Salvation Study: The Mercy of Salvation

BLJ: We will spend a few days talking about salvation. Let me blunt. I am convinced that many people attending church are not saved. They go to church because of the social benefits and friendships they make. Yet, they lack the deep commitment to Jesus Christ. As we study a work by Rev. Kenneth Fay, search your soul. Are you saved?

THE MERCY OF SALVATION

Isa 55:6-8 Seek ye the LORD while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near: 7 Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. 8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.

Saint Paul declared, "God is rich in mercy" (Ephesians 2:4). Some Christians now believe that Nikita S. Khrushchev, one time Dictator of the U.S.S.R., has been saved. It is not incredible that the "Bloody Butcher," as he was called, has found mercy. Even Hitler or Mussolini might have found forgiveness had they repented, for "God is rich in mercy." God has demonstrated great forgiveness to great sinners and granted great favors times without number. "It must be great mercy, or no mercy," said John Bunyan, "for little mercy will never serve my turn!"

What hope this brings to men today! There are reportedly nineteen thousand suicides in the United States annually, besides other thousands which are successfully disguised as accidental. At present there are said to be over five million alcoholics in the United States. Everywhere we turn, the demons of drink and dope, lust and lunacy, murder and madness are driving millions to despair and suicide and at last to the unending torments of hell. It is a grim picture, but there is good news. Listen! "Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely" (Revelation 22:17). Commenting on this verse, the sainted Richard Baxter once said, "I am thankful it says 'whosoever' rather than 'Richard Baxter,' as sweet as that might sound, for then at the last I might have discovered God meant some other Richard Baxter. Now I know He means me!" Yes, God's mercy is available to all!

Rejected mercy, however, remains the tragedy of our age. A noted surgeon received a phone call at two o'clock in the morning. A hospital authority, twenty miles away, explained that a young man, following a car accident, lay near death. He was the only surgeon within calling distance that could possibly get there in time. Would he come? Hurriedly he dressed and drove to the city, where he stopped for a traffic light. Suddenly his car door jerked open and a gun was jammed into his ribs.

"Drive!" a man ordered, closing the door behind him. All attempts to explain the urgency of his mission were futile.

"Drive! " he snapped. Somewhere on a quiet street in that city his captor ordered the car stopped and the surgeon to "get out!" Again, all attempts to explain were silenced at gunpoint. Helplessly he watched as the gunman, who was dressed in a brown coat and gray trousers with a cap pulled down over his eyes, drove away in his car. A taxi was hailed after a lapse of time and finally the surgeon reached the hospital. Outside "Emergency" a nurse appeared and said, "I'm sorry Doctor..., you are too late...the boy is dead." Saddened, he turned to leave. "Doctor," the nurse whispered, "his father is brokenhearted. Would you speak to him...please?"

There in the waiting room, face in hands and sobbing, sat the grieving father. Suddenly a look of amazement spread across the surgeon's face. Could he believe his eyes? The man was wearing a brown coat, gray trousers, and a cap was at his side. This was the man who had taken the surgeon's car! This was the man who had forced into the night the only man that could save his son!

The lesson this true story illustrates is important. You, unsaved friend, have the "death-rattle" in your soul and are now facing the fearful prospects of eternity. God has sent His Son to save you. Christ pleads with you not to turn Him away. DO NOT, then, make the fatal mistake of forcing from your life the only ONE who can save you! How fearful it will be to face Him on the judgment morning, knowing you have spurned His mercy! How dreadful to be thrust into eternity's night to weep with the damned and live with your memory and remorse ---forever!

Why make this mistake? Is there anything in life worth bartering your soul for? Of course not! Then bow before this waiting, insulted, yet pleading Christ and ask Him to save you. But do it NOW! Remember delay can be as fatal as denial! "How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation?" (Hebrews 2:3).