The Chanute times. [volume] (Chanute, Kan.) 1897-1913, 1902-02-28

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Must you be carried to the skies
On fiowery beds OF ease
While Others fought to win the prize
Or sailed through bloody seas?
Toplady shouts in his old hymn;
Your harps, ye trembling saints,
Down by the willows take;
Loud to the praise Of love divine
Bid every string awake.
While Charles Wesley. the Method
st, breaks forth in words a little va
ried;
A charge to keep you have,
A God to glorify,
A never dying soul to save
Ana fit it for the sky!
/ look again and | see the gallery of
our departed. Many Of those in the
other galleries we have heard of, but
these we knew. Oh, how familiar their
faces! They sat at our tables, and we
walked to the house of God in COM
pany. Have they forgotten us? Those
fathers and mothers started us on the
road Of life. Are they careless as to
what becomes of us? And those chill
dren-do they look with stolid indiffer-
ence as to whether we win or lose this
battle of life? They remember the
day they left us. They remember the
agony of the last farewell. Though
years in heaven, they know our faces.
They remember our sorrows. They
speak our names. They watch this
fight for heaven. Nay, see them rise
up and lean over and wave before us
their recognition and encouragement.
That gallery is not full. They are
keeping places for us. After we have
slain the lion they expect the king to
call us, saying, Come up higher!" Be-
tween the hot struggles in the arena |
wipe the sweat from my brow and
stand on tlptoe, reaching up my right
hand to clasp theirs in rapturous
handshaking. while their voices come
ringing down from the gallery, crying,
BE thou faithful unto death, and you
shall have crown!'
But here pause, overwhelmed with
the majesty and the joy of the scene!
Gallery of the King! Gallery Of an
gels! Gallery of prophets and apostles!
Gallery of friends and kindred! o
majestic circles of light and love!
Throngs, throngs, throngs! How shall
we stand the gaze of the universe?
lode Of nir1o
lads of hearts beating in sympathy for
us! How shall we ever dare to sin
again? How shall we ever become dis
couraged again? How shall we ever
feel lonely again? With God for us
and angels for us and prophets and
apostles for us and the great souls of
the ages for us and our glorified kind
red for us-shall we give up the fight
and die? No, Son of God, who didst
die to save us! No, we angels, whose
wings are spread forth to shelter us!
No, we prophets and apostles, whose
warnings startle us! No, ye loved ones,
whose arms are outstretched to re-
ceive us! No, we will never surren-
der!
Sure 1 must fight if would reign,
Be faithful to my Lord,
And bear the cross, endure the pain,
Supported by thy word.
Thy saints in all this glorious war
Shall conquer though they die;
They see the triumph from afar
And seize it with their eye.
When that illustrious day shall rise
And all thine armies shine
In robes of victory through the skies,
The glory shall be thine.
My hearers, shall we die in the
arena or rise to join our friends in the
gallery? Through Christ we may
come off more than conquerers. A
soldier dying in the hospital rose up in
bed the last moment and cried, Here,
here!" His attendants put him back
on his pillow and asked him why he
shouted "Here!" 'Oh, / heard the roll
call of heaven. and l was only answer
ing to my name!" 1 wonder whether
after this battle of this life is over our
names will be called in the muster roll
Of the pardoned and glorified and, with
the joy of heaven breaking upon our
souls, shall cry, Here. here!"