“Lo, I am with you alway” (Matt. xxviii. 20).
This living Christ is not the person that was, but the person that still
is, your living Lord. At Preston Pans, near Edinburgh, I looked on the
field where in the olden days armies were engaged in contest. In the
crisis of the battle the chieftain fell wounded. His men were about to
shrink away from the field when they saw their leader’s form go down;
their strong hands held the claymore with trembling grip, and they
faltered for a moment. Then the old chieftain rallied strength enough to
rise on his elbow and cry: “I am not dead, my children, I am only watching
you—to see my clansmen do their duty.” And so from the other side of
Calvary He is speaking; we cannot see Him, but He says, “Lo, I am with you
alway, even to the end of the world”; and He puts it, “I am”—an
uninterrupted and continuous presence. Not “I will be,” but the unbroken
presence still is with us forevermore.
Soon the conflict shall be done,
Soon the battle shall be won;
Soon shall wave the victor’s palm,
Soon shall sing the eternal Psalm;
Then our joyful song shall be,
I have overcome through Thee.