FANNY HAYES was a Christian. And although she was only nine years old, she told others about God’s free salvation.
One day she asked a gentleman, “Do you love Jesus?”
The gentleman smiled and said, “Yes, I do love Jesus. And now,” he continued, “may I ask you why you love Jesus?”
“Oh, because He died for me and was a substitute for my sins,” she answered.
“Substitution is a long word,” he said. “Can you tell me what it means?”
“Oh, yes, sir. It means that instead of me dying for my sins, Jesus died for them, and washed them away. Now I do not have to die, because He died instead of me.”
This is the meaning of substitution. But what about yourself? Are you still in your sins? If you are, the judgment of God awaits you. The sentence of death—eternal death—will be that judgment.
The Bible, the Word of God, tells us, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” Ezekiel 18:44Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sinneth, it shall die. (Ezekiel 18:4). Those words are so solemn that God repeats them in the 20th verse of that chapter: “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.”
ML-02/09/1964