The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1891, Page 21

Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

⤓ Download .txt · copy text

—6Ghe Lutheran Pioneer.

A MISSIONARY MONTHLY.

Posuisnep BY THE EvANGELICAL LurHeRAN SyNODICAL CONFERENCE OF NorTH AMERICA.
R. A. BISCHOFF, Editor.

Entered at the Post Office at St. Louis, Mo., as second-class matter.

Vol. XIII.

St. Louis, Mo., June, 1891.

No. 6.

God so Loved the World.

John 3, 16.

God loved the world: God gave His Son.
What more than this could love have done
To save lost men!

See here the height! The only Son
From highest heaven, The Mighty One,
The Prince of Peace.

See here the depth! To sinful earth
The Lord came down, and here had birth,
And lived and died.

Behold the length! Life evermore
For dying souls, a boundless store—
Unending bliss!

Behold the breadth! Whoever will,
Of Mercy’s draught may take his fill:
And without price.

Oh, precious Gift! Oh, wondrous love!
Join all below and all above

To sing His praise.
Selected.
—> - oe -

Trust only in Christ's Righteousness.

Suppose it is needful for you to cross a river,
over which two planks are laid. One of the
planks is perfectly sound, and the other com-
pletely rotten. If you walk upon the rotten
plank, you are sure to fall into the river. If
you put one foot on the rotten plank and the
other on the sound plank, it will be the same;
you will certainly fall through‘and perish. So
he that trusts partly in the righteousness of
Christ, and partly in his own righteousness, will
surely fail of eternal life. Christ is the only
Way to heaven. ‘Neither is there salvation in
any other; for there is none other name under
heaven given among men whereby we must be
Saved,’ Acts4,12. It is not the work of Christ
ware mething added that saves us, but the
ath Recast alone, apart from anything and
cma nae we can do or feel. The finished
ne, Christ is the only sound plank on which
enter ~i cross the dark river of death and

s eae life. Don’t try to walk at the
Tighteousne on the rotten plank of your om
Your p. ah of your own good conduct, 0
Your ow. feelings, or of anything you find in

1 sinful self. In whatever you trust

outside of Christ’s righteousness is a rotten
plank. And if a man tries to walk on a sound
and a rotten plank at the same time, he will
as certainly fall into the water, as if neither
were strong enough to bear his weight. Trust
only in the righteousness of Christ and you
shall be saved.

A minister was making a pastoral visit to an
old Scotch woman, who for a long time had
been trying to be saved, and who could find no
peace and rest in all her efforts. Her cottage
could be reached only by passing over a rapid
brook that was bridged by a single plank. At
first he feared to step upon the plank, but the
woman seeing his hesitation hurried from the
door with the cry, ‘Just trust it!”” He did
trust the plank and soon stood by her side.
“Woman,” he said, ‘“‘the blood of Jesus Christ
cleanseth us from all sin; just trust it.’’ She
did give up trying to walk on the rotten plank
of her own righteousness. She simply trusted
in the blood of Jesus and thus found peace,
and rest, and salvation in the righteousness of
Christ.

“Jesus, thy blood and righteousness
My beauty are—my glorious dress;
’Midst flaming worlds, in these arrayed,
With joy shall I lift up my head.”

—>-- <0

‘‘And have you no doubt about it?”

“None whatever,’’ she returned, unhesitat-
ingly; and, holding up her hand, added, “I
have known I was Mrs. B—— ever since that
ring was put on my hand.’’

“That is just how it is with me,’’ the visitor
said. ‘I do not try to be a Christian, but I
know I am one, and that I belong to the Lord
Jesus Christ ever since I put out an empty
hand, and received Him as my Saviour. It is
by nothing that I have ever done, or ever could
do, that I have gained everlasting life, but
simply by believing God’s record that ‘while
we were yet sinners, Christ died for us’—just
receiving Jesus as my substitute, and believing
that now, ‘being justified by His blood, we
shall be eaved from wrath through Him,’’’
Rom. 5, 8. 9.

It was a new light to the poor soul, who was
struggling on in darkness and doubt, seeking
by her own endeavors to earn that everlasting
life which God will sell to no man, but which
He bestows as a free gift upon ‘‘whosoever be-
lieveth.’’—Selected.

_— oP oo

Come to Jesus.

How can a man trust in his own righteous-
ness? It is like seeking shelter under one’s
own shadow. A man may stoop to the very
ground, and the lower he bends he still finds
that his shadow is beneath him. But if a man
flee to the shadow of a great rock or of a wide-
spreading tree, he will find shelter from the
rays of the noon-day sun. So human merits
can not give salvation, and Christ alone is able
to save to the uttermost those who come unto
God by Him.

——__2 <2 ee

“Since the Marriage-Day.”

“How long have you been lying here, Mrs.
1B tae

This question was addressed to a bed-ridden
old woman, whose worn and troubled face told
a tale of years of suffering.

“Oh! a long while now,’ she reqlied, wea-
rily; ‘‘and I don’t suppose I shall ever get
about again.” Ve

“Are you a Christian?’” returned the visitor.

“]’m trying to be one,’’ she answered, almost
hopelessly.

a fiend was silent for a moment, and
then, as if a new thought struck him, he in:
quired, ‘‘Do you ever try to be Mrs. Ba ?

«Nol? she replied, “I am Mrs. B—. .

“How long have you been Mrs. B—,,’’ he

ursued. ‘
: («ever since the marriage-day, she answered,

in some surprise.

Our true knowledge is to know our own
ignorance. Our true strength is to know our
own weakness. Our true dignity is to confeas
that we have no dignity, and are nobody and
nothing in ourselves, and to cast ourselves down
before the dignity of God under the shadow of
whose wings, and in the smile of whose counte-
nance alone, is any created being safe. Let us
cling to our Father in heaven, as achild, walk-
ing in the night, clings to his father’s hand.