A strange subject! Yet if this subject were rightly understood, it would be well. As long as men think they are “something” when they are “nothing” (Galatians 6:3), they are in peril. But he who realizes that “All nations … ” before God “… are as nothing …” (Isaiah 40: 17), and that he personally is “nothing” and has “nothing,” a true hope begins.
The Lord Jesus strikingly said, “… the flesh profiteth nothing …” (John 6:63); whatever a man does or says, he cannot make himself fit for God and Heaven. Deep down in the heart there is pride that will not confess the facts of the case. How few have seen themselves in God’s sight. Stripped of all tinsel, the soul has “nothing” in God’s sight. He who has this experience may well be alarmed.
It is important to remember something else. Ecclesiastes 5: 15 reminds us that a man can “… take nothing of his labour …” when he dies. He must leave everything! It is strange indeed that men are willing to go on in a world of uncertainty, a world of “nothing” – nothing real, nothing permanent, nothing to satisfy the heart – when all the time there is a certainty, there is a security, there is a blessedness in Christ Jesus.
Let a sinner take his right place and own himself a sinner, let him cry out under the burden of sin, let him feel his need of a Saviour what will happen then? Scripture is not indefinite as to the answer, and the Holy Spirit is not slow to apply it to the heart of one awakened. When the load of sin seems too heavy, the Saviour’s “Come unto me …” (Matthew 11 :28) is music to the heart. When the debtor realizes he has “… nothing to pay …” (Luke 7:42), the Lord speaks of frank and full forgiveness. Yes, it is for such that the Gospel has been graciously provided. It is an impressive fact that the Bible has not a single word to encourage the self-confident; all the invitations are worded to show grace to the unworthy.
Think of a few Gospel declarations: ” … he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound” (Isaiah 61:1); ” … bring in hither the poor, and the maimed, and the halt, and the blind” (Luke 14:21). Could anything be more repulsive and distressing to the one who vainly thinks he has “something”? But could anything be more refreshing to the one who knows he has “nothing”? Truly, in this sense, “He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away” (Luke 1 :53).
Reader, if you are rich in your own self-righteousness, you too will be sent empty away. Read Psalm 107, and you will find each part speaks of God’s wonderful works to those who are in dire need and none others. First we have the hungry and the thirsty, then those that sit in darkness and the shadow of death, next those that draw near to the gates of death, and lastly those who are at their wit’s end. The great peril today is that sinners do not see their utter need and, thus, do not see the precious necessity of the death of Christ if they are to be saved. When we own and feel we are nothing and can do nothing, Christ is the only hope- everything is a blank without Him!