so precious, what will the whole wealth
of the inheritance which it heralds be when it is received?

For such reasons the transitory passage becomes less painful and
unwelcome. Who is there that would hesitate to dip his foot into the
ice-cold brook if he knew that it would not reach above his ankles,
and that a step would land him in blessedness unimagined till
experienced?

Therefore the Christian temper is that of quiet willingness and
constant courage. There is nothing hysterical here, nothing morbid,
nothing overstrained, nothing artificial. The Apostle says: 'I would
rather not. I should like if I could escape it. It is an unwelcome
necessity; but when I see what I do see beyond,' I am ready. Since so
it must be, I will go, not reluctantly, nor dragged away from life,
nor clinging desperately to it as it slips from my hands, nor
dreading anything that may happen beyond; but always courageous, and
prepared to go whithersoever the path may take me, since I am sure
that it ends in His bosom. He is willing to go from the home of the
body, because to do that is to go home to Christ.

There are other references of our Apostle's, substantially of the
same tone as that of my text, but with very beautiful and encouraging
differences. When he was nearer his end, when it seemed to him as if
the headsman's block was not very far off, his _willingness_ had
intensified into 'having a _desire_ to depart and to be with
Christ, which is far better.' And when the end was all but reached,
and he knew that death was waiting just round the next turn in the
road, he said, with the confidence that in the midst of the struggle
would have been vainglory, but at the end of it was a foretaste of
the calm of Heaven, 'I have finished my course, I have kept the
faith; henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness.'
That is our model, dear brethren,--'always courageous,' afraid of
nothing in life, in death, or beyond, and therefore willing to go
from home from the body and to go home to the Lord.

Think of this man thus fronting the inevitable, with no excitement
and with no delusions. Remember what Paul believed about death, about
sin, about his own sin, about judgment, about hell. And then think of
how to him death had made its darkness beautiful with the light of
Christ's face, and all the terror was gone out of it. Do you think so
about death? Do you shrink from it? Why? Why do you not take Paul's
cure for the shrinking?