I am in eternity--and you are on the brink!

Passing through a country graveyard the other day, an inscription on a head-stone struck my eye. The stone was by the side of the path, where everyone could see it, and it was placed there in memory of a young man who died at the age of seventeen. It was--

"Reader, one moment,
Stop, and think:
That I am in eternity!
And you are on the brink!"

In eternity! A young man, only seventeen years of age, in eternity!

In a fixed, a changeless, an eternal state!

In Heaven--or in Hell!

Saved with an everlasting salvation--or damned forever!

If it should be the latter, what a fearful supposition! And yet many have gone to Hell--before they have been seventeen years of age!

"I am in eternity--and you are on the brink!" Yes, though you may be young, apparently healthy, full of life and vigor--you are on the brink of eternity! A slight accident, a few days illness--and you are in eternity! What a solemn thought!

What will eternity be to you?

Where will you be in eternity?

Are your sins pardoned?
Are you reconciled to God by the death of His Son?
Are you sanctified by the Holy Spirit--and thus made fit for Heaven?

If not, remember that in Hell, there is . . .
no gospel,
no means of grace,
no way of escape from the wrath of God!
Once there--and your doom is fixed forever!

Think, O think . . .
Of the dreadful consequences of dying in your sins!
Of going down to the grave in an unconverted state!
Of dying under the curse of God!

"Behold, now is the accepted time!
Behold, now is the day of salvation!"

(James Smith, "A Solemn Admonition" 1859)