“THE Master” is at present “sat down,” but the I day approaches when He will “rise up”! The door is at present wide open, but the moment comes when it will be shut! (Luke Num. 25). Things cannot go on indefinitely as they are today; a sudden awakening will ere long overtake a sleeping world!
The lovely “day of salvation” will change into the awful “day of judgment,” and the silvery call of grace will pass into the sentence of woe. And because the Master sits in patience the world deems He is indifferent to its folly! What a mistake!
He sits in order that men may repent; that they may give up their folly; that they may turn to God; but He does not sit because He is, or can be, indifferent to sin.
He sits, and will sit, till the appointed moment arrives, and then He will rise up―patience over and longsuffering past― and shut to the door. A shut door How awful! That door is open today; it may be shut tomorrow! Hence, procrastinator, haste! But, if shut, is it shut forever? Will not the hand, which kept it open so kindly for all these long centuries of darkness and sin, open it again for one brief moment, and permit a soul, at last aroused and truly sincere, to enter? Never, no, never!
“When once the Master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying; Lord, Lord, open unto us; and He shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are,” and again, “Depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity!” (Luke 13:25, 27). The door is not opened again, even to those who shall cry so earnestly, “Lord, Lord, open to us.” Their sincerity may be genuine, but it is too late! They should have cried before. Now it is useless. They are unknown; they are workers of iniquity. Many flatter, nay, delude themselves today that “another chance of salvation” will be given them after they have missed the present.
They must die of course, but, having died and been “thrust out” into “weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth,” they enjoy the “larger hope,” as it is falsely called, of one more opportunity of escape. The hope is vain! The wish is, of course, the father of the thought, but the wish and its offspring are both doomed to awful disappointment. The gulf is fixed; the judgment is eternal. The shutting of the door is an event of eternal import. It is closed finally and forever.
Hence the question is asked, “How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?” Fail to enter the door while it stands open; fail to turn to the Saviour while grace avails; fail to believe savingly now; despise the blood of Christ which alone can cleanse from sin, and the fault and the blame and the endless remorse must be all your own.
Knock now, enter now, find a welcome now― or NEVER!
J.W.S.
A Farewell Message. ―A condemned murderer recently sent the following message to his comrades: “Look for something more real than the pleasures of this life; seek the realities of another world, because they are the only things you will need in the end.”