Lost | AdventAI

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Aug 13, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 31.

Lost.

A FRIEND recently related a very peculiar and suggestive experience in getting lost on the island of Nantucket. He was one of a gunning party whose camp was on a desolate part of this ancient domain. One afternoon he wandered off alone in the pursuit of game, and success stimulated him to continue the hunt until the twilight was fading into darkness. Laden with wild fowl, he turned his steps toward the distant shelter. At length a light appeared, but, upon looking again, it came and went, instead of having a steady glow, and he concluded at once that it was a revolving beacon on the coast, the location of which he knew. Changing his course, he traveled towards another light-house—into the gloom which enshrouded his path—till, exhausted, he was compelled to part with the burden of game and thread his way back to the point of departure from the light which he first saw; and he heard, erelong, the welcome voices of his comrades. One of their number, while preparing supper, had removed, at intervals, the lamp from the window to the fire, which caused the deception, made him turn his back upon it and follow a light which led him farther and farther from the camp.

There are two practical points in this narrative, of special moral significance. Men must be careful what lights they follow. The lost hunter reproached himself because he did not survey more closely the horizon and become sure of his course, as he might have done before leaving the homeward track. The other suggestion is, that every person who holds a lamp should be cautious how his light shines. Christ put this warning into two letters in their connection, "Let your light so shine that men, seeing," etc. And surely it is a fearful fact that, in all ages, many in the visible church, by the false light of an empty profession and inconsistent life, lead the bewildered and benighted, the too willing to be thus misguided, into the darkness which has no morning.—Sel.