Concerning Death

Concerning Death

(No. 1922)

A SERMON DELIVERED ON LORD'S-DAY MORNING, SEPTEMBER 26, 1886,

BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

"For I know that You will bring me to death, and to the house appointed
for all living.'" Job 30:23.

JOB suffered from a terrible sickness which filled him with pain both
day and night. It is supposed that, in addition to his grievous
eruptions upon the skin, he endured great difficulty in breathing. He
says in the 18th verse, "By the great force of my disease is my garment
changed: it binds me about as the collar of my coat." His clothes were
soiled and clung to him. His skin was blackened and seemed to be
tightened. He was like a man whose tunic strangles him–the collar of
his garment seemed to be fast bound about his throat. Those who have
suffered from it, know what distress is occasioned by this complaint,
especially when they are also compelled to cry, "My bones are pierced
in me in the night season: and my sinews take no rest." At such a time
Job thought of death and, surely, if at any period in our lives we
should consider our latter end, it is when the frail tent of our body
begins to tremble because the cords are loosened and the curtain is
torn!

It is the general custom with sick people to talk about "getting well"
and those who visit them, even when they are gracious people, will see
the tokens of death upon them and yet will speak as if they were
hopeful of their recovery. I remember a father asking me when I prayed
with a consumptive girl to be sure not to mention death. In such cases
it would be far more sensible for the sick man to turn his thoughts
towards eternity and stand prepared for the great change. When our God,
by our affliction, calls upon us to number our days, let us not refuse
to do so! I admire the wisdom of Job, that he does not shirk the
subject of death, but dwells upon it as an appropriate topic, saying,
"I know that You will bring me to death, and to the house appointed for
all living."

Yet Job made a mistake in the hasty conclusion which he drew from his
grievous affliction. Under depression of spirit he felt sure that he
must very soon die. He feared that God would not relax the blows of His
hands until his body became a ruin–and then he would have rest. But he
did not die at that time. He was fully recovered and God gave him twice
as much as he had before! A life of usefulness, happiness and honor lay
before him and yet he had set up his own tombstone and reckoned himself
a dead man. It is a pity for us to pretend to predict the future, for
we certainly cannot see an inch before us. As it is idle with daydreams
to fascinate the heart into a groundless expectation, so is it equally
foolish to increase the evil of the day by forebodings of tomorrow. Who
knows what is to be? Therefore why should I wish to lift up the corner
of the curtain and peer into what God has hidden? Some of those who
have been most sure that they would soon die, have lived longer than
others. A Prophet once prayed to die and yet he never saw death. From
the lips of Elijah, who was to be caught up by a whirlwind into Heaven,
it was a strange prayer–"Take away my life; for I am not better than
my fathers."

It is the part of a brave man and especially of a believing man,
neither to dread death nor to sigh for it–neither to fear it nor to
court it. Possessing his soul in patience, he should not despair of
life when harshly pressed and he should be always more eager to run his
race well than to reach its end. It is no work of men of faith to
predict their own deaths. These things are with God. How long we shall
live on earth, we know not and need not wish to know. We have not the
choosing of short or long life and if we had such choice, it would be
wise to refer it back to our God. "Father, into Your hands I commend my
spirit," is an admirable prayer for living as well as for dying saints.
To wish to pry between the folded leaves of the Book of Destiny is to
desire a questionable privilege–doubtless we live better because we
cannot foresee the moment when this life shall reach its finis.

Job made a mistake as to the date of his death, but he made no mistake
as to the fact itself. He spoke truly when he said, "I know that You
will bring me to death." Some day or other, the Lord will call us from
our home above ground to the house appointed for all living. I invite
you, this morning, to consider this unquestioned Truth of God. Do you
start back? Why do you do so? Is it not greatly wise to talk about our
last hours? "We want a cheerful theme." Do you? Is not this a cheerful
theme to you? It is solemn, but it ought also to be welcome to you! You
say that you cannot stand the thought of death. Then you greatly need
it! Your shrinking from it proves that you are not in a right state of
mind, or else you would take it into due consideration without
reluctance. That is a poor happiness which overlooks the most important
of facts. I would not endure a peace which could only be maintained by
thoughtlessness. You have something yet to learn if you are a Christian
and yet are not prepared to die! You need to reach a higher state of
Grace and attain to a firmer and more forceful faith. That you are as
yet a babe in Grace is clear from your admission that to depart and be
with Christ does not seem to be a better thing for you than to abide in
the flesh!

Should it not be the business of this life to prepare for the next life
and, in that respect, to prepare to die? But how can a man be prepared
for that which he never thinks of? Do you mean to take a leap in the
dark? If so, you are in an unhappy condition and I beseech you as you
love your own soul to escape from such peril by the help of God's Holy
Spirit!

"Oh," says one, "but I do not feel called upon to think of it." Why,
the very season of the year calls you to it. Each fading leaf
admonishes you. You will most surely have to die–why not think upon
the inevitable? It is said that the ostrich buries its head in the sand
and fancies itself secure when it can no longer see the hunter. I can
hardly fancy that even a bird can be quite so foolish! And I beseech
you do not enact such madness. If I do not think of death, yet death
will think of me! If I will not go to death by meditation and
consideration, death will come to me! Let me, then, meet it like a man
and, to that end, let me look it in the face! Death comes into our
houses and steals away our loved ones. Seldom do I enter this pulpit
without missing some accustomed face from its place. Never a week
passes over this Church without some of our happy fellowship being
caught away to the still happier fellowship above! This week a youthful
member has melted away and her mourning parents are in our midst. We as
a congregation are continually being summoned to remember our mortality
and so, whether we will hear him or not, Death is preaching to us each
time we assemble in this house! Does he come so often with God's
message and shall we refuse to hear? No, let us lend a willing ear and
heart and hear what God, the Lord, would say to us at this time!

Oh, you that are youngest, you that are most full of health and
strength, I lovingly invite you not to put away this subject from you!
Remember, the youngest may be taken away. Early in the life of my boys
I took them to the old churchyard of Wimbledon and bade them measure
some of the little graves within that enclosure–and they found several
green hillocks which were shorter than themselves. I tried thus to
impress upon their young minds the uncertainty of life. I would have
every child remember that he is not too young to die. Let others know
that they are not too strong to die. The stoutest trees of the forest
are often the first to fall beneath the destroyer's axe. Paracelsus,
the renowned physician of old time, prepared a medicine of which he
said that if a man took it regularly, he would never die, except it
were of extreme old age. Yet Paracelsus himself died a young man!

Those who think they have found the secret of immortality will yet
learn that they are under a strong delusion. None of us can discover a
spot where we are out of bow-shot of the last enemy and, therefore, it
would be idiotic to refuse to think of it! A certain vainglorious
French Duke forbade his attendants ever to mention death in his hearing
and when his secretary read to him the words, "The late King of Spain,"
he turned upon him with contemptuous indignation and asked him what he
meant by it. The poor secretary could only stammer out, "It is a title
which they take." Yes, indeed, it is a title we shall all take and it
will be well to note how it will befit us! The King of Terrors comes to
kings, nor does he disdain to strip the pauper of his scanty flesh–to
you, to me, to all he comes–let us all make ready for his sure
approach.

I. First, then, very solemnly under the teaching of God's Spirit, I
call your attention to a piece of PERSONAL KNOWLEDGE–"I know that You
will bring me to death, and to the house appointed for all living." A
general Truth of God here receives a personal application.

Job knew that he should be brought to the grave because he perceived
the universality of that fact in reference to others. He lived on the
verge of an age when life was longer than now and yet the Patriarch had
never known a person who had not, after a certain age, left this
earthly stage. Cast your eyes over every land, glance from the pole to
the equator

and along to the other pole, and see if this is not the universal law,
that man must be dissolved in death. "It is appointed unto men once to
die." Only two men entered the next world without seeing death, but
those two exceptions prove the rule. Another great exception is yet to
come which I would never overlook. Perhaps the Lord Jesus Christ may
personally come before we see death–and when He comes, we that are
alive and remain shall not fall asleep–but even then "we shall all be
changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet,
for the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed."

This is the great exception to the rule and we cheerfully allow it to
dwell upon our minds, but if the Master tarries, we, ourselves, shall
not be exempt from the common rule. We must all die. Dust to dust,
ashes to ashes must be the last word for us among the sons of men. I
hope nobody here is so foolish as to suppose that he shall live on and
never be gathered with the great assembly in the house appointed for
all living. Last week one poor fanatic who taught that she, herself,
would never see corruption, was taken from the midst of her dupes to be
laid in the sepulcher. A clergyman whom I well knew, lectured upon his
having found the means of living here forever–but he, too, has gone
over to the great majority. That we can avoid the grave is a dream, an
idle dream, not worthy of a moment's controversy! All flesh shall see
corruption in due time, if it is not changed at the Lord's coming.
"What man is he that lives and shall not see death? Shall he deliver
his soul from the hand of the grave?" In their myriads, the races of
the past have subsided into the earth. In one endless harvest, death
has reaped down all born of woman. Job knew that he, himself, should be
brought to death because all others had been brought there.

He knew it, also, because he had considered the origin of mankind. In
our text, the Hebrew expression would run somewhat thus–"I know that
You will bring me to death." He had never died before, yet the
expression is constantly used, as in the following passage–"You turn
man to destruction and say, Return, you children of men." We were never
in the grave before–how then can we return? Was it not said to Adam,
"Dust you are, and unto dust shall you return?" We were taken out of
the earth and it is only by a prolonged miracle that this dust of ours
is kept from going back to its kindred–the day will come when our
earth shall embrace its mother and so the body shall return to its
original. If we had come from Heaven, we might dream that we should not
die. If we had been cast in some celestial mold, as angels are, we
might fancy that the grave would never encase us. But being of the
earth, earthy, we must go back to earth! Job says, "I have said to
corruption, You are my father: to the worm, You are my mother and my
sister." Thus we have affinities which call us back to the dust. Job
knew this and, therefore, seeing from where men came, he inferred–and
inferred cor-rectly–that he, himself, would return to the earth.

Further, Job had a recollection of man's sin and knew that all men are
under condemnation on account of it. Does he not say that the grave is
a "house appointed for all living?" It is appointed simply because of
the penal sentence passed upon our first parent and, in him, upon the
whole race. "Dust you are, and unto dust shall you return," was not for
father Adam only, but for all the innumerable sons that come of his
loins. "Death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." "In Adam
all die." Our babes, who have not personally sinned, yet feel the
blight of Adam's sin and wither in the bud. Our dear children who are
nearing manhood and womanhood are cut down and gathered in their
beauty. We, also, in the prime and flower of life, bow our heads before
the killing wind of death. As for our Sires bending, each man, upon his
staff, their posture salutes the tomb towards which they bend. A common
fall and a common sin have brought on us universal death. Look on our
vast cemeteries and say, "Who slew all these?" The only answer is,
"Death came by sin and so death passed upon all men, for that all have
sinned."

Once more, Job arrived at this personal knowledge through his own
bodily feebleness. Perhaps he had not always said, "I know that You
will bring me to death," but now, as he sits upon the dunghill and
scrapes himself with the potsherd and writhes in anguish and is
depressed in spirit, he realizes his own mortality. When the tent pole
quivers in the storm and the covering flaps to and fro in the wind–and
the whole structure threatens to dissolve in the tempest–then the
tenant of the habitation, chilled to his marrow, needs not to be
instructed that his home is frail. He knows it well enough. We need
many touches of the rod of affliction before we really learn the
undeniable truth of our mortality. Every man, woman and child in this
place should unite with me in saying, "I know that You will bring me to
death." And yet it is highly probable that a large number of us do not
know this to be so.

"It is a commonplace matter of fact which we all admit," cries one. I
know it is so and yet in the very commonness of the truth there lies a
temptation to overlook its personal application. We know this as though
we knew it not! To many,

it is not taken into the reckoning and it is not a factor in their
being. They do not number their days so as to apply their hearts unto
wisdom. That poet was half inspired who said, "All men count all men
mortal but themselves." Is it not so with us? We do not really expect
to die. We reckon that we shall live a very considerable time. Even
those who are very aged still think that as a few others have lived to
an extreme old age, so may they! I am afraid there are few who could
say with a gracious soldier, "I thank God I fear not death. These 30
years together I never rose from my bed in the morning and reckoned
upon living till night."

Those who die daily will die easily. Those who make themselves familiar
with the tomb will find it transfigured into a bed–the morgue will
become a couch. The man who rejoices in the Covenant of Grace is
cheered by the fact that even death, itself, is comprehended among the
things which belong to the Believer. I would to God we had learned this
lesson. We should not, then, put death aside among the lumber, nor set
it upon the shelf among the things which we never intend to use. Let us
live as dying men among dying men and then we shall truly live! This
will not make us unhappy, for surely no heir of Heaven will fret
because he is not doomed to live here forever. It were a sad sentence
if we were bound over to dwell in this poor world forever! Who among us
would wish to realize in his own person the fabled life of the
Wandering Jew, or even of Prester John? Who desires to go up and down
among the sons of men for twice a thousand years?

If the Supreme should say, "Live here forever," it were a malediction
rather than a benediction! To grow ripe and to be carried home like
shocks of corn in their season–is not this a fit and fair thing? To
labor through a blessed day and then, at nightfall, to go home and to
receive the wages of Grace–is there anything dark and dismal about
that? God forgive you that you ever thought so! If you are the Lord's
own child, I invite you to look this Home-going in the face until you
change your thought and see no more in it gloom and dread, but a very
Heaven of hope and glory!

Suffer not my text to be a dirge, but turn it into a golden Psalm, as
you say, "I know that You will bring me to death, and to the house
appointed for all living."

II. Having thus discoursed upon a piece of personal knowledge, I now
beg you to see in my text the shining of HOLY INTELLIGENCE. Perhaps,
when I read the words in your hearing, you did not notice all they
contain. Let me then point out to you certain hidden jewels. Job, even
in his anguish, does not, for a moment, forget his God. He speaks of
Him, here–"I know that You will bring me to death." He perceives that
he will not die apart from God. He does not say his sore boils or his
strangulation will bring him to death, but, "You will bring me to
death." He does not trace his approaching death to chance, or to fate,
or to second causes–no, he sees only the hand of the Lord! To Him
belong both life and death. Say not that the wasting consumption took
away your darling! Complain not that a fierce fever slew your father,
but feel that the Lord, Himself, has done it! "It is the Lord, let Him
do what seems Him good." Blame not the accident, neither complain of
the pestilence, for Jehovah, Himself, gathers Home His own. He only
will remove you and me. "I know that You will bring me to death." There
is, to my heart, much delicious comfort in the language before us!

I love that old-fashioned verse–

"Plagues and deaths around me fly. Till He bids I cannot die– Not a
single shaft can hit Till the God of Love thinks fit."

In the midst of malaria and pestilence, we are safe with God. "Because
you have made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the Most High, your
habitation; there shall no evil befall you, neither shall any plague
come near your dwelling." Beneath the shadow of Jehovah's wings we need
not be afraid for the terror by night, nor for the arrow that flies by
day, nor for the pestilence that walks in darkness. We are immortal
till our work is done! Be you, therefore, quiet in the day of evil.
Rest peacefully in the day of destruction–all things are ordered by
wisdom and precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His
saints. No forces in the world are outside of His control. God suffers
no foes to trespass on the domain of Providence. All things are
ordained of God and specially are our deaths under the peculiar
oversight of our exalted Lord and Savior! He lives and was dead–and
bears the keys of death at His belt. He Himself shall guide us through
death's iron gate. Surely what the Lord wills and what He, Himself,
works, cannot be otherwise than acceptable to His chosen! Let us
rejoice that in life and death we are in the Lord's hands.

The text seems to me to cover another sweet and comforting thought,
namely, that God will be with us in death. "I know that You will bring
me to death." He will bring us on our journey till He brings us to the
journey's end–He, Himself, our Escort and our Leader. We shall have
the Lord's company even to our dying hour–"You will bring me to

death." He leads me even to those still waters which men so much fear.
"Yes, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will
fear no evil for You are with me. Your rod and Your staff, they comfort
me." Beloved, we live with God, do we not? Shall we not die with Him?
Our life is one long holiday when the Lord Jesus keeps us company–
will He leave us at the end? Because God is with us, we go forth with
joy and are led forth with peace! The mountains and the hills break
forth before us into singing and all the trees of the field clap their
hands. Will they not be equally glad when we rise to our eternal
reward? It is not living that is happiness, but living with God–it is
not dying that will be wretchedness, but dying without God!

The child has to go to bed, but it does not cry if mother is going
upstairs with it. It is quite dark, but what of that? The mother's eyes
are lamps to the child. It is very lonely and still. Not so–the
mother's arms are the child's company and her voice is its music. O
Lord, when the hour comes for me to go to bed, I know that You will
take me there and speak lovingly into my ear–therefore I cannot fear,
but will even look forward to that hour of Your manifested love! You
had not thought of that, had you? You have been afraid of death, but
you cannot be so any longer if your Lord will bring you there in His
arms of love. Dismiss all fear and calmly proceed on your way, though
the shades thicken around you, for the Lord is your light and your
salvation!

It may not be in the text, but it naturally follows from it, that if
God brings us to death, He will bring us up again. Job, in another
passage, declared that he was sure that God would vindicate His
cause–"I know," he says, "that my Redeemer lives and that He shall
stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though after my skin, worms
destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God." Certain wise men
who would expunge the very idea of a resurrection out of the Old
Testament have tried to make out that Job expected to be restored and
vindicated in this life, but he evidently did not expect any such
thing, for, according to the text, it is clear that he feared he would
die at once! We gather from this verse, by a negative process of
reasoning, that the living Redeemer and the vindication which was to be
brought to him by that living Redeemer were matters of hope in another
life after death!

Beloved, you and I know this Truth of God from many declarations of our
Lord in His Divine Book. Though we die in one sense, yet in another we
shall not die, but live! Though our bodies shall, for a little while,
sleep in their lowly resting places, our souls shall be forever with
the Lord. We shall spend an interval as unclothed spirits in the
company of Him to whom we are united by vital bonds–and then the
trumpet of the archangel shall summon our bodies from their sleeping
places to be reunited with our souls! These bodies, the comrades of our
warfare, shall be companions of our victory! "This mortal must put on
immortality."

He who raised up Jesus shall also raise us up! We shall come forth from
the land of the enemy in fullness of joy. Therefore we ought to take
great comfort from the words of our text and be of good courage. We
shall die–there is no discharge in this war. We shall die–let us not
sit down like cowards and weep tears bitter with despair. We sorrow not
as those that are without hope! Let us view our departure in the soft
and mellow light which is shed upon it by the words, "You shall bring
me to death, and to the house appointed for all living."

III. I pass on to notice the QUIET EXPECTATION which breathes in this
text. It is my prayer that we may enjoy the same restfulness. My dear
Brothers and Sisters, the text is full of a calm stillness of hope. Job
speaks of his death as a certainty, but speaks of it without regret.
No, more than that, if you read the connection–it is with a smile of
desire, with a flush of expectancy–"I know that You will bring me to
death, and to the house appointed for all living." Many men are unable
to regard death with composure–they are disturbed and alarmed by the
very hint of it.

1 want to reason with those disciples of our Lord Jesus who are in
bondage from fear of death. What are the times when men are able to
speak of death quietly and happily? Sometimes they do so in periods of
great bodily suffering. I have, on several occasions, felt everything
like fear of dying taken from me simply by the process of weariness,
for I could not wish to live any longer in such pain as I then
endured–and I have no doubt that such an experience is common among
sufferers from acute disorders. The sons and daughters of affliction
are not only trained to wait the Lord's will, but they are even driven
to desire to depart–they would sooner rest from so stern a struggle
than continue the fierce conflict.

It is well that pain and anguish should cut the ropes which moor us to
these earthly shores, that we may spread our sails for a voyage to the
Better Land! Oh, what a place Heaven must be to those whose bones have
worn through their skin through long lying upon the bed of anguish!
What a change from the workhouse or the infirmary to the New Jerusalem!
I have stood at the bedside of suffering saints where I could not but
weep at the sight of their pains–what a transi-

tion from such agony to bliss! Track the glorious flight of the chosen
one from yon weary couch to the crown, the harp, the palm branch and
the King in His beauty! The bitter suffering of the body helps the
Believer to look upon his translation as a thing to be desired.

The growing infirmities of age work in the same way. Yonder venerable
Sister has, at length, become quite deaf. Her great delight was to
attend the House of God and she still comes, but the service is a dumb
show to her–she cannot hear her pastor's voice which was once so sweet
in her ears. Her eyes, after being helped with more powerful glasses,
are, at length, unable to read that dear old Bible which remained her
sole solace when she could not hear. Her existence, now, is but half
life–she cannot walk far–even in crossing the room, her limbs
tremble. She is already half gone. Do you not think that she will now
feel happy to quit life, even as a ripe apple easily leaves the tree?
At any rate, there will be little strength with which to resist the
plucking of Death's hands. It will be well when the spirit breaks away
from the dilapidated hovel of the time-worn body and rises to the
building of God–the house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens!
Many of God's aged servants who have been spared to advanced years have
come to look out for the setting of earth's sun without a fear of
darkness. While they have seemed to have one foot in the grave, they
have really had one foot in Heaven!

Beloved, without either falling into sickness, or aging into infirmity,
we can reach this state of mind in another way–by being filled with an
entire submission to the will of God. When the decree of God is our
delight, we feel no abhorrence to anything which He appoints, either in
life or in death. If we are living as Christians ought to live, we have
denied our self-will and we have accepted the Lord to be the Arbiter of
all events, the absolute Ruler of our being. If your soul is truly
married to Christ, you find your supreme bliss in the Bridegroom's
will. Your cry is, "Your will be done!" This should be our ordinary
condition in daily life and it is an admirable preparation for thinking
of death with composure. Let me live, if God will be with me in life!
Let me die, if He will be with me in death! So long as we are, "forever
with the Lord," what matters where else we are? We will not further ask
when or where–our when is "forever"–our where is "with the Lord."
Delight in God is the cure for dread of death!

Next, I believe that great holiness sets us free from the love of this
world and makes us ready to depart. By great holiness, I mean great
horror of sin and great longing after perfect purity. When a man feels
sin within him, he hates it and longs to be delivered from it. He
loathes the sin that is around him and cries, "Woe is me, that I
sojourn in Mesech, that I dwell in the tents of Kedar!" Have you ever
been cast in the midst of blasphemers? I am sure you have then sighed
to be in Heaven. If you have been sickened by the drunkenness and
debauchery of this city, you have cried, "Oh that I had wings like a
dove! For then would I fly away and be at rest." Did you not wish as
much last year when the lid was being lifted from the reeking caldron
of London's unnatural lust? I am sure I did. I sighed for a lodge in
some vast wilderness where rumor of such villainy might never reach me
again. In the midst of human sin, if the trumpet were sounded, "up and
away," you would be glad to hear it so that you might speed to the fair
land where sin and sorrow will never assail you again!

Another thing that will make us look at death with complacency is when
we have a full assurance that we are in Christ and that, come what may,
nothing can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus
our Lord. Doubt your salvation and you may well be afraid to die. Let
even a shadow of doubt fall on the clear mirror in which you see your
loving Lord and you will be disquieted. If you can say, "I know whom I
have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I
have committed unto Him against that day," you cannot fear! What reason
can you have for alarm? A Christian should go to his bed at night
without an anxious care as to whether he shall wake up in this world or
in the next. He should so live that nothing would need to be altered if
his last hour should strike.

Let us imitate Mr. Wesley's calm anticipation of his end. A lady once
asked Dr. Wesley, "Suppose that you knew you were to die at twelve
o'clock tomorrow night, how would you spend the intervening time?"
"How, Madam?" he replied, "why just as I intend to spend it now. I
should preach this evening at Gloucester and again at five tomorrow
morning. After that I should ride to Tewkesbury, preach in the
afternoon and meet the society in the evening. I should then repair to
friend Martin's house, who expects to entertain me, converse and pray
with the family as usual, retire to my room at ten o'clock, commend
myself to my heavenly Father, lie down to rest and wake up in Glory!"

Live in such a way that any day would make a suitable top stone for
life! Live so that you need not change your mode of living, even if
your sudden departure were immediately predicted to you! When you so
live, you will look upon death without fear. We usually fear because we
have cause for fear–when all is right we shall bid farewell to terror!

Let me add that there are times when our joys run high, when the big
waves come rolling in from the Pacific of eternal bliss! Then we see
the King in His beauty by the eye of faith and though it is but a dim
vision, we are so charmed with it that our love of Him makes us
impatient to behold Him face to face. Have you not sometimes felt that
you could sit in this congregation and sing yourself away to
everlasting bliss? These high days and holidays are not always with us.
All the days of the week are not Sabbaths and all our halting places
are not Elim. Brothers and Sisters, when we do play upon the
high-sounding cymbals, then we are for joining the angelic chorus! When
we feel Heaven within us and stand like the cherubim above the Mercy
Seat with outstretched wings, then we do not dread the thought of
speedy flight! "Now, Lord, why do I wait? My hope is in You." Yes, we
even cry with Simeon, "Now let Your servant depart in peace, according
to Your Word." Brethren, we shall soon be on the wing! Then will we
rise and sing and sing as we rise! We will ascend yon blue sky and,
within the jeweled portal, we will spend eternity in praise!

I hope some of you are getting up, a bit, out of your notion that to
think of death is gloomy work. I trust you will begin to view it with
hope and confidence.

IV. I conclude by saying that this subject affords us SACRED
INSTRUCTION. "I know that You will bring me to death, and to the house
appointed for all living." Brothers and Sisters, I shall not always
have the privilege of coming here on the Sabbath to speak with you.
Perhaps, before long, another voice will invite your attention and I
shall be silent in the grave. Neither will you mingle in this throng
which so happily gathers here–not much longer will you sit among those
who frequent these lower courts. What then?

Let us prepare for death. Let us cleave to the Lord Jesus who is our
All. Make your calling and election sure. Believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ and believe intensely. Repent of sin and fly from it earnestly
and with your whole heart.

Live diligently. Live while you live. Let every moment be spent as you
will wish to have spent it when you survey life from your last pillow.
Let us live unto God in Christ by the Holy Spirit. May the Lord quicken
our pace by the thought that it is but a little while! A short day will
not allow loitering. Do we not live too much as if we played at living?
A man will preach a poor sermon if he thinks, "I shall preach for
another 20 years." We must preach as though we never might preach
again. You will teach that class very badly, this afternoon, if you
have a notion that you can afford to be a little slovenly since you can
make up, in the future, for the neglects of the present. Drop no
stitches. Do all your work at your best. Do a day's work in a day and
have no balance of debt to carry over to tomorrow's account. Soon shall
you and I stand before the Judgement Seat of Christ to give an account
of the things done in the body–therefore let us live as in the light
of that day of days, doing work which may bear that fierce light which
beats about the Great White Throne.

Next to that, let us learn from the general assembly in the house
appointed for all living to walk very humbly. A common tomb must
accommodate us all in the end, therefore let us despise all pride of
birth, rank, or wealth. There are no distinctions in the last Meeting
House–the rich and the poor meet together and the slave is free from
his master. I hate that pride which makes persons carry themselves as
if they were more than mortal. "I have said, you are gods; but you
shall die like men." A voice from the tombs proclaims a grim equality
in death–

"Princes, this clay must be your bed, In spite of all your towers; The
tall, the wise, the reverend head Must lie as low as ours."

Therefore speak no more so exceedingly proud. It is madness for dying
men to boast! When Saladin lay a-dying he bade them take his winding
sheet and carry it upon a lance through the camp, with the
proclamation, "This is all that remains of the mighty Saladin, the
conqueror of nations!" A lingerer in the graveyard will take up your
skull, one day, and moralize upon it, little knowing how wise a man you
were! None will then do you reverence. Therefore, be humble.

Beprompt, for life is brief. If your children are to be trained up in
God's fear, begin with them today. If you are to win souls, continue at
the holy labor without pause. You will soon be gone from all
opportunity of doing good, therefore, whatever your hand finds to do,
do it with all your might. When the Eastern emperors were crowned at
Constantinople, it is said to have been a custom for the royal mason to
set before his majesty a certain number of marble slabs, one of which
he was to choose to be his tombstone. It was well for him to remember
his funeral at his coronation! I bring

before you, now, the unwritten marbles of life! Which will you have,
holiness or sin, Christ or self? When you have chosen, you will begin
to write the inscription upon it, for your life's works will be your
memorial. God help us to be diligent in His business, for it is not
long that we can be at it!

Men and women, project yourselves into eternity–get away from
time–for you must soon be driven away from it. You are birds with
wings, sit not on these boughs forever blinking in the dark like owls.
Bestir yourselves and mount like eagles. Rise to the heights above the
present. Life is a short day at its longest and when its sun goes down,
it leaves you in eternity. Eternal woe or eternal joy will fill your
undying spirit. Your indestructible self must swim in endless bliss or
sink in fathomless misery! If you mean to be lost, count the cost and
know what you are doing. If you have set your mind on sin and its
consequences, do the deed deliberately and do not make a sport of it.
Oh, Sirs, some of you will, one of these days, wake up as from an awful
dream. Oh that you could foresee the scene which awaits you!

Those were strong words, but they were the words of Jesus–"And in Hell
he lifted up his eyes, being in torments." These words reveal none of
that pretty nonsense which some prattle about–"a larger hope"–yet
Jesus spoke them and His hope was of the largest. He that loved you
better than these philosophers love you, also said, "Beside all this,
between us and you there is a great gulf fixed so that they which would
pass from there to you, cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would
come from there." Our Lord put it very strongly. If you mean to dare
the infernal terrors, I can do no less than ask you to know what you
are doing. If you have chosen sin, you have chosen ruin! Begin to
consider it and see whether it is worth while.

But if you have chosen Christ, mercy and eternal life and, if by faith
these are yours, begin to enjoy them now! Rehearse the music of the
skies. Taste the delights of fellowship with God even here! Rejoice in
the victory which now overcomes the world, even our faith. You will be
in the Glory Land before long and some of you much sooner than you
think. So, as the sermon ends, under a sense of my own frailty, I bid
you a sincere adieu. Until the day breaks and the shadows flee
away–fare you well.