Such changes strike us as most memorable. They must not be passed over without remark. In the course of forty years, my brethren, what changes take place in every community, in every church, in every family! A friend showed me, last Thursday, a photograph of myself, in the midst of my first deacons. It was taken scarcely thirty-eight years ago, and yet of the entire group I only survive. Those associates of the youthful preacher have all gone to their reward. We have likenesses of other groups of church officers of a later date, in which I am placed in the center, and I am there still; but nearly all of those who once surrounded me have gone home. Those who were our leaders in our days of struggle, and who saw the hand of God with us in those first years, are growing few in number. We have not yet completed the forty years; but when we have done so, the words of our text will be almost literally applicable to our case as a church. The going and the coming, the adding and the taking away, have changed the texture of this fabric; and no thread will soon be left. Surely the Lord would have us notice this, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. A costly operation, involving so many sorrows, is not to be passed over without thought. Beloved, we, too, are passing away. The pastor and his present helpers must themselves be summoned home in due course. The march of the generations is not a procession passing before our eyes, while we sit, like spectators, at the window; but we are in the procession ourselves, and we, too, are passing down the streets of time, and shall disappear in our turn. We, too, shall sleep with our fathers, unless the Lord shall come speedily. I hear a clarion-blast sounding out from the graves which lie behind us: “Be ye also ready.” From the last closed sepulcher there comes the prophetic warning, “Set thine house in order; for thou shalt die, and not live.”
This change was universal throughout the whole camp. There was a change even in the enumerators. The Sinai census had been taken by Moses and Aaron; and now Moses just remains long enough to take his leading place; but his brother Aaron is not there; the high priest of God has gone up to mount Hor, has been stripped of his garments, has been buried and mourned by all Israel, and now Eleazar his son stands before the Lord in his father’s stead. It was so among the other priests and Levites and elders of the people. There was a change everywhere: among the poorest dwellers in that canvas city and among the princes who dwelt beneath the standards of the tribes, all had changed. There was not left a man of them.” Thus is it among ourselves: no offices can be permanently held by the same men: “they are not suffered to continue by reason of death.” No position, however lofty or lowly, can retain its old possessor. It is not only the cedars that fall, but the fir trees feel the axe. “There is no discharge in that war.” That same scythe which cuts down the towering flower among the grass, also sweeps down whole regiments of green blades. See how they lie together in long rows, to wither in a common decay! Throughout the whole body this change is gradually taking place. No man can climb the rock of immortality, and sit there amid the seething sea, and say to death, “Thy waves cannot reach me here!” Though vigorous in health, though sound in constitution, though guarded by all the armor of the science of health, you too must fall by the arrows of the insatiable archer. “It is appointed unto men once to die.”
The change is inevitable. Man that is born of woman must be of few days. If it had not been for the great sin of Israel at Kadesh, many of the people might have lived to the second census, and beyond it; but even then if by reason of strength their lives had been lengthened, yet would they soon have died out in the ordinary course of nature. If forty years had not been appointed as the end of that generation, yet without that appointment they would all have passed away in another twenty or thirty years. As Moses said in his wilderness psalm, “The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labor and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.”
We must soon quit our tents for the last battle. When the conscript number shall be drawn we may escape this year, and next; but the lot will fall upon us in due time. There is no leaping from the net of mortality wherein, like a shoal of fish, we are all enclosed. Unless our Lord shall soon appear we shall each one find a grave; for, as the wise man says, All are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.” “We must needs die, and are as water spilt on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again.” Therefore we wisely bow before the stern decree, and yield ourselves to death.
But let us not forget that all this change was still under the divine control. Though the people must pass away, yet still the Lord’s hand would be in each death and its surroundings. If not a sparrow falleth to the ground without our Father’s knowledge, we may rest assured that no man dieth without the will of God; no man is carried to his long home unless the Lord hath said, “Return, ye children of men.”
What can preserve my life, or what destroy?
An angel’s arm can’t snatch me from the grave—
Legions of angels can’t confine me there.”
To create and to destroy are sole prerogatives of the King of kings. Till he speaks the word, we live not; or living, we die not. Walking in the midst of ten thousand stricken with the plague, we are safe till God appoints our removal. Concerning those that are asleep, we know that they have not died without the will of our Father: concerning our time also, we know that we shall not be the toys of chance, or the victims of fate. A wise and loving God fixes the date and place of our decease; for “precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.” Stern though the work may be, his great and tender heart rules the ravages of death. Let us therefore be comforted concerning the great changes which death is working. Here is no cause for tears, as though we were left in a monster’s power, and bereft of a Father’s care. The Lord is still ruling, and nothing happens save as he appoints.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”