DANIEL Webster, the famous American orator and politician, spent a summer in New Hampshire. Every Sunday found him in church paying marked attention to the sermon.
His niece asked how it was that he paid so much attention when he paid little attention to far abler sermons in Washington. He replied: “In Washington they preach to Daniel Webster, the statesman, but this man has been telling Daniel Webster, the sinner, of Jesus Christ.”
Does not this remark indicate plainly where the power of preaching lies? A revival had lately broken out and the question was asked, What does the message consist of which is being used in conversions? The answer was given: The ruin of man and the redemption which is in Christ Jesus.
We speak of persons being great and small in this world, but the greatest of these is but a worm in the presence of God. The Emperor dies as much as the meanest of his subjects-all are sinners and all alike need redemption.
Countess de Krudener, a Christian lady, stood before Alexander I, the Emperor of Russia, emancipator of the serfs, and told him plainly that God would not receive him because he was Czar of all the Russia’s, but because he came as a lost, unworthy sinner in repentance before God and in faith centered on the Lord Jesus Christ as his personal Savior. Thank God, he acted on this advice.
The Lord said to Zacchæus, as he sat up in the sycamore tree, "Make haste and come down." Surely this is the cry today. "Make haste." No time to be lost. The issues at stake are too tremendous. "Come down." "Come down" from your self-righteousness, from the heights of a Christless religion, from the elevation of a worthless ritualism it may be, "come down" to the feet of the Savior, and there and there alone will you be blessed. "By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast." (Eph. 2:8, 98For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9Not of works, lest any man should boast. (Ephesians 2:8‑9)).
It was the story of Christ's coming into this world, dying on the cross, of his triumphant ascension, of His dying for the sinner that his sins might be forgiven that suited Daniel Webster, the sinner. Does this not suit you, my reader? You are a sinner and you admit this. Neglect the message of the gospel and you seal your own doom.
THE EDITOR