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By Vance Havner
tion ”— therein lies the sad story of Israel’s rejection and misery to this day. And there lies a serious message fo r us as well. They did not know Him when He came the first time in the visitation o f grace. How oft would He have gathered His people but they would not. He came to Nazareth and could do no mighty works because o f their unbelief. He came to Gadara and they were more concerned over the loss o f hogs than the presence of God’s Son. Strangely enough, the scribes, the religious experts of His time, the Scripture students, the prophecy specialists, were blindest of all. There stood One among them whom they knew not, as John the Baptist said. Think o f the Son o f God growing up in your town, preaching in the neighborhood, performing mir acles before your eyes, and yet you do not know the time o f your visita tion ! But so it was and so it will be when He comes again. Most people m il not know the time o f their visitation when He comes in glory. He Himself said it would be as in the days of Noah. They were eating and drink ing, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark and knew not until the flood came and took them all away. Our Lord, in that same discourse, said, “ But this know, that if the goodman of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched, and not have suffered his house to be broken through” (Luke 12:39). But when men say “ Peace and safety,” sudden destruction shall come. Scoffers today make light o f His coming and know not that in denying the signs they are a sign themselves! And just as the religious experts missed Jesus the first time, some who should know better but are wilfully ignorant will not know the time o f their visitation when He comes again. God would not have us ignorant. The day and hour we cannot know, but we can know when His coming draw- eth nigh. Just as men did not know Him when He came first in the visitation of
O NE o f the saddest laments ever to escape human lips is the oft- repeated cry, “ If I had only known!” The motorist who drove to tragedy on the railroad tracks moans “ I f I had only seen the train !” Hos pitals are filled with wrecks who would have lived more moderately if they had only known. No man means to be a drunkard or to destroy his body when he sets out in the way o f sin. If we realized the consequences we would do something about the cause. Many a pauper, if he had known, would have made preparation fo r the rainy day. And think of the tragedy o f lost youth. Many an old man has said, “ If I had known then what I know now, I would have remembered my Creator in the days of my youth.” If youth only knew how to live and old age could! But experience is some thing we have when it is too late to use it. I f we had known that dear ones would be so suddenly snatched from us, we would have been kinder.
But consider a more serious appli cation. Our Lord is weeping over Jerusalem. He has come to the lost sheep o f the house o f Israel and they have not recognized the Shepherd. He has come unto His own and His own have received Him not. And now He laments, “ I f thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! But now they are hid from thine eyes” (Luke 19:42). Then He describes the coming de struction o f Jerusalem, fulfilled to the letter forty years later: “ For the days shall come upon thee, that thine ene mies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee in on every side, and shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy children within thee; and they shall not'leave in thee one stone upon an other, because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation” (Luke 19:48, 44). “ I f thou hadst known . . . thou knewest not the time o f thy visita-
T H E K I N G ' S B U S I N E S S
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