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Rapture and Soul Winning The Importance of Utilizing the Moments in View of the Impending Rapture
By D. M. PANTON
MOST significant fact, and one I have never seen observed, is th at, ap a rt from our Lord’s P hilip’s rap tu re is the only rap tu re named as an historical occurrence, in the New Testa
knees and he had accepted Christ, and a station or two afterw ards we parted for ever. F a r mpre dram atic was th is in tersection of lives. The one man was white, th e other was black; the one was an Asiatic, th e other was an A frican; th e one was a Jew, the other was a Gentile; th e one was a poor man, th e other was a rich m an; the one was a commoner, the other was a nobleman; the one was a child of Shem, th e blessed, th e other was a child of Ham, the cursed; the one was a Christian, th e other was a heath en. A t any moment an angel may open for us a railway carriage door, or send us across a continent. Heaven’s tre mendous machinery, set in motion for th e conversion of a single soul, can bring face to face u tte r strangers in rank, re ligion, nation, race. The next act in th is richest of soul w inning dram as is still more wonderful: th e machinery of the Godhead itself is now set in motion. “And th e Spirit said unto Philip, Go near, and join thy self to th is chariot.” The exact chariot in which th e God-sought soul is sitting has to be indicated to Philip; for no evangelist knows, no angel even, but only th e Spirit of God, the names th a t are w ritten in the Lamb’s Book of Life. Which of the apostles could have dreamed th a t th e next convert was to be a black man living more th a n two thou sand miles away, driving th rough the desert of Gaza into d istan t E thiopia? Now it is ju st th is tru th th a t “One by One” workers seem to find it so hard to m aster, w ith disastrous consequences. There is a profound difference between simple w itnessing and soul-winning. We
ment. And why? Could any h in t be more powerful? As we ourselves stand on the threshold of imm inent rap tu re—■ (th e same word is used of Philip and of those who shall be “ caught away” to meet the L o rd )—we are to be on th e K ing’s errand of seeking the lost, per haps only a single soul. It is a picture of God’s ambassador sent out into the desert of the world to reap th e last soul ere th e coming of the Lord. F o r v© see first how Heaven’s machin ery is set in motion for th e conversion of a single soul. “An angel of th e Lord spake unto P hilip” (Acts 8 :2 6 ). Every conversion is planned in heaven. “ I can no more convert a soul th an I can create a s ta r” ; and angels are our colleagues, carrying forw ard God’s work, not ours. Heaven’s visitor, w ith the clairvoyance of an angel, sees th e dusky face seventy miles away dim ly rolling through th e dust-clouds of the desert; and th a t angel plans the intersecting of these two re motely disconnected human lives, sud denly uniting them , and then as sud denly parting them forever. The night before leaving for Canada, six years ago, a friend prayed th a t I m ight lead a soul to Christ next day in the railway carriage. I had wholly forgotten the incident next morning when, a- few sta tions from Norwich, a young man leapt into th e carriage as th e train moved off. W ithin tw enty m inutes we were on our
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