As I was starting from S―the other day by the Great Western, the guard unlocked the door of the compartment in which I was seated and let in four working men, with their wallets and tools, traveling by a railway pass to G―.
At one of the stations our tickets were demanded for inspection, and to be notched by the officials. The guard’s whistle was then replied to by the engine-driver, and on the train went.
When we were outside the station, I moved nearer my companions and said, “You are traveling by a railway pass, are you not?” “Yes,” they answered. I asked if the pass would carry them to the end of their journey. “Yes.” Then I remarked on the value of another kind of pass, viâ the cross and the sepulcher of Christ, — out of this world into another, ―out of time into eternity, ―a pass from here to yonder, where Christ is crowned with glory and honor, “at the right hand of God.” Had either of them got this in their possession?
We had just come out of a long and dark tunnel, and not having any lights in our carriage, it seemed unusually dark and dreary. This led me to comment on the further importance of such a pass, the purchase of Christ’s atoning blood, and the free gift of God to a poor sinner, which would be acknowledged all the way along, and be found by the traveler of the greatest moment when going through the dark tunnel of death and the grave, which was a-head of them. Could they look through and see the bright light at the other end of such a tunnel as this? Did they know that line which is opened up beyond it by the resurrection and ascension of Jesus, ― “a new and living way,” which leads up into the glory and the Father’s house? What a terminus! One of these men remarked that he had “heard something of this sort,” and another said he “must go and learn about it.”
I replied, “You did not tell the clerk when he wrote out your pass, and put it into your hand this morning, that you must first go and learn how to read before you used it. On the contrary, you are presenting it solely on the authority of the Great Western Company, with all the assurance that attaches to the pass, from the fact of your having had nothing to do with the filling it up. It is to frank you to the end of your journey, and whether you can read it or not has nothing to do with the matter. You produce the pass when required, and go forward; the inspector reads it.”
“Quite true,” said another of his companions; but he added, “We must go to a house of prayer, sir.” I replied, “Yes, but what for? Not to get your pass to the glory, but to praise Him through whose death it has been obtained. ‘Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.’ Faith in Him puts it into your hand. You will then find how necessary prayer is for your daily walk as ‘a new creature in Christ.’”
Do you ask where you must go for this through ticket? Listen! You need not leave your seats in search of schoolmaster, minister, or priest; for “if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.” (Romans 10:9.) Upon this one of the men said, “I see what it means. ‘Tis just like my wife, when she has put my supper upon the table against I come home; ‘tis for me to eat it.”
Another, who had sat quietly in the corner, objected to this free grace of the gospel to the unconverted, and turned on me, saying “he liked people to be consistent,” which led me to demand in what respect I had been inconsistent. In a loud voice he answered, “A man must have life before he can believe. What is the use of speaking to dead men?”
I quoted to him, “God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Turning from him to the others, I continued, “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners,” pressing it upon their acceptance as a word for themselves, and for to-day.
Again the objector said, “A man must have life before he can believe. How can he act life? Can a dead man hear?” I reminded him I had not said to his companions that they were to act life, for the obvious reason there must be life before they could do so, and show it outwardly. Could he not distinguish between the Spirit working by the word in a sinner, in order to quicken to life, through faith in Christ, and the possession of life, that the outings proper to one who is “born of God” might be manifested? Would he shake a man’s confidence in the living God by throwing a doubt into his mind as to the finished work of Christ for the one who believes? In reply to his question whether a dead man can hear; this was no business of mine. Reasoning as a man I should say, No; but knowing the power of God in Christ my answer would be, Yes; for I believe in Him who “quickeneth the dead,” and “calleth things that are not as though they were.”
In my turn I asked this man what were the “glad tidings” he had to present to his fellows, seeing he objected to mine? One of his companions took up the question, asking, “What harm has the gentleman done by telling us that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners?”
Of course I encouraged this man to accept “the faithful saying,” and put it to the proof, as he had done the company’s pass today. What is the right use of these Scriptures, if that which had been made was the wrong one? For whom were they intended, if not for sinners?
On leaving the carriage I shook them by the, hand, telling the objector I had a word for him about the acting’s of this new life as he professed to have it. Paul says, “Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life or by death: for to me to live is Christ.” If he would take no less an example than Christ for the acting’s of life, he would find this to be a searching and humbling, though blessed occupation. And so we parted.
Reader, can you see yourself in the light of this narrative? Do you know where you are, and by what road you are traveling, and under whose pass? Are you determined to earn your own ticket, and refuse to go “without money and without price”? Dare you try your own merit as the pass-word? or is it in the prevalence of that only “name given under heaven whereby we must be saved”? Are you waiting for more confidence from some good actions, or for deeper repentance upon your bad ones?
The elder brother, in Luke 15, never got into the father’s house: “he was angry, and would not go in.” Self-righteousness kept him out, ― “neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment.” He would not enter on the footing of the prodigal, but upbraided the grace of a father’s heart, which triumphed over the wanderer as he said, “This my son was dead, and is alive again; was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry.”
Are you outside the Father’s house with the elder brother upon your good deeds? or inside it with the prodigal on account of your bad ones, knowing that Christ in love to you made them His own upon the cross, and put them away forever by His sufferings and death in your stead?