Sermons

WHILE “night,” in all languages, is the symbol for

▼ gloom and suffering, it is often really cheerful, bright, and impressive. I speak not of such nights as come down with no -star pouring light from above, or silvered wave tossing up light from beneath — murky, hurtling, portentous, but such as you often see when the pomp and magnificence of heaven turn out on night-parade; and it seems as though the song which the morning stars began so long ago were chiming yet among the constellations, and the sons of God were shouting for joy. Such nights the sailor blesses from the forecastle, and the trapper on# the vast prairie, and the belated traveler by the road-side, and the soldier from the tent, earthly hosts gazing upon heavenly, and shepherds guarding their flocks afield, while angel hands above them set the silver bells a ringing: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace; good will toward men.”

What a solemn and glorious thing is night in the wilderness! Night among the mountains! Night on the

ocean! Fragrant night among tropical groves! Flash¬ ing night amid arctic severities! Calm night on Roman Campagna! Awful night among the Cordilleras! Glorious night 5mid sea after a tempest! Thank God for the night! The moon and the stars which rule it are light-houses on the coast, toward which I hope we all are sailing, and blind mariners are we if, with so many beam¬ ing, burning, flaming glories to guide us, we can not find our way into the harbor.

My text may well suggest that, as the natural evening is often luminous, so it shall be light in the evening of our sorrows — of old age — of the world’s history — of the Christian life.

“At eventime it shall be light.55

I. This prophecy will be fulfilled in the evening of Christian sorrow. For a long time it is broad daylight. The sun rides high. Innumerable activities go ahead with a thousand feet, and work with a thousand arms, and the pickaxe struck a mine, and the battery made a discovery, and the investment yielded its twenty per cent., and the book came to its twentieth edition, and the farm quadrupled in value, and sudden fortune hoisted to high position, and children wTere praised, and friends without number swayned into the family hive, and prosperity sang in the music, and stepped in the dance, and glowed in the wine, and ate at the banquet, and all the gods of music, and ease, and gratification gathered around this Jupiter holding in his hands so many thunderbolts of power. But every sun must set, and the brightest day must have its twilight. Suddenly the sky wTas overcast. The fountain dried up. The song hushed. The wolf broke into the family fold and carried off the best lamb. A deep howl of woe came crashing down through thQ joyous symphonies. At one rough twang of the hand of disaster the harp-strings all broke. Down went the strong business firm! Away went long-established credit! Up flew a flock of calumnies! The new book would not sell. A patent could not be secured for the invention. Stocks sank like lead. The insurance company exploded. “How much,” says the sheriff, “will you bid for this piano?” “How much for this library?” “How much for this family picture?” “How much? Will you let it go at less than half price? Going — going — gone!” Will the grace of God hold one up in such circumstances? What have become of the great multitude of God’s children who have been pounded of the flail, and crushed under the wheel, and trampled under the hoof? Did they lie down in the dust, weeping, wail¬ ing, and gnashing their teeth? Did they, like Job, curse God, and want to die because they had boils? When’ the rod of fatherly chastisement struck them, did they strike back? Because they found one bitter cup on the table of God’s supply, did they upset the whole table? Did they kneel down at their empty money-vault and say, “All my treasures are gone?” Did they stand by the grave of their dead, saying, •“There never will be a resurrection?”

Did they bemoan their thwarted plans and say, “The stocks are down — would God I were dead?” Did the night of their disaster come upon them moonless, star¬ less, dank, and howling, smothering and choking their life out? Ho! Ho! Ho! At eventime it was light. The swift promises overtook them. The eternal constellations, from their circuit about God’s throne, poured

down an infinite lustre. Under their shining the billows of trouble took on crests, and plumes of gold, and jasper, and amethyst, and flame. All the trees of life rustled in the midsummer air of God’s love. The night¬ blooming assurances of Christ’s sympathy filled all the atmosphere with heaven. The soul at every step seemed to start up from its feet bright- winged joys, warbling heavenward. “It is good that I have been afflicted,” cries David. “The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away,” exclaims Job. “Sorrowful, yet always rejoicing,” says St. Paul. “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes,” exclaims John, in apocalyptic vision. At eventime it was light.. Light from the cross! Light from the promises! Light from the throne! S tr earning, joyous, outgushing, everlasting light!

II. The text shall find fulfillment in the time of old age. It is a grand thing to be young — to have the sight clear, and the hearing acute, and the step elastic, and all our pulses marching on to the drumming of a stout heart. Mid-life and old age will be denied many of us, but youth — we all know what that is. Those wrinkles were not always on your brow. That snow was not always on your head. That brawny muscle did not always bunch your arm. You have not always worn spectacles. Grave and dignified as you now are, you once went coasting down the hill-side, or threw off your hat for the race, or sent the ball flying sky-high. But youth will not always last. It stays only long enough to gwe us exuberant spirits, and broad shoulders for burden-carrying, and an arm with which to battle our way through difficulties. Life’s path, if you follow it long enough, will come under frowning crag and across

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trembling causeway. Blessed old age, if you let it come naturally. You can not hide it. You may try to cover the wrinkles, but you can not cover the wrinkles. If the time has come for you to be old, be not ashamed to be old. The grandest things in all the universe are old. Old mountains; old rivers; old seas; old stars, and an old eternity. Then do not be ashamed to be old, unless you are older than the mountains, and older than the stars.

How men and women will lie! They say they are forty, but they are sixty. They say they are twenty, but they are thirty. They say they are sixty, but they are eighty. How some people will lie!

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