ONE frosty winter's evening a party of boys and girls started off for a walk to a little village in Kent, a few miles from their homes, where a lecture was to be given on the moon. Such lectures were rare in the neighborhood and very much welcomed.
The village hall soon filled with boys and girls, all eager to see and hear. The lecturer showed them lantern slides of the mountains of the moon, mountains with mighty volcanic craters, some of them measuring many miles across and quite unlike those of our earth. Amongst the many photos was one of Tycho, the great circular mountain, and the center of a region in which lie hundreds of craters, one named Copernicus, having a diameter of fifty-six miles.
The lecturer told them how much smaller the moon was than our earth and that no human being could live there, because there was no atmosphere. The moon, he said, had two great things to do: to reflect the light of the sun and to control the tides.
It was all very interesting to one of the party, named Mary, for she remembered that the moon was one of the works of the Lord, the very "work of his fingers," and she wanted to know all she could about, it.
She knew that David had said: "When consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained." (Psa. 8:33When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; (Psalm 8:3).)
She found out from the lecture that the moon in itself was a dreary, desolate, unlovely place. "Very much like I am," thought Mary. There was no life of any kind on it, no sound, no trees, no flowers, no streams, no lakes no seas, no rivers, no vegetation of any kind, nothing but a black-looking mountain rising out of a barren waste. But when the sun shone on it it became a thing of surpassing beauty, wonderful for shadows and lights of every shade and intensity, such as are never seen on our earth.
“Why!" thought Mary,” that is like a Christian with no goodness in himself, but beautiful when reflecting some of the glory of Christ, the Sun of righteousness, and becoming, with others, the very light of the world, for Jesus said when here: "Ye are the light of the world." (Matt. 5:1414Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. (Matthew 5:14).)
The lecture was over all too soon, and as Mary and her friends walked home, they talked together of the wonders of the heavens, how God's glory covered them (Hab. 3:33God came from Teman, and the Holy One from mount Paran. Selah. His glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of his praise. (Habakkuk 3:3)), and how the earth should be filled with His praise. Then their thoughts went up above the moon and the stars, right into heaven, where Jesus lives.
They thought how He had left this earth, and how His disciples watched Him go, until a cloud hid Him from their sight. He did not stay just behind the cloud, but entered into heaven itself; into the very presence of God.
This was the world into which Stephen the martyr had gazed. It opened for him, and as he died he said: "Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God.”
Mary often wondered how it was that Stephen was able to look into heaven. Then as she thought and read about him she found these words, "They chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost," and "Stephen, full of faith and power, did great wonders and miracles," and again, "He [Stephen], being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus.”
She felt sure after reading these verses that it was by faith and the Holy Spirit within him, that he was able to look right into heaven. It is, She felt sure, the "eyes of our heart" which look up in the power of an ungrieved Spirit within us, so that the distant land with its marvelous glory and light and the Person of our Lord Jesus Christ are brought near to us.
Mary used to look into this world, and any boy and girl whose sins are forgiven and who is pleasing to the Lord and does not grieve the Holy Spirit, will be able to do so too, and can pray, as Mary often did:
Lord Jesus, make Thyself to me
A living, bright reality.
More precious to faith's vision keen
Than any outward object seen
More dear, more intimately nigh
Than e'en the nearest earthly tie.”