"For when they shall say, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them,... and they shall not escape" (1 Thess. 5:3).
ALAS! the worldlings turn a deaf ear to all God's warnings, and rush onward to meet a sudden and awful doom.
History repeats itself. "As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man "(Luke 17:26). In Noah's day" God was not in all their thoughts." They had place for their various occupations, and time to listen to the sweet sounds of Jubal's harp and organ (Gen. 4), but no place for God, and no time to listen to His warnings through Noah, "the preacher of righteousness." At last the moment arrives when the preacher's voice is hushed. The last message has fallen upon deaf ears, and unbelief has sealed their doom. God shuts Noah and his family in the ark for salvation; then the sweet sounds cease, and terror seizes upon the guilty and depraved sinners, as they find themselves pursued and engulphed in the surging waters of judgment from an insulted and angry God. May God deliver you, my reader, if unsaved, from "the wrath to come.”
Surely we might expect that the descendants of these witnesses of the doom of the ungodly would never turn aside after vanity again, or lend a deaf ear to the voice of the Lords But, alas! “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked” (Jer. 17:9).
Allow me for a moment to press this solemn fact upon the reader of these lines. Your heart is bad. Speak not of your acts, or the amount of your guilt. Do not mention your standing reputation or character. It is your heart. The very spring of your moral being is all wrong. “God desires truth in the inward parts" (Psa. 51:6); but your "heart is deceitful, and desperately wicked." Nothing will do for you but a new birth. "Ye must be born again" (John 3:7). You must have the new birth, or the second death.
No sooner does man come out of the ark and multiply (though the rainbow spans the heavens, reminding him of the past, and God's covenant for the future), than we find him turning away from God again, and sinning with a high hand, till at last he is found in the foulest sink of corruption. The sun rises in the heavens as usual, and all seems fair, when suddenly the fiery deluge descends on Sodom and Gomorrah, and tells its awful tale, that men were again saying "Peace and safety," when "sudden destruction" came upon them, and they did not escape. Christless soul, let the awful doom of Sodom and Gomorrah remind thee that "God is not mocked.”
Shall we multiply passages to prove it? Need we remind you how the destroying angel, in the darkness and gloom of that terrible midnight in Egypt, found his way into every house where there was no blood sprinkled, to slay the first-born? Then a great cry arose from the midst of that hardened and guilty people, once more teaching both them and us, that “when men shall say, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh,... and they shall not escape.”
And yet men turn a deaf ear to all God's pleadings and warnings. Whether he pipes or mourns, it is all the same; there is no response from man. The past examples of His swift judgments, and the present warnings of impending wrath about to engulf the guilty and Christless souls in everlasting ruin, — all seem unheeded by the multitude of men, women, and children, carried on by the whirl of business or pleasure at break-neck speed; without time to think about anything, except how they are to outstrip each other—yea, time itself—in their haste to get rich, or gratify their passions and lusts. And lest their consciences should prick them, and clamor to be heard, reminding them of their sins and neglect of God, they seek to themselves prophets to their own liking, to whom they say, “Prophesy to us smooth things" (Isa. 30:9-13). And thus their consciences are quieted, and their fears calmed, as they swallow greedily hell's opiates, administered by Satan through his ministers, who preach “Peace, peace; when there is none "(Jer. 6:14), till at last “sudden destruction cometh," and their guilty sin-stained souls are launched into eternity, into the quenchless fires of an everlasting hell.
O ye men of the world, to whom a few minutes is a great consideration in these go-ahead times, to you I call! I lift up my voice to warn you Stop and think! If only for a moment or two, stop! “Sudden destruction cometh." He who has given you so many examples of it, now warns you, and desires that you might repent and be saved.
O the deep joy of being delivered from that whirlpool, in whose vortex this poor world will soon be engulphed forever! Who can describe it? Saved with an everlasting salvation Fitted and ready for the return of the One who gives this great deliverance. Then, just as the world before the flood, seething in its corruption, missed the godly man (Enoch) from their midst, so will this world some day soon awake to the fact that the saints are gone to be "forever with the Lord." Then they will settle down to their occupations and pleasures, blinded by the strong delusion (2 Thess. 2:11, 12), saying, "Peace and safety," till “sudden destruction cometh, and they shall not escape.”
O worldling, give ear while the saints are near!
Soon must the tie be riven,
And men, side by side, God's hand will divide,
As far as hell's depths from heaven.
Thank God, there is a place of safety, divine safety. "A refuge from the storm, and a covert from the tempest " (Isa. 32:2); a way to be delivered from "the wrath to come;" a way invented by God to bring you to Himself in righteousness, and save you from all the just consequences of your guilt and departure from Him. Yes, “God can be just, and justify you" (Rom. 3:26).
Do you ask how? “Through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus" (Rom. 3:24). Marvelous transaction, accomplished at Calvary's cross. The just suffered for the unjust; the righteous for the guilty. Justice sternly demanded the death of the guilty. Love provided the substitute in the person of the Saviour. Glory to that matchless name! Jesus meets the requirements of the throne, and the needs of the believing sinner. Mighty, stupendous work!—a work that upholds the throne in righteousness, and purges the conscience of the poor, guilty, but believing sinner, putting him at ease with the throne, so that he can be before it in peace,— peace founded on righteousness,—immovable, imperishable, and eternal!
The work is completely done, so perfectly accomplished, that Christ is enthroned in the glory as the living and eternal witness of God's own satisfaction and delight in it. Surely such a work needs nothing put to it by any poor sinner. It stands in its own grand solitary dignity, available for any repentant, believing soul. Jesus and His work, in all its eternal and infinite efficacy and worth, can be had by any anxious soul on the principle of faith. “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved" (Acts 16:31), is all God asks for.
The moment your faith takes hold of Christ, salvation is yours. Both peace and safety are your everlasting portion. Do not dishonor Him by a doubt, and do not disgrace yourself by a fear. His word is surely enough. "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my word shall never pass away” (Matt. 24:35). W. E.