WHERE IS OUR SAFETY?

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Mar 16, 1904

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 30, No. 11.

WHERE IS OUR SAFETY?

THIS age is teaching its children to trust in self. God is teaching the world, through the very instability of the works of man, that there is no safety, nothing enduring in self. The glory of the ancients has crumbled into dust before our eyes; their lives have gone out like a whisper in the night; but the same stars that shone upon them are shining upon us with the same luster. Under the noiseless tread of the ages the most enduring works of the delvers in stone are being ground into powder, that generations to come might see the wasting process of human vanity. The wasting away of the glory of the pyramids keeps time to the process of destruction in every other monument to human pride, every work of man.

The human aspirant for glory has pressed the record of his speech and his doings into tablets of clay. To-day these books of brick are lisping and stammering in a pitiful attempt to articulate the glories of the human during the heyday of heathenism. Until the history of sin is finished, wasting and desolation are the appointed portion of all those things that minister to the glory of the human.

God has permitted men to build, out of the most indestructible material in this earth, massive monuments to self, in order that the slow elements of destruction might teach men their own weakness; so that, looking up into the imperishable heavens, they might throw themselves upon the everlasting mercies of Him who created the stars, and "calleth them all by names by the greatness of His might." That is the lesson for men to draw from all the perishing monuments of this earth. It is the lesson of the triumph of eternity over time; of the Infinite over the finite; of a loving Creator over a rebellious creature; of righteousness over sin. The finite has lifted its hand against the Infinite, set up the throne of selfishness in the very shadow of Calvary, and flung defiance at that Word which caused the earth to spring out of nothing. A patient Creator allows man's folly to be manifest to his posterity through the wasting away of those things which man has made to perpetuate his memory.

Every monument to self, to worldly fame, to human glory; every work of selfishness of whatever kind or whatever it is, every work that is not of God, is summoned to its trial in the court of eternity. The test is on, and precedents are barred. "Every man's work shall be made manifest; for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is." 1 Cor. 3:13.

We have looked upon the faded and shattered glories of the most substantial works of man; we have seen the fragmentary records of their greatest achievements still trying to tell their broken story; we have seen sickly childhood, tottering age, and the feeble frame of the wasting invalid; and we have seen the plumed hearse and the black-robed mourners leading a perpetual procession to the tomb. We have seen all this, and we have asked, Is there, then, nothing substantial, nothing imperishable, nothing perpetual but death and decay in all the star-sprinkled universe of God? Go out in the stillness of the night, when the prattle of humanity has been hushed upon the bosom of the crooning old earth, and look up into God's great torchlight procession, marching and countermarching to the orders of Heaven; and then fall down upon your knees, and ask God about it. Question the Maker of it all. He is not bound by time or distance. His ear is always within hearing of the lips of His feeblest children. Ask Him if there is nothing stable, tangible, perpetual in all His realm.

He will tell you that "from everlasting to everlasting" He is God. He will tell you that tho "all flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field" that perisheth, yet the word that has gone out of His lips "shall stand forever." "I am the Lord, I change not." "The things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal." While you are looking upon the dissolution of earthly things, the Lord will tell you that there is "a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens;" that the kingdom which He promises to the ransomed of earth is "an everlasting kingdom." Are you mourning the loss of human love, and wondering if there is any hope to which the human soul can anchor? Then know that God has loved you "with an everlasting love," and seeks to bind you to Himself with His everlasting cable of loving-kindness. Are you discouraged and cast down, forsaken and oppressed? Then know that "underneath are the everlasting arms." When trouble comes in like a flood till the very earth seems to tremble beneath your feet, then know that "the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are His." As He knoweth the stars and calleth them all by names, so He knows you, calleth you by name, knoweth your frame, and remembereth that you are dust. At the same time the Spirit maketh intercession for us with groanings that can not be uttered.

Then there is an eternal Rock, to which the most storm-tossed can anchor; there is an eternal habitation for the most footsore pilgrim; in the midst of changes and destruction, there is One who is "the same yesterday, to-day, and forever;" tho the words and works of men are crumbling and fading away, the word and works of God "stand fast forever;" the pyramid may become the plaything of the summer breeze, but "the foundation of God standeth sure;" the record of human selfishness will fade from the memory of the redeemed, but the simple story of Calvary will be sung by angels and by the redeemed as long as God shall live. In the very midst of death and decay, we may be laying hold on eternal life. We have learned that there is no safety in any device of man, no protection, no security against the elements of decay or the elements of strife and passion, that are rampant in the earth to-day. Our safety, our security, our salvation is in the Rock Christ Jesus, and in Him alone. Human schemes are but pitfalls of the enemy of our souls; but in the provision which God has made for us we may trust with absolute certainty.