BY THE LATE REV. DAVID CAMPBELL, FREE CHURCH,
DUNNET, CAITHNESS.
Ordained 4th June, 1844. Died 26th February, 1876.*
* A friend has kindly sent us these valuable, though incomplete, notes of a sermon by a worthy minister of the past in the far north, along with an obituary sketch which appeared at the time of his death. The latter, which is also interesting and edifying, we embody at the end of the sermon.—Ed.
“O spare me, that I may recover strength before I go hence,
and be no more.”—PSALMS xxxix. 13.
THERE is, if we may so speak, a two-fold preparation for death, with which every member of Christ’s mystical body is more or less acquainted. There is a preparation which takes place in the day of true conversion, when they are delivered from the power of spiritual death, and there is a preparation that arises from the work of sanctification in the soul, when they are weaned more and more from the world and the things thereof, and the whole man—soul and affections—is set upon another and better world. But although we say that every member of Christ’s mystical body is more or less acquainted with this two-fold preparation for death, yet we do not say that they are at all times favoured with such a happy frame of mind as would make them long for their departure to another world. For there are times and seasons with them, when sin lies very heavy upon them, ready to sink them lower than the grave, and when He, who can comfort, is far from them. All their former experience is lying under a cloud, so that they are ready to call in question if ever the Lord made Himself known to them, and therefore all before them is dark and distressing. Now, when this is the case, is it any wonder that they should cry out as the Psalmist did, when death knocked at his door, “O spare me, that I may recover strength, before I go hence, and be no more?” O my friends, it is the new creation alone that prepares for death. “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
The words of our text may be illustrated by a few practical observations.
i. Here we may observe, first, that death is represented to us in the words of our text as a going hence, or as a departure out of this world.
The Apostle Paul speaks of his own death in a somewhat similar manner, when he says: “I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.” Now, this departure refers more to the soul than to the body, because the body is committed to the grave and remains there asleep in the dust until the morning of the resurrection, but the soul departs immediately, when it leaves the body, to Him who gave it. We find the Lord saying to the rich man who had heaped together much of this world’s goods, and who was forming plans for the enjoyment of them, “Thou fool, this night thy soul is required of thee.” The union that subsists between soul and body, although very close and intimate, death shall break, for “it is appointed unto men once to die,” and none is able to resist death. Death not only dissolves the union that subsists between soul and body, but it also breaks the union which is formed between husband and wife, and between parent and child. And when once these unions are broken by death, they shall never be formed any more, for we are told that at the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage. Death not only dissolves these unions, but the departure that it creates will be for ever. “For when a few more years are come,” says Job, “we shall then go the way whence we shall not return.” A sinner, dying in his sins, cannot return any more to this world, even should he be willing, because although there is a way from earth to hell, there is no way from hell to earth. None ever yet returned from thence. The rich man wished Lazarus to go and tell his brethren not to follow him, because he could not go himself. And so, on the other hand, a soul in union with the Lord would not return any more for a thousand worlds. If the tree falls to the north or south, in the place where it falls, there it shall be (Eccles. xi. 3). Heaven and hell receive all that leave the world, but none return any more.
2. Further, death is not only a going hence, but they who go are said to “be no more.”
Now, this “no more” does not mean that the soul is to become extinct, or dead when it leaves the body, because the soul is to exist in another world. Neither is the body to be annihilated, or reduced to nothing, when separated from the soul, for although it is reduced to putrefaction and dust, it is not reduced to nothing. The form or shape of the body may be lost, but none of the substance of which it is formed can be lost. We are told that He will command the earth and the sea to yield up what was committed to them, and we also find the Apostle Paul saying that this mortal, meaning the body, shall yet put on immortality, and this corruptible shall put on incorruption (1 Cor. xv. 53). But what is meant is that neither soul nor body is to be found in the place they once occupied, so that with respect to this world, they are to be “no more.” The poor man is not found any more in his cottage, nor yet the rich man in his mansion. The minister is no longer found in the pulpit, nor yet the pious parent worshipping in his family, and the place he once occupied in the house of God here is now occupied by another. When the prophet Elijah was translated from this world to another, we are told that the sons of the prophets persevered in seeking him for three days, but they sought him in vain, because he was “no more” in this world.
Death not only takes us away from our place in this world, but it also takes us away from those we love here. And indeed to a truly pious man it is no small affliction to be separate from those he often took counsel with and with whom he delighted to wait upon the Lord. We find that good king Hezekiah was deeply affected with this thought, when the time of his departure seemed to be at hand. “For,” says he, “I said, I shall no more see the Lord, even the Lord, in the land of the living. I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of this world.” Attempts have been made to put a stop to the progress of disease, and to avert the arrow of death, but all at length will be of no avail, for, says Job, “Thou prevalest for ever against him and he passeth. Thou changest his countenance and sendest him away.”
3. But, thirdly, we observe to you that these two things greatly affected the Psalmist and lead him to say, “O spare me that I may recover strength.”
From this cry, we find that even those who are in covenant with the Lord may be afraid of death. And what, perhaps, will you ask is the reason? Oh, it is because, although believers are reconciled to the Father through the blood shed on Calvary, yet it does not necessarily follow that they are reconciled to death, and that the love of life here is altogether extinguished. It is, my friends, indeed true that the terror or fear of death is the mountain that faith removes, yet it is only strong faith that can remove this mountain. And although it is said that Christ came to “deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage,” yet it was not to deliver them entirely from the painful apprehensions of death so much as to deliver them from the dreadful consequences of death. For we find that Christ Himself, when He was approaching death, was not without His fears, and hence His request to His Father, “If it be thy will, let this cup pass from me.” And again, it is said of Him by the Apostle Paul in the Epistle to the Hebrews: “Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears, unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared.” (The notes regrettably end here.)
SKETCH OF THE REV. DAVID CAMPBELL OF DUNNET.
The Rev. David Campbell, the author of the preceding discourse, was one of the best and most faithful ministers of the gospel, settled in the far north shortly after the Disruption of 1843. He was a native of Halkirk, and was between sixty and seventy years of age when he died. Though it is thirty-five years since he passed away, his memory is still fresh in the minds of some who derived spiritual profit from his ministry. The pity is that hardly any record of his discourses has been preserved. The above notes are the only ones, as far as we are aware, that have appeared in print. Mr. Campbell’s preaching was marked by awakening force and stirring fervour. He proclaimed the whole counsel of God—law and gospel—without respect to the favour or frowns of men. The awful danger of men perishing in his sins was deeply impressed on his spirit, and moved him to preach “the terror of the Lord” with overwhelming earnestness to his hearers. In this respect he was outstanding among his worthy contemporaries. The people would not sleep under Mr. Campbell’s ministry if he could help it. Several worthy people walked many miles every Sabbath to hear him. Moreover, he was a faithful witness for the original principles of the Free Church, and stoutly opposed the proposals for union with the U.P. Church, which were made for the first time in his day. He was an attached friend of the late Rev. Archibald Cook of Daviot, and the last times Mr. Cook was in Caithness were Communion seasons in Dunnet in the years 1861-62, when he assisted Mr. Campbell. The following obituary sketch, which appeared in a Wick paper at the time of his decease, will be read with much interest. It came from the pen of the respected Mr. William Crowe, who in his latter years was an elder in the Free Presbyterian Church, Wick:—
The death of the Rev. David Campbell, Free Church minister of Dunnet, to which appropriate reference was made in the Ensign of last week, will be read at home and abroad with deep regret, seeing that, as he had been settled upwards of thirty years in a parish noted as a nursery for seamen, many of his flock are scattered over the world.
After the Disruption, Mr. Campbell was unanimously chosen by the Free Church congregation, and never have they had reason to regret the choice. Entering on his ministry in a parish long proverbial for cold Moderatism, where Sabbath profanation was unblushingly perpetrated, his first endeavour was to get hold on the young, and many can remember his solemn appeals to parents and children, affectionately yet faithfully denouncing Sabbath breach and debauchery of every kind, then, alas! too common in the parish. The result soon became manifest by a marked change for the better, so that Dunnet now holds the enviable position in Caithness of standing at the top of the list for morality.
Evangelical at the core, his pulpit was not thrown open to every one who fancied he had a call to preach the gospel. While the vexed Union question was perplexing and embarrassing the Church, Mr. Campbell, no, not for a moment, submitted to any mutual concessions, not even when many of his co-presbyters were vacillating and too often evincing a compromising tendency. He was never known to hang out the white flag, and gave no uncertain sound on the subject. The despised few, who, for conscience sake were driven out of other congregations, found in him a tender, sympathising father and friend. His church became a rendezvous for the wounded, where they were always entertained with the finest of the wheat, where the services were conducted with becoming solemnity, and where the precious Psalms were sung without accompaniment or frisking balladry. No innovations were countenanced on the Hill of Barrock.
Zion has lost a faithful minister, one that fed their souls with rich experimental food. Dunnet has lost an affectionate pastor, who watched for souls as one that must give an account, ever at his post in defence of the truth; the Voluntaries have got rid of a warm opposer, one who neither courted the smiles nor feared the frowns of any man; and now that the grave in Dunnet churchyard has closed in upon his remains, the congregation would do well to remember his dying request, that the pulpit may never be desecrated by another gospel. He has left behind him a gentle beloved widow, and a dear daughter, two of his daughters having predeceased him.
The funeral on Tuesday last was attended by a large concourse of people of every denomination in the parish and many from a distance. His congregation was deeply affected, seeming fully to realise their desolate condition in being left as sheep without a shepherd. His remains were laid not far from those of the late godly David Budge. “Lovely and pleasant in their lives,” in their death they were not long divided. Having spent their strength on the same field of labour, they now lie together in the same ancient churchyard, under the shade of the towering romantic Dunnet Head, with the rude Atlantic billows lashing its shore, and moaning through its time-worn caverns, resting until the sound of the last trumpet, when they shall together ascend to their places on the right hand of the Judge, for ever to be engaged in the same service.
Well may the Church adopt the lamentation of the prophet Micah, “Woe is me! for I am as when they have gathered the summer fruits, as the grape gleanings of the vintage; there is no cluster to eat;” or meekly, as in the language of Amos, “By whom shall Jacob arise, for he is small?”
The Roman Catholic Church in France.
The Archbishop of Paris stated recently:—”We shall soon have no priests. The Church is neglected, and the young French generation is showing open anti-clerical tendencies. During 1910 only 26 young men were ordained priests in Paris; and for 1911, there are only 6 candidates for the priesthood. The year after there will be still less. This condition of things does not exist in Paris alone. In many villages, divine service is conducted by some laymen because there are no priests.”