THE man accused of crime is by no means indifferent to his position. He engages an eminent counselor, in order that his case may be pleaded, and pleaded in such a way that he shall appear just before his judge.
Men are wise enough concerning their temporal interests, while the interests of eternity are often counted as the small dust of the balance.
How is it with you, my reader? Has Job’s question ever received your serious consideration?
Job was a man of extraordinary wisdom. When he spoke even the aged kept silence, and by his word their matters were decided.
If the above question were worthy of Job’s attention, surely it cannot be altogether beneath my reader’s notice.
Perhaps you reply, “But I am no great sinner, and therefore I do not trouble myself much on this matter. I regularly attend church, and always do my duty. If I were a flagrant sinner, I certainly would start afresh.”
Granted, dear reader, that you are respectable, upright, and by your fellows highly esteemed.
Yet methinks you will scarcely claim equality with Job. He was not only reverenced by man, but also approved of God. God declared of Job, “There is none like him in the earth,” yet Job’s heart was exercised about this question.
How man should be just with God was to him a matter of vital importance; and there can be no doubt that it is of equal significance to all who rank below him.
Mark you, it is not, How should a sinner be just with God? but, How should man be just with God?
Ah! this, then, becomes a personal question with each one of us. Am I a man? Am I a human being?
Here, then, is a problem the solving of which I dare not delay: How should man be just with God?
But why should this question interest me? Why should I be anxious to know how I stand with God?
BECAUSE I, as a creature, am responsible to God.
BECAUSE God is “the Judge of all the earth.”
BECAUSE “He hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world in righteousness.”
We do not, however, stand in the position of the man spoken of at the beginning of this paper.
We are not on our trial. We have been tried, and not only tried, but found guilty and condemned.
God thus speaks in His Word: “There is none righteous, no, not one.... All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.”
God also says that He will by no means clear the guilty.
Hence the importance of Job’s question, and the unreasonableness of indifference.
My reader may say, “If I am guilty and already condemned, is there any hope of escaping punishment, much less of being justified?”
Well, dear reader, our case would indeed be hopeless if it were not that God is interested in our question, How should man be just with God? Yes, God has been deeply interested in our case, and, in His infinite wisdom, has devised a plan by which we may not only escape the punishment due to our sins, but also stand justified before Him.
To the aid of infinite love came infinite wisdom. Justice demanded satisfaction.
The guilty must die, or a competent substitute be found.
But what resource had we? None. No man could atone for his own sins, much less for those of his brother. No angel nor archangel was equal to the emergency. Then spake the beloved Son, “Lo, I come to do Thy will, O God.” God had a resource in Christ.
It was God’s will that man should be saved, and the Lord Jesus undertook the work of redemption. He died, the just for the unjust.
On the ground of that work God can “be just, and the Justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.”
You know that Christ took upon Him the form of man; but remember His incarnation did not save us. No, no. If He took upon Him the form of man, it was for the suffering of death; because without shedding of blood there could be no remission.
Here, then, is the answer to the question, “How should man be just with God?”
How shall I be just before God? By simply taking the lost sinner’s place, and believing God’s testimony concerning His Son as my Saviour.
What has God said concerning His Son? “HE GAVE HIMSELF A RANSOM FOR ALL,” and therefore for you. This, dear reader, is God’s message to you. But are not good works necessary to salvation? Let God’s Word answer. “Not of works, lest any man should boast.”
Then how are you treating this message of salvation? Upon it depends your eternal destiny. If you despise it, you will perish; if you neglect it, how shall you escape? If you receive it, Christ says you shall never perish: none shall pluck you out of His hand.
“He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.”
Reader, do you believe in Jesus? Is His precious blood the foundation of your hope?
Then, indeed, are you just before God. Who can condemn? It is God that justifieth. Who shall lay anything to your charge? It is Christ that died.
The question of the believer’s sins will never again be raised, because God visited His own Son with the punishment due to them.
Let us indeed praise God that the question so important to us has been a question of such deep interest to Him.
What God’s love devised, His power and wisdom have accomplished. How, then, can the reader be indifferent and escape?
CHAS. H.