III. I shall detain you but a few minutes longer, while I dwell upon the third theme, which is, THAT SUDDEN EXCHANGE WHICH A SUDDEN DEATH WILL CAUSE.
You see yonder Christian man, he is full of a thousand fears, he is afraid even of his interest in Christ, he is troubled spiritually, and vexed with temporal cares. You see him cast down and exceeding troubled, his faith but very weak; he steps outside your door, and there meets him a messenger from God, who smites him to the heart, and he is dead. Can you conceive the change? Death has cured him of his fears, his tears are wiped away once for all from his eyes; and, to his surprise, he stands where he feared he should never be, in the midst of the redeemed of God, in the general assembly and church of the first-born. If he should think of such things, would he not upbraid himself for thinking so much of his trouble, and for looking into a future which he was never to see? See yonder man, he can scarcely walk, he has a hundred pains in his body, he says he is more tried and pained than any man. Death puts his skeleton hand upon him, and he dies. How marvellous the change! No aches now, no casting down of spirit, he then is supremely blest, the decrepit has become perfect, the weak has become strong, the trembling one has become a David, and David has become as the angel of the Lord. Hark to the song which pours from the lips of him who just now groaned; look at the celestial smile which lights the features of the man just now racked with pain and tormented with anguish! Was ever change so surprising, so marvellous? When I think of it, I could almost long for it to come across myself this morning; to go from the thousand eyes of you that look upon me, to look into the eyes of Christ, and to go from your songs, to the songs of spirits before the throne, to leave the sabbath work on earth for an eternal sabbath of rest: to go from unbelieving hearts, from Christians who need to be cheered and sinners to be convinced, to be with those who need no preaching, but who in one eternal song, sing “Hallelujah to God and the Lamb.” I can imagine that when a man dies thus suddenly, one of the first emotions he experiences in the next world will be surprise. I can conceive that the spirit knows not where it is. It is like a man waking up from a dream. He looks about him. Oh, that glory! how resplendent you throne! He listens to harps of gold, and he can scarce believe it true. “I, the chief of sinners, and yet in heaven? I, a doubting one, and yet in paradise?” And then when he is conscious that he is really in heaven, oh! what overwhelming joy; how is the spirit flooded with delight, covered over with it, scarcely able to enjoy it because it seems to be all but crushed beneath the eternal weight of glory. And next, when the spirit has power to recover itself, and open its eyes from the blindness caused by this dazzling light, and to think—when its thoughts have recovered themselves from the sudden effect of a tremendous flood of bliss,—the next emotion will be gratitude. See how that believer, five minutes ago a mourner, now takes his crown from off his head, and with transporting joy and gratitude bows before his Saviour’s throne. Hear how he sings; was ever song like that, the first song he ever sang that had the fulness of Paradise and perfection in it—”Unto him that loved me and washed me from my sins in his blood, unto him be glory.” And how he repeats it, and repeats it again, and looks round to cherubim and seraphim, and prays them to assist him in his song, till all the harps of heaven re-taught the melody of gratitude, re-tuned by the one faithful heart, send up another hallelujah, and yet another, and another; while the floods of harmony surround the eternal throne of God.
But what must be the change to the unconverted man? His joys are over for ever. His death is the death of his happiness—his funeral is the funeral of his mirth. He has just risen from his cups; he has another cup to drain, which is full of bitterness. He has just listened to the sound of the harp and the viol, and the music of them that make merry; an eternal dirge greets his ears, mixed with the doleful chorus of the shrieks of damned souls. What horror and surprise shall seize upon him! “Good God,” he says, “I thought it was not so, but lo, it is. What the minister said to me is true; the things I would not believe are at last really so.” When the poor soul shall find itself in the hands of angry fiends, and lifts up his eyes in hell, being in torments so hot, so feverish, so thirsty, that it shall seem in that first moment as though it had been athirst for a million years, what will be his surprise! “And am I,” he will say, “really here? I was in the streets of London but a minute ago; I was singing a song but an instant before, and here am I in hell! What! so soon damned? Is the sentence of God like a lightning-flash? Does it so instantaneously rive the spirit and destroy its joys? Am I really here?” And when the soul has convinced itself that it is actually in hell, can you imagine next the overwhelming horror that will roll over it. It, too, will be stunned with a mighty flood, not with a flood of glory but with a flood of anger, of wrath, of divine justice. Oh! how the spirit is tormented now—tormented beyond thought. And then at last, when the wave recedes a moment, and there is a pause, what black despair shall then seize upon the spirit! Have you ever seen men die without a hope? I read but yesterday a case of a young woman who had procrastinated many times, and at last she was told by the physician that within nine hours he really believed she would be a corpse. Then, when death really became a matter of fact to her, she rose up in the bed upon which she had been laid by the sudden stroke of God, and she prayed—prayed till she fell back fainting, and her lips were livid and her cheek was pale, while she cried, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” Friends talked to her, consoled and comforted her, and bade her trust in Christ; but she said, “It is of no use for you to comfort me; no, it is too late. I made a fatal resolve some months ago that I would again enjoy the world, and that resolve destroyed by soul.” And then she rose up in bed again, with eyes starting from their sockets, and prayed again till she was breathless, and groaned and cried, and fell down again in a faint, needing to be restored once more. And so she did, till with ghastly look—an awful look of horror—as though she felt the anguish of another world, she expired.
Now if such is the remorse of a spirit before it feels the wrath of God—if the first drops are sufficient thus to destroy all hope and beat in pieces all our boastings, what will the eternal hail be—what will the everlasting sleet of divine wrath be when once it is poured our? Sodom and Gomorrah! Why all their fiery hail from heaven shall be nothing compared with the eternal fire that must fall upon the sinner. Do you think I love to speak on such a theme as this? My soul trembles while she thinks of it. No, I would sooner preach of other things by far, but it is needful that men may be awakened. Oh! I implore you, men and brethren, ye that know not God, and are still condemned, because you believe not in Christ, I pray you think of these things. Oh that I had a Baxter’s heart, that I could weep over sinners as he did; but my soul feels as true an anguish for your souls as ever Baxter felt. Oh that you would be saved! My eyes ache; my brow is full of fire now, because I cannot preach as I wanted to preach to you. Oh that God would take up the work and send that truth right home. I know I shall soon die and you too, and I shall face each of you, and your eyes shall stare on me for ever and ever, if you be lost through my unfaithfulness. And shall it be—shall it be? Oh that we had a hope that all of us might see the face of God and live! “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved.”
Spirit of God, convince of sin, and bring the heart to Christ, and may we all without exception see thy face in joy and glory, and praise thee, world without end. Amen.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”
