intelligent man should ever make it. But I have a good one. I am too
having broken the first and greatest of God's commandments, of having committed the very worst sin that a man or woman can commit. One night after a meeting like this, a friend of mine, a pastor in Chicago, came to me and said, "I have a young man who wants to enter the ministry. I want you to talk to him." He brought up the young man, and I said to him, "The pastor says you want to be a minister." He said, "Yes, I do." I said, "Are you a Christian?" He answered, "My, of course I am. I was brought up as a Christian, and I am not going back on the training of my parents." I said, "Have you ever been born again?" He said, "What?" I said, "The Word of God says `except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.' Have you been born again?" He replied, "I never heard of that before in all my life." I said, "Do you know that you have committed the greatest sin a man can commi t?" He said, "No, I never have." "What do you think is the greatest sin?" He said, "Murder, of course." I said, "You are greatly mistaken. See what the Lord Jesus Christ says about it." And I opened the Bible at Matthew xxii. 37, 38, and he read: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment." I said "Which commandment is that?" He replied, "It is the first and great commandment." I said, "Have you kept it? Have you loved God with all your heart and soul and mind? Have you put God first in everything, God first in business, God first in study, God first in pleasure, God first in everything?" He answered "No sir, I have not." "Well, what have you done?" "I have broken this commandment." "Which commandment is it?" "It is the first and great commandment." "What have you done?" He said, "I have committed the greatest sin a man can possibly commit; I have broken the first and greatest of God's commandments, but I never saw it before in all my life." Probably you never saw it before, but you see it tonight. There is no difference. Every man and woman out of Christ has broken the first and greatest of God's commandments, and there is no hope for you outside the atoning blood of Jesus Christ, shed on the Cross of Calvary. When I was in Sydney, I said that at a meeting, and the next day I received a note from a lady, who said, "I wish you would pray for me. I have been trusting in my morality but you showed me last night that I was a very wicked woman." Oh, may God grant that some of you here tonight, that have been trusting in your goodness, may see that in God's sight you are very wicked men, very sinful women, for you have broken the first and greatest of God's laws. 4. Another man says, "That excuse is not a good one. I wonder that any intelligent man should ever make it. But I have a good one. I am too great a sinner to come to Christ." Now, I believe people make that excuse honestly. I believe there are a great many people who would like to come, but think they are too bad. What shall I say to them? What God says in 1 Timothy i. 15: "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of