Well may the coming of Christ be reckoned into His people’s glory and enumerated with those ingredients that compound this precious antidote of rest, for to this end it is intended, and to this end it is of apparent necessity.  Alas, fellow Christians, what should we do if our Lord should not return?  What a case are we here left in!  It cannot be; never fear it, it cannot be.  And O, fellow-Christians, what a day will that be when we, who have been kept prisoners by sin and the grave, shall be fetched out by the Lord Himself!  It will not be such a coming as His first was—­in meanness and poverty and contempt.  He will not come, O careless world, to be slighted and neglected by you any more.  To think and speak of that day with horror doth well beseem the impenitent sinner, but ill the believing saint.  How full of joy was that blessed martyr Mr. Glover, with the discovery of Christ to his soul, after long doubting and waiting in sorrow, so that he cries out:  “He is come!  He is come!” If thou have but a dear friend returned, that hath been far and long absent, how do all run out to meet him with joy!  “Oh,” said the child, “My father is come!” Saith the wife, “My husband is come!” And shall not we, when we behold our Lord in His majesty returning, cry out:  “He is come!  He is come!”

The second stream that leadeth to Paradise is that great work of Jesus Christ in raising our bodies from the dust and uniting them again unto the soul.  A wonderful effect of infinite power and love.  “Yea, wonderful indeed,” saith unbelief, “if it be true.”  “What,” saith the Atheist and Sadducee, “shall all these scattered bones and dust become a man?  A man drowned in the sea is eaten by fishes, and they by men again, and these men by worms.  What is to become of the body of that first man?  Shall it rise again?” Thou fool—­for so Paul calls thee—­dost thou dispute against the power of the Almighty?  Wilt thou pose him with thy sophistry?  Dost thou object difficulties to infinite strength?  Thou blind mole, thou silly worm; thou little piece of creeping, breathing clay; thou dust, thou nothing, knowest thou who it is whose power thou dost question?  If thou shouldst see Him, thou wouldst presently die.  If He should come and dispute His cause with thee, couldst thou bear it?  If thou shouldst hear His voice, couldst thou endure?

Come then, fellow-Christians, let us contentedly commit these carcasses to the dust, knowing that prison shall not long contain them.  Let us lie down in peace and take our rest; it will not be an everlasting night or endless sleep.  As sure as we awake in the morning when we have slept out the night, so sure shall we then awake.  What if our carcasses become as vile as those of the beasts that perish, what if our bones are digged up and scattered about the pit brink, and worms consume our flesh, yet we know that our Redeemer liveth, and shall stand at the last on earth, and we shall see Him with these eyes.