Paying the Fare

‘I ““HAT was an expensive voyage which Jonah made when he” fled from the presence of the Lord “and ran away to Tarshish. He found a ship just ready to sail, and he the fare thereof.” But he paid dearly. How much money he paid we do not know; but it was a dead loss, for he never got to Tarshish. He paid away his credit as a servant of the Lord. He made a hard draft on his conscience, and that is always a dear bargain for any man. Nothing hurts us like the hurts we give to our conscience.

After Jonah’s sinful voyage began, the second part, and the hardest part, of the bill came in. For the Almighty sent after him the policeman of a mighty gale, which caught hold of the vessel and well-nigh shivered it

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into wreck. Poor Jonah had not paid his fare to the bottom of the sea; but there is no help for him. The frightened crew pitched him out into the deep, and but for God’s interposing mercy he might have been devoured by the sharks instead of being preserved by that “great fish” which was sent to transport him safely to the dry land. A dear voyage that! The prophet who ran away from God lost his money, lost his time, lost his credit, lost the approval of his conscience and of his God, and would have lost his life but for a miraculous interposition. AH this was the “fare” which one man paid for sinning.

But many of our readers may be committing the same terrible mistake. For no path seems to most people so easy and pleasant to travel, as the path of sinful inclination. It is what the Bible calls “walking in the way of a man’s own heart, and in the sight of his own eyes.” One man, for example, is entirely absorbed in making money. When this becomes a greedy appetite, the money-lover must pay for it with daily anxiety and worry, and he runs the fearful risk of being eaten up with covetousness. A greed for wealth grows with years. When the rich miser of New York tottered out into the street at fourscore, and a friend asked him how he felt, the feeble old miser replied eagerly, “I feel better to-day: stochs are up.’’ Ah! what a fare that old millionnaire had to pay for travelling farther and faster than others on the road to wealth! It shrivelled up his very soul. Gold may be a useful servant, but it is a cruel master. It is not easy to own it without its owning us. Where one man makes it a rich blessing to others, thousands make it the ruin of their souls. Love of money drew Lot to the fertile valley of Sodom, and he “paid the fare thereof” in the destruction of his family. Love of money made Gehazi a knave: he “paid the fare” in an incurable leprosy. Love of money was one of two sins for which Judas paid with the suicide’s rope, and everlasting infamy. No man can make money safely and wisely, unless he holds his earnings as a trust from God. What would it profit you to win the wealth of an empire, if you should pay for it the price of your undying soul? “What shall a man give in exchange for his souH”

Into no road do young persons press more eagerly than the road to sensual indulgence. No turnpike is more travelled, and none exacts a more terrible “toll.” He who travels it must “pay the fare” thereof. The licentious man pays it in shame and self-loathing, in remorse and “rottenness of the bones.” No young maiden can take these hot coals into her bosom without being fearfully burned. The beautiful but ill-fated girl from New Jersey, whose tragical end once awakened such a universal thrill of horror, may have taken only one false step at first. But how far that led! It requires but one step to go down Niagara. She paid dearly for yielding to temptation; for the end of it was death. Hundreds of young men are pressing in every night to houses of wanton pleasure, bent only on enjoyment. But over the door of every house of infamy the finger of inspiration has written, “This house is the way to hell going down to the chambers of death.”

All along the seductive pathways of self-indulgence God places his toll-gates of retribution. I sometimes pass in the streets a wretched man who often needs the help of a policeman to convey him to his desolated home. He was once rich and respected. Poor victim of the bottle, he is “paying the toll” on the devil’s turnpike. The heartless dramsellers, who furnish him the poison for guilty gain, will have to pay theirs when they reach the judgment-bar of God I

We cannot stop to recount all the penalties which men and women have to pay for sinning. The costliest thing in the world is sin. It costs purity of conscience, and costs the favor of God. It will cost at the last the loss of heaven. The sin of grieving the Holy Ghost has cost many a one everlasting perdition.

“Show me the better way, — show me the safe way,” exclaim sone of my readers who are alarmed at their own course of sin, and who really desire to live a better life. “Show me the way, and tell me what is the fare thereof.” Friend, salvation is free on God’s side; but on your side it must be won by repentance and faith. As far aa Christ’s precious atonement is concerned,

“Nothing, either great or small.

Remains for you to do;

Jesus died and paid it all —

All the debt you owe!”

But the road to heaven, which the crucified Jesus has opened to you, cg,n only be entered by your abandoning of yoi;r sins, and following him in faith and self-denial. “Except a man be born again, he caianot see the kingdom of God.” “Except a man take up his cross and follow Christ, he cannot be his disciple.” Friend, this “fare” you must “pay” to enter heaven. Are you willing?