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One of the most precious of our "Four Freedoms" is the freedom to worship God as we think right, without our government telling us how or when we must worship Him. Long ago people did not have this freedom. They could worship God and study His Word, the Bible, only in the way their rulers allowed and only when they chose to allow them to do so. One of those who helped to win the right to study the Bible and to preach to others about the love of God and the death of the Lord Jesus Christ for us was a man named John Bunyan.
Because he preached about the Lord Jesus when the king did not want him to, he was shut in prison for twelve long years. Those who locked John Bunyan in prison did one kind thing for him; they allowed him to take his Bible into the prison. How lonely he would have been without it! There in that dark, damp English prison he learned to know the Lord Jesus better than he had ever known Him. He also learned many things about himself and his own heart that he had not known before, or about which he had never thought when he was free. While in the prison, he wrote a wonderful book about a man's journey from The City of Destruction to the Celestial City, or the City of God. That book he called Pilgrim's Progress. It was written almost 300 years ago, and has since been translated so that it may be read by boys and girls who read French or Italian or Chinese or many other languages. Here is the man who is the main character in our story. His name is Pilgrim (for the beginning of our story).
We immediately notice three things about him: 1. He is carrying a great burden on his back. What do you suppose is in it? We shall soon find out. 2. He has an open Book in his hands, which he is reading. 3. His clothes also attract our attention for they are patched, ragged and dirty. He does not appear to be happy, does he? He is not happy! In fact, he is miserable, for one day while reading the Book, the Bible, he read, "It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment" (Hebrews 9:27). When he began to think about God's judgment he immediately began to think about his own sins and there were so many that they became the great burden which we see on his back. Now you know what the great load is. What is it? Yes, SINS. He thought, I will not think of my sins. I will think of all the good things I have done. I will think of all the pleasing things my family and my neighbors say about me. He wrapped himself in his own righteousness and thought he looked very attractive, but as he read The Book and found out more and more about God's holiness, he began to see the pride and sin in all the things which he had thought were good. His righteousness began to have holes in it, and finally he read, "All our righteousness are as filthy rags" (Isaiah 64:6). That is the reason he is dressed in dirty ragged clothes and burdened with a great load of sins. Although his name is Christian, he really is not a Christian at all. He does not know the Lord Jesus. Only those who know the Lord Jesus and trust in Him are Christians. So, for now we will call him Pilgrim. Many people today are like Pilgrim. They call themselves Christians even though they have never had their load of sins taken away, and are clothed only in the filthy rags of their own righteousness, instead of the perfect righteousness of Christ. To add to Pilgrim's grief, he read in The Book that the place where he lived, The City of Destruction, was condemned to judgment. Burdened with sins and condemned to judgment, he was very distressed. Night or day he could find no rest until one day as he walked in the fields he cried, "What must I do to be saved?" Many boys and girls are like Pilgrim. They are also burdened with their sins. Some have more sins than others, but all have them, for God says, "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23). The good lives they have lived and the good deeds they have done are like Pilgrim's righteousness in God's sight. They are only filthy rags. Like Pilgrim, we too live in a placed condemned to judgment, for we read that God "hath appointed a day, in which God will judge the world in righteousness" (Acts 17:31). Like Pilgrim, we cannot find true rest and peace until we discover that we need to be saved. When Pilgrim cried out, "What must I do to be saved?" he saw a man coming toward him. "Who are you?" asked Pilgrim.
"My name is Evangelist," replied the man. "I am the one who brings Good News. But, tell me sir, why are you so sad?" "Because," replied Pilgrim, "I read in my Book that I must die and then meet God and be judged for all my sins." "But see," said Evangelist, "it says also in the Book, 'Flee from the wrath to come.' So there must be a way of escape for you. Why do you not find it?" "Oh, I would gladly do so," cried Pilgrim, "if only I knew the way!" "Very well," replied Evangelist, "Do you see that wicket gate there in the distance?" "No! No!" cried Pilgrim, "I see no gate at all." "Then," said Evangelist, "do you see that light, that bright shining light?" "Yes," answered Pilgrim eagerly, "I think I see the light." "Go to the light," said Evangelist. "There you will be told what you must do." That was Evangelist's "Good News" to Pilgrim; and that is God's "Good News" to us. The Lord Jesus said, "I am the light of the world" (John 8:12). Anyone who comes to Him and believes on Him can say as King David did so many years ago, "The Lord is my light and my salvation" (Psalm 27:1). There is salvation only in Him. To any boy and girl
who, like Pilgrim, knows that he or she needs to be saved, God says,
"Flee from the wrath to come" (Matthew 3:7). Flee to the Lord
Jesus. Believe that when He died on the cross, He died for
your sins. He suffered God's punishment that you might be free.
The Lord Jesus who says, "I am the Light of the World," says also
"Come unto me, all you who labor and I will give you rest"
(Matthew 11:28). To continue the
story of Pilgrim's Progress,
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