Times-promoter., 1908-06-12

he had passed from this life to the
great beyond. He had seen that help
less, haunted look In the deep5set eyes
over which the misty film Of death
was gradually creeping. He had
heard the words of regret over the
life lived and those of fear in the face
of impending death. There was moth
ing oil hope or comfort there. Only
darkness and despair.
But how different was the deathbed
of the prophet Elisha. Word had
come one day all unexpected and sud
den that the aged prophet was sick,
and the king had gone thither. Little
contact had he had with the prophet
during his life. He had treated him
with indifference and disdain, con-
tent to live his life of wicked pleas
ure, and unmindful of the rebukes and
entreaties of this aged servant of God.
To be sure he was familiar with all
the wonderful history of Elisha's sery-
ices to Israel, Of how time and time
again, when famine and war menaced
the life of the nation, the prophet had
interposed in the name of his God and
brought deliverance. But free from
any serious troubles in his own king
dom and at peace with all the nations
about, King Joash had seen no occa-
sion to bother himself about the
prophet.
The only time he had ever known
his father, JehoahaZ, to humble him
self before Elisha had been when the
Syrian hosts had threatened to de-
stroy the nation, and well he remem-
bered how in the strength Of the prom
ise of the prophet his father had gone
out and won a hard-earned victory
over the forces Of the king CT Syria
But no such dangers had threatened
him to drive him to the prophet, and
so he had, as we have said, treated the
prophet with indifference and cis-
dain.
But when the messenger had come
saying that the prophet Elisha was
dying and that he wished to see him,
there swept over him realization of
what the nation would lose with the
passing away of this man ct God. He
had had a contempt for his religion,
but not for the stirring part he had
played in the history of the nation
from before his grandfather Jehu's
time down to the present. The story
Of how the prophet Elisha had sent
the word and the amounting oil which
had encouraged Jehu to seize the king
dom from the house of Ahab had been
told him over and over again by his
grandfather as he had stood at his knee
when a boy, and now as word came
that the prophet was dying there
swept over him sense of loss to the
nation which almost made him trern-
BILE. Thus moved. he had gone. ss7
What scene and experience that
had been With the memory Of the
death of his own father fresh In his
mind he had gone to the death cham
} ber of the prophet expecting to find
again that gloom, that despair, that
) hopelessness which he had somehow
come to think was always part of the
J death scene, but instead he had found
cheer instead of gloom, expectancy
} and hopefulness instead Of despair and
hopelessness. Physical weakness there
was, and it was plain to see that the
sands of life were running out fast
but there was moral strength there
which told only too plainly that that
fieeting life was conscious of being
linked with the eternal and thai
! though earth was passing the things
which the life had stood for would &c
on after he had passed away.
King Joash had run over in his mind
the comforting things he would try
J to say, but as he had entered the
room where the old prophet lay and
, had felt those quiet, earnest, search
ing eyes fixed upon his face, he had
forgotten everything except that here
was man who rose above physical
weakness, and in that instant there
came to his mind faint realization
that 1t was the character behind 9
man after all, and not physica
strength or worldly position, which
counted.
Intuitively he felt that the true
man stood revealed in the presence
of death, and In that first moment
| in the prophets chamber there swept
T over him the contrast between his owI
| father nrf1I1 md hoJnIoco opd IN <o,.