This is an extract, lightly edited, from “an account of some of his last words on his deathbed” in 1712. A quotation from this account appeared in the first article in last month’s Magazine. The “Account” was published in Halyburton’s Memoirs and has been reprinted in Faith and Experience, volume 4 of the James Bebb Society edition of Halyburton’s Works (available from the Free Presbyterian Bookroom).
September 17.
When a friend came and asked him in the morning how he had rested the by-past night, he answered, “Not well”, and told he had this night been sore tossed with the thoughts of eternity. “But”, said he, “I dare not say they were distracting. My evidences are much clouded indeed; I have been thinking on the terrible things of God, and all that is difficult in death to a saint. All my enemies have been round about. I have had a great conflict, and faith like to fail. O that I may be kept now, in this last trial that is coming, from being an offence to His people.”
Afternoon.
When some of his brethren came in to visit him, he said to them, “I am but young and have little experience, but this deathbed now makes me old; and therefore I use the freedom to exhort you to faithfulness in the Lord’s work. You will never repent of this; He is a good master. I have always found Him so; if I had a thousand lives, I would think them all too little to employ in His service.”
All this day and some days preceding he was under a cloud and desertion.
September 18.
When a friend returned to ask him how he was in the morning, he broke silence with these words: “O what a terrible conflict had I yesterday! But now I can say, I have fought the good fight, I have kept the faith (2 Tim 4:7). Now He has filled my mouth with a ‘new song’ (Ps 40:3), ‘Jehovah-jireh . . . in the mount of the Lord’ (Gen 22:14). Praise, ‘praise is comely for the upright’ (Ps 3:1). Shortly I shall get another sight of God than ever I had, and be more meet to praise Him than ever. O the thoughts of an incarnate God are sweet and ravishing! And O how do I wonder at myself that I do not love Him more, that I do not admire Him more! O that I could honour Him! What a wonder that I enjoy such composure under all my bodily trouble, and in view of approaching death! O what a mercy that I have the use of my reason till I have declared His goodness to me!”
To his wife, he said, “He came to me in the third watch of the night, walking upon the waters; and He said to me, ‘I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end’ (Rev 1:8); ‘I am He that liveth, and was dead; and . . . I am alive for evermore . . . and have the keys of hell and death’ (Rev 1:18).” And he added, “He stilled the tempest, and O there is a sweet calm in my soul”.
Afterwards, when desired to be tender of his health, he said, “I’ll strive to last as long as I can, and I’ll get to my rest ere it be long. I have no more to do with my time, but to measure it out for the glory of God.”
Then he said, “I’ll see my Redeemer stand on the earth, at the last day, (Job 19:25); but I hope to see Him before that, the ‘Lamb . . . in the midst of the throne’ (Rev 7:17). O it will be a beautiful company: ‘the spirits of just men made perfect’ (Heb 12:23), and ‘Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant’ (Heb 12:24). O for grace, grace to be patient to the end!” Then he desired a minister to pray. . . .
Seeing his youngest child, he caused them to bring her to him and said, “Mady,” my dear, “the Lord bless you; the God of your father and of my father bless you, the God that fed me all my life, the angel that redeemed me from all evil, bless you and the rest, and be your portion. That is a goodly heritage, better than if I had crowns and sceptres to leave you. My child, I got you from Him, and I give you to Him again.”
To his wife, he said, “My dear, encourage yourself in the Lord; He will keep you, though you even come among enemies’ hands; surely He will cause the enemy to treat you well”. And then, declaring his willingness to part with his dearest relations, he said, “This is the practice of religion. Sirs, this is a practical part of religion: to make use of it when we come to the strait. This is a lesson of practical divinity.”
When the physician came in, he said, “Is my pulse weak, doctor?” Answer: “Yes, but I have seen it as weak”. Then he said, “Doctor, as to this piece of work, you are near an end with it. I wish you may lay it to heart; it will come to your door also, and it is a business of great moment, to die like a Christian; and it is a rarity. Christ Himself has told us, that there are but few that shall be saved (Lk 13:23) even among them who are called outwardly. I wish the Lord Himself may show you kindness. The greatest kindness I am now capable to show you is to commend serious religion to you. There is a reality in religion, doctor; but this is an age that has lost the sense of it. He has not said to the house of Jacob, Seek ye My face in vain (Is 45:19). Atheists will see one day whether it be so or not.
“I bless God, I was educated by godly parents in the principles of the Church of Scotland. I bless Him that, when I came to riper years, I did, on mature deliberation, make them my choice; I bless the Lord I have been helped ever since to adhere to them without wavering; I bless Him, I have seen that holiness yields peace and comfort in prosperity and adversity. What should I seek more, or desire more, to give evidence of the reality of it? Therefore ‘I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ; for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth’ (Rom 1:16). I am so far from altering my thoughts of religion, by reason of the present contempt thrown on it and opposition made to it, that this endears it the more to me.
“As to the simplicity of gospel worship, many must have gaudy pomp nowadays in worship, it is an evidence of the decay of religion; for when people lack the power and spirituality of it, they must have something to please the carnal heart. This is my sense of it, and it is ‘the words of truth and soberness’ (Acts 26:25); and I speak as being shortly to appear in judgement, and hope to give an account of this with joy (Heb 13:17) as a part of the testimony of Jesus.
“Well, doctor, the Lord be with you, and persuade you to be in earnest. I return you thanks for your diligence. Is my pulse low?” Answer: “Yes”. He replied, “I am very well pleased. I would have been content to have been away long ere now. I found my spirits failing. It is but a few strokes more, and victory, victory for evermore, through the Captain of our salvation.”
After a pause, he said, “Everyone that is in Christ Jesus must be a new creature; he must have union with Christ and have a new nature that is the groundwork of religion. The Christian religion is little understood by the most part of us; O the gospel of Christ! How purely it was preached in this place when I was at the university; though I found not the sweetness in it at the time when I heard others preach on these subjects, I found it since, and it has fallen on me like showers on the mown grass. Verily there is a reality in religion; few have lively impressions of it.
St Andrews.
“Now get acquaintance with God; the little acquaintance I have had with God, within these two days, has been better than ten thousand times the pains I have all my life been at about religion. It is good to have Him to go to when we are turning our ‘face to the wall’ (2 Ki 20:2); He is known for a refuge in the palaces of Zion (Ps 48:3), ‘a very present help in trouble’ (Ps 46:1).
“O there is a strange hardness in the heart of man! I believe there are few men come to age but, when they see others dying, have a conviction that they must die and yet are not duly affected with it. . . . But they have Moses and the prophets; if they will not hear them, neither would they hear though one should rise from the dead (Lk 16:29-31). We must have an ear from God before we can hear. Ye hear not My words, says Christ, “because ye are not of God” (Jn 8:47). However, whether people will hear or whether they will forbear, it is our duty, whom the Lord has employed to preach His gospel, to speak His Word. And when we are dead and rotten, what we speak of His word, in the name of the Lord, will take hold of them.
“We must have patience to wait till He come; ‘yet a little while, and He that shall come will come, and will not tarry’; and till He come, ‘the just shall live by faith: but if any man draw back,’ says the Lord, ‘My soul shall have no pleasure in him’ (Heb 10:37,38). To point once heavenward and then draw back is a dangerous thing.
“We are foolish creatures, we would have all the trial at our disposal and limit the Lord as to the circumstances of our trial. Why should I complain of a little trouble in lying on the bed? Blessed be God, there is an everlasting rest. Yea, Christ has perfumed a bed of languishing and a grave; He has unstinged death.”