WHEN a patient has recovered from a serious malady through the skill of some eminent physician, it is only natural for him to long that others, suffering from the same disease, should seek the same medical aid and reap like benefit at his hands. Even the little captive maid in Naaman’s house, when she saw the awful plight of her leprous master, exclaimed, “Would God my lord were with the prophet that is in Samaria, for he would recover him of his leprosy.”
The following is a rough translation of two verses said to have been written by the present Czar of Russia. In the original they are, expressed in exquisitely poetical language. The second and third verses of the poem run thus:―
My happiness was born at night,
And succored in the gloom;
My pleasures have dissolved in flight,
Heart-stricken at my doom.
“My soul strives blindly for relief,
Chilled, as by drifting snow,
By doubts which scoff at the belief
Of finding peace below.”
Now what true believer in the Lord Jesus Christ could read these lines without an inward earnest longing, “Oh that the royal poet knew my Saviour, and had the joy and peace in believing that fills my heart through Him”?
But as some reader of these lines may find them, at least in measure, a true expression of his own feelings, let us say a word or two for such.
First, it is no small mercy to have the soul brought into the personal realization of how it actually stands with God, since it is with God that we all must have to do, sooner or later. When the true character of sin in His holy sight is seen; when the fact is really grasped that sin must receive its just judgment, and that the penalty is death; when it is rightly understood, and the truth honestly faced, that God can no more reverse His sentence against sin than man can reverse the wheel of time and live his life over again―it is little wonder that the man so laid bare in God’s presence should stand “heart-stricken, at his doom.”
But, thank God, when the light of the gospel of peace is seen; when God stands before the soul, as of old before a sinful nation, saying, “O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in ME is thine help” (Hos. 13:99O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in me is thine help. (Hosea 13:9)), what a mighty change takes place! I find that God is for me, notwithstanding all I have said and done. If He hates my sin He cares for me, and His gracious provision for me proves it beyond all question.
But while all these gracious statements come before us in the Old Testament, it is left for the lips of Jesus Himself to utter those wondrous words, “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” (John 3:1616For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)).
Thus God is known, not as One who would show me favor if I had always done right, but as coming forth to show me kindness though I have always done wrong. Yet this kindness was shown not in passing by or winking at the wrong, but in judging it unsparingly at the cross and by the death of His adorable Son.
When this is seen, instead of my pleasure taking flight and my sorely stricken heart being filled with dark despair and dismal forebodings, God’s perfect love casts out all my fear. Tormenting doubt gives place to joy and peace in believing. Oh, happy portion! Then why does not every troubled heart come into it at once?
Ah, alas! it is only too common for the heart-stricken one to turn blindly to his own efforts to obtain relief. And thus, like the writer of the above lines, he is bereft of the hope of “finding peace below.”
God has only one “way of peace,” and that way is Christ; only one way of salvation, and that salvation is in Christ. He is our hope, our peace, our joy, our all.
Oh, then, come to Him; come confessing your sinfulness in the past, your helplessness as to, the future. It is all you have to bring; all He expects you to bring. All the rest you will find in Him pardon through His precious blood, power through His blessed Spirit, everlasting life in Him, eternal glory with Him; yea, all He is and all He has will be yours. But beware of delay. This year may be your last, and what then? You will indeed be “HEART-STRICKEN AT YOUR DOOM,” if you die without Him.
GEO. C.