SUCH was the thought that disturbed a dying girl as she lay on a bed of sickness. Being the youngest of the family, like Benjamin, she was specially loved and cared for, having a place in the parents' hearts that none other possessed.
Though only twelve years of age, soon she was about to enter that bourne from whence no traveler One excepted has ever returned.
He was that One who came from the glory of God down to this poor scene where sin and death reigned, to tell us of God, and to declare Him (John 1:1818No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him. (John 1:18)), and to reveal the Father (John 14:6-106Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. 7If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. 8Philip saith unto him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us. 9Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father? 10Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. (John 14:6‑10)), blessed be His name,—who could say, “I do always the things that please the Father.”
In John 10:1717Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. (John 10:17), in speaking of that last act of obedience and devotedness, He could say, "Therefore Both my Father love me because I lay down my life, that I might take it up again." Man put Him in the grave, but God raised Him out from among the dead, and seated him at His own right hand (Eph. 1:2020Which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, (Ephesians 1:20)), and sent down the Holy Ghost to make known to us the glory—as man—He now had received, and to lead our hearts to share all that glory with Him. Dear reader, God loves you, and wants to reveal Himself to you as Father. He has been so glorified by the work Jesus did on the cross that He now comes and invites all (1 John 2:2 John 3:1616For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)) to believe on Jesus,-receive Him (John 1:1212But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: (John 1:12)),—and be in present possession of everlasting life.
The poor sufferer, feeling that the end—so far as concerned the body, but not the soul—was near, suddenly asked her mother, “If I die, where will I go to?" The mother answered," If you have been a good girl, you will go to heaven." Miserable comfort at such a solemn hour!
Again the dying girl's voice is heard, “But if I have been a bad one—where will I go to?" What a solemn question to fall upon the ears of the one that loved her best and the mother felt it, and did not know how to answer. At last she said, “I do not know." As the words fell upon the sufferer's ears she shrieked out, "Such a pity!”
And thus she died.
Parents, I appeal to you, if placed in the same position, what would you have said? Could you have given the sweetest of all answers by pointing to Jesus, who says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life." "I am the door; by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved” (John 14:6; 10:96Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. (John 14:6)
9I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture. (John 10:9)). Dear fellow-traveler to eternity, let me ask you, how would you have answered the poor dying girl?
Would you have pointed her to works of her own as her mother did? Surely not, with the third of Romans before you: " There is none that doeth good, no, not one.”
The father of the girl was a respectable, moral, upright man, but had imbibed Unitarian ideas—those baleful, pernicious doctrines, that would rob us of all that God has so graciously revealed in His own blessed Word. The kernel of that peerless volume is Jesus (Luke 24:2727And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. (Luke 24:27)), and the books of Moses must go, and all the prophets, for they speak of the things concerning Himself, if He be not what He said He was—the Son of God. What comfort can it bring to poor hell-deserving sinners, as we all are by nature, to be told of a Supreme Being if there is no "Daysman," no mediator between God and man; and there is only one— the man Christ Jesus (1 Tim. 2:5, 65For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; 6Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time. (1 Timothy 2:5‑6)). His young daughter's dying words haunted the father. She was gone, but where? That question all his freethinking could not answer for him. His wife, afraid he was going wrong in the mind through brooding over it, his own soul trembling in the balance, tried to calm him by saying," We could not help it." Well he knew he could not help it now, but still the question that pressed on his soul was, Where?
“Eternity, where? Oh! eternity, where?
With redeemed ones in glory,
Or with fiends in despair,—
The one, or the other,—
Eternity, where?”
Possibly my reader may have imbibed those ideas that man is pleased to say are in keeping with the enlightened age in which we live, but which practically set aside God and His Christ.. I warn you in the most affectionate manner to “consider your ways," for such can only end in the second death (Rev. 21:88But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death. (Revelation 21:8)).
Still the father's thoughts could not be so easily lifted from the searching question, death being so vividly brought before him. Eternity, where?
His wife, determined to get his conscience quieted, —and he, not knowing God as Job did, unable to silence her by saying, “Thou speakest as one of the foolish women,"—brought him a glass of whiskey, saying, “Here, take that; that'll quiet you." Alas, alas, she succeeded; and so Satan's peace took the place of that peace which might have been his—the peace that Christ made by the blood of His cross. He lived for some time after, and then died too; but so far as known to man he was never again anxious about his soul, and never born again.
And now, dear reader, ere we part, let me ask you, How do you stand as to your soul's salvation?
Where will you spend eternity?
“With redeemed souls in glory,
Or with fiends in despair?”
L.