Some people are very much concerned because they cannot point to any particular time when they were converted. For that reason they sometimes wonder whether they have ever been converted at all. We think they trouble themselves needlessly. There are those who are able to tell the very hour when this great transaction took place. They could show you the spot where God met with them, and tell you all the attendant circumstances. The Apostle Paul could do this; so could the jailer at Philippi; and Lydia of Thyatira would remember that eventful Sabbath day when some strangers joined the little band of worshipers by the riverside and spake to them of Jesus and the resurrection, and her heart was opened to receive the message (Acts 16). But it is not everyone who can. Perhaps you cannot. That which we stress here is, can you say now that you trust in Christ as your own personal Saviour? Do you thankfully confess Him as your Lord and Saviour at this very moment? Are all your hopes centered in Him now? Do you now see that apart from Him you must forever perish, but trusting Him you are forever saved?
"On Christ the solid rock I stand, All other ground is sinking sand."
If that is our song, then we may be quite sure that we belong to Christ and are among His loved ones, even though we cannot name the hour when this became true.
And let us also remember that no two conversions have ever been exactly alike. God’s way of dealing with souls varies according to His manifold wisdom. With some it is an instant transition from night to day. With others it is gradual; they pass through a lingering agony of conscience about their sins and sinful state. The pains of hell get hold of them. They tremble on the edge of the dark abyss. One such was John Bunyan of Bedford. Others are attracted by the grace of the Lord Jesus and are drawn to Him by a power which they neither can nor would resist. Of such was the one written about in Luke 7:36-49. Let no one be unhappy because his conversion does not answer in every feature to that of somebody else. It is what we should expect. There are not two blades of grass alike, nor two leaves alike on all the forest trees, nor two flakes of snow the same. So it is with the history of souls in the new creation.
There is another question which troubles some people greatly. Have I accepted Christ? Now that is not the thing to be inquired about at all. Such a question is apt to turn our thoughts in upon ourselves, and then we need not wonder if darkness and uncertainty result. Indeed, it may be doubted whether Christ is ever offered for our acceptance. Essentially, the question rather is, "Has God, against whom we have all sinned_has He accepted Christ?" The Saviour’s sacrifice, while offered on our behalf, was certainly presented for God’s acceptance, not ours. If a man be heavily in debt, who is it that has to be satisfied_himself or his creditors? If we have sinned against God, who is it that has to be propitiated_the sinner or the One sinned against? Now we know of a surety that God has accepted Christ. He is much more than satisfied with the atonement Christ has made. And if God is satisfied, ought not we to be?
"Have we not, then, to accept Christ?" asks some one. We would not put it in that form. The acceptance is on God’s side. To us the gospel is preached_glad tidings concerning Jesus, who died for our sins and has been raised from among the dead and is now in glory. This gospel we believe, and in believing we are forgiven, justified, saved, and have life through His name. The tendency of our deceitful hearts is to turn from Christ to self in some shape or form. We shut ourselves up in a dark dungeon and then sorrow because the sun does not shine!
The gospel is a royal proclamation sent out to all the earth. Its terms are grandly simple. "Be it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this Man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins:and by Him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses" (Acts 13:38, 39). Nothing could be plainer. Thus forgiveness of sins is announced and the assurance given that all who believe are justified from all things. These are blessed tidings indeed! They are God’s glad tidings_sent by Him to guilty, ruined, lost, perishing men. They bear His signature and seal. Let us believe them. If we do not, we shall starve in the midst of plenty and perish from thirst with water all around.
And that is what so many are doing. Instead of believing the gospel, they are for ever thinking of themselves, of something they must do, or be, or feel in order to find peace. No wonder that doubts and fears plague them. Does the reader happen to know any of these unhappy folks? You may recognize them by their speech, for they have a dialect of their own. I and me are their favorite pronouns. They cannot say five words without them. In this respect they bear a striking likeness to the one whose experiences are described in Romans 7. Nearly forty times within as many moments does that dejected man talk of I and me! The great vision of his soul is full of self from one end of it to the other. So it is with them. And as in his case so in theirs a harvest of wretchedness is the only result. And so it must go on till, turning from themselves, they cry out for a deliverer, and find Him in Christ.
Oh, let us turn away from self_let us loathe it, hate it, and never listen to it again. Christ is rest to the weary. He is the Fountain of living waters where the thirsty may drink and be satisfied. He is bread for the hungry, clothing for the naked, the shadow of a great rock in a weary land. Here our souls, worn out by constant effort to be other than what they are, may lie down and be at rest. "Not I but Christ!" "Not I, but Christ!" The lesson is learned at last. May it never, never be forgotten.