"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me."—Ps. xxiii. 4.

O God, I come to Thee this night through Jesus Christ, the Son of Thy love, beseeching Thee to have mercy upon me, and to impart unto me that Peace of Thine which passeth all understanding. Blessed be Thy great and glorious name for those hopes full of immortality which have been opened up to me in the Gospel. I rejoice in Christ as the great Abolisher of death. I rejoice that the rainbow of covenant faithfulness spans the entrance to the dark valley; that all that is terrible in the last enemy is in Him taken away, and that I can regard these closing hours of existence as the introduction and doorway into everlasting bliss.

Give me grace, O God, to be living in constant preparation for death. Let me not unprofitably squander my present golden moments. {95} Let me live while I live—let me live a dying life. Let me feel that life is a trust given me by Thee. O Thou Great Proprietor of my being, may this all important talent of time be more consecrated to Thy glory. Let it not be mine, when the hour of death arrives, to bewail, when it is too late, lost and forfeited opportunities. Let me not leave till then, what best can be done and what only may be done now. May it be my earnest endeavor while it is called today to secure a saving interest in the everlasting covenant, and then I need not fear how soon the silver cord may be loosed and the golden bowl broken. Through Jesus the darkness has been taken from death, and to His own true people its shadows will melt and merge into the brightness of eternal day.