Death-Bed Repentance

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Title:     Death-Bed Repentance
Author: Helen Hunt Jackson [More Titles by Jackson]

Not long since, a Congregationalist clergyman, who had been for forty-one years in the ministry, said in my hearing, "I have never, in all my experience as a pastor, known of a single instance in which a repentance on what was supposed to be a death-bed proved to be of any value whatever after the person recovered."

This was strong language. I involuntarily exclaimed, "Have you known many such cases?"

"More than I dare to remember."

"And as many more, perhaps, where the person died."

"Yes, fully as many more."

"Then did not the bitter failure of these death-bed repentances to bear the tests of time shake your confidence in their value under the tests of eternity?"

"It did,--it does," said the clergyman, with tears in his eyes. The conversation made a deep impression on my mind. It was strong evidence, from a quarter in which I least looked for it, of the utter paltriness and insufficiency of fear as a motive when brought to bear upon decisions in spiritual things. There seem to be no words strong enough to stigmatize it in all other affairs except spiritual. All ages, all races, hold cowardice chief among vices; noble barbarians punished it with death. Even civilization the most cautiously legislated for, does the same thing when a soldier shows it "in face of the enemy." Language, gathering itself up and concentrating its force to describe base behavior, can do no more than call it "cowardly." No instinct of all the blessed body-guard of instincts born with us seems in the outset a stronger one than the instinct that to be noble, one must be brave. Almost in the cradle the baby taunts or is taunted by the accusation of being "afraid." And the sting of the taunt lies in the probability of its truth. For in all men, alas! is born a certain selfish weakness, to which fear can address itself. But how strange does it appear that they who wish to inculcate noblest action, raise to most exalted spiritual conditions, should appeal to this lowest of motives to help them! We believe that there are many "death-bed repentances" among hale, hearty sinners, who are approached by the same methods, stimulated by the same considerations, frightened by the same conceptions of possible future suffering, which so often make the chambers of dying men dark with terrors. Fear is fear all the same whether its dread be for the next hour or the next century. The closer the enemy, the swifter it runs. That is all the difference. Let the enemy be surely and plainly removed, and in one instance it is no more,--is as if it had never been. Every thought, word, and action based upon it has come to end.

I was forcibly reminded of the conversation above quoted by some observations I once had opportunity of making at a Methodist camp-meeting. Much of the preaching and exhortation consisted simply and solely of urgent, impassioned appeals to the people to repent,--not because repentance is right; not because God is love, and it is base not to love and obey him; not even because godliness is in itself great gain, and sinfulness is, even temporarily, loss and ruin; but because there is a wrath to come, which will inflict terrible and unending suffering on the sinner. He is to "flee" for his life from torments indescribable and eternal; he is to call on Jesus, not to make him holy, but to save him from woe, to rescue him from frightful danger; all and every thing else is subordinate to the one selfish idea of escaping future misery. The effect of these appeals, of these harrowing pictures, on some of the young men and women and children was almost too painful to be borne. They were in an hysterical condition,--weeping from sheer nervous terror. When the excitement had reached its highest pitch, an elder rose and told the story of a wicked and impenitent man whom he had visited a few weeks before. The man had assented to all that he told him of the necessity of repentance; but said that he was not at leisure that day to attend the class meeting. He resolved and promised, however, to do so the next week. That very night he was taken ill with a disease of the brain, and, after three days of unconsciousness, died. I would not like to quote here the emphasis of application which was made of this story to the terrors of the weeping young people. Under its influence several were led, almost carried by force, into the anxious seats.

It was hard not to fancy the gentle Christ looking down upon the scene with a pain as great as that with which he yearned over Jerusalem. I longed for some instant miracle to be wrought on the spot, by which there should come floating down from the peaceful blue sky, through the sweet tree-tops, some of the loving and serene words of balm from his Gospel.

Theologians may theorize, and good Christians may differ (they always will) as to the existence, extent, and nature of future punishment; but the fact remains indisputably clear that, whether there be less or more of it, whether it be of this sort or of that, fear of it is a base motive to appeal to, a false motive to act from, and a worthless motive to trust in. Perfect love does not know it; spiritual courage resents it; the true Kingdom of Heaven is never taken by its "violence."

Somewhere (I wish I knew where, and I wish I knew from whose lips) I once found this immortal sentence: "A woman went through the streets of Alexandria, bearing a jar of water and a lighted torch, and crying aloud, 'With this torch I will burn up Heaven, and with this water I will put out Hell, that God may be loved for himself alone.'"

[The end]
Helen Hunt Jackson's essay: Death-Bed Repentance

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