HE October sun was shining brightly, and its glad rays were watched by a dying man. It was the last time his large blue eyes were to see those golden streaks, far brighter glory awaited him. Now he must face that great reality―death―and he could do so calmly and quietly, for his Saviour had taken away the sting and dispelled the gloom. As the afternoon closed in and the sun was sinking, the invalid called his wife, and then his children, around his bedside. From the eldest, to whom he gave his mother’s Bible, to the little child who could hardly understand―one by one they were brought in, and each, separately, said a sad farewell. One only was absent, and he, thousands of miles away, was ploughing the sea in an East Indiaman.
We must leave the sick chamber a moment and visit the sailor son. He is asleep in his bunk, and in his dreams wanders to his dear home in the beautiful county of Kent. He sees the red house and the garden, every corner of which he knows. Now he seems to enter one room―it is his father’s―and in his dream he beholds those whom he loves around a deathbed, and sees his beloved father passing away.
The tears were on his pillow when the sailor lad awoke, and with a heavy heart, he went on deck and told the captain his dream, and said he felt sure it was too true. And so it was, for as that short October day died away, the sun of the dying Christian set, but only to rise and shine in fairer climes.
Before the father passed away he requested that his watch chain should be brought to him, and, taking a large gold locket off it, he said to his wife, “Give this to my absent boy, with my love and blessing, and tell him I did not forget him.”
A year has passed―the East Indiaman has arrived at Liverpool, and the sailor boy, weather beaten and grown, is at the door of his new home. What a greeting he receives! What a long, loving kiss from his widowed mother! How his heart beats with pleasure once more to see her and those he loves! But the father is not there.
“My boy,” said his mother, “your father did not forget you,” and she produced the golden locket. What a treasure it was to the boy! As he raised it to his lips, his kisses told how much, how very much, he valued it; and even now, although years have rolled by, the chief of his treasures is his father’s love token.
The memory of some loved one is fresh in your mind, dear reader, and probably you have your love tokens in close keeping; will you once more meet your friends who have gone to be with the Lord? Shall the love which still burns in your heart toward them be once more rejoiced by your meeting them in the home above, where there are no separations?
The bright time of the assembling together of all of God’s children is near at hand. What are your hopes for that day? Have you the Christ of God as your Saviour? Have you received God’s gift―His beloved Son, the Saviour of the sinner, as your own? Do you answer humbly, but confidently, Yes? Is it yours to say God has by His Spirit made His Christ your Saviour? Then, like the writer, you can look on beyond the homes of this poor dying world and beyond the grave, to the reunions and the bliss of heaven.