54 THE GOOD WILL OF A LIFETIME
disappeared ; and, instead of the " Draw not nigh," we may hear the " Come unto me " ; for in Him " we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him."
1. The old man refers to the days of his youth. He is no longer old ; he is young. With his shepherd's staff, tending his sheep below the bare mountain of Horeb, he sees what he had never seen before — a thorn-tree in flame. The old man places his one hand upon the first object of his life, and his other hand he places upon the last, and between the two his whole history is comprised — from Sinai, through Egypt, through the Eed Sea, through the desert to the Jordan. It is all there. His whole life is in his grasp, and he is carrying it with him up the mountain and into eternity.
2. The beginning and the end of life are brought together. The man, one hundred and twenty years old, burdened with the weight of days, his eye bright as ever, his natural force of character but little impaired, his hair white, the sign at once of age and of a vast experience, leaning upon the staff that he carried for support, giving the words of affectionate blessing that come so well from the aged. Here he parts from those with whom he had journeyed so long. It is the last glimpse that we have of the man. Here he enters into the dark portal. That is one picture. But the other picture is that of an active, careless young man, who had broken loose from the restraint of Egyptian society, wandering about as a Bedouin Arab. How great a contrast between those two ! And yet those two are the same man. What a wonderful thing is this continuance of personality.
3. Observe lastly the deep mark made on an old man by his religious experience. Moses goes back to the hour when, in the loneliness of the desert, he first realized the presence and the reality of God ; when the spiritual world first became to him a real world, and with deep feeling he felt that he stood upon holy ground. In that hour he was first called by God summoning him to an earnest life. It was that meeting with God that coloured his whole history ; and now when strength is failing, and death is near, he goes back to it, and he wishes for those whom he leaves that the blessing which came to him in that experience may come to them also — " The good will of him that dwelt in the bush."
DEUTERONOMY xxxiii. i6 55
^ On what is it that our eye will rest most lovingly as it glances along the line of our closing life ? It will not be on the hours of folly or sin by which our life has been stained. It will rather be on the fitful moments when those things have been real to us which to most men are unreal — when, as through an opening in a tangled forest, we have looked upwards and seen the blue sky above us, and have shaped our course by the glimpse that we have had. God was near us then. We heard His voice then; we felt His presence in our souls and we were assured of His good-will. We chose then the better part, and we trusted our- selves to Him as our Father and as our Saviour. And now, when strength is failing and the shades of eventide are falling thick and fast, and the unknown future is before us, we know that we have His good-will.^
Never, my heart, wilt thou grow old ! My hair is white, my blood runs cold, And one by one my powers depart. But youth sits smiling in my heart.
Downhill the path of age ! oh, no ; Up, up with patient steps I go; I watch the skies fast brightening there, I breathe a sweeter, purer air.
Beside my road small tasks spring up, Though but to hand the cooling cup, Speak the true word of hearty cheer, Tell the lone soul that God is near.
Beat on, my heart, and grow not old! And when thy pulses all are told, Let me, though working, loving still. Kneel as I meet my Father's will.^
* J. Cameron Leoa, * Louisa Jane Hall.
God Who is our Home.
Literature,
Armstrong (W.), Five-Minute Sermons to Children, 46. Darlow (T. H.), T/ie Upward Calling, 154. Fairbairn (A. M.), The City of God, 190.
„ (R. B.), College Sermons, 302. Horan (F. S.), A Call to Seamen, 131. Hunter (J.), De Profundis Clamavi, 310. Hutton (J. A.), The Fear of Things, 1. Parks (L.), The Winning of the Soul, 201. Robinson (J. A.), Unity in Christ, 123, 137.
„ Holy Ground, 7, 15.
Smellie (A.), In the Secret Place, 345. Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, xi. (1865), No, 624;
xiv. (1868), No. 803 ; xxiv. (1878), No. 1413. Wardell (R. J.), Studies in Homiletics, 94. Christian Age, xxx. 66 (Farrar). Cliristian World Pulpit, xxix. 209 (Farrar) ; Iv. 4 (Home) ; Ixviii,
401 (Hunter). Churchman's Pulpit : The Old and New Year, ii. 412 (Hunter) ;
Sermons to the Young, xvi. 288 (Ross) ; Harvest Thanksgiving, 31