The End of a Saint

Harry Benton was a successful business man, there was no question about that. He was not known in the commercial world as a “big” man, and he could not write out a check for a million dollars and give it to some charitable institution as some of the multi-millionaires can do, but he was regarded by all who knew him as a successful business man. He had a business in Chicago that was thriving if not colossal. From the income from this business he was able to own and maintain a beautiful and comfortable home in one of the residential districts of the great city. It was his pleasure and privilege to give each year a few thousand dollars to the cause of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Harry was the second son of Jake Benton, the backwoods holiness preacher of the Ozarks. At the age of twenty-one he had become the husband of Eva Cray, who was two years younger than he. This union had been a blessed happy one. If all of Chicago’s homes were like that of Harry Benton, it might well be nicknamed the Paradise of America. Thrice the angel of blessings had visited this home, decorating it each time with one of heaven’s jewels in the form of a baby. Nolan Benton, the twelve-year-old boy, had the name of his Grandfather Gray, and he also had all the religious indications of his Grandfather Benton. Blanche was two years younger than Nolan. She fell heir to the blue eyes, the ruddy cheeks, the flaxen hair of her mother. Little Jake, the baby, was five years old. He inherited his Grandfather Benton’s name and his Grandfather Gray’s red hair.

One Sunday morning when this happy family gathered around the breakfast table, Harry Benton’s appetite was absent. He could not eat. He steadfastly gazed through the east window of the beautiful dining room into the park which spread itself over several acres of ground just across the street from his home.

“Harry, dear, why do you not eat?” remarked his wife. Harry Benton smiled, but as he did so a tear glistened on his cheek.

“For some reason,” he answered, “I awoke an hour before day this morning and memory insisted on taking me on a journey over the past and carrying me on a ramble through the scenes of my childhood, and as I sit here the sight of those trees in the park remind me of old Ozark’s grand forests. I like to think of those old scenes, and by the way, wife, come to think about it, it is three years this month since we were down home on a visit. It doesn’t seem possible that it is so long. We get so absorbed with our business here in this big wicked city that the years flit by like dreams and we do not realize how long we have been away. I should like to take a stroll this morning along the old creek where we boys used to swim. I’d like to visit the old schoolhouse in the walnut grove where we used to spend so many hours. Three years ago when we were down there I visited that old schoolhouse. It looked just about like it did twenty-five or thirty years ago, when you and I were there. I sat on the old limestone rock beneath the old locust-tree where we used to play ‘dare base.’ The old play ground is just the same. There was the ballground where we used to play ‘town ball.’ The same old stone was there that we used for second base.”

As Harry Benton thus spoke his wife and children listened intently, and when the meal was finished and the Bible was brought for the morning worship, the whole family was in a serious frame of mind. Benton went on to say, “And when we talk of home scenes, I always think of Father and his godly influence upon my life. As I look across the years, I see myself an ignorant, awkward country boy; but there is one thing for which I shall always thank my God, and that is that I was blessed with a Christian father. Throughout the years his saintly life has been a benediction to me. The most sacred picture that hangs on the wall of my memory is that of my father with the big family Bible on his lap and all the children gathered around him and Mother for the worship of his God. Well do I remember when he used to pray for us, naming us out one by one and asking God to make us useful men and women. And, oh, how he used to be persecuted by the Mount Olivet people. Well do I remember, wife, how one morning when Father was on his way to milk your father’s cows, he was met by Deacon Gramps, who beat him so shamefully. That night in family worship Father prayed so fervently and asked God to forgive Gramps and save him from his wicked ways. The impressions I received during those stirring days never will leave me. I tell you, Eva, it meant something for Father to stand true as he did, and I think heaven will be especially sweet to those who have suffered as he has suffered.”

When he had left off speaking and the family knelt in prayer, Harry Benton’s voice trembled with emotion as he prayed for all those back home whom he remembered, and especially for his father.

When the morning chores were done and Harry Benton started to the Full Salvation Mission, which mission he had superintended and supported for a number of years, he was met on his front porch by a Western Union messenger boy, who took from beneath his blue cap a slip of yellow paper and handed it to him. This is how it read: “Come, Father very low.”

Benton telephoned one of his brethren to take charge of the Mission, and after earnestly beseeching the Lord to spare his father until his bedside could be reached, he and his wife made hasty arrangements to start, and were soon speeding across the fertile fields of Illinois. They crossed the mighty Mississippi, changed trains in St. Louis’ big Union Depot, and after a few hours’ ride their train was gliding past old familiar scenes of bygone days.

“Dobbinsville! Dobbinsville!” shouted the porter as he thrust his face in at the door of the coach. Three short jerks at the signal cord—swish, swish, swish—back from the englne—t-oot-oot-oot—a sudden let-up in speed, a screech of the airbrakes, a bang of the door, and the Texas Canonball made one of its seldom stops at Dobbinsville, and Harry Benton and his family stepped to the platform.

A thirty-minute ride through the country in a neighbor’s automobile and once more in life Harry Benton stepped foot upon the premises of his childhood. His prayer had been answered. His father had seemed to be dying during the night, but with the coming of morning he revived and regained consciousness. When Harry and Eva entered the room where his father lay, the old saint seemed as happy as a child and much rejoiced at seeing Harry and Eva and their babies, who were the last to arrive of a great flock of sons and sons-in-law and daughters and daughters-in-law and grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

“Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints.”* (Psalm 116:15) Since Jake Benton’s conversion, more than a quarter of a century previously to this time, his life had been one continuous sermon—a sermon more eloquent than any ever preached from a pulpit. But if the sermon of his life was eloquent, that of his death was more so. According to his simple philosophy, life was just a sort of lodgingplace beside the long road to eternity, and death, to him, was not a leaving home, but rather a starting for home.

When he gathered his loved ones about his bedside, on the day following the arrival of Harry and his family, to say goodbye, it was not the goodbye of one who was entering upon a dark and perilous journey to parts unknown, but that of one sustained by an unfailing faith that he was entering upon an abode in the eternal mansion, where he should wait but a brief period for the coming of those he loved.

Just as the purple shadows of the October evening were lengthening, the end was drawing near. The hoary patriarch called his children all by name—Harry and Eva, Joe and his wife, Albert and his wife, Nancy and her husband, Hannah and her husband, and Hattie, the unmarried daughter yet at home—and they all gathered in the room where death was to be a guest. The grandchildren, happy and carefree, unconscious of what life is and of what death means, were called in from their places of play, and told that Grandpa was leaving them. The little tots, bless them, came in and stood around the old-fashioned bedstead all unmindful of the significance of a meeting of time and eternity. They gathered around and gazed into the old saint’s face, where death and life alternately wrote their names. As they passed around one by one by the head of the bed, the old man laid his withered hands upon each little head and pronounced his blessing. Then he began to talk.

“If this is death,” he said, “it is a blessed thing to die. The way has been long and the road rough, at times, but now it is all over. I have suffered a few things for Jesus’ sake, but how unworthy I have been of all the love He has shown me. I have only one dying request to make of my loved ones, and it is the same as my living request has been, that you all live for God and meet me over there. Oh, I am so happy. How I love Jesus, and on His bosom I shall rest forever.” His voice grew fainter. “Just one more step and I am there.” The loved ones hovered nearer. A soft white hand was laid upon his brow. It was the hand of Hattie. Subdued sobs were heard about the room. “Don’t weep, dear children,” he faintly murmured, “I am just passing into—I see the darling’s hands—no pale cheeks—how sweet—about my neck—this Rose—Rose’s Savior Papa’s Savior, too. Let’s go—”

He was dead—and “Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord.”* (Revelation 13:14)