"If only we could get people to believe that the work is finished," exclaimed a preacher of the gospel, addressing a company in the open air, from the text, "So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many." Heb. 9:2828So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation. (Hebrews 9:28).
But people turn away from God's message of salvation through the finished work of Christ, and vainly try by some effort of their own to obtain forgiveness and peace.
"Yes, I am quite happy now," said a young girl who had been for some time troubled about her sins. "I came to Jesus today. I was always trying to come before."
"How did you try?" she was asked.
"I tried to be good," she replied.
But this dear girl had found how useless her own efforts were. Giving up trying, she took the place of a sinner before God and rested on His Word, "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." Isa. 53:66All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:6).
At once her soul found peace, and she could rejoice in the forgiveness of her sins.
A poor girl lay on a bed in a large hospital.
She had been badly injured by a machine in the factory where she worked, and now lay unable to move. A visitor, passing, stopped to speak to her, and after hearing of her suffering, asked if she knew Jesus as her Savior.
"I am trying to seek Him," was her reply.
"But He is seeking you.”
The suffering girl seemed impressed with this, and willingly listened to the story in Luke 15 of the Shepherd who went after that which was lost until He found it. Her visitor never saw her again, for she was removed to her home as incurable. However, a Christian woman in the next bed said she believed the dear girl had found a Savior in the One who came to "seek and to save that which was lost." Luke 19:1010For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. (Luke 19:10).
A missionary was giving out tracts among some tenement houses. At one house the door was opened by a young woman with a baby in her arms. She took the offered tract with such evident pleasure that her visitor asked if she were interested in the things of God. "I have not yet given my heart to Christ," was her quick reply. A brief conversation brought out the fact that the young mother had often attended open-air preachings and had been impressed. She had even been brought to think seriously about her soul, but had never taken for herself the salvation so freely offered. "But I must really try to," she added as she firmly closed the door.
Her visitor was obliged to withdraw with the fear that the poor woman was still resting on her own efforts and again putting away from her God's offered salvation.
Are you trying to obtain salvation by any efforts of your own? All has been done, and you have only to receive what God so longs to give you.
"Cast your deadly doings down,
Down at Jesus' feet
Stand in Him, in Him alone,
Gloriously complete.”