The Retirement Years
The Retirement Years
John Anderson, my Jo, John,
We clamb the hill thegither.
And mony a canty day, John,
We’ve had wi’ one anither;
Naw we maun totter down, John,
But hand in hand we’ll go,
And sleep thegither at the foot,
John Anderson, my Jo.
– Robert Burns
Hand in hand when our life was May,
Hand in hand when our hair is grey,
Shadow and sun for everyone
As the years roll on.
Hand in hand till the long night tide
Gently covers us, side by side.
Ah, lad – though we know not when –
Love will be with us ever then!
Always the same, Darby, my own,
Always the same to your old wife Joan.
– F. E. Weatherly
Our faces at fifty, sixty, and seventy tell many tales. They are written over with legends which are hieroglyphics to most, but to which love holds the key. Those gray hairs came in that long absence from each other when the heart was sometimes sick with fear. Those lines around the mouth and eye were the result of that long anxiety over the boy who seemed about to take the wrong turn. Those crow’s feet and wrinkles were left by the awful anxiety of that business crisis. Withered, scarred, bent, and old, the watchcase is not in quite the same condition on the golden wedding day as it was on that day fifty years before, which it commemorates. But the love is unchanged. And though winter has cast her frost with lavish hand on the bent head, there is summer – perpetual summer – in the heart.
Yes, ’tis summer in the heart;
Snows may fall and teardrops start,
But the soul that loves, forever
Keeps summer in the heart.
To the elderly couple, as they sit together on the ridge of the hill of life in the summer twilight, what a glimpse there is backward into the vale through which they have traveled together for so many years! They can now trace the way by which they have been led, and confess that goodness and mercy have followed them all their days. They see where they made mistakes, but these have been forgiven, and the consequences have been neutralized by the magic of the divine grace. They discern the graves over which they bent together, the Ebenezer stones they reared, the dark, dense woods they traversed, and the sunlit elevations on which they stood hand in hand amid the gleams of prosperity and success. All these live again in their memories which, though difficult to recall the impressions of yesterday, are retentive enough for those of the distant past. Live, young people, with the prospect of that review ahead of you, so when it comes, it may bring you sunny and blessed memories!
Dr. Chalmers used to say that every man should have a Sabbatical decade at the close of his life when, after sixty years of earnest endeavor, he should have ten years for review and rest and preparation for the eternal home. It is to be desired for us all and should be the goal of each of us. It is beneficial when life’s toils have brought sufficient remuneration to secure a sufficiency for our last years and for the dear partner of our life. For what can infuse the evening hours of a man’s life with more anguish than the knowledge that in the darkening night of his wife’s bereavement, there would be the additional pain of threadbare destitution and helpless dependence upon others.
To the elderly, grandchildren are a source of perpetual enjoyment. It is somehow easy for them to become children again with their children’s children, and often a comical comradeship springs up between the esteemed grandparent and the grandchild. On the part of the one, there is willingness to listen, ability to spend an unlimited number of hours, and aptness at being greatly interested in the trifles, which weigh so heavily in a child’s life. How beautiful are those photographs of Mr. Gladstone and Miss Dorothy Drew, in which the veteran’s furrowed face sets off the sweet, cheerful features of his granddaughter!
In response, grandchildren have a patronizing air with the elderly, which is very charming. They lead them off to see their treasures – the dear little kitties, the little ducklings swimming after their mother on the pond, the squirrel that will take his nuts from their hand, or the beautiful big caterpillar that they caught crawling over the gravel path. They admit grandparents into their confidences and hopes, not without some knowledge of their aptitude for spoiling them. They jabber unceasingly of matters which they suppose are as new to the grandparents as to themselves. The little ones indeed seem to think that they have received a charge to be especially mindful of the elderly, and to this they loyally devote themselves.
And so, the elderly couple are still sweethearts. Their love is ripe and mellow. The river may not froth and foam as it did in early days, but it is quieter because it is deeper, fuller, and more weighted with its responsibilities. April with its clouds and sunshine, May with its blooms of promise, June with its maturing beauty, July with its long and unshadowed days, August with its golden colors, and September with its harvests of corn and fruit have yielded to October with its second summer. But there is a slight chill in the air which warns of the fall of the leaf. Yet the love that has lighted their pathway still smiles on them. Were life to start over again, each would choose the other for another spell of fifty years. And the desire is deep in each heart that in death they may not be long divided; no, each thinks that it would be impossible to survive the other and live long alone. But each hopes to close the eyes of the other in the last sleep so that the plight of loneliness and grief may not come upon that other soul which is dearer than self. On such love, faithful and true until death, the angels, on their way home to God, turn aside to look.
Surely for such there must be reunion and companionship in the world where love is supreme. That there will be recognition in that world is not doubtful, thank God. Were there no other proof, it would be sufficient to point out the resurrection of our Lord, in which He was identified by those who had known Him in the days of His flesh. The most incredulous of them recognized Him and cried, My Lord and my God. And He addressed Mary in the familiar tone she knew so well, teaching that the intonations of the voice in the spiritual body will not be altogether strange. But there will be more than recognition; there will be love. In his exquisite psalm of love, the apostle anticipates the time when prophecy, tongues, and knowledge shall pass away, while faith, hope, and love shall abide, and the greatest of these is love. In heaven, as Jesus said, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but those who have loved with an utter devotion and oneness will be permitted the added pleasure of enjoying heaven together. Lovely and pleasant in their lives – surely in death and eternity they will not be divided.
The Bible so often speaks of sitting with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of God, placing together grandfather, father, and grandson, that we may cherish the hope that family life will not be entirely obliterated amid “those solemn troops and sweet societies.” And when it is promised to Daniel to stand in his lot at the end of the days, it may be that this is referred to. What an assembly that will be, when the successive generations stand together, when the heads and founders of godly families shall meet with their latest descendants, according to the promise: My spirit that is upon thee, . . . shall not depart out of . . . the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed’s seed, saith the Lord, from henceforth and for ever (Isaiah 59:21).
There are innumerable cases on record of the fulfillment of that promise. The annals of godly families are full of instances of this spiritual succession, as the children have followed in their fathers’ steps, taken up their fathers’ work, preached in their pulpits, or devoted themselves to the fulfillment of their cherished ideals. God still keeps His mercy for thousands of them who love Him and keep His commandments. We do not believe that devotion is hereditary and can be passed like genius from father to child. But certainly, a predisposition to a godly life is a gracious inheritance, and in answer to believing prayer, God does, in certain families, manifestly grant a godly succession from generation to generation.
Elderly friends, pray for us. The rush and turmoil of your lives has somewhat subsided. You have crossed the stormy seas and lie safely moored in the harbor, bathed in the evening afterglow. Now lift your hearts in prayer for sons and daughters who are in their midlife years, and for the bright boys and girls who are venturing forth. Teach us the secret of the love which has blessed your days. Warn us, if we are missing the best, and call us back to the safer, better way, so a trail of light shall mark your sunset, and the heavens will be long irradiated with the beauty of the sundown.
Let thy work appear unto thy servants, and thy glory unto their children. And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us: and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our hands establish thou it (Psalm 90:16-17).