Many years ago I was attending a Christian lady whose malady demanded rather frequent visits. She was an earnest Christian, and very warm in her desire that the gospel of the grace of God, which she herself enjoyed, should reach others also. She one day informed me that she was expecting her cousin, a remarkably pretty and attractive girl of nineteen, who resided in a large town in the north of England, to spend a while with her, and she fervently hoped that she was coming to Edinburgh to receive spiritual blessing.
She told me that she was an out-and-out worldling, her one idea being to cull what joy she could from life in the shape of balls, parties, theaters, novels, etc., while any acknowledgment of God was not only distasteful to her, but was even forbidden by her mother in the home in which she had been reared.
Within a few days I formed the young lady’s acquaintance, but she took very good care not to give me an opportunity of intruding what she regarded as her cousin’s and my “peculiar notions” upon her. The moment I arrived in the house she vanished; or if she happened to be at my patient’s bedside when I entered, she quitted the room immediately.
Many weeks rolled by, and her cousin recovered her health so far as to be able to attend the Sunday evening gospel meetings, which I was holding in a large hall near to the apartments in which they were dwelling.
Invited, and earnestly entreated to come and hear the gospel, C-for many weeks persistently declined, but one evening, to my surprise and delight, I noticed her sitting in the last row of seats at the bottom of the hall. The subject before us that night was the Three Appearings of Christ, as presented in the end of Hebrews 9.
1. HIS PAST APPEARING.
2. HIS PRESENT APPEARING.
3. HIS FUTURE APPEARING.
His first appearing was dwelt upon at considerable length – when it took place, namely, in the end of the world or more truly, the consummation of the ages. That is to say, after man had been tested and tried in every possible way, and found to be only a total ruin, Christ appeared.
The Ages of Testing Were Several
(1) Man placed in the Garden of Eden in innocence was tempted, fell, became a sinner, afraid of God, and was driven out of Paradise.
(2) Man outside of Paradise left to his own conscience, became so corrupt and godless that God must needs bring in “the flood upon the world of the ungodly” (2 Peter 2:55And spared not the old world, but saved Noah the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly; (2 Peter 2:5)). Without law he was utterly godless.
(3) In Moses’ day a select people, Israel, were placed under law, and, alas, broke it before they had fully received its terms.
(4) Last of all, man was tested by the presence of the Son of God – incarnate Love and Light. His only response was, “Away with Him! Crucify Him!”
All this but shows the state of man’s heart – that he was hopelessly alienated from God, and but the slave of lust and passion, governed by Satan at the back of all. Then it was that Christ appeared “to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.” On the cross of Calvary He took up before God the whole question of sin, as God knows it. “For He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Cor. 5:2121For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. (2 Corinthians 5:21)). “For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh” (Rom. 8:33For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: (Romans 8:3)). Sin was unsparingly judged in the person of the holy Son of God, when, as a substitute, He sacrificed Himself in absolute and blessed love to put away sin.
But more than that, “As it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment; so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many.” This is the great and blessed truth of substitution. As a substitute He bore the sins, died the death, and sustained the judgment which attached to sinners as such. He effected propitiation by sacrificing Himself for sin. He shone as the blessed substitute when He bore the sins of many. The one who believes in Him is entitled, therefore, to know that God has been perfectly glorified about his sin, and that Christ has borne and blotted out forever all his sins, which have lain as a heavy burden on the conscience.
Calling to see my patient on Monday morning, my young friend C- greeted me quite warmly, and began to speak of last night’s meeting, and her interest in what she had heard; and from that day for a considerable number of weeks she attended every meeting she could where the Word of the Lord was being spoken. She seemed to be thoroughly arrested by the Spirit of God, her mind was full of inquiry as to divine things, and all who knew her were hopeful that she was about to decide for Christ. No one pressed confession on her, and it could not be said that she actually confessed Christ.
The time came for her to return home. I happened to be at the railway station at the hour of her departure, and seized the opportunity of a final conversation. I pressed upon her the importance of thorough decision for Christ and bold confession of His name, showing the blessedness of such action, and quoted to her the Spirit’s words – “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” (Rom. 10:99That 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. (Romans 10:9)).
She assented, was deeply interested, and said, “I am going home, doctor, and I hope you will hear good news of me. I know what you want, and I hope you will hear it about me.” She stepped into the train, and I saw her no more.
Several months rolled by, and I often inquired of my patient, “What about C-?” and only got the reply, “I know nothing; I am afraid she has not confessed Christ at home.” At length came news, startling news, sad news. The great ball of the season was coming on. C- was beautiful, and of course had received an invitation, which, with pain, we also heard she had accepted. Then came other news – that she had been attacked by typhoid fever, and was dangerously ill.
My patient, in great distress of mind, repaired to the city in which her cousin lay so ill. To her intense sorrow and disappointment she was not permitted to see her. Her mother, whose enmity against Christ seems to have been deep beyond expression, declared that she would not have her daughter’s mind troubled by religious folly. She had trained her for the world: in the world she was to have shone. To the coming ball she was to have gone. A beautiful ball dress had been provided, and was now hanging in her wardrobe ready for use on the eventful evening, which arrived in due course.
The ball was a magnificent scene, everything that could contribute to the pleasure of the gay crowd gathered there was provided, but my fair young friend C- was not present. The ball dress was never worn. The day she should have been arrayed in it her remains were laid in the old churchyard.
And how did she die? say you. This only do I know, that, alas, she had never confessed Christ. When death stared her in the face, and the realities of eternity appeared before her affrighted gaze, she said to her mother, “Send for E-, let me see E-“ – the Christian cousin with whom she had stayed. This comfort the Christless mother denied her dying daughter, and then the fever-stricken girl charged her mother with being the cause of her eternal damnation, and so died.
And you, my dear young friend, who may be reading this, harden not your heart, nor shut your ears to the moral of this sad history. Procrastination, I fear, coupled with timidity – cowardice, if you like the word better – led poor dear C- to hesitate fully to confess the Lord, to whom she was certainly for a little while attracted. Apparently afraid of the consequences of an out-and-out confession of His blessed name, she shrank from owning Him at home; the warnings and wooings of the Spirit of God were, I fear, slighted.
Then came death, unwanted and unlooked for, which carried her with startling swiftness into the realities of eternity.
Let me beseech you, reader, at once to close in with God’s offer of mercy, nor risk the awfulness of a lost eternity by continuing unrepentant and unbelieving. Listen once more to God’s gospel, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.”
“Whosoever shall be ashamed of Me and of My words, of him shall the Son of man be ashamed, when He shall come in His own glory, and in His Father’s, and of the holy angels” (Luke 9:2929And as he prayed, the fashion of his countenance was altered, and his raiment was white and glistering. (Luke 9:29)).