Well, this mother began to write and plead to the boy to write to his
father first, and his father would forgive him; but the boy said, "I
will never go home till father asks me." She pleaded with the father,
but the father said, "No, I will never ask him."
At last the mother was brought down to her sickbed, broken-hearted,
and when she was given up by the physicians to die, the husband,
anxious to gratify her last wish, wanted to know if there was not
anything he could do for her before she died. The mother gave him a
look; he well knew what it meant. Then she said, "Yes, there is one
thing you can do, you can send for my boy. That is the only wish on
earth you can gratify. If you do not pity him and love him when I am
dead and gone, who will?" "Well," said the father, "I will send word
to him that you want to see him." "No," she says, "you know he will
not come for me. If ever I see him you must send for him." At last the
father went to his office and wrote a despatch in his own name, asking
the boy to come home. As soon as he got the invitation from his
father, he started off to see his dying mother. When he opened the
door to go in he found his mother dying and his father by the bedside.
The father heard the door open, and saw the boy, but instead of going
to meet him he went to another part of the room, and refused to speak
to him. His mother seized his hand--how she had longed to press it!
She kissed him, and then said, "Now, my son, just speak to your
father. You speak first, and it will all be over." But the boy said,
"No, mother, I will not speak to him until he speaks to me." She took
her husband's hand in one hand and the boy's in the other, and spent
her dying moments and strength in trying to bring about a
reconciliation. Just as she was expiring she could not speak, so she
put the hand of the wayward boy into the hand of the father, and
passed away. The boy looked at the mother, and the father at the wife;
and at last the father's heart broke, and he opened his arms, and took
that boy to his bosom, and by that body they were reconciled. Sinner,
that is only a faint type, a poor illustration, because God is not
angry with you. God gives you Christ, and I bring you to-night to the
dead body of Christ. I ask you to look at the wounds in His hands and
feet, and the wound in His side. My friends, gaze upon His five
wounds. And I ask you, "Will you not be reconciled?" When He left
heaven, He went clear down to the manger that He might get hold of the
vilest sinner, and put the hand of the wayward prodigal into that of
the Father, and He died that you and I might be reconciled. If you
take my advice, you will not go out of this hall to-night until you
are reconciled. "Be ye reconciled." Oh, this gospel of reconciliation!
My friends, come home to-night. Your Father wants you to come. Say as
the prodigal did of old, "I will arise and go to my father," and there
will be joy in heaven.