There is, however, one point still that practically and to each of us is the most important of all. It is not said simply: "I will pass over you," but, "When I see the blood, I will pass over you." It was not enough that the paschal lamb had been slain. Nor was it sufficient that the Most High Lamb merely purpose to spare them as His chosen people. If they would escape the calamity that was to fall upon their heathen oppressors, they must sprinkle the blood of that lamb openly on the posts of their doors. And even so it is not enough that God will have all men to be saved and come unto the knowledge of the truth; not enough that the Lamb of God was slain to take away the sins of a guilty world, unless that blood is sprinkled by faith on the heart, unless, in other words, Christ is taken by each separately and individually as his or her Savior. It is faith which forms the grand connecting link between the priceless blessings of redemption and the perishing sinner's soul. What avails it to the wretch who is being borne down by a rapid current nearer and nearer to the fatal cataract to throw him a rope if he will not grasp it? Or what to him whose dwelling is in flames, to place a ladder for his rescue, if he will not so much as step upon it? Even so, what will it serve any of us, but only fearfully to heighten our condemnation, to be told of the great salvation, and have that salvation pressed on us in almost every form of persuasive appeal, as the only means of escape from death and destruction, if we still refuse to it the homage of our hearts, and deem ourselves perfectly safe without, and treat it as an idle tale?
Christ's blood has been shed, but before it can work its wonders, can stay the arm of divine Justice uplifted to smite, that blood must be sprinkled, too; and the reason why it is not sprinkled on some, why it is not sprinkled on all who have heard of it, why all such do not feel in their hearts and display in their lives its cleansing, sanctifying power, is, and can only be, their willful, stubborn unbelief. How it is with you whom I am now addressing it is not for me to say.
Those only who are thus marked have any right to count themselves to the Lord's people, and to set themselves at the Savior's table. Let us hold, not as a dry doctrine, but as a blessed truth, that apart from Christ's blood there is no salvation. Let us fix our hearts with deeper and more prayerful love on Him; let it be ours with a glow of spiritual fervor, a joy with which nothing else will compare, to confess: