A Bankrupt.

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Helpless but Not Hopeless.
READER, have you ever considered how you stand with God? You may be able to say, I owe no man anything. But what of our account with God? A wise sea-captain will take his bearings. A wise business man will periodically take stock and reckon up his liabilities. But if it is wise to know how a man stands as to material things, is it less so to consider how he stands in regard to God and eternal things? You will not be always here: you have to leave this world. Why, then, like the farmer in Luke 12, play the fool? He thought only of his temporary assets, and forgot all about his eternal liabilities. Sooner or later you must take God into account. Every man has to appear before God and give account of himself there (see Romans 14:1212So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God. (Romans 14:12) and Rev. 20:1212And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. (Revelation 20:12)).
Now God has taken your case into account already.
What! you say, God taken me into account? Yes. You are contemplated in Luke 7:4141There was a certain creditor which had two debtors: the one owed five hundred pence, and the other fifty. (Luke 7:41): “A certain creditor had two debtors.” The two before Jesus at the time were representative debtors, and you belong to one class or the other. God Himself is the creditor.
What has God had from man? Naturally nothing but sin. This is what He has had from you, dear reader. Put down your liabilities, for you have nothing else to put down. You have nothing to pay with. In plain words, you are a total bankrupt. If you believe it, listen! Jesus said, “And when they had nothing to pay, He frankly forgave them both.” Is yours not a parallel case? God’s disposition toward these two debtors is His disposition toward you. He wants you as a repentant sinner to take this into account, that Jesus was delivered for our (that is the believer’s) offenses (Rom. 4:2525Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification. (Romans 4:25)). His liabilities have been met by another―the man Christ Jesus―and this in order that all who believe on Him might have forgiveness. There are two kinds of debtors in this world, and only two. One recognizes his debt like the publican in Luke 18, the other, like the Pharisee, ignores it and learns nothing of the gracious disposition of God toward men.
How, then, do you stand, my reader? You cannot meet your own liabilities. Scripture is very clear about this. “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:2323For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; (Romans 3:23)). “The glory of God” mentioned in this verse does not refer to heaven, but to what is God’s standard for man. You do not, my reader, come up to that standard. He says so in that little word “ALL.” You are a moral bankrupt. But He (Jesus) was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification, and now “through this Man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins, and by Him all that believe are justified from all things.”
God discharges no debts at the expense of righteousness. Christ in death met all our liabilities, in order “that God might be just and the Justifier of him which believeth in Jesus” (Rom. 3:2626To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. (Romans 3:26)). Be honest with yourself. Be honest toward God. Confess your liabilities, and in the name and through the merits and work of the man Christ Jesus accept God’s forgiveness.
J. D. M.