“YOU cannot take me, I'm dead!”
Anyone would say this was a most extraordinary statement for a sane man to make, but I think that when you have heard my story you will agree it was not so very extraordinary after all.
The events I am about to relate took place during the terrible war years ago in the United States of America, known as the war between the North and South. This war—as I believe is always the case—was entered upon with little idea of the tremendous cost in lives and treasure that it would entail. It was not long before more men to fill the thinned ranks were urgently needed, and sufficient volunteers were not forthcoming. The Government of the Northern States had to resort to a general conscription, and every town and village had to provide its quota, which was determined by lot.
In one village amongst those drawn was a young man, who had a widowed mother dependent on him, and who was most averse to a soldier's life and risks. Fortunately for him there were others who did not dread the war so much, and he was able by the expenditure of the savings of his lifetime to purchase a substitute. Alas! for the substitute; it was not long before he found a soldier's grave.
One can well imagine the feelings of the young man when the news of his substitute's death reached him-a death which might have been his if another had not taken his place. Truly he could say, Another has died for me; and as truly, dear readers, you can say the same. Another has died for you, but ah He was no purchased Substitute, and His was no ordinary death. It was love, and love, too, beyond all thought or conception, led Jesus to give His spotless life and die under all the awful judgment of God and in your stead, for, by the grace of God, He tasted death for every man.
Has this fact ever moved your heart in gratitude and love to Jesus? That He in all His worth should leave His home on high, unsought, to die for you? And yet this is so—for us, for you, the unjust, He the just One died.
Well, to return to my story. The war went on; more soldiers were required and again a conscription was resorted to, and again it was the lot of the young man to be drawn for military service. What was he to do now? His money was all gone. The war more terrible than before. No fresh substitute could lie buy, nor in fact could money buy any one. It was too grim an ordeal to find any equivalent in mere money. The case seemed hopeless. And yet there was a way of escape, and his necessity taught him to avail himself of it. He approached the authorities with the plea at the head of this paper, “You cannot take me; I'm dead." Yes, he claimed that his substitute having died, he must be reckoned dead.
This is the good old Gospel plea. The apostle Paul argued, "For we thus judge that if One died for all, then were all dead." Have you yet put in this plea? You, too, are a "prisoner appointed to death," and "after this the judgment." But Jesus has died and borne the judgment that "the lawful captive might be delivered," that you might go free. Will you in all your need avail yourself of it? Will you put in your plea like the young man? Will you turn to God, owning that you are under His righteous judgment in respect of your sins, but pleading that Jesus died for you? If you do, be assured that your plea will be allowed, for faith can say, “He was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification "(Rom. 4:25). " When we were yet without strength ... Christ died for the ungodly."(Rom. 10:6)
“I need no other argument,
I want no other plea,
It is enough that Jesus died,
And that He died for ME.”
W. L. J. O.