"He Prophesieth of the Times that are Far Off"
"He Prophesieth of the
Times that are Far Off"
One would have thought that if the glorious Lord condescended to send His servants to speak to men of the way of salvation, all mankind would delight to hear the message. We should naturally conclude that the people would immediately run together in eager crowds to catch every word, and would be obedient at once to the heavenly command. But, alas! it has not been so. Man's opposition to God is too deep, too stubborn for that. The prophets of old were compelled to cry, "Who hath believed our report?" and the servants of God in later times found themselves face to face with a stiff-necked generation, who resisted the Holy Ghost as did their fathers. Men display great ingenuity in making excuses for rejecting the message of God's love. They display marvellous skill, not in seeking salvation, but in fashioning reasons for refusing it; they are dexterous in avoiding grace, and in securing their own ruin. They hold up first this shield and then the other, to ward off the gracious arrows of the gospel of Jesus Christ, which are only meant to slay the deadly sins which lurk in their bosoms. The evil argument which is mentioned in the text has been used from Ezekiel's day right down to the present moment, and it has served Satan's turn in ten thousand cases. By its means men have delayed themselves into hell. The sons of men, when they hear of the great atonement made upon the cross by the Lord Jesus, and are bidden to lay hold upon eternal life in Him, still say concerning the gospel, "The vision that he seeth is for many days to come, and he prophesieth of times that are far off." That is to say, they pretend that the matters whereof we speak are not of immediate importance, and may safely be postponed. They imagine that religion is for the weakness of the dying and the infirmity of the aged, but not for healthy men and women. They meet our pressing invitation, "All things are now ready, come ye to the supper," with the reply, "Religion is meant to prepare us for eternity, but we are far off from it as yet, and are still in the heyday of our being; there is plenty of time for those dreary preparations for death. Your religion smells of the vault and the worm. Let us be merry while we may. There will be room for more serious considerations when we have enjoyed life a little, or have become established in business, or can retire to live upon our savings. Religion is for the sere and yellow leaf of the year's fall, when life is fading, but not for the opening hours of spring, when the birds are pairing and the primroses smiling upon the returning sun. You prophesy of things that are for many days to come, and of times that are far off." Very few young people may have said as much as this, but that is the secret thought of many; and with this they resist the admonition of the Holy Ghost, who saith, "To-day, if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts." They put off the day of conversion, as if it were a day of tempest and terror, and not, as it really is, a day most calm, most bright, the bridal of the soul with Heaven.
Let every unconverted person recollect that God knows what his excuse is for turning a deaf ear to the voice of a dying Saviour's love. You may not have spoken it to yourself so as to put it into words; you might not even dare to do so, lest your conscience should be too much startled; but God knows it all. He sees the hollowness, the folly, and the wickedness of your excuses. He is not deceived by your vain words, but makes short work with your apologies for delay. Remember the parables of our Lord, and note that when the man of one talent professed to think his master a hard man, he took him at his word, and out of his own mouth condemned him; and in the case of the invited guests who pleaded their farms and their merchandise as excuses, no weight was attached to what they said, but the sentence went forth, "None of these men that are bidden shall taste of my supper." God knows the frivolity of your plea for delay, He knows that you yourself are doubtful about it, and dare not stand to it so as to give it anything like a solemn consideration. Very hard do you try to deceive yourself into an easy state of conscience concerning it, but in your inmost soul you are ashamed of your own falsehoods.
Suppose that you are spared for threescore years and ten. Young man, suppose that God spares you in your sins till the snows of many winters shall whiten your head; young woman, suppose that your now youthful countenance shall still escape the grave until wrinkles are upon your brow; yet, still, how short will your life be! You, perhaps, think seventy years a long period, but those who are seventy, in looking back, will tell you that their age is a hand-breadth. I feel that every year flies more swiftly than the last; and months and weeks are contracted into twinklings of the eye. The older one grows, the shorter one's life appears. I do not wonder that Jacob said, "Few and evil have the days of the years of my life been," for he spake as an extremely old man. Man is shortlived compared with his surroundings, he comes into the world and goes out of it, as a meteor flashes through yonder skies which have remained the same for ages. Listen to the brook which murmurs as it flows, and the meditative ear will hear it warble,—
"Men may come and men may go, But I go on for ever."
Look at yonder venerable oak, which has for five hundred years battled with the winds, and what an infant one seems when reclining beneath its shade! Stand by some giant rock, which has confronted the tempests of the ages, and you feel like the insect of an hour. There are persons of seventy years of age who look back to the days of their boyhood as if they were but yesterday. Ask them, and they will tell you that their life seems to have been little more than a wink of the eye; it has gone like a dream, or a lightning's flash,—
"What is life? 'Tis but a vapour, Soon it vanishes away."
Therefore do not say, "These things are for a far-off time;" for even if we could guarantee to you the whole length of human existence, it is but a span. But there comes upon the heels of this a reflection never to be forgotten—that not one among us can promise, with anything like certainty, that he shall ever see threescore years and ten. We may survive, and by reason of strength we may creep up to fourscore years; yet not one of us can be sure that he shall do so; the most of us will assuredly be gone long before that age. Nay, more, we cannot promise that we shall see half that length of time. Young men and women cannot be certain they shall reach middle life. You cannot be certain that you will see this year out, and hear the bells ring in a new year. Yea, close upon you as to-morrow is, boast not yourselves of it, for it may never come; or, should it come, you know not what it may bring forth to you, perhaps a coffin or a shroud. Ay, and this very night, when you close your eyes and rest your head upon your pillow, reckon not too surely that you shall ever again look on that familiar chamber, or go forth from it to the pursuits of life. It is clear, then, that the things which make for your peace are not matters for a far-off time, the frailty of life makes them necessities of this very hour. You are not far from your grave, you are nearer to it than when this discourse began; some of you are far nearer than you think. To some this reflection comes with remarkable emphasis, for your occupation has enough of danger about it every day to furnish death with a hundred roads to convey you to his prison-house in the sepulchre. Can you look through a newspaper without meeting with the words "fatal accident," or "sudden death"? Travelling has many dangers, and even to cross the street is perilous. Men die at home, and when engaged about their lawful callings many are met by death. How true is this of those who go down to the sea in ships, or descend into the earth in mines! But, indeed, no occupations are secure from death; a needle can kill as well as a sword; a scald, a burn, a fall, may end our lives, quite as readily as a pestilence or a battle. Does your business lead you to climb a ladder; it is no very perilous matter, but have you never heard of one who missed his footing and fell, never to rise again? You work amidst the materials of a rising building; have you never heard of stones that have fallen and have crushed the workers?
"Dangers stand thick through all the ground To push us to the tomb, And fierce diseases wait around To hurry mortals home."
Notwithstanding all that can be done by sanitary laws, fevers are not unknown, and deadly strokes which fell men to the ground in an instant, as a butcher slays an ox, are not uncommon. Death has already removed many of your former companions. You have ridden into the battle of life, like the soldiers in the charge at Balaklava; and, young as you are in this warfare, you have seen saddles emptied right and left around you; you survive, but death has grazed you. The arrow of destruction has gone whizzing by your ear to find another mark; have you never wondered that it spared you? There are persons of delicate constitution. It grieves me to see so many fair daughters of our land with the mark of consumption upon their cheeks. Full well I know that lurid flame upon the countenance, and that strange lustre of the eye—signs of exhausting fires feeding upon life and consuming it too soon. Young men and women, many of you, from the condition of your bodily frames, can only struggle on till middle life, and scarcely that; for beyond thirty or forty you cannot survive. I fear that some of you have, even in walking, sometimes felt a suspicious weariness, which augurs exhaustion and decline. How can you say, when we talk to you about preparing to die, that we are talking about things that are far off? Do not be so foolish. I implore you let these warnings lead you to decision. Far be it from me to cause you needless alarm, but is it needless? I am sure I love you too well to distress you without cause, but is there not cause enough? Come now, I press you most affectionately, answer me and say, does not your own reason tell you that anxiety for you is not misplaced? Ought you not at once to lay to heart your Redeemer's call, and obey your Saviour's appeal? The time is short, catch the moments as they fly and hasten to be blest.
Remember, also, that even if you knew that you should escape from accident and fever and sudden death, yet there is one grand event that we too often forget, which may put an end to your day of mercy on a sudden. Have you never heard that Jesus Christ of Nazareth, who was crucified on Calvary, died on the cross, and was laid in the tomb? Do you not know that He rose again on the third day, and that after He had spent a little while with His disciples, He took them to the top of the Mount of Olives, and there before their eyes ascended into Heaven, a cloud hiding Him from their view? Have you forgotten the words of the angels, who said, "This same Jesus who is taken up from you into Heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into Heaven"? Jesus will certainly come a second time to judge the world. Of that day and of that hour knoweth no man—no, not the angels of God. He will come as a thief in the night to an ungodly world; they shall be eating and drinking, and marrying and giving in marriage, just as they were when Noah entered into the ark, and they knew not until the flood came and swept them all away. In a moment—we cannot tell when, perhaps it may be ere next the words escape my lips—a sound far louder than any mortal voice will be heard above the clamours of worldly traffic, ay, and above the roaring of the sea. That sound as of a trumpet will proclaim the day of the Son of man. "Behold, the Bridegroom cometh: go ye out to meet Him," will sound throughout the Church; and to the world there will ring out this clarion note, "Behold, He cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see Him, and they also which crucified Him." Jesus may come to-night. If He were to do so, would you then tell me that I am talking of far-off things? Did not Jesus say," Behold, I come quickly"? His tarrying may be long to us, but to God it will be brief. We are to stand hourly watching and daily waiting for the coming of the Lord from Heaven. Oh, I pray you do not say that the Lord delayeth His coming, for that was the language of the wicked servant who was cut in pieces, and it is the mark of the mockers of the last days, that they say, "Where is the promise of His coming?" Be ye not mockers, lest your bands be made strong; but listen to the undoubted voice of prophecy and of the Word of God," Behold, I come quickly." "Be ye also ready, for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh."
Now, then, it is clear enough that even if the gospel message did concern only our life in another world, yet still it is unwise for men to say, "The vision is for many days to come, and he prophesieth of the times that are far off."