When the Philistines came down on the field, they stepped between the corpses, and they rolled over the dead, and they took away everything that was valuable; and so it was with the people that followed after our army at Chancellorsville, and at Pittsburg Landing, and at Stone River, and at Atlanta, stripping the slain; but the Northern and Southern women—God bless them!—came on the field with basins, and pads, and towels, and lint, and cordials, and Christian encouragement; and the poor fellows that lay there lifted up their arms and said: "Oh, how good that does feel since you dressed it!" and others looked up and said: "Oh, how you make me think of my mother!" and others said: "Tell the folks at home I died thinking about them;" and another looked up and said: "Miss, won't you sing me a verse of 'Home, Sweet Home,' before I die?" And then the tattoo was sounded, and the hats were off, and the service was read: "I am the resurrection and the life;" and in honor of the departed the muskets were loaded, and the command given: "Take aim—fire!" And there was a shingle set up at the head of the grave, with the epitaph of "Lieutenant —— in the Fourteenth Massachusetts Regulars," or "Captain —— in the Fifteenth Regiment of South Carolina Volunteers." And so to-night, across this great field of moral and spiritual battle, the angels of God come walking among the slain, and there are voices of comfort, and voices of hope, and voices of resurrection, and voices of heaven.
Christ is ready to give life to the dead. He will make the deaf ear to hear, the blind eye to see, the pulseless heart to beat, and the damp walls of your spiritual charnel-house will crash into ruin at His cry: "Come forth!" I verily believe there are souls in this house who are now dead in sin, who in half an hour will be alive forever. There was a thrilling dream, a glorious dream—you may have heard of it. Ezekiel closed his eyes, and he saw two mountains, and a valley between the mountains. That valley looked as though there had been a great battle there, and a whole army had been slain, and they had been unburied; and the heat of the land, and the vultures coming there, soon the bones were exposed to the sun, and they looked like thousands of snow-drifts all through the valley. Frightful spectacle! The bleaching skeletons of a host!
But Ezekiel still kept his eyes shut; and lo! there were four currents of wind that struck the battle-field, and when those four currents of wind met, the bones began to rattle; and the foot came to the ankle, and the hand came to the wrist, and the jaws clashed together, and the spinal column gathered up the ganglions and the nervous fiber, and all the valley wriggled and writhed, and throbbed, and rocked, and rose up. There, a man coming to life. There, a hundred men. There, a thousand; and all falling into line, waiting for the shout of their commander. Ten thousand bleached skeletons springing up into ten thousand warriors, panting for the fray. I hope that instead of being a dream it may be a prophecy of what we shall see here to-day. Let this north wall be one of the mountains, and the south wall be taken for another of the mountains, and let all the aisles and the pews be the valley between, for there are thousands here to-day without one pulsation of spiritual life.
I look off in one direction, and they are dead. I look off in another direction, and they are dead. Who will bring them to life? Who shall rouse them up? If I should halloo at the top of my voice I could not wake them. Wait a moment! Listen! There is a rustling. There is a gale from heaven. It comes from the north, and from the south, and from the east, and from the west. It shuts us in. It blows upon the slain. There a soul begins to move in spiritual life; there, ten souls; there, a score of souls; there, a hundred souls. The nostrils throbbing in divine respiration, the hands lifted as though to take hold of heaven, the tongue moving as in prayer and adoration. Life! immortal life coming into the slain. Ten men for God—fifty—a hundred—a regiment—an army for God! Oh, that we might have such a scene here to-day! In Ezekiel's words, and in almost a frenzy of prayer, I cry: "Come from the four winds, O Breath! and breathe upon the slain."
You will have to surrender your heart to-day to God. You can not take the responsibility of fighting against the Spirit in this crisis which will decide whether you are to go to heaven or to hell—to join the hallelujahs of the saved, or the lamentations of the lost. You must pray. You must repent. You must this day fling your sinful soul on the pardoning mercy of God. You must! I see your resolution against God giving way, your determination wavering. I break through the breach in the wall and follow up the advantage gained, hoping to rout your last opposition to Christ, and to make you "ground arms" at the feet of the Divine Conqueror. Oh, you must! You must!
The moon does not ask the tides of the Atlantic Ocean to rise. It only stoops down with two great hands of light, the one at the European beach, and the other at the American beach, and then lifts the great layer of molten silver. And God, it seems to me, is now going to lift this audience to newness of life. Do you not feel the swellings of the great oceanic tides of Divine mercy? My heart is in anguish to have you saved. For this I pray, and preach, and long, glad to be called a fool for Christ's sake, and your salvation.
Some one replies: "Dear me, I do wish I could have these matters arranged with my God. I want to be saved. God knows I want to be saved; but you stand there talking about this matter, and you don't show me how." My dear brother, the work has all been done. Christ did it with His own torn hand, and lacerated foot, and bleeding side. He took your place, and died your death, if you will only believe it—only accept Him as your substitute.
What an amazing pity that any man should go from this house unblessed, when such a large blessing is offered him at less cost than you would pay for a pin—"without money and without price." I have driven down to-day with the Lord's ambulance to the battle-field where your soul lies exposed to the darkness and the storm, and I want to lift you in, and drive off with you toward heaven. Oh, Christians, by your prayers help to lift these wounded souls into the ambulance! God forbid that any should be left on the field, and that at last eternal sorrow, and remorse, and despair should come up around their soul like the bandit Philistines to the field of Gilboa, stripping the slain.