ETERNAL LIFE
"And I give unto them eternal life." John 10:28
Jesus is speaking. He says this of His "sheep," those people who believe in Him, who obey His voice and follow Him. He knows them and gives unto them ETERNAL LIFE.
Eternal life refers not only to long life, but abundant life. It has reference not just to quantity but to quality; not just extent of time but substance; not just length, but depth, height, and breadth.
Its opposite number is Eternal Death. Eternal death means separation from God and all that is good forever. Eternal life means oneness with God and enjoyment of all that is good forever. Eternal death is hell and the lake of fire. Eternal life is heaven -- a new heaven and a new earth. Eternal death is darkness, torment, subjugation in Satan's kingdom. Eternal life is light, the end of suffering, and inheritance in the Kingdom of God's dear Son.
Eternal life is God-made, God-given, God-sustained, God-like, and God-honoring. It is Christ-centered, and Spirit-breathed. It is a mystery to the world, envied by the powers of darkness, crushing to sin. Eternal life is holiness, happiness, hope.
Eternal life is Jesus. "He that hath the Son hath (eternal) life." "I am . . . the life," said Jesus. He came to give it; He lived to demonstrate it; He died to purchase it; He arose to guarantee it; He ascended and sits glorified to offer it. He offers it to whosoever will receive it; He is coming back to receive unto Himself all who have it.
Eternal life may be yours. It is as real as Christ is real, as precious as Christ is precious, as near as Christ is near. It is exactly what it says: eternal -- everlasting -- never ending life. Life with a capital "L". Jesus said, "I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish." This is His promise. Do you want to live forever? Do you want to live with Him forever? You may if you will -- if you will receive Christ as your own Saviour. You must do it now. Eternal life becomes yours the moment you say "Yes" to the Lord Jesus Christ.
-- Editor
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"This is life eternal,
that they might know thee the only true God,
and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent."
John 17:3
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Second In A Series
HIS VIRGIN BIRTH
One argument against the Virgin Birth of Christ, set forth by its critics, is that the Virgin Birth is only mentioned by two of the New Testament writers, and these (they say) contradict each other.
But the truth is, these two accounts in Matthew and Luke agree as to the main facts. Here are the main facts:
1) The mother was a woman named Mary. M.1:18, L.1:27
2) She was a virgin. M.1:18,23, L.1:27,34
3) She was betrothed to a man named Joseph. M.1:18, L.1:27
4) Mary becomes with child AFTER her betrothal and BEFORE consummation of the marriage. M.1:18,20, L.1:27,34
5) Angels announce the coming. M.1:20, L.1:26
6) They explain the conception as due to a special creative act of the Holy Spirit. M.1:20, L.1:35
7) The child is to be named "Jesus." M.1:21, L.1:31
8) The child is to be the Saviour of His people. M.1:21, L.2:11
9) Joseph took Mary to be his wife before the birth. M.1:24, L.2:5
10) The child is born in Bethlehem and named "Jesus." M.2:1, 1:25, L.2:4-7,21
But there are also differences between the two accounts. These differences cannot be labeled as contradictions, however. The greatest difference between the two is the prominent person in each account. In Matthew's account, Joseph is the most prominent. In Luke's, Mary is the most prominent.
The reason for this is obvious if we stop a moment to see it.
First, the source of information for the two writers was different. There were only two people in all the world who knew the facts of the Virgin Birth: Joseph and Mary. Joseph was Matthew's source of information, while Mary was Luke's. That is why the story is related differently by the two writers.
Secondly, the purpose of the two writers was different. Matthew wrote to show Jesus as KING of the Jews. Luke wrote to show Jesus as SON of MAN. This is seen in the genealogies which each man sets down. Matthew traces Jesus' genealogy back only to David and to Abraham, the father of the Jewish race, thus showing Jesus' right to the throne of David. Luke goes back to Adam, the father of the human race, thus showing Jesus to be truly a Son of Man. So, there are differences but not contradictions.
However, the significance for you and me extends beyond His miraculous Virgin Birth, to His death and resurrection and glorification. Matthew recounts the angel's message to Joseph thus: "And she shall bring forth a son; and thou shalt call his name JESUS; for it is he that shall save his people from their sins" (M.1:21).
Luke recounts the angel's announcement to the shepherds thus: "For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord" (L.2:11).
The virgin-born babe lives today in the Glory as the Man Christ Jesus, the one Mediator between God and man. He wants to be your Saviour and Lord. You need Him, "For the wages of sin is death; but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 6:23). Receive Him by faith.
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TURNED INTO BLESSING
By Mrs. Frances Pool
Looking back to the night when I gave my heart to the Lord, I can scarcely believe it was only three years ago. Surely there could never have been a time when He was not my constant Companion and Friend; never a time when He was not guiding and directing my steps. How could I have lived, even for a moment, without Him? I realize now that He had been calling me from early childhood, but the noise of the world had deafened me to that still, small Voice. I can only marvel at His patience, and praise Him that He has led me to this place of complete consecration.
But let me take you back to the beginning. Significant, perhaps, that it should have started in a hospital bed and that one of the first lessons I learned was that we are often nearer Him in suffering than in our full health and strength! I was awaiting an operation that night -- a young woman with everything life had to offer; everything, that is, that the world calls success and happiness. From a very early age, I had studied for a musical career and had come a long way up the ladder. Now I had my own school of music and drama, and was utterly absorbed in my work, seven days a week. Yet here, in the stillness, it wasn't of my work that I was thinking, nor of my many friends; not even of my home and husband. I kept remembering a Gospel message I had heard as a child when, for a short time, I played a tiny organ in a humble mission hall. Deep in my heart, I had never forgotten it and, under all the interest and activity of the intervening years, had been a hunger, a restlessness, that nothing seemed to satisfy. In the quietness of that hospital ward, I was brought face to face with my own need and I realized that only God could supply it. This factual testimony has since been an encouragement to many a youth worker, as it serves to illustrate the value of a seed sown in childhood and how wonderfully it can be blessed in later years.
Back at home again, my life was completely changed. The old pleasures held no appeal; friends were incredulous, even amused; work had lost its savor. I was waiting for God to open the door to full-time Christian service and I spent every available moment preparing myself for it. During this period, my husband also came to know the Lord Jesus Christ as his personal Saviour, so when the call came for me to take up my duties as a young people's worker for the Lord's Day Observance Society in the west of England, we unhesitatingly sold our home and moved west. In countless ways, the Lord confirmed the rightness of this step and within weeks we were led to a little cottage near Bristol which was to be our new home.
How I rejoiced that my experience of young folk could now be used to His glory! Instead of teaching the rudiments of music and elocution, I was telling them the glad news of the Gospel! Then, less than a year later, the blow fell. A strange numbness in my feet began to spread up my legs, so that I tripped over mats and curbs and the smallest tasks became an effort. Three weeks of hospital investigations revealed that nothing medically could be done for me, and I returned home to life in a wheel-chair, paralyzed from the waist down.
As on that other occasion, God met with me and I was utterly at peace, but grieved that I could no longer serve Him. I could have prayed -- "Heal me, Lord, so that I may continue to work for Thee," for I know full well He has the power to heal. Instead, I found myself saying, "I am going to serve You, Lord, whether You see fit to heal me or not! If I can do nothing else -- I CAN PRAY!" And in those words lay the key to all that has happened since. He gave me a vision of intercession such as I had never glimpsed before and revealed to me that here was the most vital -- if alas! the most neglected -- ministry of all. There must, I thought, be many others laid aside as I am and longing to serve the Master. Could we not unite in prayer? Distance is no obstacle to Christian fellowship, so through the pages of a Christian periodical, I made known my desire to contact other children of God who, like myself, were weak in body, but (to Him be the Glory!) still strong in spirit. I recall what an effort it was to get to my typewriter that day and to type out the letter, but how richly rewarding it has been! Christians from all parts of the country, then later, from overseas too, wrote and rejoiced with me in the idea of such a fellowship, and so the Disabled Christians' Fellowship was born . . . a fast-growing army of prayer warriors "behind the lines" . . . a homeguard to "pray through" the more active armies of God. Most of our members are severely handicapped, but still rejoicing in God's grace and all-sufficiency. There is the crippled brother who manages to conduct a small Bible depot; the dear sister who cannot speak or move easily since a stroke, yet has found a ministry in letter-writing; the blind organist who cares for a semi-invalid wife . . . such are the saints who are winning a victory in the midst of seeming defeat; not fighting with swords, but with prayer and loving hearts.
Other doors of service have opened for me, too. Writing for the Christian press is one avenue which the Lord is blessing -- and how I rejoiced when I was commissioned to write a series of children's stories with a Gospel message! Then, too, I have been invited to start a women's work in our local chapel and there is a whole vineyard of opportunity on my own doorstep. Life is so full and happy in His will, physical pain and weakness are forgotten, or at least greatly mitigated, and I have learned so much in my affliction that I would not forego one minute of it. Not the least of these lessons has been that all things can be turned into blessing if committed to Him, and that Christian service is not confined to pulpit or mission field; nor are we ever unfit for service in His eyes. Every day, I am proving His love and His grace, and every day He grows more precious to me. Out of suffering has come a new peace and joy; a new awareness of His Presence; and a new appreciation of Christian fellowship. Truly He has fulfilled His promise that "instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree." And for the believer there is the added joy of knowing what is meant by the treasures of darkness.
(From a tract by Mrs. Pool.)
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GOD'S UNIQUE SON
By John Ferguson
"Who is like the Holy One, or who is His equal?"
Isaiah 40:25
The one outstanding figure of history is Jesus Christ, and nearly all we know of His brief passage across the course of time is recorded in the four Gospels. The Evangelists give us a picture of One who towers high above all others.
The apostle John describes Him as God's "only begotten Son," and in the French Bible this expression is rendered: "Son fils unique," which is in English, "His unique Son." The word "unique" means, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, "unmatched, having no like or equal."
This very aptly describes our Lord Jesus Christ. He was and is unique. This world has never seen another like Him. He stands alone, supreme -- God's unique Son! Let us consider some respects in which He is unique.
1. He was unique in His birth. He came into the world by a supernatural birth. Had He been born as other men are, He would have inherited man's sinful nature. Thus He Himself would have needed a Saviour, and it follows that He could not have been a Saviour of others. The very fact that He was God coming into the world in flesh demanded a miraculous entrance into the world.
His birth had been eagerly awaited for centuries before it took place. The coming of the Redeemer had been clearly foretold by many of the Hebrew prophets. In Matthew's Gospel, which records the story of His entrance into the world, we are told in the first chapter of five Old Testament prophecies, recorded hundreds of years previously, which were literally fulfilled in the circumstances attendant on His birth. No other man has ever come into the world as He did. He was unique in His birth.
2. He was unique in His character. His character, as presented to us in the four Gospels has for centuries been subjected to the closest scrutiny. It has been examined and re-examined, scrutinized and analyzed, with the most careful attention to the minutest details of His words and deeds; and this not only by His friends, but even more so by His enemies. The result has been that friend and foe alike have united in acclaiming Him as the one perfect man. None has proved any fault. His actions have always been good, His motives always transparently pure, and His words always wise and true.
Further, some of the very men who reject His claims and spurn His authority, have recommended His life as the ideal example to be followed. No other man ever lived such a life as He lived. He was unique in His character.
3. He was unique in His teachings. The soldiers sent to arrest Him failed to do so, and came back overawed by His teachings, saying, "Never man spake like this Man." He confirmed the accuracy of the Old Testament, establishing its Divine authority and using its narratives to unfold and illustrate deeper truths that are recorded in the New Testament. His words of consolation and comfort to the sorrowing, of help and sympathy to the distressed, and of baffling wisdom and unchallengeable logic to those who disputed His authority, all pointed to Him as One such as the world had never before seen. His prophetic teachings, too, revealed Him as One to whom the future is as near as the present. He was unique in His teachings.
4. He was unique in His deeds. Think of Him with the weeping women by the grave of Lazarus, already four days dead. With a loud voice He calls Lazarus to come forth, and, he comes to life! Death had met its Master.
Again, He meets a victim of leprosy, horribly disfigured, a loathsome sight, and incurable. He touches him, speaks the word, and a complete, immediate, and permanent cure follows.
See Him, too in the Temple. With a few pieces of cord used as a whip, He drives out the traders and moneychangers whose presence defiled the House of God. He was one against many; but they feared Him too much to resist -- they fled!
Once more, and we see Him standing on the deck of a small ship in a raging tempest. His terrified disciples watch in amazement while with a few words He hushes the angry waves to a calm and sends the stormy winds back to the rugged Galilean hills from whence they came. Truly, He was unique in His deeds.
5. He was unique in His death, because His death was predicted in detail, centuries before His birth. The cause of His death, the manner of it -- the piercing of hands and feet, the intense thirst, the mocking crowd, the parting of the garments, the burial in a rich man's grave -- these and other details were all foretold by the God-inspired prophets of Israel. Hundreds of years later every prediction was fulfilled to the very letter.
His death was symbolized in all the sacrifices offered in Old Testament times. A careful study of these reveals the fact that every sacrificial victim slain at the altars of Israel "forepictured" the sacrifice of God's Son on the cross. They told out in symbol what the New Testament teaches, that "Christ is sacrificed for us." They pointed forward to that "one sacrifice for sins for ever," of Calvary.
His death was a death for others. Clearly it was far more than the death of a Reformer who died for his ideals. It was something greater than the death of a martyr, who gave his life for a noble cause. But let the voice of Scripture speak on this great theme. In the first of the two letters of Peter we read these words: "Christ also once for all died for sins, the innocent One for the guilty many, in order to bring us to God" (I Peter 3:18 Weymouth).
There you have it! Christ died, "the innocent One for the guilty many," and at the Cross the offending sinner can meet his offended God.
Of all the uncountable millions of our race who have passed away, no other has died with such remarkable attendant circumstances. When He died nature went into convulsions and the sun was robed in black; but the last words from His lips were a shout of triumph: "It is finished!" He had completed the work he had come into the world to do. Truly never man died as He died. He was unique in His death.
6. He was unique in His resurrection. His resurrection is the miracle of all miracles! Death is in reverse! The Man whose body was laid to rest in Joseph's tomb, has come again from Death's dark prison. In language of joyous assurance and exulting triumph we proclaim: "He is not here; He is risen."
The disciples had become the laughing stock of the city because of the death of their Leader. They were broken and despairing men and women. Then they were dazed, astounded, and transformed by His resurrection. Peter, afraid of a housemaid's tongue had shouted hysterically, "I never knew Him!" a few weeks later, this same nerve-shattered Peter boldly announces to the astonished Jews that God has reversed their judgment, and that Christ is alive. The risen Christ had turned sorrow into joy, despair into thanksgiving, weakness into strength, fear into fearlessness, and defeat into triumph. Others have moved the hearts of men and women, have risen to giddy heights of fame, have ruled with unchallenged power over the lives of millions, and have made themselves the dispensers of life and death to their people; but they are dead.
Some have founded great religions, and their teachings guide the lives of millions of their followers all over the globe today; but they are dead.
Christ, too, has died; but He conquered the grave, and now He lives!
Others, like Lazarus and the widow's son have been raised from the dead; but they have all died again. Death had a mortgage on their lives, and when death called them they had to go. But Death has no further claim on Christ: He lives to die no more. Once He died for us; now He lives for us. The Book says, He is able to save to the uttermost because He ever liveth.
Because He died for our sins He is "mighty to save." Because He rose again from the dead and lives He is "mighty to keep." He was unique in His resurrection.
7. He is unique in His power to change the lives of those who yield themselves to Him.
He is the one and only Saviour. He, and He alone, can
(1) Wipe out the guilty past,
(2) Keep, support and guide every soul that has trusted in Him,
(3) Bring that soul safely into the Father's house above,
(4) Guarantee the security of the coming power, for the present.
The Scripture assures us that there is "none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved," and He Himself assures us that He is the Good Shepherd, and that His sheep shall never perish. The one thing necessary on our part is faith in Him. He Himself said, "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life!" That is salvation by faith. Again we read, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved." That, too, is salvation by faith -- faith in God's unique Son. He is unique in His power.
Because of all these facts He is unique in His power to save the lost, to transform their lives, and to support and sustain them in all the changing scenes and circumstances of life. Well might the poet write in that great hymn of the church:
"All hail the power of Jesus' name!
Let angels prostrate fall;
Bring forth the royal diadem,
And crown Him Lord of all!"
(In "Things Concerning Himself," published by Charles Nunnerley, High Down, Cokes Lane, Chalfont St. Giles, Bucks, England.)
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GOD IN EVERYTHING
By A. F.
"IN EVERYTHING." This we have proved is the secret of a happy life. Nothing can come into the life of a child of God without his Father's permission. Our text is one of many which makes this fact plain, "He performeth the thing that is appointed for me."
What a change it makes in the life of those who believe it.
How differently we look upon the many things that tend to irritate us.
How we go through the many duties of the day always rejoicing.
How differently we act toward those who ill-treat and misrepresent us.
How we gladly submit to "over-work" when asked, and rest content "whatever lot we see."
How willingly we answer all inquiries, no matter how busy we may be.
How is it? Because "God is in everything." He permits it ALL to be so.
It matters not what comes. "It's all right." All His appointment. All the very best.
Beloved, this is how -- He makes us into "the vessels of honour meet for His use."
Dear child of God, whatever your feelings or circumstances may be, rest on His word. "He performeth the thing that is appointed for YOU," and "we know that all things work together for good to them that love God."
Could anything be sweeter? Think of it -- the Almighty so looking after us, that He just performs the very thing that is appointed for us. Should there be any disappointments then? Surely never, when all are HIS appointments.
Believe it! Live on it!
"Underneath are the everlasting arms."
Lean hard! Lie still! Rest!
(From a tract published by Tract Evangelistic Crusade, Tempe, AZ.)
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