- Overcomer Literature Trust
- Swindon
- Wiltshire
SALVATION.
By Sadhu Sundar Singh
The Disciple.
Master, in days past some educated men and their followers regarded your atonement by blood as meaningless and futile. They said that Christ was only a great teacher and an example for our spiritual life, and that salvation and eternal happiness depend on our own efforts and good deeds.
The Master.
Never forget that spiritual and religious ideas are connected less with the head than with the heart, which is the temple of God, and when the heart is filled with the presence of God the head also is enlightened. For the mind and the eyes of the understanding are useless without the true light, as the natural eyes are without daylight. In the dark, one may mistake a rope for a snake, just as the wise of this world pervert spiritual truth and lead others astray. So Satan when charming Eve, used a snake, the most crafty of all animals, and not a sheep or a dove. He takes the wisdom of the wise and the skill of the educated, and makes them instruments for his purpose. But it is not enough to be clever, one must also have the innocence of the dove, therefore I have said, “therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves” (Matthew 10 v16).
There are many who have learnt from experience that human goodness cannot give peace of heart, nor can it give them a certainty of salvation or eternal life. The young man who came to Me for eternal life first thought about Me wrongly, like some worldly people do today. He thought I am one of those teachers who are like whitewashed tombs, and in whose lives there is not even a little bit of goodness. Therefore I said to him, “why do you ask me about what is good?” (Matthew 19 v17). There is only One who is good. But he failed to see Me as the giver of goodness and life, and when I sought to offer him My friendship, make him a truly good man, and give life to him, he became sad and left Me. His life however, makes perfectly clear that his keeping the commandments and his goodness did not satisfy or give peace, or he would not have come to ask Me, or had he come he would not have left sad, but would have gone away rejoicing and believing My words.
Not long afterwards the young man Paul recognised Me, the desire of his heart was completely fulfilled. Instead of turning away in sadness he gave up all that he had and followed Me (Philippians 3 v6-15). So everyone who ceases to trust in his own righteousness and follows Me shall receive from Me true peace and everlasting life.
From ‘At the Master’s Feet’.