The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1896, Page 41

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Che Lutheran Pioneer.

A MISSIONARY MONTHLY.

PusiisHEeD BY THE EVANGELICAL LuruerRan SynopicaAL CoNnFERENCE OF NortH AMERICA.

R. A. BISCHOFF, Editor.

Entered at the Post Office at St. Louis, Mo., as second-class matter.

Vol. XVIII.

Thanksgiving.

“Sing to the Lord of harvest,
Sing songs of love and praise;

With joyful hearts and voices
Your alleluiahs raise.

“By Him the rolling seasons
In fruitful order move.
Sing to the Lord of harvest
A song of happy love.’’

Are You Ready?

‘Therefore be ye also ready; for in such
an hour as ye think not the Son of man
cometh,’’ Matt. 24,44. Of these words of our
Saviour we are reminded by the lessons of
the last Sundays of the church year. He that
comes to us throughout the year as our Re-
deemer in His Word and Sacrament will come
‘visibly in the clouds of heaven as the Judge
of the quick and the dead and as the Bride-
groom that comes to lead His bride to the
Inarriage supper of the Lamb. Are you
ready? How important this question is, since
Christ Himself says that He will come in such
an hour as we think not! How foolish it is
for people to put off their getting ready from
Sunday to Sunday. As the church year
comes to an end, so their time of grace may
come to an end at any moment; ‘‘for in such
an hour as ye think not the Son of man
cometh.’? Are you ready?

In the book of Revelations we read that the
bride is “ready’’ for the marriage supper—
“arrayed in fine linen, clean and white.’
This wedding garment is ‘‘the righteousness
of the saints’” procured for them and given to
them by Christ. Have you this wedding gar-
Ment? A wedding garment so white and
clean, that He who is of purer eyes than to
behold iniquity can detect upon it no spot or
wrinkle, or any such thing. Have you this
wedding garment on now? Remember, ‘in
Such an hour as ye think not the Son of man
cometh.’” Though you may deceive your
pastor in this matter, though children may
deceive their parents, and husbands their
Wives, and ‘wives their husbands, and friends
their friends, yet the solemn truth remains
the same, that at the coming of the Son of
Man every refuge of lies will be forever

St. Louis, Mo., November, 1896.

swept away, and our self-made garments will
appear but as filthy rags before the searching
eyes of Him with whom we have to do.

The wedding garment, suitable for every
sinner, was wrought out and fashioned cen-
turies ago by the life, sufferings, and death
of the Saviour. Therefore the Bible tells us
again and again that salvation is a gift from
Him who gave His only Son for lost and ruined
man. We read in its sacred pages that the
‘‘wages of sin is death,’’ but we nowhere read
that the wages of our righteousness is eter-
nal life. No. The Bible says, ‘‘The gift of
God is eternal life.’’ It tells us that we are
justified freely by His grace through the re-
demption that is in Christ Jesus. Yea, that
by the righteousness of' One, namely, of
Christ, the free gift came upon all men unto
justification of life. How amazing then, that
any should try to work out a righteousness
for themselves, when they are told that God’s
Son was Himself made sin that they might be
made the righteousness of God in Him.

Does our reader say, ‘‘Yes, I see that sal-
yation is a gift, that the wedding garment is
freely offered, but how am I to lay hold
of it?’ By the hand of faith, is the Bible’s
answer. God is fully satisfied with the work
of His Son, the law is satisfied, and on Cal-
vary’s hill the Lord Jesus made an end of
sins, and brought in everlasting righteous-
ness. This rightcousness is offered to you in
the Gospel without money and without price.
It is offered to you freely. The moment you
take it and as long as you keep it, you are
prepared and ready for the coming of the Lord.
Take, then, with the hand of faith what the
Gospel offers to you, and though you be the
chief of sinners, you become a child of God,
are clothed with a righteousness of His own,
and will be a welcome guest at the marriage
supper of the Lamb.

The church year closes. And every Sun-
day, yea, every day and hour brings you
nearer to that great event—the coming of
Christ in the clouds of heaven. Soon the cry
will be raised, ‘The Bridegroom cometh!’’
See to it that you as His bride stand ready,
“arrayed in fine linen, clean and white’? —
the righteousness of Christ!

No. 11.

“Instant in Prayer.”

Stonewall Jackson was once asked what
was his understanding of the Bible command
to be “instant in prayer’’ and ‘‘pray without
ceasing.’’ His reply was, ‘‘I can give you my
idea of it by illustration, if you will allow it,
and will not think Iam setting myself up as
a model for others. I have so fixed the habit
in my own mind that I never raise a glass of
water to my lips without lifting my heart to
God in thanks and prayer for the water of
life. Then when we take our meals, there is
the grace. Whenever I drop a letter in the
post-office, I send a petition along with it for
God’s blessing upon its mission and the per-
son to whom it is sent. When I break the
zeal of a letter just received, I stop to ask
God to prepare me for its contents, and make
it a messenger of good. When I go to my
class-room and await the arrangement of the
cadets in their places, that is my time to in-
tercede with God for them. And so in every
act of the day I have made the practice
habitual.”

‘‘And don’t you sometimes forget to do
this?’”’ asked his friend.

“T can hardly say that I do,’’ replied Jack-
son, ‘‘the habit has become almost as fixed as
to breathe.’’ :

—_—s-o-<—P o-oo

Believe all Things are Ours.

Dr. Arnot tells a story of a father moving
into a new house and furnishing it far more
elegantly than his former dwelling, and his
little boy was wonderfully excited and ran
through the new house, saying, ‘‘Father, is
this ours?’”’ He felt that that which belonged
to his father belonged to him; and this
pleased the father very much. So should
Christians believe—that that whieh belongs
to God, their Father, belongs to them. And
this is true, for the Bible declares, ‘‘All
things are yours, and ye are Christ’s, and
Christ is God’s.

——.>- o> -

SLANDER would yery soon starve and die of
itself if no one took it in and gave it lodging.