IT was a serious meeting—most serious.
And was it specially arranged on his account, and he not there?
Ah, yes. It was the very fact of his absence that constituted the sadness of the occasion. For, strange as it may sound, if it had even been possible for him to be present at this meeting, it would never have been called at all—it was because he had gone that it was arranged.
The treasurer of a building society absconded, and a meeting of its members was called to examine how his financial matters stood. But the meeting we refer to was not for such a purpose as this. The absent one had not absconded: he had been apprehended. A sure-handed detective had taken him off most unceremoniously. Yet he well knew that this officer was coming.
Then why not try to escape?
Well, he would have evaded him if he could, but evasion was impossible. Indeed, all the skill and power both of devoted friends and of paid agents proved utterly fruitless to keep at arm’s length the unwelcome visitor. There is no question they did their utmost, yet their best was baffled, and it had to be whispered round the house after all, “He has gone.” Then the special meeting above referred to began to be spoken of. What meeting? Well, it was the meeting of relatives and sympathizing friends around the grave of a young man, who, it is to be feared, died in his sins. And, unless you repent, a similar meeting will probably be called for you before many years have fled.
When the funeral of that “rich man” mentioned in the sixteenth chapter of Luke took place, it was, after all, only the clay tabernacle that they buried. He was not there. “In hell he lifted up his eyes... in torments.” He had left all that he valued on earth, and kept nothing! It is true he retained his memory, but that was only a source of inexpressible remorse.
“I am leaving this pretty little home for you, my dear,” said a dying gentleman to his wife, “and I am sure you will take a delight in keeping it as near as possible to what it now is.”
“But what have you got for yourself, my dear?” was her question, but it brought no answer!
What have you got for yourself, my reader? If called today to part with everything that could gratify your natural senses, what have you got for yourself? Have you yet found an undying portion for that heart of yours? Have you got salvation? Have you received Christ? Without Christ, your narrow span of life here is only the outer porch to an eternal prison-house, the certain way to an undying death.
However many might attend your funeral and mourn their loss in your departure, it will be only your body that they quietly lower into the grave. You will then have passed ALONE into the realities of eternity. Not that you will be certain, of a funeral. Thousands are hurried off so rapidly that their death and burial are but one event. How absolutely true of them, “buried without ceremony”! Not till the sea shall be commanded to give up her dead will those vast thousands be told, save that in God’s account they have already been numbered.
But there is another meeting which has been arranged, though it has not yet taken place. We mean the gathering together in the clouds of those who, in this day of grace, have repented of their sins, and believed the gospel of God’s grace in the gift of His beloved Son: Will you not be there, dear friend? Thank God, you may be. “They that are Christ’s at His coming” surely will be (1 Cor. 15:2323But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming. (1 Corinthians 15:23)). Is He necessary to you? If you cannot do without Him, depend upon it He will not do without you. Every believer can say, “It was my badness that made me first seek Him; it was His goodness that made Him first seek me. I was so bad I could not do without Him; He so good He would not do without me.”
But since the time we first came to Him, we have found another reason why we could not do without Him―His own personal blessedness and unchanging worth. His precious love has formed a bond that nothing can separate.
“Lord, from Thy love I cannot part,
Nor wouldst Thou part with mine.
You may, my reader, know the unspeakable reality of such a bond.
“What can wash away thy stains?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus!
So that not one spot remains?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus
But if you die in your sins, as surely as they will say on earth,
NOT HERE,
they may, looking heavenward, add with equal certainty,
NOT THERE.
It is for you, therefore, to consider seriously
WHERE, THEN? FOR EVER―WHERE?
The blessed Lord made this solemn matter unmistakably plain when He said to certain bystanders, “Ye shall die in your sins,” and “Whither I go ye cannot come” (John 8:2121Then said Jesus again unto them, I go my way, and ye shall seek me, and shall die in your sins: whither I go, ye cannot come. (John 8:21)). Yet, in the very same chapter, we have an account of His touching grace to one whose very sinfulness detained her in His holy presence until every self-satisfied, accusing Pharisee had been made to feel the powerful gaze of His all-searching eye, and to beat a hasty retreat in consequence.
He is the same Saviour still. If He will not tolerate empty show and self-righteous pretension, thank God He will not turn away the guiltiest sinner that comes with a broken spirit and contrite heart to Him. He will graciously welcome, abundantly pardon, eternally save. Will you not come to such a Saviour, my reader?
“I have seen the face of Jesus,
Tell me not of aught beside;
I have heard the voice of Jesus,
All my soul is satisfied.
In the brightness of the glory
First I saw His blessed face;
And from henceforth shall that glory
Be my home, my dwelling-place.