Sarah Simmons Fordyce Obituary
1902


Composed in loving memory of our mother, Sarah, wife of John A. Fordyce, who departed this life at her home in Center township, Monday, July 7th, 1902, aged 77 years, 6 months, and 2 days. She was a faithful wife, a loving mother, a consistent christian, her mission work on earth is completed and she has passed from labor to reward, from darkness to light, from the land of death to the land of life. She has joined that innumerable throng which no man can number, who have come up through great tribulation having washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. She united with the Disciple church at the Willow Grove appointment in the year 1850 under the preaching of Elder Barton. She leaves an aged husband, one son and one daughter and a host of relatives and friends to mourn her loss.

Life's winter drear, oh mother dear,
      To thee has passed away,
We feel bereft for thou has left
      This tenement of clay.

Yet oft it seems in lands of dreams
      That mother's here again,
With rapture wild, once more a child
      That I with her remain.

But wake again to face with pain,
      The stern reality,
That olden time in earthly clime
      Is never more to be.

And day's fair light and gloomy night
      Each other will succeed,
Thy absence still which none can fill,
      Will leave our hearts to bleed.

And spring shall dawn on field and lawn
      And feathered songsters sing,
And tree tops nod in praise to God,
      And buds their blossoms bring.

The sun shall rise in vernal skies,
      To gild the ocean wave,
But those bright rays in coming days
      Will shine on mother's grave.

But why those tears? when days and years
      Have bridged the gulf of time.
That separates twixt state and state
      We'll meet in that fair clime.

Where God shall rise and from all eyes
      Wipe off the bitter tear,
Where pain's sharp cry and sorrow's sigh
      We never more shall hear.

Where death at last, and hell are cast
      Into the lake of fire,
His reign is o'er, he finds no more
      On which to vent his ire.

Wht should we weep when christians sleep
      And take their needful rest;
Their sweet repose in Him who rose
      And all their couches blest.

Though sorrow deep is forced to weep,
      The words are dear to me,
Though from the urn none can return.
      Yet we can go to thee.

Together rise and scale the skies,
      In answer to the call.
When we rejoice to hail a voice,
      That shall be heard by all.

And share that crown of vast renown
      For which we lived and died,
And over there His likeness share,
      We shall be satisfied.

Newspaper obituary, date and source unknown (Greene County, Pennsylvania)


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