WHEREVER the glad tidings of the love of God to a ruined world has been proclaimed, mankind may be regarded as divided into two classes, viz.: —
The first class, consists of those who, having chosen “a way that seemeth right” unto men, “but the end thereof are the ways of death,” have “fled from the presence of the Lord.”
When Adam had sinned, he “hid himself from the presence of the Lord,” choosing for his hiding-place “the trees of the garden.”
When Cain had murdered his brother, he “went out from the presence of the Lord,” and, away from that presence, chose for his dwelling “the land of Nod.”
When Jonah rose up to flee from the presence of the Lord, he chose to go by ship to Tarshish, instead of going to Nineveh as required by God.
When, in a later day, all classes of men will “say to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of Him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb,” the way of their choosing will be to “hide themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains.”
Sin always separates from the presence of God, who, being eternally holy and eternally just, “can by no means clear the guilty”; and Scripture says, “All have sinned.”
“All the world” is “guilty before God.”
“All... have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way.”
“They are all gone out of the way.”
“There is none righteous, no, not one.”
Sweeping statements these. And, moreover, we read that “God... will render to every man according to his deeds,” “in the day when He shall judge the secrets of men.”
The other class, consists of those “who have fled for refuge” to Christ “from the wrath to come.”
Of old it was ordained that “there shall be six cities of refuge for the man-slayer, that he may flee thither,” and thus escape the consequences of his fault. So now, as to the sinner, “Christ died for the ungodly”; and He, the risen Jesus, whose “blood cleanseth from all sin,” has become the believing sinner’s glorious and blessed refuge from the coming judgment.
“O precious blood! poured freely forth for me,
My sins are sunk beneath Thy crimson tide;
No more before the avenger’s sword I flee,
Christ is the Refuge-city where I hide.”
N. L. N.