WHAT mind can think or tongue declare how much is wrapped up in one word, “Forever”? The human mind seems to be almost incapable of grasping the momentous issues that are involved in it. It means, for man, being without end—endless duration.
With man, in his present state, everything has an end. We rise in the morning and day ends in night. We begin our life in youth, and the short span of threescore years and ten with rare exceptions (and in the vast majority of cases far, far less) ends our history in this world.
Ask the oldest man you meet and he will tell you as he looks back that his life is like a dream, and seems to him but as yesterday. A man takes a nine hundred and ninety-nine years’ lease of some ground, which seems a long time in comparison to our short threescore years and ten, yet the term runs out and the lease expires. It comes to an end. But what of eternity? What of eternity? It is limitless. It never, never ends.
Reader, ponder it well and seriously. You have entered on an existence that shall never end in one sense. Death may kill your body, but the soul which is the true and inner life of man, it can never touch. You have a deathless spirit. If death wrecks your body, your spirit will survive it. Oh, that men would think seriously of so important a matter.
Brownlow North, a celebrated English preacher, tried to picture eternity to his audience. He supposed a little bird coming every thousand years to a huge mountain of sand, and carrying in its little beak one tiny grain to some distant spot. We could suppose, said he, a time when the bird would have removed the mountain. But were the mountain removed, eternity would still roll on, and on, and on.
The story is told of a shoemaker sitting working under his clock. As the pendulum swung to and fro, giving its well-known tick, tick, it seemed to say to him one day, Forever! where? Forever! where? Forever! where?
The effect produced upon him was to make him most unhappy. He thought of his sins and where those sins would land him if he were ushered into eternity unprepared. He felt for the first time the awful solemnity of meeting God. Meet God he must. From this solemn fact there was no possibility of escape. He stopped the clock, but that only intensified his misery. In the silence his conscience spoke louder than ever. “Forever! where? Forever! where? Forever! where?”
Upon hearing this incident some one composed these telling lines: —
“Eternity! where? it floats on the air,
‘Mid clamour or silence it ever is there,
The question so solemn—
Eternity! where?
Eternity! where? O Eternity! where?
With redeemed ones in glory, or fiends in despair,
With one or the other—
Eternity! where?
Eternity! where? is aught worth a care?
Oh, can we, oh, shall we e’en venture to dare
Do aught till we settle
Eternity! where?
Eternity! where? O Eternity! Where?
Friend, sleep not, nor take of your rest any share,
Till you answer this question—
Eternity! where?”
Reader, is it too much to ask, WHERE SHALL YOU EXIST FOREVER? I do not ask, Where would you like to exist forever? I never met the man, nor do I believe he is to be found, but would like to escape damnation and enjoy heaven at last. There are few but would say, however they might live, “Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his.”
Now the point of gravest moment is, How is this possible if you go on in your sins? How could it be possible for God to take a man into heaven who dies in a state of uncleanness and utterly unrepentant? Impossible!
No, “Except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish.” These words were uttered by the Lord Jesus to those who were most zealous religionists outwardly.
REPENT OR PERISH! Which?
He also said to a teacher of the same religious people, “YE MUST BE BORN AGAIN.” “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” To the same people He also said, “Ye shall die in your sins” (that is, if you die unforgiven). “Where I go you cannot come.” These are the words of the Son of God, and plain unmistakable words they are. They undoubtedly shut the door of heaven on all who have not repented, on all who are living in sin, and on all who have not experienced the NEW birth.
There is only one door into heaven, ONE way, NOT TWO. The blessed Son of God said, “I am the door,” “I am the way.” There is no possibility of a sinner approaching God or entering heaven except through the crucified, risen, and now glorified Saviour. The necessity of the case on our side demanded nothing less than death on His side—a death, too, that involved the drinking of the bitterest cup that ever was put to any lips.
Oh! who could ever conceive the depth of the agony the blessed holy Son of God passed through when, amid the darkness of Calvary, betrayed, denied, and bereft of every friend, He was left alone and abandoned of God? Not for His own sins did this happen, but for the sins of His very murderers. For the sins of the dying robber, for the sins of Saul of Tarsus, once His most bitter opponent, and for your sins, my reader (however deep-dyed and foul they may be) if you believe on Him.
His death avails for the most guilty. His death avails for all. It is told that as a murderer was on his way to the scaffold to be executed, he was heard to exclaim: “Oh, isn’t He a great Saviour! Oh, isn’t He a great Saviour! Oh, isn’t He a great Saviour!” He had good reason to use such language, for He had saved him.
The celebrated English preacher, John Newton, once said that he never despaired of anybody being saved since Jesus saved him. It is well known that before his conversion to God he was most notorious for his sinfulness and utter profligacy. Those who have known the power of His saving grace may well sing, “Hallelujah! what a Saviour.”
Listen to the sweet, simple message, “Christ also path once suffered for sins, THE JUST FOR THE UNJUST, that he might bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:1818For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: (1 Peter 3:18)). This was certainly an exchange of places. He took my guilty place in grace to me, and bore all the judgment my sins should have brought upon me. By His dying for me I am forever free from that judgment, and am now justified from every charge of sin before a holy God.
He not only died to relieve me from the judgment of my sins, but that He might have the joy of bringing me right home to God. Wonderful grace Those who believe are brought near to God, even into all the nearness of Jesus Himself, the Beloved of the Father.
“The offended dies to set the offender free.”
Think of that word FREE. Free from what? Free from all imputation of sin. Free from the fear of death. Free from the intense dread of coming wrath. Free from the whole dominion and power of Satan. Free to love God and find our greatest pleasure in His blessed service. Free to anticipate the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with joyful expectation. Free to proclaim the same blessing to all who will accept it without conditions.
Free! “Ah!” you say, “I never was a slave.” Fatal error. More, you are blinded to your spiritual condition, and do not understand what freedom means. Wake up at this moment lest you die in darkness and despair, and, bound hand and foot, be cast into outer darkness, where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
Look at that negro servant waiting upon and watching incessantly every glance of her English master. See how she serves and waits upon him.
She is ready at every call to do his bidding. Ask her why all this loving yet apparently slavish attention. She has only one reply, namely: “He redeemed me. He redeemed me. He redeemed me.”
Does she not know what freedom means? Yes, ah, yes. All her happy service to her new master is the result of her purchased freedom. Her service is not legal drudgery, but the sweetest liberty.
So Christ hath redeemed us (believers) from the curse of the law, “being made a curse for us.” He paid the ransom price in blood. His own precious life’s blood was shed for us to set us free. We are everlastingly free, and now it is our joyful liberty to serve. If we are captives, we are His captives by the chains of love. These are chains we never want broken. Each redeemed heart would say, May they bind us more strongly to Him until we see His face and sing forever in His presence, “Thou art worthy, for thou halt redeemed us to God by thy blood.” Then and not till then shall we fully know the value of the ransom paid for us.
P. W.