A Christian woman was dying, and sent for a servant of God, to whom she was well known, to be with her during the last and trying moments of her natural life. He came as desired, and, kneeling beside her bed, asked the One who had overcome death to make His sustaining and comforting presence felt by this dear, dying child of God. While thus engaged, the woman’s husband, a wicked, hardened, dissolute man, came suddenly into the room, and commanded God’s servant to rise up from his knees instantly, and cease praying, for he would “allow no more of it.”
Notwithstanding the effort of Satan thus to disturb and embitter the few remaining hours of God’s saint, that prayer was graciously answered, and her happy soul, released from its earthly tenement, passed away out of a scene of wretchedness and misery to be forever with the Lord she loved, which is “far better.”
Some months following the above solemn and yet happy event, the same minister of the gospel was requested to visit a man who was at the point of death, and wished to see him.
Upon entering the room he recognized in the poor, dying man, the husband of the Christian woman whose deathbed he had attended some time before, and whose end was so peacefully happy.
The poor man, turning his restless eyes upon him, said, “Sir, you remember me? I am dying, and I’m lost! Pray for me, pray for me!” But God’s servant felt he could not pray; his mouth seemed closed, while his heart was full. Again the wretched man, in his agony of mind, besought and entreated of him to pray. He knelt down and uttered a few words, pleading the God of all grace to save the poor perishing one’s soul, but he felt, in his own heart, they were not real prayer! He advised the dying man to arrange his worldly affairs for his family’s sake, as he had but a very short time to live, and then left him, feeling that he could neither do nor say anything more. But the most solemn part of this account has yet to be told. The moment approaching, when death, as the “wages of sin,” must have the mastery―the man who had time after time rejected Christ as his Saviour, who had often and often heard the gospel of God’s free salvation preached, and would not accept it―this man died in the clutches of Satan, shrieking out as his last audible words, “I AM DYING, AND I AM LOST!”
What a contrast did these two deathbed scenes present! The first was tone whose sins had been all forgiven, and washed away by the blood of Christ, her Saviour. The happy consciousness of this fact gave the dying woman a deep, settled, unruffled peace, of which nothing could rob her, not even death, for it had no terrors for her. She was calmly awaiting the glad moment to arrive when death should come in the natural course of things, and burst the chains which held down her spirit to earth, that it might soar up to its living source in HEAVEN!
But how different and awfully solemn were the last moments of the poor wretched man.
He had lived “without God,” and without hope in the world, and felt himself sinking slowly, surely, into HELL; everlasting perdition was his portion, and he knew it, for with his dying breath he shrieked out, “I AM LOST, I AM LOST.”
Oh! reader, whoever you are, whatever your condition in life, if you do not know what it is to have all your sins washed away through the blood of Christ the Saviour, if you have not yet had the question of sin forever settled, between God and yourself, do not rest a single hour until it is so. Delay not, nor procrastinate even one hour, for by so doing it may prove fatal to your eternal salvation; remember that though you may be in the bloom of health, “In the midst of life we are in death!” Do not deceive yourself, nor lull your conscience by the thought that you have not been guilty of any gross moral wickedness, have not committed many sins during your life, and therefore are not bad enough to be sent to hell! You were born in sin and shapen in iniquity, therefore a sinner by nature. “There is none righteous, no not one,” but, “all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:11, 2311There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. (Romans 3:11)
23For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; (Romans 3:23)). Think not that you have to obtain salvation by your “good works,” for “by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his (God’s) sight” (Rom. 3:2020Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin. (Romans 3:20)). Come to God as you are, a lost, undone, hell-deserving sinner. Come now and shelter yourself under cover of the precious blood of Christ, which cleanses from all sin (1 John 1:77But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. (1 John 1:7)). The choice is left with yourself to choose either the way to heaven and everlasting happiness, or the way to hell and eternal misery! The gates of heaven are open now; oh! enter while there is time and opportunity.
The “straight and narrow way” which leads to heaven is sprinkled with the blood of Christ, the Lamb of God, and even the chief of sinners may tread in that path without fear, having the consciousness of sins put away, and forgiven. Christ has “obtained eternal redemption for us,” by His finished work upon the cross (Heb. 9:1212Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us. (Hebrews 9:12)), He has borne God’s wrath and judgment on account of sin, all His righteous claims have been met there, God is satisfied, and in perfect love is patiently waiting to welcome every sinner who comes to Him through Christ Jesus. If you refuse to know God as your Saviour now, you will one day have to meet Him as your Judge, and hear Him say, “I know you not. Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.”
Reader, and fellow-sinner, if still unsaved, “flee from the wrath to come.” “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved”