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Will you do me a little favor?
Will you take a little time alone, perhaps this evening-
Get a paper and pencil, and after you have honestly and fairly
thought on your own spiritual state, and weighed your own condition
before the Lord, will you write down one of these two words.
If you feel that you are not a believer write down this word “Condemned.”
And if you are a believer in Jesus, and put your trust in him alone,
write down the word “Forgiven.”
Do it, even though you have to write down the word condemned.
We lately received into Church-fellowship a young man, who said —
Sir, I wrote down the word condemned, and I looked at it; there it was;
I had written it myself — “Condemned.”
As he looked the tears began to flow, and his heart began to break;
and before long he fled to Christ, put that paper in the fire, and wrote
down on another paper, “Forgiven.”
Remember you are either one or the other;
you are either condemned or forgiven.
Do not stand between the two.
Let it be decided, and remember if you are condemned today, yet you are
not in hell. There is hope yet. Blessed be God, still is Christ lifted up, and
whoever believes on him shall not perish but have everlasting life. The
gate of glory is not closed; the proclamation of mercy is not hushed; the
Spirit of God still goes forth to open blind eyes and to unstop deaf ears,
and still is it preached to you, to every creature under heaven —
Whoever believes on the Son of God has everlasting life; he that
believes and is baptized shall be saved; he that be believes not shall be
damned. Believe. God help you to believe. Trust Jesus; trust him now; and
may the Lord grant that your name may be written among the some that
believe, and not among the some that believe not.
from Spurgeon’s sermon, “The Minister's Stock-taking”
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