I was in a large town where gospel meetings were being held, and I went to them. The speaker was a fearless man, faithful to his Master, and to his hearers. I thought he was just suited for his audience, and was enjoying his plain words, when one evening he made use of what I regarded as a strange and unwarrantable expression. I remember the words well, even to this day—now over twenty years gone by—though no doubt the servant of God who uttered them has long since lost their remembrance, if indeed he has not gone home. The words are these,
“The most amiable lady in this town, out of Christ, is as near hell as the greatest drunkard in it.”
What dreadful words to use, I thought; how dare he say such a thing as this. I went home highly indignant with the preacher, and, of course, gave him the cold shoulder, and prated to my wife about such manner of preaching as his; but at the same time I was restless. Can it be true, thought I, that a religious man as I am—one who has never drunk a glass of intoxicating drink in his life, and who has lived most morally—can such a one be as near hell as a poor drunkard? No, no, the idea is too shocking. But what does God say?
I read these words, among many others, and was led to bow to the Word of God. I discovered I was all wrong, and became anxious to be made all right.
Bless God, He soon revealed His Son to me as my only Saviour. I believed Him, and then could sing in truth,
“Happy day, happy day,
When Jesus washed my sins away.”
Some while after my conversion, I was in charge of a mission yacht, on her way to the Shetland Islands, to carry the good news of salvation to the hardy islanders. A steady breeze blew when the yacht was off the Y. coast, which freshened to a gale, and soon after, unable to keep her course—the gale increasing—she was compelled to scud before it under bare poles. The heavy seas rolled up like huge monsters under her stern, roaring and threatening to engulf vessel and crew; and, when midnight came in all its fearful blackness of darkness, the little vessel was fast making water, and all hope of saving her was gone. Then the writer committed the small crew to God—not one of whom was converted—and remembered the loved ones at home. And then he stood steering the little craft throughout the long night, expecting every minute the next sea would sweep all into eternity. In that soul-searching hour he was, by grace, enabled humbly, yet calmly, to sing,
“Jesus, lover of my soul,
Let me to Thy bosom fly,
While the nearer waters roll,
While the tempest still is high.”
And how dear these lines have been to him ever since! O, what a contrast it was that night, when looking into the face of a watery grave, and standing on the verge of eternity, between the storm without, and the calm within! What a contrast to his, feelings on the first storm which he has narrated!
As one who has faced death, both as an unsaved sinner and as a saved man, both in view of hell and of heaven, reader, I appeal to you. Are you at peace with God? Are you reconciled to Him, and are you one with His Christ? Would death be to you a leap in the dark—going, going, where?—to spend an eternity in hell? or would it be a blessed entrance into Paradise? Why will you be lost? For rejecting Christ, the only Savior?
Your sins may all be forgiven you, but the rejection of Christ will never be forgiven. Pardon and peace are now offered to you through the atoning blood of God’s own dear Son. Come then, repent now of your sins, believe on Christ, and be saved.