‘My mother! I never knew her stand gossiping at the door for five minutes, all my life; and I never knew her go to the theater or enter a public house: she was a remarkable woman, but she was the best of women.’
‘But I, do you know what I have been? I have been the greatest rascal in the town! I have been a great rascal! I had no brothers or sisters to play with, and I got tired of home and got among bad companions outside. I got with thieves, and jail birds, and prostitutes: at last I associated with a gang of house breakers, and what a time we led the police! But five of them died in prison, and three committed a capital crime, and paid capital punishment; I am the only one left.’
‘And grace has met you!’
‘Yes, thirty-two years ago. And if I could be saved, no one is too bad to be saved. When I was converted, I went to the police and told them they need not trouble about me anymore. I should not bother them again. I was a new man. And they know it.’
‘You remind me of the apostle’s words, “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. Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first (or as ‘chief’), Jesus Christ might show forth all long-suffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on Him to life everlasting” (1 Tim. 1:15, 1615This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief. 16Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting. (1 Timothy 1:15‑16)).
‘Yes, but he had been a good moral man, and I, a very bad one. It was his hatred to Christ and those that bore His name that made him the chief of sinners.’
‘But it is the Holy Spirit of God that gives him that title. It was the truth. He was the chief.’
‘He was. But to think that I could have gone from such a home to such depths! I often think how much I owe to my mother’s prayers. I am sixty-seven now, and it is thirty-two years since my conversion.’
‘It is forty-one since I was brought to Christ. Like yourself I had no brothers or sisters, but He met me when quite a child. So we are equally debtors to mercy. You, for being saved out of such depths, I for being kept from them.’
‘Yes, but I bitterly regret having gone into them.’
The above conversation took place but twelve hours ago, and it is related here in order to echo the words, ‘If I could be saved, none are too bad’! It may be this will reach the eye of one who feels himself indeed the greatest rascal in the town, one who has sunk into the lowest depths of depravity, and who feels no power can raise him. But there is One who can. His name is Jesus, and He came from heaven to earth, in order to save His people from their sins. And while here He showed by His unremitting acts of grace and love that
“None (were) too vile and loathsome
For a Saviour’s grace.”
The work is finished; He said so with His dying breath, for having declared “It is finished,” He bowed His head and gave up the ghost; and God is satisfied, for He raised Him from the dead, and seated Him at His own right hand.
Oh, will you not trust this Saviour? Come to Him just as you are with all your sins. He does not ask reformed characters to come to Him. He came to save sinners, not the righteous. He came to save you. Oh, put in your claim to His grace, and accept His great salvation. He will not only blot out your past in His precious blood, for “the blood of Jesus Christ, His (God’s) Son, cleanseth us from all sin,” but He will give you a new life, a new nature, and the Holy Spirit as the power of that new life, so that it shall be true of you, “old things have passed away, behold all things are become new.” Oh, listen, my friend. “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow, though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool” (Isaiah 1:1818Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. (Isaiah 1:18)).
But it may be this will also reach the eye of one who has been the complete opposite of the greatest rascal in the town, one who is moral, upright, and maybe, religious, but who nevertheless has no thought of his or her need of a Saviour, and has never come to Christ. It was such an one who confessed himself the chief of sinners! The best boy in his class at school, excelling his young companions in religious knowledge, a good boy at home, and exemplary outside, yet he hated Christ, he hated the name of Jesus, and, in consequence, those who bore it. But he “obtained mercy,” and so may you. You need it, for
“What think ye of Christ? is the test
To try both your state and your scheme;
You cannot be right in the rest
Unless you think rightly of Him.
As Jesus appears in your view,
As He is beloved or not,
So God is disposed towards you
And mercy or wrath is your lot.”
But there is mercy for you today, if you will only cast yourself on it; “there is forgiveness with Thee that Thou mayest be feared.” “There is no difference,” “for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon Him,” and “There is no difference, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 3:23, 2423For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; 24Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: (Romans 3:23‑24)).
T.