THE ONLY HOPE IN THIS WORLD.
THE only hope for any permanent, lasting good to this world is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. That is “the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.” Rom. 1:16. But it is the hope of this world only as it is the hope of each individual; for belief—faith—is an individual, not a corporate or national matter. The hope, the salvation in Jesus Christ, is an individual, personal matter, because it is a matter of righteousness by faith. “For therein [in the Gospel] is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.” Verse 17. There are all sorts of political schemes, which promise prosperity and happiness to the inhabitants of this poor, old world, heavily weighted with its load of sin and misery. And there is no doubt but that men might help matters greatly to relieve the distress of poverty, and the conditions among the miserable poor in the charnel-house tenements of our overteeming cities. But all that man can do will not take away death, nor make men permanently happy. The working man, with his long hours of labor, imagines that if he had the leisure and money of the rich he would be happy; but he might be a debauche or a tyrant. There is many a wealthy man whose heart is a hell and whose grand palace is a marble tomb of all holy aspirations. There are more suicides proportionately among the ones of wealth and leisure than among the hard workers of earth. There is more happiness and content generally in the humble cottage than in the lordly mansion. But there is misery and dissatisfaction and want in both if Christ is not there. It did not take the governor's palace to inspire Paul and Silas with song. They could sing praises to God in a Roman prison, with sore and bleeding backs from the pitiless Roman scourge and feet fast in the stocks. Christ was with them, their Life, their Companion, their Friend. The troubled one at that time was the jailer, who had authority over all. But he found peace and joy when he found Christ Jesus. “Be not deceived,” no political conditions or changes in this world can bring peace to the soul where self reigns, to the heart that loves sin, or no permanent peace to any one. But the soul who knows Christ Jesus will have peace and joy even in poverty and privation. He has a freedom that no political party or change can give, freedom from the tyrant, sin. Man may sever the iron shackle which binds the limb of the slave, and bring a gladness to his heart and light to his eye for a little time, but Jesus Christ strikes from the mind, the heart, the soul, the fetters of sin and self, and makes the man a new creature. The slave set free from physical bondage often goes to a worse master, but the slave set free from sin goes forward to constant progression in Christ Jesus. Death may for a time interrupt the liberty, the joy, the gladness; but it is only an incident after all. Life, eternal life, is his who is Christ's, and from the hands of the Master it will be resumed, eternally, at His coming. O reader, seek the freedom which Christ Jesus gives freely to all who believe. There is happiness nowhere else. There is hope in naught else.