While visiting an aged woman, I turned to the all-important subject of the welfare of her soul. She said she had no wish to live, and was ready to go when the Lord saw fit to take her. But she seemed to have no definite reason why this should be, nor where her soul would go for eternity.
She readily assented to my remarks that all are in need of a Savior, and the rich provision God had made for the needy in the Person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Still I felt there was no depth in her expressions, though she was so free with them.
Several times I called to see her, with apparently the same results. Always I pressed on her the need of accepting the atoning work of Christ ere there could be any hope of glory.
At last the truth as to this aged woman's real state came out. Her answer to the question, "What makes you think that your sins are forgiven, and that you are ready for death?" was: "Because I feel more comfortable in myself than I used to do.”
Her professions were but empty words. She had been saying to her soul, "Peace, peace," when there was no peace. How solemn! Yet how many do this very thing. Forgetting the past, they are unconcerned about the present. How vain is their hope that somehow or other the future will be right!
Having gained this admission, I next tried to make this poor soul see that, as her hopes were in herself and she herself a sinful creature, they were but vanity. This she would not consent to. She thought much of herself, and would not believe that she was hopelessly bad and unfit for God's glory. She evidently needed to see herself in the light of God's Word.
So I said to her, "You should get the looking-glass, and have a good look at yourself." She glanced up at me and I added, "In it you will see a sinner." This brought her to the point I desired, to have herself before her mind's eye while I read to her the third chapter of Romans. There, from verses ten to nineteen, the sinner is pictured as God sees him, and what a sight it is! Having gone thus far, I left her to meditate upon what evidently to her was a surprising revelation.
The next time I called I found her troubled and anxious. She had discovered that self was a bad foundation, and she was desirous of knowing the way to be saved. On my telling that God has said, "Blessed are they that put their trust in Him," she answered, "I'll try Him.”
During subsequent visits, I had cause for believing she was truly building her hopes for God's glory on the merits of God's Son.
Will not you, dear reader, look at yourself in the looking-glass of God's Word?