Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-12-08

the due reward Of our deeds, but this man
hath done nothing amiss
A. And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remem-
Der me when thou contest into thy kingdom
43. And Jesus saith unto him, Verify
say unto thee, today shalt thou be with me
in Paradise.
there was darkness over all the earth
until the ninth hour.
40. And the sun was darkened, and the
veil of the temple was rent in the midst
49, And when Jesus had cried with
loud voice. He said, Father. into Thy hands
I commend my spirit; and having said thus,
He gave UP the ghost.
Mark xv:34 And at the ninth bour
Jesus cried with loud voice, saying, Eloi,
Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is being in
terpreted, MY God. My God, why hast thou
The Lesson.
When some one dies the friends all gather
to hear what were his last words, and
those most Immediately near him listen to
the reading of his last will and testament,
reverently, respectfully, each one hoping
be left to him, just that he may feel the
love Of the dear one gone.
These passages containing the seven
last words of Jesus are to us a sort of
legacy which we should sometimes con
over to see If we have surely come into the
fullness Of our inheritance.
His worldly goods, the things most near
and dear to him? He had but few to give.
and they were human: Woman, behold
thy son! Son, behold thy mother!" And
relationships. 1t is not always natural ties
that bind. The love Of Jesus and His last
act binds us to take for friends, for mothers
or sisters or brothers or sons or daughters,
W M n a I'm
Yet how few of us have accepted that dear
legacy of Jesus, and from that hour'-that
Is from the moment we have recognized
Jesus desire for US to love others, have
our hearts, those whom He loves, just be-
cause He loves them? If We would think
OF that more would it not make it possible
for us to pass over offenses and to really
like" some who now are distasteful to US?
How we dwell upon the last moments of
of the agony they suffered, and of our help
lessness or our stupidity in not relieving
some trifing pain or discomfort. Very few
OF Jesus last words were of Himself. Yet
the little agony of thirst troubled him, ard
surely those loving women at the cross
must many times have upbraided their
anguished minds by thinking how they
should have had water there for Him to
not take. But do We ever stop to think
that Jesus is thirsting today for our love
and our loyalty, and we give Him compar-
atively little of it?
Does not Jesus. by those words Of His
upon the cross: Father, forgive them for
they know not what they do leave re-
quest-an example If you prefer-that we
should do SO also, by our enemies-the enc
mics that should have been our friends?
If anything we have to bear from them
greater than He bore from those who were
crucifying Him?
Even in the last hour He was ready to
forget His own sufferings and speak peace
to wicked. repentant. troubled soul. whose
presence made His own shame and agony
the greater, and with whom he shared
gnominy that He might save him. Could
you and l work thus to save fellow
being in our own last moments?
HE was in all points tempted like as we
are" He felt the dimness and far-away
ness that you and l sometimes feel when
God seems not to answer us, and body and
soul seem sinking into one black abyss
MY God, my God why hast Thou forsaken
me?" And with the call and question comes
the assurance once more, and we can feel
that assurance shining for us through all
darkness and be ready to say with Him:
Father, into Thy hands I commit my
spirit-come life or DEATH"
Applied Truth.
During the last hours of Frances Willard,
once in the night, after looking long time
at the Deaull1ul race Oh CnTlSt, Sne SAID.
II am Merlin, and am dying,
But I'll follow the Gleam.'
I'm getting tired: how can 1 follow it
much longer? He giveth His be-
loved sleep" Toward morning she whis-
pered to Miss Gordon, saying: Il want to
say what Mary and l used to say to each
other away back in the old days on the
say to Mary. I ask your forgiveness, and 1
thank YOU, and she would say, freely
forgive you, and welcome l want to say
that to you and to every White Ribboner,
and to every one,' And then her dear
friend knew that she was nearing the bor-
der line.
Later, when she was so very far away
she did not know them and could not speak.
and pressed her hand lovingly. AS she did
so Miss Willard looked up, called her name,
and said: I've crept in with mother, and
it's the same beautiful world and the same
people, remember that-it's just the same"
Just as she was passing away she lifted
her little white hands UPWARD, saying:
How beautiful to be with God!'
How sure we are of our own forgive
ness from God. How certain we are that
we are made in His image, when we for
give heartily and out of hand one who has
wronged us. Sentimentally we may feel,
and lightly We may say, TO err is human,
to forgive divine but we never taste the
nobility and divinity of forgiving till We
forgive ana know the victory OF forgiveness
over our sense of being wronged, over NOR
titled pride and wounded sensibilities. Here
we are in living touch with Him who treats
US as though nothing had Representative
turns His back upon the past and bids us
journey with Him into goodness and glad
ness, into neWness of life"
MALTBIE D. BABCOCK.
Richard Langhorn. unjustly condemned
to be hung, assembled the scaffold as one
would go to a coronation. Before all the
people who had attended to witness his
death he declared with a bearing which
told that every word he uttered was true:
Il do declare. in the presence of the eternal
God and as hope to be saved by the mer-
its of my dear Jesus, that l am not guilty,
directly or indirectly, of any crime that has
been sworn against me-" He further said
that the testimony of the man who had
been the cause of his apprehension and
condemnation was wholly false, and that
he forgave him with his dying breath, and
hoped that God would bring him to repent
ance. He prayed the king, the nation
and for all his enemies and false accusers.
He forgave the sheriff after the rope had
been adjusted, and his last words were:
BLESSED Jesus, into Thy hands l recon-
mend my soul and spirit, now. at this in
slant. Take me into paradise. I am de-
sirous to be with my Jesus. l am ready