“DEAD and GONE! DEAD and GONE!” were the mournful words which fell continually from the lips of an elderly gentleman while he questioned a friend, whom he had not seen for many years, as to what had become of those he had known well in his earlier life.
Some had died suddenly, others had met with tragic deaths, while of the rest there was not much to relate, only that with one or two exceptions all were “dead and gone!” “How soon is told life’s story.”
A few short years at most, dear reader, and then you too will be “dead and gone,” but where? How unspeakably awful it would be if you found, when too late, that you had not availed yourself of God’s salvation, and that a lost eternity lay before you? What mad folly to refuse the forgiveness which God, on the ground of Christ’s atoning death, offers you, if you will turn in repentance to Him.
“Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Tim. 1:1515This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief. (1 Timothy 1:15)), but on your part there must be the coming to Him as the sinner to the Saviour, and the appropriation of what He has done for you.
Remember, dear reader, that however amiable and refined you may be, if you “neglect so great salvation” you are just as sure of God’s judgment as is the grossly wicked person who scornfully rejects it, for unanswerable is the query, “How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?” (Heb. 2:33How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him; (Hebrews 2:3)).
F. A.