What He Has in Store for Them
By S.
CHARACTERISTICS OF GOD'S REMNANTS. NO. 2.
What He Has in Store for Them.
CHRIST says of those who are accounted worthy to be numbered among the overcomers: "I will write upon him the name of My God, and the name of the city of My God, the New Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from My God, and Mine own new name." Rev. 3:12. Can we even imagine that God will permit His name, the symbol of His righteous character, to be stamped for eternity upon the forehead of any soul who is hiding sin in his heart? God will permit no Achans in heaven. The lesson of the hidden theft in the camp of Israel is full of meaning for the child of God. Not for one moment must we harbor the thought that Jesus Christ, whose life in human form and whose death on Calvary were made necessary by sin, will write His own new name upon the forehead of any soul who is clinging to sin while professing to serve Him. Can we imagine that the righteous Ruler of that city where only righteousness is ever to be, will ever label you or me for a habitation there, while there remains in our hearts the root of that evil plant which disrupted the peace of heaven, and put the seal of death on the tomb of the Son of God? Such can never be. If we allow any such idea to actuate us, as even a remote possibility, we are following a will-o'-the-wisp into the mire and quicksands of eternal death. God will not stamp us righteous till we are. And we will not be able to look upon the glorious majesty of the coming Christ, unless, before the time He appears, we have bid a final farewell to the last cherished sin, and have set our faces against it as firmly as the rock of ages. Christ says of that city: "There shall in nowise enter into it anything unclean, or he that maketh an abomination and a lie; but only they that are written in the Lamb's book of life." Rev. 21:27. "They that wash their robes" in the blood of Christ from all the defilements of sin are given "the right to the tree of life," and to "enter in by the gates into the city;" they have left outside everything that would have bound them to the kingdom of the adversary. They that cling to their sins are left outside with them. Inside those gates of pearl they can never enter; over that jasper wall they can not go; in the joyous pleasures and occupations of the redeemed they can never participate. "Without are the dogs, and the sorcerers, and the fornicators, and the murderers, and the idolators, and every one that loveth and maketh a lie." Rev. 22:15. If the tendrils of our hearts have wound themselves around some dear sin, our only hope is in cutting loose, no matter how much the cutting process may hurt us; for the longer they grow, the stronger they get. If you permit them too long to continue, a time may come—nay, will come—when you will have no power to cut loose, and they will drag you down with them, as the heavy cannon-ball drags the dead sailor down into the sea. Cut loose; cut loose now! The price of our dalliance with sin is far too dear. We can't afford to trade off a whole eternity of righteous life and enjoyment for a few short years of sinful pleasure here. "To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with Me in My throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with My Father in His throne." O, how much there is wrapped up in that! There is a striving for the Christ-life here, in temperance, in righteousness, in work, and then the right to be an inhabitant of the New Jerusalem, and to sit upon the throne of Him who is "King of Kings and Lord of Lords." Out of this over-grown garden of weeds Christ will take the choice plants of His most tender care, and place them where the weeds and the tares can never come to annoy and destroy. Out from among the ragged rocks of this disrupted and worn-out old world, Christ is even to-day chiseling and polishing stones that are to reflect the glory of His never-diminishing righteousness throughout eternity. Out from among the weepings and the woes, the sickness and the sins, the wasted opportunities and the blasting pleasures of life, Christ is to-day fashioning characters that He is going to entrust with the glorious honor of bearing His name, the symbol of His character, all through eternity. Of each such individual He says, "I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall go out thence no more." God grant that this may be said of you who read these words.