaping of the follies sown through wasted years. How. this is the question I want to ark: Is there any hope for a man like that? Thank God; there Is. The Master comes to such a man as this and says: "I will even receive you also; go ye Into the vineyard, and whatever Is right that shall ye receive.” In the passage from which our text Is taken God Is reoresented as a hus bandman seeking for laborers who will serve at harvest time. In the early ua«n he has gone to tne inurKer place, and all whom he has found .who are willing he ha» enlisted in his work. And then ns the periods of the day liass, hour by hour, ho goes again and again, and as fie finds others he urges them to enter Into his service. But now the day Is well nigh done, the night Is drawing on; the hourglass of opportunity Is almost empty; within a brief time the sun that Is slipping down the western slope will dip be neath the rim and the 'day will be dead. He goes ngaln to the market place, and finds there still others stand ing Idle. To them he speaks, and to them he gives the Invitation—'''Even now, qt eventide, go ye also Into the vineyard.” Are there some of you who have been idle all the while that others have tolled, who have been trifling when there was need of earnestness and of action, who have wasted your lives, and have del the golden sands of oppor tunity slip through your fingers until only a few grains now are left, and 1o you now, as dusk Is about to fall, ap preciate what this waste of life and of Its energies Imports? Then, my broth er, there Is hope for you In the Invita tion of the text. An aimless, careless life may satisfy In the early hours, but ns the time draws nigh when we must pass beyond and meet with God, there 1s scant comfort to be gotten from the consciousness of spiritual frultlessness, even though our career before the world may have been a stainless one. Tou may forget God and the fu ture while you are having your fling ut the world, while you are pampering the flesh and accumulating merely for time, but when you approach the sol emn hour of dissolution and verge the shore where you must launch out Into REV. RICHARD ORME FLINN. NEED A FENCE BUILT? PAGE FENCE CHEAPER THAN. WOOD. PHONE OR CALL FOR OUR FENCE MAN. W. J. DABNEY IMPLEMENT CO. 61 S. Forsyth Street, and 96-98*100 S. Forsyth Street. Bragg is Ryon OSTEOPATHISTS E. E. Bragg PHYSICIAN ANO SURGEON Office*: 324-325 Century Bldg. Bell Phone 3901 TEETH pain. Be noli. Best teeth SS. Money can not buy better.. PHILADELPHIA DENTAL UOOMS. No. M Whitehall M. tho unknown deep, for which you have made no pri-iiuratiiin, there cun tie little comfort In the memoriae of the paltry triumphs of your past or In whatever of temporal oggredizement and worldly gain the present moment may yield. - And It Is to Just such a disappointed soul, awakening to Its real condition, when It seems almost too late, that this glorious message of our Lord appeals— "Go ye also Into the vineyard, and whatsoever Is right I will give you." There Is In our text not only the blessed assurance that God Is willing to for give and to receive such an one, but He Is able to give them the chance at least In some measure to retrieve the mortifying disgrace of a wasted past. It Is told of Napoleon that during an engagement, as a courier came from the front he brought news that the day was well-nigh lost and awaited the orders of his commander. Turning to an ofllccr the emperor asked: "What time Is It?" The answer was, "Sire, it is 3 o'clock." Napoleon replied. "They say we are defeated: so let It be. But the day is not over yet; there Is time to tight another battle, and win tt” And so Instead of a retreat a charge was sounded; tho reserves who had been held Inactive were hurried to the front: the lines re-formed, and rein forced advanced, and before the sun had set the flcld wae won. And so. please God, It may yet be for us. We have failed? Tea, we admit It. But God loves us, and forglvea us, and by Ills gracious Invitation, even now we may take courage and go forward. "I will restore the years that tho cater pillar hath destroyed” Is His pledge, and broken though we be, and brief though be tho time, God helping us we will now enlist and give to His service right heartily all that In us Is. I recently heard of a splendid wom an whose saintly life and splendid min istry were known to all. who stated that after years of nominal member ship of a church during which she trilled with the great work to which she should have given her best endeavors, she was aroused and genuinely con verted. She said "Stung by my past neglect. I was well-nigh overwhelmed until I read those words of Joel where God promises to restore tho years that the caterpillar hath destroyed. 1 said nothing to any man about It, but cried out In the agony of my.soul, "Oh God! that Is what I want—the restoration of my past, the chance to retrieve those lust years, the opportunity to redeem the privileges with which I have trilled In the past; and though the hour Is late, oh, give me yet a chance!” And this was her testimony that one after another each of those opportunities which she hod let slip hod come bock to her, and os they came she had em braced them, and had served-with a passion intensified by the memories of wasted years; and though she enlisted late, I testify as one who knew her, that she labored well. Deathbed Repentance. There may be some of you who are making no pretence at serving Christ, who yet In your heart of hearts mean to begin to serve Him before the end. Some time, somewhere, somehow, you expect to get right with God before you die. Hut let me ask you: Suppose in God's mercy you are forgiven, and at last are saved, will you be satisfied to go empty-handed? "Must I go, and empty-handed? Thus my dear Redeemer meet? Not one day of service- give Him? Lay no trophy at His feet?” Mr. Bsnkey. In his Story of the Gos pel Hymns, tells the following Incident: "About fifteen years ago a man who as living a reckless. Godless life, went to a Sunday morning sendee In a mis sion hall In Bases. England. This hymn was used in the service, qnd as the third verse was rendered: - j "Oh, the years of sinning wasted. Could I but recall them now, I would give them to my Savior, To His will I'd gladly bow." tho man was so forcibly Impressed that he could not take part In the sing ing. He went home miserable and was unable to eat any dinner. In the aft ernoon he went to a Bible class for working men, conducted at the other end of the village, and as he entered the same hymn was being sung that had made him so miserable In the morning. The man was so moved by the words of the hymn, and so Im pressed bv the coincidence of Us being sung at both places where he had at tended that It resulted In his conver sion. He lived a consistent life there* utter, showing a real change of heart, and a strong desire to no longer waste his years in sinning." • "^he Thler on the Cross. The lesson from .the conversion of the dying thief, I fear. Is often misap plied. He Is thought of as one who had no chance to work for Christ, but was saved. There Is no doubt about his being saved, and there Is no doubt that his salvation was due to no merit of his own; there Is no doubt that he had no claim upon Christ and could not hope for reward upon the basis of what he had done. But neither ran any other man, for that. Yet. notice this: When he was saved by grace he did not go empty-handed Into glory, it was, Indeed, to him the last call. All of his active years had been spent In doing that which was wrong, and now. by his own confession, os he hung upon the rross In the agony of death, he was but suffering what was Justly Ills due ns n malefactor. . Ills had been an utterly wasted life, and there was no hope for a retrieve, no opportunity for another chance: he wAs already suffering the paroxysms and excrucia ting tortures' of a lingering but certain death. His conversion nnteceded his death but a few moments, yet In this brief space consider What he tilth • At a time when Peter and all the other disciples had deserted Christ, or were silent, at a time when those who had been nearest stood aloof, jind when the multitude was Jeering and scorning, when they mocked Him, and when the other thief. Joining with them, hurled maledictions at Him, this man who, at the very setting of the sun, received his Invitation, in the face of the howling mob, rebuked those that scoffed, de-. clarcd himself for Christ, confessed Him as his Lord, and left one of tho noblest ami most tlirillin-' testimonies to a sublime fnith and courageous al legiance that the world records. He entered the service late, but he lubnreil well. He doubtless hail never come In touch with Christ before. Ills sin and outlawry had kept him away from the places where Christ was wont to be. and now, at the last, the place or meeting was most Inauspicious, but bile ns w:ts tbe hour. In -:i<-< epteil Hie Invitation, embraced his chance, made good, and went not empty-handed Into glory. A Long Service Better Than Short One. We shall never forgive ourselves If we decline God's Invitation of the morning, or the noontide, and waste the day and wait until the evening hour before we enter His service. Nor would we by what we say suggest that wo can afford to wait. The comfort of our text Is not Intended to encourago anyone to postpone the hour of enlist ment, but instead to give faith to those who. like the dying thief, have some how never seemed to have a chance or come face to face with Christ and their duty until the life Is nigh Its close. It Is to these we bring this word of cheer. But listen! If, after this, you should decline 1o live for God your sin wlli be Indeed without excuse; for, know ing now the neew of action and of God’s willingness and love, to trifle longer would bo two-fold sin. The flcld Is white unto the harvest; the laborers are few; your life, what ever It may have been, enn yet be used. God Is seeking thoso who will servo, and your life Is needed and will be used If you will but give God a chance. Will you not today and now yield yonrseir to Ood? O, slumberer, rouse thee! Despise not the truth, give thy thy youth Why standest thou Idle? The day ilawneth! Bee! The Lord of the harvest stands waiting for thee. Holy Spirit by thy power, grant me yet another hour; Earthly pleasures I would prove; earthly Joys, and earthly love. Hardly yet hath dawned the day. Holy Spirit, wait, I pray. O, loiterer, speed thee! The day wears apace, Then squander no longer thy mo- men's of grace; But haste, while there's time with thy Master agree: The Lord of the vineyard stands waiting for thee. Gentle Spirit stny, oil stay; brightly beams this earthly day; . Let me linger 'mid these bowers; God shall have my noonday hours. Chide me not for my delay. Holy Spirit, wait, I pray. O. sinner, ‘rouse thee! The morning Is post, Already the shadows are lengthen ing fast. Then flee for thy life; from the dark' mountains, flee! The Lord of the Vineyard atill wolteth for thee. Spirit, cease thy mourful toy; leave me to myself, I pray, Eurtli hat thrown Its spell around me; pleasure's silken cords have bound me When the sun Its course has trod, Eplrit, then HI turn to God. Hark! On tho winds comes the bell’s solemn toll. Mournfully pealing the knell of tho soul. Tho Spirit’s sad strivings and plead ings are o'er. The Lord of the vineyard stands waiting no more. Bretton Hall Hotel Broadway, 85th to, 86th Streets, New York City. «Ln ow York's Largsit Uptown Hots!, in exclusive redden* tial section, overlooking Hud son River end the famous Riverside Drive. C. Subway Station et door- only ten minutes to theatre and shopping districta.Grand Central and new Pennsyl vania Railroad Stations. C,Moderateprices—unexcelled accommodations — exclusive service and appointments, C. An ideal Summer Residence Hotel for visitors. ANDERSON & PRICE CO. Also Ormond Beach, Fla., and Bretton Woods, N. H. LfN I Cincinnati. Louisville ALL POINTS NORTH THROUGH SLEEPING CARS, DINING CARS ' CITY TICKET OmCC, 4 PEACHTREE 8T.