The day of visitation

So far from God having abandoned the world, He is continually calling it to account. Not only has He fixed in His eternal mind a period of final visitation, but days of visitation are repeatedly coming. And who knows how many may come to us?
I. THE SOLEMN PERIOD SPOKEN OF. God is said to "visit" men when He comes to them, or reveals Himself, either in mercy or judgment. Christ Himself calls the days of His ministry among the Jews the day of their visitation — their Gospel day of mercy. But the term, as used in our text, is to be understood in the contrary sense, to denote a period of judgment. There are several periods which are days of Divine visitation.
1. The day of trouble.
2. The day of affliction.
3. The day of death.
4. The day of judgment.
II. THE SOUL-AWAKENING APPEAL MADE. 'What will ye do? To whom will ye flee for help?" This language implies that something has need to be done — that help will be required. Self-sufficient as we may wish to think ourselves when all is bright, whenever either of the days of Divine visitation comes, we shall find that "help" will be needed in order to stand the trial well. If so, what will you do?
1. What in the day of trouble? Many are then overwhelmed thereby; in these circumstances many die in despair, fade away in melancholy, or lay violent hands on themselves. When every draught of life's cup is the very gall of bitterness, where will ye go for sweetness?
2. Should afflictive visitations come on, what then will ye do? You may flee to the physician, but he can do no more than the God means may permit him.
3. And then, when the day of dissolution, that awful day of "visitation" comes, what will ye do? Will you send for your minister to pray for you? But what avail his prayers, if your do not pray for yourself?
4. And when the last great day — that day of all days — comes, oh, what then shall we do? And where shall we flee for help? Now, bring all this to a point.(1) Settle it in your minds that days of visitation will come.(2) How necessary, now in the time of our merciful visitation of Gospel offers and encouragements, to make the Almighty God our friend by faith in Christ.(3) If we do not, must we not expect to be abandoned and left to everlasting ruin, without help or hope?

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

God of my Fathers

Science is doing grand things today. Her beneficent step is heard almost everywhere. But physical science is comparatively young. And you know the characteristic defects of youth. It is headstrong and impatient, and often irreverent.It is sometimes not over reticent, even on matters concerning which it cannot form reliable judgments I now speak on "the claims of the religion of our fathers." 1. It was "our fathers'." That the sires trusted in God is a very sufficient reason why the sons should hesitate, and hesitate long, before they reach the grave conclusion that there is no God, or that if there be He cannot be trusted because He cannot be known. One of the healthiest facts of human nature and of human life has ever been that spirit of reverence for the past which links generation to generation, and practically makes the race one. We Englishmen are by no means destitute of this fine sentiment. 2. Our fathers proved it. What is the testimony borne by honest ...
Read more

The Word of the Lord is tried. The Bible tested and triumphant B. B. Loomis, Ph. D. Look at some of the severe tests to which the Bible has been subjected, and by successfully meeting which it has vindicated its claims to a Divine origin, and to universal human acceptance. I. THE BIBLE HAS STOOD THE TEST OF TIME. Since the Sacred Canon closed, how many and how vast are the changes which have gone on among men. Hardly one of the ancient powers is today extant. How great have been the strides of human progress! Yet the science of salvation, as taught in the Bible, has needed no remodeling. The race does not outgrow the religion of the Bible. Compare the case of the Bible with the poems of Homer. The two works are, in a certain sense, contemporaneous; critics have denied to the Bible any higher inspiration than that of human genius; and Greek poetry held among that ancient people very much the same place as did the sacred Scriptures among the Jews. Three thousand years ago the two works stood before the world on a comparative equality. How stands the case today? Homer is read as a model of epic verse and specimen of old Ionic Greek. The Bible is read everywhere as a transcript of the Eternal. II. THE TEST OF CRITICISM. Criticism, the most searching and severe to which any work has ever been subjected. A criticism often hostile. But the old Book has come out of it only purified. III. THE TEST OF PRACTICAL TRIAL. In the patent office are models of many beautiful machines that could not be worked. The Book will stand every practical test. It gives the solution of the great enigmas of the human soul, and provides the consolation for life's dark hours, those hours of disappointment, adversity, sorrow, and bereavement which come so surely to us all. (B. B. Loomis, Ph. D.)

The Word of the Lord is tried. The Bible tested and triumphant B. B. Loomis, Ph. D. Look at some of the severe tests to which the Bible has been subjected, and by successfully meeting which it has vindicated its claims to a Divine origin, and to universal human acceptance. I. THE BIBLE HAS STOOD THE TEST OF TIME. Since the Sacred Canon closed, how many and how vast are the changes which have gone on among men. Hardly one of the ancient powers is today extant. How great have been the strides of human progress! Yet the science of salvation, as taught in the Bible, has needed no remodeling. The race does not outgrow the religion of the Bible. Compare the case of the Bible with the poems of Homer. The two works are, in a certain sense, contemporaneous; critics have denied to the Bible any higher inspiration than that of human genius; and Greek poetry held among that ancient people very much the same place as did the sacred Scriptures among the Jews. Three thousand years ago the two works s...
Read more