New Tabernacle SermonsTalmage, T. De Witt (Thomas De Witt)
Religion
New Tabernacle Sermons
Talmage, T. De Witt (Thomas De Witt)
Presbyterian Church -- Sermons; Sermons, American
II. I come now to speak of the second division--those who are seeking;
some of you with more earnestness, some of you with less earnestness.
But I believe that to-night, if I should ask all those who wish to
find the way to heaven to rise, and the world did not scoff at you,
and your own proud heart did not keep you down, there would be a
thousand souls who would cry out as they rose up: "Show me the way to
heaven!" That young man who smiled to the one next to him, as though
he cared for none of these things, would be on his knees crying for
mercy. Why this anxious look? Why this deep disquietude in the soul?
Why, at the beginning of this service, did you do what you have not
done for years--bow your head in prayer? You are seeking.
"I am a gambler," says one man. There is mercy for you. "I am a
libertine," says another. There is mercy for you. "I have plunged into
every abomination." Mercy for you. The door of grace does not stand
ajar to-night, nor half swung around on the hinges. It is wide, wide
open; and there is nothing in the Bible, or in Christ, or God, or
earth, or heaven, or hell, to keep you out of the door of safety, if
you want to go in. Christ has borne your burdens, fought your battles,
suffered for your sins. The debt is paid, and the receipt is handed to
you, written in the blood of the Son of God--will you have it? Oh,
decide the matter now! Decide it here! Fling your exhausted soul down
at the feet of an all-compassionate, all-sympathizing, all-pitying,
all-pardoning Jesus. The laceration on His brow, the gash in His side,
the torn muscles and nerves of His feet beg you to come.
But remember that one inch outside the door of pardon, and you are in
as much peril as though you were a thousand miles away. Many a
shipwrecked sailor has got almost to the beach, but did not get on it.
There are thousands in the world of the lost who came very near being
saved--perhaps as near as you are to-night--but were not saved.
On the eastern coast of England, a few weeks ago, in a
fishing-village, there was a good deal of excitement. While people
were in church, the sailors and fishermen hearing the Gospel on the
Sabbath, there was a cry: "To the beach!" and the minister closed the
Bible, and with his congregation went out to help, and they saw in the
offing a ship in trouble; but there was some disorder amid the
fishing-smacks, and amid all the boats, and it was almost impossible
to get anything launched. But after awhile they did, and they pulled
away for the wreck, and came almost up, when suddenly the distressed
bark in the offing capsized, and they all went down. Oh, if the
lifeboats had only been ten minutes quicker! And how many a life-boat
has been launched from the Gospel shore! It has come almost up to the
drowning, and yet, after all, they were not rescued. Somehow they did
not get into it!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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