way for people to be rid of the multiform evils of
existence is to be rid of sin.

Salvation from sin, then, is immensely the most important matter that
can possibly engage man's heartfelt attention, as I said at the start.
How to get rid of the evil of sin--I mean the love of evil--and how to
come into the possession of the love of what is good, and as a result
of that love lead a good life, is the sum and substance of all divine
teaching. And why? Because a man's character, whether good or bad,
goes with him when he dies. Character is the only thing we do take
with us when we leave this world and enter the next. "He that soweth
to the flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to
the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting." "Whatsoever a
man soweth the same shall he reap," is a law as immutable as the law
of gravitation. Our Lord has mercifully opened up a way, a highway,
out of a life of sin into a life of holiness. The first step in this
way, nay, the first step towards it, is _repentance_. This involves a
very great change in the state of man's will or heart. Heart and will
have the same meaning. Repentance is a change in the affections of the
heart. It is a change so great that man of himself, unaided by the
Lord, would never make it. It is a change from the supreme love of
self and the world to love of the Lord and one's neighbor. "Except a
man deny himself, and take up his cross daily, he cannot be my
disciple." Self-denial and bearing the cross are repentance.

"If any man cometh unto me, and hateth not his father, and mother, and
wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life
also, he cannot be my disciple." All these relationships symbolize
evil affections and thoughts which are to be no longer loved. The
withdrawal of the affections from all our inherited and acquired evils
is repentance. If the right hand be in the way of our repentance, it
must be cut off. If the right eye cause us to stumble, it must be
plucked out.

But it will not do to leave the matter thus. The quotations and
references I have given are so strong they almost overwhelm us. We
almost cry out when we hear or read them, as the disciples did when
the Lord had just told them of the impossibility of a rich man's
entering the kingdom of heaven: "Who then can be saved?" But I give
you the same answer the Lord gave the disciples: "With men this is
impossible: but with God all things are possi