A MISSIONARY had been speaking to the men in a City house during the dinner hour. Getting afterward into conversation with one of them, he sought to help him as to his soul.
“I am trying to be better,” the man said.
“Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?” Before you can be better, you must have been good, and there is no goodness inherent or belonging to man. He is “born in sin,” and he continues in it.
If you reflect on the story the Lord Jesus told the lawyer who asked Him what good thing he should do to gain eternal life, you will understand this (Luke 10). The “certain man” was beyond the possibility of making himself better — he was “half dead” and stripped of that with which he might have been tempted to better himself; he had no resources left, and was incapable of any effort. To him came one who was furnished with power and boundless love. He did everything for him. “He... came where he was; and... had compassion on him.”
This is what Jesus is still doing for those who are bad — not for the good. “Christ receiveth sinful men.” He took the place of such. Those who were like sheep going astray can say: “He bore our sins in His own body on the tree.” He will give His place in glory to all who accept the truth that “He died, the Just for the unjust, to bring us to God.” No one who looked at Him could think of bettering himself — instead he would exclaim―
“Oh, how vile my low estate,
Since my ransom was so great!”
H. L. H.