Blessed Lord Jesus, we are not worthy of
approaching Thee to find pardon for our transgressions,
assurance in our doubt, but Thou art love
itself, and Thy compassion still calls out to
us, come unto me.
Therefore we come, precious Son of God, just
as we are, stained by our sins, weighted
by our woes, but trusting Thy limitless love
and Thy cross-earned compassion which can save
to the uttermost.
What a marvelous, merciful deliverer Thou art, and
what immeasurable agony, depthless grief, crushing soul sorrow,
Thou didst endure for us.
When to atone for our sins, Thou didst
give Thyself as our substitute into the darkest
of all deaths.
Send us Thy Holy Spirit, therefore, to teach
us how to confide in Thee with true,
acceptable faith and prayer.
Make this nation a contrite people who plead
penitently before Thee.
Abide with us, compassionate Savior, for the day
of this world is far spent and we
need Thy constant companionship.
Hear us, then help us, and hold us
in the hollow of Thy hand according to
Thy rich, blood-sealed promises.
Recently scientists searching in a cave between Jerusalem
and Bethlehem made a startling discovery.
They came across a place where early Christians
had laid their dead to rest, and on
burial urns they found, clearly and unmistakably, that
name which is above every other name, Christ.
This is the earliest mention of the Savior
outside the Bible, and it dates from only
about 35 years after our Lord's death.
We wonder what those blasphemous enemies of the
gospel, including some present-day preachers, will say
who, against history, against reason, against common sense,
deny that Jesus Christ ever lived.
Even more, these scientists brought to light a
written record of what they believe is an
account of the crucifixion itself, perhaps written by
an eyewitness of Calvary.
What will unbelieving, Bible-ridiculing college professors here
and abroad say when this cave yields historical
information that completely discredits their claim that the
crucifixion is a myth and the cross a
cruel fairy tale?
Now those who love the Lord Jesus, of
course, need no such discoveries in ancient caves
to confirm their faith.
They say, with St. Paul, I know whom
I have believed, and they rest their trust
not on men's words but on God's and
on the Holy Spirit's testimony in their hearts.
Therefore, these ancient burial urns are no direct
testimony to our faith in line with what
Scripture says.
Yet, bearing the Lord's name, they have a
personal meaning and a message for all who
are Christ's.
They should understand that these early believers buried
in that cave looked earnestly to the Son
of God, and in the hour of death,
when all human hopes collapse and the soul
trembles on the brink of eternity, they found
courage in Christ, fortitude in their faith, and
radiant victory in their Redeemer.
Those burial inscriptions were written in a perilous
age, immediately before that shocking siege and capture
of Jerusalem, which in its terrifying cruelty overshadows
even many of the last war's atrocities.
In the uncertainties of our age, too, men
and women all over the world should turn,
as those first-century Judean Christians did, to
God's Son.
As the brightness of his glorious gospel dispelled
the darkness of that early tomb, so today,
with nineteen centuries to prove his power and
love, all of us should turn to Jesus
for refuge and shelter, for the resurrection and
the life eternal.
Therefore, our appeal today asks all of you,
particularly those to whom these days have brought
heavy burden, tell it to Jesus.
Bring all your pains and problems to the
Savior.
Follow the course suggested by our text, Saint
Matthew chapter 14, verse 12, His disciples went
and told Jesus.
Our scripture deals with the death of John
the Baptist.
Christ himself said that no human being was
greater than John, and must we not trace
much of that preeminence to the fact that
he had a godly father, a priest at
the Jerusalem temple, and a prayer-filled mother?
Parents, if you want your children to be
blessed as John the Baptist was, take them
to Christ, instruct them in Christ, keep them
with Christ.
John, called by God as a messenger to
go before the Savior, brings a challenge not
only to our homes but also to our
churches.
He was the model minister, and the New
Testament bears him record that he worked not
for money, since he spurned soft, expensive clothing
in favor of cheap, coarse camel hair.
He preached not for public favor, for no
prophet of God has had the courage to
denounce sin more unsparingly than he.
He served his God not for personal comfort,
for he lived in the burning heat and
the crackling dryness of the desert, and he
ate not roasts and steaks and chops, but
locusts, grasshoppers, and wild honey.
He testified not for personal publicity, but pointing
to Jesus, his voice in the wilderness called
out, he must increase, but I must decrease.
God give us preachers today who will not
push Christ aside, belittle him, contradict him, as
they stress their personal anti-scriptural opinions, which
have no room for him who warns, without
me ye can do nothing.
If our churches are to meet the emergencies
of this crisis, and if the churches do
not, who will?
We need 20th century John the Baptist with
his one central and repeated theme, behold the
Lamb of God which taketh away the sin
of the world.
John was murdered for his royalty to the
Lord, the first New Testament preacher to pay
for his faith with his life, but not
the last.
And note these factors in his murder.
First of all, a godless mother, Herodias, whom
he had courageously rebuked for her unholy relationship
with Herod.
It is bad enough, God knows, when an
ordinary man or woman transgresses the divine law,
but when those in position and authority overstep
his bounds, it is infinitely worse, since their
transgression encourages others to follow them.
The second person in this tragedy is her
daughter Salome.
She used her charms to entice men.
In our crisis days, when the nation must
decide whether it will go forward with God
or backward without him, women have a particularly
important duty in upholding the good and clean
things of life.
If you Christian mothers and daughters fail us,
one of the strongest props of purity, decency,
and national blessings is gone.
The third character in this drama of death
is the ruthless ruler Herod.
To satisfy the whims of a wanted woman,
he committed murder.
How the war has revealed widespread sin in
the private lives of leaders, men who lived
in sinful relations and practiced perversions, yet who
sought to rule their fellow men.
God preserve our officials from such immorality.
The background in this tragedy is a birthday
party, a riotous celebration in which liquor flowed
freely.
It was Herod's own birthday banquet, and the
climax feature of the celebration was Salome's lewd
dance before Herod.
Today, likewise, the sensual dance is often the
cause of many deep scarred sorrows.
Yet when the church is worn against its
dangers, they are branded as old-fashioned, narrow,
and puritanical.
Are we?
Social experts, prison authorities, matrons of homes for
fallen girls will tell you that the dance
starts many women on their downward path.
Salome's dance cost John the Baptist his life.
When Herod, enchanted by her performance, offered her
anything up to the half of his kingdom,
she went to her mother for advice.
Now, every parent has the sacred responsibility of
leading a child aright on God-pleasing paths.
But what a devil in the flesh that
woman Herodias must have been when she maneuvered
her own daughter into murder.
Salome was told to take Herod at his
word, and to demand of him not half
of his kingdom, but that which was of
far greater value to her avenged madwoman, John
the Baptist's head.
The king, royal wretch that he was, gave
in, and that wilderness prophet was beheaded.
Closed by this murder were the eyes that
had looked lovingly toward Christ as the Son
of God and the Redeemer of the race.
Silenced the lips that had exalted Jesus as
the atoning Lamb of God, deafened in death
the ears that had heard the Savior's proclamation
of the power and the pardon that he
would bring to the whole race.
Now, can you imagine the agony which gripped
John's disciples when they heard of this horror?
What could they do?
Find another leader?
Return defeated to their homes?
Join a revolt against Herod?
They knew that all this would be less
than useless.
Thank God they also knew of the one
unfailing source of strength.
Our text records, they went and told Jesus.
Thank God they went to Christ, I say,
because they thus showed our age the one
source of true peace and blessing.
Literally hundreds of millions in the face of
the earth today have, as these disciples, seen
their hopes crash and feel that all is
wrong with the world.
As the followers of John the Baptist were
distressed over the loss of their leaders, so
many of you are burdened by loss of
health, loss of money, loss of work, loss
of business, loss of good reputation, loss of
friendship, loss of husband or wife, parents or
children, loss of the joy and happiness that
was once yours.
What will you do?
Listen to these new creeds which promise you
a pot of gold, the new program for
establishing peace in your family, the new proposals
that offer health and wealth?
Will you be comforted by statesman's pledges of
full freedom from fear?
Will you grit your teeth, square your shoulders,
and rely only on yourself with no thoughts
of the Almighty?
Oh God keep you from that, and by
His Spirit lead you to walk the way
these bereaved men did who came and told
Jesus.
This is an appeal especially for those among
you who are still outside the church, almost
in the kingdom but not quite, as a
woman who after listening to our broadcast writes
in the words of scripture, almost thou persuadest
me.
At first even the disciples of John had
been uncertain as to whether Jesus was the
promised Christ.
Some of them may have thought their own
leader even greater than Jesus because the crowd
screamed out to hear John.
Many were baptized by him and even Herod
was impressed with his straightforward messages.
Now to convince them of the truth John
sent them directly to Christ with the pointed
question, aren't thou he that is to come
or do we wait for another?
So first of all I tell you who
have not yet stood up publicly for our
Lord, don't be influenced by what men say
of Christ.
Go to him directly in his own clear
word.
Too many in our age have condemned Jesus
and his creed without giving the gospel a
chance, but once men prayerfully consider the New
Testament teachings they often recognize the divine truth
as the glorious conversion of great men shows.
That happened to John's disciples when they came
and saw Jesus beheld the mighty works that
he did before their eyes.
Saw the sick healed, the blind given sight,
the lepers cleansed, the hungry fed, the unclean
purified, the dead resurrected to new life.
They believe and when John died they came
back to Christ to confide in him.
My dear friends who are not yet with
the church, what can I do or say
that will induce you to be fair enough
and to take time for the Lord Jesus
for the sake of your own soul which
he said is worth more than all the
world and which he regarded is so inestimably
precious that he the son of God shed
his blood on the cross to save that
soul for eternity.
For that priceless pleasure you ought to be
ready at least to go to Christ to
see who he is, what he has done,
and how much he offers you.
Once you spend sacred hours with Jesus you
too may come to the highest happiness earth
can offer.
The power of his Holy Spirit is as
strong today as ever.
Recently I received a letter from a man
in Minneapolis who made some inquiries concerning the
Christian faith.
I answered and asked one of the pastors
in the city to visit him.
It turned out that he was a young
professor at the University of Minnesota.
The pastor found him without any religious background
whatever.
He had never been enrolled in a Sunday
school, never attended church, never discussed the Christian
religion with anyone, and had never been baptized.
By the word of God which he had
heard over this broadcast the Holy Spirit created
in him the desire to know more about
the Savior and following John's disciples he came
and told Jesus.
He arranged his work program so that he
could attend every one of the 32 lessons
of one hour each by which he, the
university teacher, could be taught the gospel truth.
With the pastor's guidance he went to Christ
also in private study.
As a chemist he read the Bible from
the point of view of that science, investigating
whether Christ was right when he spoke of
the salt that had lost its savior, whether
scripture was correct when it expressed the impossibility
of removing red dyes through bleaching agents, and
when he spent those long hours with Jesus
he made a public testimony of his faith
and he was baptized.
He now tells us to use his experience
as a public testimony to Christ's truth and
an invitation to others to find the joy
he now has with his savior.
As that university professor and the disciples of
John took hallowed time to meet Jesus, study
his word, see his works, and then by
the Spirit's guidance and blessing were induced to
accept him, so my fellow redeemed give Christ
a chance to be heard, felt, studied in
your heart.
Make time to read your Bible, set aside
a few hours to meet a messenger of
his truth, and remember we will gladly send
one to visit you.
Read sound Christian literature.
We will consider it a privilege to send
you some without money or charge of course.
Attend a church where Christ reigns supreme in
the sermons, the hymns, the prayers, and then
as the holy comforter strengthens you to overcome
hatreds, prejudices, ignorances, you can find in Christ
your savior, your Lord, your God, and therefore
the unfailing friend, the heavenly helper in every
need to whom you can take and tell
your pressing problems, your questions, your doubts, your
weaknesses, and find the divine answer with its
radiant comfort.
Are you weighted down by the memories of
searing sin?
Tell it to Jesus.
We regularly meet people who with tears in
their eyes and agonies in their soul plead,
will Christ forgive the terrible sins in my
life?
Oh, tell it to Jesus.
Kneel in spirit before the Savior to confess
all the wrongs in your soul, your mind,
your heart, on your hands, your lips, and
your conscience.
Don't try to conceal or withhold anything from
him, but bring it to him and have
the blessed assurance the blood of Jesus Christ,
his son, cleanseth us from all sin.
Are you laboring under crushing personal sorrows?
Have you been sick for a long time?
Do you dread an impending operation?
Are you bowed down in grief over a
recent bereavement?
Has the grim reaper entered your home to
take a loved one from the land of
the living?
Tell it to Jesus.
He alone has the promise of victory over
death, but he surely has the guarantee of
a glorious resurrection and a reunion with those
who died in the face.
Whatever the sorrow may be that weighs your
soul down, kneel before Christ.
Tell him of your fears and your worries.
Confess to him your sins and your sorrows,
and as he pronounces the benediction that has
been purchased by his blood on your life,
and as you rise from your knees with
his blessing, you will be able to face
a world of sin and sorrow with the
glorious assurance that you are his through death
and into eternity.
A friend once put this question to Stonewall
Jackson.
Suppose that these eyes that give you so
much trouble should become blinded.
Do you believe your faith would remain unclouded?
Jackson answered, even such misfortune could not make
me doubt the love of God.
His friend went on.
If beside your hopeless blindness you became bedridden,
would you call yourself happy then?
Calmly he replied, yes, I think I could.
My faith in the Almighty's wisdom is absolute,
and why should such accidents change it?
Once more he was asked, if in addition
to all this you had to receive grudging
charity from those on whom you had no
claim, what then?
Slowly Jackson declared, if it was God's will,
I think I could lie there content a
hundred years.
Jackson had that faith because he was a
man of deep-rooted trust, and the constant
prayer through which he regularly came and told
Jesus, beseeching his guidance even when he put
a stamp on a letter.
Do you want that blessing of strength and
spiritual power?
Come to Christ, tell him your troubles, pray
in his name, pray fervently, faithfully, forcefully, and
as you bow before him, the Son of
God, the Savior of your soul, the one
hope of all humanity, he promises, him that
cometh to me, I will in no wise
cast out.
Come then and tell it to Jesus now.
Amen.