WE hear a good deal today about “records” of various kinds, and we will just refer to one more. So far as we know, Methuselah, the son of Enoch and grandfather of Noah, carries the palm for old-age record, covering the enormous period of nine hundred and sixty-nine years, which is about fourteen times longer than our present comparatively small life-term of “seventy years.” There is not much said in the Bible about this record man, but we may just call attention to two very special things connected with him.
The first is “he lived,” and the second is “he died.” He lived so many long years, but even that oldest man on record had to part company absolutely with everything in this world, and it is very certain, had he still been living upon earth, it would have been only a question of time, and he would, after all, have had to die.
DIE? YES, DIE! BUT WHY DIE?
Some say that death is merely the result of decay of nature from old age and the like. Well, in a way that may be so, but it is by no means the mainspring of the answer. There is a much deeper cause for death than that. God, who is holy, with whom we all have to do, tells us in His Word, that “death passed upon all men, for that ALL HAVE SINNED,” and that “the wages of sin is death.” Yet there is something even still more serious than death, and that is—
“AFTER THIS THE JUDGMENT.”
There are people who do not seem afraid to die. That infidel we read of said on his death-bed, when his friends were bolstering him up, “I have plenty of courage to die, but what makes me a coward is the judgment, because I am not ready for it.” No indeed, “not ready for it,” and no wonder, when he had been so busy for many a day denying the very existence of the Saviour-God who had been waiting so long and patiently in love and grace to save such a sinner as he. Everything in this world bears the stamp of death, everything in heaven carries the impress of eternal life, while everything in hell is marked with endless judgment and misery. Whether a soul departs this life saved or unsaved, it is to enter upon endless duration, and
“AS THE TREE FALLS, SO WILL IT LIE.”
Friend, sooner or later you will be forced to face this solemn question, and why not now in the day of grace. God would have all to be saved, and He waits in the attitude of giving you a very welcome reception. God is so satisfied with what the Sinless One has done for sinners on Calvary’s cross of shame and death, that He has raised Him from the dead and given Him glory. When on earth Jesus said: “I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.
BELIEVEST THOU THIS?”
Dear reader, if you accept that blessed Person and put your trust in His precious blood that cleanses from all sin, eternal blessing is yours, and, in due course, you will live where
“THERE SHALL BE NO MORE DEATH.”
J. N.