Meditation CXVIII.
Meditation CXVIII.
DECLINING YEARS.
River Tagus, at Lisbon, December 26, 1761.
Hitherto I have looked upon myself as young, and coming to my prime of my life. But henceforth I shall consider myself as in my declining years. I am certain how long I have lived in the world—but quite uncertain how soon I must leave the world; and therefore should be preparing for my final departure, and daily be ripening for the regions of bliss.
Nothing would be a more forbidding prospect, than the verdure of spring to clothe the fields in harvest; but nothing would be more pleasant, than to see maturity keep pace with the approach of autumn. So should I grow daily riper for the great harvest, as the time of ingathering draws daily nearer and nearer. Leaves are pleasant in the infant orchard—but fruits are expected from the full grown trees. So in the young converts, the breathings of grace are sweet; but aged saints are expected to abound in fruits of righteousness. My love, like Ezekiel's holy waters, the longer it runs, should rise the higher, and spread the wider, until lost in its divine ocean above.
The longer we live with our friends, we grow better acquainted, more intimate with, and fonder of them. Just so, the longer I enjoy communion with God, the more ardently should I breathe after uninterrupted communion with him. As my years decline, and my outward man wastes away, so should my graces bloom, and my inner man grow strong; and when it is almost dark night with my life, it should be bright noon with my expectations.
O how pleasant is it, that the longer I live in the world—the closer I rise to heaven! If I make progress in my spiritual pilgrimage, the world and all its vanities—which is the wilderness I am traveling away from—will become less and less to me. I will daily see more of the tops of the heavenly mountains, of the towers of the New Jerusalem, toward which I am traveling.
A state of grace is a glorious condition at all times; but a growth in grace is a sweet proof and heavenly consequence of being in a state of grace. My affections should be more and more loosed from the creature, while the pins of my earthly tabernacle are loosening every day. I should at all times have my heart in heaven—and especially when walking with one foot in the grave! Now, though the time of my death seems far distant; yet thousands at my age have died—who had as many pretensions to longevity as I.
My walking with God will not shorten my life—but brighten it, and make my sun set with all the sweetness of a cloudless evening. Enoch walked with God for three hundred years. In this manner, he began heaven upon earth—so that he grew immortal, and ascended deathless to the very throne of God. O how pleasant is it to feed on the fruits of Paradise, while entering into the land of promise; and as it were, to be a citizen of heaven, before I go to dwell forever there.
A young man, and a holy life; one in his prime, and all his graces flourishing—is lovely to behold. But a grey head, and a carnal worldly heart, is a wounding sight! Henceforth, be gone bewitching vanities, and all the enchantments of the world! the last years of my life are not to be trifled away with you! Death attends me! The grave awaits me! Eternity is at hand!
Therefore, may my purified affections, river-like, enlarge as they approach the ocean; and on the wings of faith and love, may I often fly to the hills of spices, where your glories shed their beams. May I walk in the liberty of spiritual meditation in the land of bliss, that so death, when it comes, may have no more to do than lay my slumbering ashes in the silent grave—and loose my soul to be a free inhabitant in her blessed abode.
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