A Would Be Suicide
He had already
written the good-bye notes to loved ones. Luther Cook planned to end his life
that night. As he sat in a New York cafe sipping a cup of coffee, he scarcely
noticed a teenage girl sharing his table until he was startled to see her bow
her head and thank God for the food. He thought of his childhood days when his
godly parents took him to church faithfully and conducted family devotions.
Luther became a successful musician, playing the timpani (kettledrums) in several
symphony orchestras under some of the world’s most excellent conductors. He
drifted into sin and became a slave of alcohol and lust. “I can take a drink,
or I can leave it alone,” he boasted.
One day a friend
challenged him to prove that he could leave it alone. To his dismay, he found
that he could not. All the so-called “cures” failed to deliver him. He realized
he could not continue in professional music the way he was going. Finally, in
the depths of despair, he decided to end it all.
HAVE YOU BEEN BORN AGAIN?
When the girl lifted
her head, he said to her, “Where did you learn that custom?” She looked him
right in the eye and asked, “Have you been born again?” He was astonished at
her question, but he knew what she meant.
He said, “When I was
about your age, I made a profession of faith in Christ.”
“But, Mister, it
isn’t professing Christ that saves anybody; you must possess Him!” There was
another painful silence as the full force of the girl’s words smote him, and
then she added, “It seems to me that you need to get under the preaching of
God’s Word.”
“I suppose you are
right. What church would you recommend?”
“Come to my church,”
she said and gave him the pastor’s name.
Luther thanked her
and left the cafe, his head in a whirl. He walked the streets of New York, and
all he could seem to hear or think was, “It isn’t professing Christ that saves
anybody, you must possess Him!” That night he went to church for the first time
in over twenty-five years. The sermon was from John 1:12, “But as many as
received Him, to them gave HE power to become the sons of God, even to them
that believe on His name.”
“As I listened to
that blessed text,” said Luther, “I realized that possessing Christ and
receiving Him meant the same thing.”
The preacher
declared, “The Lord Jesus wants to come into your life to save you. The Lord
Jesus said, ’Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear my voice,
and open the door, I will come in to him and will sup with him, and he with Me’
(Revelation 3:20). The Lord Jesus is a gentleman. He will not force His way
into your life, but if you invite Him to come in, based on what He did for you
on the cross, He will gladly come in to stay FOREVER, because the Bible teaches
us that the Lord Jesus is a FOREVER-SAVING Saviour!”
“That clinched it,”
said Luther. “I had tried the other ‘saviors,’ and they failed. I hurried back
to my hotel room. I knelt by my bed, and, instead of blowing my brains out, I
told God that I knew I was a lost sinner. I said I believed that Christ had
died for me, was buried and rose again. There I received this forever-saving
Christ as my Lord and Saviour.”
A NEW CREATURE
“What a blessed joy
and relief I experienced that night as He lifted from me the weight of my sins,
all of which He had paid at Calvary. He began in me that blessed work of
transformation of which we read in II Corinthians 5:17, ‘Therefore if any man
be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all
things are become new.’ How I rejoice in the sure knowledge that my mother’s
faithful prayers followed me some twenty years after she went to be with the
Lord. Her prayers were answered by Him saving me and calling me into His
blessed service.”
God delivered Luther
from sinful habits and taught him to witness. Maybe another “Luther Cook” is
reading this. What God did for Mr. Cook, the professional drummer, the
miserable alcoholic, destitute, discouraged, and sad slave of sin, He can do
for you!
You must receive the
Lord Jesus. He demonstrated His love for you by his agonizing death on the
cross to provide your full and free salvation. He rose from the dead and lives
today, exalted at the right hand of God in the same body of flesh and bones in
which He was crucified and buried.
“For there is one
God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus” (I Timothy
2:5).
by Paul Levin
