God, with His loving heart and tender Word, is calling all souls everywhere. He calls through His Word, His Holy Spirit, His servants and by the stem realities of life's trials and tragedies. He sends the call to repentance, the call to service, and last of all the call to die. These calls may come to us anytime, anywhere, but they will come sometime, somewhere.
God has condensed His call to man in the one word "come." "Come and drink," "come and dine," "come and rest," and then last of all we hear "come home." These "comes" have been sent to all generations everywhere, but sometime, somewhere we hear them personally.
The call to repentance is the first call we hear. Jesus began His ministry by saying: ". . . repent ye, and believe the Gospel." Mark 1:15. He calls us from sinful living, from careless desires and from carnal works. We feel the summons of God to our spirit in an intangible and undefinable way but oh, so unmistakably. Within our hearts is a pitiful lostness, a pathetic loneliness. We feel the tug of a hard to describe longing, an awareness of incompleteness.
Dear reader, do you hear this call? "Today, if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts" (Hebrews 3:7,8). Come just now to the Lord Jesus, who is waiting with loving, outstretched arms to receive you and who will satisfy the longing and emptiness of you soil. "Incline your ear and come unto me: hear, and your soul shall live" (Isaiah 55:3). Do not wait until some more convenient season, for some day there'll be no tomorrow. Those who intend to accept Christ at the eleventh hour may die at 10:30 and to them the call to die will be unexpected and unwelcome.
When we heed the call to repentance we enter a new life, a new way, a new endeavor. We receive new hearts with new desires, new interests, new plans. We go forth with new courage, new hope, new strength; new blessings follow and new gleams of the glory above await us. "... behold all things are become new!" (2 Corinthians 5:17). We must taste it to realize the blessedness of it. 0, that everyone, everywhere would repent, receive salvation and rejoice!
The second call, the call to service, comes only to those who heed the first call. For an example, when Jesus called His disciples to follow Him, He said "and I will make you fishers of men" (Matthew 4:19). After Paul was converted "He straightway preached Christ . . . that he is the Son of God" (Acts 9:20). It is sad that within the churches of today, there are members who have never answered the call to repentance, and yet are very busy serving and sacrificing. In pretense they are so busy working for God, they haven't taken time to spend with God, and their service will not be found acceptable. "Many will say to me in that day. Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity" (Matthew 7:22,23). Our service cannot be Christ-like unless we become like Christ by first heeding the call to repentance. No church, no church doctrine, no baptism, no communion, no good deeds can save our souls. Only when Jesus Christ dwells within and the Holy Spirit directs our efforts will we be found acceptable in God's sight.
Every "born again" Christian will receive the call to service in one way or another. We are saved to serve! We cannot only be good, we must be good forsomething. No Christian should feel that the call to service is an unpleasant one, but they should devoutly thank God that they have chosen to walk the way of the cross and service. It cost God so much to save us, and do we not wish to do our little part in thankfulness for what he's done for us? Can you hear the thud of the hammer as it drove those cruel nails into the hands that often touched and healed? Can you hear those agonizing words, "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?" And it was all for us that He bore it all! "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" (Isaiah 53:5). When we catch a glimpse of this picture in all of its loneliness and submission all we can say is, "0 Lord, our very best is not enough." The road of service may be not always be smooth, but the blessings far outweigh the thorns and stones that we may encounter upon the pathway of duty. "For the Lord God, even my God, will be with thee; until thou hast finished all the work for the service of the house of the Lord" (1 Corinthian 28:20).
One by one, everyone, will hear the final and unescapable call - the call to die. "It is appointed unto man once to die, but after that the judgment" (Hebrews 9:27). No one, no age, no color, no position is exempted. And after death, what then? ". . . everyone of us shall give account of himself to God" (Romans 14:12). Are you ready to give account of your life if you should hear this final call today? "... and then He shall reward every man according to his works" (Matthew 16:27).
To those who have answered the first two calls of God and continued faithful, the last call will be a welcome one. "He that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved" (Matthew 24:13). The words "come home" will fill and thrill our souls. When we become children of the heavenly Father and walk in the pathway of service, life will be full and rich and real, but death will be even richer. We then shall no longer be pacing a rough and lonely path, but in that holy city our holy feet shall be treading streets of gold.
0' think to step ashore and find it heaven
To clasp a hand outstretched
And find it God's hand!
To step from storm and stress
To one unbroken calm
0' think to awaken and find you're home!
What a day, glorious day that will be!
Now, how will you-yes you-answer the three calls of God? If you are a sinner, answer the call to repentance now, and say, "0 Lord, I come." He has promised "him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out" (John 6:37), If you are a "born again" Christian answer the call to service by giving your time, your talent, your all in holy consecration to Him who bought you with a great price.
As you hear a final summons to die will you be able to say, "Come, Lord Jesus, come" or will you tremble as you fail into the hands of a just and righteous God? (Hebrews 10:31) The choice is yours. Which will it be?
