Alpha and Omega

‘I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last.’ Revelation 22:13

Suggested Further Reading: Ecclesiastes 12:13–14

Our Lord should be the Alpha and Omega of our life’s end and aim. What is there worth living for but Christ? What is there in the whole earth that is worth a thought but Jesus? Well did an old writer say, ‘If God be the only Eternal, then all the rest is but a puff of smoke, and shall I live to heap up puffs of smoke, and shall I toil and strive merely to aggrandise myself with smoky treasures that the wind of death shall dissipate for ever?’ No, beloved, let us live for eternal things, and what is there of eternal things that can be chosen but our Lord? O let us give him next year the Alpha of our labour. Let us begin the year by working in his vineyard, toiling in his harvest field. This year is almost over. There is another day or two left—let us serve him till the year is ended, going forward with double haste because the days are now so few. Lord, ‘teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.’ Let your time and your talents, your substance and your energies, all be given to my Master, who is worthy to be your soul’s Alpha and Omega. Jesus crucified should also be the Alpha and Omega of all our preaching and teaching. Woe to the man who makes anything else the main subject of his ministry. ‘God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.’ Do not tell me you preach sound doctrine; you preach rotten doctrine, if you do not preach Christ—preach nothing up but Christ, and nothing down but sin. Preach Christ; lift him up high on the pole of the gospel, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, and you will accomplish your life’s end.

For meditation: The Lord Jesus Christ is the A to Z of creation and should be acknowledged by us as the A to Z of our lives (Romans 11:36; 2 Corinthians 5:15). Behaving as if he is only Alpha and Iota (A to I) falls far short of obeying the commandment to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength (Mark 12:30).

Sermon no. 546
27 December (1863)