A LADY, on a visit in a little village, set to work to distribute tracts to all whom she met. One day, she met a stranger in the village shop and, as he was passing out, she offered him a tract. He accepted it with thanks, and said, “Would you like to hear the story of my conversion?”
“Very much,” she replied.
“Well,” said he, “I was a careless, godless man. One night I made up my mind I would go to the theater to enjoy myself. As I approached the door I saw a notice up in large letters: ‘This Way to the Pit.’ The words flashed through my mind in a new light. I saw a meaning in them I had never seen before. ‘This Way to the Pit’! I was there and then deeply convicted of sin. I suddenly realized I was walking on that broad road which leads to — hell ‘This Way to the Pit!’ The horror of those words seized me, and I could not shake it off.
“Shortly after my little boy begged me one Sunday to take him to a mission hall nearby. I did so. The preacher took as his text the words of the dying Saviour on Calvary’s Cross: ‘I thirst.’ He said, ‘Men and women, Jesus Christ is thirsting for your souls tonight.’ And my heart responded, And I am thirsting for Jesus Christ! ‘And there and then I accepted Him as my Saviour.”
“This Way to the Pit.” Reader! are you walking on that way? The Bible says, “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death” (Prov. 14:1212There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death. (Proverbs 14:12)).
Again, “Enter ye in at the strait gate; for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat” (Matt. 7:1414Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. (Matthew 7:14)).
In the Book of the Revelation of St. John we read: —
“And the fifth angel sounded... and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit” (9:1,2).
“Death”! “Destruction”! “The bottomless pit”! These are solemn words, but they are in God’s Book, so we cannot ignore them.
“I want to ask you a question,” said a soldier to me one day.
“What is it?” I inquired.
“Do you believe in hell?” he said.
“Well,” I replied, “God believes in it! He believed in it so much and He so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” ‘Perish’ — note that word!
“And Jesus Christ believes in it! He believed in it so much, and He loved us so much, and He was so unwilling ‘that any should perish,’ that He came and died for us on that awful cross to save us from hell if only we will turn to Him and be saved.”
“There was no other good enough
To pay the price of sin,
He only could unlock the gate
Of heaven and let us in.”
“And,” I said to the soldier, “if God believes in hell, and Jesus Christ believes in it, how dare I say there is no such place?” There is such a place. The Bible tells us very plainly about it. But, thank God, it tells us also that there is pardon and heaven for the guilty sinner who will accept the free salvation offered to him by Jesus Christ.
“Would you like this book?” said a lady to a young lad.
“What is there to pay?” he inquired.
“Nothing,” she replied.” It is like salvation — it is free!”
“Thank you,” he said,” I would like it then.”
Yes, salvation is free. Glorious news! It is a free gift. It cost the Son of God a great price — even His own life. But He paid the, price willingly so that guilty sinners might have this gift free for the asking. What wonderful love!
There are three things you can do regarding a gift: ―
1. You can reject it — absolutely refuse it!
2. Or you can neglect it — pay no heed to the offer!
3. Or you can accept it — make it your very own!
I ask which of these three things are you doing with regard to this gift of salvation? Remember it is just as serious a matter to neglect as to reject salvation. You have only to neglect your body, give it no food or attention, and you will die just as surely as if you ran a knife through your heart, or put a bullet through your brain. And you have only to neglect your soul, and it will die just as surely as if you deliberately rejected salvation. Oh! won’t you accept it, and accept it today, for “Behold, now is the day of salvation.”?
“Men and women,” said the preacher, “Jesus Christ is thirsting for your souls tonight.” And one heart, at least, in that congregation responded, “And I am thirsting for Jesus Christ!”
Reader! what are you thirsting for? Are you seeking for satisfaction in the world? Ah! you will not find it there.
“What a rage there was for the skating rink when it was first opened,” said one girl to another; “but people soon got tired of it and it had to close.”
Yes, people soon “get tired” of the world’s pleasures, for they cannot satisfy.
“My mistress can’t spend a quiet evening in the house,” remarked a servant girl. “I never saw anyone like her! She is always rushing about seeking to be amused. And in spite of it all she is not a bit happy.”
“In spite of it all”? Nay, because of it all! She was thirsting, poor woman, for satisfaction, but she sought it in the wrong direction, so remained thirsty still.
Jesus Christ satisfies the human heart and no one else — and nothing else can. Has He satisfied you?
“I came to Jesus and I drank
Of that life-giving stream;
My thirst was quenched, my soul revived —
And now I live in Him.”
E. E. HATCHELL.