THE heart of our God is set on saving sinners. His blessed work goes on, on land and sea, in peace and war; amid the fury of the elements; and when the gentle breezes blow. His heart has gone out to all, and the circle of His love takes in all. "God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:1616For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)). Unutterably blessed is it to know, for oneself, in one's own soul, the giving, dying, pardoning, redeeming, and saving power of this love; but who can tell out the blackness, the vileness, the heinousness of the sin that would spurn it all, and reject the One who came to reveal God as love, and, in dying for sinners, manifested His love towards us. "God is love;" “God commendeth his love towards us in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" (1 John 4:88He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. (1 John 4:8); Rom. 5:88But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)).
God is working still, and the foundation of His working is in the death of His Son. God is just in justifying, and righteous in saving (Rom. 3:2626To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. (Romans 3:26)); for in the cross “mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other” (Psa. 85:1010Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other. (Psalm 85:10)). Now God, in divine consistency, can justify and save the vilest sinner who turns in repentance to Him. “Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out” (John 6:3737All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. (John 6:37)).
God uses various instrumentalities in His work of saving. How often does He use the words of a mother in the conversion of her children During the Crimean War, there was a young officer who in the night was taken sick; his Turkish servant was too soundly asleep to be awakened, and there he was in his tent, with a high fever, all alone, unsaved, unforgiven, and, as it appeared to him then, with death, the grim inexorable king of terrors, at his side. What a moment in the history of that young man was that! A moment, I am bold to say, that, as long as eternity lasts, will never be forgotten.
What was to be done? He expected to die ere another sun broke upon that scene of carnage and death. Alone, in that supremely solemn moment, as he lay unsaved, without Christ, without God, without hope in the world, who can tell the feelings of his soul, or describe the repentant look of that self judged prodigal, as he looked up to God, whose delight it is to receive, and whose prerogative it is to pardon and save all such?
As he thus lay, the passage of the Word that his beloved mother had taught him was brought to his mind by the Spirit of God—" Christ died for our sins;" and, as he himself said, when relating it to a dying man, " I laid hold of that and was saved.”
And what a scene of peace and joy the death of such an one is. Some two years ago, it was the privilege of the writer to visit a very sick man, who was reached by the Word, and converted to God. Though he lingered on for two more years, yet it was only to experience the further development of his malady, and eventually succumb to death. But death to him meant release from a diseased, pain-stricken, emaciated body, to be in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ. It was victory to him—the open door into paradise. “Death is ours," was with him realized in a full blessed sense.
When asked by a Christian lady, a short time before his departure, “If you were called away from earth this evening, how would it be with you for eternity?”
With a look brightened with heaven's light, and which told of the peace and joy within, he said, "All well, all well!”
"On what are you resting?”
“On Jesus my Savior," he replied.
“Is there nothing of your own on which you are resting?”
“Oh, no, Jesus has washed away my sins," and tears rolled down his cheeks. “I would so like to talk," he said," but can't;" and fell back almost unconscious from exhaustion.
Not many hours later, the race of the ransomed saint was run, the happy moment of release came, his spirit was freed from its house of clay, and with untold and unmingled delight found itself in the presence of “him who loved us, and gave himself for us.”
An old saint, a widow of many years, who has reared her children from her own hard earnings at the wash-tub, and knows what the rugged side of life is, on conversing with me the other day, said, “There is no happiness in this world out of Mist.
To have a crust of bread, and have Him with you, is above rubies.”
This was no drawing-room Christianity, nor glibly talking of things as we recline on “flowery beds of ease;" but after many years of toil and struggling along the pathway of life, with apparently all against her, she had learned that, “There is no happiness in this world out of Christ. To have a crust of bread, and have Him with you, is above rubies.”
Come now, Mr. Infidel, what say you to all this?
Here are three witnesses to the love of God, the saving virtues of the blood of Jesus, the sufficiency of Christ to sustain the heart throughout a life of trial, and in the solemn hour of death to enable me triumphantly to say, "All well, all well!" Refuse not, I beseech you, this threefold witness.
Beloved reader, is this God your God? this Savior your Savior? And in the hour of death, can you say, "All well, all well"?
Unconverted reader, remember, that by tomorrow, you may be dead! And then! What then?
E. A.