Must He Confess?
HE was just a junior clerk at a branch, but now that it is time for promotion he is being sent to the head office. Of course he feels a little nervous about this, his first move, because he is young, only about to step out of his teens; but he has already learned that "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.”
He believes in his heart certainly that God raised Jesus from the dead. Did not the soldiers who were placed as guard over His tomb tremble and become as dead men when the angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone from the door of the empty sepulcher? Was there not joy among the disciples when they saw their Lord and Master alive again, after His resurrection? Even unbelieving Thomas exclaimed, "My Lord, and my God" when he saw the nail prints and the spear wound, for he knew that it was Jesus Himself who stood before him. Yes, there are so many infallible proofs that the junior clerk cannot help believing it.
Why should he not hide up his belief? what need for anyone else to know about it? "If thou... shalt believe in thine heart... for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness." Ah, but there is that other half of the verse, that other "if"; he might wish it were not there, but there it is, and it cannot be passed over. "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus... for with the mouth confession is made unto salvation," and there is comfort in the next verse, "Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.”
“WHOSOEVER therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven.”
“No”
THE junior clerk did not know what was going on at the other end. He did not know the word had been passed along that a "saint" was coming, but when he got there he found that somebody else had done the confessing for him.
A saint? Yes, of course he was a saint he was sanctified, set apart by the Master. "And they shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels." So it was quite all right their calling him "saint.”
Will he join in their pleasures? go with them to their sports and their merry-makings? even once perhaps? Can he?
Music? oh, yes, he loves music and singing too. Why then should he not enjoy listening to perhaps really good music? Ah, if he goes in for the under- the-sun sort of music he will not find himself in the company of those whose names are written in God's "book of remembrance," those who will presently join in singing the "new song." A set-apart person is out of place; he feels, or should feel, like a fish out of water, wherever the interests of the One who is refused, scorned, rejected, have no place.
Will his fellow clerks share his pleasures? Will they go with him to the prayer meeting, or to hear the good news of God's great love preached? Will they stand beside him at the street corners to help him tell it out to those hurrying down the broad way that leads to destruction? Will they accompany him from door to door carrying little silent messages to those who stay at home and are indifferent to the fact that they, too, have their backs toward the celestial city, because they are "careless of their souls immortal"? No! very decidedly, no, they will not join him in his favorite pursuits. That little word of two letters is not difficult for them to say, and he can say it too. "I can do all things through Christ that strengtheneth me.”
“IF ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye.”
“If any man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed; but let him glorify God on this behalf.”
“OCCUPY till I come.”
“REDEEMING the time, because the days are evil.”
Oh! fill me, Savior, with Thy deep compassion,
For those Thou lovedst even unto death.
To spread Thy fame inspire a living passion,
And use me wholly to my latest breath.
W. L.
They Live Again
YEARS hurry by, and the junior clerk, junior no longer, stands beside the grave of his father. From gazing at the name on that headstone, his eyes pass to the one next to it, and next to that again, then further on to others around, and he reads the names of men and women who, he knows, made their choice for Christ, the Savior of sinners.
Yes, this one and that one, and others here and there, died rejoicing in the knowledge that as their eyes closed on all that is of the earth, earthy, the under the-sun things, they would open in the land that is very far off, open to behold the King in His beauty! Oh, what joy! "Absent from the body, present with the Lord," and all because that Lord took their place, bore the penalty of their sins, so that they might stand as pure and spotless as He, in the presence of a holy and sin-hating God.
Turning to his sister the clerk exclaims, "Wouldn't it be splendid to be standing here when the trumpet sounds!”
They wait, quietly listening, awed at the thought of that scene when this grave, and that grave, and that, and that, and those over there, will open, and the bodies in them will come forth, not to know sin and suffering again, but to be changed, glorified, at the sound of that trumpet.
For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”
“OH, joy! oh, delight! should we go without dying,
No sickness, no sadness, no dread, and no crying;
Caught up thro' the clouds, with our Lord into glory,
When Jesus receives ' His own.'”
The Second Death
AND what about the others?
The others? You mean the graves of those who died in unbelief, who refused, or perhaps only neglected to turn to the Lord Jesus for the salvation of their souls? Oh, those graves will remain closed. The joyful voice of the archangel and the trump of God has no response from those who die in their sins. Alas! dare we consider what then? Dare we face the destiny of those who do not join that rapturous throng that rises in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, to meet the Lord in the air? Aye, we will face it because we must.
Of such it is written, "But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished.... And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.”
“BLESSED and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power.”
Why?
“Why shouldn't I? Lots of fellows who are Christians do. What's the harm?”
It is just this, lads. If you have given yourself to the Lord Jesus, if you have bowed the knee to Him and owned Him your Lord, you are not your own. You cannot do just as you like with your time or with your body, with yourself, because you have been bought with a price. All belongs to someone else, to the One who did the buying.
Think of the price He paid for you. He who was Son of God, the King of glory, made Himself lower than the angels, He took upon Him the form of a servant, He was accursed for your sake, for "Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree." It was to redeem you, your soul and body, yourself, that He took your place on that cross of shame.
In the face of all this, can you do things that appeal to you just naturally, or go where your fancy for the moment leads you? Will you lower the standard because other Christians do not rise to it?
When you were a little fellow at school learning to write, could you get your writing like the copy at the top of the page if you were all the time looking at the next boy's book? Surely not! Then is it not best to look to the only perfect Pattern, and not follow the failures of others? "For even Christ pleased not himself.”
“ALL things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but all things edify not.”
Corinthians 10:23.
How Can I Know?
“IF there were only rules laid down it I would be so much easier to know what we may, or may not do. It is so difficult sometimes to decide.”
Do you really think so? There were some people once whom God tried in this way. He gave them commandments; the first was that they should love the Lord their God with all their heart, and with all their might. But they did not do it, they could not. They were always loving someone or something better than they loved God; and so with all the other commandments, they broke every one of them.
After men had been tested in this way for about fifteen hundred years, Jesus came into the world and fulfilled the law. He did not set it aside, but He obeyed it in every particular. There was not a jot or tittle of the law that He did not carry out, and God looked down with pleasure on Him, the only Man who did always the things that pleased Him. He said: "This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.”
This Man was obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, and He was raised from the dead, and went back to heaven; since then the "Thou shalts," and the "Thou shalt nots," of the law are not sounded in our ears, but instead we hear the words of the Lord Jesus: "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.”
When you are in doubt, lads, as to whether a certain thing is right or wrong, pleasing or displeasing to the Lord, lay the matter before Him, asking, "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?" Remember that "Whatsoever is not of faith is sin.”
“IN all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.”
“If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.”
“BEHOLD, I come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown.”
Set Free
FIGHT? Yes, he has fought, and fought until he is weary of the struggle. He cannot get the better of it. He cannot break himself of the habit he began in the days of his youth, and now he is a middle-aged man. For many years he has been a Christian, he loves his Lord, and he wants to drop this thing because he knows it is displeasing and dishonoring to Him.
But why trouble about it so much? Does it really matter after all? Are we not given richly all things to enjoy? and is it not written, "All things are yours"?
“Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth.”
Here is the trouble. He is not happy because his heart and conscience condemn him; he knows very well that this indulgence has been a hindrance in the race he started to run so many years ago. Besides this, it is a cause of stumbling to others who know that he is a Christian; but how to free himself he does not know. He has no strength in himself, he is not equal to this fight alone, so he turns to the One who says, "My strength is made perfect in weakness." He confesses his failure and his weakness, and beseeches, "Oh, Lord, take away the desire for this thing from me.”
And then, one day, the answer comes, and the desire has gone—has been taken away completely. You should see him now, lads! Why, he looks a new man, or at any rate, as though he had a new face. It is just radiant. He has been set free, delivered from the bondage of that which is unworthy of one who bears the name of Christ.
“I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
“FIGHT the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and Nast professed a good profession before many witnesses.”
BEAR in mind that what you know,
Proves its worth by what you skew;
Let your life be all aglow,
And-go on!
W. L.