What Is Your Hope?

By J. A. Farley.
Insecurity is the characteristic of the present moment. “Distress of nations, with perplexity — men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming upon the earth”— a prophetic utterance recorded 1900 years ago, and yet, never more pregnant with meaning than today.
Men have lost confidence in one another. Thrones are tumbling to the ground. Long-established standards vanish overnight is there stability nowhere?
To answer this question we need a voice of authority. Shall we open up that Book and turn over its pages until “Luther’s Psalm” confronts our gaze? “Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea... God is in the midst... God shall help... and that in the dawn of the morning” (Psa. 46. J.N.D.).
As the darkness deepens — the dawn draws nearer. The expectant Christian scans the horizon for the Morning Star.
“The coming of the Lord draweth nigh.” This is the Christian’s Hope. But, maybe, there are eyes glancing through these pages to whom this is a mystery.
Overcome by heat and labor, a poor old man in the north of India fell by the roadside, and was left to perish. Passing that way was a caravan, with a godly and devout missionary in its company. Seeing the old man there, the missionary knelt down at his side, and whispered into his ear, “What is your hope?” The dying man raised himself a little to reply, and with a great effort he answered: “The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin.” He then died from the effort.
The missionary was greatly astonished at the answer, and the calm, peaceful appearance of the man, but he felt assured that he had died trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ.
How or where could this man, seemingly a heathen, have got this hope, thought he. Suddenly he saw a piece of paper grasped tightly in the hand of the dead man. He took it from his hand, and what was his surprise when he found that it was a single leaf of the Bible, containing the first chapter of the first epistle of John, in which these words are found. On that page that man had found the gospel. Probably, he had known but little of the glorious-glad tidings, and yet, he had ventured his complete confidence for time and for eternity, upon the Saviour of sinners.
You, perhaps, have heard the Story countless times; perhaps could repeat chapters from that Book of books, but, hitherto, there has been no response to the gracious invitations and solemn warnings contained in the Word of God.
It is a wonderful privilege to be born in a country where the Bible is so freely scattered; and as you think of all God’s kindness to you, so strikingly displayed in the giving up of His Son to that shameful death upon the cross for this guilty world, will you not join the company of those who love to sing:
Bearing shame and scoffing rude,
In my place condemned He stood;
Sealed my pardon with His blood:
Hallelujah what a Saviour!
Gospel Similitudes.
“As a thief in the night.”
I have often thought how very strange it is that this simile should have been used by the inspired writer, that the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ should be placed in comparison with that of a thief. Surely of the hundreds of figures used to express some of the qualities of the Saviour, figures which include a stone, a rose, a star, a worm, a nail, this figure of a thief is the strangest of all, The burglars visited us a little while since, but, being disturbed in the midst of their work, they ran away leaving some of their clothes and tools, together with a lot of spoil stolen from a neighbor, on my premises; and so I found myself standing, replacing a screw in the lock of a scullery door, in the middle of the night, with the burglar’s own screwdriver which had been used a few minutes before in taking it out. It was the Lord’s doing and marvelous in our eyes, and I felt a special gratitude and satisfaction in using that particular screwdriver. I thought as I stood there, that, to compare little events with great, I could understand David’s feeling when asked for his enemy’s sword: “There is none like that, give it me.”
And then I thought that I only recollect hearing of one case quite like this before, and that case was no doubt allegorical. It is in the Jewish Talmud where the Emperor, attacking the Rabbi Gamaliel said, “Your God is a thief He stole a rib from a sleeping man.” And the Rabbi’s daughter replied, “A thief came to our house last night and stole a silver vase.” “Bad,” said the Emperor. “But,” said the Rabbi’s daughter, “he left a gold one.” “Good,” said the Emperor. “I wish that thief would come to me, often.” “Such is our God,” said the maiden. “If He takes away anything He gives something more valuable. He took away Adam’s rib and gave him Eve.”
And He who takes from us those things that it is a gain to lose, who takes from us our sins and gives us righteousness, takes from us time and gives us eternity, takes from us hate and gives us love, receives at our hands death and bestows upon us everlasting life. Has He visited your house, your soul? But that is not, I know, the primary meaning of the phrase, which is to set forth to the slumbering people of Sardis the coming of Christ as an occurrence, which to those not prepared for it, would be something unexpected and dreadful. To one class of people, His coming will be like the rising of the “bright and morning star” which preludes the dawning of an eternal day: to another His coming is calamity and disaster. To the one it is a promise; to the other it is a threat: “Repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee!”
J. C. Bayly.