At this time take from the heap of rubbish the book of fashion plates. "Must attend to this book—every month brings me something new. If I hold my own with 'my set' I must follow the fashion plates to appear just right." This is burning incense to the Goddess of Vanity, and this Goddess is not satisfied with a fragment of time, but it demands full time and it generally gets it. Fashion plates and the scriptures are impossible mates. They never mix well because they are not of one blood. So the plate stays and the Bible goes under it. It is right that we should give attention to our dress and address, and the way to do this is to seek the Bible way of beauty of dress and character adornment. To look beautiful we must commence to be beautiful inside, and at last it will shine forth and transfigure the outside. Follow the teaching of the Bible and be pure in heart: put on the robe of Christ's righteousness, and then you will be in heavenly style and unmatched by anything the wide world can dream of for personal adornment. Follow the Bible, the world's divine fashion plate.
Next remove the theatrical poster. In this day the popular amusements have gripped the young people with a mad hand. No time for the Bible. Much time for the show. "What shall I do to amuse myself" is the cardinal question of this age and every moment possible is given over to the answer. People grow white in the face in their excessive seeking to find the latest thrill, and they stay white until he cold hand of death gets them. Pleasures pure are pleasures right. At the right hand of God there are pleasures forever more. If they are right for heaven, they are right for the world, but pleasures worshipped are always bad for they are tipped with sin and bar the gates of heaven from the pleasures at the "right hand of God." There is deep sweet pleasure in the reading of God's word. Sing with Psalm 103. Whisper Psalm 23 when the night cometh. Read John 14 when the darkness is at hand, and nothing in the wide, wide world can be compared to the heart pleasure this gives. It puts the soul in touch with a little bit of heaven. Don't cover up God's great pleasure garden—the Bible— with a ton of worthless worn out, dried and faded earthly flowers.
Now take off the cash book. The Bible has often been hidden by the business ledger,—so often business crowds the Bible out. Hard work, mental strain, and the fierce fight of the present day business man gives but short time for the reading of the Bible, and more often no time at all. Head and nerves are worn out at the end of the day, and the soul also is worn out with business cares, so the cash box, the ledger and typewriter have covered up the Bible and it is out of sight and buried under business activities. It must be remembered in this day of fever heat and mad rush that a business man must give his utmost to his trade if he wishes to put it over, but it should also be remembered that in the soul's great ledger if "A man gains the whole world" it is reckoned as loss in the Book of God. We can serve God and read His Book and yet be successful. Mr. John Wanamaker, the best known citizen, and foremost Christian of the business world of America, blended the Bible with his great commercial enterprises by always putting up a Bible verse over his office desk and mixing up its truth with the trade of the day. He honored God's word and God honored his trade. He never lost his Bible under his cash register.
Now remove the bundle of Sunday newspapers. It is because these are read on Sunday that no time is found to read God's book on God's day. The newspaper is on the Sunday morning breakfast table inviting us to spend Sunday with it. No time to read the Bible. The Sunday Newspapers often contain as many words as the entire New Testament. We will read the papers first, after that we have no time or mind for the Book. Very often if all the words we read were counted they would be more than the words of the four gospels and yet we have no time to read even a chapter of God's good book. We mean we have no mind to read it. We have buried it under the sensational and often nauseous Sunday newspaper. After we lift up the last paper from the Bible, we exclaim "God's Book—long lost—now found." Lift the Bible up and say "I will place it next to my heart and cover it with my love, so shall the Bible not be covered with sin. 'Thy word have I hid in my heart.' May it always thus be covered and evermore in the battle and strife of life my Bible shall always be first."
A great merchant in the city of Philadelphia, submerged with business cares and thoughtless about God, said to his little boy one day he had no time to read the Bible, he was so bothered with bonds and stocks. His little boy could not understand these big words, and continued to ask him to read his Bible and be good. One morning the father came down stairs with a quick step and hurried to his paper to look over the morning news when the little boy just recovering from a severe spell of sickness, crept up into his lap and said "Bible first, Daddy." The father looked into his little pale face and his heart was touched, his eyes filled with tears, and he said "It shall be as you say, dear little fellow. God has given you back to me, and I will go back to my Bible" and he did, and he said it made a great man of him and a greater merchant also. Let this be your motto "Bible first" and it will never be buried under the rubbish of the things of this life again. "The Bible first, Daddy," is the voice of God.
CHAPTER XXX
THE CHRISTMAS CANDLE
Objects used; A Small Candle; in a Common Candlestick; A Representation of a Window. This is a Story Object Sermon
THE CHRISTMAS CANDLE
CHRISTMAS fires and lights are as old as the story of the birth of Jesus. The earliest form of lighting was the wood fire in the cave. Around this light the ancients sat and told the stories of old. Around the fire on the field of the shepherds, sat the ancient guardians of the sheep, as they read from the holy parchment, of the "coming ONE" and as they sat watching the dying embers of some such fire, were startled by flash of heavenly light and heard the angels' song of the new-born King. That was the first Christmas light. Ever since that day, whenever the glad Christmas day approaches, lights, beautiful and cheerful seem to shine out the glad light of the first Christmas day and so from window on hill top or valley, from tree and toy room of countless homes, the Christmas candle plays its happy part in the drama of Merry Christmas. To illustrate this Christmas candle story, construct a large background like the inside view of a window, and place a tall candle in front of it. If the window cannot be erected draw one on a blackboard or sketch one on a piece of muslin. If there is a small window in the alcove of the pulpit platform in good sight of the people, use that. Then tell the following story: A little crippled child, in one of the back alleys of a great city, wondered what she could do to brighten Christmas day for some one else. She was too poor to give even "the widow's mite" yet she had a kindly heart for other children poorer than herself. Her mother, with tears dropping from her eyes, said "God had not made it possible for us to do anything for the rest of the world except just to be glad and they would both try to do that in the name of the little Lord Jesus, who was once as poor as they." She remembered that in her own native land, far over the sea, the children of her childhood always put a lighted candle in the window (here light the candle in front of the window) which sent out a cheerful light over the snow on Christmas. They could do that, at least, and with a glad heart they lit the candle and prayed "God bless the light." From the outside the little glittering light looked like the star of Bethlehem. The darkness hid the ugly surroundings of the dilapidated home and it looked supremely beautiful on the "Night of Nights." A laboring man, hastening by to the corner saloon, with his wages in his pocket, thinking only of himself and a night of sin, saw the light in the window. Said he, "It is Christmas eve" and all about him he saw, hastening to and fro, men and women bearing Christmas gifts to the loved ones. It had been many a year since he had made his little ones happy by Christmas gifts. He had forgotten Christmas was so near until he saw the little candle in the window. The light held him—a prisoner—It called him back—back to his childhood days and the happy Christmas time he had spent in his own home. His father and mother had taught him in the early days to love God and keep His Commandments. He wiped away a tear—turned about face as he looked again at the Christmas candle, and went home. They had a Merry Christmas in that home that glad day, and the poor little girl's Christmas candle blessed of God, brought the wayward son back to God, home, and Christmas. Just across the narrow alley, a window of a room, in which an old man, worn out with years, trying to sleep, heard the snow beating against the window pane, arose and looked out at the falling snow. As he did so, he saw the light in the window across the way. That reminded him it was again Christmas eve. Not for long years had he even given it a serious or religious thought. He had lived for self alone because he was alone. His children had forsaken him; wife had died long years ago, but somehow this light had "got him" also. Memories of other years came back and rang the Christmas bells of long ago. In his thoughts he was back to his childhood day. How happy those memories made him feel. "Christmas back again" said he as he looked again at this lone light in the window across the way. "I'll put one in my window" and he relit the candle he had extinguished as he slipped into bed. Another window with a candle in it was shining out until, when midnight came, the dark alley was aglow with lighted windows. The old man said as he closed his eyes in slumber, "Tomorrow I will make the day merry for the little mother and child across the way" and he kept his promise.