Young fruits

Pastor Matt shared this idea with the youth group today:

It is true that God sometimes arrests the youth in his thoughtless career for no purpose so ostensible as to fit him for an early grave, and it is a beautiful expression of His love when He thus calls the pious young from the conflicts and storms of earth to their heavenly home. These flowers of hope bloom sweetly in the heavenly paradise. Death is the messenger of heavenly love, sent down by the great Husbandman to His garden below to gather these young fruits of righteousness and transplant them in purer skies. It is but another lily gathered when the youthful Christian dies.

Yet we are to remember that this is not the ordinary procedure of a wise providence. God more usually spares the pious young as living exemplifications of the truth and grace which He has caused them to hope. They occupy spheres of responsibility and usefulness which cannot be occupied by the ungodly.

Definitions:

thoughtless: without consideration of the possible consequences

ostensible: stated or appearing to be true, but not necessarily so

arrest: stop or check (progress or a process)