“Make me to hear joy and gladness, that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice.” ―PSA, 51:8.
HENRY F― was a billiard-marker in the hotel at a noted watering-place of favorite resort in the West of England. Himself an excellent player, he often engaged with the frequenters of the “table,” and it was nothing unusual to find the exciting interest of the play prolonged to an advanced hour, especially during the “season,” with its influx of visitors, many of whom vainly seek happiness in such-like pursuits. But one night in the autumn of 186― the game went on beyond the ordinary and, after repeated successes and reverses, he retired as unsatisfied as at the commencement, for the so-called pleasures of the world yield no satisfaction. Wearied with excitement, he lay later than usual the next morning. Not caring for breakfast he arranged with a companion to take a stroll to the shore. It was a stormy morning, the wind blowing a perfect hurricane, and the object of their walk was to watch the effect of the storm on the vessels near that rockbound coast. As they were leaving the hotel, being desired not to go without having breakfast, his friend yielded, but Henry, with that strange determination which so often precedes the most dreadful casualties, went alone, little thinking a calamity that seemed scarcely better than death awaited him, and within an hour he would be carried back helpless and all but lifeless.
The havoc made by the storm was not confined to the sea. Many have cause to remember that day, loss of life and damage to property being considerable on land, beside which many of our brave sailors, having reached old England’s shores, found graves beneath the foaming waters just in sight of home. At the moment F― was passing a large building in course of erection, the roof of an adjacent workshop was raised by a terrific gust, and in another moment he was buried beneath it. To extricate what seemed in all human probability the lifeless corpse was at once proceeded with, and great was the relief of those assembled to find life was not extinct; but so crushed was the poor body that it could only be identified by the clothes. He was now conveyed to the hotel which he had left but a short time since. The surgeon in attendance gave his opinion that he would only survive a few hours, but God willed otherwise. He “who killeth and maketh alive” said “Live,” and in a few days he was removed to the hospital in a neighboring town, where his friends resided, as it was thought well for him to have the advice of the doctors there. Here he learned that if he lived he would be a helpless cripple. What a blow for one just in the flower of his youth!
Having been an inmate some months, and getting no better, he wished to be removed to his borne. He was brought to the little room where we first saw him, at the age of nineteen, and laid upon his bed, from which he never rose.
We were at once struck with his open and intelligent countenance, as few could fail to be, although now pale and thin from suffering. The lower part of his body being paralyzed from the shock to the spine, he lay thoroughly helpless.
We now became intensely interested in him, believing the Lord had claimed him for Himself by such a merciful preservation from death. We trusted it had led him to think of his need as a sinner, but discovered he was perfectly indifferent as to his real state, his one thought being the possibility of recovery. He had not realized that God had purposes of love towards him; although He had “broken his bones,” His desire was to save the soul. As yet he knew not the hand that seemed to be laid so heavily upon him; he only felt the weight of the stroke, and knew not the love that sent it. Narrow indeed was the range of his sight, for his eyes were not yet opened to behold Him who afterward so filled the vision of his soul that his chamber was like a Paradise. He listened attentively as we told him of the love of God in giving “His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
After visiting him for about twelve months, without apparent result, and being made to feel how utterly powerless we were, one night the Lord spoke to him during a thunderstorm, giving him to see himself in his true condition, and to cry out, “Woe is me, for I am undone.” Then, as is ever the case with those who take sides with God against themselves, he saw that another had undertaken all for him, had stepped into his place and borne the penalty which was due to him. All had been met on the cross by the Lord Jesus—God’s requirements and his need, nothing compromised. God was satisfied about the question of sin, yea, glorified, and thus He could be the Justifier of him that believeth in Jesus. How simple, how blessed for the sinner; but remember, reader, what it was to Jesus, He who was the delight of the Father, upon whom the heavens opened to signify God’s pleasure in Him, but when He was on the cross God’s face was hidden from him on account of sin: “For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.” Is it nothing to you to hear that cry, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Then it was He was met by God as the God of judgment, that He might meet us as the God of peace.
“Yea, all the billows passed o’er
Our sins, they bore Him down.”
Dear Henry F— knew now that it was because the blessed Lord Jesus was bearing his sins that He was forsaken of God; He saw that God had been satisfied, proof of it being that He raised Him up from the dead and gave Him glory; and he was satisfied too. Now came the time of “joy and gladness.” Truly, he was made to “rejoice” ― “And they began to be merry” (Luke 15:2424For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry. (Luke 15:24)). Oh, the divine merriment over a prodigal returned, the lost one found, the dead alive again! What joy the Father has! And this is what is depicted in chapter 15 of Luke, the Father’s joy; not the prodigal’s, not the piece of silver’s, not the joy of the sheep in being found, but “Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost.”
It was sweet to mark how rapidly he grew in divine things: before his conversion he could only read imperfectly and with difficulty, but he said the Lord helped him. He used and valued the word of God; it was his constant study and delight. It may be truly said of dear Henry that was a life of suffering, but he glorified God in it. Often have we gone to give a word of cheer, and found ourselves receiving instead of giving, as he was always bright and happy in the Lord. The last few weeks of his sojourn here were marked by intense suffering; but he was sustained most graciously and kept in perfect peace, at our last interview expressing himself as perfectly assured the Lord’s way was test, but desiring to depart and be with Christ, which he knew was far better. When the Lord was pleased to take him, how blessed the change― “Absent from the body, present with the Lord.”
Dear reader, will you come to Jesus? Will you be brought to God thus now, or choose you rather to be summoned before the “great white throne,” only to hear the sentence of your eternal doom? We warn you of your danger, and intreat you to delay no longer. The subject of this sketch is another proof of the uncertainty of everything down here. “Now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.” Today God is beseeching you to be reconciled to Him. How marvelous! — God beseeching, yet you refusing. This must have an end soon; the Lord Jesus is coming to call heme His own to Himself, “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air and so shall we ever be with the Lord” (1 Thess. 4:16, 1716For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: 17Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. (1 Thessalonians 4:16‑17)).
Then the door of mercy will be closed eternally.
Reader, will it shut you inside, or outside?
Inside, to dwell forever in that home of heavenly glory― the Father’s house―or outside, for judgment, which?
W. H. S.