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قراءة كتاب Wondrous Love, and other Gospel addresses

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Wondrous Love, and other Gospel addresses

Wondrous Love, and other Gospel addresses

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دار النشر: Project Gutenberg
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picture which I shall show you to illustrate Christ’s compassion is the man that was going down to Jericho and fell among thieves. They had taken away his coat, aye, and if he had a watch they would have taken that as well. However, they took his money, and stripped him, and left him half dead. Look at him wounded, bleeding, dying; and now comes down the road a priest, and he looks upon the scene. His heart might have been touched, but he was not moved with compassion enough to help the poor man. He might have said, “Poor fellow”; but he passed by on the other side and left him. After him came down a Levite, and he said, “Poor man”; but he was not moved with compassion to help him. Ah, there are a good many like the priest and Levite! Perhaps some of you coming down to this hall meet a drunkard reeling in the street, and just say, “Poor fellow,” or it may be you laugh because he stammers out some foolish thing. We are very unlike the Son of God. At last a Samaritan came down that way, and he looked down on the man and had compassion on him. He got off his beast, and took oil and poured it into his wounds, and bound them up, and took him out of the ditch, helpless as he was, and placed him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. That good Samaritan represents your Christ and mine. He came into the world to seek and to save

THAT WHICH WAS LOST.

Young man, have you come to London, and fallen in with bad companions? Have they taken you to theatres and vicious places, and left you bleeding and wounded? Oh, come to-night to the Son of God, and He will have compassion on you, and take you off from the dunghill, and transform you, and lift you up into His kingdom, and into the heights of His glory, if you will only let Him! I do not care who you are; I do not care what your past life may have been. As He said to the poor woman caught in adultery, “Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.” He had compassion upon her, and He will have compassion on you. That man coming down from Jerusalem to Jericho represents thousands in London, and that good Samaritan represents the Son of God. Young man, Jesus Christ has set His heart on saving you. Will you receive His love and compassion? Do not have such hard thoughts about the Son of God. Do not think He has come to condemn you. He has come to save you.

THE PRODIGAL.

But I should like to draw another picture, another scene—that young man going away from his home that we read of in the fifteenth chapter of Luke; an ungrateful man, an ungrateful wretch as ever one saw. He could not wait for his inheritance till his father was dead, he wanted his share at once; and so he said to his father, “Give me the goods that belong to me,” and his good old father gives him the goods, and away he goes. I can see him now as he starts on his journey, full of pride, boastful and arrogant, going out to see life, off in grand style to some foreign country—say, going down to London. How many have come down to London, that being the far country to them, squandering all their money. Yes, he was a popular man as long as he had money. His friends last as long as his money lasts; a very popular young man in London, “hail-fellow-well-met” greets him everywhere. He always paid the liquor bill and cigars. Yes, he had plenty of friends in London. What grand folly! But when his money was gone, where were his friends? Oh, you that serve the devil, you have a hard master! Well, when the prodigal’s money was all gone, of course they laughed at him, and called him a fool; and so he was. What a blind, misguided young man he was! Just see what he lost. He lost his father’s home, his table and food, and testimony, and every comfort, and lost his work, except what he got down there while feeding those swine. He was in an unlawful business. And that’s just what

THE BACKSLIDER

is doing; he is in the devil’s pay. You are losing your time and testimony. No one has any confidence in a backslider; for even the world despises such a character. This young man lost his testimony. Look at him amongst the swine. At last one in that far country comes along, and, taking stock of him, says, “Look at that miserable, wretched, dirty, barefooted fellow taking care of swine.” “Ah,” says the prodigal, “don’t talk to me like that. Why, my father’s a rich man, and has got servants better dressed than you are.” “Don’t tell me that,” says the other. “If you had such a father as that, I know very well he wouldn’t own you.” And no one would believe him.

HE HAD LOST HIS TESTIMONY.

No one believes a backslider. Let him talk about his enjoyment with God, nobody believes it. Oh, poor backslider, I pity you! You had better come home again. Well, at last the poor prodigal comes to himself, and he says, “I will arise and go to my father,” and now he starts. Look at him as he goes along, pale and hungry, with his head down; his strength is exhausted, and perhaps disease in his frame, and so shattered that no one would know him but his father. Love is keen to detect its object. The old man has often been longing for his return. I can see him many a night up on the house-top looking out to catch a glimpse of him. Many a long night he has wrestled with God that his prodigal son might come back. Everything he had heard from that far country told him his boy was going to ruin as fast as he could go. The old man spent much time in prayer for him, and at last faith begins to arise, and he says, “I believe God will send back my boy”; and one day the old man sees afar off that long-lost boy. He does not know him by his dress, but he detected the gait of him, and he says to himself, “Yes, that’s my boy.” I see him now pass down the stairs; he rushes along the highway; he is running. Ah! that is just like God. Many a time in the Bible God is represented as running; He is in great haste to meet the backslider. Yes, the old man is running; he sees him afar off, and he has compassion on him. The boy wanted to tell him his story what he had done, and where he had been, but the old man could not wait to hear him; his heart was filled with compassion, and he took him to his loving bosom. The boy wanted to go down into the kitchen, but the old man would not let him. No, but he bade the servants put shoes on his feet, and a ring on his finger, and kill the fatted calf, and make merry. The prodigal has come home, the wanderer has returned, and the old man rejoices over the backslider’s return. Oh, backslider, come home, and there will be joy in your heart and in the heart of God. May God bring the backsliders back to-night—this very hour. Say as the poor prodigal did, “I will arise and go to my father,” and on the authority of God I tell you God will receive you; He will blot out your sins, and restore you to His love, and you shall walk again in the light of His reconciled countenance.

CHRIST WEEPS OVER JERUSALEM.

But look again. He comes to mount Olivet. He is under the shadow of the cross. The city bursts upon Him. Yonder is the Temple; He sees it in all its grandeur and glory. The people are shouting, Hosanna to the Son of David! They are breaking off the palm branches, and taking off their garments, and spreading them before Him, still shouting, Hosanna to the Son of David! and bowing down before Him. But He forgets it all. Yes, even Calvary with all its sorrow He forgets. Gethsemane lay there at the foot of the hill; He forgot it too. As He looked upon the city which He loved, the great heart of the Son of God was moved with compassion, and He cried aloud, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!”

My friends, look at Him there weeping

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