A FEW years ago, with two others, I visited an old woman living alone in a little upstairs room in a large seaport town. She was one of the class God speaks of as "the poor of this world, rich in faith, heirs of the kingdom which He hath promised to them that love Him"; and already her face, though wrinkled with age, was lit up with a joy and a glory altogether foreign to her poor dreary lodging.
We sat and chatted some time about the Lord she knew so well, and about His goodness, and then inquired of her how long she had known Him, and what the manner of her conversion was; accordingly she replied, "Well, I always say that the Lord met with me at Sychar; and bound me with His two ' I' s.”
This peculiar expression puzzled us; she saw it and hastened to explain, saying, "You don't understand me; but I say He met with me at Sychar, because I was a poor ruined sinner like the woman in the fourth chapter of John when He met with me, and then He fastened this passage of Scripture upon my mind—' When I see the blood I will pass over;' and from it I found peace.”
Turn over the leaves of your Bible, dear reader, and come to the fourth chapter of John; you will see there the character of the woman the Lord had undertaken a long, weary journey to meet. Without dispute she was a sinner, shunning the gaze and company of her fellow-women, for she came at an unwonted hour of day to draw her water. But Jesus, in His tender pity, knowing all about her, waited, weary with His journey, by the well-side, that He might meet her in all her wretchedness and speak peace to her wearied heart. Ah, we say, as we consider the well of Sychar, with the Saviour and the sinner by its side, Poor thirsty, guilty soul, thou hast now met with the only One who can meet thy heart's deep, deep need!
Have you, my reader, looked at this wonderful picture until you have found yourself, as it were, there also, and in company with the Lord-yourself, a sinner, like the woman of Samaria? Do you reply you are not an open sinner, as she was, but moral, respectable, and religiously inclined? All this maybe, yet you know that you are a sinner in thought, word, and deed. The word of God distinctly describes you as such, and your own conscience will not acquit you, though you may seek to silence it. Our Lord Jesus, the Saviour of sinners, the only One who can meet your need, waits to save and satisfy you, even as He waited by the well to bless the poor woman of Samaria. He is not upon earth, it is true, but in heaven. He is now the risen, ascended, glorious Saviour, who has Himself accomplished the work of redemption, yet He waits that He may be gracious even to you.
But how then can God pass over our sinfulness? Let us listen to His word. By the blood—"When I see the blood, I will pass over you." (Ex. 12:1313And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye are: and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt. (Exodus 12:13).) Mark, He does not say, "When I see your good works," nor does He bring in morality, respectability, religious inclinations, charity, repentance, or prayers. "It is the blood that maketh atonement for the soul,"—the" precious blood of Christ, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot." This "blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, cleanseth us from all sin." Have you "faith in His blood?" In other words, you have accepted as true God's estimate of that precious blood, which enables Him to pass over the sinner righteously, without visiting sin upon his guilty head?
“Save by the blood He could not bless,
So pure, so great His holiness:
But He it is who gave the Lamb,
And by His blood absolved I am.”
Notice, then, the two "I" s of which the aged woman spoke. "When I see the blood, I will pass over you." God does not say, "When you see it." But the One, who in righteousness deals the stroke of judgment on the guilty and the lost, knows the value of that blood; and His eye resting upon it, He righteously passes over the believer who is sheltered by it. Oh, is that peaceful, happy shelter yours? It shall be, by simple "faith in His blood.”
Thus it is, divinely and perfectly, that God meets all our guiltiness. But can He also meet our thirst? Does He satisfy as well as save? Yes, He can, He does, as the aged woman I speak of so abundantly testified; for whence came the radiant joy so manifest upon her face? From communion with her blessed Saviour. She had over her mantel-piece this text, taken from Heb. 13, "I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee." "Ah," said she, "I have given Him a great deal of trouble, but He has been with me all along, and now He says to me," I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee; " and her dear old face was upturned towards Him, the expression of a heart brimful of praise.
Since I saw her she has passed away to be with Christ, "which is far better." I look to meet her once more, on that glorious morning when Jesus shall gather all His ransomed ones together, when she and I, with all. His redeemed, shall sing His praise "who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests to God and His Father.”
Reader, will you meet with us then, and join in that anthem? J. R.