The News-Herald. [volume] (Hillsboro, Highland Co., Ohio) 1886-1973, 1886-07-07
GROWING OLD.

The joyful Prospect Before the Aged
Chrlstian-Hopeful, Happy and Useful.
To the man who lives only for this
world, who has no hope or Inheritance
beyond, it must be sad indeed to feel
that he is growing old. Soon he must
leave all that he has toilcd so hard to
secure. There is a limit to human
life. He knows not just where it is in
his own case; but he is nearer to it at
sixty than at fifty. The years fly faster,
too. Weeks becomes what days were
in youth. Plans for worldly success
multiply. Possibilities of greater
things than he has attained loom up
before him and lure on. And yet, as
he looks and longs and tolls, he is con-
scious that his strength is failing, that
what his hands find to do he can not
do with his might as in other days.
Oh, If he could live as long as Methus-
elah life would amount to something.
But to know that he must go away
just when he has begun to garner the
fruits of his labOrs clouds the declining
years of him who has been most sue
cessful.
But the case of the Christian is far
different. He has a new life in Christ
"a life that is hid with Christ in God.
Death will not avert the development
of this life, will not interrupt its activ-
tiles and its joys, but transfer it to
higher and wider sphere. He will
take with him when he dies all that he
really cared for on the earth. He will
live right on with the objects that in
terested him. Hence, the conscious
ness of growing old is not depressing
to the Christian. He is only so much
nearer to a grand and glorious era in
his experience of the power and the
love of God.
1t was this prospect that kindied in
the breast of Paul the desire to depart
of which he wrote to the Philippians.
1t was this which prompted him to
say to Timothy: II am ready to be
offered" He knew that the day of
his death would be his coronation day
that as soon rs he was absent from
the body he would be present with the
Lord. Hence, when he wrote Paul,
the aged" it was rather with exulta-
ton than with sadness. Weakness
and pain are the loosing of the tent
pins that the tabernacle might be
taken down and he enter the building
of God, the house not made with hands,
eternal in the Heavens. How beauti-
full is Bunyan's description of the aged
Christian in the land of Beulah:
"here they heard continually the singing
pear in the earth. and heard the voice of the
turtle in the land. In this COuntrv the ann
shineth night and day. Here thev were with
IN sight of the city they were going to; also.
In this land the shining ones commonly
walked, because 1t was upon the borders OF
Heaven, In this land. also, the contract be-
renewed. Yea. here, as the bridegroom re-
jo!ce over them"
Sweet is the trust of a soul in the day
of its espousals-the bright glad day
of days when it can say: '.My beloved
is mine and 1 am his.'' But sweeter
far is the trust that has grown through
years of testing, and has found Gods
grace always sufficient. On such q
well-tried hope the aged head can pill
low itself and say with Job: ~ know
that my Rcdeemer liveth," say with
Paul: II know in whom have believ-
ed, and that he is able to keep that
which / have committed to him." A
quaint old author writes:
Every aged Christian may be Ike Solomon
so neu eSes ss
salvation" pity tho Christian who ollnRs
70 life, and docs not fecl the growing attrac:
that we have passed safely so much OF our
probationary course; that we have been kept
by the power of God, while. SO many
our eternal home, where we shall see Christ
in his beauty, and be united with the friends
who have gone before US. And we ought to
the earth In doing oil the good we can. in lay
can; Aeed Christians should be happy, and
While hopeful and happy the aged
Christian may be eminently useful.
He can not lose his interest in the world
though he is soon to leave it. 1t is tho
world for which Christ died-the world
in which Christ is carrying on His work
of love. In it are souls as dear to him
as life itself who are yet unsaved and
whom he may yet be instrumental in
bringing to Christ. Our mortal life is
one day In the vineyard, and we have
no right to quit toiling until the sun
goes down. Nay, if we are true dis
cipies of our Lord, we will want to be
more active and earnest as the time
grows shorter. Paul. the aged, was
full of zeal and abundant in labors to
the last. When released from his first
imprisonment at Rome he seems to
have gone back to Asia Minor.to revisit
the churches he had planted there.
And then he hurried away to Spain,
which was the farthest west at that
day. Paul did some of his best mis-
sionary work after he wrote this letter
to Philemon in which he calls himself
1.-THE aged" There need be no retired
soldiers in the army of the Lord. Even
the sick can do good service. am Ex-
Piles of patient suffering and of sweet
acqulescence in the will of God are more
eloquent than sermons. The faithful
believer who went about shining as a
light in the world and directing his fel-
low men to Christ, when enfeebled by
age and unable to 60 abroad any more,
can make his chamber q lighthouse.
And he can there offer up prayers that
shall bring down priceless blessings
upon his kindred, upon the church and
upon the world.
Then lot us cherish the aged. Lei
Us not speak or think Of them g hav'
ing outlived their lusefulness- Let III
listen rsverently TO their words q VII