WHEN on board ship, off Calcutta, in the year 1861, bound for dear old England, our passengers consisted of “time expired” soldiers of various regiments, who had served during the Indian mutiny. In addition to the military, we had a good many soldiers’ wives and children on board.
One fine morning, when out of sight of land, I observed several strange faces appear on deck; they were convicts, sent home to England to undergo different periods of penal servitude for insubordination during the mutiny in India. They were mostly fine young men, and, from their appearance, would not have been taken for what they really were. The greatest kindness was shown them by nearly all on board, more especially by the soldiers’ wives. “Let us treat the poor fellows kindly while they are with us” was the language of the greater part of those on board; indeed these men wanted nothing which kind hearts could procure for them.
The long voyage round the Cape in a sailing vessel is very monotonous, unless the passengers, by the captain’s permission, find means of enlivening the days as they pass. This we did in various ways; we had music, singing, and dancing, in all which amusements the convicts took the lead. Their behavior surprised me very much, for they seemed the happiest of the men in the ship.
How they sang, how they danced! They were foremost in every amusement and frolic, and yet they were convicts, for they had been tried, found guilty, and sentenced, and their “irons” were between decks.
Seemingly they forgot the fact that they were “condemned already.” I marveled at them, although in one sense I was just as foolish and thoughtless as any of them; still I was not a convict, for I was on my way home to wife and children, while they were on their way to prison. However, in spite of the doom that awaited them, the convicts seemed happy. Was it with them, as it is with many, a short life and a merry one?
I pitied the convicts, but when God in His mercy saved me through faith in Christ Jesus, I saw in them a complete picture of myself, and I remembered the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, “He that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” (John 3:18.)
The law of England had condemned the convicts, and justly so, if they were guilty. The word of God had condemned me because I was guilty. Yes, the awful sentence of God is written against everyone who is out of Christ― “condemned already.” In those days I called myself a Christian, but in truth I was a rebel in heart against God, a rejecter of His grace, and a neglecter of His great salvation, “having no hope,” and being “without God in the world.” And thus it is with every reader of this page who is out of Christ; he is condemned already, he is on the way to judgment, though he spend his voyage of life, as did the convicts on board our ship, dancing and singing and merry-making.
Dear reader, if you do not believe on the Lord Jesus condemned already―condemned joy by God, whether awake or asleep, in oy or in sorrow, in prosperity or in adversity, nay, in life or in death, you are under the wrath of God, if not in Christ. Do you know it? May the Spirit of God open your eyes before they are closed, no more to open until in the presence of the great Judge, to be cast out of that presence into outer darkness, there to weep over your madness and folly through a lost eternity.
One afternoon, near the cook’s galley, sat a man whom I had not seen before—a fine-looking fellow in the prime of life. I asked him who he was.
“I am one of the convicts,” said he.
“What were you in the regiment?”
“I was sergeant.”
“How long are you sentenced for?”
He looked up, and his eyes filled with tears as he said, “My sentence is for life. I do not care so much for myself, it is my poor wife and children. Separated from them for life—how shall I bear it?” Poor fellow! his grief affected even me, and I turned away to hide my feelings.
Dear reader, if you remain under the condemnation of God, in your unbelief, your sentence will not only be for the term of your natural life, but oh! it will and must be for all eternity What do you think of such madness as yours, if you any longer neglect so great salvation?
Our voyage at length came to an end, and we sang, “Home at last”; and it would have done your heart good to have seen our happy faces, after four months and six day at sea, on now finding friends, and those dear to us, almost within speaking distance. Every one of our faces beamed with gladness. Bur not so with the convicts. They became miserable as we came so near home. It was no home for them. The dancing and the song had ceased, the delusion had vanished from their souls, and the heart-breaking reality had burst upon them. How solemn were their faces! The sentence passed on then in India was soon to begin, and, once within the prison walls, there would be no escape So in like manner will it be with all who will not accept the complete salvation of God, in God’s time and in God’s way. His time is now, His way is Jesus.
I wonder, if our kind-hearted Queen had sent a free pardon to those poor convicts whether they would have made light of it. Think you they would have ridiculed her messenger, and have laughed at the worth in which the pardon was written?
What would the sergeant, who had been sentenced for life, have said to an offer of mercy on condition of his pleading guilty for his offense against his queen and country? Would he have spurned the offer? Nay, would not he, poor man, have fallen upon his knees, and from his heart have cried, “Guilty, guilty”? But God offers you pardon this day, and what have you done, O man, condemned already? Have you not scoffed at His messengers, or at least treated them with contempt, while His written word has been to you but an object of ridicule or indifference?
How dare you carelessly thus drift on towards eternity, knowing yourself to be “condemned already”? How will you face the righteous Judge in your sins? How account for it to Him that, having heard of His free grace in Christ, you have never accepted Him for your Saviour? I beseech you, delay not to settle this momentous question. J. D.