the grave, are symbols of its reception into heaven, the proper pageantry of its arrival and resting place within the veil?  Believe it not!  If God prepared in our hearts such a welcome for the infant stranger, that even its helpless feet were thought of and cared for, surely when those feet, wearied in the pilgrimage of the strait and narrow way, arrive at heaven’s gate, it must be, it is, amidst rejoicings and ministrations of love to which earth has no parallel.  Let kings and queens prepare a royal room for the new-born prince:  “In my Father’s house are many mansions:  if it were not so, I would have told you.  I go to prepare a place for you.  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.”

Could we look into that place, as it stands waiting for its occupant from earth, we should behold sights which would instantly clothe even death with beauty, and make it seem now, as it will seem then, a blessed thing to die.

* * * * *

To miss of dying would no doubt be a calamity.  Dying will be an experience to the believer which will be fraught with inestimably good things; that is, the act of dying, and not merely the being dead.  It is no doubt as necessary to the nature of the soul, to its psychology, its soul-life, as the changes of the worm, chrysalis, and butterfly, are to the insect.  And thus, as in all other things, where sin abounded, grace much more abounds, and even death, like a cross, is turned into a ministration of infinite blessing.

It is not unsuitable for a dying Christian to consider, that he is compassed about with a great cloud of witnesses, who themselves have died, and who are watching his departure.  We ought to die with such faith in Jesus, such confidence in God, such confident expectation and hope, that they will rejoice to see us conquer death.  Our last conflict should be fought in a manner worthy of the company and scenes into which we are immediately to pass.

We should not anxiously seek to remove entirely from any one, in the course of his life, his fears with regard to death, except as we may substitute faith for those fears.  God probably intends them now for the increase of faith.  Moreover, when the event of death happens, it will be mingled with so much mercy as to make the Christian smile at his fears.  The exhortation of the apostle in view of his great discourse of death and resurrection is noticeable:  “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord; forasmuch as ye know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.”