But his wife said to him, If Yahweh were pleased to kill us, he wouldn't have received a burnt offering and a meal-offering at our hand, neither would he have shown us all these things, nor would at this time have told such things as these.
I should like to say these two or three words to you who are unconverted, but who are troubled in your souls. You think that God means to destroy you. Now, dear friend, I take it that if the Lord had meant to kill you, He would not have sent the Gospel to you. If there had been a purpose and a decree to destroy you, He would not have brought you here. Now you are sitting to hear that Jesus has died to save such as you are. You are sitting where you are bidden to trust Him and be saved. If the Lord had meant to slay you I do not think He would haven sent me on such a fruitless errand as to tell you of a Christ who could not save you. Some of you have had your lives spared very remarkably. You have been in accidents on land or on sea perhaps in battle and shipwreck. You have been raised from a sickbed. If the Lord had meant to destroy you, surely He would have let you die then; but He has spared you, and you are getting on in years; surely it is time that you yielded to His mercy and gave yourself up into the hands of grace. If the Lord had meant to destroy you, surely, He would not have brought you here, for, possibly, I am addressing one who has come here, wondering why. All the time that he has been sitting here he has been saying to himself, “﻿I do not know how I got into this place, but here I am.﻿” God means to bless you tonight, I trust, and He will, if you breathe this prayer to heaven, “﻿Father, forgive me! I have sinned against heaven and before thee, but for Christ’s sake forgive me! I put my trust in thy Son.﻿” You shall find eternal life, rejoicing in the sacrifice which God has accepted. You shall one of these days rejoice in the revelations of His love, and in the promises which He gives you, and say as we say tonight, “﻿If the Lord were pleased to kill us He would not have showed us all these things.﻿”