MANY preachers are giving up the old ideas about the fall and total depravity of man. People are not often plainly told now that they are guilty sinners before a holy God. The sermons of our forefathers― who used to press this so constantly upon their hearers―are looked upon in many quarters as relics of the dark ages. There is, however, one preacher left of the old school, and he speaks today as loudly and as clearly as ever. He is not a popular preacher, though the world is his parish, and he travels over every part of the globe, and speaks in every language under the sun. He visits the poor; he calls upon the rich; you may meet him in the workhouse, or find him moving in the very highest circles of society. He preaches to people of every denomination, of every religion and of no religion, and, whatever text he may have, the substance of his sermon is always the same.
He is an eloquent preacher; he often stirs feelings which no other preacher could reach, and brings tears into eyes that are little used to weep. He addresses himself to the intellect, the conscience, and the heart of his hearers. His arguments none have been able to refute; there is no conscience on earth that has not at some time quailed in his presence; nor is there any heart that has remained wholly unmoved by the force of his weighty appeals. Most people hate him, but in one way or another he makes everybody hear him.
He is neither refined nor polite. Indeed, he often interrupts the public arrangements, and breaks in rudely upon the private enjoyments of life. He lurks about the doors of the theater and the ballroom; his shadow falls sometimes on the card table; he is often in the neighborhood of the public-house; he frequents the shop, the farm, the office, the mill; he has a master-key which gives him access to the most secluded chamber; he appears in the midst of legislators, and of fashionable and religious assemblies; neither the villa, the mansion, or the palace daunt him by their greatness; and no court or alley is mean enough to escape his notice. His name is Death.
You have heard many sermons from the old preacher. You cannot take up a newspaper without finding that he has a corner in it. Every tombstone serves him for a pulpit. You often see his congregations passing to and from the graveyard. Every scrap of mourning is a memento of one of his visits. Nay, he has often addressed himself to you personally. The sudden departure of that neighbor―the solemn parting with that dear parent―the loss of that valued friend―the awful gap that was left in your heart when that fondly loved wife, that idolized child, was taken―have all been loud and solemn appeals from the old preacher. Some day very soon he may have you for his text, and in your bereaved family circle, and by your graveside he may be preaching to others. Let your heart turn to God this moment to thank Him that you are still in the land of the living—that you have not, ere now, died in your sins!
You may get rid of the Bible. You may disprove―to your own satisfaction―its histories; you may ridicule its teaching; you may despise its warnings; you may reject the Saviour of whom it speaks. You can get away from the preachers of the gospel. You are not compelled to go to either church, chapel, or mission; and you can cross over to the other side of the street if there be an open-air meeting. It is in your power to burn this, and every other such book that comes in your possession.
But if you get rid of God’s Word and of God’s servants, what will you do with the old preacher of whom I have spoken?
Dying men, women and children, consider the prospect that is before you! Your little day will soon be passed. Your pleasures will have an end. Your occupations will be worthless to you in the solemn hour when your body is reduced to a few handfuls of dust.
Consider this matter, I pray you. Must there not be a cause for this? Is it by mere accident that a creature with such powers and capacities should come to so ignominious an end? There is but one answer to these questions, and as long as the old preacher goes on his rounds he will continue to proclaim it. Listen “By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin.”
THE FALL OF MAN
is no mere theological dogma, but a fearful reality, to which the world’s history, and the stern, sad facts of our own experience, bear terrible witness. Sin is not simply an ugly word in the Bible or on preachers’ lips; it is a dark, foul reality, which blights and curses the world by its presence. Nor is there any exception to the scope of its ravages. “Death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.” My reader is implicated in this matter. There is a great difference between the careless spectator in a court of justice, and the criminal in the dock whose life is at stake. The latter is your position. You have sinned; upon you the sentence of death has passed; and very soon it will be said of you, as it was said of nine old men in the fifth chapter of Genesis― “he died.”
Sad, sad indeed, if that word comes true of you, which was thrice repeated of some very respectable people a long time ago:― “YE SHALL DIE IN YOUR SIN.” One second after your death, it will be a matter of no consequence to you whether you died in a palace or in a cellar. But your whole eternity will hang upon the state in which you die. If sin works such havoc, and sins have such fearful consequences in this world, what must they entail in the next? Men reap as they sow in this world, but God does not definitively execute judgment upon sins in this life. “After death, the judgment.” In this world you can, in a sense, avoid God. Many live “without God in the world.” But death dissolves all connection with the things of time by which God can be excluded, and beyond you must have to do with God.
An innocent man might plead for justice, but the sinner’s only hope is mercy. The guilty one can only escape by the door of mercy. If the offender does not receive the due reward of his deeds, it must be on the ground of mercy. The transgressor can only be pardoned at the mercy-seat. Hence the penitent’s cry is, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” He is conscious that nothing but mercy will do for him. Your only chance is mercy. Oh, how sad, how complete, how irretrievable would be your ruin, if you should die “without mercy”! Over you then would have to be written the solemn epitaph of Heb. 10:2828He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses: (Hebrews 10:28):
“DIED WITHOUT MERCY.”
“THESE ALL DIED IN FAITH.”
Yea! though the clear men thus spoken of lived in a dispensation of comparative darkness, though the promised Saviour had not yet come, nor His blessed atoning work yet been accomplished―yet, in the starlight of types, symbols, and promises, they trod the path of faith, which is now lighted up for us by the glory which shines in the face of the seated Saviour on the throne of God; and, as they lived, so they died, “IN FAITH.”
God has not been indifferent to the ruin of His creature, whose sin has brought death upon him. There is no denying the fact that “the wages of sin is death;” but it is equally true that “the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 6:2323For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 6:23)). “In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him” (1 John 4:99In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. (1 John 4:9)). The holy Son of God has
DIED IN LOVE
upon the cross. Yea, “God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:88But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)). The old preacher never spoke so loudly, or in such solemn tones, as when Jesus went to Calvary. Divine love would; save the sinner, but divine holiness could not make light of sin. The full penalty of guilt―the wages of sin in all its dark and dread reality―passed upon the sinless Substitute. He took our place in death and judgment, that we might have His life, and His place of acceptance and favor before God.
“Oh! for this love, let rocks and hills
Their lasting silence break;
And, all harmonious, human tongues
Their Saviour’s praises speak!”
You may die unsaved; you will not die unloved. The Son of God is for you: Christ died for you: eternal life may be yours. The love of God, the work of Christ, urge you to turn to the Son of God whose soul-assuring words are: “He that heareth My words, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment; but is passed from death unto life” (John 5:2424Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. (John 5:24)).
C. A. C.