In this age of many and varied kinds of insurance societies it is well to remember that they can in no wise insure the life of the body or the eternal welfare of the soul. All that they can do is pay indemnities or damages incurred against the mortal and his temporal possessions.
There are many different kinds of insurance: some for our homes and real estate; some for our goods; some for our families; but there is only one insurance that may be said to be indispensable: that for our souls. This insurance is at every one's door. It is free; and the most abject and degraded person may receive it as a gift.
Some time ago two doctors who were earnestly desirous to advance the science of healing stood by the bedside of a man in the last stages of a dread disease. They discussed in Latin a terrible operation they proposed to try on him. It was of the deepest importance to their experiments, from a surgical point of view. Indeed there was no thought of the suffering patient, whom they spoke of as this "anima vilis." They saw him only as a suitable subject to experiment on.
It so happened that this "anima vilis," impoverished as he was in worldly goods, was rich in faith toward God, and in his better days had been a Latin scholar also. Now slowly turning his head, he said, in that language: "That soul is not vile for whom Jesus Christ has died.”
That was his insurance. He knew that the precious blood of Christ was the price by which his soul had been redeemed. Lying there in that charity ward, he possessed in fact immense wealth, the only lasting riches. He knew no fear of the future, whether in life or in death. In the midst of all his sufferings, he had the only real life insurance―that which the Apostle Paul knew when he said: "For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Rom. 8:38, 3938For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, 39Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:38‑39).