A few years ago there was a miner living in A. who was prospecting for gold. One day he found some very rich ore, so he started for the land office to file his claim. But while on his way, he met an old friend whom he had not seen for several years. They stood and talked over old times for awhile, and then resorted to a saloon to treat each other. (This is a token of friendship among a great many people, especially among miners.) They indulged in drink after drink, so after a few hours the miner thought he had better go to the land office and get the required papers to hold his mine. But when he got there, to his astonishment and disappointment, he found that a man had been there just a little before him, and taken his claim. But his disappointment deepened as time went on; the mine proved to be a very rich one, for the man who got it made a fortune out of it.
As the poor miner labored hard for daily bread, he thought of the fortune that might have been his, which would have released him from hard toil for the rest of his life. But he had allowed the opportunity to slip away by drinking with his friend.
Now, let us be careful lest our foolishness far surpass his; for there are thousands of people who are running after the fancies, and vanities of this fleeting life and who will soon be too late to obtain the riches and glory that God is now offering them. It is not the kind of riches that the miner lost. It is "an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away," and it is "reserved in heaven" (1 Peter 1:44To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, (1 Peter 1:4)).
The miner's accepted time was when he started for the land office and your accepted time is now.
What will it be to be wrapped in the shades of endless night, in that place of deep despair, with fiends and devils for companions, and to know that thousands are in fadeless light and glory; and then to say I might have been there, too, enjoying the blissful company of Jesus, saints and angels, but I neglected it in the pursuit of life's fleeting pleasures!
O, be wise; accept of Christ as your Savior now, and you will have the riches "reserved in heaven," which will never fade away.