Alice was an only child and, in the natural course of time and events, she would have become a very wealthy heiress. She was lovely and accomplished; but she lived for this world with all of its extraordinary attractions.
When Alice failed to look quite so bright as formerly, a physician was called in. He diagnosed her illness as tuberculosis, and ere long all could see that her days were numbered.
Alice sank by degrees, although all the care and luxuries wealth could procure were showered upon her. She now had time to think. How sad, she thought, to have to leave her loving friends and all her brilliant prospects, and to go—where? Where?
She sent for her clergyman. He came. The family were assembled. They all knelt round her bed. He intoned the services for the sick. Having received her confession and pronounced absolution, he administered the sacrament. Then placing his hands on her head, he blessed her and pronounced her "a good child of the church.”
When he departed, satisfied with his own ritualistic performance, he assured the anxious parents that all was well with their child. But was Alice satisfied?
She had submitted to the rites of the church, but she knew that her own heart was not right with God.
"Father," she said, "I know I am going to die. Tell me, where am I going?" The father could give her no answer.
"Mother," she cried, "tell me what to do to get to heaven?" Still there was no reply.
"I'm lost! Lost!" she exclaimed. "Am I not lost, Father? Is there anyone who can tell me how to be saved?”
Lovingly the mother soothed her. "My child, you have always been a dutiful daughter. You have never grieved your parents. You have regularly attended church and even joined in its services. Your minister has performed the rites of the church, and he says he himself is satisfied with your state.”
"But, Mother, I feel that is not enough. That gives no rest to my soul. It is all hollow—it is not real. Oh, I am going to die, and I don't know where I am going. Oh, how black is the way before me! Can no one tell me what I can do to be saved?”
Just within the door stood the young maid whose duty it was to attend Alice. This girl knew the Savior and the joy of knowing the forgiveness of her own sins. Silently she prayed for courage to tell her mistress of the one who had told her how to find "forgiveness" through the finished work of Christ. At last she stepped to the bed-side, and from a full heart she poured out her thanks for this man of God.
"Oh, could I see him?" exclaimed the dying girl. This Christian was sent for, and again the family assembled. Raising herself, Alice appealed to him: "Can you tell me what I must do to find rest for my soul and to die at peace with God?”
"I cannot," was the answer.
Alice fell back on her pillows. "Oh," she cried; "is that true? Is there no hope for me?”
"Wait," said he; "though I can't tell you what you can do to be saved, I can tell you what has been done for you. Jesus Christ, the Savior, has completely finished a work by which lost and helpless sinners may be righteously saved. God is love. The blessed Savior left the glory, bled and died, that the sinner who receives Him might live.
"'He bare our sins in His own body on the tree.' He endured the wrath of God. All, everything, is done. The work is finished. Believe and live. 'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.'" Acts 16:31.
"Then have I nothing to do?”
"Nothing, no doing, working, praying, giving, or abstaining, can relieve a conscience burdened with sin. It is not a work done in you by yourself. All the work was done for you by another, long, long ago. Jesus said, `It is finished.' You can do nothing to add to the perfect work of Christ.
"Doing is not God's way of salvation. You must believe what God in Christ has already done for you.”
"I do believe that Jesus died on the cross for sinners; but how can I know that God has accepted me?”
"Jesus has ascended into heaven before God in the value of His shed blood, and has been accepted there for us. When we believe in Him and His great work for us, we are accepted in Him—accepted in God's beloved Son.
"Believe the message God sends you. Appropriate to yourself all He did, and say, Tor me He was slain.' `He was bruised for my iniquities.'
"'Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world!'" John 1:29.
The newly awakened sinner listened with breathless attention. She believed the Word of God revealing Christ to her soul, and received Him as her own Savior.
READER, WHERE ARE YOU GOING? WHERE!
Are you trusting in works, feelings, anything other than the finished work of Christ? Test your hope— try your foundations now by the Word of God. Trust no longer in self, nor in forms, ceremonies, nor the whole service of ritualism. They are but a snare and delusion.
"Cast your deadly "doing" down,
Down at Jesus' feet;
Stand in Him, in Him alone,
Gloriously complete!”