No, sir, I would not allow you or anyone else to class me with the vile and degraded sinners around us, such as drunkards, swearers, gamblers, and the like. I consider myself superior to them, for I have ever been upright, honorable and honest, and have sought to keep myself respectable. I am willing to own that I am a sinner, but you must draw a line between refined and cultured people, and those who are coarse, vulgar and reprobate, not caring what they do or say.”
These words were uttered by one who resented my seeking to skew him from the scriptures, that all men are alike lost sinners. "For there is no difference: for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God." “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." He appeared to treat lightly that, on the other hand, God has made such a rich provision for the sinner, so that the glad tidings can be announced to' all, "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners."
I fear, alas! this man represents many in the present day. Souls seem slow to own that they are bankrupt sinners, ruined and lost; and that if they are to be saved, it must be outside of themselves, on the ground of mercy and grace. They kick against this, for the simple reason that it makes nothing of them, and everything of the One who is ready and willing to save them.
Now, dear reader, I trust you are not among those who thus seek to raise their heads above their fellows, thinking themselves superior. Should you be so, you will do well to search the scriptures, believing them to be the word of God, with a heart willing and ready to bow to what they say about you and to you. One thing is certain, if these are your thoughts, you have never yet seen yourself in the searching light of God's holy presence, for there is no creature that is not manifest in His sight, all things being naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.
It might be well for you just to turn up your Bible, and see the effect that the presence of God had upon several of old who were brought there. And you must remember that God is of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look upon iniquity.
We are told of Job, who seeing himself through his own eyes, maintained his integrity, and justified himself, in the face of all that his professed friends sought to charge home to him, But when he got into God's presence, we find everything changed, and he says, " I have heard of thee with the hearing of the ear; but now mine eye seeth thee: wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in. dust and ashes." Ah! he found nothing to cling to when once all was revealed in the light and holiness of the presence of God, yea, rather he saw himself as that which was worthy only to be hated; and that led to his repentance. He had said to the Lord, Behold, I am vile." This was his true condition.
Then we read of Isaiah, who, when he gets into the presence of God, exclaims, "Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts." His guilt is taken away, and his sin purged by the live coal from off the altar being laid upon his mouth by one of the seraphim.
You will also find an instance of this in the eighth chapter of John. Those who were upright in their own eyes looked down with contempt upon a poor woman who was taken in the very act of sin, and brought her into the presence of Jesus, who was God manifest in flesh, that she might be stoned according to the law of Moses. They had not contemplated the light and holiness of the presence of this lowly One. By the remark He made, He revealed to them that He knew their hearts, and their consciences became uneasy, as He said, "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her," and being convicted by their own conscience, they went out one by one, beginning at the eldest even unto the last; Jesus being left alone with the woman.
No, beloved reader, you may depend upon it, you will not think, yourself better than your neighbor when once you see yourself as God sees you. Even if you think of your own righteousness, the word of God meets you there, saying, all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags." And filthy rags are lit only for the dunghill. You are a lost sinner, whoever you may be, who are not saved. Morality and respectability, all right in their proper places, do not, before God, raise you one step higher than that platform upon which all are by nature. "There is no difference for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”
Oh! if you will only see and own this, it will be glad news to you to hear that, "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners," and the Lord Himself says, "The Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost." And why, think you, can God save sinners, seeing He is holy and righteous, and cannot look upon sin? I turn you to that atoning work accomplished by the Lord Jesus Christ, God's beloved Son, upon Calvary's Cross, whereby He has met and satisfied the just claims of God against sin, at the same time revealing the unbounded love for sinners that is in the heart of God. The cross of Christ tells me how repugnant sin is to God, for Christ there being made sin, suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust to bring us to God. Hence God is now righteous in saving you, a poor lost sinner. But mark, dear reader, that God does not, and cannot, save guilty and ruined sinners at the expense of His righteousness and holiness.
The perfect righteousness of God
Is witnessed in the Saviour's blood;
'Tis in the cross of Christ we trace
His righteousness, yet wondrous grace.
God could not pass the sinner by,
His sin demands that He must die;
But in the cross of Christ we see
How God can save, yet righteous be.
We see in the cross of Christ, that man by nature was so evil and corrupt—incurably wicked—that God judges him and punishes him in the person of His Son; hence He can now be just and yet the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." He that heareth my word" says Jesus, "and believeth on Him that sent me, hath everlasting life and shall not come into judgment, but is passed from death unto life." Oh! ye sinners, guilty and lost, dare you think there is any escape for you if you neglect so great salvation, when that blessed Saviour who was made sin, had to suffer the mighty wrath and indignation of God upon the cross? He bore the judgment of God (blessed be His holy name), that you and l might go free. Was ever love like this? Surely it was stronger than death. Many waters could not quench it, neither could the floods drown it.
Beloved reader, it will be imputed to you for righteousness, if you believe on Him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification, and being justified by faith, you will have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. He is still a Saviour for sinners, though seated at the right hand of God, and still says, "Come unto me," and may you respond ere it is too late, for soon, He that shall come will come and will not tarry."
"Come ye weary heavy-laden
Lost and ruined by the fall,
If you tarry till you're better
You will never come at all.
Not the righteous,
Sinners, Jesus came to call.”
W. G.