Jesus Christ came not to bring vengeance, but salvation, fulfilling Isaiah's prophecy of an acceptable year of the Lord. He offers freedom from sin's bondage, healing for the brokenhearted, and sight to the spiritually blind. While God has appointed a future day of judgment, the present is the day of grace, where salvation is available through faith in Christ's atoning sacrifice. The sermon emphasizes that believing God's witness about His Son is the key to receiving eternal life and assures that this salvation, once received, brings lasting peace and freedom from doubt.
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And there he is today a trophy of grace. The first time I met that man, he'd just been saved. He couldn't even stand up and read out of how he was an insurance agent, I don't know, but he actually couldn't stand up and read the third chapter of John so you could recognize it. That's how ignorant a man was, now an educator. And today he's a splendid preacher of the gospel. Why, he even preaches on the Book of Daniel and the Seven Trumpets and all the horsemen of the apocalypse, something I couldn't do. But there he does. Charlie Clausley, a trophy of God's grace. He's got beautiful ashes, dear friends. Just think of him laying in the gutter on a Saturday night and the police coming along with a paddy wagon and shoveling him in.
A worthless bunch of ashes, that's all I want. Poor, sinful flesh. In the sight of God worth no more than a bunch of ashes in our sight. And yet God reached him and saved him. And there he is, a wonderful trophy of grace, with the beauty of Jesus shining out of his face. I wish you could hear him. Maybe you have. I don't know if he's either been out this way or not. He's been someplace in Iowa preaching the gospel. I know that. Dear old Charlie Crossey, waiting for the day when he can get his pension from the insurance company so he can spend all his time Going around preaching the gospel. Oh, I'll tell you, dear friend, beautiful action. Well, now you notice in that fourth chapter of Luke a very remarkable difference.
Our Lord Jesus Christ, when he stood up in that synagogue and he took the scroll and he unrolled that scroll of parchment until he came to that sixty-first chapter of Isaiah and he read those words that we read. They're translated for us because it's the Greek, you know, translated from the Hebrew. The words are just a trifle difference in the New Testament and our version, but there it was, that very same passage. And he read some of those things that we read. And he read these words, and to preach the acceptable year of the Lord, and then he closed them up. Now, have you noticed what we read in the book of Isaiah? It said to preach the acceptable year of the Lord on the day of vengeance of our God.
And the Lord Jesus Christ didn't quote that in the synagogue at Nazareth. He closed the book. Oh, I'm so glad he closed the book. I'm so glad he closed the book without quoting the rest of that verse in Isaiah. What's the significance of that? Oh, dear friends, he had come into the world. not to usher in the day of vengeance, but to usher in the day of God's salvation. He came into the world to be the savior of the world. He came into the world that he might become the sacrifice of Calvary, bearing in his body on the tree the sins of the world, the land of God, to bear away the sin of the world.
That's why he came. He hadn't come, dear friends, to usher in the day of God's vengeance. No. He came to preach the acceptable year of the Lord, and here it's gone on for over nineteen hundred years, the wonderful day of grace. And you, by the grace of God, my dear unsaved friend, whether you're a boy or girl, or whether you're a man or woman, by the wonderful grace of God, you're sitting in this gospel hall tonight. And you're able to listen with your sound mind and all the faculties that enable you to take the message in. You're listening to the acceptable year of the Lord being preached. You're listening to the gospel of the grace of God, and you tonight can have the salvation that the Lord Jesus Christ died on Calvary to procure for you.
Oh, dear friend, where do you stand in regard to these things? Where do you stand? He came to heal the brokenhearted. He came to give sight to the blind, those that are blinded by sin. And dear friends, if you're here on stage tonight, you're blind. Oh, you might be able to see me. You might be able to stare me down with those good eyes of yours. But dear friends, God says you're blind. You're blind as far as eternal things are concerned. blinded by the God of this world. If our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost.
Because the God of this world has blinded the minds of them that believe not. The Lord Jesus Christ came to give you sight, dear friend. He came to heal the brokenhearted. Oh, is there anyone here tonight that's conscious of your need? Conscious of the fact that you're not right with God. Conscious of the fact that should you be called out of time into eternity tonight, you'd be lost forever. And you're contrite and brokenhearted about it. Oh, Lord Jesus, pain to heal the brokenhearted. Oh, friend, salvation can be yours tonight.
He came to set the captive free. And everyone that's here tonight that's on stage, you're a captive. Satan holds you in his bond. Sin holds you in his bond. Try as you will and strive as you will. You cannot break those bonds yourself. But oh, he came to set the captive free. He came to let the prisoner out of the prison, dear friend, to take away the prison bond, to lose the bond. And tonight you can have this wonderful salvation. You can be able to sing with those of us that are saved. My chains are snapped, the bonds of sin are broken, and I am free.
Oh, and you can sing the triumph of the one who made it possible by dying for you. He came to preach the acceptable year of the Lord. Then, dear friends, let's revert to Isaiah for a moment. In Isaiah it says, on the day of vengeance of our God, and while this is the day of grace, and while the Lord Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, while he came into the world to die that cruel death on Calvary, my dear friends, God's word tells us this.
that God hath appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness, by that man whom he hath ordained, whereby he hath given assurance unto all men unto thee, hath raised him from the dead. And that very one who spake those gracious words, you remember we read in the fourth chapter of Luke, that they wondered at the gracious words that came forth from his lips. Oh, just think of it. You remember one time the powers that were in power in religious Israel, they sent soldiers to take him captive. They said, go and arrest that man, Jesus, of Nazareth.
And the soldiers went. They made a mistake. They listened to him. And they too heard gracious words that proceeded out of his lips, just like these people in the synagogue. And they went back to their masters and they had no prisoner and they said, Why did you not bring him? Oh, they said, Never man spake like this man. And dear friends, that's true. Oh, listen to these gracious words that come from his lips. Come unto me, oh, are you at labor and are heavy laden? And I will give you rest.
My friend, no person that ever lived upon this earth could say words like that that could have any meaning. No one. Not even the beloved Apostle Paul. He couldn't have said that. And fulfill the promise. But this one said it. This blessed one that stood in the synagogue at Nazareth, he said it. And he's saying it to you tonight. Boy, girl, man, woman, whoever you might be, you children of Christian parents that have been the subject of so many prayers for so many years.
And you're here tonight on stage. Oh, this lovely man. this lovely person, the loveliest of all persons that ever trod this earth, the one who's the cheapest among ten thousand. These gracious words are coming out of his lips tonight as they did in that synagogue at Nazareth that morning, and he's saying to you, come unto me, and I will give you rest. Will you come tonight? Will you listen to him? Dear friend, He came to preach the acceptable year of the Lord. But the prophet Isaiah preached also the day of vengeance of our God.
And that one who came to save, that one who went to Calvary and suffered in blood and died as a victim on the cross. He did die. He accomplished the work of redemption by dying on that cross. And God raised him from the dead and took him and placed him at his own right hand. And there he sits tonight. prince and a savior, able and willing and anxious to save to the uttermost all those who will come under God by him. But someday he's going to rise up from that place of his father's right hand and he's going to come. First of all, to take the saved ones home and then come down to this earth and why is he going to come the next time?
Oh, there'll be no gracious word proceeding out of his mouth then. because he'll come to usher in the day of vengeance of our God. And the hymn writer has put it this way, if you then the call refuse and all his wondrous love abused, soon will he sadly from you turn your bitter prayer of pardon spurred. Too late, too late will be the cry Jesus of Nazareth has passed by.
And my friend, that will be your portion if you refuse to listen to these gracious words. Oh, tonight he wants to give you beauty for ashes. He wants to take away your sin. He wants to take away your trouble. He wants to take away your heartache. And he wants to give you peace and joy and gladness and salvation. And friend, the choice is yours. No one can take this step for you. It's for you and you alone to make the choice.
What then will you do with Jesus, the Christ, the gracious man of the synagogue of Nazareth, the man who suffered in Pilate's judgment hall, the man who was crowned with that mocking crown of thorns, who was buffeted, beaten with many stripes, who tore up that hill low and gray, bearing its cross and sank beneath its weight, and then was taken and by wicked men nailed to that cross, and that cross raised and thrust into the ground. And he suffered. and he bled and he died for you, for you, dear friend, for you.
I say again, you have to make the choice. What will your answer be? I want to tell you how God reached me before I turn the meeting over to Mr. Rogers. Like I hinted before, I was brought up in the Christian home Unfortunately, I've never known the joy and wonderment of a mother's love because my mother died when I was an infant. I don't remember my mother, but I do know that my mother's in heaven because I've had numbers of people that knew my mother tell me what a beautiful Christian my mother was.
And I'm sure that Ear she went home to be with the Lord, she prayed to an infant boy who would never know her love down here. But I was blessed with a godly father. However, my father was taken home to heaven when I was ten years of age. But before he went to heaven, he left impressed on my heart and on my mind and conscience the truth of God. I was born in the old country in England, and of course, Sundays over there at that time were spent in either going to a meeting or staying in the home and either reading from the Bible or hearing about Bible stories, nothing else.
And I can remember my father taking the honors me and reading to me the story, the wonderful stories of the Bible, and that's where I learned them. And I can remember reading the story of Daniel, reading the story of David. Read the story of Joseph, and I suppose I would be eight or nine years of age at that time. I can remember sobbing my heart out as he read the story of Joseph, poor Joseph, down in the pit and sold down into Egypt. Well, those stories never left me. When I was eleven years of old, eleven years of age, I was brought out to this country by an older brother and taken to the meeting in Boston, Massachusetts, in Cliff Street.
went to the Sunday school there, sat under the sound of real searching preaching. Some of you remember Mr. William Matthews, a great man of God, John Smith, Mr. Douglas, men of that type. I really knew how to preach the gospel with convicting power, and many a time I was convicted. As a matter of fact, I made a profession when I was about, oh, eleven to twelve years of age, but it proved to be not a real profession. It was just a profession. And so it went on. And about the age of fifteen, I left school, and I didn't want my brother to be spending his money supporting me, and so I left school after a year of high school and went to work.
And, of course, after I went to work, I felt I was quite independent, and I just pulled myself away and stopped going to the Gospel Hall in Boston, and I went out into the world at that tender age. And I'm very thankful for this that God did deliver me from entering into gross sin. I suppose that the worst sin that I was really guilty of was the sin of I became a very indebted smoker when I was fifteen and sixteen years of age. And also I learned to use profanity with a very great deal of proficiency. I'm very, very sorry to say that, but that's true.
And of course I had no use for the gospel, no use for gospel meetings. I did go to some churches once in a while, about just as a lock more than anything else. But oh, I'm so glad for the wonderful mercy of God. The riches of the great. How wonderful they are. that little baby boy that that mother prayed for before she went home to heaven, and that ten-year-old boy that my father prayed for when he lay on his deathbed with pneumonia and then was taken away from me. Oh, I know he prayed for me. God heard those prayers. And some friends of mine persuaded me to go back to the gospel meeting in Cliff Street, and I heard Mr.
Matthews preach the gospel again. And God entered into my heart with a real spirit of conviction. And for a little over a year, I had no peace of mind. I can remember deep conviction of soul. And during that year or more, about fifteen months, I think it was, I tried as hard as any human being ever tried to get saved. I read every verse in the Bible that has ever been quoted to me. I used to take hymns in the hymn book, and I'd read those hymns. I'd sing those hymns and think that through the singing of a reading some way, I would find out how I could trust Christ.
Oh, I could tell anybody a way of salvation. When I was going to these churches before I was saved, you know how they do in some of those places? When we have a prayer meeting, there's somebody that stands up in front and he calls on different ones to pray, and sometimes he'd call on me and I could pray better than any of them. I'd been brought up in a Gospel Hall Sunday school. Why shouldn't I be able to pray? I'd heard so many prayers in my day that I could say some of them backwards almost, you know. And yet I wasn't saved. And so that went on, and I really got so bad that I couldn't even do my work. I was learning the trade of a meat cutter at the time. And I went back to the hall Sunday after Sunday.
And some of you remember all Mr. John Smith. Do you remember John Smith in Cleveland? A lot of you remember here. Well, one night he was there preaching the gospel. And Mrs. Matthews' dear soul that she was. She loved me. She's been in our home when I was a little boy in the old country, Mr. and Mrs. Matthews. And oh, they loved me. And they loved that poor little orphan boy that came to the United States and they did their best to help me. And they were so glad when I came back to the gospel meeting. And then you know I was anxious to be saved, and one night Mrs. Matthews brought old Mr. John Smith. She brought me to him, and she said, Mr. Smith, here's a young man that's very, very anxious to be saved. He's been trying to be saved for a long, long time.
Well, you know Mr. Smith. He has fire in his eyes, and those big long black whiskers of his, you know. And I thought to myself, well, now he'll take me up on the corner, he'll sit down, and he'll He'll read some verses to me. Maybe I'll see it tonight. But he didn't do anything of the kind. He took hold of me by the lapel of my coat. And he shook me just like that. And he said, Young man, isn't the word of God good enough for you? He turned around left me. And I'll tell you, I was the most disappointed boy you ever looked at. I really was. I thought, well, is that all he cares about whether I get saved or not? But that was the Spirit of God led that man.
Those men were godly men. They were men of God. And about a week from that following Sunday, I went to the gospel meeting again, still anxious. Nothing happened. I went home, went to work on Monday, went home Monday night. And I sat in my room. I was rooming. Of course, having no home on my own, I was rooming with a brother there. And everybody's gone out of the house, and I sat by the electric light on my little table in my room. And I tried that method again. I went through all the hymns. I remember singing that hymn or saying that hymn. I don't know whether I said it or sang it.
I've tried in vain a thousand ways. My fears to quell, my hopes to raise. That struck a responsive chord in my heart because that was my case. And I say those words, it's ever only Jesus, but nothing happened. And I closed my Bible and I said, I'm going to give up. There's no hope for me. And I sat there despondent. And suddenly, it must have been the Spirit of God, prompted me to open my Bible. And I opened my Bible to a verse Some verses, Mr. Matthews had quoted to me not very long. In fact, he's done it two or three times. And I read these words in the fifth chapter, the first epistle of John.
If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater. Are you here tonight and you'd like to be saved? You've tried to be saved. And you just can't see it all. Listen to this. This is the way God opened my eyes. I read these words if we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater. And this is the record. This is the witness which God hath testified of his Son. He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself, and he that believeth not God hath made him a liar. Now, Mr.
Matthews has quoted that to me, read it to me many times. Don't you realize that when you refuse to believe God, you're making God out to be a liar? Do you want to do that? And I said, no, well, he said, that's what you're doing. But I've never realized it. I realized it this night. I've made him a liar. Because he believed him not the record that God gave of his son. And this is the record that God has given to us eternal life. And this life is in his son. And I stopped. And I went over it again. And suddenly I was like the blind man that saw men as trees walk, and the glimmer of light began to come. And I said to myself, Oh, I think I understand that.
What does it say? If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is great. Well, I said, I can understand that. If my brother will, who was living with me, if he told me, said, Charlie, I'm going down to The North Station and I'm going to take a train to Portland, Maine. I wouldn't take a whole year and three months to try and see if I could believe that. Not at all. I'd say, well, Bill, I hope you have a good trip. Goodbye. Hope you have a good trip. And I thought to myself, well, if I can believe my brother as easily as that, This verse says, The witness of God is greater.
It should be much easier to believe God. Oh, I said, Lord, what do you want me to believe? I'll believe you. What do you want me to believe? Well, I said, it's right here. God have given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Oh, I said, I see it. I see it. God tells me that he's satisfied. with the work His Son did when He died on Calvary as atonement for my sin. I see it. It's just as easy as that. And I can remember I said, Lord Jesus, Lord Jesus, I'm going to trust you for my salvation.
I'm going to give everything else, Lord Jesus. I'm just going to trust you with my soul for eternity. And I remember I said this, it may have been a reverend, but I said it. And I said, Lord Jesus, that if I don't get to heaven that way, there's no use. But I'm trusting you right now. And my dear friends, I want to tell you, it was just as real to me as if a voice had spoken from heaven. You're saved. You're saved. Why? Oh, because as soon as my oil I ventured on the atoning blood, The Holy Spirit entered, and I was born of God.
There it was. The sun broke. The burden was gone, yes, I saved him in the story. And I was free. And I can remember jumping up off that chair and running through the house, trying to find somebody to tell them. The dear old landlady that had taken care of me for a number of years, I'd lived with her since I was ever an eleven-year-old boy that came to this country, and she was out, and I was so disappointed. There wasn't anybody there to tell the good news to, and I couldn't wait until they came back. And when she came back, she was the first one to come. I said, oh, Mrs. Watson, I'm saved. I'm saved. And she threw her arms around me, a great big hamper, boom, little big Irish lady.
And she just hugged me too much. And she just, oh, shouting, Charlie, I can't believe it. And she just wet my head with her tears. She was so full of joy. Oh, I'll tell you, dear friend. I feel like a Pentecostal. I'll get up and shout and jump. Hallelujah. But I'm going to tell you something. I've heard people talk about getting saved and doubting their salvation. Now that can happen. I know it can. I've known people that have that experience. But I can say before God that from that moment I have never doubted my salvation. I've been away from God and He's had to deal with me.
But I never for one second doubted my salvation. Why? Oh, because the Word said if we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater. And this is the record that God has given to us, eternal life, and that life is in its Son. And I believe that that night and trusted my all and the Lord Jesus Christ. Friend, you can have that blessed experience tonight. Or if you'd like to be saved, believe God. Trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. And you too. that know the joy of salvation. Arthur, I've stolen about six or seven minutes. I'm awfully sorry. Will you forgive me?