The Sinner's Business

Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 17, 1859

The Sinner's Business.

A FEW weeks ago, as a minister of Christ was passing out of his lecture-room one evening after preaching, he accosted a young man who was standing near the door, with the question, "Are you a Christian?" "That's my business," was the young man's blunt reply. It was a rude answer, and was no doubt prompted by improper feeling. But the words which he uttered are fitted to suggest a most important truth, which cannot be too deeply impressed upon the mind of every unconverted sinner. Yes, it is his buisness, to settle the question whether or not he is a Christian; it is his immediate and urgent business; it is a business in which he ought to be diligent; it were better and safer for him to neglect or defer any other business, rather than this.

Reader, are you a Christian? If you are, will you not do your utmost to arouse your unconverted friend, neighbor, fellow-citizen, out of his criminal and dangerous neglect of the most important business which he has to do in this world? If you are not a Christian, will you make it your business,—your first and chief business,—to become a Christian? If you do not make it your business, though all the Christians in the world should unite in importunate prayer and persevering effort for your salvation, all would be vain; you would never be a Christian, you would never be saved. But on the other hand, if there were not a Christian heart in all the world that felt any concern for your salvation, so that you might truly say, "no man cares for my soul," yet if you would make it your business to care for it, you might come to Christ and be saved. An inalienable, inevitable responsibility rests with yourself. A precious treasure is committed to your keeping, to be forever saved, or forever lost, and "the time is short." "If thou be wise, thou shalt be wise for thyself; but if thou scornest, thou alone shalt bear it."

[Reflector.