WHAT a vast difference there is in the experience of those who are looking at themselves for peace, and those who are looking wholly and simply to the Lord Jesus Christ! The former never get peace; it is impossible that they could, because they are not on the true ground of peace; whereas, the latter always have peace, for they are looking straight to Him who has finished the work the Father gave Him to do, and has made peace by the blood of His cross. Those who are looking at themselves in any measure for peace, are constantly thinking of themselves, and talking of themselves; it may be their feelings, their sins, their experience, their attainments, or their doings—self in some shape; but those who give the Lord Jesus Christ the full glory of their eternal salvation, think of Him—His love, sufferings, death, blood-shedding, triumphant resurrection and ascension, intercession and coming. This is the secret of true happiness, for we have, as scripture says, joy and peace in believing.
In a time of great religious profession, like the present, we constantly come in contact with souls who are thus occupied with themselves. The fact is that men are very slow to accept God's verdict as to their thoroughly bad and ruined state that "they that are in the flesh cannot please God." When the soul is really taught by the Spirit of God to bow to this truth, then it becomes a simple necessity to look wholly to another for deliverance from the wrath to come.
We subjoin an account of a couple of cases which we have lately read, as sheaving the difference between a soul looking at self and looking only and wholly to the Lord Jesus. The writer says, “On going to a military hospital one evening, I was requested to see a dying man, who was hardly expected to live till morning. I went to his bedside, and spoke to him of Jesus.
“Oh, yes, Jesus!" he exclaimed in a tone of the deepest feeling;" he has had mercy on me, and has filled my soul with joy.”
“But are you not in pain?" I asked.
“Yes, great pain—but I am so happy.”
“Where are your friends?”
“Away in the West; but Jesus is my friend, and He is here.”
Here was a rough soldier, dying, far from home and friends, among strangers in an hospital where suffering and death were all around him, exclaiming, in broken, half-uttered sentences—"I am so happy. I am not afraid to die. Jesus has saved me. I trust in His blood." It was a scene not to be forgotten. I spoke to him of the many mansions which Jesus had gone to prepare; and as I did so, he grasped my hand in his, now growing cold in death, and showed his assent by tears of joy, and the most heavenly smile I ever beheld. The realized present possession of eternal life and communion with Jesus shone in that smile.
On leaving him, I was requested to see another man in the same ward. A noble-looking soldier lay there prostrated by a temporary illness.
“I want to speak to you about religion," he said, as I stood by his bed. “I have made up my mind with an earnest resolve to serve God and do my duty—not with the feeble resolution of a boy, but with man's determined purpose, that henceforward I will do what is right." At some length he told me what he was going to do—his vows, his purposes, his plans. All was about himself—not one word about Christ the Savior.
Having listened to him quietly, I said at last
"Then you are at peace, my friend.”
“Oh, no," said he; "my agony of mind: only increases.”
“Why so? Have you not kept your vows?”
“No, I cannot," he answered despairingly.
“Had you not better, then, try again?" I asked; “or can you think of no way of making up the account?”
He shook his head hopelessly. "I know not what to do," he said.
I could not but think what a contrast was this scene to the one I had just witnessed. There Jesus, and what he had done, was everything, and all was perfect peace. "Here, the poor sinner's thoughts and words were only of himself, and what he was to do, and nothing but sorrow and despair were the result. I turned to the poor unhappy soldier with a silent prayer that God would open his eyes to see the glorious truth which I was about to unfold to him.
“My friend," said I," stop your vowing. Satan has enticed you on to his quicksand, where you are fast sinking down, to hell: Your house is on the sand. You cannot be your own Savior. Listen to God's way of saving sinners. Jesus Christ—God manifested in the flesh—came into the world to save sinners, not to help them to save themselves. His work was ' finished' on the Cross eighteen hundred years ago, and he has left you nothing to do but to receive the benefits of what He has done. He that believeth hath eternal life.' ‘Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.'”
“But must I not do something?" he asked, "Can I believe on Christ and become a child of God, and. tomorrow go back to the world and live as the other soldiers? An easy way, truly!”
“Stop, stop, Sir!" I cried; “when you see a lamb rolling in the mire as the swine do, then, and not then, may Christ's sheep, who know His voice and follow him, roll in the world's mire. Nay, Sir, you know that though the lamb may stumble into the mud, he does not love it; his very nature shrinks from it. But the swine loves and revels in the filth. Take Jesus at His word. Trust Him as your Savior, and you will soon join Paul in saying, ‘Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid! How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?' When you become a child of God by faith in Jesus, God gives you the heart of a child, so that you no longer love the sins you once delighted in." "But you say only believe;' how am I to know that I do believe?" he asked.
“Not by looking into your own heart, and fixing your thoughts there," I answered., " any more than you can tell whether you have sight by closing your eyes to all around you, and then trying to discover, by self-examination, whether you can see. Look at this lantern. Do you see its brightness? Then do you not know that you have sight? It is not by shutting out all but your own feelings, that you can tell whether you have faith. Look at the light that shines on the Cross at Calvary, and see Jesus there, your Savior, your Substitute, who, having no sin of His own, bore the punishment of sin ' in His own body on the tree.' ‘He was made sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.'”
“I see it! I see it!” he exclaimed, with a wondering joy." I have been all wrong; I have been placing all my hopes of salvation on myself and what I could do, and not on the Savior and His work for me. Yes, He is a Savior—not merely a helper. He came into the world to save sinners. I see it!”