Further, this old man, who said, “I will go and see my son,” yet felt that it was but for a little while. He says, “I will go and see him before I die.” He had seventeen more years to live, but he did not know that; he felt so old a man at one hundred and thirty that he thought he should only just manage to see his son, and perhaps die on his neck. He said, “But I will go and see him, even though it be only with my dying eyes. I will die with the sight of Joseph before me, and that will be enough to make me happy.” And, dear souls, if you did but get to Jesus, you might be happy if you could only say, “Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation.” But it need not be death to you any more than it was to Jacob. Indeed, when you have seen him, you shall live, and never die; but your eyes shall be opened to see yet more and more of him, and the light of Christ shall so shine into your soul that you shall behold him after a still more glorious fashion till he shall be the joy of your heart, and the heaven of your soul for ever. Therefore, singe there is such a living Savior, go to him, I pray you, and you shall not merely see him for a little while, and then die, but you shall see him and live for ever. Therefore, hasten by faith to see him this very moment.
Old Jacob also felt that age should not hinder, but rather speed him. He believed that he was soon going to die, but he said, “I will go and see him before I die.” I think that Jacob’s age really made him go more quickly. “Ah!” said he to himself, “I shall be dead soon; therefore, let me hasten down to Joseph, that I may see him before I die.” So, dear friends, do not let anyone gay, “I am too old to be saved.” Who is too old to trust Christ? Who is too old to seek and find the Savior? I have often heard stories told about people not being converted after they are five-and-forty, or thereabouts; but that is all untrue, and I do not believe a word of it. I have seen just as many people in proportion converted at one age as at another. There are more young people in the world than there are aged persons, and therefore there are more people converted, by God’s grace, while they are young. There are fewer old people than young ones; but I do thank God that, even in this building, I could point out a great many who I know were baptized after their hair had grown grey. Some of them put their trust in Jesus when they were threescore years and ten, and others even later than that. There was a dear old brother, who came in here when he was past eighty years of age, and he found the Savior. He was such a Little-faith or Feeble-mind that he hardly dared to “peak to any of us as he came in and out amongst us, but at last he said to himself, “I must join the church.” I fancy that he was eighty-eight when he was baptized, and he was so happy with us for about six months, and then he gently slipped away and went home. I am sure I never saw a more childlike person, or a more genuine conversion than that of this dear old man. However old you are, friend, come along. If Methuselah were here, I would preach to him the same gospel that I would teach to one of these dear girls; for, however old a sinner is, there is nothing in the gospel about limiting it to persons of a certain age. “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature;” does not mean, go and begin picking out the creatures, and saying, “I only preach the gospel to people who are under a specified age.” Go home, and go to bed, sir, if that is how you talk; Christ never sent you on such an errand as that. He sent us to preach the gospel to every creature; and to you who are almost worn out, if there be but life in you, I cry, “Come along, trust in Jesus, and he will save even you.”
“While the lamp holds out to burn,
The vilest sinner may return;”
and, returning, he shall find Christ.
Be quick about it, however, you who are getting on in life, you who are far advanced in years, and may God bless you! Yesterday, I had many kind letters congratulating me on completing my fifty-second year, but there was one that did a little surprise and amuse me. One brother writes that he has read my sermons for many years, and that, at my advanced age, he cannot pray that I may have many returns of the day; but he does trust that God may spare me at least two or three years longer for the good of the church. Well, as I read the letter, I could not help smiling, as you do, for I do not feel that I am quite as advanced in age as that; but still, I thought that, perhaps, this brother’s letter might be prophetic. We may be older than we think we are, and two or three years may be all the time we are to have here. At any rate, I will try to work for Christ as earnestly as if I had only two or three years to live, and then it may be that he will add to us yet more; and, if not, what matters it? We shall go home to him who sent us, and be gathered to our Father in peace.
Once more, old Jacob was not kept back from going to see his son because it was a long journey into Egypt. Journeys appear longer to old men than they do to young folk, and it was a very great undertaking to go so far with those seventy and more people around him. There would be a deal of packing up to be done, and there were no Pantechnicon vans in those days to carry everything for the whole company. It was the transplanting of a grand old tree, and it was a difficult task to move so venerable an oak, with such wide-spreading roots and branches. Yet Jacob said, “I will go and see Joseph before I die.” Now, dear friend, if it does seem a long way to Jesus, yet undertake the journey; and if you can persuade your wife and all your children also to go, so much the better. Christ will receive them all in Goshen, and they shall dwell with him for ever. I wish that there might be a blessed migration of many who have been rooted to the soil of the old Canaan, the sinful place, who will now go, not down to Egypt, but up to Jesus in the land of plenty and of purity, to dwell with him for ever. That which ruins so many is that hesitancy, that delaying, that halting between two opinions, which I find in the original is hopping upon two twigs, and never resting upon either; let not that be the case with you. Procrastination is the devil’s net in which myriads are entangled to their utter destruction; may the Lord deliver any of you who have been caught in it! Decide for Christ now, I beseech you; may the Holy Spirit constrain you to decide at once, for Christ’s sake! Amen.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”
