I. First, then, notice that the saying of my text—­in the application which I now seek to make of it—­is a truth, but it is only half a truth.

Of course, Ezekiel was speaking simply about the destruction of Jerusalem.  If it had been true, as his hearers assumed, that that was not going to happen for a good many years yet, the chances were that it had no bearing upon them, and they were right enough in neglecting the teaching.  And, of course, when I apply such a word as this in the direction in which I wish to do now, we do bring in a different set of thoughts; but the main idea remains the same.  The neglect of God’s solemn message by a great many people is based, more or less consciously, upon the notion that the message of Christianity—­or, if you like to call it so, of the gospel; or, if you like to call it more vaguely, religion—­has to do mainly with blessings and woes beyond the grave, and that there is plenty of time to attend to it when we get nearer the end.

Now is it true that ‘he prophesies of times that are far off’?  Yes! and No!  Yes! it is true, and it is the great glory of Christianity that it shifts the centre of gravity, so to speak, from this poor, transient, contemptible present, and sets it away out yonder in an august and infinite future.  It brings to us not only knowledge of the future, but certitude, and takes the conception of another life out of the region of perhapses, possibilities, dreads, or hopes, as the case may be, and sets it in the sunlight of certainty.  There is no more mist.  Other faiths, even when they have risen to the height of some contemplation of a future, have always seen it wrapped in nebulous clouds of possibilities, but Christianity sets it clear, definite, solid, as certain as yesterday, as certain as to-day.

It not only gives us the knowledge and the certitude of the times that are afar off, and that are not times but eternities, but it gives us, as the all-important element in that future, that its ruling characteristic is retribution.  It ‘brings life and immortality to light,’ and just because it does, it brings the dark orb which, like some of the double stars in the heavens, is knit to the radiant sphere by a necessary band.  It brings to light, with life and immortality, death and woe.  It is true—­’he prophesies of times that are far off’ and it is the glory of the gospel of Christ’s revelation, and of the religion that is based thereon, that its centre is beyond the grave, and that its eye is so often turned to the clearly discerned facts that lie there.

But is that all that we have to say about Christianity?  Many representations of it, I am free to confess, from pulpits and books and elsewhere, do talk as if that was all, as if it was a magnificent thing to have when you came to die.  As the play has it, ’I said to him that I hoped there was no need that he should think about God yet,’ because he was not going to die.  But I urge you to remember,