POST TENEBRAS LUX
Dear Reader,
Are you prepared to die and face God as Judge? Are you prepared to stand before the Almighty?
No longer content with conquering the raging seas, I faced these same quandaries.
“But I am the LORD thy God, that divided the sea, whose waves roared: The LORD of hosts is his name” (Isaiah 51:15).
Was I ready to die, and what would become of me after death? When I die, and I stand before God on the day of judgment, what will be my sentence?
Come, set sail with me as I share my discovery of grace.
With supplies dwindling, and no idea where to port. My crew and I cast lots. With three ports up for bid, our destination would be determined. As stated in Proverbs 16:33, ”The lot is cast into the lap; But the whole disposing thereof is of the LORD.”
The winning lot led us North. Mooring up in the year of 1739, it was found that my great ship had suffered irreparable damage and would soon find its resting place on the shores of Connecticut. This felt like destiny, I was ready to abandon a life of piracy on the raging seas, and find rest on land. To my great despair, my crew had other ideas, and fled to continue their lives of debauchery on the high seas which seemed right to them.
“There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, But the end thereof are the ways of death” (Proverbs 14:12).
At this moment I felt the eerie silence of abandonment and managed to make my way inland to the small town of Enfield to find respite for my weary soul, which was headed for the great abyss.
For the first time in many moons, I was alone with my thoughts and the realization of my life on the violent seas: my vile wretchedness, my constant desire to discover worldly vanities, and no care as to who was destroyed along the way. I contemplated my eternity. Hopeless and alone, I rested night after night in the lowly town tavern.
At daybreak on July 8th in the year of 1741, I was making my way to the tavern to numb my mind, body, and soul of all of the guilt and sin of my life as a pirate on the high seas, and all of the lives I destroyed on my quest for self-gratification and the haunt of the treasure that was never discovered.
Before I could reach the tavern, I was oddly drawn to the crowd that had gathered at the Enfield second Meetinghouse. Amongst the upheaval of the crowd, I was drawn to the center where I was confronted with the inescapable reality of my sin. I couldn’t turn myself away from the passionate fervent speaker as he cried out, “O sinner! Consider the fearful danger you are in: it is a great furnace of wrath, a wide and bottomless pit, full of the fire of wrath, that you are held over in the hand of that God, whose wrath is provoked and incensed as much against you, as against many of the damned in hell."1
”For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).
At this point, my heart feels the heaviness of sin and hopelessness. I feel myself sinking into the deep abyss. Will my soul be consumed and damned to hell? Is hell my destiny? …I know it is!! I know I deserve eternal torment, as stated in Scripture, “For the wages of sin is death…” (Romans 6:23a).
The speaker continues, and I nervously listen, my hat fills with sweat. His next words strike me to my core: “and nothing to lay hold of to save yourself, nothing to keep off the flames of wrath, nothing of your own, nothing that you ever have done, nothing that you can do, to induce God to spare you one moment.”2
A chill ran up my spine. Can I truly be spared? Is there a God that would offer me such forgiveness? Scripture states: “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6).
I yearn for more, and I make my way even closer so I don’t miss a single word: “And now you have an extraordinary opportunity, a day wherein Christ has thrown the door of mercy wide open, and stands calling and crying with a loud voice to poor sinners; a day wherein many are flocking to him, and pressing into the kingdom of God.”3
There was a great awakening in my soul; the Holy Spirit breathed life into my dead corpse, replacing my heart of stone with a heart of flesh. As stated in Ezekiel 36:26: “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh.”
I embraced the speaker’s life changing words: “with their hearts filled with love of him who has loved them, and washed them from their sin in his own blood, and rejoicing in hope of the glory of God. How awful is it to be left behind on such a day!”4
I knew I had discovered the treasure I had been longing to find. That treasure being the rugged cross, where Jesus bore my guilt, my sin, my shame. He took the punishment I was due.
“For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18).
It was July 8th, 1741, when my eternal life and life on this earth was forever changed; sailing from the kingdom of darkness into the glorious kingdom of light.
Like everyone born of this world, I was once condemned in my sin, lost and without hope.
“Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned” (Romans 5:12).
No one can escape death, nor the chains of sin, but by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. I tell you today that I have found hope in my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I beseech you, repent and believe.
"For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9).
Repent! Turn to God! Today is the day of salvation.
Sincerely,
Chiefest of Sinners
Post Tenebras Lux (After Darkness, Light)
Written by Pirates and Pearls Coffee Roasters
CITATIONS 1-4: Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God: Jonathan Edwards. (1741). Chapel Library. https://www.chapellibrary.org/book/sith/sinners-in-the-hands-of-an-angry-god-edwardsjonathan