COME TO JESUS | AdventAI

Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Dec 15, 1859

COME TO JESUS.

"WHY SHOULD I COME?" YOU ARE A SINNER, COME FOR PARDON.

Perhaps you do not feel you are a sinner. At least you think you are no worse than others, but better than many. You are no drunkard, thief, adulterer, but keep the Sabbath, read the Bible, and attend the house of God. But have you indeed obeyed all the commandments? Never broken any of them? Always been true, chaste, sober, honest, forgiving, kind? Never indulged in pride, malice, anger, deceit, or lust? God requires purity of heart as well as of outward conduct, and he knows all our thoughts. Have you then never cherished the thought of sin in your heart, though you have feared outwardly to commit it? Besides, the first and chief command is to love the Lord our God with all our mind and strength. Have you always done this; always been thankful for his mercies; always carefully

read his word in order to obey it; always tried to please him, loved to pray to him, taken delight in his day, his people, his worship; always striven to be "holy as he is holy," to make known his truth, to induce others to love him, and endeavored in all things to glorify him? If you have always done this, you have still only just done your duty, and have nothing to boast of. But you have not done it. Conscience tells you so. You know you have sinned thousands of times. You know you have sought your own pleasure, have not been prompted by a desire to please God. You have lived for yourself; you have sought man's approval, but God has not been in all your thoughts. The Bible tells us, "If a man say he hath no sin he deceiveth himself. There is none righteous, no, not one. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God." O, my fellow sinner is it not true of thee, "The God in whose hand thy breath is, and whose are all thy ways, thou hast not glorified?" You are a sinner. Guilt, enormous guilt, hangs upon you. In God's book all your sins are written down. You cannot get rid of them. Were you to labor for thousands of years you could not atone for the past. All you could do would only be your duty. Paying to-day's debt still leaves yesterday's where it was. And were you to give all you possess, or suffer torture and death, it would not take away sin. The past cannot be recalled. But there is forgiveness, free, full, eternal, for the guilty. Jesus has pardon for thee, sinner, purchased with his own blood. Come for it. Come to Jesus Christ for it.

FOR PEACE OF CONSCIENCE COME.

"There is no peace saith my God to the wicked." Some sinners seem to be at peace, but it is only by refusing to think. They will not consider. But such thoughtlessness is not worthy to be called peace. It is like a man in a sinking ship, who will not examine what is the danger; or like a tradesman who fancies all is not going on well, but will not look into his accounts lest his mind should be disturbed. So the sinner fancies something is wrong, and fearing to be made unhappy he banishes reflection about God and his soul. Yet every sinner thinks sometimes, and then he must be wretched. When death visits a neighbor's house, or enters his own, or threatens himself, and at many other times the thought will come, "God is angry; my soul is in danger; I am not fit to die." And how must such a thought damp his pleasure and disturb his repose.

No you cannot be at peace till you have obtained pardon. You may try all the pleasures of the world in turn; you may seek to drown thought by plunging deeper and deeper into sin but you cannot be happy. But when we come to Jesus all our sins are at once forgiven. We still think of them with sorrow, but we need no more think of them with terror. God says to us, "Your sins and your iniquities will I remember no more." He blots out "all trespasses." He "casts them behind his back—into the depths of the sea." They will not be mentioned at the judgment-day. "He will abundantly pardon." He now regards us with love. We need not be afraid of him. He invites us to trust him as a kind friend. Instead of hiding from him as Adam did, we may hide in him as David did, saying, "Thou art my hiding-place." O what a happy change! I am a sinner still, but a sinner pardoned, reconciled,

saved. And whatever dreadful things conscience may tell me, Jesus says "thy sins are forgiven thee, go in peace." Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you. "Being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ." Poor sinner, you and peace have long been strangers. Worldly pleasure is not peace; and nothing can give it while you and God are enemies, and your sins hang heavily on your soul. Come then to Jesus. He both makes and gives peace. Seek pardon through him, and you will soon know what is meant by the peace of God which passeth all understanding."

FOR A NEW HEART—COME.

"Ye must be born again," said Christ to Nicodemus. There must be a great change in our thoughts and feelings respecting God, before we are able to serve him on earth and enjoy him in heaven. Sin has estranged our minds from God so that we do not desire him and love him. True religion is not pleasant to us. This is being "carnally minded, which is death." To love the things which sin makes distasteful, is a great change like coming to life. It is called the new birth or regeneration. Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." Unconverted sinner, how can you expect to enter heaven? You would not be happy there. A swallow enjoys the air and a cow the meadows, but a fish would soon languish there and die. There must be adaptation. Music charms those alone who have an ear for it; books are no treat to those who dislike reading; and society is only pleasant when it is congenial. A clown would not feel at ease at court; the ignorant cannot enjoy the company of the learned, the profligate do not love the society of the virtuous; and just so the ungodly cannot take pleasure in religion. Is not the Sabbath to you a dull day, the Bible a dry book, religious conversation unpleasant, prayer a task, and the company of the pious irksome? But heaven is all Sabbath, all worship, all holiness—its inhabitants all righteous, and their talk and actions all have reference to God. Heaven is happy because it is holy, and because God is there. But if you do not love holiness and God, it would not be a happy place for you. You would wander about, a miserable solitary thing, damping the enjoyment you could not share, and polluting the temple in which you alone would be unable to worship. Therefore, unless born again you never will enter. You cannot, I know, change your own heart, but the Spirit of God can. And Jesus died to obtain for us the gift of the Spirit. And this gift is freely bestowed on all who sincerely apply to the Saviour for it. O then earnestly pray for the Spirit of God, that you may be born again. Come to Jesus with the petition of David, "Create in me a clean heart O God, and renew a right spirit within me." And for your encouragement think, of the gracious assurance of Christ. "If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?"

FOR THE PRIVILEGES AND JOYS OF ADOPTION—COME.

Persons of wealth sometimes take the children of the poor, and train them as their own; this

is called adoption. And thus God describes his treatment of those who come to Jesus. "Ye shall be my sons and daughters saith the Lord Almighty." "We have received the Spirit of adoption whereby we cry Abba Father." We are permitted in prayer, to address God as "Our Father which art in heaven." He loves these adopted children with more than an earthly parent's affection. He teaches, watches over, comforts, feeds, protects them. Sorrows are his kind chastisements, intended for their benefit. "If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth." In all their trials he consoles them. "Like as a father pitieth his children so the Lord pitieth them that fear him." "As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you." Sickness, poverty, bereavement, all their troubles are overruled for their advantage. "All things work together for good to them that love God." "They shall not want any good thing." "No weapon formed against them shall prosper." In every difficulty and danger their Father is at their side. "Fear not, for I have redeemed thee. I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine. When thou passest through the waters I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee." "I will never leave thee nor forsake thee." They may tell their Father all their wants. "In everything make known your requests unto God." His ear is ever open to their cry, and his hand ever outstretched to do them good. As a father he provides for them an inheritance; but, unlike those of earth, it is "incorruptible, undefiled and that fadeth not away." O what happiness to be a child of God; to feel that "God is my Father! He loves me, pities, pardons, keeps me. I am safe from all evil. Wicked men and wicked spirits cannot harm me. God is my refuge, ever near; and he never slumbers, never is weary, never forgets, and will never change. He says 'I have loved thee with an everlasting love.' He will be always near me while on my journey here, and at last will take me to dwell with him in his palace forever. What earthly greatness can equal this? Reader would you be a child of God? You may if you come to Jesus; for 'as many as received,' came to 'him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God.'

THAT YOU MAY ENTER HEAVEN—COME.

As there is a place of punishment for the wicked so there is a heaven of glory for all who come to Jesus. God, in his great love to sinners, sent his Son not only to deliver them from hell, but to make them happy and glorious with him forever. How delightful is the description the Bible gives of heaven. We are told that sickness sorrow and death never enter there; that cares, fears, and anxieties are never felt there; that poverty, privation, unkindness and disappointment are never known there. The body that will rise from the grave will be "incorruptible," and will never experience, pain, weariness or decay. Old age will, never enfeeble for there will be perpetual youth; and death will never snatch away those we love for death itself will be destroyed. What is still better, there will be no more sin, but all hearts will be full of holy love to God, and to one another. Every one will rejoice in the society and happiness of every one else, and God himself will dwell among them. All the good men of former ages will be there—the martyrs and apostles and prophets. There, too, we shall meet with angels and archangels; and more than all, we shall behold Jesus in his glorified human body—we shall see his face, and ever be with the Lord. To show how glorious heaven is, it is compared to a place of rest after labor; to a father's house, a happy home. "They shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away. Everlasting joy shall be upon their heads. In his presence is fullness of joy, and at his right hand are pleasures for evermore." The best joys of earth are soon gone. Riches fly, health decays, friends depart, death is written on all things. But the joys of heaven are forever, and forever, and forever. Reader, this heaven may be thine. Jesus keeps

the door, but he has opened it wide for all sinners to enter. If you will not come to Jesus you cannot enter heaven; for he is the door, the only door. But he invites you to come. Yes however guilty and vile you are heaven may and certainly will be yours if you come to Jesus. "To you is the word of this salvation sent." O then, for heavenly bliss come to Jesus.—Am. Tract.