"Shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect? God forbid: yea, let God be true, but every man a liar." (Rom. 3:3, 4)
The enemy of souls is circulating two glaring falsehoods today, and, alas! finds plenty of willing hearts to take them in. He has no need now to stealthily whisper them in secret. There is no lack of instruments for public service in this line and, if he can get them to style it 'divine service', all the better, for all the more will it be likely to succeed.
In barefaced defiance of the plainest statements of Holy Scripture, from platform and pulpit these soul-destroying lies are boldly sounded forth in the ears of Christian professors, and men's hearts not only gladly endorse them, but flatter and applaud those who announce them.
1. Man by grace is not altogether SAVED.
2. Man without Christ is not altogether LOST, neither in this world nor the next.
No man in this world, say they, can know he is saved. Everyone may need a little purifying, some more, some less but another world will do for that, and all will be blessed in the end. If Scripture tells a different tale to this, and does not agree with us, so much the worse for Scripture, is their daring avowal; we shall stick to our commonsense opinions to the end.
But shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect? No, thank God, it shall not. These so-called old-fashioned doctrines are still accomplishing God's blessed purposes, spite of all the craft and opposition of men and devils. There is One in this world —"Spirit of grace," "Spirit of truth," the Holy Spirit of God —who gives divine effect to divine testimony. He produces an unmistakable response in every heart where He makes His sanctifying power felt, His quickening voice heard. Where He divinely operates, the gospel proves itself to be "in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh" in them that believe (1 Thess. 2:13). Let us give you two or three examples.
William Hone, an atheist, wrote a spurious gospel, that he might bring into contempt the New Testament. He maintained that he could write a gospel of his own that would produce as good results as that which was called the gospel of God. When the book was published, there was such an outcry that he set to work to read the true Gospels that he might the better reply to his opponents. Whilst reading them such a flood of light burst upon him that it led to his conversion, and he then wrote:
‘The proudest heart that ever beat
Hath been subdued in me;
The wildest will that ever rose
To scorn Thy word, or aid Thy foes,
Is quelled, my God, by Thee.
‘Thy will, and not my will, be done
My heart be ever Thine!
Confessing Thee, the mighty Word
I hail Thee, Christ, my God, my Lord,
And make Thy name my sign.'
One Lord's Day evening in a crowded Sheffield thoroughfare, two or three gospel preachers had been seeking to extol the saving name of their blessed Lord and Master. At the close of their little service a broad-shouldered, muscular-looking, working man stepped forward, and expressed a wish to say a few words to the bystanders before they moved away. It appears that the previous Sunday evening he had on that very spot told the crowd of his mother's conversion. And in this was another proof of the power of God's word. One single line of Scripture was enough through the power of the Spirit to bring it all about. While busy that evening in her cottage spreading the table for her husband's supper, from the voice of a lowly street preacher she distinctly heard these words:
"Prepare to meet thy God."
The words came with soul-arresting power. She was busily preparing to meet her husband; the Spirit of God used those few words to bring another meeting before her —"Prepare to meet thy God."
Next day she sought out the preacher, and owned herself to be a troubled sinner seeking salvation. The good news of the gospel was preached to her and, believing it, her soul was saved. From that moment her great desire was the salvation of her friends and neighbors, so she opened her cottage for the preaching of that gospel which had been the power of God to her own salvation.
One evening when the son came home he found a man standing in the corner of the house, with the Bible in his hand, preaching the word. He first tried to prevent a continuance of these meetings and, failing in this, told his mother his determination to leave home. 'But,' said he, 'if I could get away from my mother's roof, I could not get away from my mother's prayers. For twenty-three years I plunged deeper and deeper into sin until, through a severe accident, I found myself in the hospital at Cardiff. There I got a view of myself; and you may talk of 'no hell' if you will, but that sight was 'hell upon earth' to me. I saw myself lost! Not a little lost, friends, not half lost, but LOST! I could see no chance of mercy for me.
`A Christian visitor called at my bedside to read and speak to me; but I said, "Go to someone else and read that book, I'm too bad for anything, I'm lost!" But grace met me, and I found I was not too bad for Christ. And now, if I had the chance of leaving this place, where do you think I would fly to? Once I would have gone anywhere to get away from God; now, if I could, I would fly straight to those arms that were once outstretched for me at Calvary.
`Before the time I speak of in the hospital I had often tried to make my peace with God. After a drunken bout, or on coming out of prison, I would make a fresh determination to be different, but down I went again. Now I see that He made peace by the blood of His cross, and therefore it is not left for me to make it.'
Here, then, was another testimony to the power of the word and Spirit of God. Although in the Scriptures 'lost' had been written against his name as an unbelieving sinner, yet of itself this was as nothing to him; but when God's Spirit wrote 'lost' upon his heart, all, all was changed!
Has the Spirit of God so worked in your soul, dear reader, that His testimony to you has become a powerful reality within you? Be sure of this, the doctrines of partly lost and partly saved go together. When a man realizes that in himself he is utterly lost, he can never rest till, through the work of Another, he is eternally saved.
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