" And this is
the Lord whom people fancy is gone away far above the stars, till the
end of time! Oh, my friends, rather bow your heads before Him here
this moment. For here He is among us now, listening to every thought
of our poor sinful hearts. . . . He is where God is--God IN whom we
live, and move, and have our being--and that is everywhere. Do you
wish Him to be any nearer, my friends? Or do you--do you--take care
what your hearts answer, for He is watching them--do you in the depth
of your hearts wish that He were a little farther off? Does the
notion of His being here on this earth, watching and interfering (as
we call it nowadays in our atheism) with us and everything, seem
unpleasant and burdensome? Is it more comfortable to you to think
that He is away far up beyond the stars? Do you feel the lighter and
freer for fancying that He will not visit the earth for many a year
to come? In short, is it in your HEARTS that you are saying, The
Lord delays His coming?
That is a very important question. For mind, a pious man might be,
as many a pious man has been in these days, deceived by bad teaching
into the notion that Jesus Christ was gone far away. But if he were
a truly pious man, if he truly loved the Lord, that would be a
painful thought--as I should have fancied, an unbearable thought--to
him, when he looked out upon this poor miserable, confused world.
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