182. Banners Hoisted

Banners Hoisted

Psa_20:5 : ’93In the name of our God, we will set up our banners.’94

I hate war! In boyhood we may have read the biography of Alexander or of some Revolutionary hero until our young hearts beat high and we wished we had been born over a hundred years ago, just for the glory of striking down a Hessian. For rusty swords hung up on the rafters and bullets cut out of log-houses in which they were lodged during the great strife we had unbounded admiration, or on some public day, clothed in our grandfather’92s soldierly accoutrements, we felt as brave as Garibaldi or Miltiades. We are wiser now, for we make a vast distinction between the poetry and the prose of war. The roll of drums and the call of bugles, and the champing of steeds foaming and pawing for the battle; a hundred thousand muskets glittering among the dancing plumes; ’93God Save the King’94 waving up from clarionets and trumpets and rung back from deep defiles or the arches of a prostrate city; distant capitals of kingdoms illuminated at the tidings; generals returning home under flaming arches and showering amaranths and the shout of empires; that is poetry. Chilled and half-blanketed, lying on the wet earth; feet sore with the march and bleeding at the slightest touch; hunger pulling on every fibre of flesh or attempting to satisfy itself with a scanty and spoiled ration; thirst licking up the dew or drinking out of filthy and trampled pool; thoughts of home and kindred far away while just on the eve of a deadly strife, where death may leap on him from any one of a hundred bayonets; the closing in of two armies, now changed to a hundred thousand maniacs; the ground slippery with blood and shattered flesh; fallen ones writhing under the hoofs of unbridled chargers maddened with pain; the dreadfulness of night that comes down when the strife is over; the struggle of the wounded ones crawling out over the corpses; the long, feverish agony of the crowded barrack and hospital, from whose mattresses the fragments of men send up their groans, the only music of carnage and butchery; desolate homes from which fathers and husbands and brothers and sons went off without giving any dying message or sending a kiss to the dear ones at home, tumbled into the soldiers’92 grave trench; and houses in which a few weeks before unbroken family circles rejoiced, now plunged in the great sorrows of widowhood and orphanage; that is prose. But there is now on the earth a kingdom which has set itself up for conflicts without number. In its march it tramples no grain fields, it sacks no cities, it impoverishes no treasuries, it fills no hospitals, it bereaves no families. The courage and victory of Solferino and Magenta without carnage. The kingdom of Christ against the kingdom of Satan. That is the strife now raging. We will offer no armistice; we will make no treaty. Until all the revolted nations of the earth shall submit again to King Emanuel, ’93In the name of God we will set up our banners.’94

Every army has its ensigns. Long before the time when David wrote the text they were in use. The hosts of Israel displayed them. The tribe of Benjamin carried a flag with the inscription of a wolf. The tribe of Dan, a representation of cherubim. Judah, a lion wrought into the groundwork of white, purple, crimson, and blue. Such flags from their folds shook fire into the hearts of such numbers as were in the field when Abijah fought against Jehoram, and there were twelve hundred thousand soldiers, and more than five hundred thousand were left dead on the field. These ensigns gave heroism to such numbers as were assembled when Asa fought against Zerah, and there were one million five hundred and eighty thousand troops in the battle. The Athenians carried an inscription of the owl, which was their emblem of wisdom. The flags of modern nations are familiar to you all, and many of them so inappropriate for the character of the nations they represent it would be impolitic to enumerate them. These ensigns are streamers borne on the point of a lance and on the top of wooden shafts. They are carried in the front and rear of armies. They unroll from the maintop-gallant-masthead of an admiral’92s flagship to distinguish it among other ships of the same squadron. They are the objects of national pride. The loss of them on the field is ignominious.

The three banners of the Lord’92s hosts are the hanner of proclamation, the banner of recruit, and the banner of victory. When a nation feels its rights infringed, or its honor insulted, when its citizens have in foreign climes been oppressed and no indemnity has been offered to the inhabitant of the republic or kingdom, a proclamation of war is issued. On the top of batteries and arsenals and custom houses and revenue offices flags are immediately swung out. All who look upon them realize the fact that uncompromising war is declared. Thus it is that the Church of Jesus Christ, jealous for the honor of its Sovereign, and determined to get back those who have been carried off captive into the bondage of Satan, and intent upon the destruction of those mighty wrongs which have so long cursed the earth, and bent upon the extension of the Saviour’92s reign of mercy, in the name of God sets up its banner of proclamation.

The Church makes no assault upon the world. I do not believe that God ever made a better world than this. It is magnificent even in its ruins. Let us stop talking so much against the world. God pronounced it very good at the beginning. Though a wandering child of God, I see in it yet the Great Father’92s lineaments. Though tossed and driven by the storms of six thousand years, this old world sails bravely yet, and as at her launching in the beginning the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy, so at last, when coming into the calm harbor of God’92s mercy, she shall be greeted by the huzzas of glorified constellations. It is not the world against which we contend, but its transgressions. Whatever is obstinate in the will, degrading in passion, harmful in custom, false in friendship, hypocritical in profession’97against all this Christ makes onset. From false profession he would tear the mask. From oppression he would snatch the rod. From pride he would rend off the plumes. From revenge he would exorcise the devil. While Christ loved the world so much that He died to save it, He hates sin so well that to eradicate the last trace of its pollution He will utterly consume the continents and the oceans. At the gate of Eden the declaration of perpetual enmity was made against the serpent. The tumult round about Mount Sinai was only the roar and flash of God’92s artillery of wrath against sin. Sodom on fire was only one of God’92s flaming bulletins announcing hostility. Nineveh and Tyre and Jerusalem in awful ruin mark the track of Jehovah’92s campaign. They show that God was terribly in earnest when He declared Himself abhorrent of all iniquity. They make us believe that though nations belligerent and revengeful may sign articles of peace and come to an amicable adjustment, there shall be no cessation of hostilities between the forces of light and the forces of darkness until the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord. Affrighted by no opposition, discouraged by no temporary defeats, shrinking from no exposure’97every man to his position, while from the top of our schools and churches and seminaries and asylums, ’93In the name of God we will set up our banners.’94

Again, it was the custom in ancient times, for the purpose of gathering armies, to lift an ensign on the top of some high hill, so that all who saw it would feel impelled to rally around it. In more modern times the same plan has been employed for the gathering of an army. Thus it is that the Church of Christ lifts its flag for recruits. The cross of Jesus is our standard, planted on the hill of Calvary. Other armies demand that persons desiring to enter the lists of war shall be between such and such an age, lest the folly of extreme youth or the infirmity of advanced age be a clog rather than an advantage. But none are too young for Christ’92s regiment; none can be too old. The hand that is strong enough to bound a ball or trundle a hoop is skilled enough to fight for Christ, while many a hand trembling with old age has grasped the arrow of truth, and with a dim eye close to it, taking aim, has sent its sharp point right through the heart of the King’92s enemies. Many of you have long ago had your names written on the roll of celestial troops, and you like the service well, although you now bear the scars of multitudinous conflicts and can recount many a long march, and tell of siege guns opened on you that you thought never would be spiked. But there may be some who have not yet enlisted. Your being in the house of God implies that you are seriously thinking about it, and your attention makes me hope that you are only looking for the standard to be hoisted. Will you not, a hundred of you, with all the aroused enthusiasm of your nature, come bounding into the ranks, while ’93In the name of God we set up our banners.’94

Through natural modesty do you hold back and say, ’93I will be of no advantage to Christ; I am too awkward to learn the step of the host, or to be of any service in the shock of battle?’94 To you I make the reply, Try it. One hour under Christ’92s drill, and you would so well understand His rules, that the first step of your march heavenward would make the gates of hell tremble on their hinges. We may not be as polished and trim as many Christians we have known and we may not as well understand sharpshooting; but there is rough work which we can all accomplish. We may be axmen and hew a pathway through the forests. We may be spademen, and dig the trenches and throw up the fortifications. We do not care where, we do not care what,’97if we can only help in the cause of our King we may shout as loudly as any of them at the completion of the conquest.

There are non-professors who have a very correct idea of what Christians ought to be. You have seen members of the Church who were as proud as Ahab and lied as badly as Ananias, and who were as foul hypocrites as Judas. You abhor all that. You say followers of Christ ought to be honorable, humble and self-denying, and charitable, and patient, and forgiving. Amen! So they ought. Come into the kingdom of Christ, my hearer, and be just that glorious Christian that you have described. Every church has enough stingy men in it to arrest its charities, and enough proud men in it to grieve away the Holy Ghost, and enough lazy men in it to hang on behind till its wheels, like Pharaoh’92s chariots, drag heavily, and enough worldly men to exhaust the patience of the very elect, and enough snarly men to make appropriate the Bible warning, ’93Beware of dogs.’94 If any of you men on the outside of the kingdom expect to make such Christians as these, we do not want you to come, for the Church has already a million members too many of just that kind. We do not want our ranks crowded with serfs when we can have them filled with zouaves. There are men now, as in Christ’92s time, possessed of seven devils. In some instances it seems as though at conversion only six of those evil spirits were cast out, while there remains still one in the heart, the devil of avarice, the devil of lust, or the devil of pride. Men of the world, if you would be transformed and elevated by the power of the Gospel, now is the time to come. It is no mean ensign I lift this hour. It is a time-honored flag. It has been in terrific battle. Draggled in the dust of a Saviour’92s humiliation from Bethlehem to Calvary. Rent by hell’92s onset, the spears of a maddened soldiery, and the hands of the men who said, ’93Let him be crucified.’94 With this ensign in his bleeding hand the Saviour scaled the heights of our sin. With this he mounted the walls of perdition, and amid its very smoke, and flame, and blasphemy, he waved his triumph, while demons howled with defeat, and heaven

Thronged his chariot wheels

And bore him to his throne;

Then swept their golden harps and sang,

The glorious work is done.

Again, when a grand victory has been won, it is customary to announce it by flags floating from public buildings and from trees and from the masts of ships. They are the signal for eulogy and rejoicing and festivity. So the ensign which the Church hoists is a banner of victory. There was a time when the religion of Christ was not considered respectable. Men of learning and position frowned upon it. Governments anathematized its supporters. To be a Christian was to be an underling. But mark the difference. Religion has compelled the world’92s respect. Infidelity, in the mighty effort it has made to crush it, has acknowledged its power. And there is not now a single civilized nation but in its constitution, or laws, or proclamations, pays homage to the religion of the Cross. In the war in India, when Sir Archibald Campbell found in an hour of danger that the men he ordered to the field were intoxicated, and asked for the pious men whom the Christian Havelock had under his management, he said: ’93Call out Havelock’92s saints; they are never drunk, and Havelock is always ready.’94 That Christianity which gathered its first trophies from the fishermen’92s huts on the shore of Galilee, now has Samsonian strength in its shoulders and has carried off the gates of science and worldly power. We point not to fortresses and standing armies and navies as the evidence of the Church’92s progress. We point to the men whom Christ has redeemed by his blood. What if arsenals and navy yards do not belong to the Church! We do not want them. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but spiritual, and mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. The world and Satan have no idea of the strength and heroism which God will yet let out against the forces of darkness. As yet, they have had only one round from the first regiment. The Lord of Hosts will soon appear in the field at the head of his troops. Depend upon it, that when God inspires the soul with a new life he puts in it the principle of ’93never give up.’94

In all ages of the Church, there have been those who have had a faith that was almost equal to sight, looking through persecution and reverses with as much expectation as through palpable achievements. There have been men for Christ who have acted as did the favorite troop of Brien, attacked by Fitzpatrick of Ossory. The wounded soldiers begged that they might enter the fight with the others. They said, ’93Let stakes be driven into the ground and suffer each of us, tied to and supported by one of these stakes, to battle in the ranks by the side of a sound man.’94 It is said that seven or eight hundred men, pale and emaciated from former wounds, and thus supported by stakes, struggled through the combat. Thus has it been that multitudes of the children of God, though feeling themselves weak and wounded’97perhaps in body, perhaps in estate, perhaps in soul’97supported by the staff of God’92s promise, have warred it up to the hilt in the subjugation of a world of wickedness.

We are mighty in this cause, for we have the help of pious dead. Messengers of salvation from high heaven, they visit the field. They stand behind us to keep us from ignominious retreat. They go before us to encourage us in the strife. The McCheynes and the Paysons and the Martyns and the Brainerds, an uncounted multitude of the glorified, are our coadjutors. Have you heard the Swiss tradition? The herdsmen say that three great leaders of the Helvetic nation, though seemingly dead, are only lying down under the ground, in their old-time dress, refreshing themselves with sleep, and that if at any time the liberties of their country are in danger they will immediately spring to their feet and drive back the enemy. May I not have the thought that if ever the Church of the blessed Christ shall be threatened with destruction by foes which seem too great for her strength, the Lord Himself will not only come to the deliverance, but those great ancients who have seemed to be sleeping among the dead shall immediately hear the trumpet blast of the Church militant, and full-armed, spring back to their old positions in the ranks of God, with the battle cry, ’93More than conquerors through Him that loved us.’94 Although we have already much to encourage us in the work of the world’92s evangelization, yet we must confess that much of our time has been consumed in planting our batteries and getting ready for the conflict. We have not yet begun to preach. We have not yet begun to pray. We have not yet begun to work. On the coasts of heathendom are missionary stations. They have scarcely yet begun to accomplish what they propose. It takes some time to dig the trenches and elevate the standard and direct the great guns. From what I hear, I think they are about ready now. Let but the Great Captain wave the signal, and the ringing of celestial weapons shall quake every dungeon of hell and sound up among the thrones of heaven. Pagodas and temples shall tumble under the shock, and besotted nations, flying from their idols and superstitions, shouting like the disconcerted worshipers of Baal, ’93The Lord, He is the God! The Lord, He is the God!’94

We go not alone to the field. We have invincible allies in the dumb elements of nature. As Job said, we are in league with the very stones of the field. The sun by day, and the moon by night, directly or indirectly, shall favor Christianity. The stars in their courses are marshaled for us, as they fought against Sisera. The winds of heaven are now as certainly acting in favor of Christ as when, in Reformation times, the invincible Armada, in its pride, approached the coast of England. As that proud navy directed their guns against the friends of Christ and religious liberty, God said unto His winds, ’93Seize hold of them,’94 and to the sea, ’93Swallow them.’94 The Lord, with His tempests, dashed their hulks together and splintered them on the rocks, until the flower of Spanish pride and valor lay crushed among the waves on the sea-beach. All are ours. Aye! God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost are our allies.

The Mohammedans, in their struggle to subjugate the world, had passages from the Koran inscribed on the blades of their scimiters, and we have nothing to fear if, approaching the infidelity and malice that oppose the kingdom of Christ, we shall have glittering on our swords the words of David to the giant, ’93I come to thee in the name of the Lord of Hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied.’94

Now the Church goes forth bearing precious seed, but after a while it will be the sheaf-binding, and reaper angels shall shout the harvest home. Now it is tents and marching and exposure, but then over the ranks of prostrate iniquity, and on the very walls of heaven, ’93In the name of God we will set up our banners.’94

The earth sends up its long, deep groan of pain, and clanks the great chains of its bondage, and cries by the voice of sea and land and sky, ’93How long, O Lord, how long?’94 There was a tradition on the other side of the water that the daughter of Lir was transformed into a bird of the air, and that she wandered for hundreds of years over river and lake until the arrival of Christianity, and that at the stroke of the first cathedral bell her spirit was freed. Uncounted millions of our race, by the power of sin and Satan, have been transformed into a state of wretchedness, and they wander like the poor daughter of Lir; but they shall after a while be released. When the great Church of Christ shall in those darkened lands from its tower ring out the glad tidings of the Gospel, then millions of wandering souls shall find rest in a Saviour’92s pity and a Saviour’92s love, transported from the kingdom of Satan into the kingdom of God’92s dear Son.

By and by you would hardly know the earth if you saw it. The world as a whole shall be greatly improved as the individual heart by conversion. Fraud, leaving its trickery, will go to work for an honest living. Knavery shall begin to make righteous bargains. Passion shall answer to the control of reason. Scoffers shall be changed into worshipers, and sceptics into Bible lovers. Christ shall begin His reign on earth. Whether he shall descend to the earth in person and establish a government at Jerusalem, I cannot say; but it will be an era of more than Augustan splendor. That is enough. Knowing this, we can never despair. But as we see the Church of Christ putting on her beautiful garments, and arising to shine, we will say, with the enthusiasm of Oliver Cromwell, who, standing before his sick and famine-stricken soldiers at Dunbar, saw the sun rising out of the morning mist, and pointing to it with his sword, uttered a prayer which hurled his men upon the foe like a sky full of thunderbolts and crushed them: ’93Arise, O God! Let thine enemies be scattered.’94 With the ear of faith I catch the sound of the latter-day glory. Church of Christ, unsheathe thy sword and advance into the battle. In the name of Christ, march on! Upon every school and hospital, upon every banker’92s desk and merchant’92s counter, upon every chemist’92s laboratory and astronomer’92s tower, upon shepherd’92s hut and woodman’92s cabin, upon ship’92s deck and sailor’92s hammock, far out on the sea and high up in the mountain, before the gaze of nations, under the plaudits of heaven, ’93In the name of God we will set up our banners.’94

My subject has taught you that in this contest we are not without ensigns and colors. All we want now is men to carry them. Before I sit down I must propose to each of you this great honor. Becoming a Christian is not so ignoble a thing as many have thought it. ’93It makes a man stoop,’94 you say. I know it, but it is only the stoop of an heir of royalty, who on his knees is to receive a crown of dominion. We want standard bearers at all pulpits, in all places of business’97everywhere. I do not ask you how old you are, nor how young; how weak or how strong; how dull or how sharp; nor what your home, nor who your ancestors. Without any condition, without any reserve, in the name of the God of Israel, I offer you the honor of carrying the Church’92s ensigns. Do not be afraid of the assaults of a world whose ranks you desert, nor of devils who will oppose you with infernal might. It were more blessed to fall here than stand anywhere else. It were more of an honor, engaged with Christ, to be trampled under foot with this bannered army, than, opposing Christ, to be buried like Edward I, in Egyptian porphyry.

You know in ancient times elephants were trained to fight, and that on one occasion, instead of attacking the enemy, they turned upon their owners and thousands were crushed under the stroke of their trunks and the mountain weight of their step. These mighty opportunities of work for Christ may accomplish great things in overthrowing the sin of the world, and beating to pieces its errors, but if we do not wield them aright these very advantages will, in unguarded moments, turn terribly upon us and under their heels of vengeance grind us to powder. Rejected blessings are seven-fold curses. We cannot compromise this matter. We cannot stand aside and look on. Christ has declared it: ’93All who are not with me are against me.’94 Lord Jesus, we surrender.

The prophecies intimate that there shall, before the destruction of the world, be one great battle between truth and unrighteousness. We shall probably not see it on earth. God grant that we may see it, bending from the battlements of heaven. On the side of sin shall be arrayed all forms of oppression and cruelty, led on by infamous kings and generals. The votaries of Paganism led on by their priests. The subjects of Mohammedism following the commands of their sheiks. And gluttony, and intemperance, and iniquity of every phase, shall be largely represented on the field. All the wealth and splendor and power and glory of wickedness shall be concentrated on that one decisive spot, and maddened by ten thousand previous defeats, shall gather themselves up for one last, terrible assault. With hatred to God for their cause, and blasphemy for the battle-cry, they spread out over the earth in square beyond square, and legion beyond legion, while in some overhanging cloud of blackness foul spirits of hell watch this last struggle of sin and darkness for dominion.

Scattered by the blasts of Jehovah’92s nostrils, plunder, and sin, and Satanic force shall quit the field. As the roar of the conflict sounds through the universe all worlds shall listen. The air shall be full of wings of heavenly cohorts. The work is done, and in the presence of a world reclaimed for the crown of Jesus, and amid the crumbling of tyrannies and the defeat of Satanic force, and amid the sound of heavenly acclamations, the Church shall rise up in the image of our Lord, and with the crown of victory on her head, and the sceptre of dominion in her hand, in the name of God shall set up her banners. Then Himalaya shall become Mount Zion, and the Pyrenees, Moriah, and the oceans the walking place of him who trod the wave crests of Galilee, and the great heavens become a sounding-board which shall strike back the sound of exultation to the earth till it rebound again to the throne of the Almighty. Angel of the Apocalypse, fly! fly! for who will stand in the way of thy might of resist the sweep of thy wing?

Autor: T. De Witt Talmage