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It's a powerful moment when John Bunyan's protagonist Christian (from the classic The Pilgrim's Progress), just before he disappears from the world, declares,

I have loved to hear my Lord spoken of; and where-ever I have seen the print of his shoe in the earth, there I have coveted to set my foot too.... His Voice to me has been most sweet; and his Countenance I have more desired than they that have most desired the light of the Sun. His Word did I use to gather for my food, and for antidotes against my faintings. He has held me, and I have kept me from mine iniquities; yea, my steps hath he strengthened in his Way.

That's how I want to leave this place. Not with these exact words, of course, but certainly not in the hollowness of, say, Bertrand Russell, who as he lay dying muttered with a stroke of great sorrow, "There is darkness without, and when I die there will be darkness within. There is no splendor, no vastness anywhere, only triviality for a moment, and then nothing." 

G. J. C.

No, I want to join with the angels and sing hearty hallelujahs as I pass from this world into the far-off country! By grace I will not be gazing out upon a hopeless, timeless, Godless void, but upon the certain, masterful glories of heaven, the throne that Christ shares with us.

Till that day, or till the Lion of Judah returns, I am a vassal of the Lord of Hosts, a bondservant of the Most High, a footsoldier, a warrior, a proclaimer: "God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to another generation, your power to all those to come" (Ps. 71:17-18).

Only the Father knows where his light shall shine down to direct my path. For now I am a student, a pupil of greater minds and softer hearts, a reader and drinker of the Word. I try to keep open my ears, my sails, to his whispers, his gusts, his commands. And when he wills it, I ask for grace to do otherwise. I keep my armor on, standing ready to go, to rush, to fly and fight and find and fortify. Christ Jesus is my king, and he will be my judge. Through his grace I live and breathe; through his righteousness I stand; through the Spirit sent after him to dwell in and comfort me am I formed and taught and reformed.

I pray my life would be of use. I pray that I will not squander it. I pray that God would work through my frailty as he sees fit, for his glory and not my own, for his name's sake, to make himself known to his people and to the nations.

"I am bound for the Kingdom. Won't you come with me?"

A glad recipient of an irresistible gift of grace,
Gregory