Migration Heavenward

“The stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed time; and the turtle and the crane and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but my people know not the judgment of the Lord.” — Jeremiah lin., 7.

WHEN God would set fast a beautiful thought, he plants it in a tree. When he would put it afloat, he fashions it into a fish. When he would have it glide the air, he moulds it into a bird. My text speaks of four birds of beautiful instinct — the stork, of such strong affection that it is allowed familiarly to come, in Holland and Germany, and build its nest over the door-way; the sweet-dispositioned turtle-dove, mingling in color white, and black, and brown, and ashen, and chestnut; the crane, with voice like the clang of a trumpet; the swallow, swift as a dart shot out of the bow of heaven, falling, mounting, skimming, sailing — four birds started by the prophet twenty -five centuries ago, yet flying on through the ages, with rousing truth under glossy wing and in the clutch of stout claw. I suppose it may have been this very season of the year — autumn — and the prophet out-of-doors, thinking of the impenitence of the people of his day, hears a great cry overhead.

Now, you know it is no easy thing for one with ordinary delicacy of eye-sight to look into the deep blue of the noonday heaven; but the prophet looks up, and there are flocks of storks, and turtle-doves, and cranes, and swallows, drawn out in long lines for flight southmighatiox he a venward. 163

ward. As is their habit, the cranes had arranged themselves into two lines making an angle, a wedge splitting the air with wild velocity, the old crane, with commanding call bidding them onward; while the towns, and the cities, and the continents slid under them. The prophet, almost blinded from looking into the dazzling heavens, stoops down and begins to think how much superior the birds are in sagacity about their safety than men about theirs; and he puts his hand upon the pen, and begins to write: “The stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times; and the turtle and the crane and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but my people know not the judgment of the Lord.”

If you were in the field to-day, in the clump of trees at the corner of the field, you would see a convention of birds, noisy as the American Congress the last night before adjournment, or as the English Parliament when some unfortunate member proposes more economy in the Queen’s household — a convention of birds all talking at once, moving and passing resolutions on the subject of migration; some proposing to go to-morrow, some moving that they go to-day, some moving that they go to Brazil, some to Florida, some to the table-lands of Mexico, but all unanimous in the fact that they must go soon, for they have marching orders from the Lord, written on the first white sheet of the frost, and in the pictorial of the changing leaves. There is not a belted king-fisher, or a chafiinch, or a fire-crested wren, or a plover, or a red-legged partridge but expects to spend the winter at the South, for the apartments have already been ordered for them in South America, or in Africa; and after thousands of miles of flight, they will stop in the very tree “where they spent last January. Farewell, bright plumage! Until spring weather, away! Fly on, great band of heavenly musicians! Strew the continents with music, and whether from Northern fields, or Carolinian swamps, or Brazilian groves men see your wings, or hear your voice, may they bethink themselves of the solemn words of the text: “The stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times; and the turtle and the crane and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but my people know not the judgment of the Lord.”

I propose, so far as God may help me, this morning, carrying out the idea of the text, to show that the birds of the air have more sagacity than men. And I begin by particularizing and saying that JJiey ^imgle ^nukmitlL^^ their ivorh. The most serious undertaking of a bird’s life is this annual travel from the Hudson to the Amazon, from the Thames to the Nile. Naturalists tell us that they arrive there thin, and weary, and plumage ruffled, and yet they go singing all the way; the ground, the lower line of the music, the sky, the upper line of the music, themselves, the notes scattered up and down between. I suppose their song gives elasticity to their wing, and helps on with the journey, dwindling a thousand miles into four hundred. Would God that we were as wise as they in mingling Christian song with our every-day work! I believe there is such a thing as taking the pitch of Christian devotion in the morning, and keeping it all the day. I think we might take some of the dullest, heaviest, most disagreeable work of our life, and set it to the tune of “Antioch” or “Mount Pisgah.”

It is a good sign when you hear a workman whistle. i ys V better sign when you hear him hum a roundelay.

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It is a still better sign when you hear him wng the words of Isaac Watts or Charles Wesley A violin chorded and strung, if something accidentally sirike it, makes music, and I suppose there is such a thing as having our hearts so attuned by divine grace, that even the rough collisions of life will make a heavenly vibration. I do not believe that the power of Christian song has yet been fully tried. I believe that if you could roll the “Old Hundred” doxology through Wall Street, it would put an end to the panic! I believe that the discords, and the sorrows, and the sins of the world are to be swept out by heaven-born hallelujahs. Some one asked Haydn, the celebrated musician, why he always composed such cheerful music. “Why,” he said, ‘“I can’t do otherwise. When I think of God, my soul is so full of joy that the notes leap and dance from my pen.” I wish we might all exult melodiously before the Lord. With God for our Father, and Christ for our Saviour, and heaven for our home, and angels for future companions, and eternity for a lifetime, we should strike all the notes of joy. Goins; throuo-h the wilderness of this world, let us remember that we are on the way to the summery clime of heaven, and from the migratory populations flying through this autumnal air learn always to keep singing.

Children of the heavenly Eng,
As ye jouraey, sweetly sing;
Sing your Saviour’s worthy praise,
Glorious in his works and ways.

“Ye are traveling home to God,
In the way your fathers trod;
They are happy now, and we
Soon their happiness shall see.”

16d MIGRATION HEAVENWARD.

The Church of God never will be a triumphant church until it becomes a singing church.

I go further, and remark that the birds of the air are wiser than we, in the fact that, in their migration, they fly very high. During the summer, when they ar’e-ift-. the- fie-ldsj thy often come within reach of the gun; but when they start for the annual flight southward, they take their places mid-heaven, and go straight as a mark. The longest rifle that was ever brought to shoulder’ can not reach them. Would to God that we were as wise as the stork and crane in our flight heavenward! We fly so low that we are within easy range of the world, the flesh, and the devil. We are brought down by temptations that ought not to come within a mile of reaching us. Oh for some of the faith of George Müller of England, and Alfred Cookman, once of the Church militant, now of the Church triumphant 1 So poor is the type of piety in the Church of God now, that men actually caricature the idea that there is any such thing as a higher life. Moles never did believe in eagles. But, my brethren, because we have not reached these heights ourselves, shall we deride the fact that there are any such heights? A man was once talking to Brunei, the famous enoineer,

about the length of the railroad from London to Bristol. The engineer said, “It is not very great. We shall have, after a while, a steamer running from England to New York.” They laughed him to scorn; but we have gone so far now that we have ceased to laugh at any thing as impossible for human achievement. Then, I ask, is any thing impossible for the Lord? I do not believe that God exhausted all his grace in Paul, and Latimer, and Edward Pay son. I believe there are higher points of

Christian attainment to be reached in the future ages of the Christian world. You tell me that Paul went up to the tiptop of the Alps of Christian attainment. Then I tell you that the stork and crane have found above the Alps plenty of room for free flying. We go out and we conquer our temptations by the grace of God, and lie down. On the morrow, those temptations rally themselves and attack us, and by the grace of God we defeat them again; but, staying all the time in the old encampment, we have the same old battles to fight over. Why not whip out our temptations, and then forward march, making one raid through the enemy’s country, stopping not until we break ranks after the last victory. Do, my brethren, let us have some novelty of combat, at any rate, by changing, by going on, by making advancement, trading off our stale prayers about sins we ought to have quit long ago, going on toward a higher state of Christian character, and routing out sins that we have never thought of yet. The fact is, if the Church of God — if we, as individuals, made rapid advancement in the Christian life, these stereotyped prayers we have been making for ten or fifteen years would be as inappropriate to us as the shoes, and the hats, and the coats we wore ten or fifteen years ago. Oh for a higher flight in the Christian life, the stork and the crane in their migration teaching us the lesson!

“Dear Lord, and shall we ever live,
At this poor dying rate — Our love so faint, so cold to thee,
And thine to us so gieat?”

Again, I remark that the birds of the air are wiser than we, because thoy know when to start. If you should go out now and shout, “Stop, storks and cranes, don’t be in a hurrj!” they would say, “No, we can not stop; last night we heard the roaring in the woods bidding us away, and the shrill flute of the north wind has sounded the retreat. We must go. We must go.” So they gather themselves into companies, and turning not aside for storm or mountain top or shock of musketry, over land and sea, straight as an arrow to the mark they go. And if you come out this morning with a sack of corn and throw it in the fields and try to get them to stop, they are so far up they would hardly see it. They are on their way south. You could not stop them. Oh that we were as wise about the best time to start for God and heaven! We say, “Wait until it is a little later in the season of mercy. Wait until some of these green leaves of hope are all dried up and have been scattered. Wait until next year.” After a while we start, and it is too late, and we perish in the way when God’s wrath is kindled but a little. There are, you know, exceptional cases “where birds have started too late, and in the morning you have found them dead on the snow. And there are those who have perished half-way between the world and Christ. They waited until the last sickness, when the mind was gone, or they were on the express train going at forty miles an hour, and they came to the bridge and the “draw was up” and they went down. How long to repent and pray? Two seconds! Two seconds! To do the work of a lifetime and to prepare for the vast eternity in two seconds! I was reading of an entertainment given in a king’s court, and there were musicians there, with elaborate pieces of music. After a while Mozart came and began to play, and he had a blank piece of paper before him, and the king familiarly looked over his shoulder and said, “What are you playing? I see no music before you.” And Mozart put his hand on his brow, as much as to say, “I am improvising.” It was very well for him, but oh, my friends, we can not extemporize heaven. If we do not get prepared in this world, we will never take part in the orchestral harmonies of the saved. If we go out of this world unpardoned, we secure for our souls a blasted residence. Oh that we were as wise as the crane and the stork, flying away, flying away from the tempest!

Some of you have felt the pinching frost of sin. Yoa feel it to-day. You are not happy. I look into your faces, and I know you are not happy. There are voices within your soul that will not be silenced, telling you that you are sinners, and that without the pardon of God you are undone forever. What are you going to do, my friends, with the accumulated trangressions of this lifetime? Will you stand still and let the avalanche tumble over you? Oh that you would go away into the warm heart of God’s mercy. The Southern grove, redolent with magnolia and cactus, never waited for Northern flocks as God has waited for you, saying, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love. Come unto me, all ye who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”

Another frost is bidding you away — it is the frost of sorrow. Where do you live now? “Oh,” you say, “I have moved.” Why did you move? You say, “I don’t want as large a house now as formerly.” Why do you not want as large a house? You say, “My family is not so large.” Where have they gone to? Eternity! Your mind goes back through that last sickness and through the almost supernatural effort to keep life, and through those prayers that seemed unavailing, and through that kiss which received no response because the lips were lifeless, and I hear the bells tolling and I hear the hearts breaking — while I speak, I hear them break. A heart! Another heart! Alone! alone! alone! This world, which in your girlhood and boyhood was sunshine, is cold now, and oh! weary dove, you fly around this world as though you would like to stay, when the wind and the frost and the blackening clouds would bid you away into the heart of an all-comforting God. Oh, I have noticed again and again what a botch this world makes of it when it tries to comfort a soul in trouble! It says, “Don’t cry!” How can we help crying when the heart’s treasures are scattered, and father is gone, and mother is gone, and companions are gone, and the child is gone, and every thing seems gone? It is no comfort to tell a man not to cry. The world comes up and says, “Oh, it is only the body of “your loved one that you have put in the ground!” But there is no comfort in that. That body is precious. Shall we never put our hand in that hand again, and shall we never see that sweet face again? Away with your heartlessness, oh world! But come, Jesus! and tell us that when the tears fall they foil into God’s bottle; that the dear bodies of our loved ones shall rise radiant in the resurrection; and all the breakings down here shall be liftings up there, and “they shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more, neither shall the sun light on them nor any heat, for the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall lead them to living fountains of water, and God shall wipe all tears from their eyes.”

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Yon may have noticed that when the chaffinch or the stork or the crane starts on its migration, it calls all those of its kind to come too. The tree-tops are full of chirp and whistle and carol and the long roll-call. The bird does not start off alone. It gathers all of its kind. Oh that you might be as wise in this migration to heaven, and that you might gather all your families and your friends with you! I would that Hannah might take Samuel by the hand, and Abraham might take Isaac, and Hagar might take Ishmael. I ask you if those who sat at your breakfast-table this morning will sit with you in heaven? I ask you what influences you are trying to bring upon them, what example you are setting them? Are you calling them to go with you? Ay, ay, have you started yourself? I say it in all love. I could not stand here in any other spirit and say this. I ask you what the prospects are that you will be united families in heaven? I have heard of whole fiimilies saved, and so have you. I suppose there is such a thing also as a whole family lost. Father lost, mother lost, sons and daughters lost, the estate of wTetchedness going down from generation to generation, the tide of blackness deepening and swiftening into wilder rapids and mightier plunges of despair. Impenitent father, impenitent mother! if you reject Christ, and your children come up to years of discretion, and through your influence reject him and are lost, it will be your fault. Oh, if there should come throuofh the darkness of the lost world words from their own lips, saying, ‘’Father, you never invited me to Christ; mother, your example led me away from Jesus, and I am lost; you got me here; you can not get me out!”

Start for heaven yourself, and take your children with you. Come thou and all thy house into the ark. Tell your little ones that there are realms of balm and sweetness for all those who fly in the right direction. Heaven beckons from above; hell gapes from beneath; and this is the only safe hour. Oh, make the best of it. Swifter than eagle’s stroke, put out for heaven. Like the crane or the stork, stop not night nor day until you find the right place for stopping. Seated to-day in Christian service, will you be seated in the same glorious service when the heavens have passed away with a great noise, and the elements have melted with fervent heat, and the redeemed are gathered around the throne of Jesus? Oh, is it impossible that the separating line goes through any family in my beloved flock? Is the father on one side and the mother on the other side of the line that divides the two eternities? If you are saved, take your friends with you. Invite all your children to go along. Together on earth, may you be together in heaven!

It is strange how out of the same bell you may get such different sounds — glad and sad — just as the janitor rings it fast or slow. So when Independence-day comes he rings the bell merrily, and every stroke seems to say “Independence,” “liberty;” and then, when the long procession winds into the church-yard, that very same bell tolls for the dead. So it is with this Gospel bell. I lay hold the rope to-day, and offer you pardon, peace, and heaven. How gladly the bell rings out I Free! Free I But there is another story to be told. Those who reject God and wander away from him, go into perpetual sorrow; and so I lay hold the rope of the bell and give it slow, sad, solemn pull, and it rings out, through the darkness of the destroyed spirit, Woe! Woe!

To-day the Saviour calls,

Ye wanderers come.

Oh, ye benighted souls,

Why longer roam?

The Spirit calls to-day,

Yield to his power.
Oh, grieve Him not awaj,

‘Tis mercy’s hour.”