Losses and Gains by William Nicholson
Paul might well say, To die is gain. Most men are desirous of
gain. Some make gain the great object
of their life, and will barter away their precious souls for
the perishable riches of the world. Gain is also the believer's
great object, but remember, his gain is durable riches and righteousness. He loses nothing by his espousal
of true religion, but that which is evil and afflicting. He loses
sin, his greatest plague, his vilest incendiary, which has
robbed him in every duty and marred every pleasure. He loses
Satan. Grace puts a child of God out
of Satan's possession. Glory puts a child of God out
of Satan's temptation. He loses his fears, which have
armed him against himself and seeded deep melancholy on his
brow. He loses his tears, the effect
of those clouds of sorrow which have gathered in his heart and
dropped from his eyes. He loses his crosses, the weight
of which has so pressed him down that he has not been able to
look up. He loses his poverty, which was his dishonor among
men and deprived him of many comforts. He loses his sickness,
which incapacitated him for duty. He loses his cares, which wasted
his spirits and broke his rest. He loses his spiritual desertions,
which were his heaviest mental sorrows, that his God for a moment
should forsake him. And he loses the weariness of
the pilgrimage, occasioned by the clouds and darkness, and
storms and enemies, which encompassed his path. Oh, yes, he loses them
all. He shall see them no more, forever. but his gains, who can reckon
them? Paul was caught up into the third
heaven, but he informs us that the glories, the joys, the beauties,
the society, the employments are all unspeakable. Yet this
we know, that the presence of Christ is the handkerchief which
wipes away all tears. Yes, Christ's presence shall
turn his sinful deformity into spotless purity, and his doleful
lamentations into everlasting hallelujahs. Then he shall exchange
his pilgrim staff for a palm of victory, his helmet of salvation
for a crown of glory, His perishing tabernacle for an incorruptible
inheritance, and the day of His dissolution for the day of His
coronation.