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Echoes of Grace–2015–November
It Was for Me
One afternoon a class of young girls was gathering in a small home for Bible study. One girl had been learning during the week the words of Isaiah 53, and as she was walking along she repeated the verses to herself. They merely sounded to her like a lovely song or a pleasant voice―she had not yet understood the meaning of being healed by His stripes.
“It was for me―it was for me!”
After the prayer to begin the class, Mary stood to repeat her chapter. She said the first four verses, but when she reached the fifth verse, “He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed,” tears filled her eyes. Before reaching the end of the verse her head dropped and her tears fell on the open Bible before her as she cried: “It was for me―it was for me!”
Intense Moment
The intense solemnity of the moment held the teacher silent. Then as Mary’s tears still fell, the older woman said: “Let’s thank Him, my dear, that it was for you.”
They knelt down, and after the teacher had thanked the Lord for opening the eyes of the girl to see Jesus as her substitute, the tears were dried and Mary whispered, “Lord Jesus, thank You for dying for me and for taking my punishment.” Then the quiet calm of being accepted by God filled her heart, and she had peace with God.
Adapted from Living Waters.
What Is a True Christian?–Large Print Tract
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What Is a True Christian?
What, then, is a true Christian?
He is cleansed! “The blood of Jesus Christ…cleanseth us from all sin.” Having come as a sinner to the Saviour, he is made whiter than snow in God’s holy sight (Isaiah 1:18).
He is redeemed! “Christ hath redeemed us.” He has bought us back from our slavery to sin and brought us back to God (Galatians 3:13).
He is enlightened! He was in darkness. He did not know what he was as a sinner. He did not know Christ the Saviour. Now he has light and can see clearly (Acts 26:18).
He is sanctified! He is set apart from all his former associations. He no longer belongs to the world. He belongs to Christ, and is called to walk so as to glorify Him (2 Corinthians 6:16-18).
He is trusting! He confides in Christ, and depends upon Him day by day for needed grace, strength, and wisdom (Hebrews 13:6).
He is accepted! God has put him in Christ’s place before His face, and so God’s thoughts of Him are measured by God’s thoughts of Christ (Ephesians 1:3-6).
He is made new! “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature.” He has been born again-born of God. He now has new desires-different from those he had when unconverted (2 Corinthians 5:17).
Are you then a true, born again Christian? If not, you are only a pretender. You need to come to Christ for salvation. Then you will have the joy and peace which belong to the true Christian. You will know that when He comes you will be caught up to meet Him in the air, and be forever with Him in heaven.
“What must I do to be saved?…Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:30-31).
Echoes of Grace–2015–October
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Was It a Lie?
The wagons were rolling westward. Long lines of wagons moved slowly across the hot prairies, over the cold mountains, bearing settlers, miners, adventurers, hunters, trappers―all seeking something beyond. One wagon train had a company of Christians who hoped to take the gospel of God’s grace to those in the West.
It was a company of Christians―plus Joe. Joe was not a Christian. Joe, in his own country, was wanted for murder. It was not safe for him to stay in his own neighborhood, so meeting up with the Christians, he asked to be hired as a driver of one of their wagons.
However, being in the company of Christians did not make Joe a saint! He hated religion. When the wagons stopped rolling for the Lord’s Day (Sunday), Joe didn’t have to drive, so he would go off with his gun and spend the hours hunting. He would keep well out of the way of hearing the Word of God preached.
As the party went on their way, in the middle of July there came a Sunday so hot that Joe didn’t care to hunt. He laid himself down in the shadow of one of the wagons, carefully selecting the wagon of one of the group who would not be expected to conduct the service.
But Joe had made a mistake. The one whose turn it was to preach was so overcome by the heat that he asked to be excused, and the owner of the wagon under whose shade Joe was sheltering offered to take his place. So the little company gathered around his wagon, and the meeting began.
Joe was lying in the long grass, half asleep, and was furious at being disturbed. To lie still while hymns were sung and to see the hated Bible opened was too much for him. He would move. He stood up to go, but the heat was too great and he threw himself back down on the grass. There he lay on his back in front of the preacher, his angry eyes glaring up at him.
“He said that God loved wicked men. Wasn’t that a lie?”
“Lord, help me to preach to Joe,” prayed the speaker as he saw the opportunity before him. Forgetting everybody else, he began to tell of the love of God to all His creatures. He told his hearers that, though God gave them rain and sunshine, food and drink, even life itself, yet they didn’t love Him in return. Instead of loving Him, they hated Him and His servants and His Book. But did He send the lightning and strike them down for their enmity? No, He had given His Son to die to put away their sins. He had shown His love to them, to the worst of them, even to the murderers, and if they would only believe in His Son He would forgive them and make them His dear children.
Joe’s eyes were fixed on the speaker who, as he went on, watched the anger slowly fading out.
Lies?
Joe didn’t forget that sermon. One day, walking beside another of the men, he said, “Didn’t the preacher tell awful lies that hot Sunday?”
“Lies, Joe? I didn’t hear any.”
“He said that God loved wicked men. Wasn’t that a lie?”
“Not at all, Joe; it’s in the Book. ‘God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins.’”
“But wasn’t that an awful lie, that the Great Father gave His Son?”
“No, Joe, it’s in the Book. ‘In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.’”
Then Joe said, “But it must be a lie, that He was preparing the beautiful place for them.”
“No,” was the answer. “That’s true too. It’s in the Book. Jesus, the Son of God, said to sinful men whom He loved and had saved, I go to prepare a place for you.”
Then Joe said, “If all this is true, I want this way of peace; I want this new life!”
That sermon, and the talk that followed, turned Joe from being Joe-the-wicked to Joe-the-Christian. He believed that God loved him and gave His Son to die for him, and joyfully he received Christ Jesus as his Lord.
Adapted from Living Waters.
A Race for Life–Color Tract
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Even in our modern times, no roads exist that connect Nome to the rest of Alaska. In January 1925, when car and air travel were impossible, Dr. Curtis Welch of Nome diagnosed an outbreak of diphtheria — a deadly and contagious disease. Sadly, Dr. Welch had none of the needed antitoxin serum. He sent out an urgent telegraph pleading for help. Every hour without the serum increased the death toll.
This dreadful disease reminds us of sin. Sin has infected every one of us, and if we don’t use the right treatment for it, sin will eventually cause our eternal death. The Bible makes it clear how dangerous sin really is: “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23).
Who is the only one who can remove the problem of sin? Before His birth an angel announced, “Thou shalt call His name Jesus: for He shall save His people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21). When Jesus died on the cross, He shed His precious blood. God says, “The blood of Jesus Christ [God’s] Son cleanseth us from all sin” (1 John 1:7).
The antitoxin serum was located in Anchorage and was sent by train to the town of Nenana — still 650 miles away from Nome. More than twenty dogsled teams were ready, spaced out along the route to Nome.
The crate containing the vials of serum was carefully lashed onto the first sled, and the driver yelled, “Mush!” The dogsled race to save lives had begun.
After harrowing adventures, the serum was lashed to Gunnar Kaasen’s next-to-last dogsled. With the command “Mush!” his team of dogs sprinted away. Shortly after this team started, a severe snowstorm blew in. Snow fell so fast that Gunnar could no longer tell if he was headed in the right direction. He had to trust his lead dog to guide them. The lead dog made his way through the blizzard until he lost his sense of direction and stopped. Worried that they would never reach Nome, Gunnar got off the sled.
The snow was blowing so thick that Gunnar could barely see the faint outlines of his dogs in their harnesses. His glance fell on one of the dogs that was hitched at the back of the team. Instead of standing still, this dog Balto was jumping against the braces of the harness. He seemed to be saying, I know the way; trust me! Gunnar switched Balto to the lead spot. The dog paused for a moment, just long enough for Gunnar to get behind his sled, and then surged forward into the storm.
The wind blew at forty miles an hour. The temperature was minus forty and falling, and snow continued to fall fast. Balto led them through the terrible storm. At one point, a strong gust of wind hit them and lifted Gunnar, the sled and all the dogs off the ground before slamming them back down again.
The Home Stretch
When they neared the last relay station, Gunnar saw no lights in the roadhouse. Instead of losing precious time in rousing the sleeping driver, Gunnar kept going on the last twenty-mile leg of the journey. Even after working all day, Balto ran like the wind.
At 5:30 a.m., Balto led the team to the front of the tiny hospital in Nome. They had traveled over twenty hours through some of the worst conditions known to man. Gunnar put his arm around his lead dog and then noticed that Balto’s feet were bleeding. Despite danger and incredible hardships, Balto had gotten the sled carrying the antitoxin serum through to Nome.
Did you know that Jesus left His home in heaven and came here to earth to face dangers and incredible hardships so that you could be saved? The words He spoke were so powerful that they struck men deep in their hearts. Because He spoke about sin, He earned the hatred of many who “loved darkness rather than light.” At last they took Him and nailed Him to a cross. God knew that it was only through the death of His dear Son that sin could ever be put away. In His own body at the cross, He carried those sins which were bringing us down to death and judgment. “He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed” (Isaiah 53:5).
The Lord Jesus Christ died for you on the cross. After His death, He was laid in a grave, but a grave couldn’t hold Him. He rose from the dead. If you believe on this Saviour, you will receive the forgiveness of your sins and the gift of eternal life.
Won’t you trust the Lord Jesus to save you?
Twenty Three Thousand Sins–Large Print Tract
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Twenty Three Thousand Sins
“How old are you?” asked the Christian.
“Twenty-three.”
“Now listen,” said the other. “Won’t you admit that few days have passed that you haven’t had a foolish thought? God’s Word says: The thought of foolishness is sin. Have you also said silly things?”
“Well, of course!”
“The Lord Jesus Christ said that, ‘Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.’ Do you sometimes tell lies, or break laws, or lose your temper?”
“Every day!”
“You have admitted three sins a day; this means that on the lowest average you have committed no less than one thousand a year. On your own confession, you stand convicted of twenty-three thousand sins!”
Dan’s smile was gone now. Seriously, he asked, “What can I do?”
“You can do nothing but to take a sinner’s place and claim the sinner’s Saviour. Then you may be sure that ‘the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin.’” There and then Dan, a convicted sinner, trusted the Saviour and rejoiced in the certainty of sins forgiven.
Use the same method the evangelist used with Dan. Try to add up your sins. It will give you a very faint idea of your own guilt and show you how impossible it is to make yourself right with God.
Thank God, what you never could do the Lord Jesus has done. “IT IS FINISHED!” was His dying cry. Redemption has been accomplished. Faith in a once-crucified, now-risen Saviour secures eternal blessing for you, “for if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved” (Romans 10:9).
Echoes of Grace–2015–September
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The Blood-Marked Door–Color Tract
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During a cruel and bloody war, a commander took an oath that he would slaughter the entire population of a certain town, and in due course his violent troops were let loose on the defenseless people.
A fugitive seeking shelter spied a number of soldiers as they broke into a house and slaughtered its inhabitants. On leaving it, one of them dipped a cloth into a pool of blood and splashed it on the door, as a sign to any who might follow that everyone inside was dead.
Quick as he could, the fugitive ran to a large house in the center of the town, where a number of his friends were concealed, and breathlessly told them what he had seen. Immediately they knew what to do. A goat was in the yard. They killed it without delay and splashed its blood on the door. They closed the door just before soldiers rushed into their street. But when they came to the blood-marked door, they made no attempt to enter! The sword, so they thought, had already entered. While many around were slain, all within the blood-marked door were saved.
The First Passover
“The Lord spake unto Moses … Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying … they shall take to them every man a lamb. … Your lamb shall be without blemish … and the whole … congregation … shall kill it in the evening. … And ye shall take a bunch of hyssop, and dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and strike the lintel and the two side posts with the blood … and none of you shall go out at the door of his house until the morning. For the Lord will pass through to smite the Egyptians; and when He seeth the blood … the Lord will pass over the door, and will not suffer the destroyer to come in unto your houses to smite you.
“And it came to pass, that at midnight the Lord smote all the firstborn in the land of Egypt … and there was a great cry in Egypt: for there was not a house where there was not one dead” (Exodus 12).
The children of Israel, in the shelter of the blood, were perfectly safe, for the Lord had said, “When I see the blood, I will pass over you” (Exodus 12:13).
And those same words apply in all their saving power. That first passover foreshadowed Christ our passover, the Lamb “without blemish and without spot” (1 Peter 1:19), who was “sacrificed for us” (1 Corinthians 5:7) on the cross of Calvary. His shed blood has stopped the sword of divine judgment for everyone who by faith takes shelter in it. Have you by faith applied to yourself that precious blood? Have you put yourself under its shelter? It is the only place of safety from the judgment of God that will soon fall on this sinful, Christless world, “because He hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world in righteousness” (Acts 17:31). It is foolish to remain without Christ.
“Ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold … but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot” (1 Peter 1:18‑19).
“For 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).
“We may have boldness in the day of judgment” (1 John 4:17).
The Unseen Helmsman
An Atheist Loses Control
An unbeliever, he would, with forceful language and powerful argument prove, as he thought, that religion was a fallacy and God was a myth.
One night the fishing fleet was far out at sea when an unusually intense storm sprang up. Nets had to be cut adrift, and every boat headed for the harbor. Even Dan became alarmed. For the first time in his life he was really afraid.
His Christian friend, Tom Rogers, was at the wheel with him when a great wave broke over the bow and swept the little craft from stem to stern. Tom was torn from the wheel and hurled into the raging waves.
He had no time to grieve over the loss of his friend who had often urged him to trust in Christ; it was now a desperate and lonely struggle to reach the shore. For what seemed like hours of terror he clung to the wheel, driving on and on through the darkness with no sign of the harbor light. He was losing strength, and realized that he could not carry on much longer.
The Atheist’s First Prayer
The icy wind chilled him to the bone. The spray that broke in clouds over the vessel blinded him and cut his face.
He could hear the waves beating against the rocks like distant thunder, and his heart seemed to freeze with fear.
Dan felt sure that he was near the land, though he could see nothing in the intense darkness. Through the roar of the wind he could hear the waves beating against the rocks like distant thunder, and his heart seemed to freeze with fear.In that terrible moment he prayed. Hopeless, helpless, and despairing, he cried to God for help. It was only a desperate cry: “O God, help me!”
Then a strange thing happened. He felt a strong Hand was on the wheel, turning it in spite of his own despairing grip, turning it―and swinging the vessel from its course. In a moment the fury of the wind lessened, the waves grew quieter, and Dan found himself within his own harbor.
What he felt at that moment he could never describe. At first he was terribly afraid. He knew ―yes, he knew―that God had taken the wheel from his hand and brought him through the inlet into the harbor, and he was afraid of the unseen Helmsman whom he had mocked and ridiculed. But it changed his whole life, and he had the courage to tell his mates what had happened and how God had come to his help. As soon as he was able, he came to ask for help and guidance, and soon he found the way to the Lord Jesus Christ and accepted Him as his own Saviour.
Until that same strong and loving Hand steered his vessel of life into its final port, he was never tired of telling all who would listen the wonderful story of the unseen Helmsman.
“Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:13).
Adapted from His Riches.