The Beatrice Daily Express

HIS GLORIOUS FAITH.

REV. DR. TALMAGE PREACHES ON
RECOGNITION IN HEAVEN.
He Sums Up the Evidence of the Bible
and That of the Dying Christian to Prove
a General Hope-A Sermon of Absorb-
ing Interest.

MINNEAPOLIS, Jan. 24. -Dr. Talmage
has been for a few days preaching and
lecturing in Chicago, Minneapolis and
St. Paul, and his sermon is on a theme
which will absorbingly interest all who
read it. He returns this week to Wash-
ington. The subject is "Heavenly Rec-
ognition, " and the text, II Sam. xii, 23,
"I shall go to him."

There is a very sick child in the abode
of David the king. Disease, which
stalks up the dark lane of the poor and
puts its smothering hand on lip and
nostril of the wan and wasted, also
mounts the palace stairs and, bending
over the pillow, blows into the face of a
young prince the frosts of pain and
death. Tears are wine to the king of
terrors. Alas. for David the king! He
can neither sleep nor eat and lies pros-
trate on his face, weeping and wailing
until the palace rings with the outcry
of woe.

I Shall Go to Him.

What are courtly attendants or vic-
torious armies or conquered provinces
under such circumstances? What to any
parent is all splendid surrounding when
his child is sick? Seven days have passed
on. There, in that great house, two eye-
lids are gently closed, two little hands
folded. two little feet quiet, one heart
still. The servants come to bear the tid-
ings to the king, but they cannot make
up their minds to tell him, and they
stand at the door whispering'about the
matter. and David hears them, and he
looks up and says to them. "Is the child
dead?""Yes, he is dead."

David rouses himself up, washes him-
self. puts on new apparel and sits down
to food. What power hushed that tem-
pest? What strength was it that lifted
up that king whom grief had dethroned?
Oh, it was the thought that he would
come again into the possession of that
darling child! No gravedigger's spade
could hide him. The wintry blasts of
death could not put out the bright light.
There would be a forge somewhere that
with silver hammer would weld the
broken links. In a city where the hoofs
of the pale horse never strike the pave-
ment he would clasp his lost treasure.
He wipes away the tears from his eyes,
and he clears the choking grief from his
throat and exclaims, 'I shall go to him!'

Was David right or wrong? If we part
on earth, will we meet again in the next
world? "Well,"says some one, "that
seems to be an impossibility. Heaven is
so large a place we never could find our
kindred there." Going into some city
without having appointed a time and
place for meeting, you might wander
around for weeks and for months, and
perhaps for years, and never see each
other, and heaven is vaster than all
earthly cities together. And how are you
going to find your departed friend in
that country? It is so vast a realm.
John went up on one mountain of in-
spiration, and he looked off upon the
multitude, and he said, "Thousands of
thousands." Then he came upon a
greater altitude of inspiration and looked
off upon it again, and he said, "Ten
thousand times ten thousand." And
then he came on a higher mount of in-
spiration and looked off again and he
said, "A hundred and forty and four
thousand and thousands of thousands."
And he came on a still greater height
of inspiration, and he looked off again
and exclaimed, "A great multitude that
no man can number.'

Now. I ask, how are you going to find
your friends in such a throng as that?
Is not this idea we have been entertain-
ing after all a falsity? Is this doctrine
of future recognition of friends in heav-
en a guess, a myth, a whim, or is it a
granitic foundation upon which the soul
pierced of all ages may build a glorious
hope? Intense question! Every heart in
this audience throbs right into it. There
is in every soul here the tomb of at least
one dead. Tremendous question! It
makes the lip quiver, and the cheek
flush, and the entire nature thrill. Shall
we know each other there? I get letters
almost every month asking me to dis-
cuss this subject. I get a letter in a
bold, scholarly hand, on gilt edged pa-
per, asking me to discuss this question,
and I say, "Ah, that is a curious man,
and he wants a curious question solved."
But I get another letter. It is written
with a trembling hand and on what
seems to be a torn out leaf of a book,
and there and here is the mark of a tear,
and I say, "Oh, that is a broken heart,
and it wants to be comforted."

From Theory to Certainty.

The object of this sermon is to take
this theory out of the region of surmise
and speculation into the region of posi-
tive certainty. People say: "It would be
very pleasant if that doctrine were true.
I hope it may be true. Perhaps it is true.
I wish it were true. " But I believe that
I can bring an accumulation of argu-
ment to bear upon this matter which
will prove the doctrine of future recog-
nition as plainly as that there is any
heaven at all, and that the kiss of re-
union at the celestial gate will be as
certain as the dying kiss at the door of
the sepulcher.

Now. when you are going to build a
ship you must get the right kind of tim-
ber. You lay the keel and make the
framework of the very best materials
-the keelson, stanchions, plank shear.
counter timber, knees, transoms-all
iron or solid oak. You may build a ship
of lighter material, but when the cy-
clone comes on it will go down. Now.
we may have a great many beautiful
theories about the future world built
out of our own fancy, and they may do
very well as long as we have smooth
sailing in the world. But when the
storms of sorrow come upon us, and the
hurricane of death, we will be swamped,
we will be foundered. We want a the-
ory built out of God's eternal word. The
doctrine of future recognition is not so
often positively stated in the word of
God as implied, and you know, my
friends, that that is, after all, the
strongest mode of affirmation. Your
friend travels in foreign lands. He
comes home. He does not begin by ar-
guing with you to prove that there are
such places as London and Stockholm
and Paris and Dresden and Berlin, but
his conversation implies it. And so this
Bible does not so positively state this
theory as all up and down its chapters
take it for granted.

What does my text imply? "I shall
go to him." What consolation would it
be to David to go to his child if he
would not know him? Would David
have been allowed to record this antici-
pation for the inspection of all ages if it
were a groundless anticipation? We read
in the first book of the Bible: Abraham
died and was gathered to his people.
Jacob died and was gathered to his peo-
ple. Moses died and was gathered to his
people. What people? Why, their
friends, their comrades, their old com-
panions. Of course it means that. It
cannot mean anything else. So in the
very beginning of the Bible four times
that is taken for granted. The whole
New Testament is an arbor over which
this doctrine creeps like a luxuriant
vine full of the purple clusters of con-
solation. James, John and Peter fol-
lowed Christ into the mountain. A light
falls from heaven on that mountain and
lifts it into the glories of the celestial.
Christ's garments glow, and his face
shines like the sun. The door of heaven
swings open. Two spirits come down
and alight on that mountain. The dis-
ciples look at them and recognize them
as Moses and Elias. Now, if those dis-
ciples standing on the earth could recog-
nize these two spirits who have been for
years in heaven, do you tell me that
we, with our heavenly eyesight, will
not be able to recognize those who have
gone out from among us only 5, 10, 20,
30 years ago?

Recognition.

The Bible indicates, over and over
again, that the angels know each other,
and then the Bible says that we are to
be higher than the angels. And if the
angels have the power of recognition,
shall not we, who are to be higher than
they in the next realm, have as good
eyesight and as good capacity? What did
Christ mean. in his conversation with
Mary and Martha, when he said, Thy
brother shall rise again?" It was as
much as to say: "Don't cry. Don't wear
yourselves out with this trouble. You
will see him again. Thy brother shall
rise again."

The Bible describes heaven as a great
home circle. Well, now. that would be
a very queer home circle where the
members did not know each other. The
Bible describes death as a sleep. If we
know each other before we go to sleep,
shall we not know each other after we
wake up? Oh. yes! We will know each
other a great deal better then than now,
"for now," says the apostle, "we see
through a glass darkly, but then face to
face." It will be my purified, enthroned
and glorified body gazing on your puri-
fied, enthroned and glorified body.

Now, I, demand. if you believe the
Bible, that you take this theory of fu-
ture recognition out of the realm of
speculation and surmise into the region
of positive certainty, and no more keep
saying: "I hope it is so. I have an idea
it is so. I guess it is so." Be able to
say, with all the concentrated energy of
body, mind and soul, "I know it is so!"
There are, in addition to these Bible
arguments, other reasons why I accept
this theory. In the first place, because
the rejection of it implies the entire ob-
literation of our memory. Can it be
possible that we shall forget forever
those with whose walk, look, manner,
we have been so long familiar? Will
death come and with a sharp, keen blade
hew away this faculty of memory?
Abraham said to Dives, "Son, remem-
ber. " If the exiled and the lost remem-
ber, will not the enthroned remember?
You know very well that our joy in
any circumstance is augmented by the
companionship of our friends. We can-
not see a picture with less than four
eyes or hear a song with less than four
ears. We want some one beside us with
whom to exchange glances and sympa-
thies, and I suppose the joy of heaven is
to be augmented by the fact that we are
to have our friends with us when there
rise before us the thrones of the blessed
and when there surges up in our ear the
jubilate of the saved. Heaven is not a
contraction. It is an expansion. If I
know you here, I will know you better
there. Here I see you with only two
eyes, but there the soul shall have
1,000, 000 eyes. It will be immortality
gazing on immortality, ransomed spirit
in colloquy with ransomed spirit, victor
beside victor. When John Evans, the
Scotch minister, was seated in his study,
his wife came in and said to him, "My
dear, do you think we will know each
other in heaven?"' He turned to her and
said, "My dear, do you think we will
be bigger fools in heaven than we are
here?"

The World Expects It.

Again, I accept this doctrine cf future
recognition because the world's expect-
ancv affirms it. In all lands and ages
this theory is received. What form of
religion planted it? Noform of religion.
for it is received under all forms of re-
ligion. Then, I argue, a sentiment, a
feeling. an anticipation, universally
planted, must have been God implanted,
and if God implanted it is rightfully
implanted. Socrates writes: "Who
would not part with a great deal to
purchase a meeting with Orpheus and
Homer? If it be true that this is to be
the consequence of death, I could even
be able to die often.'
Among the Danes, when a master
dies his servant sometimes slavs himself
that he may serve the mastr in the fu-
ture world. Cicero, living before
Christ's coming, said: "Oh, glorious
day when I shall retire from this low
and sordid scene to associate with the
divine assenblage of departed spirits,
and not only with the one I have just
mentioned, but with my dear Cato, the
best of sons and most faithful of men.
it i seemed to bear his death with forti
tude, it was by no means that I did not
most sensibly feel the loss I had sus.
tained. It was because I was supported
by the cc. if ling reflection that we could
not long be separated."

The Norwegian believesit; the Indian
believes it; the Greenlander believes it:
the Swiss believo it; the Turks believe
it. Under every sky, by every river, in
every zone, the theory is adopted. And
so I say a principle universally implant.
ed must be God implanted, and hence a
right belief. The argument is irresisti-
ble.

Again, I adopt this theory because
there are features of moral temperament
and features of the soul that will distin-
guish ns forever. How do we kuow each
other in this world? Is it merely by the
color of the eve. or the length of the
hair, or the facial proportions? Oh, no!
It is by the disposition as well, by nat-
ural affinity, using the word in the very
best sense and not in the bad sense. And
if in the dust our body should perish
and lie there forever, and there should
be no resurrection. still the soul has
enough features and the disposition has
enough features to make us distinguish-
able. I can understand how in sickness
a'man will become so delirious that he
will not know his own friends, but will
we be blasted with such insufferable
idiocy that. standing beside our best
friends for all eternity. we will never
guess who they are?

One Reason For Belief.

Again, I think that one reason why
we ought to accept this doctrine is be-
cause we never in this world have an
opportunity to give thanks to those to
whom we are spiritually indebted. The
joy of heaven, we are told, is to be in-
augurated by a review of life's work.
These Christian men and women whc
have been toiling for Christ, have they
seen the full result of their work? Oh,
no!

In the church at Somerville, N. J..
John Vredenburgh preached for a great
many years. He felt that his ministry
was a failure, although he was a faith-
ful minister preaching the gospel all
the time. He died, and died amid dis-
conragements, and went home to God
for no one ever doubted that John Vre-
denburgh was a good Christian minister.
A little while after his death there came
a great awakening in Somerville. and
one Sabbath 200 souls stood up at the
Christian altar espousing the cause of
Christ, among them my own father and
mother. And what was peculiar in re-
gard to nearly all of those 200 souls was
that they dated their religious impres-
sions from the ministry of John Vre-
denburgh. Will that good Christian
man before the throne of God never
meet those souls brought to Christ
through his instrumentality? Oh, of
course he will know them! I remember
one Sabbath afternoon, borne down with
the sense of my sins and knowing not
God. I took up Doddridge's "Rise and
Progress." Oh, what a dark afternoon
it was, and I read the chapters, and I
read the prayers, and I tried to make
the prayers my own. Oh, I must see
Philip Doddridge! A glorious old book
he wrote! It is out of fashion now.
There is a mother before the throne
of God. You say her joy is full. Is it?
You say there can be no augmentation
of it. Cannot there be? Her son was a
wanderer and a vagabond on the earth
when that good mother died. He broke
her old heart. She died. leaving him in
the wilderness of sin. She is before the
throne of God now. Years pass, and
that son repents of his crimes and gives
his heart to God and becomes a useful
Christian and dies and enters the gates
of heaven. You tell me that that moth-
er's joy cannot be augmented. Let them
confront each other, the son and the
mother. "Oh,"she savs to the angels of
God. "rejoice with me! The dead is alive
again, and the lost is found. Hallelu-
iah, I never expected to see this lost one
come back." The Bible says nations are
to be born in a day. When China comes
to God, will it not know Dr. Abeel?
When India comes. will it not know Dr.
John Scudder? When the Indians come
to God, will they not know David
Brainerd?

I see a sonl entering heaven at last
with covered face at the idea that it has
done so little for Christ and feeling
borne down with unworthiness, and it
says to itself, "I have no right to be
here." A voice from a throne says:
"Oh, you forget that Sunday school
class you invited to Christ! I was one
of them." And another voice says:
"You forget that poor man to whom
you gave a loaf of bread and told of the
heavenly bread. I was that man." And
another says: "You forget that sick one
to whom you gave medicine for the body
and the soul. I was that one." And
then Christ, from a throne overtopping
all the rest, will say, "Inasmuch as ye
did it to one of the least of these, you
did it to me." And then the seraphs
will take their harps from the side of
the throne and cry, "What song shall
it be?" And Christ, bending over the
harpers, shall say, "It shall be the
'Harvest Home. "

Theory Confirmed by the Dying.

One more reason why I am disposed
to accept this doctrine of future recogni-
tion is that so many in their last hour
on earth have confirmed this theory. I
speak not of persons who have been de-
lirious in their last moment and knew
not what thoy were about, but of per-
sons who died in calmness and placidity,
and who were not naturally supersti-
tious, Often the glories of heaven have
struck the dying pillow, and the depart-
ing man has said he saw and heard
those who had gone away from him.
How often it is in the dving moments
parents see their departed children and
children see their departed parents! I
came down to the banks of the Mohawk
river. It was evening. and I wanted to
go over the river, and so I waved my
hat and shouted, and after awhile I saw
some one waving on the opposite bank,
and I heard him shout, and the boat
came across, and I got in and was trans-
ported. And so I suppose it will be in
the evening of our life. We will come
down to the river of death and give a
signal to our friends on the other shore,
and they will give a signal back to us.
and the boat comes, and our departed
kindred are the oarsmen, the fires of the
setting day tingeing the tops of the pad-
ldles.

Oh, have you never sat by such a
deathbed? In that hour you hear the de-
parting soul cry: "Hark! Look!" You
hearkened, and you looked. A little
child pining away because of the death
of its mother. getting weaker and weak-
er every day, was taken into thc room
where hung the picture of her mother.
She seemed to enjoy looking at it, and
then she was taken away, and after
awhile died. In the last moment that
wan and wasted little one lifted her
hands, while her face lighted up with
the glory of the next world and cried
out, "Mother!"Do you tell me she did
not see her mother? She did. So in my
first settlement at Belleville a plain man
said to me: "What do you think I heard
last night? I was in the room where one
of my neighbors was dying. He was a
good man, and he said he heard the an-
gels of God singing before the throne. I
haven't much poetry about me, but I lis-
ened, and I heard them too." Said I,
"I have no doubt of it." Why, we are
to be taken up to heaven at last by min-
istering spirits. Who are they to be?
Souls that went up from Madras or An-
tioch or Jerusalem? Oh, no, our glori-
fied kinded are going to troop around us.
Heaven: is not a stately, formal place,
as I sometimes hear it described, a very
frigidity of splendor, where people stand
on cold formalities and go roundabout
with heavy crowns of gold on their
heads. No, that is not my idea of heav-
en. My idea of heaven is more like this:
You are seated in the eveningtide by the
fireplace, your whole family there, or
nearly all of them there. While your are
seated, talking and enjoying the even-
ing hour, there is a knock at the door.
and the door opens, and there comes in
a brother that has been long absent. He
has been absent, for years you have not
seen him, and no sooner do you make
up your mind that it is certainly he
than you leap up, and the question is
who shall give him the first embrace.
That is my idea of heaven-a great
home circle where they are waiting for
us. Oh, will you not know your moth-
er's voice there? She who always called
you by your first name long after others
had given you the formal "Mister?"
You were never anything but James or
John or George or Thomas or Mary or
Florence to her. Will you not know
your child's voice--she of the bright eye
and the ruddy cheek and the quiet step,
who came in from play and flung her
self into your lap, a very shower of
mirth and beauty? Why, the picture is
graven in your soul. It cannot wear
out. If that little one should stand on
the other side of some heavenly hill and
call to you, you would hear her voice
above the burst of heaven's great or-
chestra. Know it? You could not help
but know it.

Consolation,

Now I bring you this glorious con-
solation of future recognition. If you
could get this theory into your heart, it
would lift a great many shadows that
are stretching across it. When I was a
lad. I used to go out to the railroad
track and put my ear down on the track,
and I could hear the express train rum-
bling miles away and coming on, and
today, my friends, if we only had faith
enough, we could put our ear down to
the grave of our dead and listen and
hear in the distance the rumbling on of
the chariots of resurrection victory.
Oh. heaven. sweet heaven! You do
not spell heaven as you used to spell it
-h-e-a-v-e-n, heaven. But now when
you want to spell that word you place
side by side the faces of the loved ones
who are gone. and in that irradiation of
light and love and beauty and_joy you
spell it out as never before in songs and
halleluiahs. O ye whose hearts are
down under the sod of the cemetery,
cheer up at the thought of this reunior
Oh, how much you will have to tell
them when once you meet them!
How mnch yon have been throngh
since you saw them last! On the shiny
shore you will talk it all over. The
heartaches, the loneliness, the sleepless
nights, the weeping until you had no
more power to weep because the heart
was withered and dried up. Story of
vacant chair and empty cradle and lit-
tle shoe only half worn out, never to be
worn again, just the shape of the foot
that once pressed it. And dreams when
you thought that the departed had come
back again, and the room seemed bright
with their faces, and you started up to
greet them, and in the effort the drear
broke, and you found yoursel: standing
amidroom in the midnight -- alone
Talking it all over, and then, hand in
hand, walking up and down in the light.
No sorrow, no tears, no death. Oh,
heaven, beautiful heaven! Heaven
where our friends are; heaven where we
expect to be. In the east they take a
cage of birds and bring it to the tomb of
the dead, and then they open the door
of the cage, and the birds, flying out,
sing. And I would today bring a cage
of Christian consolations to the grave
of your loved ones, and I would open
the door and let them fill all the air
with the music of their voices

From Earth to Heaven.

Oh, how they bound in, these spirits
before the throne! Some shout with
gladness. Some break forth into uncon-
trollable weeping for joy. Some stand
speechless in their shock of delight.
They sing. They quiver with excessive
gladness. They gaze on the temples, on
the palaces, on the waters, on each
other. They weave their joy into gar-
lands, they spring it into triumphal
arches, they strike on timbrels, and then
all the loved ones gather in a great cir:
cle around the throne of God--fathers,
mothers, brothers, sisters, sons and
daughters, lovers and friends, hand to
hand around about the throne, the circle,
hand to hand, joy to joy, jubilee to ju-
bilee. victory to victory, "until the day.
break and the shadows flee away. Turn,
my beloved, and be like a roe or a young
hart upon the mountains of Bether."

Oh, how different it is on earth from
the way it is in heaven when a Chris-
heaven they say, Give him a nalm.
On earth we say, "Let him down in
the ground." In heaven they say,
"Hoist him on a throne." On earth it
is, "Farewell, farewell." In heaven it
is, "Welcome, welcome." And so I see
a Christian soul coming down to the
river of death, and he steps into the
river, and the water comes up to the
ankle. He says, Lord Jesus, is this
death?" "No," says Christ, "this is
not death." And he wades still deeper
down into the waters until the flood
comes to the knee, and he says. "Lord
Jesus, tell me, tell me, is this death?"
And Christ says, "No, no, this is not
death." And he wades still farther
down until the wave comes to the gir-
dle, and the soul says, 'Lord Jesus, is
this death?" "No," says Christ, "this
is not." And deeper in wades the soul
till the billow strikes the lip, and the
departing one cries. "'Lord Jesus. is
this death?""No,"says Christ, "this
is not." But when Christ had lifted
this soul on a throne of glory and all
the pomp and joy of heaven came surg-
ing to its feet then Christ said, "This,
O transported soul, this is death!"