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God Is Love

Article Series, by Wes Guy

by Wes Guy

 
Series Theme: Illustrations Of God's Love

This is a collection of four short articles:

• Article 1 - The Third Finger
• Article 2 - Happy Days to Come
• Article 3 - The Cross Pervades All Scripture
• Article 4 - Whosoever

The Third Finger

A little girl was on a visit to her aunt, who, being a real Christian, sought to instruct the child in the knowledge of Christ. She asked the little one, "What are the first words of the 23rd Psalm." Promptly the answer came, "The Lord is my shepherd."

"Now, these words just answer to your five fingers - try it." The - putting the finger on the thumb of the left hand; LORD - touching the first finger; IS - touching the second; MY - touching the third; SHEPHERD - touching the fourth.

"Now," asked the aunt, "which of these five words do you like the best?" And on her little fingers she went over and over the words till at last she paused; her mind made up - it was the one that stood for the MY. This is what faith does. It is taking Jesus as my own saviour; it is believing that He loved me and gave Himself for me. Faith is not content with saying,  Isaiah 53:5 (But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed),  but says, for MY transgressions. Not only 1 Timothy 2:6  (Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time).

The little girl went home again after the visit to her aunt, and it was not very long before she had a stroke of paralysis which so affected her speech that she could not make herself understood. As the end drew near her mother asked her had she had really found  peace through faith in the Lord Jesus, and the only response was the moving of the right hand and clasping the third finger of the left, and thus she died. The parents could not understand it, though they marked the movements of the little hands, and wondered what it might mean. Some time after they told the aunt how she passed away holding the third finger of her left hand.

"Oh, I know what it meant," said the aunt, and she told the sorrowing parents about the lesson on the first five words of the 23rd Psalm, and all was plain.

Can you say, "He loved ME and gave himself for ME," I take him as MY saviour and "the lord is MY shepherd?"

Happy Days To Come

Text   Isaiah 11:6   -  And a little child shall lead them.

"What picture is that?" asked a little fellow in my class, as I unrolled a Bible picture entitled "Happy Days to Come." In which a little child, a lion, a lamb, an ox, and other beasts are all seen together in peaceful harmony.

The little chap was deeply interested in the pretty picture, and told all the rest of the boys and girls, as they came in, what I had in store for their lesson that afternoon. So I had a very attentive congregation, as I set before them, the prophetic picture of the peaceful millennial kingdom of the Lord Jesus, when, under His blessed kingly rule, earth, the beasts of the field and forest will once more be free from the curse and sad effects of the first man's fall, and no longer wild and ferocious, will be led by a little child in peace and safety.

I sought to show them how sin was the cause of all the ferocity of man and beasts, and of all the quarrels and fights among children, and that only when Jesus is received as Saviour, and owned as Lord in the heart and the life, is there peace and happiness.

Then regarding the future, when He Who is earth's rightful King, is no longer despised as He was when they put Him on the cruel cross, and wrote in mockery over Him, "This is Jesus the King of the Jews," but owned by every nation and kingdom, all the world over, as "Prince of Peace", the King of Kings, ruling and reigning over all the earth, His Name on every tongue, and all nations at peace, under His righteous and glorious rule.

"Will it all come true?" asked one little boy, whose earnest face told his interest in the subject. "Yes, every word of it, as surely as God has said it. And the way to make sure that you will see it and share in it, if not on earth, in heavenly glory, where, from the open heavens above, the redeemed will look down upon the peaceful and happy earth, is to be saved and have your title and fitness for entering the Kingdom of God now." This the Lord Jesus tells us in John 3:3 (Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God).

The Cross Pervades All Scripture

In the gospels, while only the briefest account is given of our Lord's life and ministry, or even of that fundamental truth, the Incarnation, His death is described in minutest detail by each evangelist.

Why should the Gospel writers dwell on those harrowing details? Surely out of love to their Lord they would pass over with the merest reference the humiliation of His shameful death. "But the Spirit suffered them not" (Acts 16:7)

Even on the Holy Mount, Moses and Elias, instead of discoursing, as would have been natural, of the Heavenly Glory they had just left, or of that Kingdom Glory which was to come, "Spake of His decease, which He should accomplish at Jerusalem" (Luke 9:31) To them that decease was of transcendent importance, and so to the Apostles in their preaching in the Acts, and in their teaching in the Epistles.

Moses, back in the ages, by faith esteemed the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt.

Whosoever

"I don't like that word, Whosoever," said a gentleman one day to a friend whom he had invited to dinner, and who had been quoting that grand Gospel text, JOHN 3:16 - "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that Whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

"It seems so wide," he continued, "so vague and extended, that it becomes exceedingly difficult to make the question a personal one and of individual applications." "Why so?" replied his guest; "it makes it, to my mind, even more simple, because no doubt is here implied. If you and I were out for a walk and were suddenly stopped short by the sight of a board with the following announcement: "Whosoever is found trespassing upon this property will be prosecuted," I think we would both come to the conclusion we were the parties concerned." This effectually settles the question as to the meaning of Whosoever. Yes, Whosoever means Whosoever. It means a great many more people, no doubt, but the important thing for you to understand is this, that it refers to YOU. Have you believed on Christ, and thus taken your place among the Whosoever? Or have you despised the goodness of God and rejected salvation?

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