“NO doubt it is a very great thing for any man while here in the body to be able truthfully to say that he is saved and ready for heaven. I would give a very great deal to be able to say that.” “You need not give anything. It is not by giving but by taking you get your soul saved.”
“Can you tell me how I am to have this certainty?”
“Whom am I speaking to? Am I speaking to a good man or to a bad man?”
“I hope I am not a bad man; though I do not for a moment fancy I am perfect.”
“You do not deserve damnation?”
“No, I trust not.”
“Do you believe God is just?”
“Most surely.”
“Would a just God send a man to hell who did not deserve to be sent there?”
“I am certain He would not.”
“Therefore, as you do not deserve hell, there is no fear of Him sending you there. Will you tell me now what you want to be saved from?”
“I want to be saved from my sins.”
“Have you got sins?”
“Yes, I have got sins. Everyone has got sins.
There is no one perfect.”
“You are not a bad man, and yet you have sinned against God. That is a paradox. But tell me, what takes people to hell?”
“Their sins, the Bible tells us.”
“And your sins are taking you to hell?”
“I hope not.”
“Are they taking you to heaven?”
“My sins will not take me there.”
“Nor to hell either?”
“I do not know.”
“But you tell me the sins of other people take them to hell?”
“I hope I have never done anything to take me there.”
“Are your sins nothing?”
“There is many a greater sinner than I.”
“Whom have they sinned against?”
“God.”
“And whom have you sinned against?”
“We have all sinned against the same Person.”
“But He does not think so badly of your sins as He does of the sins of others.”
“I have never done anything very wicked.”
“That is for God to say. He declares you have never done good.”
“Where does He say that?”
“It is the testimony of the Scriptures. But will you look with me at the third chapter of Romans? Read verse 10 to 12― ‘There is none righteous, no, not one: there is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, NO, NOT ONE.’”
“Well, I think I have done a great deal of good, though I admit I may also have done a few wrong things.”
“In that case you had better take your pen and write on the margin of your Bible, ‘This testimony is false,’ and thus, to use a common expression, nail the lie to the counter.”
“Oh, I do not say it is a lie.”
“What then? The Word of God says of all who are on the ground of works for salvation, there is none that doeth good, no, not one, and you say there is one, for you yourself have done a great deal of good. You make God a liar.”
“Well, it is strange if I have never done good.” “Do you think the devil does any good?”
“No, there is no good in him.”
“Exactly. He is a fallen creature, an apostate from God, so also are you, and all mankind by nature. ‘They are all gone out of the way’ (Rom. 3:1212They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. (Romans 3:12)). And ‘the carnal mind is enmity against God’ (8:7). You are also God’s enemy: think of that.”
“I am not His enemy.”
“Are you His friend?”
“I trust I am.”
“That is an honorable distinction in this world: Abraham was called the friend of God.”
“The devil may be, and I am certain is, God’s enemy, but I most surely am not.”
“Well, the devil’s great object from the beginning has been to call the Word of God in question, and make Him a liar. You and he seem to be running on the same lines. God affirms of man in his natural state that there is none that doeth good, and you flatly contradict Him.”
“Perhaps the things I may have thought good have not been good in His judgment.”
“Is His judgment wrong? Will you condemn Him that you may be just?”
“No, His judgment must be right.”
“Then yours is wrong.”
“I do not see how all this puzzling can be any help to me. I am as ignorant as ever as to the way of salvation.”
Salvation from what? In your judgment you are not a bad sort of person; you have never done anything wicked; you have no dread of coming into judgment with God; He cannot justly condemn you. What the law says to them who are under it, “There is not one that doeth good,” has no application to you; in short, righteously you cannot be sent to hell, and yet you want to know the way of salvation, and would give anything to know you were saved. Again, let me ask you, what you want with salvation? You do not need to be saved from the wrath to come, for you do not merit it, nor from hell, fur you are not going there. You would be horrified to think that a good, respectable, well-behaved religious man like you could deserve the damnation of the lake of fire. Let me tell you what the Saviour of sinners declared when here upon earth. ‘They that are whole have no need of the physician; but they that are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.’ If I accept your character as given by yourself, you could have neither part nor lot in Christ nor in the salvation of God. Christ died for the ungodly... when we were yet sinners ‘Christ died for us... when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son.’
“UNGODLY! SINNERS! ENEMIES! Every true Christian will admit that by nature he was all three. You see how simple it would be for you to be saved if you were in any of these three classes, because Jesus died for such, and His blood cleanses from all sin. By your efforts at self-justification you cut yourself off from any hope in Christ, and ‘the publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you.’
“Go down in the dust before Him, lest He take you away with His stroke. You have offended Him more by your, attempts to justify yourself than by all your other sins put together. Accept His verdict about your guilty life. Your wisdom is to put your hand on your mouth, and lay both in the dust, and say, ‘I have sinned.’”
“I suppose it is. God help me. If He has decided against me, I may well lay my hand upon my mouth. It is all over with me. I cannot force Him to change His mind. I cannot contend against Him, and who dare say they will enlighten Him? It is acceptance with Him I want, and if He refuses me, what will I gain by self-justification? I have been sitting on the judge’s seat when I ought to have been in the dock. His verdict has been given. I cannot ask Him to reconsider it. I dare not. I am appalled when I see with whom I have been at strife. I was trying to constitute myself judge of my own case. I can only say, God be merciful to me a sinner.”
“Thank God, you have been brought to this. You are now for the first time in your true place, and in your right mind. Like the willful son in the gospel, you have come to yourself. The truth is, there is no good in you; and if the fountain is bitter, the waters cannot be sweet; if the tree is corrupt, the fruit must be corrupt also. The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked, and out of that cesspool of evil are all the issues of life. But how good of God to let His light shine in upon your state, that you might see yourself to be vile in His sight, and that the revelation of His grace might be good news to you. No person but the one who sees himself a sinner will appreciate the Saviour. He will be despised by every other. Indeed, no one has a right to the Saviour but the sinner. Cold water is not welcome to any but the thirsty, nor is bread desired by any but the hungry. The full soul loatheth an honeycomb, and so Jesus is despised by the self-righteous.
“You will now be glad to hear of the salvation of God. He has taken upon Himself the whole settlement of the question of sin. He has taken upon Him to put right what man put wrong. He sent His Son. No one else could have accomplished this mighty work. He came to do the will of God. To glorify Him in the place where He has been dishonored, to crush the power of Satan, to abolish and destroy death, to cleanse the universe from the taint of sin, to present everything to God in perfect order, to bring in a universe of bliss where God can dwell amongst men in a city built of living stones, where all His brightness shall be displayed, where God shall be known in His nature and delighted in.
“This could only be accomplished through the death of Christ. He is the Second Man. The first man would do only his own will. You and I know something of him; we were poor, good-for-nothing, self-willed things. The Second Man came to do the will of God. He has suffered the judgment due to sin. By the sacrifice of Himself He has taken it out of the way of man’s blessing. It stands no longer in God’s path of blessing man. By dying He has broken the power of death, and He has crushed the whole power of the devil.
‘He hell in hell laid low;
Made sin, He sin o’erthrew;
Bowed to the grave, destroyed it so,
And death by dying slew.’
God has raised Him from the dead and glorified Him. God has found His perfect delight and satisfaction in Christ. He does not want anything from you and me. To every creature He sends forgiveness in the name of Jesus. There is no salvation in any other. To Him give all the prophets witness, that through His name whosoever believeth on Him shall receive remission of sins.
“But He is also appointed as Judge of living and dead. Those who refuse Him as He is preached in the gospel as Saviour must have to do with Him as Judge. God will make His enemies His footstool. He must reign till He has put all His enemies under His feet. ‘Now is the day of salvation. ‘It is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.’ Not the righteous―SINNERS Jesus came to call.” J. B―D.