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2 (556) T H E
IMMANUEL. GOD S GREAT ANSWER TO
THE NEED OF THE WORLD.
We feel our need of Him. There is something
within us that cries out for God. We
may call it the instinct for the infinite. There
is that in men that cannot be satisfied with the
temporal, and the soul finds itself leaning out
of the finite and listening for the infinite. An
eaglet stolen from its mother's nest, and
reared in a barnyard among common fowls,
may be imagined looking up with an undefined
longing for the sky. A child lost from its
parents in its babyhood, growing up not knowing
who its father is or whether or not he
has a father, feels that there is a vacancy in
its heart which only a father can fill. Men
.1,. ...a ..1 l 1' - '
<n? inn iiiw?i\M kiiiiw wiihi me miginy yearning
?f their sonls means. A vast unrest is
abroad in the world. Man is ever wanting
something, seeking something. lie may seek
and win the great things he wants, but they
never satisfy him. The mighty hunger of his soul
is not UUIieased- O HIV follow mnn nr?f n
Christian, have you not felt this mysterious
yearning? Do you not feel it now, to-day?
You want, at the bottom of your uninterpreted
being, you want God. The experience of life
brings out into intensest action this want of
your soul.
You have felt it in a quiet hour when you
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nati unit' tt# iiiiiii\, w licit uic \vt#i iti tvtth miih
out, and your soul communed with itself; when
from the depths of your being there came up a
cry, a prayer, inarticulate, indeed, and not understood
by yourself, but a cry for somethiiur
vaster, grander than anything the world had
to give. It may have come over you when you
had failed in, worldly things, and you felt the
vanity of existence in your disappointment. Or
it may have come to you when you had not
failed,'when you had succeeded up to or beyond
your utmost expectations. You had
gained what you set your heart upon, and your
heart was unsatisfied. You gained your end,
and vet it was not an end : it was but a beuriii
ning. You achieved a fortune, and there was
a latent sense of failure in it. You expected to
be satisfied, and you were not. The greatest
failure is to succeed and not be satisfied. You
sought position, influence, reputation, and
gained them all, and while the applause of the
multitude was ringing in your ears, you were
not satisfied as you expected to be. On the
pinnacle of fame tho soul feels a strange loneliness
come over it. It lacks something, the
greatest thing, something without which all else
is a disappointment. O soul, great soul of man,
there is in thee a kinship with the infinite, you
want God, utterly and everlastingly thou needest
God. You have climbed to top of the
Alps and can go no further, yet you yearn out
into infinite sky.
Sorrow awakens this want as nothing else
can, and it becomes an infinite pain. A great
bereavement overshadows you. That is taken
out of your arms that which makes life a vast
solitude. An infinite hunger consumes you. You
feel the utter vanity of human existence. It
is as if the very earth had dropped from beneath
your feet, and you feel yourself floating
in eternity. . You have crossed the limit of
humanity, you have traversed the frontier of
the temporal, you are in a boundless universe,
and do not know where you are. You ery out
for the infinite complement of the finite. There
is One and only One in all the limitless spaces
for you. It is lie who fills all space, it is God?
Goa.'
"God is in heaven and all's well with the
world." Is it? Hardly. All's not well with
the world. Where can I find God?
Not in philosophy, not in ponderous reasonings,
not in heaven. Heaven is beyond you.
PRESBYTERIAN OF THE SC
God may be in heaven, but heaven is a far away
country to you. You want God here, now, in
the world, in the valley of the shadow of death.
Is He here? Let me find Him, let me east myself
upon the breast of omnipotence. Where
do we find Him? We find Him in humanity,
in man. We find Him along the life that we
live. We find Him a babe on a woman's breast:
God touching young motherhood, and God inllilbit
illET illfjllU'V W n find Ilim in liftwlmn/l
It is something startling to find God in a boy
twelve years old. We find Ilim in a young man,
a humble young man, a young man at work
with carpenter's tools, making chairs and tables
for a living. God in the toil of a laborer's life.
Where do we find God? We find Ilim at a marriage
entering into the joys of the wedding
feast where two hearts juv made nn<? in ti?o
holy glow of love. We find Ilim where the sick
lie 011 beds that have 110 rest for them, where
fever burns, where palsy withers, where leprosy
eats out the eore of life. We find Him
with the blind, with those who grope for the
gate, who have never seen nor will ever, but
for Him, see the sun. We find Ilim among the
hungry, and see that lie provides for the poor.
We find Him with sinners conscience-stricken,
and hear Ilim say, "Thy sins are all forgiven,"
"Neither do I condemn thee." We find Him at
the funeral, as at the grave, and we see tears
titi I lis face, (lie face of God, tears of human
sympathy, divine sympathy, we hear Him sob.
The thunder of an omnipotent word is about to
burst from His lips, but "Lazarus come forth"
is 110 more glorious for us, than "Jesus wept."
Where do we find Him? We find Ilim deserted,
betrayed, just as we have been deserted,
lintxovnU -.1 ..I 1 ~:a_. I -1 ?i
uvi/iujvii, vuuuciiiiicU) auuacu, crucilieu, U^ lllg
like one of us, and see Ilim carried to a grave.
Where do we find God? We find Him everywhere
that we have been or shall have to go
from the cradle to the tomb. Where else? Nowhere
else, except when life is ended for another
better life. We do not dwell 011 th^t now.
We find God where we need God?"with us,"
all along the weary road of life. Wherever we
are we say God is here. Emmanuel?God with
us.
This is the answer to the mighty instinct of
the world. God in humanity, God with us.
God under our burden. God in our novertv.
God in our pain, in our sickness, in our death,
and in our grave, God become man.
Joseph Parker says, "There is one man who,
if he seek God will always find Him, and the
man's name is "The Broken Heart."
Where do we find God now? He is where we
need to find Him.
AVhere do we need to find God? The poor
man needs to find Him in his daily toil, in his
humble home. The distressed soul, in its dark
solitude. The sick and suffering on their bed
of pain. The sailor on his ship in the storm at
sea. We don't want a God far away dwelling
in glory, hut a God near at hand throned in
sorrows. A God whose environment resembles
mine?God in the toils, the tears, the misery of
the world. Mankind have been ever fascinated
by the sight of the lonely Son of Mary bearing
a cross up the hill.
Some one asked a ragged boy in the slums,
"Where is God?" He did not know the answer
the theologians give, and truly, "God is everywhere."
He had an answer of his own.
"Where is God? God lives in our alley now."
Ilis father had been a drunkard, cruel with his
family, but some one had gone to him with the
gospel, and he had accepted it, and given himself
to God. So the little theologian was right
when he said, "God lives in our alley now."
Where will you find God, if you seek to know
Him well and to have a revelation of God in
) U T H. [August 18, 1915
your own soul? You will find Him where they
us'mi to nml Him long ago. Walk among the
poor, to give them bread, and sympathy. (j0
to the neglected, the obscure, the untaught to
help them hear the burdens that are heavy.
Visit the sick, the weary, the broken hearted,
to give them cheer, and when you come away,
if you have gone in Ilis name, and for His sake,
you will have God in your heart, revealing
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xmnntii in mi xnr> ucuiay, grace, iruin, love, .
and mightiness. Immanuel?God with us.
If you have a great sorrow, look for God in
the midst of your sorrow and you will find
Ilim there. If you have a great disappoint
ment you will find God in it.
This is what tho incarnation means. This is
the infinite significance of that starlight night
in Bethlehem. Come all ye mothers, fathers, little
children, youths, men and women of poverty,
toil, sickness, ye who have wept or weep
now, you who are overwhelmed with a sense
of sin, ye disappointed ones, deserted, forsaken,
persecuted, oppressed, ye who bear the
scars and memory of sin. Come to Bethlehem.
Conic sec the promise, and prophecy of release,
of comfort, of succor, of eternal hope. God
has gotten down under the world's burden, He
will carry it; under the world's sorrows, He
will give divine consolation. Come see God,
our God, God with us, Emmanuel. In this
nativity is tlie birthday uf eternal hope. Come
1 r'.i_ *!._ tr___ i . ?
rvuv-ci ucaiuc me manger. i ou neeu not ue
afraid. There is no shining cherub there, no
blinding majesty, "low lies his head with the
beasts of the stall." Here are the shepherds;
come kneel beside them. Here are the weary
pilgrims traveled from far, bring your offering;
if not gold, frankincense and myrrh, too
poor for that, bring the treasure of your sorrow
and your love.
It is the greatest thing that has ever happened.
God has become a man, to live, and
die a man, to be a man forever more. Heaven
and earth rejoice. Ye constellations of the sky
lend an orb, hold a lamp aloft above the cradle
of your God. Come angels, ye multitude of
* ?'--i ?
niu im utuiuj inini, icpcai y%jm pruciiiimihuii,
let us hear you say, "Fear not, for behold
I bring you glad tidings which shall be unto
all people, for unto you (unto you, not unto
us; lie is yours, born for you), unto you is
born this clay in the city of David a Saviour,
a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord!" Ye have
heard it, men, ye have heard it, angels. Now
ye chiming hosts, strike your harps, strike them
as you have never struck them before, and sing,
sing the natal song of our King. We cannot
sing as we should, heaven lend us your choir.
Now all heaven responds, a multitude is singiticr
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"?? *? ?"*v
highest," that is the shout that goes surging
up to the throne. Now for our part, "And 011
earth peace, on earth peace," peace with God,
peace between man and man, peace within the
souls of men, "peace on earth," poor old battered,
scarred, tear-stained earth, "and good
will, good will towards men."
This is the song the angels gave us to sing.
They raised the tune, the hymn, "Glory, peace,
good will," and men have heard it ever since.
Throughout the corridors of time, "Glory,
peace, good will," have gone ringing on, and
will "o'er earth's wide fields and ocean's wave
beat shore," until at last, when we shall see
and hear the angels "singing to welcome the
pilgrims of the night."
Superstition is a sin. A few great men have
had their superstitions, but that does not recommend
superstition; on the contrary, it detracts
from the greatness of the men. Our undivided
trust must be in Him who said, "Thou shalt
have no other gods before me."?W. F. M.
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