IN the days of war a widowed mother gave her only son up to her country. So great was her love for the Homeland that she said, “Go, my son; though you are my only son and child, my joy and support, I give you freely.” That was a great sacrifice. Just before the regiment started for the camp at the Front it was drawn up in line, and all our friends came out to bid us “Good-bye.” That widowed mother stood by her son, her arms about him, all her deep mother-love looking out of her eyes up into his face. Then the bugle sounded “Prepare to mount!” She clung to him with a closer embrace, when in another moment the second bugle sounded “Mount!” The boy gently unclasped his mother’s arms from about his neck, and sprang to his saddle; but the mother lay at his feet in a swoon. Ah! it was costing her sore to part with her only son.
Some of you, perhaps, know what it cost you to give son, husband, brother, and betrothed; but could that mother have foreseen what I saw a few days afterward — that only son smitten down by the fragment of a burst shell that went crashing through his brain, and the next moment trampled underfoot by the red iron hoof of war, as the battle surged back and forth over the spot where he fell; could she have seen her boy, torn, mangled, bleeding, dying, dead, and buried in a nameless grave, I doubt if she could or would have given her only son. The cost would have been too great.
Could the loyal mothers, wives, and sisters have foreseen all, many would have held back the sacrifice. They gave with the chances in their favor, that their dear ones would come back covered with glory. But when God gave His Son He knew what would be the result. He knew that from His manger-cradle to the cross He would be set upon by the devil, that the very people He came to save would never rest until they had hanged Him on the cross. He foresaw those hours of agony in the garden, where He sweat, as it were, great drops of blood. He foresaw the trial before Pilate, the shameful buffeting, the cruel mocking, and the Roman lash laid over His bare back till His holy and sinless flesh hung like ribbons there. He foresaw the cross, with its nails crashing through hands and feet, the pierced side, the thorn-covered and pierced brow. Yea, and He knew that in the bitterest hour of His sacrificial agony He must withdraw Himself and forsake Him.
Think you not that it cost the Father something to hear that well-beloved Son cry out, “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” And why did the Father forsake His own when He was gladly doing His will? Why? Because He was dying under the curse of the law, in the place of sinners, and so must suffer as a sinner, though He knew no sin. And the Father could not draw near to help. When I think of all this, and that that blood was shed for the redemption of my sins, I say, too — it is precious.
The Son of God paid the last farthing of our redemption price. O my soul, and this for thee! Precious blood! Precious Son of God! How great was and is Thy love to sinners! Alas, alas! that sinners should scorn and despise Thee! No wonder the wicked are turned into hell with the nations that forget God, for where else could they go who have no place in their hearts for Thy love and redemption? Does it not speak to your heart? Have you trusted in the blood? Have you life through His death?
DR. PENTECOST.