THIS short notice is no more than a belated intimation of this young man’s death. He was a son of the late Osgood Mackenzie, our worthy elder, and we had little thought that a record of the death of his son would appear in these pages so soon after the father’s. Though “Sandy,” as he was affectionately known here, was not long professing, yet his exemplary life previously was virtually a profession. One who knew him intimately and loved him much, on hearing of his removal wrote to us as follows: “This came as a great surprise and with the effect of a shock, since I had not entertained the idea of his illness being of a serious nature. The Lord, however, knew the end from the beginning, and I am sweetly persuaded that he had been preparing our dear friend ‘against that day.’ I have no doubt you will feel his death keenly since you would have been reckoning, as I had myself, on his being spared many years of usefulness in the world. We have great need of the spirit of acquiescence with and submission to the will of God so beautifully exemplified by our Saviour when He prayed ‘not my will but thine be done,’ and again, ‘even so, Father, for it seemed good in thy sight.'” Yes, many had been “reckoning on his being spared many years of usefulness in the world”; for in his behaviour they had manifest tokens that, if spared, he would be a great support to the cause of Christ. He was one that abounded in love to God, to His laws, to His people. “Hereby shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye love one another”—and this witness we had in him. He was fully alive to the sins and vanities of the times and was deeply grieved with these.
He was strong and robust till about three months before his death, when as the result of a severe attack of influenza his heart began to trouble him. It was not till a week of the end that friends got alarmed about him. Medical skill could not keep him here. In his sickness he was patient and content. His mind was beyond the world. “I see now that it is good for me that I did not leave off thinking of eternity till now,” he said to a friend two days before God took him. Spasm after spasm hastened him to the shores of the incorruptible kingdom, till on the morning of 14th April, 1937, he entered on the full enjoyment of it. As friends witnessed his departure from time they heard him utter two petitions in his mother tongue: “Lord have mercy on my soul,” and then as if all were ready: “Lord take possession of my soul.” His widow, his three little sons, his aged mother and the congregation of Gairloch have much to sorrow, but not as others who have no hope.—A. B.