By the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified in God’s sight. All that the law can do is bring a knowledge of sin. Stop all your working and rest in the perfect, finished work of the Bleeding Substitute. Trusting in your doings will be the death of you. Do nothing else but come to Christ and His Atonement for Rest. *Matthew 11:28* You have attempted to do this and that to heal your own soul, but you have never ministered one bit to your cure. Access to Heaven was purchased at the cost of Christ’s blood. Human nature wants what is easy, not what is Right and Pure.
The evil tendency of human nature is to rely upon a salvation by its own works. The pride of man leads him to believe that he can be, at least in some part, his own savior. But your finest deeds must be renounced. You might as well attempt to put out a raging volcano with a cup of water, as hope by any means to get rid of your sinful nature or put away your past sinfulness by doing better in the future. Give up the delusive dream that you will make yourself better by and by, and somehow help save yourself from sin and the wrath of Hell. Anything that you do by which to save yourself is a selfish act, and therefore it cannot be good. You cannot help save yourself – but Christ can save you completely and permanently – simply trust Christ with your immortal soul. How can you be born again? Thorough belief in Christ alone – looking straightaway to the Cross. You must give up your dependence on yourself – your cleverness, your self-improvement, your plans of becoming religious – and just look to the Bleeding Lamb of Calvary.
You could toil night and day for the rest of your life, but God demands perfect obedience to His law from day one till your death, and you have come up way short of the holiness God requires to enter Heaven. *Romans 3:23* A man's works never gives him a present assurance of salvation. Salvation by human merit can be possible if a man possesses absolute perfection, but that is utterly impossible, for every man has already sinned. God will never accept anything short of a perfect Righteousness from man to enter Heaven. Do remember - Only faith in the Blood of Christ saves real sinners from hell fire. Jesus will never save you because of your good works, and He will never forsake you because of your bad works. Leave off doing and working, simply trust in the finished Cross-work which Jesus has already done. The perfect Righteousness that God requires can only be received from Christ Himself as a free gift. Only the Spirit of God can help you sense your vileness and make you conscious of your deep need of Christ. You are not saved by what you do, but by what Christ has done. The word of God is quick and powerful and will cut down your self-righteousness. The death of your good works will be the salvation of your soul. The man that trusts in his own works (in any way) is relying on a spider’s web to hold him up in Eternity.
If you think you can earn salvation with your own merits, you have a very poor idea of the value of Christ’s work. The blood and merits of Jesus Christ is the only thing that can keep you out of Hell. You insult God to His face when you bring your counterfeit coin to pay for Christ’s treasures. You have no good works in which to trust, and no righteousness on which you can rely. Stop attempting to save yourself through your own goodness. You can do nothing whatsoever to help save yourself from the hell you justly deserve. Good as you think yourself to be, you can never mend your own sinful soul. Put away your high looks and humble yourself under the mighty hand of God. You have no power to obey the Law at all.
Stop trusting in two things – partly in Christ and partly in your good works. The road to Hell is paved with human goodness, religiousness, and morality. Your self-righteousness will never be enough and will only destroy your soul. Christ has prepared a better Righteousness than yours; come to Him and rest in His Righteousness. Unless you have a better Righteousness than your own, when God begins to mark iniquities, His divine justice will always condemn you. The Holy Spirit must make you poor in spirit, so you will give up your goodness, and seek Christ's riches. The Holy Ghost’s work will cause you to see you need a much better Righteousness than your own to approach God in safety. Any hopes you may have of self-salvation is only a delusion. Put away your high looks, leave off trusting your goodness and religious efforts, doctrines, forms, and performances.
Christ’s perfect Blood Atonement for human sin is finished forever, and the sinner that tries to add to what Christ has finished has blasphemed his Creator and doomed his soul. The most commendable works of your hands can never be accepted before the bar of God's judgment. All of your self-goodness is only a lie; reject and renounce all of it. Trust only in Christ’s name, His promises, His truth, His works, His atoning blood, His finished Righteousness. Your best works are filthy and must be washed in Christ's blood. Christ’s Righteousness is your soul’s only shelter from wrath of God. Come to Christ’s Precious Blood and be really made clean. If you keep messing around and die in your sins, that will be an eternal disaster for you.
Christ Jesus, God Incarnate, will not have you and your good works, but He will take you and your sins. Christ will take you just as you are. Flee from your good works just as you would flee from your bad ones. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. But what is it to believe on Christ? It is to trust Him – trust Him with your soul, just as it is. Trust Him with your soul now. You must take Christ the Person as He is, take Him now. God’s mercy is free – Christ is willing to save you. The moment you stop trusting yourself and trust Christ alone, you are saved for all Eternity. Just as you are, take Christ just as He is. Leave your sins and your works – Come on with you to the Cross – Believe on Christ now – trust Him alone, and your guilty soul is saved. Cry out to God for mercy through the Blood of Jesus Christ. Simply rely only on what Jesus did on Calvary's Cross, and your sins are forgiven forever.
First, renounce all of your own righteousness, and all attempts to seek a righteousness by your own doings. Nothing you can do will ever commend you to God. You have worked for a long time to better yourself, but you are not one bit the better for it. Leave all attempts to work out a salvation for yourself. The Law examines all of your actions, private and public; all of your words, even your idle words and gossip; the Law examines all of your thoughts and longings. You haven't lived a day without a sinful thought.
Your sinful deeds do condemn you, but just your vain thoughts of yourself are enough to send you straight to Hell. The very thought of foolishness is sin. You cannot attain to the Law's holy requirements. Remember your youthful sins - you dishonored your father and mother, you lied to others, and you took things that didn't belong to you. Think about the long, black list of your sins during your manhood. Once the Holy Ghost makes your soul conscious of your sins, then all hopes of salvation by your own works is abandoned, and you realize you are utterly condemned and in deep need of the Savior's atoning blood.
Your sinful deeds do condemn you, but just your vain thoughts of yourself are enough to send you straight to Hell. The very thought of foolishness is sin. You cannot attain to the Law's holy requirements. Remember your youthful sins - you dishonored your father and mother, you lied to others, and you took things that didn't belong to you. Think about the long, black list of your sins during your manhood. Once the Holy Ghost makes your soul conscious of your sins, then all hopes of salvation by your own works is abandoned, and you realize you are utterly condemned and in deep need of the Savior's atoning blood.
You can never satisfy God's Divine Justice with your actions, none of your deeds can take away the anger of God (John 3:36) towards you for your sins. Stop hoping to do what no sinner has ever done. Your self-goodness can never atone for your sinful past, you cannot prevent yourself from sinning in the future, your inward nature is as evil as your actions. Your being is filled with lust, you are loathsome to the core. Evil comes from you, for there is a fountain of evil spewing within you. You are an enemy to God, your carnal mind rebels against God's mind. Thoroughly give up your self-righteousness, be willing to be nothing, and to do nothing to help save yourself. Christ Jesus has completed a Perfect Righteousness and Blood Atonement for us. Free Salvation can be yours now by grace through simple faith in the precious atoning blood of the Lord Jesus Christ - God manifest in the flesh (Ephesians 2:8-9; Romans 5:9-11; I Timothy 3:16).
