Echoes of Grace: 2009

“High drama,” was what the headline called it, and it truly was “high” drama. An old, five-story factory was being remodeled into apartments when a fire broke out. Flames and smoke were shooting high into the sir.

A construction crane was in place 250 feet above the building to demolish two high smokestacks. Through the ring of smoke the cab of the crane was sometimes visible, and in the cab was a man. The operator of the crane, Ivers Sims, was trapped.

He must be rescued – he couldn’t be left like a piece of meat over a grill! But how could it be done? Flames were roaring through the building at the base of the crane; to come down from there would have delivered him straight into the inferno.

Firemen fought to “knock down” the fire, but raging flames drove them back. Helicopters tried to blow the flames and smoke away, but with no success.

It grew hotter and hotter in the cab, and the heat was coming through the thick soles of Sims’ shoes. Abandoning the cab, he moved along the arm of the crane to the cement balance weight. That put eight feet of concrete between him and the flame, but it did not lessen the danger that the whole crane assembly might be toppled and fall into the fire.

After trying fruitlessly for over an hour to save Sims, firefighter Sam Mosely turned again to the helicopters. Tethering himself to a helicopter, he dangled in the air by a rope and was able at last to reach Sims on the crane. Quickly fastening him into a harness, the two men clung together as the helicopter lifted them and circled slowly as it brought them to safety.

It is a picture, a faint picture, but still a little illustration of what the Lord Jesus Christ has done. From the unimaginable heights of His glory He looked down on a world of humanity headed straight for destruction – a world poised above an abyss far, far worse than a burning building.

As Sims was helpless atop the crane – there was nothing he could do to escape a dreadful fate – so is the whole human race unable in itself to avert a final fiery judgment. Help must come for Sims from above, and only from above has help come for us. The Lord Jesus came down to rescue souls in danger of hell fire and to give His life to save them. (Sam Mosely only risked his life.)

How thankful Sims felt when he was held fast by the strong arms of Mosely as they swung precariously away from danger! And that is how the Lord will tightly, strongly, and safely hold everyone who has put their trust in Him. His promise is: “I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck

A Terrible Freedom

“Terrible” isn’t often used to describe the word “freedom.” Other things are aptly described as terrible: “T-rex” might be a terrible lizard; droughts, tornadoes, and other natural disasters might be called “terrible,” but “freedom?”

How could freedom possibly be terrible?

Every person on Planet Earth has the freedom to believe on the Man who rose from the grave. By the resurrection from the dead, and the power of a holy, sinless life, He showed that He was God’s Son. As the Son of God, Jesus Christ came from heaven to earth that He might bring sinful men back to God. He alone in all the history of mankind arose from the dead to live in the power of an endless life, and He alone has the power to give eternal life

If men are free to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, they are also free to reject Him. This is what makes the freedom to believe exceedingly terrible. The flip side of believing on Christ is rejecting Him. Rejecting Christ for any reason carries with it the terrible price of eternal death and separation from God.

Men are free to close their eyes to the great truths in the Bible: the truth of sin, death, and a Saviour come from glory, but they are not free to escape the eternal death their sins have earned. The “outer darkness” of hell is as real as the air you breathe or the ground you stand on. It is a place that many seem to be racing to by loving sin and darkness, and excluding the God of all grace from their lives.

God loves you. So that you might be saved, He sent His Son into the world. “The Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world” (1 John 4:14). On the cross the Lord Jesus paid the terrible price our sin deserves by His own death. By coming to Him in faith, hell-deserving sinners are forgiven and receive the gift of eternal life. “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life” (Romans 6:23).

You cannot deserve the great gift of salvation by your own efforts. You must receive it as a free gift through faith. “For by grace are [you] saved through faith, and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8).

You have the freedom to receive this gift right now by placing your faith in Christ. Nothing can prevent you from doing so. You need not wait another moment before you come to Christ. You may trust Him from any spot on earth. You are free to trust Him! You also have the terrible freedom to go through life rejecting the gospel message.

What you do with this freedom will determine where you spend eternity. By God’s grace, won’t you trust the Saviour?

Is There No God

Are all the wonders that we see all about us in nature accidental? Who made the delicate flowers, and how do they grow from tiny seeds? Was there no forethought in all of the rich supplies stored in the earth for man’s use—coal, oil, and countless valuable minerals? The fertile soil that covers so much of the earth, without which we could grow no food for man and beast – whose foresight provided it?

What keeps the sun just hot enough to sustain life on earth, but not too hot or too cold? And who planned the land surface and the ocean just so that the warm currents of water and wind would circulate about the continents like a great air conditioner?

Whose wisdom so ordered that water expands when frozen, while other elements contract? This make ice lighter than water and keeps it floating on the surface, so that lakes and rivers are not frozen down to the bottom and the fish and other water life survive until the ice melts. Who made this wise arrangement?

Is all of this accidental? Is there no God? “Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these things” (Isaiah 40:26).

Yet with all of the abundant evidence in creation of a Creator God, man cannot
know God until by faith he comes to know God’s Son, the Saviour, Jesus Christ the Lord We cannot know God by studying nature alone.

Jesus Christ came to earth to reveal God to us. He was God living among us, because Jesus is God, and “God is love.” The same wisdom and love that has provided so abundntly for the bodily needs of mankind has also provided a Saviour for whoever will believe His love and accept the gift of eternal life that He alone can give.

It was God’s provision for sinners that Jesus became a man and died on the cross as the Sin-bearer for anyone who will accept Him as their Saviour and Lord. Because He was God, death could not hold Him and He arose from the grave and, having finished redemption’s work, has gone back to heaven – God’s dwelling.

This Creator-Saviour-God has promised to return and receive to Himself all who confess Him now as Lord. Do you know Him?

What Is the Way to Heaven

People do not just happen to get to heaven. There is only one way there, and that is Christ. The “way” is not a path or road, but a Person, and that Person is the Lord Jesus Christ. You go to town by a road; you go to heaven by Him.

If you belong to Him, and He lives in your heart, then you are on the way to heaven.

Jesus said: “I am the way, the truth, and the Life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by Me” (John 14:6).

An Unconditional Invitation

All shapes and all sizes,

Every color and race,

From all kinds of homes,

And from just any place -

The rich and the poor,

Their need is the same –

And for all such as these

The Lord Jesus came!

“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 3:16).

A Lost Stradivarius

After a concert Peter Stumf, the principle cellist for the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, went to a friend’s house. He inadvertently left his cello in its case on the doorstep while he entered to have a chat with the friend. A young man riding his bike down the city street saw an opportunity for an easy theft. He grabbed the case and rapidly pedaled down the street. In his hurry to escape, he knocked into pedestrians and light poles with the cumbersome case. The thief rode what he thought was a safe distance away. He stopped to examine the contents of the case. He was so disappointed with what he found that he tossed it into a garbage dumpster. Little did the thief know that the cello was a rare Stradivarius valued at over 3.5 million dollars.

When Peter Stumf discovered his cello missing, his heart sank. He couldn’t believe he had been so careless as to lose the irreplaceable instrument. He had no idea that the nearly priceless cello was lying in a trash dumpster with discarded table scraps and other refuse.

That cello was extremely valuable, but you have something far more valuable in your possession. You have a soul, and like the Stradivarius, your soul can be lost. The Lord Jesus said, “What shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” (Mark 8:36).

A soul is lost in this life when it seeks to find its pleasure in the trash heaps of lust, sin, pride and moral corruption that so abound in this world. “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way” (Isaiah 53:6). There isn’t a person alive who hasn’t visited those trash heaps and contracted the defilement of sin. “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). Because we all have sinned, each one of us needs the Saviour. The only way to be cleansed from sin is to believe on the Lord Jesus and the great work He did on Calvary’s cross. It was there that He gave His life for sinners. “God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:6). The blood which flowed from His wounds while He hung on the cross is able to cleanse the worst sinner who will look to Him in faith.

Because of Christ’s death on the cross, the good news of the gospel can go out to each lost soul in this world, telling them to “believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:37). What a truly priceless gift God gave to mankind when He sent His Son into this world that sinners might be saved!

Peter Stumf’s Stradivarius lay in a garbage dumpster, and soon a truck would come and haul it away to a landfill where it would be lost forever. Fortunately, the cello was rescued before that truck arrived. A young lady spotted it in the dumpster and picked it out of the garbage. She thought she might be able to convert the cello into a CD cabinet. She brought it home and, on closer inspection, discovered it was the missing Stradivarius that was being reported in the news. Even though it had been scratched and dented, she was able to return it to its rightful owner.

The Stradivarius was recovered, but it came very close to being lost forever. If a sinner dies never having come to the Saviour, they must remain lost forever. The Lord Jesus spoke often on the reality of hell. He likened hell to a site called “Gehenna” in the valley of Hinnom just outside of Jerusalem. In ancient times, it was a place where human sacrifices were offered by fire to an idol. Then for hundreds of years the place became a garbage dump. City dwellers dumped and burned all manner of trash and refuse there. It was a maggot-ridden trash heap with fires constantly smoldering in it. The Lord Jesus used this dirty, smoldering site to illustrate what hell was like. “If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out: it is better for thee to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye, than having two eyes to be cast into hell: where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched” (Mark 9:4748). Hell is a terrible place where lost souls will suffer forever.

Oh, won’t you realize that you have a soul that must be lost forever if you don’t come to the Saviour? In love and grace He is willing to save you the moment you realize your need and turn to Him in faith. He knows all about you. You can’t hide anything from Him. The incredible thing about His love is that even when He knows all about us, He still loves us anyway. Because Jesus Christ died for sins, God’s grace can go out to a guilty world, which by its actions does not deserve His love but His wrath. Don’t fling your soul away like the thief threw the cello worth 3.5 million dollars away. Instead, come to Him who said, “Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out” (John 6:37).

“The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:23).

Be Prepared

Bobby Leach was the second person to brave Niagara Falls and live. He performed his death-defying stunt when he was 49 years old, sealed in a barrel. Fifteen years later he met his end in a way least expected, as the following news release records:

“Bobby Leach, who achieved fame when he went over Niagara Falls in a barrel, died today of injuries received when he slipped on an orange peel. Leach, who made the perilous journey without receiving a scratch, broke his leg when he slipped on the orange peel. Complications set in following an amputation, causing death.”

The case of Bobby Leach is only one of thousands reported, with many more untold. An officer, hero of many battles, escapes all danger from gunfire and bombs, only to die later from an infected pin prick. A sea captain, who had weathered many a storm and always reached port safely, was drowned in his bathtub at home.

The preservation of our natural life often seems —and is treated by some — as a gamble. But if we had all-knowing eyes, we would be compelled to say, “There is just a step between me and death.”

The moral is plain. Your time may be short — be prepared!

“Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2)

Big Winners

That was the headline of the newspaper story: “Big Winners.” It was true: They were big winners. The prize was 13.9 million dollars, making the couple instant millionaires.

Now they had all the money they could spend, just for the price of a $1.00 lottery ticket! But what about all the losers, all those others who bought tickets and didn’t win? There were 67.5 million tickets sold (equal to about two and a half tickets for every living Canadian), but only one grand prize. One winner — and millions of losers. Not very good odds, surely.

Of course, it was only a small loss in the hope of a big gain, but what about the many, many people who are risking a great loss, an immeasurable loss, for a very small gain? What about the people who are gambling with their souls? Can you measure eternal loss with any short-lived pleasure or gain now? The Bible puts it plainly: “What shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” (Mark 8:36).

If you have not yet settled the question of your soul’s eternal destiny, if you have not made sure that you will not “lose your own soul,” then every time you lie down at night you are gambling — yes, gambling—that sickness will not strike in the night and that you will wake in the morning. Every time you get up in the morning, you are gambling that you will meet no accident that day. Every time you say to yourself, “I am going to accept the Lord Jesus and make sure of my soul’s salvation, after the next party — when school is out — when I am older — or richer — or wiser . . . ” you are gambling your eternal salvation for a few minutes of time.

The Apostle Paul saw things in the right perspective when he said, “I have suffered the loss of all things . . . that I may win Christ” (Philippians 3:8). Nothing in this world can compare with that!

To lose your wealth is much;
To lose your health is more;
To lose your soul is such a loss
As nothing can restore!

The Lady's Rock

On the west coast of England there is a steep rock that is known as “The Lady’s Rock.” At low tide it is on a sandy beach; at high tide the waters surround it.

Once there was a woman who sat down at low tide to read a book. She did not notice the tide was coming in until she heard the shout of a coast guard on the cliff. Then she saw that the waves with their white foam were between her and the shore. There was no boat, and the watchers who quickly gathered on the beach could not reach her.

The coast guard shouted, “Climb the rock!” It was the only way to keep out of the water, but the rock was steep. Even the boys who climbed its face to get sea bird eggs had trouble getting up to the nests. How could she climb it? As she hesitated, an incoming wave splashed spray at her feet. She could see that the tide was coming closer, and she began to climb, little by little, until she reached a ledge. She looked down at the sea; it was rising higher and higher, and she was getting wet with its spray.

“Climb higher!” shouted the people on the shore. Again she inched her way upward, hanging on with bleeding fingers and finding footholds in crevices, until at last she was able to grasp a tuft of grass at the top and to pull herself up. She collapsed on top of the rock while the people shouted, “She’s saved! Thank God, she’s saved!”

There was no one who could save her from the rising sea, but there is someone who can save you from the wrath of God before it comes in like a rising flood upon this world. Like the lady on the rock, you may be so interested in the things of the world around you that you do not realize that you may be lost in that sea.

You cannot save yourself, but if you call on the Lord Jesus Christ, He will save you — He will deliver you “from the wrath to come.” The lady of the rock saved herself by climbing up the rock, but there is no way to climb from earth to heaven. There must be a deliverer, and that deliverer is the Lord Jesus Christ.

“Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

Tomorrow

“Tomorrow,” he promised his conscience,

“Tomorrow I mean to believe;

Tomorrow I’ll think as I ought to,

Tomorrow the Saviour receive;

Tomorrow I’ll conquer the habits

That hold me in sin’s bitter sway”;

But ever his conscience repeated one word:

“Today, today, today!”

“Tomorrow — tomorrow — tomorrow,”

So day after day it went on;

“Tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow,”

Till youth like a vision was gone;

Till age and his passing had written

The sentence of fate on his brow,

And forth from the shadows came Death,

With the pitiless syllable: “NOW!”

Clutter

It started with just a few things out of place and scattered around in the little house. Little by little bits and pieces of broken things began to pile up, and at last it was beyond the power of the owner, 74year-old Gordon Stewart, to get it all in order again.

No one seems to know why, but finally he began adding to the accumulation. Day after day the neighbors would see him coming home on his bicycle carrying bags and boxes of broken and discarded things. As the piles of rubbish reached the ceiling it became difficult to move around in the house. He began making a system of tunnels through the trash.

After ten years of collecting and storing trash and building his tunnels, the day came when he evidently lost his way in the mess and was unable to find the way out. The police officers who crawled through the tunnels searching for him said that he had died in the tunnels — died of dehydration.

One can hardly bear to think of the old man dying alone — dying of thirst — surrounded by all the trash he had spent his life to collect. What a waste of his life!

What a sad way to end his life — that is, to end his life on earth — life as we know it. We have summer and winter, seed time and harvest, trees and flowers, and rivers and lakes and oceans of water — a wonderful, marvelous earth. It is sad indeed to think of leaving all that in such a way, but what follows? Remember the man who in hell prayed for just one drop of water to cool his tongue?

Imagination stops short at the thought, but it is real — terribly, dreadfully real. And there is no promise anywhere in the Bible (the Word of God) of any relief to those who suffer there — never — ever.

Do you want to risk that? Do you want to spend your life gathering more and more of the rubbish of this world, and find at the last that it cost your eternal life?

Please don’t! Please, please don’t!

“What is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” (Matthew l6:26).

My Adoption

When I was five years old, my parents deserted us. We were put into foster homes to be cared for, and from then on I was moved from one place to another.

Sometimes a couple would come and visit one of these places, looking for a child to adopt, so that they could have a boy or girl to raise and love as their own child.

As I watched these people looking over the group, I always hoped that I’d be the one they would adopt. I wanted a home. I wanted so much to have a “Mom” and “Dad.”

As the years passed, that hope grew into a burning desire to “belong.” I would ask the matron, “Will anybody ever adopt me?”

She would have to say, “Well, I just don’t know, Jim. Maybe someday you will be chosen.”

But it never happened.

In all those homes, no one ever told me about Jesus. The only thing I remember in the way of prayer was what one house mother taught me:

“Now I lay me down to sleep;
I pray Thee, Lord, my soul to keep. Amen.”

I think the Lord answered that simple prayer in spite of everything!

As I grew older, I got into trouble and was put into detention homes, then reform school, then jail, and finally I had to be put into the penitentiary. God saved me about two years ago while I was being held for trial in the county jail. A man came there with a Bible and spoke to us of the love of the Lord Jesus Christ, and I accepted Him as my Saviour.

The other day, as I was reading in my Bible in Romans 8:1417, it suddenly dawned on me: I had been chosen! I was adopted into the family of God, and God is my Father. I am His child! No one else would have me as their child, but God adopted me and I belong to Him!

“The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God; and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ” (Romans 8:1617). “According as He hath chosen us in Him . . . unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the beloved: in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace” (Ephesians 1:47).

Have you been adopted into God’s family?

When Drought Comes, Then Comes Fire

There is a saying in the American West, “When drought comes, then comes fire.” The events in Montana in 1910 reveal the deadly truth of this statement. For the two years prior to 1910, only tiny amounts of rain fell on the western part of the mountain state. All summer long sizzling heat conditions sucked the moisture out of the great forests making them vulnerable to fire. In August, three small blazes broke out, and then, fanned by a powerful wind, they combined into a terrible blazing inferno. The updraft caused by the searing heat generated winds in excess of a hundred miles an hour. Entire trees were uprooted and sent flying, flaming, through the sky sometimes miles at a time. Towns were burnt to the ground. Firefighters were mostly helpless against its overwhelming power. The energy released by the flames was greater than multiple nuclear explosions. The power of the fire was hardly imaginable by anyone not present. Millions of acres of forest were laid waste.

An old-timer who witnessed the effects of the fire said, “You can’t outrun wind and fire that are traveling 70 miles an hour. You can’t hide when you are surrounded by red-hot color. You can’t see when it is pitch-black in the afternoon.”

Hopefully the American West will never again experience a forest fire of this magnitude again. However, there is a drought of a different sort that has potentially even more disastrous effects. This drought is a drought of the soul and is caused by the withering effects of living apart from God. If this drought goes on for a lifetime and a soul never comes to know and love its Maker, the destruction it will experience will be greater than any forest fire. Souls who don’t come to repentance and faith in Christ will personally experience the wrath of God firsthand. His wrath against sinners who lived out their lives in an affront to His majesty will be terrible. The Bible describes the environment where impenitent souls spend eternity as a “lake of fire.” The idea of a “lake” carries with it the idea of immersion. How horrible the thought of spending an endless eternity surrounded by red-hot color in the “lake of fire.” “The fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable and murderers . . . and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death” (Revelation 21:8).

God is of infinite love, infinite goodness and perfect righteousness. Those who offend Him and never make amends will suffer in an infinite manner. The agony of hell is forever. “These shall go away into everlasting punishment” (Matthew 25:46). Don’t buy into the idea that the soul of man has no existence after death. Man is God’s special creation. He was made in God’s image and given the power of choice. God will honor the choices every man makes in this life. Those who reject His offer of a free salvation through His Son will have their choice honored by being removed out of His presence into the darkness of hell for all eternity.

The darkness of a lost eternity — what a thought! The great Montana forest fire pumped so much smoke and ash into the sky that the afternoon sky was pitch black. The pitch blackness of that sky brings to mind the blackness of “outer darkness,” a term used by the Lord Jesus to describe the condition of the lost. “Bind him hand and foot . . . and cast him into the outer darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 22:13). That darkness shall overtake everyone who dies in their sins apart from the Saviour.

The only way to make amends for one’s deeds is to come to the Lord Jesus Christ with all your sin, guilt and shame. The blood Jesus Christ shed on the cross has the power to wash the vilest sinner clean. “The blood of Jesus Christ His [God’s] Son cleanseth us from all sin” (1 John 1:7). His blood has the power to wash so clean that the all-searching, all-knowing eyes of God will not see a speck of sin remaining. It is a cleansing that all men need from the most respectable to the most dissolute. It is a cleansing that all those who realize their lost condition and place their faith in the Saviour receive when they believe. The Lord Jesus Christ is a divine person who has an infinite dignity and an infinite worth. Therefore, the blood He shed on the cross has an infinite power to wipe away the darkest stains of sin. Even if your sins were a thousand times worse than they are, His blood could wash their guilt completely away.

Men in the terrible forest fire could not outrun the flames, nor could they hide from the extreme heat. Man in his own strength or wisdom cannot run or hide from the wrath of God either. The only way to escape is to come to Christ. Although you have spent your life apart from Him and pursued many things which in the depths of your heart you must know He hates, if you come to Him with a penitent heart He will receive you fully. He will make you His and put a new life in you. Then for all eternity, you will be able to enjoy God fully. The atmosphere of heaven will be full of light. Just to be there will fill a person with more joy than they could ever have experienced while on earth.

God is great! Don’t trifle with Him. The horrors of hell and the wonders of heaven are both great. Don’t pass into eternity in a drought condition of never having come to Christ for salvation. In the Lord Jesus alone can a sinner ever find the “water of life.” Each one who feels a thirst in their soul is invited to come and drink freely. “Let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him come and take the water of life freely” (Revelation 22:17). A person can drink of the water of life for the first time when they come to Christ in faith. There is no other way to end the drought condition in your soul. Will you do it?

Free! Free! Free!

The postman has just passed and left our box full of mail. We can hardly wait to read it all! But as we turn the envelopes and folders over, one by one, the excitement and anticipation fades. What do we find today?

There is one post card from a vacationing neighbor. Two utility bills. A subscription reminder. All the rest (and an amazing quantity it is) consists of offers trumpeting FREE in the largest possible type.

What are all these FREE offers? “FREE installation”—with a two year contract. “FREE examination”—with purchase of hearing aid or eye glasses. “FREE grocery item” — with an equal or greater purchase. You know: buy one, get one FREE.

All free, at first glance, but with strings attached. Strings, small or large, visible or hidden, are always present and the price must be paid. It is easy to feel cynical about everything and to grumble, “Nothing in life is free.”

Nothing?

There is one offer that is real and true. You cannot pay for it; it is offered “without money and without price.” It cannot be earned; “to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness” (Romans 4:5). Just believing — just receiving — it seems too good to be true!

For the heart that has been sickened by the false offers, what a relief it is to find reality at last — an offer with no “strings attached,” no quibbling, no “hype”; just a simple and firm and truly FREE offer. Nothing could be plainer; nothing could be more wonderful.

It cost the One who makes the offer untold suffering; it brings the one who accepts the offer unbelievable joy. That does not mean there cannot be pain and sorrow still as long as this life on earth lasts, but through the darkest days the knowledge of who and what Jesus is and that He loves us so much — well! It is just totally beyond words to tell. It must be known and felt — believed and enjoyed personally.

“O taste and see that the Lord is good: blessed [happy] is the man that trusteth in Him” (Psalm 34:8).

When the Saviour Came My Way

You ask me why I love the Lord;

Well, friend, just let me say:

My life was not worth living

Till the Saviour came my way.

You say I lose so much in life;

Yes, friend, praise God, I do!

I lose the sin and sorrow

Which was all I ever knew.

I lose the days spent seeking joy,

The long nights full of tears;

I lose the heavy burdens

Which I carried through the years.

But, friend, I would not have them back

For all that you could pay!

My life was not worth living

Till the Saviour came my way!

Al's Dentist

Al was a clerk in a grocery store, polite and friendly and well-liked by all who knew him. He was a “good living” chap, too, and a member of the church which he attended regularly.

There was also another young man in the same town who was respected by everyone. He was the local dentist. People said they liked him, except for one thing. He . . .

But to start at the beginning of our story, it was because of a bad toothache that Al first became acquainted with the dentist. When he went to his office, he found a little gospel tract lying on the table and he began to read it while waiting for his appointment.

When he was finally seated in the dental chair, the friendly dentist asked him if he liked the gospel tract he had been reading.

“Yes,” he replied.

“Are you saved?” was the next question.

“I don’t know what you mean,” said Al. “I go to church and Sunday school too. No one ever asked me that before.”

That was all he had time to say, for he had to open his mouth wide and let the dentist begin his work. While the dentist worked, he talked, explaining earnestly that the Lord Jesus is the only Saviour of sinners. It is not optional; it is necessary to turn to the Lord Jesus and accept Him as our Saviour.

Al’s mouth was wide open as the dentist worked on his teeth, so he could not talk, but he could think. He thought himself good enough (treasurer and librarian of the Sunday school!) and no one had the right to talk as if he needed to be saved. Now he knew what it was that people did not like about the new dentist, and he felt the same! When his tooth was fixed, he strode out of the office. It would be a long time before the dentist got a chance to talk to him again!

It was a long time, too. If he saw the dentist coming, he would cross the street rather than say “Good morning” to him. But another tooth began to ache, and there was no other dentist as convenient as this one. He put it off as long as he could, but finally he just had to be seated in the same dental chair and have it attended to.

The dentist guessed the feelings of his patient. He knew there were many who did not like him to speak to them about the Lord Jesus, but he was not discouraged. Very gently he opened the subject again, for this was more important to him than dentistry. He reminded Al that it was God who had said, “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). It was not just his opinion. He told Al that he was either a saved sinner or a lost sinner. He could not answer, but he began to see that it was God who was speaking to him and not just the dentist.

After a few unhappy days, during which the dentist was praying for Al, they met on the street and Al did not try to slip away as he had before. He wanted to have peace with God.

“Will you come with me to a meeting?” asked the dentist.

Perhaps this would give him the peace he longed for, and so off they went together. As the speaker told simply and earnestly the good news of salvation through faith in Christ alone, the light broke into Al’s soul. He saw that he was a sinner and that his “good works,” in which he had been trusting, were of no avail in the presence of a holy God.

At last by faith he saw the Lord Jesus taking his place and bearing his sins on the cross of Calvary. He heard that cry, “It is finished” — he believed it and was saved. The finished work of Christ was just what he needed, and oh, what peace filled his soul as he trusted in the Word of God telling him that “he that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.”

“Being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1).

Confession

It used to be that “confession” was felt to be a little embarrassing, a baring of the darker side of our nature. Now our view has changed. Today it is thought to be “something good for you,” perhaps a boost for your self-esteem or a form of self-improvement.

A student in a western college said, “It is no wonder that parents and priests press confession. A weight just seems to slip from your shoulders.”

Some churches have urged their members to write their sins on paper, and then run the paper through a shredder. A real boost for one’s self-esteem?

But can you offer God, the Maker of earth and heaven, a bag of shredded paper in place of heartfelt repentance? Could you even think of facing God with such an offering?

God’s view of confession is very different from ours. It is not a confession of how greatly we have failed, how far short we have come. It is a thankful confession that Jesus Christ is Lord, that He is the true and only Saviour. To confess Him so and to believe in your heart that “God raised Him from the dead” — what a joyful confession that is!

One man, Alvah Reis, made a real “production” of his confession. After a lifetime of committing every possible sin, he came at last to trial. Having prepared a long list of crimes he had committed, he stood before the court and “confessed” for five and a half hours. It was a tremendous “confession,” and people were much impressed.

Was God? No. He knew it all before, and it is unlikely He had any pleasure in the recital. It is not the long and eloquent confession (and certainly not the flippant little pile of shredded paper!) but the simple admission of repentance and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible, in Romans 10:9-10, makes it all so clear: “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man [believes] unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”

Just an OrdinaryDay

It was just one day — a normal day — an average day — in just one town, a very average, normal town. Look at the news reports:

Boy drowns in lake.

Pedestrian hit by car.

Driver killed by ramming pole.

Three-year-old dies in collision.

Man disappears on fishing trip.

Man critically burned.

Man falls off sailboat, drowns.

Just one day’s toll of accidents. Just one day, in just one town. How many more were there in the nation? How many more around the world?

Not one of those people got up in the morning and said, “I’m going to face death today.” There was no warning that this day would be different from every day of their lives. They went about their usual affairs — walking, driving, swimming, fishing—until that unforeseen moment arrived.

Were they ready for it? We cannot tell.

Are you ready? Only you can answer that. If the next accident victim should be you, can you face it unafraid because for you death is only going to be “with Christ; which is far better” (Philippians 1:23)?

If you already know Him as your Saviour, know that He died for you, and know that you have received Him by faith, then you can meet each new day in confiding trust. You can say, “The worst that can come just shortens the journey and hastens us home.”

But if you are one of those who have “received Him not,” you are living each day in deadly peril. If this is your day to meet that sudden, fatal moment, if today you pass into eternity without Christ, you will be lost — lost forever. Instead of the “many mansions,” the love and light and joy of the Father’s house, it will be darkness and despair forever.

Oh, do not risk it! Do not wait one minute longer. Tomorrow may be too late.

Shaiki Yokoi

Shoiki Yokoi, a sergeant in the Imperial Japanese Army during World War II, stared at the leaflets in his hand. They were everywhere, he thought gloomily; the island of Guam was littered with them. Printed in clear Japanese, the leaflets told him that Japan had surrendered, the war was over, and there would be a general amnesty for all Japanese soldiers who would also surrender.

He dropped the papers in disgust. “American propaganda,” and crawled back into the tunnel-like cave he had dug in the jungle. So there he stayed, hidden and alone, while his fellow-soldiers accepted the offer. Singly or in groups, they came out of the jungle to the American encampments to be repatriated to their homes.

All but Yokoi! He stayed hidden. There were coconuts and papayas to eat, and he also caught frogs and rats. As his uniform wore out, he replaced it with strips of bark he wove together, and he marked cycles of the moon for a crude calendar. Surviving as best he could, he waited for the return of the victorious Japanese army.

After twenty-seven years, two hunters surprised Yokoi while he was fishing along the Talofofo River — and he learned the propaganda was true! At last believing and accepting the news, he was returned to his homeland and people.

He lived for twenty-six more years and died at last in Nagoya, Japan— in a Japan enjoying unprecedented peace and prosperity. What a contrast to his tunneled cave in the jungle!

There is a far more important amnesty (pardon) being offered today. This offer has been open for 2000 years: a full and free pardon for all who will receive it. What an offer it is! “Come unto Me . . . and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly” (John 10:10). “My peace I give unto you” (John 14:27).

Is this “propaganda”? “Religious propaganda”? Never! These are the words of the Lord Jesus Himself. Through Him God is offering what is far, far beyond the ability of our minds to grasp or understand. Is it reasonable to doubt God, “who cannot lie,” and crawl back into the dark tunnel of unbelief?

“Men loved darkness . . . because their deeds were evil” — but “God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.” Why not come “out of darkness into His marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9)?

Choose

“Someday,” you say, “I will seek the Lord”;

“Someday make Him my choice;

Someday—someday, I will heed His word,

And answer the Spirit’s voice.”

God’s time is now, for the days fly fast;

Swiftly the seasons roll;

The present is yours, perhaps your last;

Choose for your priceless soul.

Choose now, just now; there’s a soul at stake;

What will your answer be?

It’s life or death, and the choice you make

Is for eternity!

Lord, Forgive My Sins!

On January 15, 2009, US Airway’s flight 1549 took off from La Guardia Airport in New York with 155 persons aboard. The pilot was 58-year-old Captain Chesley Sullenberger, an experienced pilot with nearly 20,000 flight hours logged.

In a very short time, the plane hit a large flock of birds, which disabled both jet engines. The plane was rendered powerless. No one on board expected that within five minutes of takeoff the 80-ton Airbus A320 would have to make an emergency landing on the Hudson River.

The passengers were buckled in and leaning forward in preparation for a crash landing. Some, no doubt, feared that they might die. We are told that some were praying, “Lord, forgive me for my sins.” Their consciences made them feel they were not ready to meet God. Honest prayers certainly reach the ears of a loving God. He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

Let us hope that they did not forget this concern once they were taken to safety! We should all ask ourselves, “Am I ready to meet the righteous Judge?” The Bible tells us, “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). Our own consciences will make us feel that we come short of God’s standard.

There is a sure remedy. It is this: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:31).

By the mercy of the Lord, the pilot skillfully eased the big plane down onto the water. All the people on board survived, with only one (non-fatal) injury. They were all able to climb out onto the wing of the aircraft and were quickly rescued by boats.

After all the passengers had gotten to safety, Captain Sullenberger walked up and down the aisle before he got out to safety. He wanted to be sure all the passengers were safely out of the sinking plane. None were left behind. He wanted to account for them all.

This reminds us that when the Lord Jesus comes He will take all that believe on Him to be with Him in heaven. None will be missing. “The dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord” (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17). None of His redeemed ones will be missing in heaven. All of them will be there.

Will you be there?

Plane Crashes

There have been so many plane crashes lately. Investigators are working overtime to pinpoint the cause of each: mechanical failure, pilot error, wind shear, lightning, sabotage, metal fatigue — and let’s not forget a flock of birds! It is a long list, and in some cases it will take months and even years before they can announce their findings.

To the passengers who were on the wrecked planes, the cause of the crash is no longer important. What does matter is how well they were prepared to face the possibility of sudden death. At such a moment, it is too late to “prepare to meet God.”

One man, a Christian who survived a terrible crash, tells how horrified he was to see “people strapped into their seats, literally burning to death and cursing through it all.”

Bert Hamilton, also a survivor of a plane crash (one of the five who escaped alive from Air Florida flight 90) concludes that “however you live your life, when dying, that is how you’re going to die. If you hadn’t known Christ and hadn’t made that commitment; you’re not going to turn around (to God) in thirty seconds.” That, he says, is the most important point.

“You never know when your plane crash is going to come, so you have to make that commitment now. You can’t put it off!”

After every major crash there is a reaction — a wholesome reaction, if it causes anyone to remember that “now is the day of salvation,” and that to postpone that decision for Christ can be fatal —forever fatal. It is as though God were saying to you, “Stop and think!”

On the other hand, the devil has a word to say too: “It can’t happen to you!” In line with this reasoning, a state university’s counseling center has released some advice: To get rid of a fear of flying, just stop thinking about it.

“If you’re thinking about all those people going down in those planes, you need to stop and switch to thinking about images that are pleasant. Tell yourself it’s very unlikely your plane will crash, and there are lots of safety features on the plane.”

(And we thought the old theory of the ostrich hiding her head in the sand had been disproved!)

It is true that the plane probably will not crash; the chances are really small of any particular flight’s meeting disaster; almost all plane passengers will safely arrive at their destination. But it is also true that “it is appointed unto men once to die . . . after this the judgment.” Whether in a flaming crash of plane or car, or quietly in bed at home or in the hospital, it is an appointment that must be kept. “Thinking pleasant thoughts” will neither avert that end not prepare for the judgment afterwards. There will be no “escape, if we neglect so great salvation” (Hebrews 2:3).

“Seek ye the Lord while He may be found, call ye upon Him while He is near” (Isaiah 55:6).

TOMORROW MAY BE TOO LATE!

The Warning Sirens

It was June 4 in Grand Island, Nebraska. At the local weather station the radar equipment picked up a nearby tornado even before it touched down. The city’s warning sirens were turned on twenty minutes before the huge funnel cloud formations struck the city. During the next few minutes, seven different tornadoes tore up 150 square blocks of the city. The destruction was almost unbelievable. House after house was destroyed; roofs were torn off, and at least one large motel was completely ruined.

Four people died, and 166 were hurt during the terrible storms. “The city’s sirens were sounded,” said city attorney Keith Sinor. “It is likely that people didn’t heed them because the city has not had any bad tornadoes that anyone can remember. I suppose people stopped believing the sirens.”

How this reminds us of the warnings that God gives us of the coming judgment: “God . . . hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world in righteousness” (Acts 17:30-31).

Some did take the warning. Steve Bennett took his wife and two children to the safest place he knew —his basement. While they huddled together there, three tornadoes struck the house above them. Steve said, “There was a tremendous roar down the furnace pipes, and then there was a screech when the house was torn apart. It sounded like nails being pulled out of wet wood.” His neighbor’s house toppled on top of the Bennetts’ car, but — the Bennett family was in a safe place and escaped unharmed.

And there is a safe place for you, too, to escape the righteous judgment of God against sin: “A man shall be as a hiding place” (Isaiah 32:2). “Whoso putteth his trust in the Lord shall be safe” (Proverbs 29:25).

No Diving!

The signs were plain enough: NO DIVING! But the sandy white beach shone in the sunlight, and the long pier stretched out temptingly over the blue water.

Splashing — swimming — diving — and then one silent moment of panic and a frantic cry of “Lifeguard! Lifeguard!”

Ah-h! There was a reason for the NO DIVING signs. Just under the water the cruel rocks waited, and one diver’s head struck them as he went down.

Precious minutes passed as they searched for him under the water — more time was lost in bringing him to shore — and by then it was too late. Once a faint flutter of a pulse gave hope, but cardiopulmonary resuscitation, oxygen, injections, even electrical shocks could not keep his heart beating. An hour later the doctors at the hospital looked at each other and shook their heads wearily. He was dead — dead at nineteen — his life cut off almost before it began —because he would not be warned by the signs.

There had been many other signs in his life. We all meet them every day: NO PARKING — YIELD —SLOW — DANGEROUS CURVE — and probably he had ignored them often enough and “got by with it.”

Don’t we do the same? And we often “get by” too. No policeman stops us. No accident happened. We made it again! Silly old signs!

But sooner or later we speed past the SLOW sign — and the crash comes. Or we dive into the dangerous water and strike sharp rocks.

God has posted His signs in our lives too. He has said that “the soul that sinneth, it shall die.” But we go on “getting by” with this and that, forgetting that He sees us, forgetting that “because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil” (Ecclesiastes 8:11).

There are other warnings — other signposts — in our lives. Every cemetery, every funeral, is a warning—a reminder that “it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment” (Hebrews 9:27). Can we race on past the warning signs, to crash on the rocks below? Can we ignore the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, who “was once offered to bear the sins of many”? (Hebrews 9:28).

Yes, we can. But — “know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment” (Ecclesiastes 11:9). We may seem to “get by” and “get away with it” for a time, but never forget that “God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil” (Ecclesiastes 12:14).

The Finished Work

Upon a life I did not live,
Upon a death I did not die,
Another’s life, another’s death,
I stake my whole eternity!

“Being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1).

He “made peace through the blood of His cross” (Colossians 1:20).

Experienced Strong - and Helpless

Heat waves shimmered up from the sunbaked tarmac as Richard and Benjamin taxied their jet towards the runway. Richard, in his late sixties, had thousands of hours of flight time and was a seasoned aviator. Benjamin, a strong and intelligent young man, had relatively little experience. They had just completed their mission and were headed back to their home base in Detroit.

High flying airplanes come in all shapes and sizes, but one thing most have in common is their pressurization system. Hot, compressed air is bled from the engines, cooled, and then routed through ducts to provide air for the passengers and crew members to breathe. In the airplane they were in, there was no way to cool this hot air while the plane was moving slowly on the ground. Thinking he would keep the cockpit cool during their short taxi to the runway, Richard reached over and flipped the cabin-air switch, shutting off the hot air into the cabin. At altitudes below 10,000 feet you might not even notice whether or not the cabin was being pressurized. But at 34,000 feet, where they were planning to fly, there isn’t enough oxygen to breathe and you would slip into unconsciousness. In training, both Richard and Benjamin were taught never to touch that switch, and Richard fully intended to turn it back on before takeoff. But he forgot! The Bible says, “There is a way that [seems] right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death” (Proverbs 14:12). ATC cleared them for an immediate takeoff, and in their haste they launched into the sky with the cabin-air switch shut off.

The after-takeoff list called for a pressurization check. A gauge in the cockpit clearly showed that the cabin altitude was climbing too fast. Carelessly, they both looked at it but didn’t realize what it was telling them. Passing through 10,000 feet, the cabin altitude warning horn began whooping, alerting them that they were in danger. They silenced the horn! (Are you silencing God’s warnings? Do you even know what they sound like? God warns us in His Word that “the soul that sinneth, it shall die.” And “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).

Leaving 17,000 feet, they performed the transition checklist, and once again a pressurization check was called for. For the second time, they both looked at the cabin altimeter, but their oxygen-starved brains were now incapable of making good decisions. Higher and higher they climbed until Richard finally tried to level off at 34,000 feet.

The air traffic controller noticed that they were not holding their altitude well and asked them if they needed assistance. Benjamin, whose job it was to use the radio, didn’t hear the call, for he had quietly slipped into unconsciousness. Mounted six inches behind his head was an oxygen mask full of life-giving air. But it was too late for Benjamin; his strong arms hung limply from drooping shoulders, completely powerless to reach for the mask.

To his left sat Richard, his right hand futilely fumbling with the autopilot. With his left hand Richard keyed the microphone and in a slow and drowsy voice informed ATC that he had everything under control. “I’m just having a small problem with the autopilot,” he stammered slowly. “I want to go directly to Detroit.” Do you think you have everything in your life under control? God tells us in His Word, “Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall” (1 Corinthians 10:12).

Richard was in big trouble and he didn’t even realize it. He had an unconscious copilot, an airplane that he could not control, and he thought that he could handle the situation! He had no idea that he was in a state of emergency. Help was offered but refused. How foolish he seems to us, but are you doing the same thing? Are you telling God how you are going to fix your own problems?

The controller again asked him if he needed assistance. A few minutes later he responded that he did not need any help. “I just have a small problem with the autopilot, and I want to go directly to Detroit.”

Mounted six inches behind Richard’s head was also an oxygen mask. Two or three breaths from the mask and he would have been able to think clearly. But he didn’t think he needed it. So, Richard continued trying to set the altitude hold on the autopilot. But his wise and intelligent mind could not force his well-trained and experienced finger to perform the simple task of hitting the right button. Do you trust in your own wisdom to see you through life? Does the thought of calling out to God for help seem like foolishness? “He that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6).

Had Richard been successful in setting the altitude hold, he would have sat back, relaxed, and slipped into total unconsciousness. The airplane would have flown straight and level until it ran out of fuel and then they would have crashed. But that didn’t happen!

The controller realized that something was terribly wrong and instructed them to descend immediately to a lower altitude. Thankfully, Richard complied and began to descend. As they descended both men returned to their senses and they were able to continue the flight to a safe end.

The pilots had to descend to be safe. You, too, need to lower yourself. (James says, “Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He shall lift you up.”) Will you respond to God’s call? He says, “Seek the Lord while He may be found, call . . . upon Him while He is near” (Isaiah 55:6). He also says that “whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:13). Can you think of any greater promises?

The Helping Hand

The Amtrak “Sunset Limited” rolled on in the night through the bayou country. Bayous, rivers and bridges were the main features of the flat landscape, and the train was making good time. Nearing the end of the long trip from the West Coast, the passengers were sleeping in comfortable berths or reclining seats. Then — the jolt, the shock, the wild “roller coaster” motion, and the terrifying awakening. The train was suddenly plunged into the deep, dark water of Bayou Canot.

One car was only half submerged. The panic-stricken passengers inside were choking and blinded by smoke from a car burning near them. Amid the groans and cries of the injured someone yelled, “We’re all going to die!”

One young man, Michael Dopheide, borrowed a key-ring flashlight from a fellow-passenger. Following its faint gleam, he scrambled to the higher part of the car. A piece of timber from the bridge had crashed through a window; climbing outside, Dopheide clung to the timber and called to the others to follow. Holding on with his left hand, he reached out with his right hand to help people scramble through the window. Grasping firmly, he lowered them feet first into the water — a drop of about six feet. Those who could not swim to safety were perched on pieces of wreckage and floated across to a bridge support.

All told, about thirty people grasped that extended hand and were pulled from the wrecked car to safety. Gus Maloney, whose injured wife was rescued by Dopheide, said, “If there was any way to reward him, I would. We’ll be forever grateful.”

There is another hand stretched out — a hand stretched out to you and to me and to all souls in peril of eternal death. God says, “All day long have I stretched forth My hands” (Romans 10:12). All day, all night, those hands have been stretched out to rescue souls in danger. Those hands are stretched out still and the way to eternal safety is still open. Only accept that firm grip and, like Gus Maloney, you will be forever grateful.

“Is My hand shortened at all, that it cannot redeem?” (Isaiah 50:2).

“The Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save” (Isaiah 59:1).

A Happy Ending

“And they lived happily ever after.” A “happy ending” — now that’s the way for a story to end. All troubles over, all problems solved, all relationships neatly worked out, and nothing ahead but enjoyment of the new and permanent pleasures.

Yes, that’s the happy ending of a story, but — life isn’t like that.

Life — mortal life — ends very differently. In a hospital or on a sickbed at home — in a crashing accident on the street — in a war, or as the victim of a crime — life usually comes to its suffering, sorrowful end.

Mortal life — that is, the life we have lived in our bodies — has an end. But there is no end for the soul. It will go on — and on — and on — beyond the utmost limits of our finite minds.

There will be no “ending”; no end will be possible. But there are two choices for that endless existence. It with its immortal body can be spent with God, where there will be “fullness of joy” (Psalm 16:11) forever, or you will be with the devil and his angels, where you will be in “the blackness of darkness forever” (Jude 13). The choice is yours.

That choice must be made now, too, and made before your life on earth comes to its end. It is not possible to wait until after death and then say, “Oh, I made a mistake! I don’t like the darkness; I wish I had made the other choice. I’m going to change my mind!”

There are no bridges between hell and heaven; it will be too late to cross over. If in this life you have refused — or merely neglected — to receive God’s offer of eternal life through His Son, Jesus Christ, it will be too late to change — forever too late.

God says, “I have set before you life and death . . . therefore choose life” (Deuteronomy 30:19).

I Can't Love God

Sometimes people think that God requires them to love Him in order to be saved. They begin to search their hearts, and they cannot find there one particle of love to Him. If we are not to be saved till we love Him, we will never be saved at all!

The wonderful truth is, HE LOVES US! “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation [atonement] for our sins” (1 John 4:10).

Have you been trying to love God in order to be saved? Give it up! It is true that you ought to love Him, but so long as you are unsaved you cannot do so. Accept the gift of His Son, Jesus Christ, think of His love to you, and you will be able to say, “We love Him, because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19).

Will You Be There?

We’re waiting for Jesus! . . . His promise is plain;

His word sure and steadfast . . . He’scoming again;

A numberless people will meet in the air

The Lord who redeemed them . . . but will you be there?

In the home of our Father the banquet is spread;

There the naked are clothed and the hungry are fed;

The house is fast filling — there’s roomyet to spare;

Not a seat will be vacant . . . but will you be there?

River Rescue

Jesse Gaskens certainly knew the rules. He was a volunteer firefighter and surely knew that, as a “first responder,” he was duty bound to protect himself first and foremost. What good was an injured or killed rescue worker, needing help himself? So he had learned the rules by heart — but where would that have left Gayla and Kaci?

Gayla and her little daughter Kaci were canoeing—and the canoe tipped over. Somehow Gayla lost her life jacket, and neither she nor Kaci knew how to swim. They were able to catch hold of an overhanging branch and to cling to it, but Gayla was losing her tight hold on both the branch and Kaci.

Jesse was eating his lunch in a park on the Peace River. Usually the river was just as peaceful as its name signified, but recent heavy rains had turned it into a treacherous, rain-swollen torrent. He saw their dangerous position and jumped into the rushing water and caught and held them both against the branch until a rescuer in a boat might arrive.

Park officials were unable to enter the “much too dangerous river” until the proper equipment arrived. They had rules! That sounds like the old, old story of the Good Samaritan. When the man who “went down from Jerusalem to Jericho” was robbed and left half dead by the side of the road, both the priest and the Levite “passed by on the other side [of the road].” It was against their rules to touch a possibly defiling dead body.

At last (after 45 minutes!) a man arrived with a boat, and the three were lifted out of the water and into the boat. What a relief that must have been! And what a picture of our Good Samaritan, the Lord Jesus Christ, who came where we were, helpless in the rushing river of this life, and who lifts and holds securely everyone who trusts in those everlasting arms.

Those arms are still outstretched—welcoming, healing, and forever sheltering all who have believed and trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ. The unshakable promise in Romans 10:9 is that “if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved!” That is absolute safety.

Overdue Books

The books were overdue, long, long overdue, but the library had waited sixteen months before deciding to turn the case over to the court system. Notice after notice had been sent, but there was still no response to the request for the return of the missing property.

At last the librarian appealed to the court. A court date was set, a summons was issued, and, as a last resort, a warrant for the arrest of the delinquent borrower. Then — two police officers at the door, a trip to the county jail, and a court appearance. What a shock it was to the young mother who had disregarded the repeated notices!

All that for a few overdue books? But the missing books were worth $127.86 — in itself, a fairly small sum, but out of the library’s loss for the year, $180,000, or one third of the library’s book budget, went to replace lost or overdue materials.

“We don’t want to put people in jail,” the librarian said. “This is not something the library enjoys doing or even wants to do.

“There is a point at which we turn it over to the court system and the court date is set. If they do not appear in court or choose to ignore the court order, that is when a warrant is issued for their arrest.”

“I can’t believe it happened!” the shocked woman said after her release and the payment of the fines. But it did happen, and to others also. As the news of her arrest spread, there was a sudden rush to the libraries to return overdue materials. Many a book found its way back to the proper shelf!

The library declared a general amnesty, for a limited time, when all returned materials would be accepted without question or penalty.

People sometimes have “overdue books” to account for in their lives. Do you possibly have some? Is there a vague but haunting little consciousness that all is not quite right — there are things done and things left undone that you will have to account for someday? God has offered an amnesty period too, a chance to “have the slate wiped clean,” and all the penalty of sin remitted. Isn’t that wonderful news?

God has proclaimed this time —right now, while we are living, today!—to be a “day of grace.” Like the librarian who did not “want to put people in jail,” God is “not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).

Some library systems offer a “grace period,” when there will be no penalty for lateness. But —whether “amnesty” or “grace period” or even “the day of grace” — there is a definite time limit. We can’t tell when the day of grace will end, but we may be very sure that God knows and has set the time. We can also be sure that the end cannot be delayed much longer. “Now is the accepted time . . . now is the day of salvation.”

God is offering to all a time of grace, pure grace. It is not a reward for doing good things, not a goal we can work toward, but the free gift of God: “By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8).

The Stranded Bird

Out of the hurricane, out of that wild smother of wind and rain, the white bird came — battered, bruised, and hardly alive.

Far, far from home, she lay on the soccer field of a Massachusetts school. A thousand miles of storm-tossed water lay between her and her nesting ground. Helplessly lying there, her life was fast flickering out. Then ten-year-old Ilse and her mother came to the rescue. Gently lifting the strange bird into a box, they carried her home to safety and began to nurse her back to health.

Ornithologists identified her as a white-tailed tropicbird, sometimes called a “long-tail” because of the bird’s two long tail feathers. It is the “national bird” of Bermuda.

A research station that raises live fish for laboratories donated her food: live herring, smelts, and saltwater minnows. Soon she was gaining weight and fluttering her wings again.

And now, what was to be done with her? She could not survive in that cold climate, but Bermuda was too far away, weather conditions too uncertain, for the young bird to fly home. But fly she did — all the way home from Boston to Bermuda — on a big Delta Airlines plane. Ilse’s mother bought a ticket for herself and the bird, and she flew with her to Bermuda to give her freedom again.

It seems a great expenditure of time and money to save the life of just one bird, but bird lovers will understand. And it is a little picture of what has been done for human beings — for us. We have been battered and bruised by the storms of life; we have gotten far from God and home; we may be nearer death than we realize. Yet there is hope. As Ilse and her mother lifted up the big tropicbird and took her to safety, so the Lord Jesus came in love to save us.

It was at a fearful cost to Him: “The Son of God . . . gave Himself” (Galatians 2:20)! And as the bird was carried safely home by the wings of the great plane, so He wants to take us home to be with Himself. Home — the Father’s house — “fullness of joy . . . forever” (Psalm 16:11) — He would give it all to us.

The helpless tropicbird was rescued altogether by the kindness of others; even so we are saved “by grace . . . through faith; and that not of [ourselves]: it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8). He does it all. All we can do is believe, and receive, and thank and praise God.

Always Confined

The unusual thing about “Pop” Brown is that he spent most of his life behind the bars of jail and prisons — over seventy years, in fact. Brown called such places “home.” Escape or release from one merely opened the way for being put into another. Again and again the story was repeated, until a lifetime was gone. The opportunities and joys of freedom were lost forever. He was always confined.

You are thinking: Nothing could be worse! Nothing? Think a bit. Food, clothing, shelter — all were provided. Even a decent suit to wear! Every time he doffed his stripes for a release, he had the opportunity to go out and try a better way of life, but petty theft and drunkenness were his own choice.

Then think of someone like Dianne Odell, who lived for almost sixty years in an iron lung. An attack of polio when she was only three years old left her paralyzed, unable even to breathe on her own. (This was before polio vaccine was developed.) The “iron lung” was a metal cylinder, seven feet long, sealed at the neck. By positive and negative pressures air was forced in and out of her lungs, and so she lived for sixty years.

Her room was bright with pictures, balloons, and everything a loving family could provide. She could see visitors in an angled mirror; she wrote on a voice-activated computer and operated a television with a blowtube, but she could never escape her iron prison for a minute.

After so long a time, a power failure during a storm shut off the iron lung — and she died.

Total confinement in a prison cell, even worse confinement in a helpless body, long and terrible as they were, there was still a limit. Sixty years—seventy years — both may have seemed endless to the sufferers but they were not forever.

“Forever” will be after this life; it is called ETERNITY. And it is preceded by a choice! On the one hand: SALVATION! LIFE! On the other hand — we can hardly call it death, for the soul cannot die. It will only live on — and on — endlessly on — with the conscious knowledge that there is no end, no hope, no “light at the end of the tunnel.”

But now there is still GOOD NEWS! Jesus Christ died on the cross to save us from the judgment and confinement of hell. He suffered for our sins. With His own blood, He paid the full price for our salvation. “Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures. . . . He was buried. . . . He rose again the third day according to the scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:34).

What does He offer now to any and all who accept that wonderful salvation? He offers freedom now! “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed” (John 8:36).

Freedom forever! “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus . . . free from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:12).

God's Boundary

There is a time, we know not when,
A point, we know not where,
That marks the destiny of men
To glory or despair.

There is a line by us unseen
That crosses every path,
The hidden boundary between
God’s patience and His wrath.

How far may one go on in sin?
How long will God forbear?
Where does hope end, and where begin
The confines of despair?

An answer from the skies is sent:
“Ye that from God depart,
While it is called today, repent
And harden not your heart.”

No Water in the Hydrant!

Walter and Virginia Butler, both in their eighties, were awakened before dawn by a crackling noise. Looking out their window they saw orange flames leaping up over the roof of their attached garage. They immediately took the sensible course of action. They called 911 and got out of the burning house.

Minutes later firefighters arrived. Racing against time, they hauled the long hoses out of their truck and attached them to a black and white fire hydrant at the corner of the front yard. The first rays of dawn were illuminating the sky. By this time the fire had spread to the main house. A fireman fitted a large, heavy wrench over the top of the hydrant and threw his body weight on it to open the valve and release the flow of water. To the dismay of the firefighters, nothing happened when the valve was opened. There was no water in the hydrant. It turns out that the hydrant they were depending on to supply water to fight the fire was a lawn ornament placed on the premises by the Butlers for the sole purpose of decoration.

The firefighters had wasted precious minutes. Quickly they hooked up the hose to a real supply of water. However, it was too late to save the Butlers’ house. It was completely destroyed by fire.

An ornamental fire hydrant might have looked nice as a lawn decoration, but in the crisis of a house fire, firefighters need a genuine hydrant that pumps water.

Lots of people are making token acknowledgments of God in their lives. These token acknowledgements come far short of genuine faith in Jesus Christ as the only Saviour for sinners. “I believe in God my own way.” “I go to church.” “I support relief efforts for the downtrodden.” You might hear people say these and many similar things, as if doing such things were an ornament to beautify and add meaning to their lives. But unless they have come to the point of seeing themselves as sinners on the way to hell and have turned by faith to the Lord Jesus for salvation, such token acknowledgments will, in the end, do them little good. Just like the ornamental hydrant on the Butlers’ lawn, they will prove to be worthless when needed the most.

Beware! Very few of us will go through the ordeal of a house fire, but all of us will have to be dealt with by God about our sins. There is an impending crisis ahead for each person who remains in his or her sins. Sin has more than natural consequences in this life; it has eternal consequences as well. Those who die in their sins will be cast out of God’s presence forever: “Cast . . . the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 25:30).

A superficial acknowledgment of God won’t save you from the punishment sins deserve. What you need is repentance and faith in Christ. In the depth of your soul, you need to turn from the sin which will destroy you and, instead, turn by faith to the Saviour of sinners.

It won’t do to have a token relationship with God. At the cross the Lord suffered untold agony to put sins away. He went into death so that sinners might not have to die and pay that fearful punishment for sin. The sins of those who believe in Christ are blotted out of God’s sight forever. He rose again, walked on earth and ascended into heaven so that sinners who believe on Him might have the assurance that the gift of eternal life will last forever. In love He is reaching out to sinners today through the preaching of the gospel. His love to this world is deep and profound.

Salvation is in Christ alone. Won’t you believe on Him that you might draw living, flowing waters out of the wells of salvation? There is no other way to meet our desperate need as sinners!

“Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Timothy 1:15).

He Found a Way

The young mother was “caught red-handed” by the store security people, who immediately called the city police. They had a simple, “open and shut” case, and there was nothing to do but arrest the woman.

But there were two little girls — babies, really —and a story that is all too familiar these days. The mother told the officers that her husband was being deported, she had been evicted, and she had no money to buy supplies for the babies. But touching though the story was, there was still a law to be dealt with. The policeman had sworn to uphold the law, so what could he do?

He found a way! Digging into his own pockets, he was able to pay the seventy dollars she owed for the baby supplies she had hoped to take out of the store and he even tucked in a couple of sandwiches as well.

There were no charges filed, her name was not released to the press, and the babies had food and supplies for a little while, at least. The little group broke up — security agents, store manager, police, and the little family — in a rosy glow of satisfaction with the outcome.

Of course, it will not be long before seventy dollars’ worth of baby supplies will be exhausted — not long before the sandwiches were gone — and what will happen? We can only hope there will be someone wise as well as tenderhearted who will take an interest in the case and find a more lasting solution.

We, too, as well as all humanity, owed a debt — a tremendous debt —with no possibility of paying it. But like the policeman, God found a way! There used to be a little Sunday school song; you may have heard it.

Love found a way to redeem my soul;
Love found a way to make me whole;
Love sent my Saviour to the cross of shame;
Love found the way — oh, praise His holy name!

Yes, God did “find the way,” and the price of our redemption was paid by the death of Jesus Christ on the cross. We couldn’t pay —the whole world couldn’t pay —that tremendous debt of sin, but God found the way at His own terrible cost.

No one can estimate how great that cost was. No one can repay that debt, but all that God asks of us is to accept the gift — to receive the Lord Jesus as our own Saviour.

When we ask, “What shall I render [return] unto the Lord for all His benefits toward me?” the answer should be, “I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the Lord” (Psalm 116:1213).

The Romans Road

The ancient Romans were great road builders.They had amassed the greatest empire the world had yet seen, and it was important to them to be able to send messengers to the farthest corners of that empire (and to receive taxes from the farthest boundaries too!). So it was necessary to build a good road system and to maintain it in good order. In fact, some of those roads, built 2000 or more years ago, are still in place today. The Roman people expected the government to build strong, secure roads with the directions well marked. So when Paul the Apostle wrote his letter to “all that be in Rome,” he made it as straight and clear as a Roman highway.

Like the old road, Paul’s letter has lasted for two thousand years; unlike the old road, that letter, “The Epistle to the Romans,” is as important as ever and as true a guide to the millions of souls that have followed it. Let’s join them in a walk down the Romans Road.

Our starting point is the Book of Romans, chapter 3 and verse 10.

Romans 3:10 says, “There is none righteous, no, not one.” That is followed by, “There is none that doeth good, no, not one” (Romans 3:12).

The point of these two verses is to show that none of us is perfect. We have all messed up. We all make mistakes. We are all sinners. Most people will admit that they have done things in their lives that are not right, but some people have a difficulty accepting this simple concept of sin because they are trying to escape responsibility for their actions. It’s the “blame it on someone else” game.

Romans 5:12 Says, “By one man [Adam] sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”

This verse refers to the sin of Adam’s disobedience, which is the first sin of mankind and the reason that sin was passed on to all men because we are all his descendents. We are sinners by nature (the nature we inherited from Adam, our great, great, great, great . . . grandfather.) In other words, we have a built-in propensity to sin, and we are also sinners because we practice sin. We have all chosen to sin.

Romans 6:23 says, “The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” We are personally responsible for our sins, and the Bible tells us that the inevitable price we must pay is death — not just the death of the body, but the “second death,” which will be the “blackness of darkness forever,” in eternal separation from God.

Romans 5:8 says, “But God commendeth His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Now we are starting to get to the heart of the gospel. It begins with the greatest act of love in history. The Son of God came to this earth and took a body and walked the earth as a man named Jesus. He lived and He died just as the very ancient prophecies of the Old Testament said He would. We have the story of His life, death, burial and resurrection in the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Now, because of this message of the love of God, many of us have been brought by the Spirit of God to see, understand and believe that Jesus was and is the Promised One, the only begotten Son of God. We know and believe from the Word of God that the Lord Jesus sacrificed Himself to pay the price of our sin, that He was raised from the dead on the third day (proving His victory over death) and that God’s righteousness has been satisfied as to the question of sin.

So how can we receive this most wonderful gift of eternal life? As Paul told the Romans, “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation” (Romans 10:910).

Here in the letter to the Romans, the Apostle Paul spells out the means of reaching out and accepting God’s gift: confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that He was raised from the dead. Paul could not have said it more simply —more clearly — nor more truly. It is still the road to heaven, and it is effective after 2000 years.

Why not trust Jesus Christ as your Saviour, right here, right now, right where you are? Just bow your head now and tell the Lord Jesus what’s in your heart in your own words.

Tell Him that you know you are a sinner. Tell Him you know that He died for you. Tell Him you trust Him to do what He said He would do. Ask Him to come into your heart and be your Saviour, just as He said He would. Then thank Him for saving you. Now go and tell somebody else!

No Time for God?

No time for God?
As soon to say, no time
To eat or sleep or live or die!
Or you will dwarf your soul,
And when the angel, death,
Comes knocking at your door,
A poor, misshapen thing you’ll be
To step into eternity!

No time for God?
That day when sickness comes
Or trouble finds you out
And you cry out for God,
Will He have time for you?

No time for God?
Someday you’ll lay aside
This mortal self and make your way
To worlds unknown;
And when you meet Him face to face,
Will He — should He — have time for you?

No time for God?
What fools we are to clutter up
Our lives with common things,
And leave without heart’s gate
The Lord of life and light itself — our God?

Archimedes Dreams of Moving the Earth

“Give me a lever long enough and a piece of firm ground, and I can move the world,” Archimedes, a mathematician from ancient Greece, is credited with saying.

Archimedes was a creative and innovative thinker far beyond his time. It would be a few thousand years before the world would have a mathematician of his caliber again. He delighted in posing questions and then seeking for creative solutions. At one time King Hieros of Syracuse built a magnificent ship as a present for Ptolemy, the king of Egypt. But King Hieros ran into a problem when it came time to move the ship from the shore to the sea. The king asked Archimedes to help him solve this problem. A few days later Archimedes rigged a system of pulleys to a large screw turned by a hand crank. When all was ready, Archimedes invited the king to the beach to watch. Archimedes turned the crank and single-handedly drew the ship into the water. The king was delighted with Archimedes’ ability.

Archimedes was a scientist who looked at the world with wonder and awe, and he loved to dream of what might be possible. He accomplished many incredible feats of engineering, but moving the earth would not be one of them! Modern mathematicians have calculated that the length of the lever needed for one man to move the world would have to be eight billion miles long. Building a lever this long is simply out of the realm of possibility.

A man may never move the earth as he dreamed of doing, but moving the earth presents no difficulty to God. In fact, He is the One who created the world and set it spinning around the sun at just the right speed and distance to sustain life. He also made man to inhabit it when He created Adam out of the dust of the earth and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.

The most extraordinary quality that man has is that God created him in His “own image.” This means He made man with the ability to know and love Him. To other creatures on earth He gave special gifts, but only man was made with that special ability to know and love God.

But through the disobedience of our first parents, Adam and Eve, the entire human race fell into sin. Instead of knowing and loving God supremely, mankind loved created things more than the Creator. All humanity wandered in the darkness of sin, but God still loved them and sought to recover them from the error of their ways.

Archimedes could dream of a way to move the earth, but he had no power to carry out his plan; God made a plan to bring a world of ruined sinners back to Himself, and He has the limitless power and wisdom to carry out His design.

To carry out His plan, “the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world” (1 John 4:14). In the most wonderful and awe-inspiring event of human history, the Son of God Himself became a man and walked on earth. At the age of thirty, He began His public ministry. For three and a half years, He walked over the countryside of Israel. He healed the sick, He did miracles, and He preached the kingdom of God. His words were of matchless power and struck men deep in their hearts. At the end of this time, He was betrayed by one of His followers into the hands of men who hated Him. They gave Him a false trial and condemned Him to death.

When they carried out the sentence, little did they realize that they were nailing to the cross the very One who had spoken the world into existence.

His death was no accident but had been planned before the world was made. The death of the Lord Jesus Christ is the only means of atoning for fallen, sin-loving, death-deserving humanity.

Death wasn’t the final chapter in the life of the Lord Jesus. He arose from the grave on the third day. He showed Himself alive for forty days on earth before being taken up to heaven to sit at God’s right hand. There are untold chapters yet to come in the glorious story of the Son of God. Don’t let the life of the Lord Jesus remain a closed book to you.

Archimedes dreamed of a lever and of a piece of solid ground in order to move the world. Surely God’s love is the lever long enough and the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is the solid ground needed to move your soul to faith in the Saviour.

With wonder and awe, won’t you consider these truths and make the Lord Jesus Christ your Saviour?

The Super Diary

There is a new project just begun, a project to record everything a person does or feels—everywhere a subject goes and everything he sees, hears, reads, says or touches.

A pretty big order, wouldn’t you think? But using camera, microphone and sensors worn by the subject, they feel certain enough about the possibility of the plan to solicit bids and award contracts too.

This will be far in the future, right?

No. Now! Now there are such plans and probably such possibilities too. But all taken together and worked out to the farthest human possibility, they will not be able to make man all-powerful, nor all-knowing, nor all-seeing! God is still in control both now and forever.

The greatest of these wonder-machines will not be able to read a mind — or intercept a single prayer — or stop one soul from believing and knowing God.

Nor can they change the love of God for His creatures. Remember John 3:16? “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

How can those same so-loved creatures turn away from the ever-living, ever-loving God? The answer is in the Bible: “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord [has] laid on Him the iniquity of us all.”

How beyond all understanding that is! To think that God, who is infinitely pure and holy, can love us — guilty, failing, sinful — and give the greatest gift in all time or eternity to redeem us from the penalty of our sins.

“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends,” but we were not even His friends! His love was even greater than that. Now He asks only that we accept and receive the pardon, redemption and everlasting joy He offers. How can we not say, “Yes, Lord”?

Extreme Weather

Have you ever seen the dashboard of a big semitruck? It looks a little bit like an airplane’s cockpit with a lot of gauges, switches and levers. Our truck has 20 gauges and 26 switches! When driving, while keeping an eye on the road in front of us, checking our side mirrors to know where traffic is behind and beside us, we also need to scan all the gauges from time to time to make sure everything is running properly.

A lot of the gauges give pressure and temperature readings. Air pressure, oil pressure, braking pressure, as well as temperature of transmission, oil, gear box and fuel gauge, and also speedometer and tachometer. If a gauge shows a problem, hopefully we will notice in time to make changes or take measures to keep from having a mechanical problem.

Today our attention was often focused on the gauge showing the outside air temperature. We watched it climb to 106.2 degrees. That is hot! The weather forecast for this weekend had warnings of extreme heat, advising people to stay inside as much as possible. When we stopped for a break, it was quite a shock to step out of the air conditioned truck into the heat.

A little further down the road a small rain shower cooled everything off. The temperature gauge showed the outside temperature dropped to 86 degrees while it was raining. That was quick!

Sometimes we are sure that summers are hotter (and winters are colder) and storms are worse than “when we were young,” but it may be the kindness of God in reminding us that earth is not our “forever home.” The Bible tells us that some of these things — earthquakes, tornadoes, fires, floods and landslides—point to the soon-coming of the Lord Jesus to take His people (the ones who have accepted Him as their Saviour) to heaven. Perhaps He is allowing so many natural disasters to wake us up to consider the end of the world and the end of our pathway on earth.

God has also promised that He is in control; the world will not end before He has finished His plans. The promise is that “while the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease” (Genesis 8:22).

There shall be famines and pestilences and earthquakes, and we shall hear of “wars, and rumors of wars,” for it is still the day of God’s grace. When the last person that God is waiting for accepts the Lord Jesus as his or her own Saviour, then God will let the Lord Jesus come for His people. Then all who are His will be caught up together “to meet the Lord in the air.” Think of it!

I Don't Believe in the Right Ways

If you are not already saved, you don’t believe in Jesus in any way. The Bible does not recognize two ways of believing — a “right way” and a “wrong one.” Men may speak about a “living faith,” a “saving faith” and an “intellectual faith,” but Scripture speaks of believing what God says.

Faith in man and faith in God are the same exercises of mind; the difference is not in the faith, but in the person on whom faith depends.

Paul did not say to the Philippian jailor, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ with the right kind of believing, and thou shalt be saved. He simply said, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Do the same, and “thou shalt be saved.” Don’t think about your believing, but about Christ, the object of your faith.

“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:31).

Such an Offer!

Such an offer! Full and free!
Is it really meant for me?
That all my sins on Christ were laid,
That all my debt by Him was paid?
Yes, Jesus says it who has died;
“Believe,” and I am justified.

Such an offer! Pardon now
For hidden sin and broken vow!
For years of cold neglect and scorn;
Can mercy’s day upon me dawn?
Yes, Jesus died instead of me;
His death for mine must be my plea.

Oh, what goodness! Lord, I take
This offer You so freely make!
My one desire shall henceforth be
To live for Him who died for me;
Spread, glad news, through every nation:
Instant – free – and full salvation!

Alligator Attack

Bradley was an energetic, fun-loving 10-year-old boy who lived in South Florida. One day Bradley and his parents, along with some other friends, were canoeing down the Loxahatchee River in Jonathan Dickinson State Park. This is a shallow, winding river with a lot of lush, tropical plants lining the banks. People enjoy paddling their canoes and seeing the many birds and animals in their natural surroundings.

People from other states specially enjoyed seeing the alligators, and there were many in the river. The park rangers warned visitors about staying out of the water and not feeding them. Alligators have a natural fear of man, but they can lose that fear if fed by people. However, it is a common practice for canoeists to get out of their canoes to push off when they are grounded on a sandbank or stuck in tree roots and to go swimming when they get too hot.

Bradley and his parents and friends were wading in the shallow water when his father suddenly missed him. Seeing something white being pulled through the water, the father grabbed at it to find it was Bradley’s T-shirt. Trying to pull his son out of the water, he felt him being tugged back in. To his horror the father discovered that a huge alligator had Bradley in his jaws! He grabbed his son’s leg and held on while others began beating the’ gator with canoe paddles.

The alligator finally let Bradley go, and his father and the others wrapped the T-shirt tightly around him to try to stop the severe bleeding. Paddling feverishly, they reached the nearest place where they could call for help. Soon Bradley was being airlifted by helicopter to the nearest hospital, but he was too badly injured, and it was not long before he died of a fractured skull.

This alligator reminds us of a far worse enemy who is trying to deceive and, in the end, destroy. Some think the devil is just a joke, but the Bible, God’s Word, tells us, “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8).

Satan deceived Eve in the Garden of Eden, and he has been trying to deceive mankind ever since. But Jesus defeated the devil at the cross of Calvary where He died for our sins. Someday the devil is going to be cast into the lake of fire forever. But all those who have believed that Jesus died on the cross for their sins and have accepted that wonderful redemption are safe forever in Jesus’ hands.

“I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand. My Father, which gave them Me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand” (John 10:28-29).

If that had been you instead of Bradley, would you be in heaven now? Jesus is coming soon to take all Christians up to be with Himself in heaven. All people need to be sure that they are ready. Are you?

Debatable Land

For three hundred years part of the land in the border region between England and Scotland was claimed by both countries. This area became known as the Debatable Land. Neither country was able to exercise control over the fierce warriors who inhabited the region. These lords and barons would often come out of their castles with their followers and attack towns and estates in the surrounding country. They grew rich and powerful by their looting. Since they owed allegiance to no authority higher than themselves, they could act in a lawless way and not fear punishment.

Their piratical ways came to an end when King James VI of Scotland became also King James 1 of England in 1603. With the united power of both countries, he took steps to pacify the border and end the lawlessness. He sent soldiers to tear down the fortified towers of the raiders and, rounding up their families, sent them to Ireland.

Another part of the world which has been dubbed Debatable Land is the coast of Georgia. The Spanish had a fort in St. Augustine, which they felt gave them a right to the land of South Georgia. The English felt their claim was established by a wilderness outpost at Fort Frederica. The coast for the most part was sparsely populated and a haven for dangerous pirates. The Spanish Governor from Florida led a force of three hundred to attack the English and drive them out of the Debatable Lands. He lost the battle of Bloody Marsh, with the result that South Georgia came firmly into English control. It remained an English colony until the American Revolution.

If you perform a word search on “Debatable Lands” on the computer, both these places would pop up. There is a third place which you should know about, which is hotly contested by two opposing countries. Lawlessness too is a chief characteristic of this place. The other Debatable Lands were from long ago and don’t directly involve you. However, the conflict going on right now for this other Debatable Land will have a tremendous impact on your life. In fact, the battle may be going on right now in your heart and life!

How does this directly affect you and me? We live in a war-torn region. We are in the midst of the immense conflict between good and evil-between God and Satan. At some future moment the Lord Jesus will return, judge His enemies, and set up His kingdom on earth. Then will begin His glorious reign. Until that time the world will be in a state of turmoil.

You can’t stand on neutral ground in this conflict; there is no neutral ground. You are either on one side or the other; to steer a neutral course and have nothing to do with either side is an utter impossibility.

Oh, be wise and repent and put your faith in Christ, He is the Victor over death and the grave, and in His name alone is there salvation for sinful man. “There is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

A Father's Love

His tie loosened around his neck and sport coat thrown casually over his shoulder, the young father walked his four-year-old daughter down an inner-city sidewalk. The little girl wore pigtails tied in ribbons, and a jumpsuit. With her little hand held snugly in his bigger hand, he was taking his child to McDonald’s for a bite to eat. They walked past dilapidated buildings and empty lots strewn with broken bottles.

Suddenly, a car careened around the corner. The car swerved wildly from side to side. Making a loud bang, it sideswiped a parked vehicle. Instead of slowing to a stop, the car sped up. The father saw the unthinkable happen. The car turned towards him and his daughter. He had only a split second to react. He grabbed his little girl and turned his back to the onrushing car. It was the last thing he ever did. The car’s tires hit the curb, flew across the sidewalk, and struck the father. He died instantly, but his little girl, shielded by his body, escaped serious injury.

Tragically, the little girl will grow up without a father, but by his action to save her she can never doubt his love. A father’s love is priceless and irreplaceable. Do you know that God, the Father, loves you with an incredible love? Before the universe was ever made He knew men and women would leave the paths of righteousness and rush headlong into sin and darkness. He made the decision to send His Son that they might have a way to be saved. “The Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14).

When the Father gave His Son, He could give no more. “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him” (Matt. 17:5). The Son was beloved because He was ever perfectly obedient to the Father’s will. His perfect obedience led Him to the cross where He offered His life as a sacrifice for sin.

Every soul who believes on Christ will be shielded from the certain judgment that must overtake all those who remain in their sins. On the cross, in His own body, the Lord Jesus bore the punishment for the sins of all those who would come to Him in faith. There is no other way to be shielded from the consequence of our sins but by believing on the heaven-sent Savior. “Who His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed” (1 Peter 2:24).

Because the Father was willing to send the Son to Calvary’s cross, no one need ever doubt His love. “He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?” (Rom. 8:32).

His love is a living love. He raised the Lord Jesus from the dead to live in the power of an endless life. From heaven He is seeking people who are dead in sins to make them His living children forever. Those who die in faith will have their bodies raised to a new life, never again subject to pain, death or harm. It is the Father’s pleasure to give to all who believe on His Son the gift of eternal life. “This is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent” (John 17:3).

His love is a love which will never cease, a love which death can never dim, a love that can bring the hope of heaven to those who otherwise would never think of it. His love is a love which no soul should ever do without. Will you not come to Jesus Christ, God’s Son, that you might know a father’s love?

In a Moment

The little car was waiting for a traffic signal to change. Suddenly there was a jolt, a jar, and the sickening sound of crumpling metal. From the car behind a protesting voice rose: “But officer, I only looked away for one moment!” And then a man’s voice: “That’s all it takes, ma’am! All it takes. Now, how do you spell your name?”

Too bad. One car damaged, one car “totaled” and all it took was one moment.

Another road, another car, and a sudden crash, a scream, a burst of flame, and a young life ended and a heartbroken mother crying: “One moment you have everything-everything!-and the next it is all taken away and you have nothing. In only one moment!”

Or think, if you had that “one moment,” or even several moments, a time to react in the face of disaster—could you use it successfully? There was a recent train wreck. Two trains hurtling toward each other and for only three or four seconds “they could possibly see each other.” Did it help? No, twenty-five people were killed in that crash, and more than 135 others injured. How quickly, how suddenly, everything changed for so many.

But there is another moment which is still to come. “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye [and how quick is that?], the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised...and we shall be changed” (1 Cor. 15:52).

Changed? Life will change, but not to grief or sorrow nor even to regret, but to all the joy of the Father’s house forever.

BUT if we have never owned God as Father, never accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior, there will not be time to change. All those who have not prepared for that great change, those who have chosen this world or have simply neglected “so great salvation,” there will not be time to change.

“I never gave it a thought” will be a very poor plea in that day. Think now! You “know not what a day may bring forth” and everything may be changed “in a moment”!

Jesus

I’ve tried in vain a thousand ways

My fears to quell, my hopes to raise;

But what I need, the Bible says,

Is ever, only, JESUS.

My soul is night, my heart is steel;

I cannot see, I cannot feel;

For light, for life, I just appeal

In simple faith to JESUS.

He died, He lives, He reigns, He pleads;

There’s love in all His words and deeds;

There’s all a guilty sinner needs

Forevermore in JESUS.

Though some should sneer, and some should blame,

I’ll go with all my guilt and shame;

I’ll go to Him, because His name

Above all names, is JESUS.

Call His name JESUS: for He shall save His people from their sins” (Matt. 1:21).

The Last Flight

The proof was in the DNA of the two large bones found in October 2008 at the crash site in California. They belonged to the unfortunate Mr. Fossett. In September 2007 he took off in a single-engine plane and just disappeared until a plane-crash site was found. Parts of a plane were found, but that was not conclusive. Not even finding his shoes and driver’s license were absolute proof that Fossett was the man who had died in that shattered plane until the bones were found and tested for DNA. That ended all doubt.

He was a 63-year-old millionaire, an adventurer who notched up 116 records in balloons, airplanes, sailboats, gliders and airships. He climbed more than 400 mountains and swam the English Channel. But one flight was his last, and he never returned. The largest air and ground search in U.S. history, involving dozens of planes and hundreds of people over an area of 17,000 square miles, failed to find him.

His flight into eternity is considered an accident. He couldn’t fly over this mountain peak, and he didn’t plan on the sight of the mountainside rushing into his windshield. He was planning his next world speed record, but his record making is finished.

You and I will never match or exceed his records. For example, in 2005 he was the first person to fly a plane around the world without refueling. But we will compare in one way. You and I will also have a last flight. He suddenly went into eternity-an unplanned flight. So will we.

Jesus Christ spoke of a man who had great plans for his future. In Luke 12 he said he would pull down his barns and build bigger ones to store the plentiful harvest he had just reaped. He would take it easy and retire on Easy Street.

He said, I have “enough...for many years; take [it easy], eat, drink, and be merry” (verse 19).

God said, “Fool! This night your soul will be required of you; then who will get it all?”

He was so busy that he forgot about God, about his soul, and about the end of this life. Jesus said the poor rich man was not rich toward God. He abruptly left everything behind and stepped into eternity. No replay possible.

How much wiser it would have been to have followed the advice in the Bible: “Seek ye the Lord while He may be found”! That applies to all ages and conditions, but-the day will come when He can no longer “be found.” We are no more sure of tomorrow than the rich man nor the flier.

"Lie Still!"

The rotating lights of the squad car flashed on and its shrill siren cut through the quiet of the inner-city Chicago neighborhood.

A taxi which had been weaving from one side of the street to the other came to a halt. In plain view of the officers in the squad car, the taxi driver opened his door, poured out the contents of a liquor bottle, and started running.

The policemen raced after him and caught him. There was a scuffle, a grappling of hands and arms. The cabdriver worked one of his arms free in the fray, reached under his jacket and pulled a handgun from a shoulder holster. He leveled it toward one of the officers. Both their weapons were still holstered.

“No! Hold it! Don’t do it,” they shouted.

Before they could react further, the cab driver shot. Officer Matura’s gun hand was hit. The driver fired again, and Officer Duffy crumpled to the pavement, his bulletproof vest pierced by a bullet.

Officer Matura stepped backwards, drew his own revolver, and fired every cartridge at the cabdriver. Shooting with his left hand, his shots went wild and missed. Out of ammunition, he retreated down the street to reload.

The cab driver turned and shot Officer Duffy again as he lay in the street, and then he went in pursuit of Officer Matura, following him down the street for half a block.

Duffy wasn’t dead. He had been shot twice, but he still was conscious. When he saw his assailant leave he struggled to his hands and knees and started crawling. He crawled about twenty feet to behind a parked van and collapsed. He was trying vainly to raise himself to crawl again when he heard a woman whisper to him, “Lie still!”

The woman saw he was dazed and didn’t understand. “Lie still!” she repeated urgently.

The gunman returned to his cab and saw that the police officer’s body was missing. He began looking for him. “Where is that guy? I’m going to kill him,” he shouted.

The young woman, Anne Claxton, quietly slipped into a position between the would-be murderer and the wounded policeman, blocking his view of Duffy lying on the pavement.

The taxi driver made a futile search for him for a few seconds, and then jumped back into his cab and sped away. There was a car chase and another gun battle before police were able to take him into custody.

Anne Claxton, standing bravely between the wounded officer and his foe, reminds us of the Lord Jesus Christ who has stood between us and our foe—Satan. To shield us from the judgment our sins deserve, the Lord Jesus went to the cross and died. He, the just One, suffered for us, the unjust, to bring us to God. Now all who believe on Him shall never come into condemnation but have passed from death to life. Rom. 8:1 Says, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.”

If it had not been for the intervention of Anne Claxton, the policeman would have likely been killed; if it were not for the Lord Jesus’ death on the cross, not a single member of the human race could ever have been saved from their sins.

Anne whispered into the ear of the wounded officer, “Lie still! Lie still!” If you have realized your own danger, if you know that you need the Savior, won’t you stop trying to help yourself and simply receive salvation as a free gift from Him who intervened between you and the enemy of your soul and died on your behalf?

“The Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me” (Gal. 2:20).

Not by Feelings

Sometimes people have the idea that before they can be saved they must feel something. They hope to get some special revelation; they expect that something remarkable will take place inwardly and that after they have experienced wonderful feelings and emotions they are then (but not until then) entitled to believe that they are saved.

Well, nobody was ever saved in that way! We are saved by the work of Christ on the cross. That work was done outside of us, so if we are to be saved by it, we must look outside of ourselves.

“Look unto Me,” Christ says. He never says, “Look unto your own heart.”

No one ever got peace by looking there. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked” (Jer. 17:9). How could we expect to get peace by looking there?

Christ made peace by the blood of His cross (Colossians 1:20). He says, “By Him all that believe are justified from all things” (Acts 13:39). That is, by believing on Christ, all your sins are forgiven in a moment, and you stand justified before God.

There is nothing here about feeling an inward transformation. We cannot feel that our sins are pardoned; that’s impossible. We can only know that they are pardoned by believing the Word of God.

When you believe on the Lord Jesus, He tells you that you are pardoned—that you have everlasting life. You didn’t have it before you believed, but you have it when you believe on Him who did it all and paid it all, and you know it simply because He says so.

Out of This Life

Out of this life I cannot take

Things of silver and gold I make;

All that I cherish and hoard away,

After I leave on earth must stay.

Though I call it mine and boast its worth,

I must give it up when I quit the earth;

All that I gather and all that I keep

I must leave behind when I fall asleep.

I wonder often just what I shall own

In that other life where I go alone;

What shall He find, and what shall He see

In the soul that answers the call for me?

Shall the great Judge say, when I am through,

That I’ve laid up treasure in heaven too?

Or shall it at last be mine to find

That all I had worked for I left behind?

Sinking in Pelican Bay

“It was a dark and stormy night,” as the old stories used to begin. But this was not a story; this was true—and in our modern times—and in “Pelican Bay,” not far away.

It was about 10:30 at night when a towboat crew reported to the Coast Guard that they had found a capsized dinghy floating in the bay. There was clothing and other debris floating, and they knew there was something wrong.

Nearing the site, the Coast Guard found another boat, a sailboat, also sinking. This boat held a survivor, Jean-Francois Duplaa, the owner of both boats, still clinging to the mast. As he struggled to climb the wet and slippery mast, four and five-foot waves continually crashed down on him. Very little more would wash him away.

No time was wasted! The Coast Guard radioed for a helicopter, and with it came a rescue swimmer, Petty Officer First Class Curt Rohrich. The swimmer quickly fastened the harness from the helicopter to the struggling man, wrapped his arms around him, and they were hoisted into the helicopter together. The rescued man was taken into a hospital for evaluation.

A happy ending to an unexpected adventure! The sailor’s life was saved, and even the sailboat may be salvaged.

It could so easily have ended so differently. What if there had been no Coast Guard crew? no rescue swimmer? no helicopter? What if all his struggles to climb had ended with him still alone on the “dark and stormy” water? There would have been no hope for him as the tip of the mast slipped under the waves. No help-no hope-even if he had reached the very top of the sinking mast.

No matter what his efforts to save himself had been, he soon would have vanished beneath the tossing, tumbling water. What a tragedy for him and his loved ones!

If we only look around, we can see the same story being reenacted in many, many ways. So many of life’s sailors are really struggling to “climb the mast” and reach a higher level of “goodness” in an effort to get to heaven. But if the ship is sinking, what will the effort be worth?

Help and rescue must come from above, from One who is “able to save.” There is One—only One—who came all the way from heaven at immense cost and suffering to Himself, to lift us up to heaven and out of the deadly waters.

You know who it was. You have probably heard about Him for years, but you must accept His salvation so freely offered, for “neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

Struggling Alone

“Greek Seaman Cerasimos Koutcufas was one minute from rescue as the lifeboat came alongside his waterlogged raft. But in those brief seconds he died.” (Daily Express)

In the darkness of night the Greek ship Zafiris was wrecked on the rocks of the Mull of Galloway. The captain, seeing that the ship was fast on the rocks and in little danger of sinking immediately, ordered the crew to stay aboard until it was light.

Koutcufas disobeyed. Seizing a life jacket and a raft, he slipped over the side in the darkness, intent on saving himself. For five hours he fought his lone battle against the icy sea. Then the Portpatrick lifeboat closed in. The 28-year-old seaman, in one last, exhausted effort, grabbed for the ropes looping the dark blue hull. He missed!

Lifeboatmen caught hold of his life jacket. It was empty! The jacket was not tied on properly, and Koutcufas slipped through it and into the sea. He was not seen again.

Poor, poor man! He lost his life while trying to save himself. Had he only obeyed his captain and stayed with the ship, he would have been saved, for the other twenty-four on board were all rescued.

How many people today are like that poor seaman? How many are trying to save themselves—not their lives, but their everlasting souls—with a raft of good works and a life jacket of hoping for the best? It will not do. “None can keep alive his own soul” (Psa. 22:29).

There is only one way. Our own efforts will not gain salvation; it is “not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us” (Titus 3:5).

“By grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast” (Eph. 2:8-9).

Why struggle on alone?

The Unchanging Word

Feelings come and feelings go,

And feelings are deceiving;

My warrant is the Word of God-

Naught else is worth believing.

Though all my heart should feel condemned

For want of some sweet token,

There is one greater than my heart

Whose Word cannot be broken.

I’ll trust in God’s unchanging Word

Till soul and body sever;

For, though all things shall pass away,

HIS WORD SHALL STAND FOREVER!

An Urgent Situation

A visitor came to my door last week, and after talking about other matters I asked permission to ask the young man a question.

“John, if you died today, do you know where you would be?”

“It would be nice to go to heaven,” he replied after some hesitation. I suspected he didn’t think about serious matters often.

“But how about your sins? Would the Lord Jesus take you into heaven with them?”

“Well,” he stammered, “I’d have to change them or something.” He tried to explain as he ran out of ideas.

He seemed to want to go just then and we parted company.

Can you stop for a moment and consider why the Lord Jesus died?

“Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Tim. 1:15).

“Christ died for the ungodly” (Rom. 5:6).

Doesn’t that make it very plain what to do about sins? Are you a sinner? Do you qualify for salvation? Have you ever confessed your utter sinfulness to God and asked for the forgiveness that comes from Christ alone? Open your Bible today—now—and seek the Lord while you can. Your situation is more urgent than you realize.

Who Can You Trust?

Farmers in the state of Washington were blaming bad weather for their poor wheat crops, their stunted corn and their sick cattle. Some thought that their own farming skills were at fault.

Then they found that the fertilizer they had bought in good faith and spread on their land to feed it might very well be the cause of their troubles. A nearby steel mill pours a dark powder into the top of a silo. It is classified as “hazardous waste.” From the bottom of that silo the same material, unaltered, comes out as raw material for fertilizer.

Who can you trust?

The art world has been stunned to find that many of Van Gogh’s paintings—paintings worth millions of dollars—may be very clever fakes. One of his famous “Sunflower” series was sold to a Japanese firm for $39.5 million by Christie’s auctioneers, of London. Is it possible that something so expensive could be a fake?

Then, who can you trust?

A young man approached an elderly widow. “Ma’am, your driveway is in bad shape, but my company can resurface it for you.” It will cost more than she can afford, and the new surface will wash off with the first hard rain. “But he seemed such a nice young man,” she moans. “Who can you trust?”

From rich or poor, individuals or whole communities, the question rises: “Who can you trust?”

Look at the coins (U.S.) in your pocket and the fresh bills from the bank. One and all they proclaim: “In God we trust.” It may seem that our trust is in the money, not the message, but to trust the money and not the message would be disastrous!

There is everlasting trustworthiness in the One who set the planets in their orbits, who controls the courses of the most distant stars, who can turn from the vastness of the universe and promise that the seasons, “seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease” (Gen. 8:22), while the earth remains. What a promise! Believe it? Of course!

You have seen the sun, the stars, the changing seasons—you believe. What about the promises you cannot see fulfilled yet? Do you believe that “whosoever believeth in Him [Jesus Christ] should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16)? Really believe it? And have you received that everlasting life for yourself?

This promise is like a coin. There are two sides to it. “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life” is absolutely true. BUT, “he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him” (John 3:36). One side is just as certain, just as sure, as the other. Believe it! In God we can trust—and in no other.

“Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed” (John 20:29).