May 18 Daily Devotional

Light at eventide

There is nothing so hopeless in the world ... as the bankruptcy of the non-Christian view of life....

Charles Darwin ... confessed at the end of his life that as a result of concentrating on one aspect only of life, he had lost the power to enjoy poetry and music and to a large extent even the power to appreciate nature itself. Poor Charles Darwin....

The end of H. G. Wells was very similar. He who had claimed so much for the mind and human understanding and who had ridiculed Christianity with its doctrines of sin and salvation, at the end of his life confessed that he was baffled and bewildered. The very title of his last book—Mind at the End of its Tether—bears eloquent testimony to the Bible's teaching about the tragedy of the end of the ungodly.

Or take the phrase from the autobiography of a rationalist such as Dr. Marrett who was the head of a college in Oxford.... "But to me the war brought to a sudden end the long summer of my life. Henceforth I have nothing to look forward to but chill autumn and still chillier winter, and yet I must somehow try not to lose heart."

The death of the ungodly is a terrible thing. Read their biographies. Their glittering days are at an end.... They have nothing to look forward to and, like the late Lord Simon, try to comfort themselves by reliving their former successes and triumphs....

In the Book of Proverbs we read that "the way of the wicked is as darkness." "But the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day" (Proverbs 4:19, 18). What a glory! ...

Then listen to the Apostle Paul (2 Timothy 4:6-8).... One of John Wesley's proudest claims for his early Methodists was, "Our people die well." ... The Bible everywhere urges us to consider our "latter end." ... Yield yourself to Him and rely upon Him and His power.... And the end will be glorious.

Faith on Trial, pp. 51-3

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“Text reproduced from ‘A First Book of Daily Readings’ by Martyn Lloyd-Jones, published by Epworth Press 1970 & 1977 © Trustees for Methodist Church Purposes. Used with permission.”

Comments on D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, A First Book of Daily Readings

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