“WISHING YOU A HAPPY NEW YEAR!” Such is the expression on the lips of thousands on the first day of a new year. Alas! how few who utter the kindly words really know the source of true happiness.
Last New Year’s Day thousands received New Year’s wishes. Now, as we glance in retrospect at the year that has passed, the opening hours of which promised so much, we are prone to sigh. How many hopes dashed to pieces! How many pleasures with a bitter sting underneath! How many bright visions of happiness, like the deceitful mirage of the desert, proved phantoms of the imagination! Yes, the fair form of many a one dear to us is now where decay and corruption feed!
That which hath been shall be, everything here is passing and uncertain. Let us remember this. Only for those who love God there is a bright future. Can you, dear reader, say, “If this year should be my last on earth, I have before me glory with Christ forever in an eternal home, where all is unfading and unchanging bliss”? If not, then let me warn you that wishes for happiness are vain, are a delusion. The pleasures of sin are only for a season, and the end—the worm that dieth not, and the fire that shall never be quenched.
Solomon, with his ivory palaces, with all his lavish use of gold and marble, sighed, “All is vanity and vexation of spirit;” while Paul, chained in prison and suffering persecution, could “rejoice greatly.” How was this? Paul’s source of joy was outside this scene, and therefore the world could neither give nor take away his happiness.
If my reader have learned the deceitful character of this world, and if his New Year’s wish for happiness be prompted by more than mere fashion, and if he long for that which is real and satisfying, will he listen to the following simple story?
A gentleman was visiting the immediate neighborhood of the well-known “Giant’s Causeway,” in the north of Ireland.
A farmer kindly offered him his house to rest in, and transact some business, and as he had also to inspect the seaboard, the farmer, who knew that part of the coast well, offered to act as guide, a proposal to which the stranger gladly assented.
They had to pass over the marvelous “Causeway,” with its numerous objects of interest, and on reaching a spot known as the “Wishing Chair” the guide said, “Now, you must sit in this chair and wish. It is the custom with people, who come for the first time, to take their seat here, and wish for all they desire.”
“The chair is perfectly useless to me,” said the visitor.
“Useless! What do you mean?” inquired his kind host.
“For the simple reason that I have nothing to wish for. I have all that heart could wish already.”
Amazed at the reply, the farmer exclaimed, “Well, well! that’s a great thing to say, surely, It must be fine to be like that.”
“Yes, indeed, you may well say so. But when you learn that I have all that God could desire for my blessing, you will understand how foolish and stupid it would be for me to follow your customs in the ‘chair.’”
“Listen, my friend! I was a sinner only fit for hell, and God gave His Son to die for my sins, and to bring me to Himself without them. His God is my God, His Father is my Father, whose whole heart is revealed to me in that blessed One, the Son of His love, who is coming, I know not how soon, to bring me to dwell with Himself into that Father’s house without spot or stain, and in a body of glory like His own. My eternal blessing will be to be thus with Him, and like Him, and not till then will He fully see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied.”
As they retraced their steps to the farmer’s house, the visitor asked his companion how it was with him—whether he knew this precious Christ, and what he thought about Him and the perfect work which He wrought on the cross for God’s satisfaction and glory? The poor man owned himself a sinner, and admitted that if God were to judge him righteously He must send him to hell, but he was not yet prepared to trust Christ alone for his soul’s salvation!
While pressing him to take God at His word the house was reached.
The farmer’s wife had tea ready, and all in the house sat down to the social meal. Addressing the good woman whose thoughtful hospitality had provided for him, the stranger related what had passed between her husband and himself. It was plain that she was intensely interested; her whole soul was moved as she heard what was said of the perfection of the work of Christ, and of the satisfaction which, by the grace of God, their guest had found in His person. “Oh!” she exclaimed, “that is what I have been wishing for for years. I never understood it like that before. Now I see it. Thank God for sending you here.”
Have you, my reader, such a craving as this lady had? Jesus says, “If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink,” and assures all who trust in Him that “he that cometh to Me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on Me shall never thirst.” Oh! look to Christ for happiness; it is found nowhere else. Look to His work for peace; vain is the search elsewhere. We desire a truly happy new year for you, beloved reader—yes, that eternal happiness may be yours. It is only as the heart makes Christ its choice, and says, “Christ for me,” that there can be real happiness.
Christ first as a Saviour; Christ next as a Master; then Christ as the object in life, the goal to be reached.
To those who look for Him shall He appear before long, to consummate their joy in an endless glory.
H. N.