ALAS, alas, how hard it is to lead the proud heart of man to believe that which God says about him! "Lost" is one of the hardest words that an unsaved sinner can spell. By common consent sinners declare it does not mean what it describes. If people really believed they were lost, they would not find it so difficult to believe what it is to be saved; for when a man knows what lost means, he soon learns the meaning of saved. Most people think they are half or at most three-parts lost, not altogether lost; that they will not believe. They fancy they have an oar to cling to, or a life-belt on, or something that belongs to the old ship self, to support them; hence, when God's salvation is presented to them, they do not regard it as the absolute and perfect thing which it is.
Partly owing to this latent self-trust, which is the very bone and blood of man, we find God letting the sinner feel what sinking is. Hence what soul-agony some pass through, what groanings, what despair! The heavens seem brass above them, and God one who will not hear. They cry and agonize, but remain struggling and sinking, as they believe, into hell itself. If the sinner would give it all up and accept God's sentence, he would soon know that the Son of man came to seek and to save that which was lost.
A friend of ours, who is a remarkably good swimmer, and who had rescued the lives of many, saw one day, as he was passing over a bridge, a man in the river beneath him. Many were looking on at the struggles of the hapless man and listening to his cries. People may argue about what the lost state of a sinner is, but no one who was drowning in a swift river would be in the mood to discuss whether he was or was not lost. The realization of his position would effectually dispose of arguments! Our friend threw aside his coat, leaped off the bridge, and swam up to the drowning man. He snatched at the easy swimmer, who bade him be still. Our friend's command to the man to be still was of no avail. He would not unreservedly submit himself to be rescued, and it was impossible to save the man so long as he would seek to help himself by snatching at the swimmer. What was to be done? Much to the indignation of the crowd on the bridge and river-banks, our friend left the drowning man as it were to his fate, and then turning towards him, struck him with his fist a heavy blow and so rendered him insensible.
"Shame! shame!" cried the people, but only to exchange their judgment for admiration as, a moment later, they saw the strong swimmer put his hand under the now subject man and bring him to shore.
“I could not have saved him in any other way," was our friend's answer to the many inquiries for his motive.
It is not according to God that a man should know that he is saved, all the while he is struggling to save himself, and God does at times allow most severe blows to fall upon the struggling sinner in order to make him submit to the righteousness of God. But the severity springs from love to the sinner. On the other hand, where there is obedience to the word, the sinner learns quickly what God's salvation is. The first difficulty with the soul is to lead it to believe the danger of being lost, and the next to believe that salvation is wholly of the Lord; not partly of the Lord, partly of self. First we have to seek to awaken the sinner to the sense of his danger, to awaken him from the sleep which must end in everlasting death; and next to prove to him from the word of God that Christ, and Christ only, can save him.
There are some who are foolish enough to suppose that they can save themselves. Such sinners do not believe they are lost. They disbelieve the plain language of the word of God about their condition in His sight. Such people will never get to heaven, where the song is sung, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain." Their heaven would be like their earth; their earth has for its song, “We are not so bad as others, we are moral, religious, pious, we are worthy." Alas, alas! the end of this self-righteousness will be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. Why did Jesus die? why was He slain? why did He shed His blood? was it that we might save ourselves by our own works?
We were speaking the other day to a man about the salvation of his soul. “Are you saved?" we said.
“Well," he replied,” I go to church regularly, and live right as near as I can; what more can I do? “Have you ever thought of these words," we said, "'the blood of Christ?’ What do they mean? “Reader, seek earnestly to know what these solemn, yet precious words, “the blood of Christ," mean. When you are taught the meaning of them by God the Holy Spirit, you will never wish to speak again of saving yourself, or of your own righteousness, but you will love to extol the name of Jesus the Saviour. When the apostle Paul had cast aside his own righteousness, his grateful heart delighted in saying, " This 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 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).) Bright and blessed words, "worthy of all acceptation!" Have you accepted them? Have you humbly and with deep gratitude received them? Can you say, Yes, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; I am a sinner, and I was a lost sinner, a perishing sinner, but He has saved me.