The last train

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THE LAST TRAIN

Peter JeямАery

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stood on the platform of life as the last train to heaven was about to

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take its passengers on board.

e platform was filled with happy smiling people about to begin the journey and I was rather interested in going, and wondered whether there would be room for me. e Station Master seeing my hesitation said, “Come along Sir I’ll take you to your seat”. He led me to a seat especially reserved for me with my name on it. He smiled at my surprise and said, “All seats are reserved on this train”. I settled into my seat and dozed off as the journey started.

I was awakened when the train went through the tunnel of pride and then a fear took hold of me. Would the finger of pride point me out as one of its regular customers? ere had been so much pride in my life that I felt sure it would accuse me. e guard could see I was disturbed and reassured me that no one was ever put off the train for Heaven.

When I confided in him about my fear he said, “Listen, no one is on this train because he deserves it. You are not here for the good things you have done but because of God’s love”. I knew this, but I needed to be reminded of it oen.

Soon we were out of the tunnel and travelling through a flat plain. e fields looked lovely but they were spiritually ugly. Fields of lust and lies and jealously once again served to remind me of my sin. How could I be on the way to Heaven with such terrible things in my life? e guard once again came to my help by reminding me that the blood of Jesus cleanses from all sin. Why did I ever forget so essential a truth?

My peace returned as I began to think of the amazing grace of God that had saved me. I talked to other passengers and we soon discovered that none of us had bought a ticket for the journey. All the costs had been met by the Lord Jesus Christ himself and together we began to praise Him for such love and mercy. As we did, doubts and uncertainties vanished; our trust and confidences were strengthened in what Christ had done for us.

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eanwhile back on the platform another group of people were gathering. One

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man seemed to epitomise them all. He took an enormous amount of baggage

with him. Surrounding him were dozens of cases filled with his sin. “Is that all mine?” he asked, and he was told yes and there’s even more, and then two trucks of cases and trunks arrived, and the stench of sin contained in them was even sickening to their owner. One case in particular had a foul smell. It was labelled unbelief. e man looked at it and wept. Remembering all the occasions when the way to Heaven had been shown to him. His thoughts went back to the many times when the Gospel of Jesus was told to him, but he rejected it with arrogant unbelief.

He believed now, but it was too late. e last train to Heaven had gone and he was le with his sin. e next train was for hell.

DON’T MISS THE TRAIN he Last Train is only a parable but it does tell us several vital truths. One is that

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you cannot get to heaven under your own steam. You need someone who can

deal with the crucial thing that is keeping you out of heaven. at thing is your sin and the only one who can deal with sin is Jesus.

It is amazing how many people think they can get to heaven by their own efforts.

Just about every religion, except biblical Christianity, teaches this. Such teaching may salve the arrogant heart but it gives no peace, no assurance and no salvation. It cannot because it is not the way God has laid out in his Word. Jesus tells us of folk who though their own way was good enough and they get to the gate of heaven full of self confidence. ey say to God, ‘‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’.

Can you imagine their amazement when God says to them, ‘‘I never knew you.

Away from me, you evildoers!’ (Matthew 7: 21).

Such ignorance of the way of salvation has no excuse because the true way is taught plainly in Scripture. In a parable taught in Luke 16 Jesus tells us of a man in hell

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pleading for someone to go and tell his five living brothers of the true way. e answer he got was, “Abraham replied, ‘ey have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’ ‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’ He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”

In other words, all that a sinner needs is to be found in Scripture. If this is true why do so many people get it wrong? Because they do not take God seriously and consequently they do not take their own sin seriously.

When this happens it becomes inevitable that they miss the train and end up not in heaven but in hell. Many of these folk are sincere about their religion but because sin is regarded so lightly everything else goes wrong. ey think all trains go to the same destination and quite happily get on a train for hell quite ignorant of its destination. ere is verse in the Old Testament which warns us about this (Proverbs 14:12) “ere is a way that appears to be right, but in the end it leads to death.’ issing the train is not caused by insincerity. People resent being

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told that they are sinners. ey will admit that they are not

perfect, but think they are not too bad really - as good as most people, they like to believe, and better than some. e tendency therefore is to treat sin and its consequences lightly, and it is an easy step from there for man to think that he can provide his own remedy for sin.

Man’s remedy Here are some of the remedies people argue for:

Good works Try your best, say some. Be kind. Be helpful. Be interested in some charity and work hard for it. is is the way to be sure of heaven.

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Morality For others the answer is: be honest and true. Do not lie or cheat. Do not be immoral in any way. Surely God cannot expect more than that of any man!

But what does God’s Word say about good works and morality as a remedy for sin and a means of salvation? ‘All our righteous acts are like filthy rags’ (Isaiah 64:6).

‘For it is by grace that you have been saved, through faith …not by works, so that no one can boast’ (Ephesians 2:8).

Good works and morality are to be commended, but they cannot put sin right. ey cannot take away God’s anger and they cannot save your soul. ‘He saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy’ (Titus 3:5).

Religion According to others the remedy for sin must surely lie in religion. Go to church. Be faithful and devout. Say your prayers.

Once again, these things are good and highly commendable, but they are only another form of good works and morality. e problem of sin remains unanswered.

Read the story in Mark 10:17-27 of the man who was good, moral and religious, but had no salvation and no eternal life. His trust was in himself, not Jesus. ere are many people who believe in all sincerity that their remedies for sin are good enough, and that these things will most surely earn them a place in heaven. hink of a great sporting event that takes place each year. e demand for

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tickets to see this event is enormous, and every year we hear of counterfeit

tickets being sold. ese are very much like the official tickets, but they are false; they do not carry the authority of the sports governing body. It is easy to imagine an avid fan buying one of these counterfeit tickets, believing it to be genuine and that it guarantees him a seat for the big match. With great expectation he travels hundreds of miles to the stadium, only to be turned away at the gate. His sincerity, and his belief that the ticket was genuine, are of no avail at all. He has been deceived. ere is no entrance for him.

Satan is the great deceiver. He is an expert at producing counterfeit ways of salvation.

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Be careful. Be sure that your hope rests in the way God himself has prepared for sinners. It is God’s remedy for sin that you need, not your own.

THE COST OF THE TRAIN TICKET he great word of the gospel when it comes to cost is GRACE. is

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means that it costs the recipient nothing, the cost is paid totally by

God. It does not mean that there is no cost. On the contrary the cost is enormous. ‘For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake. rough him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God'. (1 Peter 1).

Train fares vary from country to country with British fares the highest in the world. Launching their latest review of prices and earnings across the world, including the so-called "Big Mac" index, the researchers say that a 125-mile train trip from, say, Liverpool to London costs £54.39 second class, with the equivalent journey in Germany, the next most expensive nation, costing £40.41. Fares in France and Italy are about half the British level.

Even British fares vary depending on which day you wish to travel on and what time of day you want to go. God has no such scale on the cost of salvation. Every soul is as spiritually dead as all others. ere is no difference in sinners so it costs exactly the same price to redeem each one. A young child or a hardened old sinner, a respectable person or a drug pusher, each one is saved at the same cost.

If we may put it respectfully, God had a dilemma. He planned to save 7

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guilty sinners but how could he do this without condoning the sin? His answer was to provide for the sinner an innocent substitute who had not earned the wage of sin.

But there was no man so qualified for this, so God became man and as the man Jesus he died in the sinners place. he biblical answer to this seemingly impossible dilemma is the doctrine of the

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substitutionary death of Jesus. Leon Morris says, "e richness of New Testament

teaching on this subject centres on Christ. Was there a price to be paid? He paid it.

Was there a victory to be won? He won it. Was there a penalty to be borne? He bore it.

Was there a judgement to be faced? He faced it. View man's plight how you will, the witness of the New Testament is that Christ has come where man ought to be and has met in full all the demands that might be made on man." e teaching on substitution in both Old and New Testaments is vast and varied. In the Old Testament, we have indications of this truth oen in the historical narratives.

For instance, when Abraham was called upon to sacrifice his son Isaac in Genesis 22, God intervened and provided a ram to die instead of Isaac. It's seen more clearly in the death of the Passover Lamb in Exodus 12, and perhaps even more so in the details of the Day of Atonement in Leviticus 16. e great Messianic Song of Isaiah 53 tells us no less than ten times that Christ died for His people - He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities, the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.

In the New Testament, the teaching is direct and clear: "God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" (2 Corinthians 5:21). Moreover, "He himself bore our sins on the tree, so that we might die to sin and live for righteousness; by His wounds you have been healed" (1 Peter 2:24), and: "For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God" (1 Peter 3:18). is was God's plan to deal with human sin. It was no theoretical arrangement, but was very real and very costly. It touched the heart of God because it cost Him the death of his Son. And the cost for Jesus was beyond imagination. God imputes or credits our sins to Him and He becomes responsible for them as our substitute. As our sinbearer, He pays in full the punishment those sins deserve and faces the wrath and judgement of God. e awful reality of all this is heard on the cross when Jesus

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cries out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" He was experiencing what Psalm 22 could only imagine.

We need to grasp the significance of this. He who hung on the cross had been for all eternity the object of God's love. And during the thirty-three years Jesus had been in this world He had enjoyed unbroken communion with God the Father. What then must it have meant for Him to be forsaken by God? e hiding of the Father's face was for Jesus the most bitter ingredient of the cup God had given Him to drink.

No wonder He cries, "if it's possible may this cup be taken from me." It would only have been possible if God were willing to give up His plan to save guilty sinners; if God were prepared to scrap the plan made in eternity and prophesied in Scripture. Was this a dilemma for God? Would He forsake Jesus, His Holy Son, or forsake us guilty sinners? As Christians, we can be eternally grateful that it was God who faced this dilemma and not anyone else. Anyone else would have understandably rejected us. But it was no dilemma for God. His love for us was so amazing and so wondrous that He forsook His Son in order to save us.

Some people have great trouble accepting this truth of substitution, even regarding the idea as immoral. Leon Morris answers them, "To put it bluntly and plainly, if Christ is not my substitute I still occupy the place of a condemned sinner. If my sins and my guilt or not transferred to Him, if He didn't take them upon Himself, then surely they remain with me.

If He didn't deal with my sins, I must face their consequences. If my penalty wasn't borne by Him, it still hangs over me. ere's no other possibility.

To say that substitution is immoral is to say that redemption is impossible."

It was God's will that sin should be punished, and the idea of an innocent substitute dying instead of guilty men and women was His. He doesn't expect us to provide an innocent substitute from among our friends - and anyway there are no innocents, for all have sinned. God demands a substitute and He, Himself, provides the substitute. God gives the only sinless Man to die for us.

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If you’re honest with yourself, you will admit that you’re not as good as you would like to be, and if that is true by your standard, what do you think you are by God’s standards?

By God’s standards we are all sinners, and He doesn’t call us his children, but his enemies, and that sin puts us under his judgement. Like the man with the baggage you will have missed the train to Heaven (1 John Chapter 5 verses 11-12). e situation before the Holy One is one of hopelessness and would remain so apart from the Grace of God. God's answer to our sin is Jesus. He alone is the Saviour who can take our sin away and purchase for us a full forgiveness and a full salvation.

You need Jesus and you need Him today. e matter is urgent so pray to Him now for mercy and ask for pardon – because the last train for Heaven has not departed yet and there will be room on it for you – if you know the Lord Jesus as your Saviour.

So get your seat reserved now. Go to Him now and ask Him to be your Saviour and to forgive you all your sins. e price is paid, come let us enter in To all that Jesus died to make our own.

For every sin, more than enough He gave, And bought our freedom from each guilty stain. e price is paid, Alleluia.

Amazing grace, so strong and sure And so with all my heart, my life in every part, I live to thank You for the price You paid. e price is paid, see Satan flee away; For Jesus crucified destroys his power.

No more to pay, let accusation cease In Christ there is no condemnation now.

Graham Kendrick

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peter@peterjeery.org.uk

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