The Little Gleaner Part 4

"Yes; of all true Christians it may be said that they are come to Mount Sion. All who truly believe in Christ live under a dispensation of mercy. They are even now 'fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of G.o.d.' Their names are enrolled in the Lamb's book of life; angels are their invisible attendants; they are united in spirit to 'Jesus, the Mediator of the new covenant'; they are admitted into the gracious presence of the Father, 'the Judge of all,' so as to find access at every hour to G.o.d within the veil; and they have even now received the atonement, 'the blood of sprinkling,' by which their polluted consciences are cleansed and purified. These are great and exalted privileges, are they not?"

"Yes, sir," I said, feeling as I said it how incapable I was of appreciating them. The stranger did not notice my hesitation, however, but went on with still more animation--

"I cannot help thinking that more than I have mentioned is implied in the words which you justly think so beautiful, and that the writer had in his mind the future as well as the present life. The final and everlasting _residence_ of all believers, after all the cares and toils of their earthly pilgrimage are past, is to be Mount Sion, the city of the living G.o.d, the heavenly Jerusalem; part of their _employment_ will be holy and devout adoration; their _society_, myriads of angels and a vast a.s.sembly of the perfected spirits of the just; the _chief source of their happiness_ will be the presence of 'the Judge of all,' in 'Jesus the Mediator'; and the cause of all this blessedness is indicated in the closing words--'the blood of sprinkling,' or the atonement of Jesus."

I was interested, and wished he would continue. Probably he could see that I was not unwilling to listen, for, after the pause of a minute or two, he began to expatiate a little on some of the ideas he had already expressed. He spoke of the unbroken repose and perfect security of the city of G.o.d, and then of the happy employments of the great a.s.sembly in heaven. Here he drew a contrast between the amus.e.m.e.nts of the world and the enjoyments of the heavenly state, and added that, to worldly and unsanctified minds, these enjoyments had no attractions.

"Those who live only for this life," he said, "cannot conceive of any pleasure to be found in heavenly adoration and praise. Accustomed to account the Sabbath of the Lord a weariness, and devotional services irksome and tedious, it cannot appear to them desirable to enter upon a state of existence in which the wors.h.i.+p of the Almighty is one of the choicest occupations of its inhabitants. Nor can we wonder," continued my companion, "that it should be thus, so long as the heart remains at enmity with G.o.d, while the affections are earthly and sensual, and where there is no fear of G.o.d, no love to G.o.d, no delight in G.o.d, no earnest desire to serve and honour Him. Am I not right?" the stranger asked, fixing his eyes upon me.

"Yes, sir, I think you are," I replied, faintly; and, after some further conversation on the same subjects, my fellow-traveller told me that he was going only to the end of the present stage. "There we shall part,"

he said, "and possibly we shall not meet again in this world; but if, by divine grace, we should be fellow-heirs of the same glorious inheritance, we _shall_ meet in that general a.s.sembly."

These were almost the last words he spoke, for, in a few minutes, the coach stopped, and the stranger, alighting and bidding me farewell, disappeared.

Many years pa.s.sed away, and I was a happy wife and mother. My husband was a true and earnest Christian; and I--yes (and therein was my happiness), I, too, was a believer in Christ. My Christian life had been, in some respects, an eventful one. My first steps in it had been beset with difficulties and no ordinary opposition; but patience was given me to endure; strength, to overcome; and, blessed be G.o.d, my heart's desire and prayer to Him on behalf of some very dear to me had, I trust, been heard and answered.

My conversion was in part, at least, the result of the stage-coach conversation I have recorded. G.o.d, in His infinite mercy, by means of the words of a stranger, called me to consideration. The Holy Spirit showed me my miserable condition, as being "a lover of pleasures more than a lover of G.o.d." Through a long, dark pa.s.sage of soul-distress and great conflict I was led into the light and faith of the glorious Gospel--from the thunders of Sinai to "Mount Sion, the city of the living G.o.d; to Jesus, the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling."

One thing troubled me--or, if not troubled exactly, left within me an unsatisfied desire. For years I had longed to see, to meet once more, the stranger who had so kindly and so wisely invited my attention to religion. I wished to hear his voice again, and to tell him what the Lord had done for my soul. Sometimes, indeed, I recalled his parting words with something like awe, though yet with a thrill of pleasurable a.s.surance--"Possibly we shall not meet again in this world; but if, by divine grace, we should be fellow-heirs of the same glorious inheritance, we shall meet in that general a.s.sembly."

"Annie," said my husband one day--he had an open letter in his hand--"a visitor is coming, whom I shall be very glad for you to know--my old friend and pastor, Mr. J----"; and he put the letter into my hands. It was a short note, merely stating that, finding he should be at a certain time within easy reach of my husband's home, the writer would, if he might, avail himself of the opportunity of renewing the personal intercourse which time and distance had so long interrupted.

A few days later, a chaise drove to our door, and my husband, eager to welcome his old friend, met him in the hall, where I also was waiting to receive him. He was an elderly man, but with a firm step, a strong frame, a pleasant smile, a kindly voice, and a benevolent countenance.

"Annie, my dear, this is----"

I cannot go on to describe a scene in which I became all at once and unexpectedly so personally interested. In my husband's friend I recognized, at a single glance, my stage-coach companion, though he had no recollection of me.

It was a happy meeting--the faint foreshadowing, it may be, of such meetings innumerable in that general a.s.sembly in the heavenly Jerusalem above, when they who have sown, and those who have reaped, shall rejoice together with "joy unspeakable and full of glory."--_A Tract issued by the Religious Tract Society._

ANSWER TO BIBLE ENIGMA.

(_Page 275._)

"_I am the Rose of Sharon._"--SONG OF SOLOMON ii. 1.

I ssachar Genesis x.x.xv. 23.

A biram Numbers xxvi. 9.

M icah Judges xvii. 1.

T irzah 1 Kings xvi. 6.

H oreb Exodus iii. 1.

E bal Joshua viii. 30.

R ehoboam 1 Kings xi. 43.

O g Numbers xxi. 33.

S hammah 1 Samuel xvii. 13.

E dom 2 Samuel viii. 14.

O nan Genesis xlvi. 12.

F elix Acts xxiv. 25.

S imon Mark iii. 18.

H adadezer 2 Samuel viii. 3.

A maziah Amos vii. 10.

R aven Leviticus xi. 15.

O bed-edom 2 Samuel vi. 11.

N adab Numbers iii. 4.

ADA WILLERTON (Aged 9 years).

_Corby, Grantham._

I HAVE found, by a strict and diligent observation, that a due observance of the duty of Sunday has ever had joined to it a blessing upon the rest of my time.--_Sir Matthew Hale._

OUR BIBLE CLa.s.s.

THE CROSS OF CHRIST.

The "cross of Christ" is mentioned by the Apostle Paul in his Epistles to different Churches, but we may confidently say that the wooden gibbet upon which the Saviour suffered was never loved or reverenced by that honoured servant of the Lord, or the people to whom he wrote.

The brazen serpent, that divinely appointed means of Israel's cure, was broken in pieces by good Hezekiah, who contemptuously called it a bit of bra.s.s, because the Israelites wors.h.i.+pped it; and their idolatry is described as a base crime in 2 Kings xviii. 4, although it was a figure of Him that was to come; and Jesus Himself declared, "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life" (John iii. 14, 15); and the "true cross," if it now existed, would only be a bit of wood--a thing in itself worthless--and the adoration of it would be nothing better than idolatry.

"Christ and Him crucified" is the sinner's hope, the believer's joy, and this is what we are to understand by the apostolic mention of the cross of Jesus.

The cross was the sign, the ill.u.s.tration, of His sufferings and death.

Crucifixion was most painful and most shameful, and both these facts appear in Hebrews xii. 2. He "endured the cross, despising the shame."

With the hands and feet nailed to the cross, and the weight of the body borne by those pierced hands, the sufferer, who generally was first cruelly scourged, expired after long, lingering torture; and it was a shameful death, to which only the lowest and worst of men were supposed to be sentenced. Yet Jesus, the High and Holy One, "humbled Himself unto death, even the death of the cross."

But there was deep spiritual meaning in all this. "Tribulation and anguish" (Rom. ii. 9), sorrow and death, are sin's reward. "Dying, thou shalt die" (Gen. ii. 17, margin) is the divine sentence upon every transgressor, and "sin is a reproach to any people" (Prov. xiv. 34).

"Shame and everlasting contempt" will be the sinner's recompense. And Jesus was His people's Surety and Subst.i.tute. He stood for them; He took their place. The Just One suffered for the unjust. The King of Glory bore reproach and shame for the sake of the sinners He eternally loved, that whosoever believeth in Him should have everlasting life, glory, and joy (Dan. xii. 2).

"The death of the cross," as Jesus suffered it, involved the shedding of blood, and "the blood is the life." "He poured out His soul unto death."

"He gave His life a ransom for many," because "without shedding of blood there is no remission," no forgiveness of sin.

But crucifixion, unlike many violent deaths, did not divide or dismember the body. In stoning, the back was often broken; by other modes of execution, the head was cut off, the neck broken, or the body otherwise mutilated. The legs of the crucified might be broken to hasten death, but this was no necessary part of the sentence; and concerning Jesus it was prophesied, "None of His bones shall be broken" (Psa. x.x.xiv. 20; John xix. 36). And this also was fraught with deep spiritual meaning.

That bruised and torn, yet perfect body which hung on the cross, and was laid in the grave, was but a picture of that holy soul, that perfect spirit, which He yielded up to G.o.d. How clear was His memory! That the Scripture might be fulfilled, He said, "I thirst." How perfect His love!

He prayed for His executioners; He remembered Mary. How full His knowledge of His people, and how perfect His confidence in Himself! He blessed the penitent thief, and a.s.sured him of a home with Himself in heaven.