You will all go with me in the next point. Sometimes the day of affliction
becomes as a fast which has been turned into a feast. It is a trying thing to
lose one’s health, and to be near to death; to lose one’s wealth, and to
wonder how the children will be fed; to have heavy tidings of disaster come
to you day after day in doleful succession. But if you can grasp the promise,
and know that “All things work together for good to them that love God;”
if you can see a covenant God in all, then the fast turns into a feast, and
you say, “God is going to favour me again. He is only pruning the vine to
make it bring forth better grapes. He is going to deal with me again after
his own wise, loving, and fatherly way of discipline.” You then hear the
Lord saying to you–
“Then trust me, and fear not: thy life is secure;
My wisdom is perfect, supreme is my power;
In love I correct thee, thy soul to refine,
To make thee at length in my likeness to shine.”
I have met with some saints who have been happier in their sickness and in
their poverty than ever they were in health and in wealth. I remember how
one, who had been long afflicted, and had got well, but had lost some of
the brightness of the Lord’s presence, which he had enjoyed during his
sickness, said, “Take me back to my bed again. Let me be ill again, for I
was well when I was ill. I am afraid that I am getting ill now that I am
well.” It is often worth while being afflicted in order to experience the
great lovingkindness of God, which he bestows so abundantly on us in the
hour of trouble and perplexity. Yes, God turns our fasts into feasts, and we
are glad in the midst of our sorrow; we can praise and bless his name for
all that he does.
Once more: the solemn truth of the coming of the Lord is a feast to us,
though at first it was a fast. With very great delight we believe that the
Lord Jesus Christ will shortly come. He is even now in the act of coming.
The passage that we read, “Surely, I come quickly,” would be better
translated, “Surely, I am coming quickly.” He is on the road, and will
certainly appear, to the joy of his people, and for the emancipation of the
world. There are certain writers who say they know when he is coming; do
not you be plagued with them; they know no more about it than you do.
“Of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but
my Father only;” said the Lord Jesus. Perhaps the Lord may come sooner
than any of us expect; before this “diet of worship” shall break up, he may
be here. On the other hand, he may not come for a thousand years, or twice
ten thousand years. The times and the seasons are with him, and it is not
for us to pry behind the curtain. Those of our number who are unsaved may
well dread his coming, for he will come to destroy them that obey not the
gospel. “Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord
cometh, for it is nigh at hand; a day of darkness, and of gloominess, a day
of clouds and thick darkness.” That day will be terror, and not light to you.
When he cometh, he shall judge the earth in righteousness, and woe unto
his adversaries; for “He shall rule them with a rod of iron; as the vessels of
a potter shall they be broken into shivers.” You have grave need to keep the
fast of the Second Advent, for to you it is dies irae, day of wrath and day of
vengeance, day of dread and day of woe. But if you become a believer, and
by grace are transformed, as I described in the earlier part of this
discourse, then it shall be a feast to you. Then you will look out for his
appearing as the day of your hope, and will gladly say, “Ay, let him come!
Come Lord, nor let thy chariots wait! Come, Lord! Thy church entreats thee
to tarry no longer! Come, thou absent love, thou dear unknown, thou fairest
of ten thousand! Come to thy church, and make her glad!” To us the thought
of the glorious Advent of Christ is no fast; it is a blessed feast. Our
songs never rise higher than when we get on this strain. With what fervor
we lift up our voices, and sing–
“Brothers, this Lord Jesus
Shall return again,
With his Father’s glory,
With his angel train;
For all wreaths of empire
Meet upon his brow,
And our hearts confess him
King of glory now”!
Last of all, to come still more closely home, the approach of death is to
most men a dreadful fast. Not the Mohammedan Ramadan can be more full
of piteous grief than some men when they are obliged to think of death. If
some of you were put into a room to-morrow and were compelled to stay
there all day, and to think of death, it would certainly be a very gloomy
time to you. You will die, however, perhaps suddenly, perhaps by slow
degrees. There will come a time when people will walk very gently round
you bed, when they will wipe the death-sweat from your brow, when they
will bow over you to see whether you still breathe, or whether you have
gone. Out of the six thousand persons here to-night, there are some,
certainly, who will never see New Year’s Day. Usually this is some one
who does not see even another Sabbath-day. Almost every week we get an
intimation that a hearer of the previous week has died before the next
Lord’s-day.
Who among us will first be gone? Dare you think of it? O beloved, when
once you have peace with God, and you know that you are going to behold
his face, whom though you have not seen, yet you love, then you can think
of death without trembling. I think that there is nothing more delightful to
the man who has the full assurance of faith, than to be familiar with the
grace, and with the resurrection morning, and with the white robe, and
with the harp of gold, and with the palm, and with the endless song. The
thought of death is more a feast to us than a fast; for as Watts sings–
“Jesus can make a dying bed
Feel soft as downy pillows are,
While on his breast I lean my head,
And breathe my life out sweetly there.”
“Well, I shall soon be home,” says one old saint; and she spoke of it as she
used to speak, when a girl, of the holidays, and of her going away from
school. “I shall soon behold the King in his beauty,” says another; he
speaks of it as he might have spoken, when a young man, of his marriage-
day. Children of God can not only read Young’s Night Thoughts without
feeling any chill of solemnities there written out; but they can write in
their diaries notes of expectation, at the thought of being with Christ,
and almost notes of regret that they have not passed away to the glory, but
are lingering here in the land of shadows. “What?” said one, who had been
long lying senseless, when he came back again to consciousness, “And am
I here still? I had half hoped to have been in my heavenly Father’s home
and palace above, long before this; and I am still here.” Truly, beloved, the
fast is turned into a feast, when we reach this experience. We will not
hesitate to say, “Come, Lord, take us to thyself.” Oh for a sight of the King
in his beauty!
“Father, I long, I faint to see
The place of thine abode;
I’d leave thy earthly courts, and flee
Up to thy seat, my God.”
I knew right well a beloved brother in Christ with whom I was very
familiar, who stood up one Sabbath morning, and announced just that
verse. I thought of him when I repeated it, and I wondered whether it was
quite as true to me as it was to him. He gave it out, and said–
“Father, I long, I faint to see
The place of thine abode;
I’d leave thy earthly courts, and flee
Up to thy seat, my God!”
Then he stopped, there was a silence; and at last, one of the congregation
ventured upstairs into the pulpit, and found that the preacher was gone. His
prayer was heard. He was gone to the place of God” abode. Oh, happy they
who die thus! The Lord grant that we may never pray against a sudden
death! We may almost pray for it when once our soul is right with God. I
can join John Newton, and instead of dreading the change, say–
“Rather, my spirit would rejoice,
And long, and wish, to hear thy voice;
Glad when it bids me earth resign,
Secure of heaven, if thou art mine.”
But is Christ yours? Has the fast been changed into a feast for you, by faith
in the crucified Saviour? God help you to answer that question with a glad,
hearty “Yes”! Then may he make all your life “joy and gladness”, changing
your fearful fasts into “cheerful feasts”, until at length all of us, who
believe in Christ, and who love his appearing, shall sit down at the
marriage-supper of the Lamb! Amen.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”
