Our Life, Our Work, Our Change 2
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Whitefield used to say, of his well-known order and regularity, "I like to go to bed feeling that if I were to die tonight, there is not so much as a pair of my gloves out of their proper place." No Christian man ought to live without having his will made, and his estate put in proper condition, in case he should die suddenly. That hint may be useful to some of you who have neglected to set your house in order. No Christian man should live expecting to live another day. You cannot reckon upon an hour. You should rather be so ready, that if you were to walk out of this tabernacle and fall down dead upon the steps, it would not make any derangement in your affairs, because you are equally ready for life or death. One of our beloved sisters this week was walking down Paternoster Row: her mourning friends sit here, but they have no cause to mourn sudden faintness came over her: she was taken into a shop, and water was offered to her, but she could not drink; no, she was already drinking of the water of the river of life that flows from the throne of God and of the Lamb. In a moment she closed her eyes to the sorrows of earth, and she opened them to the joys of heaven.
When we visit the graves of those who have died in Christ, we ought not to weep for them; or, if we weep at all it should be with the regret that we are not yet admitted to the same reward. To "die daily" is the business of Christians. It is greatly wise to talk with our last hours, to make ourselves familiar with the grave. Our venerable forefathers had a peculiar habit of placing on the dressing-table a death's head, as a memento—either a real skull, or else an ornament fashioned in the form of it—to remind them of their end; yet, so far as I can gather, they were happy men and happy women, and none the less so because they familiarized themselves with death. A genuine Puritan, perhaps, never lived a day without considering the time when he should put off the garments of clay, and enter into rest; and these were the happiest and holiest of people, while this thoughtless generation, which banishes the thought of dying, is wretched with all its hollow pretense of mirth. I exhort you, brethren, wait! wait ever for the trumpet call! Live as looking for the Lord to come and take you from this mortal state, waiting for the convoy of angels to waft you to the city of the blessed, in the land of the hereafter.
Nor is this all. Waiting means enduring with patience. We are put into this world for one appointed time of suffering, and in sacred patience we must abide steadfast, the heat of the furnace. The life of many Christians is a long martyrdom: they are patiently to bear it. "Here is the patience of the saints." Many believers go from one sickness to another, from one loss to another; but herein they fulfill their life's design, if through abundant grace they learn to bear their woes without a murmur, and to wait their appointed time without repining.
Serving is also another kind of waiting. The Lord Jesus gives us plain directions as to service in the parable recorded in the seventeenth of Luke: "But which of you, having a servant plowing or feeding cattle, will say unto him by and by, when he is come from the field, go and sit down to eat? And will not rather say unto him, make ready wherewith I may dine, and gird yourself and serve me, until I have eaten and drunken; and afterwards you shall eat and drink?" In this world we are to wait upon the Lord Jesus, running his errands, nursing his children, feeding his lambs, fighting his foes, repairing the walls of his vineyard, doing anything and everything which he may please to give to us. And mark you, this is to be attended withperseverance, for Job says, "All the days of my appointed time will I wait."
He would not be a servant sometimes, and then skulk home in idleness at another season, as if his term of service were ended. Every saint should say, "I will wait upon you, my God, as long as I live; so long as I have breath to draw, it shall be spent for you. So long as I have life to spend here below, I will spend it and be spent in your service." This should be the spirit of the Christian all his days, to his last day. Waiting still, like a holy man of God among the American Indians, who, when he lay dying, was observed to be teaching a poor little Indian to read his letters, and he said, "What a mercy, now I am laid aside from preaching, that I can teach this poor little child to read his letters; God has still something for me to do, and my prayer is, that I may not live an hour after I cannot do anything for Christ." May we be in just such a state of heart. Moreover, to close this aspect of Christian life, we should be desirous to be called home. No Christian ought to desire to go out of the field of battle until the victory is won, nor to leave the field until the plough has gone up to the headland for the last time, but still he may desire to be at home, and must desire it because of the love which he bears his Lord. I cannot understand you if you do not sometimes sing that hymn—
My heart is with him on his throne,
And ill can brook delay;
Each moment listening for the voice,
‘Rise up, and come away.'
Do you love your husband, wife, if you do not really wish to see him? Do you love your home, child, if you do not wish for the time when the school shall break up, and you shall leave for home? Oh! it is a weary world, even though our Lord makes it bearable by the sweet glimpses we get of him through the telescope of faith, when he throws the lattices aside and shows himself. Yet these sweets only cause us to long for more. I tell you,heavenly food on earth is a hunger-making thing; it makes you desire fresh supplies. You cannot sip from the waters of grace on earth without longing to lie down at the well-head and drink your full of glory. Do you ever have a heart-sickness after heaven? Do you ever feel the cords that bind you to Christ tugging at your heart-strings to draw you nearer? Oh, yes! You must feel this; and if you are mixing up these longings to be with Christ, these expectings to depart, with a patient endurance of the divine will, you have hit upon Job's true idea of life. May you not only have the idea, but carry it out practically; may all the saints do so to the praise and glory of divine grace.
III. Now comes JOB'S ESTIMATE OF THE FUTURE. It is expressed in this word, "Until my change come." He refers to the two great changes which he views at one glance—the change of death when we shall "shuffle off this mortal coil.". and the change of resurrection when we shall put on our imperishable garments-shall be girt about with eternal gladness.
Beloved, let it be observed that, in a certain sense, death and resurrection are not a change to a Christian: they are not a change as to his identity. The same man who lives here will live forever. The same saint who serves God on earth will wake up in the image of Christ, to serve him day and night in his temple, and that identity will exist, not only with regard to the soul, but the body; "My eyes shall see him and not another." These very eyes which have wept for sin, shall see the King in his beauty; and these hands which here have served the Lord, shall embrace him in his glory. Do not think that death will destroy the identity of the resurrection body: it will be as much the same as the full-blown flower is the same as the seed out of which it grew.
There will be a mighty development, but it will still be the same, it is sown a natural body, and the same it is raised a spiritual body. There will also be to the regenerate no change as to his vitality. We are quickened now by the life of Christ, which is the same life that will quicken us in heaven; the incorruptible seed which lives and abides forever. "He that believes on the Son has everlasting life." He has it now—the same life which he is to live in heaven, where it will be more developed, more glorious, but still the same.
There will be no difference in the Christian's object in life when he gets to heaven. He lives to serve God here: he will live for the same end and aim there. Here holiness is his delight; it shall be his delight there.
And his occupation will not change either. He served his Master like a waiting-servant during his day on earth: he will be taken up to serve him day and night in his temple.
And the Christian will not experience a very great change as to his companions. Here on earth the excellent of the earth are all his delight; Christ Jesus his Elder Brother abides with him; the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, is resident within him; he communes with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. The fact is, heaven and earth to the Christian are the same house, only the one is the lower floor, and the other is the upper story; the one is so low and near the ground, that sometimes the water of trouble rushes into it, and the windows of the rooms below are so dark, that but a small degree of the light of heaven ever enters them, and the view is contracted; but the other rooms upstairs have a fair view, and the sun shines always through its windows, and it is furnished with a matchless skill; but still it is the same house. Heaven is thus but a slight change in some respects, yet it is a change, and we shall see that readily enough.
To the Christian it will be a change of place. He will be away from the dull and coarse materialism of this defiled, sin-stricken earth, where thorns and thistles grow, and he will arrive at the place where the inhabitants shall no more say I am sick—the paradise of God, where flowers wither not. He will change his neighborhood. He is vexed here with the ungodly conversation of the wicked; he often finds his neighbors to be like the men of Sodom, exceeding vile; but there angels shall be fellow citizens with him, and he shall commune with the spirits of the just made perfect. No vain discourse shall vex his ear, no sin shall come before him to disgust his mind; he shall not be a stranger in a strange land, but a child at home.
There, too, will be a great change as to his outward circumstances. No sweat will need to be wiped from his brow, no tear from his eye. There are no funeral knells to be heard in heaven; no open graves to be filled with the dead. In heaven there is no poverty, no proud man's scorn, no oppressor's heavy heel, no persecutor's fiery brand; but there "the wicked cease from troubling; and there the weary be at rest."
Especially will it be a change to the Christian as to that which will be within him. No body of this death to hamper him; no infirmities to cramp him; no wandering thoughts to disturb his devotion; no birds to come down upon the sacrifice, needing to be driven away. As the body shall be free from the corruption which engenders death, so shall the soul be free from the corruption which engenders strife against the new law which is in the believer's members. He shall be perfectly free from sin! There will be this change too, that he will be delivered from that dog of hell who once howled in his ears: as the world will be afar off, and cannot tempt, so Satan will be afar off, and cannot molest. A change indeed it will be, in an especial manner, to some. Have you ever visited the hospital, and sat by the side of the poor Christian woman who has lain upon that bed for months—her hearing almost gone, her sight failing, scarcely able to breathe, palpitations of the heart, life a protracted agony? Oh! what a change from the bed of languishing to the throne of God! What a difference between that hospital, with its sounds of sickness and of sorrow, and yonder New Jerusalem and the shout of them that triumph, the song of them that feast!
What an escape from the dying bed to the living glory—from the glazing eye, and the wasting frame, and the cold death-sweat, to the glory which excels, and the harps of angels, and the songs of the glorified! What a change, too, for some of the poor, for some of you sons of penury who are here this morning, from that hard work which scarcely knows a pause, from those weary fingers, and that flying needle, and that palpitating heart; from that sleep which gives but little rest, because the toil begins so soon that it seems to pervade and injure the sleep itself. What an exchange from that naked room, that unfurnished table! that cup which, so far from running over, you find it difficult to fill! from all those various pains and woes that penury is heir to, to the wealth and happiness of paradise!
What a change for you, to the mansions of the blessed, and the crowns of immortality, and the company of the princes of the blood royal, with whom you shall dwell forever! And what a change, again, for the persecuted! I know how a father's angry word breaks your heart, and how a husband's cruel remarks grieve you; but you shall soon escape from it all. The jeer of the workshop sometimes reminds you of the cruel mockings you have often read of. What a change for you to be in sweet company, where friends shall cheer and make you glad! My brethren, what a leap it must have been for the martyrs, right away from their stakes to their thrones! What a change for the men who rotted in dungeons until the moss grew on their eyelids, to the immortal beauty of the fairest of the fair, midst the bright ones doubly bright! What a change!
Right well, good patriarch, did you use the term, for it is the greatest of all changes. If you require a commentary upon this word "change," turn to the fifteenth chapter of the first epistle to the Corinthians, and read it through; we read it in your hearing just now. You will there see that all that needs to be changed, will be changed. All that must be changed to make the believer perfectly blessed, will be transformed and transfigured by the Master. If you desire a glimpse of what we shall be in heaven, remember the face of Moses when it glowed so that he covered it with a veil! remember Stephen's face when they looked upon him and saw as it were the face of an angel! remember our Lord transfigured until he was whiter than any fuller could make him! Those were transient gleams and glimpses of the beatific glory, which shall surround and environ every one of the blessed before long.
My brethren, perhaps to you it will be a sudden change. Last Sunday our sister sat here; this Sunday she sits there in heaven. Others, too, have gone this week to their home. I suppose week by week about two in this congregation die almost as regularly as I come into this pulpit So you melt away one after the other, and you disappear; but blessed thought if, when you disappear, it is to shine forever in heaven! Well, let the change come suddenly. There is much to be envied in sudden death. I never could understand why it should be put in the litany, "From sudden death, good Lord deliver us." O brethren, sudden death may God send to us so long as we are but prepared, for then we miss the pain of sickness in the gradual breaking down of the frame. It must be desirable, a choice favor which God only gives to some of his peculiarly beloved ones: a thing to pray for, not to pray against. Well it may be sudden. There is this about it, however, that if we be in Christ, let it come suddenly, we are fully prepared, "For you are complete in him." "He that believes has everlasting life." "He that lives and believes in me shall never die." Death has lost all its terror to you who are in Christ.
And there is one very sweet thought to my mind, and that though a change, it is the last change. Glory be to God, there will be no more of it, once changed into the likeness of Christ, and there will be no more changes, but immortality forever. "Forever with the Lord." We may well add—"Amen! so let it be." O you who have no hope in Jesus, death must be to you a gloomy thing indeed! It puts out your candle and leaves you forever in the dark. But you who have a good hope through grace, and have built your house upon the rock, you may joyfully look forward to the end of your appointed days, waiting until your change comes, blessing God that it will come in its appointed time, and that when it comes it will be a change for the better to you in all respects—a change which shall never be followed by another change, a change which shall make you like your Lord forever and ever! May God give his blessing! Amen!
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