BY the side of a country road in Cornwall, near the Land’s-End, I noticed one morning an aged man breaking stones. I offered him a gospel booklet. He took it, and a few words passed between us, when looking up with a beaming face he said, “I am saved, sir.” “Saved, are you!”
I replied; “How do you know that?”
“I know,” said he, “that blessed Lord Jesus up in heaven as my Saviour.”
“Thank God,” I answered, and we shook hands as fellow-travelers on our way to the glory where our Saviour is. After a little further talk about Himself and His finished work, we parted.
A few miles farther another aged stone-breaker attracted my attention. I accosted him, giving him a book, and presently asked him, “Are you saved?”
“I could not say that, sir,” was his reply, “but I hope I will be saved.”
“May I ask the ground of your hope, friend?” “I am doing the best I can, and God is very merciful,” was his answer.
“He is merciful; but the road you are taking leads to hell,” I said to him; “you cannot mix your works and God’s mercy.”
But alas! my reader, the poor old man seemed only the more to cling to his own wretched “text,” totally ignorant of God’s “text,”―not prepared to own himself a helpless as well as an ungodly man (Rom. 5:66For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. (Romans 5:6)). You will find Christ died for those who are “without strength,” unable to do what is good for God, and “ungodly,” having already done what is bad.
With which of these two men, my reader, are you seen by God at this moment? To outward appearances they were just two poor aged stone-breakers, each of them “having sinned and come short of the glory of God;” but before Him, one, having accepted Christ, and knowing Him by faith, could say, “I am saved,” “I know.” He spoke not of his doings, his thoughts, his feelings, or the like, but of the blessed Saviour and of His work upon the cross. With the other it was, “I hope to be saved”; “I am doing,” &c. The former was on his way to glory with Christ, and knew it; the latter on his way to hell, and did not know it.
Oh! beloved reader, on which road are you?
I entreat you, if hitherto you have sought to mingle what can never be mixed together, viz., God’s mercy and your works, drop your own doings at once, and rest before God in what Jesus has done. Note, in Titus 3:55Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; (Titus 3:5), a converted man (Paul), writing to another converted man (Titus), can say, “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us.” The works that are to follow salvation, to mark the saved man, are referred to in verse 8 of same chapter. May you from this moment be able to say, “I am saved;” I know that blessed Saviour.” WM. H.