A WELL-KNOWN professor was lecturing one day before a large audience of medical students-some eighteen hundred men who pressed in to hear him. He took from his desk a letter, and holding it up before him, said something to this effect: "Gentlemen, I have here a letter from one of your number in which he tells the story of his life—a record of shame, of sinful indulgence—that makes me shudder even to look at the letter. At the close of this fearful confession, he asks, Can your God save such an one as I am?”
Stopping for a moment, and surveying his audience, the speaker said: "When I came to the city this afternoon there was a beautiful, fleecy cloud spreading itself like a thing of glory in the upper sky, and I said, ‘O cloud, where do you come from?' And the cloud answered me and said, 'I come from the slums and the low, vile places of the city. The sun of heaven reached down and lifted me up, and transfigured me with his shining.'”
Looking about upon the now deeply impressed throng, the speaker, after a solemn pause, said: “I do not know whether this young man is here or not, but if he is, I can say to him that my Savior and my Master, Jesus Christ, He who is our great God and Savior, can reach down from the highest heaven to the lowest depths into which a human soul can sink, and can lift you, lift you up till He shines in you and through you, and transfigures you with the light of His love and glory.”
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This story serves to illustrate how the Lord Jesus Christ saves a degraded sinner. And what sinner is there that is not degraded? For SIN is always degrading. Let none imagine, therefore, that he does not need a Savior because he may not have sunk so low in his own estimation as the student of our narrative.
Notice now two things in the professor's illustration of the fleecy cloud that was formed from the dirty water of the slums:—
1. A new position. The water, no longer lying in filthy puddles, was floating in the sky.
2. A new nature. Instead of being foul and dirty, it had become fair and "fleecy," an object to be admired.
Let us see how these two things help us to understand how the Savior blesses the sinner.
1. He gives us a new position with regard to God. Instead of standing as condemned criminals before Him, we are pardoned, justified, and made His children. We are brought from the place of banishment and distance, and "made nigh by the blood of Christ." We are rescued from the danger to which our sins exposed us, and saved, "not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy.”
All this is true of the sinner who puts his faith in the Savior. Such an one need have no misgivings in his mind as to whether God can righteously treat him so mercifully. He need not argue that God's intolerance of sin would be a bar to such kindness and grace.
The argument would be a forcible one were it not for the fact that it has already been taken into account, and that all the requirements of God's righteousness have been met by the atoning sacrifice of Christ.
God cares for His own character, and by and by He will intervene in unsparing judgment, so that none may impute carelessness or indifference to Him in connection with His government of the world. "So that a man shall say, Verily, there is a reward for the righteous: verily He is a God that judgeth in the earth!" (Psa. 58:1111So that a man shall say, Verily there is a reward for the righteous: verily he is a God that judgeth in the earth. (Psalm 58:11)).
But when Christ stood surety for us upon the cross, the stroke of judgment due to us fell upon Him. God's intolerance of sin was manifested, and the way cleared for His grace to pardon the sinner who accepts it, who takes refuge in Christ for salvation.
2. Not only is the sinner who believes in Christ brought into a new position with regard to God (and this in complete accord with His righteousness), but he receives a new nature. He is born again, as John 3:33Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. (John 3:3) puts it: born anew by the sovereign operation of the Holy Spirit, using as His instrument the Word of God. This new nature implanted in the believer is in accord with the holiness of God, just as his new position is in accord with the righteousness of God. The new nature hates sin and loves what is of God. And the Holy Spirit, who indwells the believer, acts upon it, producing growth, and thus conforms him more and more to the likeness of Christ, so that others can take note of him that he is indeed born of God.
In saying this I do not for a moment suggest that no evil desires and no unholy thoughts ever find a place in the Christian's heart. To make such an assertion would be to contradict both Scripture and experience. While a new nature is given, the old remains incapable of improvement. It will be a source of continual trouble, ever ready as it is to re-assert itself, unless the Christian walks in the Spirit (Gal. 5:1616This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. (Galatians 5:16)). Walking in the Spirit means attending to the things which are the subject of the Spirit's testimony—the things of Christ. While these things exercise power over our souls, while they hold us captivated by their charm, "the flesh" (the old corrupt nature) has little power to act.
Thank God, in the day for which we look, the day of Christ's coming again, we shall be rid forever of the presence of "the flesh." Never again will our joy be disturbed by its intrusion. Then, indeed, we shall be like the fleecy cloud that won the professor's admiration.
Meanwhile let us gratefully remember:
1. That we have been brought to God, from the gutter of our sins, in a way that accords with perfect righteousness, by Him who "raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the throne of glory" (1 Sam. 2:88He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the throne of glory: for the pillars of the earth are the Lord's, and he hath set the world upon them. (1 Samuel 2:8)).
What abundant cause for praise and rejoicing!