LIFE'S GREAT OBJECT.



EVERY one to make life a success must have some object in view. The question with us is what shall we take for our life object. 

If this life were all, if we were to go down into the grave as the beast goes, never to rise, then we might take for our object, fame, or riches, or honor, etc. But there is an hereafter. 

We are here moral probationers for the life to come. To seek for the future life should then be our great object.  That which makes the question concerning the life to come of so great importance to us, is our capacity for happiness or misery. That these depend upon our actions here, is in a measure realized by all, though often combined with gross error. The savage in his wigwam, the pagan in the midst of his idolatries, in short, religionists of all types, at the highest and lowest points of culture, have attached to moral conduct here, a mysterious power of reaching to the hereafter.

Eternal life is not forced upon us, but rather held out for our acquisition, as the prize to be gained or lost by our conduct. Action comes first, consequences afterward. We cannot fold our arms in indifference, but must act. The Scriptures plainly teach that our present life will determine our future one for weal or woe; and the whole Bible from Genesis to Revelation looks as though something were at stake. True, oh true! Our happiness or misery.

"Be not deceived; God is not mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." These words clearly state our condition in regard to the future. We are free in, so wing, free in the formation of our characters, free in accepting or rejecting Christ; but when we have completed the period of our actions on earth, we shall have to reap what we have sown—it will be beyond our power to evade or reverse it.

What folly to chase the bubbles of the world, and neglect our future happiness! 

Let us aim high—to life's great object; nothing less will suffice. Let there be no side issues, but let everything tend to the one point—eternal life. If we fail to attain to this, all is lost, and we shall have lived in vain. 





V. A. M.